Re: [Fis] The two very important operations of Infos
Dear Terrence,
Condsider the Russell paradox.
Russell set is R = { x a set | x is not a member of itself}.
If instead we define
R = { x a set | x is not a member of itself, and x is defined PRIOR TO THE
APPLICATION OF THIS DEFINITION}
then R is not a member of itself since it occurs AFTER the definition.
The definition itself provides a definition of before and after like the mirror
in the Barber resolution.
Of course for this temporal interpretation, a new NOW comes into play every
time the definition is activated.
Activation can be done by any cognizer of the definition.
Or it can be formalized by R_{t+1} = {x| x is a set that has been defined by
time t}.
Then we could have
R_{0} = { }
R_{1} = { R_{0} } = { { } }
R_{3} = {R_{0}}, R_{1}} = {{}, {{}} }
…
For mathematical purposes the … can continue transfinitely to as high an
ordinal as one wants.
The analogy with the mirror is the cut between BEFORE and AFTER.
Note that the definition
R = { x a set | x is not a member of itself, and x is defined PRIOR TO THE
APPLICATION OF THIS DEFINITION}
is still self-referential.
It is the temporal unfolding of this self-reference that leads to the
temporality in the sense of successive times.
Best,
Lou Kauffman
P.S. I think this uses up my quota of responses for this week.
> On Oct 25, 2017, at 2:13 PM, Terrence W. DEACON > wrote:
>
> Adding a temporal dimension has often been offered as a way out of paradox in
> quasi-physical terms. This is because interpreting paradoxical logical
> relations or calculating their values generally produces interminably
> iterating self-contradicting or self-undermining results. Writers from G. S.
> Brown to Gregory Bateson (among others) have pointed out that one can resolve
> this in *process* terms (rather than assuming undecidable values) by focusing
> on this incessant oscillation itself (i.e. a meta-analysis that recognizes
> that the process of operating on these relations cannot be neglected).Using
> this meta-analysis one can take advantage of the dynamic that calculation or
> intepretation entails. It is also, of course, the way we make use of
> so-called imaginary values in mathematics, whose iteratively calculated
> results incessantly reverse sign from negative to positive. By simply
> accepting this fact as given and marking it with a distinctive token (e.g.
> "i" ) effectively generates an additional dimension that is useful in a wide
> range of applications from fourier to quantum analyses. So my question is
> whether using this mirror metaphor can be seen as a variant on this general
> approach. It also resonates with efforts to understand the interpretation of
> information in related terms (e.g. using complex numbers).
>
> — Terry
>
> PS A bit of reflection (no pun intended) also suggests that it is also
> relevant to our discussions about agency (which like the concept of
> "information" must be understood at different levels that need to be
> distinguished because they can easily be confused). My earlier point about
> the normative aspect of agency (and consistent with the previously posted URL
> to the paper by Barandiaran et al.) is that this implies the need for
> incessant contrary work to negate perturbation away from some "preferred"
> value or state. Although there can be many levels of displaced agency in both
> natural and artificial agents (like cybernetic systems such as thermostats
> and many biological regulative subsystems), there cannot be interminable
> regress of this displacement to establish these norms. At some point
> normativity requires ontological grounding where the grounded normative
> relation is the preservation of the systemic physical properties that produce
> the norm-preserving dynamic. This is paradoxically circular—a "strang loop"
> in Hofstadter's lingo. This avoids vicious regress as well avoiding assuming
> a cryptic "observer perspective." But it therefore requires that we treat
> different levels and degrees of "normative displacement" differently from one
> another. This both echoes Loet's point that we should not expect a single
> concept of agency, but it alternatively suggest that we may be able to
> construct a nested hierarchy of agency concepts (as Stan might suggest). So I
> glimpse that a set of parallel and converging views may underlie these
> superficially different domains of debate.
>
> On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 2:45 AM, Krassimir Markov > wrote:
> Dear Lou, Bruno, and FIS Colleagues,
>
> Thank you for nice and polite comments to my post about “Barber paradox”.
>
> First of all, the main idea of the post was not to solve any paradox but
> to point two very important operations of Infos:
> - Direct reflection;
> - Transitive (indirect) reflection.
> There are no other ways for Infos to collect data from environment.
>
> Second, the example with paradox had shown the well known creative
> approa
Re: [Fis] Adding dimensions
Dear Arturo, Joseph, all,
This seems a very productive line of thought. But is "dimension" the right word?
Lou, for example, has just exercised his agency in producing a
wonderful alternative description of Russell's paradox. Is it another
dimension? Or is it just another description? It seems very similar to
what Bateson does in Chapter 3 of Mind and Nature ("Multiple
descriptions of the world") where he discusses the representation of a
quadratic equation.
By "dimension", do you refer to the countable elements that would be
considered in the Shannon equation (i.e. the the number of discrete
components comprising a message)? The index in Shannon is not the same
as a physical dimension, and as Bob Ulanowicz pointed out a couple of
weeks ago, Shannon's weakness is that he cannot account for shifts in
the distinctions which are drawn between countable things.
As Loet has discussed, the relation between alternative descriptions
is one of overlap of constraint: mutual redundancy is core to it.
There is mutual redundancy in between Lou's description and
Krassimer's description. The paper on mutual redundancy that Loet sent
round a while ago spells this out very clearly.
As an educationalist, this resonates with me. Gordon Pask, who was a
pioneer in educational technology, explained that understanding is
expressed through the capacity to generate multiple redundant
descriptions of phenomena.
Dimension, as it is used in physics, is not this.
best wishes,
Mark
On 26 October 2017 at 07:54, Joseph Brenner wrote:
> Dear Arturo,
>
> I think this formulation is correct and very useful. It implies, in the
> formal sense of real implication, a dynamics of emergence of the more
> complex states. Gerhard Luhn has also pointed to this emergence (he calls it
> of 'new laws') as a property of the universe, of which are our brains are a
> fairly interesting part. . .
>
> As in Terry's recent note, this 'enriched' input avoids the straitjackets of
> binary values or simple self-contradiction.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Joseph
>
> - Original Message -
> From: tozziart...@libero.it
> To: fis@listas.unizar.es
> Sent: Thursday, October 26, 2017 7:45 AM
> Subject: [Fis] Adding dimensions
>
> Dear FISers,
>
> it is clear (and it has been demonstrated) that what you call "agent" is
> something that... increases the dimensions of the discourse.
>
> For example, our brain, rather than "extract" information from the
> environment, makes exactly the opposite process, by "diluting" and
> "increasing" it.
> Starting from sensorial inputs from the 3D (plus time) environmental data,
> our brain processes them in 4D plus time (or even more!) dimensions. This
> means that, when I see a cat in the street, my mind enriches it with other
> dimensions (emotions: "how nice is that cat!"; higher brain activities:
> "that cat is a feline"; and so on)
>
> Arturo Tozzi
>
> AA Professor Physics, University North Texas
>
> Pediatrician ASL Na2Nord, Italy
>
> Comput Intell Lab, University Manitoba
>
> http://arturotozzi.webnode.it/
>
>
>
>
> ___
> Fis mailing list
> Fis@listas.unizar.es
> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
>
>
> ___
> Fis mailing list
> Fis@listas.unizar.es
> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
>
--
Dr. Mark William Johnson
Institute of Learning and Teaching
Faculty of Health and Life Sciences
University of Liverpool
Phone: 07786 064505
Email: johnsonm...@gmail.com
Blog: http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com
___
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Re: [Fis] Adding dimensions
To clarify my previous point about paradox:
When G. S. Brown deals with re-entrant forms by introducing time, and
Gregory Bateson reframes logical type violation on the analogy of an
electric buzzer, both do indeed include an additional dimension. This is
not the same as Bateson's concept of "double description" (though he does
use this to talk about the way that stereoscopic vision creates the
experience of depth - even though not using the same logic). Finally, the
use of "imaginary" (complex) numbers to generate additional dimensions of
quantitative representation (noting that 0 X i = 0 X 1 so that the axes
intersect a zero) is standard. Indeed the fact that this operation can be
indefinitely iterated (as in j squared = -i , etc.) shows that this is a
general mathematical principle. I am sure that many of you are familiar
with other variants of this same operation. But it is important not to
confuse this with simply amplifying mental descriptors. My only point at
this stage was to show why this operation is relevant for understanding the
generation of normativity and intrinsic (not extrinsically interpreted)
agency.
On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 12:59 AM, Mark Johnson
wrote:
> Dear Arturo, Joseph, all,
>
> This seems a very productive line of thought. But is "dimension" the right
> word?
>
> Lou, for example, has just exercised his agency in producing a
> wonderful alternative description of Russell's paradox. Is it another
> dimension? Or is it just another description? It seems very similar to
> what Bateson does in Chapter 3 of Mind and Nature ("Multiple
> descriptions of the world") where he discusses the representation of a
> quadratic equation.
>
> By "dimension", do you refer to the countable elements that would be
> considered in the Shannon equation (i.e. the the number of discrete
> components comprising a message)? The index in Shannon is not the same
> as a physical dimension, and as Bob Ulanowicz pointed out a couple of
> weeks ago, Shannon's weakness is that he cannot account for shifts in
> the distinctions which are drawn between countable things.
>
> As Loet has discussed, the relation between alternative descriptions
> is one of overlap of constraint: mutual redundancy is core to it.
> There is mutual redundancy in between Lou's description and
> Krassimer's description. The paper on mutual redundancy that Loet sent
> round a while ago spells this out very clearly.
>
> As an educationalist, this resonates with me. Gordon Pask, who was a
> pioneer in educational technology, explained that understanding is
> expressed through the capacity to generate multiple redundant
> descriptions of phenomena.
>
> Dimension, as it is used in physics, is not this.
>
> best wishes,
>
> Mark
>
> On 26 October 2017 at 07:54, Joseph Brenner
> wrote:
> > Dear Arturo,
> >
> > I think this formulation is correct and very useful. It implies, in the
> > formal sense of real implication, a dynamics of emergence of the more
> > complex states. Gerhard Luhn has also pointed to this emergence (he
> calls it
> > of 'new laws') as a property of the universe, of which are our brains
> are a
> > fairly interesting part. . .
> >
> > As in Terry's recent note, this 'enriched' input avoids the
> straitjackets of
> > binary values or simple self-contradiction.
> >
> > Best wishes,
> >
> > Joseph
> >
> > - Original Message -
> > From: tozziart...@libero.it
> > To: fis@listas.unizar.es
> > Sent: Thursday, October 26, 2017 7:45 AM
> > Subject: [Fis] Adding dimensions
> >
> > Dear FISers,
> >
> > it is clear (and it has been demonstrated) that what you call "agent" is
> > something that... increases the dimensions of the discourse.
> >
> > For example, our brain, rather than "extract" information from the
> > environment, makes exactly the opposite process, by "diluting" and
> > "increasing" it.
> > Starting from sensorial inputs from the 3D (plus time) environmental
> data,
> > our brain processes them in 4D plus time (or even more!) dimensions.
> This
> > means that, when I see a cat in the street, my mind enriches it with
> other
> > dimensions (emotions: "how nice is that cat!"; higher brain activities:
> > "that cat is a feline"; and so on)
> >
> > Arturo Tozzi
> >
> > AA Professor Physics, University North Texas
> >
> > Pediatrician ASL Na2Nord, Italy
> >
> > Comput Intell Lab, University Manitoba
> >
> > http://arturotozzi.webnode.it/
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ___
> > Fis mailing list
> > Fis@listas.unizar.es
> > http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
> >
> >
> > ___
> > Fis mailing list
> > Fis@listas.unizar.es
> > http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Dr. Mark William Johnson
> Institute of Learning and Teaching
> Faculty of Health and Life Sciences
> University of Liverpool
>
> Phone: 07786 064505
> Email: johnsonm...@gmail.com
> Blog: http://dailyim
Re: [Fis] The two very important operations of Infos
Dear Terry and colleagues,
(...) , there cannot be interminable regress of this displacement to
establish these norms. At some point normativity requires ontological
grounding where the grounded normative relation is the preservation of
the systemic physical properties that produce the norm-preserving
dynamic.
I have problems with the words "ontological" and "physical" here,
whereas I agree with the need of grounding the normative. Among human
beings, this grounding of subjective normativity can be found in
intersubjectivity. Whereas the subjective remains cogitans (in doubt),
the intersubjective can be considered as cogitatum (the thing about
which one remains in doubt).
For Descartes this cogitatum is the Other of the Cogito. The Cogito
knows itself to be incomplete, and to be distinguished from what
transcends it, the Transcendental or, in Descartes' terminology, God.
(This is the ontological proof of God's presence. Kant showed that this
proof does not hold: God cannot be proven to exist.) Husserl (1929)
steps in on this point in the Cartesian Meditations: the cogitatum which
transcends us is intersubjectivity. It is not physical. The physical is
res extensa, whereas this remains res cogitans. It cannot be retrieved,
but one has reflexive access to it.
Interestingly, this philosophy provides Luhmann's point of departure.
The intersubjective can be operationalized as (interhuman)
communication. The codes in the communication can relatively be
stabilized. One can use the metaphor of eigenvectors of a communication
matrix. They remain our constructs, but they guide the communication.
(Luhmann uses "eigenvalues", but that is a misunderstanding.) Using
Parsons' idea of symbolic generalization of the codes of communication,
one can continue this metaphor and consider other than the first
eigenvector as "functional differentiations" which enable the
communication to process more complexity. The model is derived from the
Trias Politica: problems can be solved in one of the branches or the
other. The normativity of the judiciary is different from the
normativity of the legislative branch, but they both ground the
normativity that guides us.
The sciences are then a way of communication; namely, scholarly
communication about rationalized expectations. Scholarly communication
is different from, for example, political communication. An agent
("consciousness" in Luhmann's terminology) recombines reflexively and
has to integrate because of one's contingency. The transcendental
grounding is in the communication; it remains uncertain. Fortunately,
because this implies that it can be reconstructed (by us albeit not as
individuals).
A non-human does not know oneself to be contingent. Lots of things
follow from this; for example, that the non-human does not have access
to our intersubjectivity as systems of expectations.
Best,
Loet
Loet Leydesdorff
Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)
l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, Beijing;
Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck
