Jan, On Sat, Feb 22, 2014 at 12:41 PM, Jan Anders Andersson <[email protected]> wrote: > Dan > >> 22 feb 2014 kl. 05:45 skrev Dan Glover <[email protected]>: >> >> Jan and John, >> >>> On Thu, Feb 20, 2014 at 12:26 PM, John Carl <[email protected]> wrote: >>> On Mon, Feb 17, 2014 at 10:58 PM, Jan Anders Andersson < >>> [email protected]> wrote: >>> Good morning all >>> >>> I think it's time to summarize the former thread called "step one". >>> I was asking for the exact definition of the delimiter between the >>> inorganic level and the organic level. >>> >>> >>> Sorry J-A. I've wanted to wade in and add my perspective to your thread >>> but I've been trying to get a project done and been too busy. Today tho >>> I'm taking a break and doing something different. Sorry Dan. >> >> Dan: >> At the auto dealership where I maintain one of my accounts I often >> talk with one of the sales people who is also a drummer and a singer >> in a rock and roll band. He's in his early fifties and been doing his >> music since he was a teenager. He knows I scribble a bit and so we >> talk art from time to time. Lately he's been writing and recording >> original music. >> >> Today he related how he's been setting up video equipment to record >> himself while he sings. And you know what, he says... I suck. >> >> I can tell by his expression that I'm expected to laugh and so I do >> even though I also know he is being honest with his assessment of his >> skills. He goes on to say how he's been taking videos of himself for a >> couple months now, watching them, and trying to improve his technique. >> It doesn't do any good. He still sucks. >> >> I told him my writing sucks too. We all have self doubts. I'm pretty >> sure anyone who has ever created anything new and unique suffers from >> the same malady. I also think it helps to talk to others who've >> experienced the highs and the lows of being out there on the cutting >> edge. It's easy to follow a trail blazed by others. It's hard to cut a >> path of your own. >> >> It is my opinion that if a person is working upon creating something >> new they must do it with zeal, not just when they feel like it. If you >> are the type of person who is compelled to do something, then you >> don't need a kick in the pants. But if you are playing around the >> edges, working when you feel like it and saying the hell with it when >> you don't, then you need that boot up your butt. >> >> Not many people will do that for you. They'd rather see you fail. I'd >> like to read that book of yours, John. > > Did you read mine? Have you read "Evolution, Time & Order..."
D: Yes and yes > >> >>> [John] >>> When I think of the delimiter between the organic and the inorganic, I >>> think of choice. An amoeba makes rudimentary reactions that express >>> avoidance of sulphuric acid but inorganic crystals have no choice. This is >>> just a subjective observation but by seeing things from an MoQ perspective, >>> it seems to me that all the levels can be seen as escalating levels of >>> available choice. Another way of saying that is escalating levels of >>> self-ness as any organic "thing" is a self-contained organism 0 a whole >>> that is non-existent as a simple addition of parts. The whole is only a >>> whole when it's constituent parts are organized into a certain structure >>> that makes a whole, and replicates. Life replicates while inorganic matter >>> just degrades to lower levels of being, energy wise. Organic patters seem >>> to defy the rules of entropy in some ways. >> > > Evolution can also be regarded as "Extropy" John, but I think its misleading > because Entropy is definable all the way down to the bottom, while evolution > is free to go just anywhere and like Quality, impossible to define. > Experience is all we know. I experience a difference between the inorganic > level and the biological level but what it is? D: I think evolution is defined all the time. Survival depends on it. On the other hand, experience isn't something we can know. Only after the experience is anything knowable. > > >> Dan: >> I've been doing a bit of research of my own for one of my new projects >> that has to do with cowboys and Indians but that is beside the point. >> The Apache believe they and the land were created together. Now, >> before you go and get all scientific on me and tell me that is >> impossible... the land is billions of years old while the Apache >> haven't been here but a few thousand years... what they are saying >> isn't to be taken literally but rather as a bit of imagery. >> >> What the Apache are saying is that they are in no way separate and >> apart from their environment. I think that has a lot to do with what >> the MOQ is saying too. We are the patterns that make up what we think >> of as our lives. We are not a separate 'self' standing apart from the >> dirt upon which we walk and the air which we breathe. When we start >> talking 'the whole' we cannot stop at the boundary of skin... we must >> come to realize we encompass the universe. >> >> What does this mean in terms of defining inorganic patterns and >> biological patterns? We must look to values, not to such things as >> self-contained objects. The value provided by the DNA molecule defines >> the limit between life and inorganic matter. > > Certainly, a better definition of this value provided is just what I am > curious of. D: Have you tried dropping a heavy rock on your toe? I bet that will provide the value you seek. >> >>> >>> >>> J-A >>> >>> >>>> Dan and David put in some interesting read whether DNA was the most >>>> important or if a speculative and unexperienced XNA should be included. >>>> DNA and molecules are, however, inorganic patterns and would not qualify to >>>> be included in a definition of the difference between the inorganic level >>>> and the organic level. >> >> Dan: >> It wasn't my intention to add speculative XNA to the MOQ. I was using >> that as a test subject to sort through the known and the unknown and >> how new discoveries are made. >> >> Be that as it may, I sense another misunderstanding brewing here. DNA >> is a molecule and yes it is inorganic BUT according to the MOQ, the >> biological level makes use of the inorganic level for its own purpose. >> Not including DNA in a definition of life would be like saying since >> human beings are made of molecules they cannot be defined as alive. > > I am after what this DNA do, not just what it is. Doing are patterns but > different from being. D: How are patterns different from being? > >> >>> J-A: >>> >>> >>>> Andre had a good suggestion about self-reproduction as a distinctive >>>> delimiter between inorganic and organic patterns which I supported. I wrote >>>> that the time-concept is crucial for a self-reproducing pattern as >>>> succesion and organic evolution by mutations and so on would be impossible >>>> without a working time concept. >>> J: >>> >>> I agree with Andre but repeat the key here to "self-reproduction" _is_ the >>> "self". That self that is reproduced is the defining aspect of life. Life >>> = Self. >> >> Dan: >> I think if you dropped the 'self' you might find things easier to >> understand, at least according to the MOQ. > > Yes, self is just another pattern. D: The self is the patterns. > >> >> >>> >>> J-A: >>> >>> >>>> Another specific difference is that chemical reactions are mostly ignited >>>> by outer circumstances. Of course we have all representatives for the >>>> periodic table ignited by Big Bang but most of all these atoms are so >>>> stable that time and age is not an actual issue for them. The inorganic >>>> level is also good at describing the time as the millions of >>>> two-dimensional, expanding and diminishing rings, that appear on a water >>>> surface when its raining. Time is also showing as three-dimensional bubbles >>>> of sound waves in the air. Radiowaves from electronic devices. Bubbles of >>>> intensive force from explosions is another example. But it is still events >>>> and patterns at the inorganic level. >> >> Dan: >> When we see the world, we are not seeing the real world. We are >> experiencing the world through the filter of our biological senses as >> well as the filter of our cultural mores. If we assume the universe is >> a mathematical model, for example, we will make the data fit the >> theory by focusing upon what we know and ignoring what we don't know. >> >> You assume there was a Big Bang which created the universe because you >> have been told it is so. The creationist assumes god created the >> universe because they were told it is so. Both are conjectures that >> cannot be proved. Still, there are high quality ideas and there are >> low quality ideas and part of the reason we are here, perhaps, is to >> sort through them. > > The reason why I put just a brief summary over the Big Bang is that was like > trying to understand an event that started before time and that is just too > hard for us to dissicate. I am satisfied with any word that marks the > beginning, Change number one, absolute zero o'clock or just Zit! is ok for > me. Step two is easier to handle I think, because I can hold something alive > in my hand and I can kill it but not make it alive. Irreversible events are > so interesting to me and I want to have a working terminology that fits with > the MOQ. D: The MOQ starts with experience, not with the Big Bang. > >> >>>> >>>> The main difference that puts the organic patterns in its own level is not >>>> the different compositions of organic material, it is the cycles. A living >>>> thing has age, has a characteristic cycle between birth and death. An >>>> organic pattern without this cycle is just dead inorganic materia. Right? >> >> Dan: >> 'Dead' refers to that which was once alive. Inorganic patterns were >> never alive so they cannot be dead as such. > > I think you just missed the point here. Not dead patterns have something > more, right? D: Perhaps the vagaries of language are preventing an understanding. Alive and dead may seem opposites but they're different sides of the same coin. To say inorganic patterns are dead is to misunderstand the nature of death. > >> >> [Jan] >>>> It is these revolving cycles, daily, monthly, yearly, lifely cycles that is >>>> following a superior set of morals that is placed above, or after the first >>>> inorganic level. The organic level is called as a level above the the >>>> inorganic because the organic level is both dependant of the inorganic and >>>> using it for its own purpose. >> >> Dan: >> I have no idea what you mean by the 'first' inorganic level but so far >> as I can see it doesn't pertain to the MOQ. The BIOLOGICAL level >> subsumes and uses the inorganic level for its own purposes, not the >> organic level. Until we can form an agreement on basic terminology >> there is no hope for furthering an understanding of the MOQ. > > I mean the biological level of course. Exact as it is written in Lila. D: Organic isn't necessarily biological so using that term may cause confusion. Organic compounds may form precursors to life such as amino acids but they are not biological patterns. > >> >>> John: An "it's" in your statement is what I mean by self-ness. I think we >>> agree but I think I'm putting it more clearly :) >>> >>> J-A: >>> >>> >>>> These cycles are not passive automatas driven by circumstances from the >>>> surroundings but are ignited from inside. This inside motivator cycle >>>> patterns is what is passed over to the next copy. This inside placed spark >>>> has to work for keeping the energy level balanced, maintaining the correct >>>> shape and also keep up the communication and interact with the >>>> surroundings. Busy all day long. >> >> Dan: >> The cycles are conceptual creations, not some kind of object passing >> on information to the next copy. > > So what is it that uses the inorganic patterns for its own purposes? How is > it different from inorganic patterns? Grasp a glass in your hand. Do you understand now? > > I think it is some kind of repeated cycles because they have time and order > and they are not still. Its not the DNA (itself) but the "movement" it > creates. Still a recognisable pattern but different. And, somewhere, because > there is a fundamental difference, there is a border between inorganic > patterns and biological patterns. How can we easiest describe this shift? > Calling it "Step two" is just too abstract. D: I think you know that already. Thank you, Dan http://www.danglover.com Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
