Re: [Fis] Is information physical? A logical analysis

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark, Soren, and colleagues,

The easiest distinction is perhaps Descartes' one between res cogitans 
and res extensa as two different realities. Our knowledge in each case 
that things could have been different is not out there in the world as 
something seizable such as piece of wood.


Similarly, uncertainty in the case of a distribution is not seizable, 
but it can be expressed in bits of information (as one measure among 
others). The grandiose step of Shannon was, in my opinion, to enable us 
to operationalize Descartes' cogitans and make it amenable to the 
measurement as information.


Shannon-type information is dimensionless. It is provided with meaning 
by a system of reference (e.g., an observer or a discourse). Some of us 
prefer to call only thus-meaningful information real information because 
it is embedded. One can also distinguish it from Shannon-type 
information as Bateson-type information. The latter can be debated as 
physical.


In the ideal case of an elastic collision of "billard balls", the 
physical entropy (S= kB * H) goes to zero. However, if two particles 
have a distribution of momenta of 3:7 before a head-on collision, this 
distribution will change in the ideal case into 7:3. Consequently, the 
probabilistic entropy is .7 log2 (.7/.3) + .3 log2 (.3/.7) =  .86 – .37 
= .49 bits of information. One thus can prove that this information is 
not physical.


Best,
Loet

----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Burgin, Mark" <mbur...@math.ucla.edu>
To: "Søren Brier" <sbr@cbs.dk>; "Krassimir Markov" 
<mar...@foibg.com>; "fis@listas.unizar.es" <fis@listas.unizar.es>

Sent: 5/24/2018 4:23:53 AM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Is information physical? A logical analysis


Dear Søren,
You response perfectly supports my analysis. Indeed, for you only the 
Physical World is real. So, information has to by physical if it is 
real, or it cannot be real if it is not physical.
Acceptance of a more advanced model of the World, which includes other 
realities, as it was demonstrated in my book “Structural Reality,” 
allows understand information as real but not physical.


   Sincerely,
   Mark

On 5/17/2018 3:29 AM, Søren Brier wrote:

Dear Mark



Using ’physical’ this way it just tends to mean ’real’, but that 
raises the problem of how to define real. Is chance real? I Gödel’s 
theorem or mathematics and logic in general (the world of form)? Is 
subjectivity and self-awareness, qualia? I do believe you are a 
conscious subject with feelings, but I cannot feel it, see it, measure 
it. Is it physical then?? I only see what you write and your behavior. 
And are the meaning of your sentences physical? So here we touch 
phenomenology (the experiential) and hermeneutics (meaning and 
interpretation) and more generally semiotics (the meaning of signs in 
cognition and communication). We have problems encompassing these 
aspects in the natural, the quantitative and the technical sciences 
that makes up the foundation of most conceptions of information 
science.




  Best

  Søren



Fra: Fis <fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es> 
<mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es>På vegne af Krassimir Markov

Sendt: 17. maj 2018 11:33
Til:fis@listas.unizar.es; Burgin, Mark <mbur...@math.ucla.edu> 
<mailto:mbur...@math.ucla.edu>

Emne: Re: [Fis] Is information physical? A logical analysis



Dear Mark and FIS Colleagues,



First of all. I support the idea of Mark to write a paper and to 
publish it in IJ ITA.


It will be nice to continue our common work this way.



At the second place, I want to point that till now the discussion on

Is information physical?

was more-less chaotic – we had no thesis and antithesis to discuss and 
to come to some conclusions.




I think now, the Mark’s letter may be used as the needed thesis.



What about the ant-thesis? Well, I will try to write something below.





For me, physical, structural and mental  are one and the same.



Mental means physical reflections and physical processes in the Infos 
consciousness. I.e. “physical” include “mental”.




Structure (as I understand this concept) is mental reflection of the 
relationships “between” and/or “in” real (physical) entities as 

Re: [Fis] Is information physical? A logical analysis

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Perhaps, it is helpful to compare with the question whether the 
centimeter is physical. The meter is calibrated on a physical measure, 
but the centimeter is just a measure. We can provide it with a physical 
referent: "This is a centimeter".


Information is perhaps even more complex: a distribution can be expected 
to contain information. Is an expectation physical? a distribution?


I tend to disagree with Mark by cutting the world into physical / mental 
/ structural, unless the structural includes our codified conventions 
such as what is "a centimeter"? We can entertain the concept mentally, 
but therefore it is not yet mental. It is codified at an 
above-individual level as a structure in language. Is language physical? 
I doubt it: language carriers (human beings) are.


Best,
Loet

--------
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Jose Javier Blanco Rivero" <javierwe...@gmail.com>
To: "Burgin, Mark" <mbur...@math.ucla.edu>
Cc: "Fis," <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 5/17/2018 12:47:04 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Is information physical? A logical analysis


Dear FISers,

I recently came across an old interview to W. van Orman Quine and I got 
an idea -maybe  not very original per se. Quine distinguishes two kind 
of philosophical problems: ontological (those referred to the existence 
of things) and predicative (what can we say and know about things). 
Against Quine materialism I came across the idea that ontological 
problems are undecidable -I think of Turing's Halting problem. The fact 
is that we cannot leave the predicative realm. All we have as 
scientists is scientifical statements (therefore I think of Science as 
a communicative social system differentiated from its environment by 
means of a code -I think Loet would agree with me in this point). As a 
system (I mean not the social system, but the set of statements taken 
as a unity) they all are incomplete. There are many ways to deal with 
it, as logicians have shown (in this point I confess I would need to 
examine carefully B. Marchal's ideas. I think I have many points of 
agreement with him but also of disagreement -but honestly I currently 
lack the knowledge to undertake a thorough discussion). Self-reference, 
I think, is one of the most coherent ways to deal with it. But this 
means we have to learn to deal with paradoxes.
Accordingly, as information theorist we would need to identify the 
constitutive paradox of information and next unfold that paradox in a 
set of statements that represent what we know about information. The 
problem is that although we can have the intuition that information is 
real, physical as has been said, it cannot be proved. An external 
reference like "reality ", if we look carefully, acts as regulatory 
function within the system. I remember that in the "Science of the 
Society", Luhmann devised the concept of consistency proofs 
(Konsistenzprüfung).But reality as such, the Ding an sich, is 
inaccessible. In conclusion, Quine would say that we should not be 
asking us a question that cannot be answered.


Best,

JJ

El may 16, 2018 11:24 PM, "Burgin, Mark" <mbur...@math.ucla.edu> 
escribió:

   Dear FISers,
   It was an interesting discussion, in which many highly intelligent 
and creative individuals participated expressing different points of 
view. Many interesting ideas were suggested. As a conclusion to this 
discussion, I would like to suggest a logical analysis of the problem 
based on our intrinsic and often tacit assumptions.


   To great extent, our possibility to answer the question “Is 
information physical? “ depends on our model of the world. Note that 
here physical means the nature of information and not its substance, 
or more exactly, the substance of its carrier, which can be physical, 
chemical biological or quantum. By the way, expression “quantum 
information” is only the way of expressing that the carrier of 
information belongs to the quantum level of nature. This is similar to 
the expressions “mixed numbers” or “decimal numbers”, which are only 
forms or number representations and not numbers themselves.


  If we assume that there is only the physical world, we have, at 
first, to answer the question “Does information exis

Re: [Fis] Is information physical? OR Does the information exist without the carrier?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues,

Not only logic, but also language is not directly and one-to-one coupled 
to physics. The hidden positivism of claiming priority for physics by 
some of us, is at odds with the linguistic turn in the philosophy of 
science. Furthermore, the issue is not directly related to the 
definition of information as probablistic entropy or otherwise.


I agree with most of what Lou Kauffman said, but:

We come to investigate both reason and physicality through each other 
and our ability to sense and feel.
Sensing and feeling and measurement are our terms for those places 
where concept and the physical arise together in our perception.
The emphasis in the above remains on the individual sensing and feeling, 
mediated by measurement. However, scientific observation is not such 
immediate feeling, but careful and discursively constructed 
articulations of expectations which are tested against observations. The 
cocon of language (a la Maturana) is opened at specific places which are 
carefully reasoned. The feelings do enter only after having been 
articulated into observational reports. The latter contain knowledge 
claims which are validated discursively. No escape! The observations 
enable us to improve the codification in the specialist language 
(jargon).


Physics is part of this edifice of science. It has no privileged access 
to reality, but constructs its own reality. Nobody senses the particles 
at CERN. The observational reports are readings from an instrument which 
have to be discussed before one can interpret.


If any science can claim priority, it is communication studies. The 
specialist languages are shaped in processes of communication. How does 
this work? Can it be improved?


Best,
Loet




5. Beyond those places where significant related pairs of opposites 
that cannot be separated (complementarities) occur there is our (in at 
least my tradition)

personal reality of unity — whereof nothing can be said.
6. We cannot sever philosophy and logic and reason from science, AND 
for science we must open to the largest possible access to precision 
and understanding.

Best,
Lou


On Apr 27, 2018, at 4:38 AM, tozziart...@libero.it wrote:

Dear Bruno,
You claim: "all computations exists independently of the existence of 
anything physical".
I never heard, apart probably from Berkeley and Tegmark, a more 
untestable, metaphyisical, a-scientific, unquantifiable claim.


Dear FISers, we NEED to deal with something testable and quantifiable, 
otherwise we are doing philosophy and logic, not science!  Even if 
information is (as many FISers suggest) at least in part not physical, 
we NEED to focus just on the testable part, i.e., the physical one.  
And, even if physics does not exist, as Bruno states, at least it 
gives me something quantifiable and useful for my pragmatic purposes.
Even if information is something subjective in my mind (totally 
untestable, but very popular claim) who cares, by a scientific 
standpoint?
If I say that Julius Caesar was killed by an alien, the theory is 
fashinating, but useless, unless I provide proofs or testable clues.


--
Inviato da Libero Mail per Android

venerdì, 27 aprile 2018, 10:10AM +02:00 da Bruno Marchal 
marc...@ulb.ac.be:



Hi Lou, Colleagues,



On 25 Apr 2018, at 16:55, Louis H Kauffman  wrote:

Dear Krassimir and Mark,
Let us not forget the intermediate question:
How is information independent of the choice of carrier?
This is the fruitful question in my opinion, and it avoids the 
problem of assigning existence to that which is relational.


The same problem exists for numbers and other mathematical entities. 
Does the number 2 exist without any couples?
The mathematical answer is to construct a standard couple (e.g. { { 
}, {{}} } in set theory or two marks || in formalism) and say that
a collection has cardinality two if it can be placed in 1-1 
correspondence with the standard couple. In this way of speaking we 
do not have to
assign an existence to two as a noun. The Russelian alternative  — 
to take two to be the collection of all couples — is a fascinating 
intellectual move, but
I prefer to avoid it by not having to speak of the existence of two 
in such a way. Two is a concept and it is outside of formal systems 
and outside of the physical
except in that we who have that concept are linked with formalism 
and linked with the apparent physical.


And let us not forget the other question.
What is "the physical”?
What we take to be physical arises as a relation between our sensing 
(and generalized sensing) and our ability to form concepts.
To imagine that the “physical” exists independent of that relation 
is an extra assumption that is not necessary for scientific work, 
however

attractive or repelling it may seem.



Indeed, the existence of a physical ontology is an hypothesis in 
metaphysics, and not in physics. It was brought mainly by Aristotle 
and even more by its followers.


What can be shown, is 

Re: [Fis] Welcome to Knowledge Market and the FIS Sci-coins

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Krassimir and colleagues,

Our mental model can entertain discursive models reflexively. Thus, our 
models are (at least partly) discursively mediated and hence the result 
of communication. The development of discursive knowledge is thus 
liberated from biologically given constraints; it has a dynamic of its 
own. This is the source of progress in a knowledge-based economy. The 
models are evolving, whereas we are essentially the same.


When Julius Caesar said "veni, vidi, vici" he entertained a mental 
model, but he could not understand gravity. The history of mankind is 
driven from the next-order level and not by its genesis.


Best,
Loet

----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Krassimir Markov" <mar...@foibg.com>
To: "FIS" <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 3/11/2018 11:34:12 PM
Subject: [Fis] Welcome to Knowledge Market and the FIS Sci-coins




Dear Colleagues,



This letter contains more than one theme, so it is structured as 
follow:


- next step in “mental model” explanation;

- about “Knowledge market”, FIS letters’ sequences and FIS Sci-coins.



1. The next step in “mental model” explanation:



Let remember shortly my letter from 05.03.2018.



To avoid misunderstandings with concepts Subject, agent, animal, human, 
society, humanity, living creatures, etc., in [1] we use the abstract 
concept “INFOS” to denote every of them as well as all of artificial 
creatures which has features similar to the former ones.




Infos has possibility to reflect the reality via receptors and to 
operate with received reflections in its memory. The opposite is 
possible - via effectors Infos has possibility to realize in reality 
some of its (self-) reflections from its consciousness.




The commutative diagram on Figure 1 represents modeling relations. In 
the frame of diagram:


- in reality: real models: s is a model of r,

- in consciousness: mental models: si is a mental model of ri;

- between reality and consciousness: perceiving data and creating 
mental models:  triple (si, ei, ri) is a mental model of triple (s, e, 
r).




It is easy to imagine the case when the Infos realizes its reflections 
using its effectors, i.e. relation between consciousness and reality: 
realizing mental models and creating data. In this case the receptors’ 
arrows should be replaces by opposite effectors’ arrows. In this case 
triple (s, e, r) is a realization of the mental model (si, ei, ri).







Figure 1





After creating the mental model it may be reflected by other levels of 
consciousness. In literature several such levels are described. For 
instance, in [2], six levels are separated for humans (Figure 2). The 
complexity of Infos determines the levels. For instance, for societies 
the levels are much more, for animals with no neo-cortex the levels a 
less.













Figure 2.   [2]



This means that the mental models are on different consciousness levels 
and different types (for instance - touch, audition, vision).




In [2], Jeff Hawkins had remarked: “The transformation— from fast 
changing to slow changing and from spatially specific to spatially 
invariant— is well documented for vision. And although there is a 
smaller body of evidence to prove it, many neuroscientists believe 
you'd find the same thing happening in all the sensory areas of your 
cortex, not just in vision” [2].




As it is shown on Figure 2 mental models are in very large range from 
spatially specific to spatially invariant; from fast changing to slow 
changing; from “features” and “details” to objects”.


To be continued...



2.Aabout “Knowledge market”, FIS letters’ sequences and FIS Sci-coins.



The block-chain idea is not new. All forums and mailing lists have the 
possibility to organize incoming messages in internally connected 
sequences. The new is the Bit-coin, i.e. the price for including a 
message in the sequence received after successful solving a difficult 
task.




What we have in FIS are letters’ sequences already created for many 
years. What is needed to start using them is to be strictly when we 
answer to any letter not to change the “Subject” of the letter. The 
list archive may help us to follow the sequences - only what is needed 
to ask sorting by [ Subject ] 
<http://www.ithea.org/pipe

Re: [Fis] A Paradox

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark,

Can you, please, explain "transduction" in more detail? Perhaps, you can 
also provide examples?


Best,
Loet


----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Mark Johnson" <johnsonm...@gmail.com>
To: "Loet Leydesdorff" <l...@leydesdorff.net>
Cc: y...@pku.edu.cn; "FIS Group" <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 3/4/2018 1:03:17 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] A Paradox


Dear Loet, all,

I agree with this. Our construction of reality is never that of a 
single system: there are always multiple systems and they interfere 
with each other in the way that you suggest. I would suggest that 
behind all the ins-and-outs of codification or information and meaning 
is a very simple principle of transduction. I often wonder if Luhmann’s 
theory isn’t really that different from Shannon’s (who talks about 
transduction endlessly). The fact that you've made this connection 
explicit and empirically justifiable is, I think, the most important 
aspect of your work. You may disagree, but if we kept transduction and 
jettisoned the rest of Luhmann's theory, I think we still maintain the 
essential point.



There is some resonance (interesting word!) with McCulloch’s model of 
perception, where he considered “drome” (literally, “course-ing”, 
“running”) circuits each bearing on the other: 
http://vordenker.de/ggphilosophy/mcculloch_heterarchy.pdf (look at the 
pictures on pages 2 and 3) Perception, he argued was a syn-drome: a 
combination of inter-effects between different circuits. There is a 
logic to this, but it is not the logic of set theory. McCulloch wrote 
about it. I think it’s not a million miles away from Joseph’s/Lupasco’s 
logic.


Best wishes,

Mark

On 4 March 2018 at 07:03, Loet Leydesdorff <l...@leydesdorff.net> 
wrote:


Dear Xueshan Yan,

May I suggest moving from a set-theoretical model to a model of two 
(or more) helices. The one dimension may be the independent and the 
other the dependent variable at different moments of time. One can 
research this empirically; for example, in bodies of texts.


In my own models, I declare a third level of codes of communication 
organizing the meanings in different directions. Meaning both codes 
the information and refers to horizons of meaning being specifically 
coded.


Might this work as an answer to your paradox?

Best,
Loet

----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of 
London;


http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en 
<http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>



-- Original Message --
From: "Xueshan Yan" <y...@pku.edu.cn>
To: "FIS Group" <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 3/4/2018 2:17:01 AM
Subject: Re: [Fis] A Paradox


Dear Dai, Søren, Karl, Sung, Syed, Stan, Terry, and Loet,

I am sorry to reply you late, but I have thoroughly read every post 
about the paradox and they have brought me many inspirations, thank 
you. Now I offer my responses as follows:


Dai, metaphor research is an ancient topic in linguistics, which 
reveals the relationship between tenor and vehicle, ground and 
figure, target and source based on rhetoric. But where is our 
information? It looks like Syed given the answer: "Information is the 
container of meaning." If I understand it right, we may have this 
conclusion from it: Information is the carrier of meaning. Since we 
all acknowledge that sign is the carrier of information, the task of 
our Information Science will immediately become something like an 
intermediator between Semiotics (study of sign) and Semantics (study 
of meaning), this is what we absolutely want not to see. For a long 
time, we have been hoping that the goal of Information Science is so 
basic that it 

Re: [Fis] A Paradox

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Xueshan Yan,

May I suggest moving from a set-theoretical model to a model of two (or 
more) helices. The one dimension may be the independent and the other 
the dependent variable at different moments of time. One can research 
this empirically; for example, in bodies of texts.


In my own models, I declare a third level of codes of communication 
organizing the meanings in different directions. Meaning both codes the 
information and refers to horizons of meaning being specifically coded.


Might this work as an answer to your paradox?

Best,
Loet


Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Xueshan Yan" <y...@pku.edu.cn>
To: "FIS Group" <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 3/4/2018 2:17:01 AM
Subject: Re: [Fis] A Paradox


Dear Dai, Søren, Karl, Sung, Syed, Stan, Terry, and Loet,

I am sorry to reply you late, but I have thoroughly read every post 
about the paradox and they have brought me many inspirations, thank 
you. Now I offer my responses as follows:


Dai, metaphor research is an ancient topic in linguistics, which 
reveals the relationship between tenor and vehicle, ground and figure, 
target and source based on rhetoric. But where is our information? It 
looks like Syed given the answer: "Information is the container of 
meaning." If I understand it right, we may have this conclusion from 
it: Information is the carrier of meaning. Since we all acknowledge 
that sign is the carrier of information, the task of our Information 
Science will immediately become something like an intermediator between 
Semiotics (study of sign) and Semantics (study of meaning), this is 
what we absolutely want not to see. For a long time, we have been 
hoping that the goal of Information Science is so basic that it can 
explain all information phenomenon in the information age, it just like 
what Sung expects, which was consisted of axioms, or theorems or 
principles, so it can end all the debates on information, meaning, 
data, etc., but according to this view, it is very difficult to 
complete the missions. Syed, my statement is "A grammatically correct 
sentence CONTAINS information rather than the sentence itself IS 
information."


Søren believes that the solution to this paradox is to establish a new 
discipline which level is more higher than the level of Information 
Science as well as Linguistics, such as his Cybersemiotics. I have no 
right to review your opinion, because I haven't seen your book 
Cybersemiotics, I don't know its content, same as I don't know what the 
content of Biosemiotics is, but my view is that Peirce's Semiotics 
can't dissolve this paradox.


Karl thought: "Information and meaning appear to be like key and lock." 
which are two different things. Without one, the existence of another 
will lose its value, this is a bit like the paradox about hen and egg. 
I don't know how to answer this point. However, for your "The text may 
be an information for B, while it has no information value for A. The 
difference between the subjective." "‘Information’ is synonymous with 
‘new’." these claims are the classic debates in Information Science, a 
typical example is given by Mark Burgin in his book: "A good 
mathematics textbook contains a lot of information for a mathematics 
student but no information for a professional mathematician." For this 
view, Terry given his good answer: One should firstly label what 
context and paradigm they are using to define their use of the term 
"information." I think this is effective and first step toward to 
construct a general theory about information, if possible.


For Stan's "Information is the interpretation of meaning, so 
transmitted information has no meaning without interpretation." I can 
only disagree with it kindly. The most simple example from genetics is: 
an egg cell accepts a sperm cell, a fertilized egg contains a set of 
effective genetic information from paternal and maternal cell, here 
information transmission has taken place, but is there any "meaning" 
and "explanation"? We should be aware that meaning only is a human or 
animal phenomena and it does not be used in any other context like 
plant or molecule or cell etc., this is the key we dissol

Re: [Fis] Meta-observer?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Pedro, Koichiro, and colleagues,

At the level of observers, indeed, a hierarchy may be involved for the 
change of focus (although this is empirical  and not necessarily the 
case). The communication, however, as a system different from the 
communicators may contain mechanisms such as "translation" which make it 
possible to redirect.


Best,
Loet

----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Koichiro Matsuno" <cxq02...@nifty.com>
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Sent: 3/2/2018 6:41:12 AM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Meta-observer?


On 28 Feb 2018 at 10:34 PM, PedroClemente Marijuan Fernadez wrote:

A sort of "attention" capable of fast and furious displacements of the 
focus...  helas, this means a meta-observer or an observer-in-command.


   Pedro, it is of course one thing to conceive of a hierarchy of 
observers for our own sake, but quite another to figure out what the 
concrete participants such as molecules are doing out there. They are 
doing what would seem appropriate for them to do without minding what 
we are observing. At issue must be how something looking like a chain 
of command could happen to emerge without presuming such a chain in the 
beginning. Prerequisite to its emergence would be the well-being of 
each participant taken care of locally, as a replenishable inevitable. 
That is an issue of the origins of life. The impending agenda is on 
something general universal as an object, and yet concrete particular 
enough in process. The richness resides within the concreteness down to 
the bottom.




   Apropos, the communications among the local participants differ from 
computation despite the seemingly concrete outlook of the latter. 
Computation upon the notion of time as the linear sequence of the now 
points is not available to the local participants because of the lack 
of the physical means for guaranteeing the sharing of the same 
now-point among themselves.




   Koichiro Matsuno






___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] A Paradox

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Soren,

I agree with Stan's wording, but your wording is ambiguous. The meaning 
is not biologically given, but constructed in a discourse among 
biologists. The discourse can also be theological and then one obtains 
"theological" meaning.


Best,
Loet


----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Søren Brier" <sbr@cbs.dk>
To: "Stanley N Salthe" <ssal...@binghamton.edu>; "fis" 
<fis@listas.unizar.es>

Sent: 2/26/2018 6:41:25 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] A Paradox

Thanks Stan. I agree: Behind production and  interpretation of all 
quantitative data, there is  either an biological or an existential or 
a religious or a philosophical framework of meaning.




   Best

Søren



From: Stanley N Salthe [mailto:ssal...@binghamton.edu]
Sent: 26. februar 2018 16:19
To: Søren Brier <sbr@cbs.dk>; fis <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Subject: Re: [Fis] A Paradox



Following upon Søren:  Meaning is derived for a system by way of 
Interpretation.  The transmitted information has no meaning without 
interpretation.




STAN



On Mon, Feb 26, 2018 at 6:26 AM, Søren Brier <sbr@cbs.dk> wrote:


Dear  Xueshan



The solution to the paradox is to go to a metaparadigm that can 
encompass information science as well as linguistics. C.S. Peirce’s 
semiotics is such a paradigm especially if you can integrate 
cybernetics and systems theory  with it. There is a summary of the 
framework of Cybersemiotics here:


https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a5e7/cf50ffc5edbc110ccd08279d6d8b513bfbe2.pdf



Cordially yours



 Søren Brier



Depart. of Management, Society and Comunication, CBS, Dalgas Have 15 
(2VO25), 2000 Frederiksberg


Mobil 28494162 www.cbs.dk/en/staff/sbrmsc , cybersemiotics.com.







Fra: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] På vegne af Xueshan Yan
Sendt: 26. februar 2018 10:47
Til: FIS Group <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Emne: [Fis] A Paradox



Dear colleagues,

In my teaching career of Information Science, I was often puzzled by 
the following inference, I call it Paradox of Meaning and Information 
or Armenia Paradox. In order not to produce unnecessary ambiguity, I 
state it below and strictly limit our discussion within the human 
context.




Suppose an earthquake occurred in Armenia last night and all of the 
main media of the world have given the report about it. On the second 
day, two students A and B are putting forward a dialogue facing the 
newspaper headline “Earthquake Occurred in Armenia Last Night”:


Q: What is the MEANING contained in this sentence?

A: An earthquake occurred in Armenia last night.

Q: What is the INFORMATION contained in this sentence?

A: An earthquake occurred in Armenia last night.

Thus we come to the conclusion that MEANING is equal to INFORMATION, 
or strictly speaking, human meaning is equal to human information. In 
Linguistics, the study of human meaning is called Human Semantics; In 
Information Science, the study of human information is called Human 
Informatics.


Historically, Human Linguistics has two definitions: 1, It is the 
study of human language; 2, It, also called Anthropological 
Linguistics or Linguistic Anthropology, is the historical and cultural 
study of a human language. Without loss of generality, we only adopt 
the first definitions here, so we regard Human Linguistics and 
Linguistics as the same.


Due to Human Semantics is one of the disciplines of Linguistics and 
its main task is to deal with the human meaning, and Human Informatics 
is one of the disciplines of Information Science and its main task is 
to deal with the human information; Due to human meaning is equal to 
human information, thus we have the following corollary:


A: Human Informatics is a subfield of Human Linguistics.

According to the definition of general linguists, language is a 
vehicle for transmitting information, therefore, Linguistics is a 
branch of Human Informatics, so we have another corollary:


B: Human Linguistics is a subfield of Human Informatics.

Apparently, A and B are contradictory or logically unacceptable. It is 
a paradox in Information Science and Linguistics. In most cases, a 
settlement about the related paradox could lead t

Re: [Fis] The unification of the theories of information based on the cateogry theory

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Koichiro and colleagues,

The ancient Greeks had several notions of time. The main point for our 
discussion seems to me the distinction between historical time and event 
time. Trajectories, for example, can be formed in historical time by 
series of relations; trajectories are observable. Among other things, 
they can be shaped by languaging.


I agree that language uses another time. It is not a trajectory, but a 
regime. The difference is that a trajectory can be shaped, for example, 
along a life-cycle, whereas a regime is a next-order change like life or 
death. The next-order operation leaves a footprint in historical time; 
however, it is part of an evolutionary dynamics. This dynamics is not 
directly observable, but only available as an informed hypothesis which 
can be tested against the events/non-events in historical time.


Best,
Loet


Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Koichiro Matsuno" <cxq02...@nifty.com>
To: "Fis," <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 2/15/2018 5:53:23 AM
Subject: Re: [Fis] The unification of the theories of information based 
on the cateogry theory



On 8 Feb 2018 at 4:05 PM, Loet Leydesdorff wrote:

From a biological perspective, not language itself, but “languaging” 
behavior is considered the system of reference.




On 13 Feb 2018 at 7:01 PM, Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic wrote:

As in biology thre are different kinds of organisms there are also 
different kinds of “languages”.






Folks,



   Focusing upon languaging comes to shed light on the communication in 
time between whatever parties. The issue of time then reminds me of the 
oft-quoted Aristotelian aphorism on the vulgar nature of time. As 
calling attention to the nonexistence of both past and future at the 
present moment of now, Aristotle observed “the present now is not part 
of time at all, for a part measures the whole, and the whole must be 
made up of the parts, but we cannot say that time is made up of ‘nows’ 
(Physics Book 4, 218a)”. Thus, “there is a something pertaining to time 
which is indivisible, and this something is what we mean by the 
‘present’ or ‘now’ (234a)”. One outcome from these observations is 
simply a metaphysical aporia as pointing to that time both does and 
does not exist.




   One common-sense strategy getting out of the metaphysical impasse, 
which Aristotle would also seem to ‘reluctantly’ share, might be to 
view time as a linear succession of the now-points thanks to the 
additional idea of the levelling-off of the now points. This limiting 
procedure may help us to forget about the underlying aporia for the 
time being. But the contrast between languaging and language may revive 
our concern on whether we could dismiss the vulgar nature of time in a 
sweeping manner in a positive sense. So far, language has seemed to be 
quite at home with time as the linear succession of the  now points. 
That is so even in physics as we know it today. However, once the 
aspect of languaging is called up, the temporality of languaging may be 
found to differ from that of language. Languaging is not continuous, 
but distinctively discontinuous in distinguishing between the utterer 
and its potential respondent. Alternation of the role between utterer 
and respondent proceeds discretely temporally. (Bio)semiotician may 
seem to be sensitive to this issue of time.




   Koichiro Matsuno








___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] FW: New Year Lecture. Logic of Recursive Transductions

[Loet Leydesdorff]

At this point, I feel I need a ‘refresher’ on Loet Leydesdorff’s 
important distinction, with reference to information, between recursion 
and incursion. Loet?




When one thinks outside the box, as Bob U. will have us do, the air may 
seem a little thin, for a while. However, one can soon get 
acclimatized, with some good will.




Cheers,



Joseph






Dear Joseph,

I am not sure, but I guess that the recursive transductions assume a 
forward arrow of time: the previous state (at t-1) is "transduced" into 
a next one (at t = t).


An incursive system provides also a reference to its current state. For 
example, a new technology is shaped with reference to the previous one, 
but also with reference to a current market as the relevant selection 
environment. A hyperincursive system develops with reference to its next 
future state (t + 1) or even beyond that (t + n).


For example, meaning -- in interpersonal communications -- is provided 
from the perspective of hindsight in the present, but with reference to 
horizons of meaning. This reference to possible future states provides 
the intentionality that is specific for interhuman communication. The 
logic thus is different from a biological system developing with the 
arrow of time (in history).


Another terminology would be that of trajectories and regimes. 
Trajectories are shaped with time; for example, along life-cycles. 
Regimes (e.g., life vs. death) are next-order selection mechanisms which 
shape the conditions for trajectories. This is still at the level of 
general systems theory. In interhuman communication specifically, the 
order remains an order of expectations which feeds back onto the present 
state from future (possible) states. This inversion of time leads to the 
generation of redundancy as different from the (Shannon-type) 
information. It provides new options.


Hopefully, I answered your question.

Best,
Loet
___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] some notes

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Terry and colleagues,

I agree that one should not confuse communication with the substance of 
communication (e.g., life in bio-semiotics). It seems useful to me to 
distinguish between several concepts of "communication".


1. Shannon's (1948) definitions in "The Mathematical Theory of 
Communication". Information is communicated, but is yet meaningfree. 
These notions of information and communication are counter-intuitive 
(Weaver, 1949). However, they provide us with means for the measurement, 
such as bits of information. The meaning of the communication is 
provided by the system of reference (Theil, 1972); in other words, by 
the specification of "what is comunicated?" For example, if money is 
communicated (redistributed), the system of reference is a transaction 
system. If molecules are communicated, life can be generated (Maturana).


2. Information as "a difference which makes a difference" (Bateson, 
1973; McKay, 1969). A difference can only make a difference for a 
receiving system that provides meaning to the system. In my opinion, one 
should in this case talk about "meaningful information" and "meaningful 
communication" as different from the Shannon-type information (based on 
probability distributions). In this case, we don't have a clear 
instrument for the measurement. For this reason, I have a preference for 
the definitions under 1.


3. Interhuman communication is of a different order because it involves 
intentionality and language. The discourses under 1. and 2. are 
interhuman communication systems. (One has to distinguish levels and 
should not impose our intuitive notion of communication on the processes 
under study.) In my opinion, interhuman communication involves both 
communication of information and possibilities of sharing meaning.


The Shannon-type information shares with physics the notion of entropy. 
However, physical entropy is dimensioned (Joule/Kelvin; S = k(B) H), 
whereas probabilistic entropy is dimensionless (H). Classical physics, 
for example, is based on the communication of momenta and energy because 
these two quantities have to be conserved. In the 17th century, it was 
common to use the word "communication" in this context (Leibniz).


Best,
Loet

-- Original Message --
From: "Terrence W. DEACON" <dea...@berkeley.edu>
To: "fis" <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Cc: "Pedro C. Marijuan" <pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es>; "Loet Leydesdorff" 
<l...@leydesdorff.net>

Sent: 11/17/2017 6:34:18 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] some notes


On communication:

"Communication" needs to be more carefully distinguished from mere
transfer of physical differences from location to location and time to
time. Indeed, any physical transfer of physical differences in this
respect can be utilized to communicate, and all communication requires
this physical foundation. But there is an important hierarchic
distinction that we need to consider. Simply collapsing our concept of
'communication' to its physical substrate (and ignoring the process of
interpretation) has the consequence of treating nearly all physical
processes as communication and failing to distinguish those that
additionally convey something we might call representational content.

Thus while internet communication and signals transferred between
computers do indeed play an essential role in human communication, we
only have to imagine a science fiction story in which all human
interpreters suddenly disappear but our computers nevertheless
continue to exchange signals, to realize that those signals are not
"communicating" anything. At that point they would only be physically
modifying one another, not communicating, except in a sort of
metaphoric sense. This sort of process would not be fundamentally
different from solar radiation modifying atoms in the upper atmosphere
or any other similar causal process. It would be odd to say that the
sun is thereby communicating anything to the atmosphere.

So, while I recognize that there are many methodological contexts in
which it makes little difference whether or not we ignore this
semiotic aspect, as many others have also hinted, this is merely to
bracket from consideration what really distinguishes physical transfer
of causal influence from communication. Remember that this was a
methodological strategy that even Shannon was quick to acknowledge in
the first lines of his classic paper. We should endeavor to always be
as careful.

— Terry___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] some notes

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Pedro and colleagues,

2. Eigenvectors of communication. Taking the motif from Loet, and 
continuing with the above, could we say that the life cycle itself 
establishes the eigenvectors of communication? It is intriguing that 
maintenance, persistence, self-propagation are the essential motives of 
communication for whatever life entities (from bacteria to ourselves). 
With the complexity increase there appear new, more sophisticated 
directions, but the basic ones probably remain intact. What could be 
these essential directions of communication?
I am not so convinced that there is an a priori relation between life 
and communication. Communication is not alive. Non-living systems (e.g., 
computers, robots) also communicate. Perhaps, it matters for the 
communication whether the communicators are living systems; but this 
needs to be specified.


Communication studies is not biology. Perhaps, there is a specific 
biological communication as Maturana claims: when molecules are 
exchanged, one can expect life. Can one have life without communication? 
It seems to me that one can have communication without life. 
Communication would then be the broader category and life a special 
case.


Best,
Loet




3. About logics in the pre-science, Joseph is quite right demanding 
that discussion to accompany principles or basic problems. Actually 
principles, rules, theories, etc. are interconnected or should be by a 
logic (or several logics?) in order to give validity and coherence to 
the different combinations of elements. For instance, in the 
biomolecular realm there is a fascinating interplay of activation and 
inhibition among the participating molecular partners (enzymes and 
proteins) as active elements.  I am not aware that classical ideas from 
Jacob (La Logique du vivant) have been sufficiently continued; it is 
not about Crick's Central Dogma but about the logic of pathways, 
circuits, modules, etc. Probably both Torday and Ji have their own 
ideas about that-- I would be curious to hear from them.


4. I loved Michel's response to Arturo's challenge. I think that the 
two "zeros" I mentioned days ago (the unsolved themes around the cycle 
and around the observer) imply both multidisciplinary thinking and 
philosophical speculation...


Best wishes--Pedro

-
Pedro C. Marijuán
Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group
Instituto Aragonés de Ciencias de la Salud
Centro de Investigación Biomédica de Aragón (CIBA)
Avda. San Juan Bosco, 13, planta 0
50009 Zaragoza, Spain
Tfno. +34 976 71 3526 (& 6818)
pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es
http://sites.google.com/site/pedrocmarijuan/
-

___
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

Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Krassimir and colleagues,

The Scientific Revolution of the 17th century was precisely about the 
differentiation between scholarly discourse and scholastic disputatio. A 
belief system is an attribute of agents and/or of a community. The 
sciences, however, develop also as systems of rationalized expectations. 
These are based on communications as units of analysis and not agents 
(communicators). This is Luhmann's point, isn't it?


Of course, individual scientists can be religious and groups like 
Jesuits can do science. At the level of (institutional) agency or 
organizations, one has both options. However, the communication dynamics 
is very different. In religious communication, there is an original 
(e.g., the Bible) which is copied. Textbooks are updated; error is 
removed, while error was added by transcriptions by monks. The origins 
of the invention of the printing press are relevant here: Galilei could 
not publish the Discorsi in Italy, but it could be published by Louis 
Elsevier in Leiden!


In science studies, we have learned to distinguish between social and 
intellectual organization. While at the level of social organization, 
scientific and religious structures are comparable, the intellectual 
organization is very different. For example, the notion of "truth" is 
preliminary in science, while it is sacrosanct in religious philosophy. 
Thus, we can elaborate the functional differentiation between these two 
codes of communication. Scientific discourse is validated using criteria 
that are coded in communication; religious disputatio is about a given 
truth.


Best,
Loet

----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "John Collier" <ag...@ncf.ca>
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Sent: 11/5/2017 4:28:31 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism


Krassimir,

What, if like me, you see materialism and idealism as both incorrect, 
and adopt something like Russell's neutral monism. I mention this 
because I believe information to be neutral between material and ideal. 
It is a false dichotomy on my view


I disagree that information cannot be given by concrete examples. There 
are examples in both physics and of course in cognition that are used 
in both consistent and I think compatible ways.


I would go so far as to say that the division has been a sad one for 
sound philosophy, and that in some respects we should start over again 
from Aristotle (to whom the division did not seem to even occur, in 
line with general Greek thinking) and the later Scholasticism.


Regards,

John


On 2017/11/05 3:07 PM, Krassimir Markov wrote:

Dear Bruno and FIS Colleagues,

Thank you very much for your useful remarks!

This week I was ill and couldn’t work.
Hope, the next week will be better for work.

Now I want only to paraphrase my post about Idealism and Materialism:

The first is founded on believing that the Intelligent Creation exists.

The second is founded on believing that the Intelligent Creation does not
exist.

Both are kinds of religions because they could not prove their foundations
by experiments and real examples.

The scientific approach does not believe in anything in advance. The
primary concepts have to be illustrated by series of real examples. After
that the secondary concepts have to be defined and all propositions have
to be proved.

Are the mathematicians materialists or idealists?
Of course neither the first nor the second!

Mathematics is an example of the scientific approach.

Informatics lacks of well established primary concepts.
The concept of information couldn’t be primary because it couldn’t be
illustrated directly by real examples.

We need other primary concepts which will permit us to define information
and to prove all consequences.

Friendly greetings
Krassimir








-Original Message-
From: Bruno Marchal
Sent: Sunday, November 05, 2017 12:30 PM
To: Foundation of Information Science
Subject: Re: [Fis] About 10 Principles



Dear Krassimir,


On 31 Oct 2017, at 15:07, Krassimir Markov wrote:



Dear FIS Colleagues,

Many years ago, in 2011, I had written a special remark about
scientific
and non-scientific approaches to try to understand the world around.
The
letter of Logan Streondj returns this theme as actual today.

The interrelations between scientific and non-scient

Re: [Fis] The two very important operations of Infos

[Loet Leydesdorff]

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 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en





___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] TR: What is ³Agent²?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues,

In my opinion, a word like "agency" (or "action") is provided with 
meaning within a sentence/statement which is theoretically informed. 
Only in a context, a word can become a concept.


The common ground that is assumed in this discussion is the claim that 
the generation of agency can be expressed in terms of a non-linear 
dynamics of entropy; for example, in computer simulations. The genesis, 
however, is not the validity. For the latter, one needs specific 
theorizing at each systems level. Specification of the differentia 
specifica of each theoretical perspective is important particularly in 
the case of the difference between biology and sociology. Otherwise, one 
risks a return to "general systems theory", "sociobiology", etc.


I agree (with Stan and others) that "intentionality" is then a second 
dimension. Intentional action cannot be equated with a whirl. The 
concepts are not scale-free :-( In the case of information, for example, 
one can clearly distinguish between mathematical theory of communication 
or non-linear dynamics enabling is to carry metaphors from one systems 
level to another (as a heuristics) and substantive theories of 
communication such as when molecules are exchanged. The exchange of 
molecules, however, is very different from the exchange of ideas in 
scholarly communication.


Best,
Loet

--------
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Christophe Menant" <christophe.men...@hotmail.fr>
To: "gordana.dodig-crnko...@mdh.se" <gordana.dodig-crnko...@mdh.se>
Cc: "Foundation of Information Science" <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 10/22/2017 2:59:10 PM
Subject: [Fis] TR: What is ³Agent²?




Dear Gordana,
Your proposal for elementary particles and social institutions as two 
limit cases for agency is interesting as it also positions limit cases 
for normative/teleological properties


highlighted as implicit parts of agency by Terry. And it brings in 
perspectives on your subject.
Social institutions clearly have final causes (a long and complex 
list..) but associating agency and teleology to elementary particles 
may be problematic as it introduces final causes in a material 
universe. This looks close to an "intelligent design" option that we 
prefer to avoid.
Why not introduce  a possible "trend to increasing complexity" (TIC) in 
our universe, with steps since the big bang:
energy => elementary particles=> atoms=>molecules=> life=>humans=> 
(perhaps pan-computationalism has a say there?).
Agency and normative/teleological properties can then be looked at as 
emerging during the TIC at the molecules=>life transition (Terry's 
morphodynamics).
Rather than being  a limit case for agency,  elementary particles are 
then part of the thread leading to teleology/agency via the TIC.

How would you feel about such wording?
Best
Christophe






De : Fis <fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es> de la part de Gordana 
Dodig-Crnkovic <gordana.dodig-crnko...@mdh.se>

Envoyé : vendredi 20 octobre 2017 11:02
À : Terrence W. DEACON; 'Bob Logan'; l...@leydesdorff.net; 'fis'
Objet : Re: [Fis] What is ³Agent²?


Dear Terry, Bob, Loet

Thank you for sharing those important thoughts about possible choices 
for the definition of agency.


I would like to add one more perspective that I find in Pedro’s article 
which makes a distinction between matter-energy aspects and 
informational aspects of the same physical reality. I believe that on 
the fundamental level of information physics we have a good ND simplest 
example how those two entangled aspects can be formally framed.
As far as I can tell, Terrys definition covers chemical and biological 
agency.
Do we want to include apart from fundamental physics also full 
cognitive and social agency which are very much dominated by 
informational aspects (symbols and language)?
Obviously there is no information without physical implementation, but 
when we think about epistemology and the ways we know the world, for us 
and other biological agents there is no physical interaction without 
informational aspects.

Can we somehow think in terms those two face

Re: [Fis] What is “Agent”?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Bob and colleagues, 

 

I agree with the choice element. From a sociological perspective, agency is 
usually defined in relation to structure. For example, in terms of 
structure/actor contingencies. The structures provide the background that bind 
us. Remarkably, Mark, we no longer define these communalities philosophically, 
but sociologically (e.g., Merton, 1942, about the institutional norms of 
science). An interesting extension is that we nowadays not only perceive 
communality is our biological origins (as species), but also in terms of 
communicative layers that we construct and reproduce as inter-agency 
(interactions).

 

The relation with the information issue is not obvious. I worked on this a bit 
in the first half of the 90s: 

*<http://www.leydesdorff.net/jtsb93/index.htm> "Structure"/"Action" 
Contingencies and the Model of Parallel Distributed Processing, Journal for the 
Theory of Social Behaviour 23 (1993) 47-77.
*<http://www.leydesdorff.net/jses95/jses95.pdf> The Production of 
Probabilistic Entropy in Structure/Action Contingency Relations, Journal of 
Social and Evolutionary Systems 18 (1995) 339-56.

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Fellow,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Bob Logan
Sent: Friday, October 20, 2017 6:11 AM
To: Terrence W. DEACON <dea...@berkeley.edu>
Cc: fis <Fis@listas.unizar.es>
Subject: Re: [Fis] What is “Agent”?

 

Dear Terry and FIS friends - I agree with all that Terry has said about agency. 
I do wish to however to point out that an agent has choice and a non-agent has 
no choice. I would suggest that the defining characteristic of an agent is 
choice and therefore an agent must be a living organism and all living 
organisms are agents. Agents/living organisms have choice or are capable of 
choice or agency and they are the only things that have choice or can interpret 
information. Abiotic non-agents do not have information because they have no 
choice. We humans can have information about abiotic objects but those objects 
themselves do not have that information as they have no mind to be informed. 
That includes this email post, it is abiotic an has no agency. It has 
information by virtue of you reading it because you are able to interpret the 
visual signs with which I have recorded my thoughts. Marshall McLuhan would add 
to my comments that “the user is the content” as well as saying that Shannon’s 
work was not a theory of information but a "theory of transportation”. I think 
of Shannon’s work in a similar light. I also do not regard Shannon’s work as a 
theory of information but it is a theory of signals. Shannon himself said his 
theory was not about meaning and I say what is information without meaning and 
that therefore Shannon only had a theory of signals. 

 

Another insight of McLuhan’s that of figure and ground is useful to understand 
why we have so many different definitions of information. McLuhan maintained 
that one could not understand a figure unless one understood the ground in 
which it operates in. (McLuhan might have gotten this idea from his professor 
at Cambridge, I. A. Richards, who said that in order to communicate one needs 
to feedforward [he coined the term btw] the context of what one is 
communicating.) The different definitions of information we have considered are 
a result of the different contexts in which the term information is used. We 
should also keep in mind that all words are metaphors and metaphor literally 
means to carry across, derived from the Greek meta (literally ‘across') and 
phorein (literally 'to carry'). So the word information has been carried across 
from one domain or area of interest to another. It entered the English language 
as the noun associated with the verb 'to inform', i.e. to form the mind. Here 
is an excerpt from my book What Is Information? (available for free at 
demopublishing.com <http://demopublishing.com> ):

"Origins of the Concept of Information - We begin our historic survey of the 
development of the concept of information with its etymology. The English word 
information according to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) first appears in 
the written record in 1386 by Chaucer

Re: [Fis] Data - Reflection - Information

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark:

Do we want to defend a definition of meaning which is tied to 
scientific practice as we know it? Would that be too narrow? Ours may 
not be the only way of doing science...
I meant my remarks analytically. You provide them with a normative turn 
as defensive against alternative ways of doing science.


A non-discursive science might be possible - a science based around 
shared musical experience, or meditation, for example. Or even Hesse's 
"Glasperlenspiel"... Higher level coordination need not necessarily 
occur in language. Our communication technologies may one day give us 
new post-linguistic ways of coordinating ourselves.
Why should one wish to consider this as science? One can make music 
together without doing science. Musicology, however, is discursive 
reasoning about these practices.


Codification is important in our science as we know it. But it should 
also be said that our science is blind to many things. Its reductionism 
prevents effective interdisciplinary inquiry, it struggles to reconcile 
practices, bodies, and egos, and its recent obsession with journal 
publication has produced the conditions of Babel which has fed the 
pathology in our institutions. There's less meaning in the academy than 
there was 50 years ago.
This is a question with a Monty Python flavor: what is the meaning of 
science? what is the meaning of life?


The implication is that our distinguishing between information and 
meaning in science may be an epiphenomenon of something deeper.
One can always ask for "something deeper". The answers, however, tend to 
become religious. I am interested in operationalization and design.


Best,
Loet




Best wishes,

Mark

----
From: Loet Leydesdorff <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>
Sent: ‎14/‎10/‎2017 16:06
To: Terrence W. DEACON <mailto:dea...@berkeley.edu>; Sungchul Ji 
<mailto:s...@pharmacy.rutgers.edu>

Cc: foundationofinformationscience <mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es>
Subject: Re: [Fis] Data - Reflection - Information

Dear Terry and colleagues,

"Language is rather the special case, the most unusual communicative 
adaptation to ever have evolved, and one that grows out of and depends 
on informationa/semiotic capacities shared with other species and with 
biology in general."
Let me try to argue in favor of "meaning", "language", and "discursive 
knowledge", precisely because they provide the "differentia specifica" 
of mankind. "Meaning" can be provided by non-humans such as animals or 
networks, but distinguishing between the information content and the 
meaning of a message requires a discourse. The discourse enables us to 
codify the meaning of the information at the supra-individual level. 
Discursive knowledge is based on further codification of this 
intersubjective meaning. All categories used, for example, in this 
discussion are codified in scholarly discourses. The discourse(s) 
provide(s) the top of the hierarchy that controls given the cybernetic 
principle that construction is bottom up and control top-down.


Husserl uses "intentionality" and "intersubjective intentionality" 
instead of "meaning". Perhaps, this has advantages; but I am not so 
sure that the difference is more than semantic. In Cartesian 
Meditations (1929) he argues that this intersubjective intentionality 
provides us with the basis of an empirical philosophy of science. The 
sciences do not begin with observations, but with the specification of 
expectations in discourses. A predator also observes his prey, but in 
scholarly discourses, systematic observations serve the update of 
codified (that is, theoretical) expectations.


Best,
Loet

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Data - Reflection - Information

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Terry and colleagues,

"Language is rather the special case, the most unusual communicative 
adaptation to ever have evolved, and one that grows out of and depends 
on informationa/semiotic capacities shared with other species and with 
biology in general."
Let me try to argue in favor of "meaning", "language", and "discursive 
knowledge", precisely because they provide the "differentia specifica" 
of mankind. "Meaning" can be provided by non-humans such as animals or 
networks, but distinguishing between the information content and the 
meaning of a message requires a discourse. The discourse enables us to 
codify the meaning of the information at the supra-individual level. 
Discursive knowledge is based on further codification of this 
intersubjective meaning. All categories used, for example, in this 
discussion are codified in scholarly discourses. The discourse(s) 
provide(s) the top of the hierarchy that controls given the cybernetic 
principle that construction is bottom up and control top-down.


Husserl uses "intentionality" and "intersubjective intentionality" 
instead of "meaning". Perhaps, this has advantages; but I am not so sure 
that the difference is more than semantic. In Cartesian Meditations 
(1929) he argues that this intersubjective intentionality provides us 
with the basis of an empirical philosophy of science. The sciences do 
not begin with observations, but with the specification of expectations 
in discourses. A predator also observes his prey, but in scholarly 
discourses, systematic observations serve the update of codified (that 
is, theoretical) expectations.


Best,
Loet

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] If "data = information", why we need both concepts?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Cher Michel,

Loet thinks that "Nobody of us provide an operative framework and a 
single (just one!) empirical  testable prevision able to assess 
"information"

I did not say this, but reacted to one of our colleagues saying this.

Best,
Loet


___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Heretic

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Nobody of us is able to provide an operative framework and a single 
(just one!) empirical  testable prevision able to assess "information".



Dear colleague,

One should not confuse the confusion on the list with the clarity of the 
concept information in information theory. This definition is 
operational (e.g., in bits). Your computer would not work without this 
definition (1 byte = 8 bits). The problem is that this definition of 
information as uncertainty is counter-intuitive.


The search for an intuitive definition of information has led to unclear 
definitions. In a recent book, Hidalgo (2015, at p. 165), for example, 
has defined “information” with reference “to the order embodied in 
codified sequences, such as those found in music or DNA, while knowledge 
and knowhow refer to the ability of a system to process information.” 
However, codified knowledge can be abstract and—like music—does not have 
to be “embodied” (e.g., Cowan, David, & Foray, 2000).


Beyond Hidalgo’s position, Floridi (2010, p. 21) proposed “a general 
definition of information” according to which “the well-formed data are 
meaningful” (italics of the author). Luhmann (1995, p. 67) posits that 
“all information has meaning.” In his opinion, information should 
therefore be considered as a selection mechanism. Kauffman et al. (2008, 
at p. 28) added to the confusion by defining information as “natural 
selection.”


Against these attempt to bring information and meaning under a single 
denominator--and to identify variation with selection--I argue for a 
dualistic perspective (as did Prof. Zhong in a previous email). 
Information and meaning should not be confounded. Meaning is generated 
from redundancies (Bateson, 1972, p. 420; Weaver, 1949; see Leydesdorff 
et al., 2017).


Best,
Loet

References:



Bateson, G. (1972). Steps to an Ecology of Mind. New York: Ballantine.

Cowan, R., David, P., & Foray, D. (2000). The Explicit Economics of 
Knowledge Codification and Tacitness. Industrial and Corporate Change, 
9(2), 211-253.


Floridi, L. (2010). Information: A very short introduction. Oxford, UK: 
Oxford University Press.


Hidalgo, C. (2015). Why Information Grows: The Evolution of Order, from 
Atoms to Economies. New York: Basic Books.


Kauffman, S., Logan, R. K., Este, R., Goebel, R., Hobill, D., & 
Shmulevich, I. (2008). Propagating organization: an enquiry. Biology and 
Philosophy, 23(1), 27-45.


Leydesdorff, L., Johnson, M., & Ivanova, I. (2017). Toward a Calculus of 
Redundancy: Signification, Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural 
Evolution. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525.


Luhmann, N. ([1984] 1995). Social Systems. Stanford, CA: Stanford 
University Press.


Weaver, W. (1949). Some Recent Contributions to the Mathematical Theory 
of Communication. In C. E. Shannon & W. Weaver (Eds.), The Mathematical 
Theory of Communication (pp. 93-117.). Urbana: University of Illinois 
Press.




--------
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] If "data = information", why we need both concepts?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues,

Using the concept of "data", one loads the discussion with an ontology. 
"Data" is "given" or "revealed" by God. (In antiquity, the holy was 
hidden and guarded by priests, but Christianity brought the idea of 
Revelation.) In physics, one talks about "data" and "nature" as given.


It seems to me that we don't need this in a discussion about 
information. Distributions contain information or, in other words, the 
expected information content of a distribution can be expressed in bits 
(dits, nits, etc.) of information. I assume that this is equivalent to 
Prof. Zhong's object information. The specification of the object ("what 
is distributed") provides the information with meaning. "In particular, 
information must not be confused with meaning." (Weaver, 1949, p. 8).


Best,
Loet

PS. When, there is no "given," but only constructs, uncertainty (that 
is, Shannon-type information) prevails. Instead of a cosmology 
("given"), one moves to a chaology of different constructs. The 
constructs differ in terms of "what is distributed", that is, the 
specification of "the object". L.



Loet Leydesdorff

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Alex Hankey" <alexhan...@gmail.com>
To: "Krassimir Markov" <mar...@foibg.com>; "FIS Webinar" 
<fis@listas.unizar.es>

Sent: 10/3/2017 8:08:18 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] If "data = information", why we need both concepts?


This is a titbit in support of Krassimir Markov.
There was a very interesting paper by Freeman Dyson in about 1970, 
about which he gave a Colloquium at the MIT Department of Physics which 
I attended.
Dyson had analyzed data taken from higher nuclear energy levels in 
particular
bands far above the ground state - probably using the Mossbauer effect 
if I remember rightly, because it has a very high resolution. .


Dyson's question was simple: Does the data contain any useful 
information?

His analysis was that the eigenvalues represented by this selection of
data were no different from those of matrix with Random Entries.
The data were equivalent to a set of random numbers.

Dyson therefore concluded that, 'The Data Contained No Useful 
Information' for the purpose of understanding the nuclear physics 
involved.




On 3 October 2017 at 16:46, Krassimir Markov <mar...@foibg.com> wrote:

Dear John and FIS Colleagues,

I am Computer Science specialist and I never take data to be 
information.


For not specialists maybe it is normal "data to be often taken to be
information" but this is not scientific reasoning.

Simple question: if "data = information", why we need both concepts?


Friendly greetings

Krassimir


Dear list,


As Floridi points out in his Information. Oxford: Oxford University 
Press,
2010. A volume for the Very Short Introduction series. data is often 
taken

to be information. If so, then the below distinction is somewhat
arbitrary. It may be useful or not. I think that for some 
circumstances it
is useful, but for others it is misleading, especially if we are 
trying to

come to grips with what meaning is. I am not sure there is ever data
without interpretation (it seems to me that it is always assumed to be
about something). There are, however, various degrees and depths of
interpretation, and we may have data at a more abstract level that is
interpreted as meaning something less abstract, such as pointer 
readings

of a barometer and air pressure. The pointer readings are signs of air
pressure. Following C.S. Peirce, all signs have an interpretant. We 
can

ignore this (abstraction) and deal with just pointer readings of a
particular design of gauge, and take this to be the data, but even the
pointer readings have an important contextual element, being of a
particular kind of gauge, and that also determines an interpretant. 
Just
pointer readings alone are not data, they are merely numbers (which 
also,

of course, have an interpretant that is even more abstract.

So I think the data/information distinction needs to be made clear in 
each

case, if it is to be used.

Note that I believe that there is information that is independent of 
mind,
but the above points still hold once we s

Re: [Fis] Toward a Calculus of Redundancy: Signification, Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution; preprint

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Jose Javier,

Thank you so much for these rich comments. I have to think a bit before 
answering.


Best,
Loet


Loet Leydesdorff

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Jose Javier Blanco Rivero" <javierwe...@gmail.com>
To: "Loet Leydesdorff" <l...@leydesdorff.net>
Cc: "Fis," <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 9/4/2017 11:38:13 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Toward a Calculus of Redundancy: Signification, 
Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution; preprint



Dear Loet,

I want to thank you for sharing this insightful article. I myself have 
been experimenting with the difference between information and meaning, 
although from a different background -that of intellectual history.
Your essay deserves a thoughtful a comment which I cannot attempt here. 
But I´d would like to make some remarks.


1. I´ve been working with Luhmann too and I strongly desagree with 
translating "Sinn" by "meaning" -although Luhmann himself might have 
agreed. In the Spanish traslation of Social Systems, for example, they 
make a more loyal translation from the German (they translate Sinn by 
"sentido" and not by "significado"). I think it is more than a 
idiomatic question, since distinguishing between sense-making (Sinn), 
information and meaning might give us insight into the obscure process 
of meaning and knowlegde processing that we are trying to clear out.
Sense-making might not be a good candidate for an english speaker, but 
I think it works quite well when you need to distinguish between 
linguistic meanings  (those produced directly by language and 
discourse) and the pragmatics of communication. When you make sense of 
something, that involves semantics and pragmatics,that involves 
linguistic meaning and information processing from the social 
environment.
By the way, in that very page you cite Luhmann (1995, p.67) the German 
sociologist draws a distinction between "Sinn" and Information, arguing 
that is time what makes it important, because information only informs 
once, but maintains its "meaning" when repeated.


2. I´ve noticed that in previous papers you have argued that meaning is 
communicated, but here you say "Unlike information, meaning is not 
communicated" (p. 3). So, have you changed your mind? Why?


3. I agree with your thesis that the processing of meaning and the 
processing of information are two different but related things. But I 
have some doubts about the relationship between meaning, information 
and coding. You say when meaning is assigned to information, options 
arise and so does redundancy, but the proliferation of meanings is 
restrained by coding; and that codes structure the processing of 
meaning acting as a selection mechanism on redundancy.  I might 
recognize that meaning be coded, for instance, by being coupled to a 
binary opposition (the concept of nature "physis" has oscillated around 
the poles of generation and degeneration). But cannot information be 
coded as well? For instance, incursive and hyper-incursive operations 
may be guided by selective mechanisms, or codes that contribute to the 
differentiation of the system and can account for its Eigenbehavior 
(I´m thinking of Luhmann´s functional systems). And redundancy might 
also be informative and semantic. I can think of semantic (or meaning) 
redundancy when examining intellectual traditions (Liberalism, 
Communism, etc.) Hence, self organization of meaning do not always 
coincide with the self organization of information that drives systems 
differentiation.


4. I wonder why to remain attached to the sender-receiver model of 
communication. It seems inadecuate to me in such a sofisticated 
theoretical arrengement you propose.


5. I think the question of time is not adequately dealt with. I wonder 
how can one measure (Hmax) and (Hsystem) in a social system. If we are 
dealing with complex systems (and social systems are indeed complex) 
the system itself cannot know (Hmax). And if an observer could, what 
kind of observer could that be? On another hand, the realized states of 
the system are not at the system`s disposition per se. The system needs 
some kind of memory function by means of which it reconstructs past 
states in a relevant manner to 

Re: [Fis] Toward a Calculus of Redundancy: Signification, Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution; preprint

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Thanks!

Best,
Loet


Loet Leydesdorff

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-- Original Message --
From: "Moisés André Nisenbaum" <moises.nisenb...@ifrj.edu.br>
To: "Loet Leydesdorff" <l...@leydesdorff.net>
Cc: "Fis," <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Sent: 9/4/2017 2:29:31 AM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Toward a Calculus of Redundancy: Signification, 
Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution; preprint



Hi, Loet.
Thank you for your message!
Firstly because there was no FIS messages since IS4SI...
I was wondering, what could be happening?

I have read your article. It is amazing!
I liked the way you've organized historically the relationship between 
the concept of information in a multidimensional perspective.
Certainly I will use it for my research and will recommend to my 
colegues and students :-)


Thank you,

Um abraço
Moisés


2017-09-03 11:06 GMT-03:00 Loet Leydesdorff <l...@leydesdorff.net>:
Toward a Calculus of Redundancy:   
<https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525>
Signification, Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution 
<https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525>


Loet Leydesdorff, Mark W. Johnson, and Inga Ivanova

Abstract
Whereas the generation of Shannon-type information is coupled to the 
second law of thermodynamics, redundancy—that is, the complement of 
information to the maximum entropy—can be increased by making further 
distinctions. The dynamics of discursive knowledge production can thus 
infuse the historical dynamics with a cultural evolution. Providing 
the information with meaning first proliferates the number of options. 
Meanings are provided with hindsight at positions in the vector space, 
as against relations in the network space. The main axes 
(eigenvectors) of the vector space map the codes of the communication 
spanning horizons of meaning; the codes structure the communications 
as selection mechanisms. Unlike hard-wired DNA, the codes of 
non-biological systems co-evolve with the variation. Discursive 
knowledge can be considered as meta-coded communication which enables 
us to entertain models of the processing of meaning and information. 
This reinforces the hindsight perspective and can turn codification 
reflexively into coding anticipation. The dynamics of information, 
meaning, and knowledge can be evaluated empirically using the sign of 
mutual information as an indicator.


** apologies for cross-postings
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525 
<https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525>



Loet Leydesdorff

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of 
London;


http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en 
<http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>




___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis 
<http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis>






--
Moisés André Nisenbaum
Instituto Federal do Rio de Janeiro - IFRJ
Campus Rio de Janeiro
moises.nisenb...@ifrj.edu.br___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

[Fis] Toward a Calculus of Redundancy: Signification, Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution; preprint

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Toward a Calculus of Redundancy:   
<https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525>
Signification, Codification, and Anticipation in Cultural Evolution 
<https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525>


Loet Leydesdorff, Mark W. Johnson, and Inga Ivanova

Abstract
Whereas the generation of Shannon-type information is coupled to the 
second law of thermodynamics, redundancy—that is, the complement of 
information to the maximum entropy—can be increased by making further 
distinctions. The dynamics of discursive knowledge production can thus 
infuse the historical dynamics with a cultural evolution. Providing the 
information with meaning first proliferates the number of options. 
Meanings are provided with hindsight at positions in the vector space, 
as against relations in the network space. The main axes (eigenvectors) 
of the vector space map the codes of the communication spanning horizons 
of meaning; the codes structure the communications as selection 
mechanisms. Unlike hard-wired DNA, the codes of non-biological systems 
co-evolve with the variation. Discursive knowledge can be considered as 
meta-coded communication which enables us to entertain models of the 
processing of meaning and information. This reinforces the hindsight 
perspective and can turn codification reflexively into coding 
anticipation. The dynamics of information, meaning, and knowledge can be 
evaluated empirically using the sign of mutual information as an 
indicator.


** apologies for cross-postings
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3030525

----
Loet Leydesdorff

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>; 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Associate Faculty, SPRU, <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/>University of 
Sussex;


Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/>, 
Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, 
<http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html>Beijing;


Visiting Fellow, Birkbeck <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/>, University of London;

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Information: a metaphysical word

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Everybody defines information in the way he prefers: subjective, biotic, bit, 
and so on. 
Therefore, every study that talks about "information" is meaningless.

Dear Arturo, 

The “Therefore” does not follow. It is a non-igitur. For example, Shannon’s 
information theory is not necessarily meaningless, although the measure (e.g., 
bits) is devoid of meaning. It provides, among other things,  a statistics. 

On the other side, I suggested in a previous post how the information entropy 
(such as Shannon's, or Bekenstein's, or Hawking's) may change according to the 
relativistic speed of the hypothetical observer.  

Rather obscure, in my opinion. 

Therefore, I suggest to fully remove the term "information" from every 
scientific account.  The term "information" refers, in Popper's terms, to a not 
falsifiable theory, to pseudoscience: it is a metaphysical claim, like the 
concepts of Essence, Being, God and so on. 

All mathematical theories are non-falsifiable. Shannon-type information is just 
a measure. Information can be provided with subjective meaning. Many of our 
colleagues confuse this subjective meaning of information with information 
itself. 

Information can also be provided with (inter-subjective) meaning in a discourse 
such as biology or physics. The discourse then functions as an “observer”. 
However, the meaningful information (the signal) is to be distinguished from 
the information as uncertainty (noise; variation) before this selection.

Best,

Loet

Therefore, by now, the term "information" is definitely out of my scientific  
vocabulary.  
  

--
Inviato da Libero Mail per Android

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?; towards a calculus of redundancy

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Toward a Calculus of Redundancy:  <https://arxiv.org/abs/1701.02455> 
The feedback arrow of expectations in knowledge-based systems

Loet Leydesdorff, Mark W. Johnson, Inga Ivanova 

(Submitted on 10 Jan 2017; https://arxiv.org/abs/1701.02455 )

 

Whereas the generation of Shannon-type information is coupled to the second law 
of thermodynamics, redundancy--that is, the complement of information to the 
maximum entropy--can be increased by further distinctions: new options can 
discursively be generated. The dynamics of discursive knowledge production thus 
infuse the historical dynamics with a cultural evolution based on expectations 
(as different from observations). We distinguish among (i) the communication of 
information, (ii) the sharing of meaning, and (iii) discursive knowledge. 
Meaning is provided from the perspective of hindsight as feedback on the 
entropy flow and thus generates redundancy. Specific meanings can selectively 
be codified as discursive knowledge; knowledge-based reconstructions enable us 
to specify expectations about future states which can be invoked in the 
present. The cycling among the dynamics of information, meaning, and knowledge 
in feedback and feedforward loops can be evaluated empirically: When mutual 
redundancy prevails over mutual information, the sign of the resulting 
information is negative indicating reduction of uncertainty because of new 
options available for realization; innovation can then be expected to flourish. 
When historical realizations prevail, innovation may be locked-in because of 
insufficient options for further development. 

 

* Comments are very welcome in this stage

  _____  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Terrence W. DEACON [mailto:dea...@berkeley.edu] 
Sent: Saturday, January 07, 2017 8:15 PM
To: John Collier
Cc: l...@leydesdorff.net; Dai Griffiths; Foundations of Information Science 
Information Science
Subject: Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?

 

Leot remarks:

 

"... we need a kind of calculus of redundancy."

 

I agree whole-heartedly. 

 

What for Shannon was the key to error-correction is thus implicitly normative. 
But of course assessment of normativity (accurate/inacurate, useful/unuseful, 
significant/insignificant) must necessarily involve an "outside" perspective, 
i.e. more than merely the statistics of sign medium chartacteristics. 
Redundancy is also implicit in concepts like communication, shared 
understanding, iconism, and Fano's "mutual information." But notice too that 
redundancy is precisely non-information in a strictly statistical understanding 
of that concept; a redundant message is not itself "news" — and yet it can 
reduce the uncertainty of what is "message" and what is "noise." It is my 
intuition that by developing a formalization (e.g. a "calculus") using the 
complemetary notions of redundancy and constraint that we will ultimately be 
able formulate a route from Shannon to the higher-order conceptions of 
information, in which referential and normative features can be precisely 
formulated. 

 

There is an open door, though it still seems pretty dark on the other side. So 
one must risk stumbling in order to explore that space.

 

Happy 2017, Terry

 

On Sat, Jan 7, 2017 at 9:02 AM, John Collier <colli...@ukzn.ac.za> wrote:

Dear List,

 

I agree with Terry that we should not be bound by our own partial theories. We 
need an integrated view of information that shows its relations in all of its 
various forms. There is a family resemblance in the ways it is used, and some 
sort of taxonomy can be constructed. I recommend that of Luciano Floridi. His 
approach is not unified (unlike my own, reported on this list), but compatible 
with it, and is a place to start, though it needs expansion and perhaps 
modification. There may be some unifying concept of information, but its 
application to all the various ways it has been used will not be obvious, and a 
sufficiently general formulation my well seem trivial, especially to those 
interested in the vital communicative and meaningful aspects of information. I 
also agree with Loet that pessimism, however justified, is not the real 
problem. To some extent it is a matter o

Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

We agree that such a theory is a ways off, though you some are far more 
pessimisitic about its possibility than me. I believe that we would do best to 
focus on the hole that needs filling in rather than assuming that it is an 
unfillable given.

 

Dear Terrence and colleagues, 

 

It is not a matter of pessimism. We have the example of “General Systems 
Theory” of the 1930s (von Bertalanffy  and others). Only gradually, one 
realized the biological metaphor driving it. In my opinion, we have become 
reflexively skeptical about claims of “generality” because we know the 
statements are framed within paradigms. Translations are needed in this 
fractional manifold.

 

I agree that we are moving in a fruitful direction. Your book “Incomplete 
Nature” and “The Symbolic Species” have been important. The failing options 
cannot be observed, but have to be constructed culturally, that is, in 
discourse. It seems to me that we need a kind of calculus of redundancy. 
Perspectives which are reflexively aware of this need and do not assume an 
unproblematic “given” or “natural” are perhaps to be privileged nonetheless. 
The unobservbable options have first to be specified and we need theory 
(hypotheses) for this. Perhaps, this epistemological privilege can be used as a 
vantage point. 

 

There is an interesting relation to Husserl’s Critique of the European Sciences 
(1935): The failing (or forgotten) dimension is grounded in “intersubjective 
intentionality.” Nowadays, we would call this “discourse”. How are discourses 
structured and how can they be translated for the purpose of offering this 
“foundation”?

 

Happy New Year,

Loet

 

My modest suggestion is only that in the absence of a unifying theory we should 
not privilege one partial theory over others and that in the absence of a 
global general theory we need to find terminology that clearly identifies the 
level at which the concept is being used. Lacking this, we end up debating 
incompatible definitions, and defending our favored one that either excludes or 
includes issues of reference and significance or else assumes or denies the 
relevance of human interpreters. With different participants interested in 
different levels and applications of the information concept—from physics, to 
computation, to neuroscience, to biosemiotics, to language, to art, 
etc.—failure to mark this diversity will inevitably lead us in circles. 

 

I urge humility with precision and an eye toward synthesis.

 

Happy new year to all.\

 

— Terry

 

On Thu, Dec 29, 2016 at 12:30 PM, Dai Griffiths <dai.griffith...@gmail.com> 
wrote:

Thanks Stan,

Yes, it's a powerful and useful process. 

My problem is that in this list, and in other places were such matters are 
discussed, we don't seem to be able to agree on the big picture, and the higher 
up the generalisations we go, the less we agree. 

I'd like to keep open the possibility that we might be yoking ideas together 
which it may be more useful to keep apart. We are dealing with messy concepts 
in messy configurations, which may not always map neatly onto a generalisation 
model. 

Dai





On 22/12/16 16:45, Stanley N Salthe wrote:

Dai --

{phenomenon 1}

{phenomenon 2}   -->  {Phenomena 1 & 2} ---> {phenomena 1.2,3}

{phenomenon 3}

The process from left to right is generalization.

‘Information’ IS a generalization.

generalities form the substance of philosophy. Info happens to a case

 of generalization which can be mathematized, which in turn allows

 it to be generalized even more.

So, what’s the problem?

STAN

 

On Wed, Dec 21, 2016 at 7:44 AM, Dai Griffiths <dai.griffith...@gmail.com> 
wrote:

>  Information is not “something out there” which “exists” otherwise than as 
> our construct.

I agree with this. And I wonder to what extent our problems in discussing 
information come from our desire to shoe-horn many different phenomena into the 
same construct. It would be possible to disaggregate the construct. It be 
possible to discuss the topics which we address on this list without using the 
word 'information'. We could discuss redundancy, variety, constraint, meaning, 
structural coupling, coordination, expectation, language, etc.

In what ways would our explanations be weakened?

In what ways might we gain in clarity? 

If we were to go down this road, we would face the danger that our discussions 
might become (even more) remote from everyday human experience. But many 
scientific discussions are remote from everyday human experience.

Dai

On 20/12/16 08:26, Loet Leydesdorff wrote:

Dear colleagues, 

 

A distribution contains uncertainty that can be measured in terms of bits of 
information.

Alternatively: the expected information content H of a probability distribution 
is .

H is further defined as probabilistic entropy using Gibb’s formulation of the 
entropy .

 

This definition of information is an operational definition. In my opinion, we 
d

Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

In this respect Loet comments:

 

"In my opinion, the status of Shannon’s mathematical theory of information is 
different  from special theories of information (e.g., biological ones) since 
the formal theory enables us to translate between these latter theories."

 

We are essentially in agreement, and yet I would invert any perspective that 
prioritizes the approach pioneered by Shannon. 

 

Dear Terrence and colleagues, 

 

The inversion is fine with me as an exploration. But I don’t think that this 
can be done on programmatic grounds because of the assumed possibility of “a 
general theory of information”. I don’t think that such a theory exists or is 
even possible without assumptions that beg the question. 

 

In other words, we have a “hole” in the center. Each perspective can claim its 
“generality” or fundamental character. For example, many of us entertain a 
biological a priori; others (including you?) reason on the basis of physics. 
The various (special) theories, however, are not juxtaposed; but can be 
considered as other (sometimes orthogonal) perspectives. Translations are 
possible at the bottom by unpacking in normal language or sometimes more 
formally (and advanced; productive?) using Shannon’s information theory and 
formalizations derived from it.

 

I admit my own communication-theoretical a priori. I am interested in the 
communication of knowledge as different from the communication of information. 
Discursive knowledge specifies and codifies meaning. The communication/sharing 
of meaning provides an in-between layer, which has also to be distinguished 
from the communication of information. Meaning is not relational but 
positional; it cannot be communicated, but it can be shared. I am currently 
working (with coauthors) on a full paper on the subject. The following is the 
provisional abstract: 

As against a monadic reduction of knowledge and meaning to signal processing 
among neurons, we distinguish among information and meaning processing, and the 
possible codification of specific meanings as discursive knowledge. Whereas the 
Shannon-type information is coupled to the second law of thermodynamics, 
redundancy—that is, the complement of information to the maximum entropy—can be 
extended by further distinctions and the specification of expectations when new 
options are made feasible. With the opposite sign, the dynamics of knowledge 
production thus infuses the historical (e.g., institutional) dynamics with a 
cultural evolution. Meaning is provided from the perspective of hindsight as 
feedback on the entropy flow. The circling among dynamics in feedback and 
feedforward loops can be evaluated by the sign of mutual information. When 
mutual redundancy prevails, the resulting sign is negative indicating that more 
options are made available and innovation can be expected to flourish. The 
relation of this cultural evolution with the computation of anticipatory 
systems can be specified; but the resulting puzzles are a subject for future 
research.

Best,

Loet

 

  _____  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Terrence and colleagues, 

 

I agree that we should not be fundamentalistic about “information”. For 
example, one can also use “uncertainty” as an alternative word to Shannon-type 
“information”. One can also make distinctions other than 
semantic/syntactic/pragmatic, such as biological information, etc.

 

Nevertheless, what makes this list to a common platform, in my opinion, is our 
interest in the differences and similarities in the background of these 
different notions of information. In my opinion, the status of Shannon’s 
mathematical theory of information is different  from special theories of 
information (e.g., biological ones) since the formal theory enables us to 
translate between these latter theories. The translations are heuristically 
important: they enable us to import metaphors from other backgrounds (e.g., 
auto-catalysis).

 

For example, one of us communicated with me why I was completely wrong, and 
made the argument with reference to Kullback-Leibler divergence between two 
probability distributions. Since we probably will not have “a general theory” 
of information, the apparatus in which information is formally and 
operationally defined—Bar-Hillel once called it “information calculus”—can 
carry this interdisciplinary function with precision and rigor. Otherwise, we 
can only be respectful of each other’s research traditions. J

 

I wish you all a splendid 2017,

Loet   

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Terrence W. DEACON
Sent: Thursday, December 22, 2016 5:33 AM
To: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?

 

Against information fundamentalism

 

Rather than fighting over THE definition of information, I suggest that we 
stand back from the polemics for a moment and recognize that the term is being 
used in often quite incompatible ways in different domains, and that there may 
be value in paying attention to the advantages and costs of each. To ignore 
these differences, to fail to explore the links and dependencies between them, 
and to be indifferent to the different use values gained or sacrificed by each, 
I believe that we end up undermining the very enterprise we claim to be 
promoting.

 

We currently lack broadly accepted terms to unambiguously distinguish these 
divergent uses and, even worse, we lack a theoretical framework for 
understanding their relationships to one another.

So provisionally I would argue that we at least need to distinguish three 
hierarchically related uses of the concept:

 

1. Physical information: Information as intrinsically measurable medium 
properties with respect to their capacity to support 2 or 3 irrespective of any 
specific instantiation of 2 or 3.

 

2. Referential information: information as a non-intrinsic relation to 
something other than medium properties (1) that a given medium can provide 
(i.e. reference or content) irrespective of any specific instantiation of 3.

 

3. Normative information: Information as the use value provided by a given 
referential relation (2) with respect to an end-directed dynamic that is 
susceptible to contextual factors that are not directly accessible (i.e. 
functional value or significance).

 

Unfortunately, because of the history of using the same term in an unmodified 
way in each relevant domain irrespective of the others there are often 
pointless arguments of a purely definitional nature.

 

In linguistic theory an analogous three-part hierarchic partitioning of theory 
IS widely accepted. 

 

1. syntax

2. semantics

3. pragmatics

 

Thus by analogy some have proposed the distinction between

 

1. syntactic information (aka Shannon)

2. semantic information (aka meaning)

3. pragmatic information (aka useful information)

 

This has also often been applied to the philosophy of information (e.g. see The 
Stanford Dictionary of Philosophy entry for ‘information’). Unfortunately, the 
language-centric framing of this distinction can be somewhat misleading. The 
metaphoric extension of the terms ‘syntax’ and ‘semantics’ to apply to iconic 
(e.g. pictorial) or indexical (e.g. correlational) forms of communication 
exerts a subtle procrustean influence that obscures their naturalistic and 
nondigital features. T

Re: [Fis] What is information? and What is life?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear James and colleagues, 

 

Weaver (1949) made two major remarks about his coauthor (Shannon)'s
contribution:

 

1. the definition of information as uncertainty is counter-intuitive
("bizarre"); (p. 27)

2. "In particular, information must not be confused with meaning." (p. 8) 

 

The definition of information as relevant for a system of reference confuses
information with "meaningful information" and thus sacrifices the surplus
value of Shannon's counter-intuitive definition.

 

information observer

 

that integrates interactive processes such as 

 

physical interactions such photons stimulating the retina of the eye,
human-machine interactions (this is the level that Shannon lives on),
biological interaction such body temperature relative to touch ice or heat
source, social interaction such as this forum started by Pedro, economic
interaction such as the stock market, ... [Lerner, page 1].

 

We are in need of a theory of meaning. Otherwise, one cannot measure
meaningful information. In a previous series of communications we discussed
redundancy from this perspective.

 

Lerner introduces mathematical expectation E[Sap] (difference between of a
priory entropy [sic] and a posteriori entropy), which is distinguished from
the notion of relative information Iap (Learner, page 7).

 

) expresses in bits of information the information generated when the a
priori distribution is turned into the a posteriori one . This follows
within the Shannon framework without needing an observer. I use this
equation, for example, in my 1995-book The Challenge of Scientometrics
(Chapters 8 and 9), with a reference to Theil (1972). The relative
information is defined as the H/H(max).

 

I agree that the intuitive notion of information is derived from the Latin
"in-formare" (Varela, 1979). But most of us do no longer use "force" and
"mass" in the intuitive (Aristotelian) sense. J The proliferation of the
meanings of information if confused with "meaningful information" is
indicative for an "index sui et falsi", in my opinion. The repetitive
discussion lames the progression at this list. It is "like asking whether a
glass is half empty or half full" (Hayles, 1990, p. 59). 

 

This act of forming forming an information process results in the
construction of an observer that is the owner [holder] of information.

 

The system of reference is then no longer the message, but the observer who
provides meaning to the information (uncertainty). I agree that this is a
selection process, but the variation first has to be specified independently
(before it can be selected.

 

And Lerner introduces the threshold between objective and subjective
observes (page 27).   This leads to a consideration selection and
cooperation that includes entanglement.

 

I don't see a direct relation between information and entanglement. An
observer can be entangled.

 

Best, 

Loet

 

PS. Pedro: Let me assume that this is my second posting in the week which
ends tonight. L.

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Fwd: What is life?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

The problem is that information is not an absolute. The same code when
measured against different references (English vs. Spanish in this case)
will yield different measures. It's the obverse of the Third Law of
Thermodynamics. See < <http://people.clas.ufl.edu/ulan/files/FISPAP.pdf>
http://people.clas.ufl.edu/ulan/files/FISPAP.pdf>

 

Dear Bob, 

 

It seems to me that you confuse information with what information means for
a system of reference. Different systems of reference, of course, can
attribute different meanings to the same information.

 

@Alex: this confusion is unfortunately pervasive. Unlike Shannon-type
information, "information" is often defined (following Bateson and McKay) as
"a difference which makes a difference", without articulation that the
second difference presumes the specification of a system of reference. 

 

A series of differences of the first type can be considered as a probability
distribution that contains uncertainty. "A difference which makes a
difference", however, can be considered as "meaningful information". In my
opinion, this "meaningful information" should not be equated with
information because one then uses the same word for two different things and
thus generates confusion.

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Fis Digest, Vol 32, Issue 13

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Malcolm:

 

To an animal about to be attacked and eaten, the meaning of an approaching 
predator is quite clear.

 

Obviously, meaning is produced by, within, and among Observers, and not by 
language.

 

“Quite clear” and “obviously” are no arguments. It is “as if” the animal 
attributes meaning, but this is metaphorical. You as an analyst characterize 
the behavior as based on providing meaning to the event by the animal. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Is quantum information the basis of spacetime?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Alex and colleagues, 

 

Thank you for the reference; but my argument was about “meaning”. “Meaning” can 
only be considered as constructed in language. Other uses of the word are 
metaphorical. For example, the citation to Maturana.

 

Information, in my opinion, can be defined content-free (a la Shannon, etc.) 
and then be provided with meaning in (scholarly) discourses. I consider physics 
as one among other scholarly discourses. Specific about physics is perhaps the 
universalistic character of the knowledge claims. For example: “Frieden's 
points apply to quantum physics 

as well as classical physics.“ So what? This seems to me a debate within 
physics without much relevance for non-physicists (e.g., economists or 
linguists).

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Alex Hankey [mailto:alexhan...@gmail.com] 
Sent: Saturday, November 12, 2016 8:07 PM
To: Loet Leydesdorff; FIS Webinar
Subject: Re: [Fis] Is quantum information the basis of spacetime?

 

Dear Loet and Fis Colleagues, 

 

Are you aware of Roy Frieden's 

'Physics from Fisher Information'. 

His book was published in the 1990s.

I consider it a very powerful statement. 

 

Ultimately everything we can detect at 

both macroscopic and microscopic levels 

depends on information production from 

a quantum level that forms Fisher Information. 

 

Frieden's points apply to quantum physics 

as well as classical physics. 

 

Best wishes, 

 

Alex Hankey 

 

 

On 12 November 2016 at 18:56, Loet Leydesdorff <l...@leydesdorff.net> wrote:

Dear Marcus, 

 

When considering things in terms of "functional significance" one must confront 
the need to address "meaning" in terms of both the living and the physical . . 
. and their necessarily entangled nature.

 

“Meaning” is first a linguistic construct; its construction requires interhuman 
communication. However, its use in terms of the living and/or the physical is 
metaphorical. Instead of a discourse, one can this consider (with Maturana) as 
a “second-order consensual domain” that functions AS a semantic domain without 
being one; Maturana (1978, p. 50): 

 

“In still other words, if an organism is observed in its operation within a 
second-order consensual domain, it appears to the observer as if its nervous 
system interacted with internal representations of the circumstances of its 
interactions, and as if the changes of state of the organism were determined by 
the semantic value of these representations. Yet all that takes place in the 
operation of the nervous system is the structure-determined dynamics of 
changing relations of relative neuronal activity proper to a closed neuronal 
network.”

 

Failing to "make that connection" simply leaves one with an explanatory gap. 
And then, once connected, a further link to "space-time" is also easily located 
. . .

 

Yes, indeed: limiting the discussion to the metaphors instead of going to the 
phore (that is, language and codification in language) leaves one with an 
explanatory gap. Quantum physics, for example, is a highly specialized language 
in which “mass” and “information” are provided with meanings different from 
classical physics.

 

Best, 

Loet

 

 


___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis





 

-- 

Alex Hankey M.A. (Cantab.) PhD (M.I.T.)
Distinguished Professor of Yoga and Physical Science,
SVYASA, Eknath Bhavan, 19 Gavipuram Circle
Bangalore 560019, Karnataka, India  
Mobile (Intn'l): +44 7710 534195 

Mobile (India) +91 900 800 8789



 

 <http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00796107/119/3> 2015 JPBMB 
Special Issue on Integral Biomathics: Life Sciences, Mathematics and 
Phenomenological Philosophy

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Is quantum information the basis of spacetime?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Marcus, 

 

When considering things in terms of "functional significance" one must confront 
the need to address "meaning" in terms of both the living and the physical . . 
. and their necessarily entangled nature.

 

“Meaning” is first a linguistic construct; its construction requires interhuman 
communication. However, its use in terms of the living and/or the physical is 
metaphorical. Instead of a discourse, one can this consider (with Maturana) as 
a “second-order consensual domain” that functions AS a semantic domain without 
being one; Maturana (1978, p. 50): 

 

“In still other words, if an organism is observed in its operation within a 
second-order consensual domain, it appears to the observer as if its nervous 
system interacted with internal representations of the circumstances of its 
interactions, and as if the changes of state of the organism were determined by 
the semantic value of these representations. Yet all that takes place in the 
operation of the nervous system is the structure-determined dynamics of 
changing relations of relative neuronal activity proper to a closed neuronal 
network.”

 

Failing to "make that connection" simply leaves one with an explanatory gap. 
And then, once connected, a further link to "space-time" is also easily located 
. . .

 

Yes, indeed: limiting the discussion to the metaphors instead of going to the 
phore (that is, language and codification in language) leaves one with an 
explanatory gap. Quantum physics, for example, is a highly specialized language 
in which “mass” and “information” are provided with meanings different from 
classical physics.

 

Best, 

Loet

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

[Fis] 11,359 journal maps in a hierarchical classification system; (my second penny for this week)

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Clustered Journal Maps <https://arxiv.org/abs/1610.03779> 


Loet Leydesdorff, Lutz Bornmann, and Caroline S. Wagner

 

Journal maps for 11,359 journals listed in the combined Journal Citation
Reports 2015 of the Science and Social Sciences Citation Indexes are
provided at www.leydesdorff.net/jcr15 . A routine using VOSviewer for
integrating the journal mapping and their hierarchical clustering is also
made available. In this short communication, we provide background on the
journal mapping/clustering and an explanation and instructions about the
routine. 

 

Available at https://arxiv.org/abs/1610.03779 ; maps at
http://www.leydesdorff.net/jcr15 

 

  _____  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Scientific communication (from Mark)

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark and colleagues, 

 

Loet, clearly the redundancy is apophatic, although one has to be cautious
in saying this: the domain of the apophatic is bigger than the domain of
Shannon redundancy. At some point in the future we may do better in
developing measurement techniques for 'surprise' in communication (I wonder
if Lou Kauffman's Recursive Distinguishing is a way forwards...). 

 

The extension of the redundancy is not primarily a matter of measurement
techniques, but of theorizing. The redundancy depends on the specification
of the system. The Shannon-type information is empirical, but only the
specification of the system enables us to specify the H(max) and therefore
the redundancy.

 

As the system grows, it may develop new dimensions which are manifest as
bifurcations. (Reaction-diffusion dynamics; Rashevsky, Turing.) When one
goes from one dimension n to a two-dimensional system [n,m], the number of
options [H(max)] goes from log(n) to log(n * m), and thus the redundancy
increases rapidly. 

 

For example: as long as transport over the Alps is limited to passes like
the Brenner, the capacity can become exhausted. Digging tunnels or flying
over the Alps adds degrees of freedom to the transport system. The number of
options (n * m * k * ..) can "explode" by cultural and technological
developments.  The transitions come as surprises (e.g., the demise of the
Soviet-Union). Suddenly, the relevant systems definitions have to be
revised.

 

The systems definitions have the status of hypotheses. Hypotheses can be
considered as theoretically informed expectations. The world of expectations
proliferates with a dynamic different from the actualizations. The two
realms are coupled since the actualizations can be considered as
instantiations of the order of expectations; but only if the latter is
specified as different from the empirical order of realizations.

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _____  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Scientific Communication and Publishing

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark, 

 

The redundancy is apophatic. Redundancy is not "given", but generation by the 
specification of a model: what is specified as a system. Redundancy can also be 
considered as options other than the ones realized. As we argued in our 
Kybernetes paper, technological developments may enlarge the number of options 
by orders of magnitude. The redundancy and maximum entropy can then proliferate 
much faster than the realizations. This development of the economy is knowledge 
based. 

 

How can we study and operationalize redundancy or the apophatic? By studying 
and improving our models which generate them in the reflection. In operational 
terms, by the specification of informed hypotheses. Our imagination enables us 
to envisage options other than the ones realized and the communication 
(discourse) can entertain models that provide a phase space of options, other 
than realized or imagined. Hypotheses can be tested and modified.

 

Best,

Loet

 


Loet Leydesdorff, Inga Ivanova, and Mark Johnson, The Communication of 
Expectations and Individual Understanding: Redundancy as Reduction of 
Uncertainty, and the Processing of Meaning <http://ssrn.com/abstract=2358791> , 
Kybernetes 43(9/10) (2014) 1362-1371.

 

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam

Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 

Associate Faculty, SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor, Birkbeck, University of London; 

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

-Original Message-
From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Mark Johnson
Sent: Wednesday, October 05, 2016 10:04 AM
To: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Scientific Communication and Publishing

 

Dear Sergej, Rafeal, Loet, Dai and list,

 

First of all, thank you very much for the references – Gieryn looks fascinating 
(thanks Loet), and I will check out the Hobart and Schiffman (thanks to Pedro). 
It always strikes me how powerful acts of intellectual generosity are, and how 
much difference there is between pointing to a reference as if to say “This is 
the gang of academics who either agree with me or I disagree with them!” and 
“As someone who’s travelled along a similar path to you, I believe you might 
find this enlightening”. When we write academic papers, we tend to (indeed, 
have to) do the former. The latter is far more empathic - which leads me to 
reflect on Rafael’s comment about pre-understanding (I say more about this 
further down) On a forum like FIS, we can do the latter. I ask myself which is 
more useful or constructive in scientific discourse, and which should be 
encouraged?

 

Between the comments of Dai and Sergej I think there is what Pedro refers to as 
the ‘critical stance’ (as in critical theory etc, I guess). Here I would like 
to clarify my position. I do not believe that we “ought” to change the way we 
communicate about science because publishers and universities have too much 
power; that they have too much power is a systemic consequence of something 
else. Rather the argument is that the nature of the science we now practice 
(complex, uncertain, contingent) necessitates new forms of communication, and 
this science cannot effectively communicate itself through traditional media. 
It is not an argument about ‘oughts’, it is an argument about the ontology of 
complex science and communication; it is a complex science reflection on the 
communication of complex scientists.

 

That we currently have complex science and highly attenuated channels of 
communication is a source of pathology: we are at a transitional stage in 
history and such periods are often accompanied by all manner of social and 
political problems (just think of the pathologies of the early 1600s!). One 
feature of this is that we slip from talking about ‘is’ to ‘ought’ without 
reflection. I’m unconvinced by the power of political arguments (however much 
our professors of sociology would like to persuade us otherwise!) for moving 
things on – it only encourages what Bacon criticized in the Cambridge academics 
of the

1600s: “They hunt more after words than matter” (I worry about words like 
‘entanglement’ – what does it mean?); it is scientific arguments and practices 
which carry the greatest power and which (in the end) are ontologically 
inseparable from political change. I suspect the distinctions between different 
kind of arguments are the result of different kinds of constraint.

 

Having said all this about science, I want to say something about

theology(!) Rafael’s point about “pre-understanding” sent me to the work of 
Arthur Peacocke and to the relationship between ‘information’

and ‘logos’. To see information as constraint in both in the science we do, and 
in the way we communicate our scientific understanding,

Re: [Fis] Fwd: Scientific publication: Response

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark, 

Thank you for another so beautiful video!

Your focus on constraints is reminiscent of Thomas Gieryn's (1983) "boundary
objects" (cf. Star & Griesemer, 1989). You may find it interesting to make
the connection.

>From my perspective, the constraints are historical -- as different from
evolutionary. One can consider them as the footprints of the development
(retention mechanism). In the early stage, the constraints shield the new
development; but the order of control can be inverted: the genesis is
bottom-up, but control can be top-down in a next phase. For example, first
one needs a university context for generating a new field, but the emerging
paradigm thereafter may begin to shape the departments, the conferences,
etc. The self-organization of the paradigmatic development can be
distinguished from the historical development at the organizational level.
Both are needed and thus one expects a trade-off. 

The historical development of constraints necessarily generates
probabilistic entropy (Shannon-type information) because of the Second Law.
The evolutionary development restructures and can be expected to reduce
uncertainty.

What is evolving? You say it nicely in the first paper: the coordination
among expectations. (at p. 6: "How might scholarly expectations be
coordinated in an uncertain world?") The (hypothesized!) coordination is
also the selection mechanism. With hindsight some expectations have to
changed to fit into the new paradigm; others perhaps discarded as noise or
left behind as variation (outdated?). "A science that hesitates to forget
its founders is lost." (Whitehead, 1916, p. 81): the paradigm forces to
rewrite the history in the name of intellectual integrity and new
opportunities.

By focusing on the constraints, you may miss what is constrained. The system
is socially constructed; but -- unlike social-constructivism -- not the
construction itself, but the constructed is taking the lead. Of course, this
has to be worked out empirically: is organization prevailing or
self-organization? Is uncertainty generated or redundancy?

I hope that this is understandable. If some colleagues feel lost, please,
see also: Leydesdorff, Petersen & Ivanova (in press); Leydesdorff, Johnson &
Ivanova (2014).  

Best,
Loet

References:

Gieryn, T. F. (1983). Boundary-Work and the Demarcation of Science from
Non-Science: Strains and Interests in Professional Ideologies of Scientists.
American Sociological Review, 48(6), 781-795.

Leydesdorff, L., Petersen, A., & Ivanova, I. (in press). The
self-organization of meaning and the reflexive communication of information.
Social Science Information (arXiv preprint arXiv:1507.05251). 

Leydesdorff, L., Johnson, M., & Ivanova, I. A. (2014). The Communication of
Expectations and Individual Understanding: Redundancy as Reduction of
Uncertainty, and the Processing of Meaning. Kybernetes, 43(9/10), 1362-1371.


Star, S. L., & Griesemer, J. R. (1989). Institutional Ecology,Translations,
and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of
Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-39. Social Studies of Science, 19(3), 387-420.

Whitehead, A. N. (1916). Address to the British Association at Newcastle.
Nature, 98(14 September 1916), 80-81. doi: 10.1038/098033a0

Loet Leydesdorff 
Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)
l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty, SPRU, University of Sussex; 
Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
Beijing;
Visiting Professor, Birkbeck, University of London; 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

-Original Message-
From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Mark Johnson
Sent: Friday, September 30, 2016 1:46 PM
To: fis; Pedro C. Marijuan
Subject: [Fis] Fwd: Scientific publication: Response

Dear FIS Colleagues,

Thank you very much for your comments. I've made a video response which can
be found here: https://youtu.be/r8T2ssGAius

The video mostly concerns Loet's comment about selection and codification
and references Sergej's point about "shared objects" (and its relation to
activity theory). Shared objects are extremely important, but Francisco is
right - Loet's point about codification goes the heart of the matter.

In responding to Loet (and to some extent Sergej) I draw attention to the
nature of teaching and its distinction with communication. This means
standing back from Luhmann's binary model of communication, which he saw as
a contingency-reduction process in the selection of meaning. Instead I
suggest looking at communication as a process of the revealing and
coordination of constraints. In Loet's work, I think this is probably the
same as redundancy... Both Ashby and Von Foerster are powerful reference
points for a deeper understanding - notably Von Foerster's paper "On self
organising syst

Re: [Fis] Scientific Communication and Publishing

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark, Moises, and colleagues, 

I agree that this is a very beautiful piece of work. The video is impressive. 

My comment would focus on what it is that constructs reality "by language" (p. 
2). I agree with the remark about the risk of a linguistic fallacy; but how is 
the domain of counterfactual expectations constructed? The answer in the paper 
tends towards a sociological explanation: "status" for which one competes in a 
new political economy. However, it seems to me that the selection mechanism has 
to be specified. Can this be external to the communication? How is the 
paradigmatic/epistemic closure and quality control brought about by the 
communication? How is a symbolic layer shaped and coded?

One cannot reverse the reasoning: the editorial boards follow standards that 
they perceive as relevant and can reproduce. The standards are not a convention 
of the board since one would not easily agree. Reversing the reasoning would 
bring us back to interests and thus to a kind of neo-marxism a la the sociology 
of scientific knowledge (SSK). In actor-network theory (ANT) the emergence of 
standards happens historically/evolutionarily, but is not explained. 

I don't have answers on my side. But perhaps, the strength of anticipation and 
the role of models needs to be explored. Models can be entertained and enable 
us to reconstruct a knowledge-based reality.

Best,
Loet 


Loet Leydesdorff 
Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)
l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty, SPRU, University of Sussex; 
Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, Beijing;
Visiting Professor, Birkbeck, University of London; 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en


-Original Message-
From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Moisés André 
Nisenbaum
Sent: Tuesday, September 27, 2016 1:45 AM
To: Mark Johnson
Cc: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Scientific Communication and Publishing

Dear Mark.

Thank you for the excelent video and article. It is very important to discuss 
this and, if you agree, I will use your video with my students (can you send me 
the transcription?).
No doubt we are in a changing world and we have to fight against abusive 
processes, like publication industry.

In Rafael's article, the question “what is a scientific journal in the digital 
age?” I understand that we must think outside the box. I think it would be 
great if some group invent a kind of "Uber" of scientific production. Something 
that connect directly authors and readers at feasible rates.  arXiv does this 
connection in some way, but it is not universal. E-science is also a good 
initiative.

Related to this discussion, UNESCO will do an event on Wednesday
(sep/28th) at Museu do Amanhã (Rio de Janeiro) called International Day for 
Universal Access to Information (http://en.unesco.org/iduai2016).

But the fact is: we are human and the worry about "reputation" is the real 
reason of today's organization of scientific communication (about this, this 
book chapter is very good: VAN RAAN, Anthony FJ. The interdisciplinary nature 
of science: theoretical framework and bibliometric-empirical approach. 
Practising interdisciplinarity, p.
66-78, 2000.)

Kind regards,

Moisés



2016-09-26 4:55 GMT-03:00 Mark Johnson <johnsonm...@gmail.com>:
>
> Dear FIS Colleagues,
>
> To kick-start the discussion on scientific publishing, I have prepared 
> a short (hopefully provocative) video. It can be found at:
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Bh3vqM98-U
>
> (if anyone's interested, the software I used for producing it is 
> called 'Videoscribe')
>
> I have also produced a paper which is attached.
>
> I hope you find these interesting and stimulating!
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Mark
> --
> 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
>
> ___
> Fis mailing list
> Fis@listas.unizar.es
> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
>



--
Moisés André Nisenbaum
Doutorando IBICT/UFRJ. Professor. Msc.
Instituto Federal do Rio de Janeiro - IFRJ Campus Rio de Janeiro 
moises.nisenb...@ifrj.edu.br

___
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

Re: [Fis] Fis Digest, Vol 28, Issue 22

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Marcus and colleagues,  

 

But when it comes to drawing a hard line *within* behavioral adaptation – for 
example differences between instinctual behaviors and more cognitive behaviors 
– this (presently) is beyond my grasp. So the point you two now seem (to me) to 
circle around is effective differences between instinctual and cognitive 
behavior, between species.

 

Entropy develops with the arrow of time, but meaning is provided from the 
perspective of hindsight, that is, against the arrow of time. Providing meaning 
can sometimes (!) reduce uncertainty. In the Shannon model, such a reversal of 
the time arrow (feedback and feedforward) is not possible. However, in a 
knowledge-based economy, the generation of redundancies (new options and 
expectations) is crucial for the competition. 

 

Obviously, this is not biological competition such as “between species”. The 
domain is not the one of biological realizations, but of cultural expectations 
that is exclusively (inter-)human. (This cultural evolution is constrained by 
the biological/physical conditions which can be considered as a retention 
mechanism.) The dynamics are shaped in terms of expectations (“cogitata” 
carried by “cogitantes”). 

 

Another way to study this is in terms of the theory and computation of 
anticipatory systems (Rosen, Dubois). The strongly anticipatory system that 
shapes its own future options is based on the exchange and codification of 
expectations at the supra-individual level. The future states can drive a 
knowledge-based development more than the historical ones.

 

The duality between forward (historical) development and cultural evolution can 
be assessed in terms of mutual information and redundancy generation 
(Leydesdorff & Ivanova, 2014). The reduction to an a priori origin, in my 
opinion, is not a good idea. The formal a priori is contained in the notion of 
probability (which grounds also Shannon’s entropy).

 

Best,

Loet

 

PS. Pedro: my last posting was on Sunday evening. L.

 

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Cultural Legacy Redux (Freewheeling Speculation)

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Michel and colleagues,

I agree that adaptation is not specifically human and that "humanity's main
adaptive role" is not to be defined as "information". The best candidate
for a spefically human is probably, in my opinion, "double contingency":
Ego expects Alter to entertain expectations as s/he does herself. These
expectations can be exchanged (for example, in language), and also be
codified at the interpersonal level (for example, in legislation or in
scholarly discourse).

How does this relate to information? In my opinion, the dynamics of meaning
are driving cultural evolution. Information is needed at the bottom
providing the variation. The codes of communication -- for example, in
discourse among biologists (Pedro!) -- operate as next-order selection
mechanisms. These selection mechanisms are not "objective" or observable,
but can be expected to operate and be hypotesized; for example, in a
sociology of communication. We have access to these discourses
infra-reflexively.

Best,
Loet



On Sat, Jul 16, 2016 at 4:42 PM, Michel Godron <migod...@wanadoo.fr> wrote:

>
> You wrote :
> "First, humanity’s MAIN ADAPTIVE ROLE is “information,” if someone
> questions that fact *I invite you to post your view *and I will happily
> “reply.
>
> My reply is  (in red) :
> O K but I am not sure that the profound reason why it is true is clear for
> every one : this constatation "humanity’s MAIN ADAPTIVE ROLE is
> information,”  (or "information is the main way to adapt") is true also for 
> *any
> living being*, because the basic functioning of Life is a tranmission of
> information. That information is necessary for any living being to adapt to
> its environment in a cybernetic system (which was not well understood by
> von Bertalanffy cf. Fritjof Capra p. 48).
>
>  I could explain this with more details, if you want, for each of the six
> main scales (molecules in a cell, genetics with DNA, epigenetics, vegetal
> and animal communities, landscapes, humanity).
>
> M. Godron
>
> _______
> Fis mailing list
> Fis@listas.unizar.es
> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
>
>


-- 
Loet Leydesdorff
Professor Emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
l...@leydesdorff.net;  http://www.leydesdorff.net/
___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Shannonian Mechanics? - Species specific?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Jerry, 

 

At the risk of being jailed by Pedro, let me point to the beauty of the example:

 

>From a molecular biological perspective, the assertion of “same encoding” of 
>information is contrary to fact.

 

OK: the coding of the information is species specific; both theoretically and 
empirically. I fully agree. 

But this argument cannot carry the inference that the information (to be coded) 
is species specific. 

 

If one wishes to define information as “a difference which makes a difference”, 
reference systems for both differences have to be specified. Differences(1) can 
make a difference(2) for a system of reference (receiver). The latter system 
can receive the information and code it, or the information can be discarded as 
noise. 

 

Noise or probabilistic entropy can be defined as  differences(1) without 
difference(2). A set of differences(1) can be considered as a probability 
distribution which is yet meaningless; that is, Shannon-type information. 

 

Distinguishing between the coding (= diff2 operating on diff1) and the coded 
differences(1) is a condition for analytical clarity. Otherwise, one uses the 
same word for two different concepts and confusion is expected to prevail. The 
idea that one can reconcile two analytical different concept in a “universal” 
theory is mistaken.

 

Best,

Loet 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Shannonian Mechanics?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Pedro and colleagues, 

 

The figure from Weaver in Loet's excellent posting leaves a few aspects
outside. The why, the what, the how long, the with whom, and other aspects
of the information phenomenon do not enter. By doing that we have
streamlined the phenomenon... and have left it ready for applying a highly
successful theory, in the technological and in many other realms
(linguistics, artif. intelligence, neurodynamics, molec. networks, ecol.
networks, applied soc. metrics, etc). Pretty big and impressive, but is it
enough? Shouldn't we try to go beyond?



In my opinion, “The why, the what, the how long, the with whom, and other
aspects …” are subject to substantive theorizing. The type of answers will
be very different when studying biological or other systems of reference.
But then the information is provided with meaning by these theories and we
discuss “meaningful information” as different from Shannon-type information.
There will in this case a dimension to the information. 

 

For example, when particles collide, there is exchange of momenta and
energy. The dissipation is then dimensioned as Joule/Kelvin (S = k H). In
chemistry one assumes a mass balance and thus a redistribution of atoms over
molecules, etc. The dimensionality of interhuman communication is hitherto
not specified.  


I wonder whether a far wider "phenomenology of information" is needed
(reminding what Maxine argued months ago about the whole contemplation of
our own movement, or Plamen about the "war on cancer"?). If that inquiry is
successful we could find for instance that:



This is not successful. It does not lead to a research program, but to
“philosophie spontanée des savant” (Althusser) as your comprehensive
question for “The why, the what, the how long, the with whom, and other
aspects” illustrates. The hidden program is biologistic:


2. Those UNIVERSALS are SPECIES' SPECIFIC.

 

“ESSENTIAL CORES” are discipline specific!


3. Those UNIVERSALS would be organized, wrapped, around an ESSENTIAL CORE.
It would consist in the tight ingraining of self-production and
communication (almost inseparable, and both information based!). In the
human special case, it is the whole advancement of our own lives what
propels us to engage in endless communication --about the universals of our
own species-- but with the terrific advantage of an open-ended communication
system, language.

4. Those UNIVERSALS would have been streamlined in very different ways and
taken as "principles" or starting points for a number of
disciplines--remembering the discussion about the four Great Domains of
Science. A renewed Information Science should nucleate one of those domains.




“Should” is an expression of uneasiness? In my opinion, the assumption of an
origin is problematic: order is not given (ex ante) and then branching, but
emerging (ex post) from disorder (entropy). Is “disorder” perhaps a
universal? In which specific system? (I would have a provisional answer/
hypothesis; but this is my second penny for this week.)

 

Best,

Loet


Best regards to all, 
(and particular greetings to the new parties joined for this discussion)
--Pedro
   

El 27/06/2016 a las 12:43, Marcus Abundis escribió:

 

Dear Loet,

 

I hoped to reply to your posts sooner as of all the voices on FIS I
often sense a general kinship with your views. But I also confess I have
difficulty in precisely grasping your views – the reason for my delay.

 

>[while Shannon’s] concept of information (uncertainty) <

> is counter-intuitive. It enables us among other things <

> to distinguish between "information" and "meaningful <

> information". <

• Easily agreed; *how* to distinguish a presumed meaning (or
meaningless-ness) then becomes the remaining issue.

 

> Providing . . . meaning presumes the specification <

> of a system of reference; for example, an observer.< 

• It is telling for me (in viewing our differences and likenesses) that you
suggest an observer. My “system of relating“ accommodates but does not
require an observer (okay – observer, defined how?), as shown immediately
below.

 

>Different[ly] . . . expected information is dimensionless<

> ("a priori"). <

• I suggest the act of “expectation“ already infers minimal dimensions – for
example, who/what/how is doing the expecting? Thus, in my view, this is not
truly a priori. A “readiness“ or a compelling functional need innate to any
“system of relating“ has bearing. For example, a single Oxygen atom has a
compelling/innate need to react with other elements, just as any agent is
compelled to react to “nutrients.“ Both imply dimensional expectations, no?
(obviously – of different orders/types).

 

> In my opinion, a "real theory of meaning" should enable <

> us to specify/measure meaning as redundancy / reduction <

> of uncertainty given . . . I took this further in . . . <

> The Self-Organization of Meaning and the Reflexive . . .<

• My weak grasp of the concepts in this paper leads me to 

Re: [Fis] _comment to the "A Priori Modeling of Information"

[Loet Leydesdorff]

As a first step in the specification of the relevance of Shannon's
engineering model for developing a theory of meaning, Weaver (1949, at p.
26) proposed two minor additions to Shannon's diagram of a communication
channel, as follows: 

 

"One can imagine, as an addition to the diagram, another box labeled
"Semantic Receiver" interposed between the engineering receiver (which
changes signals to messages) and the destination. This semantic receiver
subjects the message to a second decoding, the demand on this one being that
it must match the statistical semantic characteristics of the message to the
statistical semantic capacities of the totality of receivers, or of that
subset of receivers which constitute the audience one wishes to affect. 

Similarly one can imagine another box in the diagram which, inserted between
the information source and the transmitter, would be labeled "semantic
noise," the box previously labeled as simply "noise" now being labeled
"engineering noise." From this source is imposed into the signal the
perturbations or distortions of meaning which are not intended by the source
but which inescapably affect the destination. And the problem of semantic
decoding must take this semantic noise into account." 

 

 

cid:image003.png@01D1CF8B.1F207680

 

Figure 1: Weaver's (1949) "minor" additions penciled into Shannon's (1948)
original diagram.

 

Since the "semantic receiver" recodes the information in the messages
(received from the "engineering receiver" who only changes signals into
messages) while having to assume the possibility of "semantic noise," a
semantic relationship between the two new boxes can also be envisaged. Given
Shannon's framework, however, this relation cannot be considered as another
information transfer-since semantics are defined as external to Shannon's
engineering model. 

 

Semantics are not based on specific communications, but on relations among
patterns of relations or, in other words, correlations. In the case of a
single relation, the relational distance is not different from the
correlational one; but in the case of relations involving three (or more)
agents, the distances in the vector space are different from the Euclidean
distances in the network space. In a triplet, the instantiation of one or
the other relation can make a difference for the further development of the
triadic system of relations. 

 

A system of relations can be considered as a semantic domain (Maturana,
1978). In other words, the sender and receiver are related in the graph of
Figure 1, while they are correlated in terms of not necessarily instantiated
relations in the background. The structure of correlations provides a latent
background that provides meaning to the information exchanges in relations.
The correlations are based on the same information, but the representation
in the vector space is different from the graph in the network space of
observable relations. 

 

In other words, meaning is not added to the information, but the same
information is delineated differently and considered from a different
perspective (including absent relations; i.e., zeros in the distribution).
As against Shannon-type information which flows linearly from the sender to
the receiver, one can expect meanings to loop, and thereby, to develop
next-order dimensionalities. New meanings generate new options and thus
redundancy. In my opinion, the task is to specify mechanisms which generate
redundancy (cf. Leydesdorff & Ivanova, 2014).

 

Source: Loet Leydesdorff, Alexander Petersen, and Inga A. Ivanova, The
Self-Organization of Meaning and the Reflexive Communication of Information.
<http://arxiv.org/abs/1507.05251>  Social Science Information (in press).
 
Loet Leydesdorff and Inga A. Ivanova, Mutual Redundancies in Inter-human
Communication Systems: Steps Towards a Calculus of Processing Meaning
<http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849> , Journal of the Association for
Information Science and Technology 65(2) (2014) 386-399.

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 




  _  

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] _ Reply to Annette (A Priori Modeling)

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Pedro and colleagues, 

 

"Agency" is missing. It is factually minimized under the form of constraints
and uncertainty. Communication occurs because some kind of "emitter" agent
operates as a "source" and sends "messages" via an appropriate "channel" to
some "receiver". I have put quotations to the standard Shannonian terms. My
central question: could there be any form of non-living agency? And then,
What different forms of life could receive the "agent" label? How being
alive biases the non-at-all-free communication game?



For example: if one constructs a citation matrix with the cited papers in
the rows and the citing papers in the columns, citing can be considered as
action and cited as structure. There is a mutual information between cited
and citing, but the effect of citing on cited is different from the effect
of cited on citing. Thus, one can evaluate agency.

 

See also: 

The Production of Probabilistic Entropy in Structure/Action Contingency
Relations,  <http://www.leydesdorff.net/jses95/jses95.pdf> Journal of Social
and Evolutionary Systems 18 (1995) 339-56.

 <http://www.leydesdorff.net/jtsb93/index.htm> "Structure"/"Action"
Contingencies and the Model of Parallel Distributed Processing, Journal for
the Theory of Social Behaviour 23 (1993) 47-77.

 

A similar argument can be made for evidence (agency) in relation to theory
(structure):

 

Knowledge Representations, Bayesian Inferences, and Empirical Science
Studies,  <http://www.leydesdorff.net/ssi92/index.htm> Social Science
Information 31 (1992, nr. 2), 213-37.

 

If so wished, I can provide pdf.


These questions will be refined next days...
Best--Pedro 



Best, 

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Fw: "Mechanical Information" in DNA

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

It seems to me that a definition of information should be compatible with the 
possibility to measure information in bits of information. Bits of information 
are dimensionless and “yet meaningless.” The meaning can be provided by the 
substantive system that is thus measured. For example, semantics can be 
measured using a semantic map; changes in the map can be measured as changes in 
the distributions, for example, of words. One can, for example, study whether 
change in one semantic domain is larger and/or faster than in another. The 
results (expressed in bits, dits or nits of information) can be provided with 
meaning by the substantive theorizing about the domain(s) under study. One may 
wish to call this “meaningful information”. 

 

I am aware that several authors have defined information as a difference that 
makes a difference (McKay, 1969; Bateson, 1973). It seems to me that this is 
“meaningful information”. Information is contained in just a series of 
differences or a distribution. Whether the differences make a difference seems 
to me a matter of statistical testing. Are the differences significant or not? 
If they are significant, they teach us about the (substantive!) systems under 
study, and can thus be provided with meaning in the terms of  studying these 
systems. 

 

Kauffman et al. (2008, at p. 28) define information as “natural selection 
assembling the very constraints on the release of energy that then constitutes 
work and the propagation of organization.” How can one measure this 
information? Can the difference that the differences in it make, be tested for 
their significance? 

 

Varela (1979, p. 266) argued that since the word “information” is derived from 
“in-formare,” the semantics call for the specification of a system of reference 
to be informed. The system of reference provides the information with meaning, 
but the meaning is not in the information which is “yet meaningless”. 
Otherwise, there are as many “informations” as there are systems of reference 
and the use of the word itself becomes a source of confusion.

 

In summary, it seems to me that the achievement of defining information more 
abstractly as measurement in bits (H = - Σ p log(p)) and the availability of 
statistics should not be ignored. From this perspective, information theory can 
be considered as another form of statistics (entropy statistics). A substantive 
definition of information itself is no longer meaningful (and perhaps even 
obscure): the expected information content of a distribution or the information 
contained in the message that an event has happened, can be expressed in bits 
or other measures of information.

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of John Collier
Sent: Thursday, June 09, 2016 12:04 PM
To: Joseph Brenner; fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Fw: "Mechanical Information" in DNA

 

I am inclined to agree with Joseph. That is why I put “mechanical information” 
in shudder quotes in my Subject line.

 

On the other hand, one of the benefits of an information approach is that one 
can add together information (taking care to subtract effects of common 
information – also describable as correlations). So I don’t think that the 
reductionist perspective follows immediately from describing the target 
information in the paper as “mechanical”. “Mechanical”, “mechanism” and similar 
terms can be used (and have been used) to refer to processes that are not 
reducible. “Mechanicism” and “mechanicist” can be used to capture reducible 
dynamics that we get from any conservative system (what I call Hamiltonian 
systems in my papers on the dynamics of emergence – such systems don’t show 
emergent properties except in a trivial sense of being unanticipated). I think 
it is doubtful at best that the mechanical information referred to is 
mechanicist.

 

John Collier

Professor Emeritus and Senior Research Associate

University of KwaZulu-Natal

http://web.ncf.ca/collier

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Joseph Brenner
Sent: Thursday, 09 June 2016 11:10 AM
To: fis <fis@listas.unizar.es>
Subject: [Fis] Fw: "Mechanical Information" in DNA

 

Dear Folks,

 

In my humbl

Re: [Fis] _ Re: _ FIS discusion

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

In my opinion, one can distinguish between the order of generation and emerging 
control. While consciousness (perhaps) arises from matter in terms of its 
generation, and language perhaps from movements, once these next-order systems 
levels have arisen, they tend to take over control and to reorganize the order 
within and among underlying systems levels. Language, for example, can further 
be developed into specialist languages, computer languages, etc., which affect 
(discipline) our behavior from above. The reduction of the complexity of 
language—used among other things to give meaning to events—to linguistic 
behavior by language carriers becomes then one research program among other 
research programs (e.g., Stan’s program to organize the world in terms of 
hierarchies).

 

One observes historical instantiations that may be organized along 
trajectories. Evolutionary, this generates variation and remains 
phenotypical/phenomenological. The selection mechanisms are not directly 
observable; they are specified by us in scholarly discourse and 
knowledge-based. Their specification sometimes provides more sophisticated 
(since theoretically informed) meaning to the same phenomena. The puzzle 
fascinating me is how this knowledge and information order transforms the 
underlying orders; first as feedback, but then increasingly as feedforward. 
Note that this does not de-legitimate the reductionists programs, but reduces 
their philosophical aspiration to one among possible research programs. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Associate Faculty,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Alex Hankey
Sent: Sunday, May 01, 2016 1:09 AM
To: FIS Webinar
Cc: Maxine Sheets-Johnstone
Subject: [Fis] _ Re: _ FIS discusion

 

In Answer to Maxine's comments 

 

While I understand Maxine's concern that we remain a phenomenological 
orientation in these discussions, and am gratified that in places we do seem to 
be achieving that, I also feel that many of us are here to bring our own 
particular perspectives, whether in Maths (Louis), Physics (myself), or 
Philosophy (albeit with Pragmatist leanings - Soren Brier), and to leave the 
phenomenologists themselves (such as Maxine) to take what is of use and 
translate it more precisely into terms that phenomenologists will accept more 
readily. 

 

For myself, I often have to listen to ideas (or students' questions) from those 
not familiar with strict scientific technicalities, and then to answer them in 
a language chosen for to try and avoid them being swamped (blinded?) by 
science. 

 

At the same time, I would like to thank Maxine for the depth and clarity of her 
thoughts - particularly her comment, "The bodies we are not", which I read 
through Vedanta-tinged spectacles (!!), her wonderful quotes from Aristotle, 
which were for me an eye opener. 

 

With regard to the referenced article on 'How Consciousness arises in Matter" 
in the Journal  of Consciousness Studies, it is clear that the current 
discussion is less concerned with description and more with how biological 
systems can support the sense of agency that leads to organism movement(s) in 
response to various stimuli. 

 

Here at the 2016 Science of Consciousness Conference in Tucson, there have been 
marvellous presentations on behaviour of babies, and how to appreciate various 
levels (or strengths) of self-awareness of agency, and of what kinds of 
behaviour may be expected in the first year, or two or three years of life as 
the brain grows and synaptic connections develop different levels of complexity 
in different brain regions like the (pre) frontal, auditory and visual 
cortices. The more synaptic connections the more complex behaviours and the 
more refined movements become possible. But with babies, we are limited to 
descriptions from the outside, rather than narratives by the 'person' 
him/her-self. 

 

On 30 April 2016 at 10:37, Maxine Sheets-Johnstone <m...@uoregon.edu> wrote:

To FIS colleagues,

First, an open-to-all response to Lou Kaufmann:

Thank you for your lengthy tutorial—some time back--but I wonder and am
genuinely puzzled given the “phenomenology-life sciences theme” why none
of the articles that I referenced were read and a r

Re: [Fis] _ Re: _ Discussion

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Lou and colleagues, 

 

The reasoning is very clear. Thank you.

 

(…)

At this point the being has attained linguistic self-reference. The being can 
say “I am the meta-name of my own naming process.”

This nexus or fixed point of self-reference can occur naturally in a being that 
has sufficient ability to distinguish, name and create.

 

It seems to me that as language arises from interhuman interactions, it takes 
over as the agent of change. One is called by a name which is then codified by 
that name.

 

This distinction is important because languages can be further differentiated 
and codified. Thomas Kuhn, for example, gives the example of “atom” having a 
meaning codified in some area of physics differently from physical chemistry. 
While we tend to call you “Lou”, the bureaucracy will call you “Louis”, and 
your wife may call you with yet another variant. These different names may 
enable you to enrich your “I”, without loosing a self-reference. I would call 
this self-reference with the additional degree of freedom for calling itself 
consciousness. Without consciousness, the name is only a semiotic “actant”. 
(Perhaps, a dog is a good example.)

 

The issue is important because once constructed, the codes guide the meaning 
(e.g., “atom”) at the supra-individual level. The control at individual level 
is only consciousness, including one’s own (idiosyncratic) degree of 
meta-reflexive freedom. From the perspective of communication, the latter 
provides the variation; in scholarly discourse, for example, knowledge claims 
are submitted. In other words, the epistemological grounding is to be found in 
the “inter” of inter-subjectivity. This goes against our (neo-liberal and 
enlightenment) intuition that agency grounds existence. The priority of 
understanding the communication tends to move the order among the sciences to a 
post-enlightenment one: a sociological epistemology becomes the center with the 
option to be operationalized in a sociology of scientific communication.

 

The additional degree of freedom in consciousness moreover enables us to 
participate selectively in the different domains. Latour called this 
“infra-reflexivity”. The selections shape our identity. The sciences are 
infra-reflexive to the extent that one can intervene across disciplinary 
language games; i.e., in other jargon. 

 

Best.

#Loet 

 

 

In this way, I convince myself that there is nothing special about 
self-reference. It arises naturally in observing systems. And I convince myself 
that self-reference is central to an organized and reflective cognition. Even 
though it is empty to say that “I am the one who says I.” this emptiness 
becomes though language an organizing center for our explorations of our own 
world and the worlds of others. The beauty of “I am the one who says I.” is 
that it is indeed a vacuous reference. Anyone can take it on. The “I” can refer 
to any observing system sophisticated enough to give it meaning.

 

My example should be expanded into a discussion of the role and creation of 
meaning in observing systems, but I shall stop here.

 

I am interested in how Soren Brier will react to these, perhaps seen as 
indirect, remarks on mind and meaning.

I take thought and the realm of discrimination as the start of epistemology and 
I do not regard the immediate apparent objects of our worlds as anything but 
incredibly decorated entities

appearing after a long history of indicative shift. What is their original 
nature? It is empty. Emptiness is form and form is emptiness. The form we take 
to exist arises from framing nothing.

 

Now, I caution you in replying to please read carefully what I have written 
here.

I will not reply directly to the discussion for another week or so.

 

Best,

Lou Kauffman

P.S. The indicative shift is precisely the formalism in back of the workings of 
Goedel’s Theorem.

See “Categorical Pairs and the Indicative Shift”, 
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1102.2048.pdf

 

 

 

On Apr 11, 2016, at 11:41 PM, Maxine Sheets-Johnstone  wrote:

 

To all colleagues,

I hope I may voice a number of concerns that have arisen in the course
of the ongoing discussions that are ostensibly about phenomenology and
the life sciences.

The concerns begin with a non-recognition of what is surely the ground
floor of real-life, real-time realities, namely, animation, not in the
sense of being alive or in opposition to the inanimate, but in the sense
of motion, movement, kinetics. As Aristotle cogently remarked,
“Nature is a principle of motion and change. . . . We must therefore see
that we understand what motion is; for if it were unknown, nature too
would be unknown” (Physics 200b12-14).

Through and through--from animate organisms to an ever-changing world--
movement is foundational to understandings of subject and world, and of
subject/world relationships, and this whether subject and world are
examined phenomenologically or scientifically. In 

Re: [Fis] _ DISCUSSION SESSION: INFOBIOSEMIOTICS

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Soren,

 

It is very strange for me to read yours –as usual very learned – text,
because your understanding of what it is I am trying to do is so different
from my own understanding. Though I have had great pleasure of reading you
works over the years I am not sure that you have read much of mine.

 

I read quite a bit of your texts, but I may have misunderstood. In that
case, I apologize.

 

Non-biologist usually underestimate the complexity of biological processes. 

 

I agree.

 

I do not know what you mean when you write about semiotics that it’s:”
status is not different from a methodology or a mathematical theory of
communication”? You seem to assume some postulate from me that is not
explicit in the text.

 

I formulated (quote):

 

“A mathematical theory of information (e.g., Shannon) enables us to
entertain models that one can use from one level to another, for testing
hypothesis. These models may come from biology (e.g. Lotka-Volterra),
engineering (anticipatory systems; Dubois), complex systems theory (Simon,
Ashby), etc. For example: can interactions among codes be modeled using
Lotka-Volterra? (Ivanova , 2014; in Scientometrics). The math is
not meta, but epi because the other domains can also be considered as
specific domains of communication. Maturana, for example, argues that a
biology is generated whenever molecules can be communicated (as more complex
than atoms exchanged in a chemistry).”

 

3. But of cause if you deny the central idea in systems theory and
especially Luhmann’s triple autopoietic theory of closed communication
systems, which I have accepted but want to put into a semiotic, pragmaticist
methodology and metaphysical framework, then of cause we do not speak the
same language at all and may be in a situation of incommensurability. 

 

I am not so sure that inter-human communications are closed in terms of
codes being unambiguous. It seems to me that differently coded
communications can always be translated more or less. Luhmann is often too
apodictic. For example, his notion of “truth” as the code for scholarly
communication seems not to hold empirically.

 

Let’s enjoy the communication. I am sorry if I offended you.

 

Best,

Loet

 

It is my feeling that you do not see what I see and attempts to communicate
and that you project postulates from scientistic researcher onto my theory
blocking you from seeing what it is I want to communicate. So I do not know
if we disagree – because that demands some mutual level of  understanding.

 

  Best

 Søren

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] _ DISCUSSION SESSION: INFOBIOSEMIOTICS

[Loet Leydesdorff]

serving "systems"; but
it is problematic to consider evolving discourse as a "system" (see above).
The codes in the communication of expectations enable us also to be
surprised by observations. (In the Shannon formulas, the denominator than
goes to zero and the expected information value therefore to infinity.)

 

Let me add that I don't wish to deny the fruitfulness of the Piercean system
of analyzing signs can have fruitful applications in the information
sciences. However, its status is not different from a methodology or a
mathematical theory of communication.

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

[Fis] Una Teoría Sociológica de la Comunicación: La Autoorganización de la Sociedad Basada en el Conocimiento

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Una Teoría Sociológica de la Comunicación:
<http://enlinea.uia.mx/libreriavirtual/detalle.cfm?clave=CSP0232
cion=LIBRO> 
La Autoorganización de la Sociedad Basada en el Conocimiento

edited and translated by Gabriel Vélez Cuartas, Liliana Ramirez Ruiz, Javier
Torres Nafarrate, et al. México: Universidad Iberoamerica (ISBN
978-607-417-343-7). Now available at
http://enlinea.uia.mx/libreriavirtual//detalle.cfm?clave=CSP0232
<http://enlinea.uia.mx/libreriavirtual/detalle.cfm?clave=CSP0232
cion=LIBRO> =LIBRO 

En esta obra, Leydesdorff retoma la teoría de la estructuración de Gidden,
la teoría de la acción comunicativa de Habermas y la propuesta de Luhmann de
la auto-organización de los sistemas sociales, y así, busca analizar si las
sociedades pueden, como propondría Luhmann, ser consideradas como
organizaciones autopoiéticas, es decir, si las sociedades son organizaciones
con la capacidad de crear sistemas auto-regulatorios para sí mismas. La
importancia de un análisis de esta naturaleza reside en que su aceptación
sería la contradicción directa a la tradición sociológica moderna, que
considera que la regulación social depende de la capacidad individual que
tiene cada sujeto de actuar en su mundo. Loet Leydesdorff, Doctor en
Sociología y profesor en el departamento de estudios de la comunicación en
la Universidad de Amsterdam, ha publicado textos de redes sociales,
filosofía de la ciencia, sociología de la innovación y cienciometría.

** apologies for cross-postings

  _____  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] _ Re: Response to Mark Johnson

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Mark, 

 

Let me just for academic purposes, note that the “we-relationship” is part of 
Schutz’ (1975 [1952]) critique of Husserl when he formulates as follows:

 

“As long as man is born from woman, intersubjectivity and the we-relationship 
will be the foundation for all other categories of human existence.” (p. 82; 
boldface added). 

 

Schutz wishes to bring the body back into the reflection, whereas Husserl’s 
position is more abstract:

 

“All communication, whether by so-called expressive movements, deictic 
gestures, or the use of visual or acoustic signs, already presupposes an 
external event in that common surrounding world which, according to Husserl, is 
not constituted except by communication.” (Schutz, 1975, at p. 72).

 

The bracketing abstracts from the body and immediacy (e.g., a supposed 
“feeling” or primary movement such as dance or music). These seeming 
immediacies can be reconstructed as symbolic media of communication (Luhmann, 
Parsons) using specific codes. Music, for example, is different from noise; 
dance different from spasm. The cultural intersubjectivity is primordial (from 
this perspective). 

 

It seems to me that this first abstraction is needed for defining information 
(H) first abstracted from a system of reference (such as biological processes 
or physical collisions). Systems of reference are needed for the measurement. 
Analogously, the body is needed for “making music together” (Schutz, 1951). 
However, the two steps have first to be distinguished, since “making music” is 
action that reorganizes possible structures. The window on the latter should 
not be obscured by focusing on the former. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

References:

 

·   Schutz, A. (1951). Making music together, Social Research, 18(1), 76-97.

·   Schutz, A. (1975). The Problem of Transcendental Intersubjectivity. In 
I. Schutz (Ed.), Collected Papers III. Studies in Phenomenological Philosophy 
(pp. 51-91). The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

 

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Mark Johnson
Sent: Friday, February 26, 2016 11:43 PM
To: FIS Webinar
Subject: [Fis] _ Re: Response to Mark Johnson

 

Dear Maxine,

 

Thank you for your response. I’m grateful for the reference you gave to your 
work on music, which I will read.

 

I found it interesting that in responding to my question about “what do we do 
when we describe something”, you pointed to the phenomenological method. I 
think this amplifies my question rather than addresses it. It also raises 
further questions about ‘coherent scientific discourse’ (the really important 
thing here is ‘coherence’).

 

The attraction of ‘pointing at the method’ is that we can get coherence by 
indexing the stages of the method: first we do ‘bracketing’, etc. Everyone 
who’s studied Husserl, even (or particularly) at a basic level, can agree. As 
simple steps to go through it perhaps isn’t controversial – until we ask about 
what bracketing is, or the nature and locus of the structures of consciousness 
which are revealed, or whether bracketing is possible at all...

 

Husserl accepted that consciousness was intersubjective, but his understanding 
of the Other in intersubjectivity was restricted to what Eugene Fink describes 
as “Others as are present to me in person (gegenwärtig anwesenden Anderen), 
that is to Others who stand in my near-field, in my perceptual field” (Fink's 
commentary on Schutz's paper 'The problems of Transcendental intersubjectivity 
in Husserl') Fink goes on to say “his analysis limits itself to explicating 
this Other as being present in a body, as having a body and, to this extent, 
not differing much from cats and dogs. And if having a body should serve as a 
sufficient indication of a transcendental fellow-subject, then one must 
consequently conclude that cats and dogs are also transcendental subjects.” 
That then leads on to a lot of problems in comparing cats and dogs to humans, 
amongst which are the ways that descriptions are made.

 

Acts of description, and acts of phenomenological reduction, occur in a world 
of Others. The question is, What conception of this world-of-others do we have, 
and how do different conceptions affect our description? I think the quest

Re: [Fis] Fis Digest, Vol 23, Issue 24

[Loet Leydesdorff]

All worldviews begin in a miracle. No exceptions.

 

I agree. Nevertheless, we should, and can, minimize the miracle. 

 

Why would one need a worldview? The whole assumption of an order as a Given
(in a Revelation) is religious. Order is always constructed (by us) and
can/needs to be explained. 

 

No "harmonia praestabilita", but ex post. No endpoint omega. No cosmology,
but chaology.

 

With due respect for those of you who wish to hold on to religion or nature
as a given; however, vaguely defined. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] _ Re: Maxine’s presentation

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Maxine and colleagues, 

It seems to me that the assumption of an origin takes a heavy load on this 
theory. We know that order can emerge from chaos. Any order will also disappear 
in the longer run. 

Why would one wish to make such assumptions? Meta-physical? 

Best,
Loet

Loet Leydesdorff 
Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)
l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU, University of Sussex; 
Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC, Beijing;
Visiting Professor, Birkbeck, University of London; 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Pedro C. Marijuan
Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 2:13 PM
To: 'fis'
Subject: [Fis] _ Re: Maxine’s presentation

Dear Maxine and Colleagues,

Concerning your presentation I have a couple of questions. About dance, first, 
let me inquire about another important aspect it may have, perhaps a "vital" 
one . In a number of species, dance is related to the mutual pre-exploration 
between potential reproductive partners. The individual fitness of the 
candidate(s) are evaluated quite strategically along the movements of dance, at 
least in the essential adaptive traits. Cultural layers of human societies may 
have created further "meanings" to dance (artistic, gimnastic, educative, 
therapeutic, etc.) but at the very roots of this human phenomenon the 
exploration between genders continues to be of the essence, I think. Those 
qualities you mention of tensional, linear, aerial, and projectional are in 
themselves excellent ways to observe the whole person: not only in the motoric 
dimension, but also concerning some related intellectual-emotional 
capabilities. The "gestalts" Alex mentions are colored very differently 
depending on the social/cultural contexts in which the same dance may take 
place. It is quite interesting that the folk inter-gender dance is performed in 
"safe" public spaces, and that it often conveys a feminine advantage (better 
synchronization of movements, more interest for fashionable pieces), etc. etc. 
Although perhaps it does not apply to most of present day "disco dance". Along 
your points, I was reminded that many years ago, someone in fis list wrote 
about the informational implications of "Tango" (originally a dance between 
castaway males in Argentina's immigrant squalors) ... it is a pity I can 
remember very little about that. 

And the second comment concerns the paleoanthropological tools. The analogy 
between the two major forms of tools and the two major tooth forms is very well 
developed.I quite agree, and also would like to ad a relationship with human 
gut-microbiome. We needed "artificial" teeth because with our terrific brain 
growth, the overall metabolic needs escalated almost 20%. However, at the same 
time the gut size (& contained microbiome) was reduced 50% in comparison with 
any Anthropoidea of our size. This is an impossible budget to maintain, unless 
the development of collective intelligence applied to our feeding and created 
completely original ways. These new ways were made possible by language, group 
identities, tools and artifact creation... but it was the new feeding style 
what pushed along this adaptive loop. We have called the new ways as "cooking", 
but actually it was a pre- or external digestion, achieved with those 
artifactual "molars and incisives", plus boiling, roasting, etc. And also by 
incorporating "external microbiomes"--fermentation-- for our service: bread, 
wine, beer, cheese, etc. The essential new foods of civilization. Cooking made 
us humans... how a "social brain" was created, and how our phenomenology became 
captive of group collective thinking might be a topic deserving further 
analysis.

Thanking in advance for the tolerance! 

Best--Pedro  

-
Phenomenology and Evolutionary Biology

(1): Phenomenology
As written in the Preface to the 2nd edition (1979) of The Phenomenology of 
Dance, “Certainly words carry no patented meanings, but the term 
‘phenomenology’ does seem stretched beyond its limits when it is used to denote 
either mere reportorial renderings of perceptive behaviors or actions, or any 
descriptive rendering at all of perceptible behaviors or actions. At the least, 
‘phenomenology’ should be recognized as a very specific mode of epistemological 
inquiry, a method of eidetic analysis invariably associated with the name 
Edmund Husserl, the founder of phenomenology; and at the most ‘phenomenology’ 
should be recognized as a philosophically-spawned terms, that is, a term having 
a 

Re: [Fis] Fw: Five Momenta. Five Itineraries

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Bruno:

 

These distinctions are not to be identified into a single "self" of the
self-reference, but to be dissolved (differentiated) in discourse. They are
carried by the communication in science & technology studies or more broadly
(since including the science/society interface) in the information sciences.
The "self" is not transcendental to these discourses, but reflexive insofar
as one has the communicative competencies to listen and - if so wished -- to
participate.

 

I think that I might agree with Pedro and Joseph. The unity of science
should be preserved, despite this is hard to do when specialities lost
themselves in gigantic territories. 

(.)

 

The unity here is given by a belief in Truth, the original main God of
Plato/Parmenides/Plotinus. 

(.)

 

I respectfully decline your offer of religious conversion.

 

I like to say that only bad faith fear reason, and only bad reasons fear
faith. 

 

I acknowledge the respect is not mutual. The word "bad" sounds very
normative to me.

 

Faith is always faith in some form of unity or unification of knowledge.

 

This was precisely my point. This assumption has turned into faith and thus
became outdated.

 

See also:

The Sciences are Discursive Constructs: The Communication Perspective as an
Empirical Philosophy of Science.
<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2499221>   Pp. 553-562
in: Lorenzo Cantoni and James A. Danowski (Eds.),
<http://www.degruyter.com/view/product/179986> Communication and Technology,
De Gruyter Mouton, 2015; doi:10.1515/9783110271355-032
<http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110271355-032> .

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] _ RE: _ Re: Cho 2016 The social life of quarks

[Loet Leydesdorff]

There is real communication between cells, people, organizations... as the
input is sensed (or disregarded) and judged according to boundary conditions
and to the accumulated experiential information content of the entity. The
outcome is adaptive: aiming at the self-production/self-propagation of the
entity.

 

"Real communication" among cells? It depends on how one defines
communication. 

Cells, for example, are not able to apologize for the misunderstanding.

 

But there is, indeed, adaptation based on exchange relations among cells.
This can also be considered as Shannon-type of communication + feedback
loops. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Five Momenta. Five Itineraries

[Loet Leydesdorff]

To Loet and Marcus: let us agree that disciplines are based on "communities of 
inquiry" that follow strict laws of "intellectual economy". Our limited 
capabilities force us to establish disciplinary specialization, and that's 
good, but a healthy knowledge system would also establish quite many "vertical" 
multidisciplines integrating the "horizontal" disciplines that apply 
simultaneously into concrete subjects (as happens in eg, medicine, engineering, 
anthrolpology, etc.).

 

Dear Pedro and colleagues, 

 

Empirically, we witness the rise of a new business model of publishing 
scholarly journals that are cross-disciplinary, such as PLoS One. See for more 
details my recent paper:

 

Loet Leydesdorff & Wouter de Nooy, Can  <http://arxiv.org/abs/1502.00229> "Hot 
Spots" in the Sciences Be Mapped Using the Dynamics of Aggregated 
Journal-Journal Citation Relations?, Journal of the Association for Information 
Science and Technology (in press); http://arxiv.org/abs/1502.00229 

 

This is a major development in the communication dynamics since 2007.

 

Furthermore, I don’t think that the metaphor of “communities of inquiry” is the 
right one. The communication is not limited by individual capacities, but 
supra-individual (at the relatively global level). The dynamics is not to be 
reduced to the interactions among communicators, but is due to the interaction 
among communications and in this sense second-order. Behavioral (including 
biological) aspects are not so relevant.

 

Offline, Soren suggested that this can all be modeled using bio-semiosis. I 
somewhat agree with the semiosis; but I don’t understand what the “bio” adds. 
This usually goes with references to Charles Pierce, but that does not really 
help. It seems to me that one has to add to semiosis a dose of structuralism 
(Parsons, Luhmann). The selection mechanisms are to be specified; these are not 
“natural”, but culturally constructed, fallible and probabilistic.

 

Best,

Loet

 

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor Emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Fw: Five Momenta. Five Itineraries

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Self-reference is a key principle in art and humor and it may also be a key
component of the structured coherence in science Pedro and we are seeking.

 

Dear Joseph:

 

Do not count me in to the "we", please. In my opinion, these "unity of
science" principles are outdated. At issue is to specify how the sciences
and specialties are different; in which respects and why? Obviously, the
boundaries are fuzzy, since what may seem far distanced from one perspective
can be nearby from another (e.g. in terms of the metrics used for the
measurement such as in the case of biometrics and econometrics). 

 

These distinctions are not to be identified into a single "self" of the
self-reference, but to be dissolved (differentiated) in discourse. They are
carried by the communication in science & technology studies or more broadly
(since including the science/society interface) in the information sciences.
The "self" is not transcendental to these discourses, but reflexive insofar
as one has the communicative competencies to listen and - if so wished -- to
participate.

 

The distinctions (such as the ones between your five schemes) may be useful
heuristics. The puzzles have then to be specified.

 

Best,

Loet

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Shannon-Weavers' Levels A, B, C.

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Marcus, Mark, Bob, and colleagues, 

 

My ambition was a bit more modest: the paper does not contain a theory of 
meaning or a theory of everything. It is an attempt to solve a problem in the 
relation between sociology (i.c. Luhmann) focusing on meaning processing (and 
autopoiesis) and (Shannon-type) information theory. Luhmann left this problem 
behind by defining information as a selection, while in my opinion entropy is a 
measure of diversity and therefore variation. I was very happy to find the 
clues in Weaver’s contributions; Katherine Hayles has signaled this previously. 

 

Another author important in the background is Herbert Simon who specified the 
model of vertical differentiation (1973), but without having Maturana & 
Varela’s theory of autopoiesis for specification of the dynamics. I agree with 
Luhmann that one has to incorporate ideas from Husserl about horizons of 
meaning and Parsons’ symbolically generalize media as structuring these 
horizons for understanding the differentia specifica of the social as 
non-biological.

 

Mark more or less answers his own questions, don’t you? The constraints of the 
body provide the contingency. The options are not given, but constructed and 
need thus to be perceived, either by individuals or at the organizational (that 
is, social) level. The contingency also positions (as different from others) 
with whom we can then entertain “double contingencies” as the basis for 
generating variation in the communication. How this works and feeds back on the 
persons involved seems to me the subject of other disciplines like psychology 
and neurology. The subject of study is then no longer (or no longer 
exclusively) res cogitans.

 

For example, if a deaf person is provided with a cochlear implant, s/he may 
enter other domains of perception and be able to provide other contributions to 
the communication. The double contingencies between him/her and others can be 
expected to change.

 

Bob and his colleagues define information (2008; p. 28) as “natural selection 
assembling the very constraints on the release of energy that then constitutes 
work and the propagation of organization.” This may have meaning in a 
biological framework, in which selection is considered “natural” resulting in 
organization(s). In the cultural domain, organization (of meaning) remains 
constructed and contingent; selection is never “natural”, but based on codified 
expectations. The codes steer the system from above. Differently from 
biological and engineered systems, this next-order level does not have to be 
slower than the systems level (Simon). Expectations can proliferate 
intersubjectively at higher speeds than we can follow. For example, we have to 
catch up with the literature. Stock exchanges operate faster than local markets 
because of the more sophisticated codes that mediate the financial exchanges.

 

Maturana (1978, at p. 56) introduced the biologist as super-observer who does 
not participate in the biological phenomena under study, but constructs them: 
“Thus, talking human beings dwell in two non-intersecting phenomenal domains.” 
(italic added). Systems which operate exclusively in terms of expectations and 
anticipations of future states cannot be found in nature; they can only be 
considered reflexively. They allow us to de- and reconstruct in terms of 
improving the models, and thus sometimes find new options for technological 
intervention. Paradoxically, biology as a science is itself part of this 
cultural domain. For example, we have access to our body only in terms of 
perceptions (that are steered by expectations) and at the other end by 
knowledge-based interventions.

 

This is my second posting for this week. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor Emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London; 

 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en> 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Marcus Abundis
Sent: Thursday, October 15, 2015 7:11 AM
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: [Fis] Shannon-Weavers' Levels A, B, C.

 

Hey Mark,

Sorry if I confused things by commenting on Bateson AND THEN 
Shannon-Weaver. In my mind those were two different matters, and did not merit 
my calling them out as such.

 

In general . . . 

I too never saw Shanon-Weaver's Levels A, B, C as complete. In fact, I 
thought

Re: [Fis] [Fwd: Re: Information is a linguistic description of structures]--T...

[Loet Leydesdorff]

-Original Message-
From: Robert E. Ulanowicz [mailto:u...@umces.edu] 
Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2015 7:11 PM
To: Mark Johnson; Loet Leydesdorff
Cc: Robert Ulanowicz
Subject: Re: [Fis] [Fwd: Re: Information is a linguistic description of
structures]--T...

 

 

Dear Mark & Loet,

 

What Bateson described is a special example of a more general agonism that
traces back to Heraclitus, who saw reality as the outcome between two
opposing tendencies -- "one that builds up and another that tears down".

Of course, the tension is fundamental to Eastern thought as well (e.g., Yin
- Yan).

 

Dear Bob, Mark, and colleagues, 

 

It seems to me that these general denominators are nowadays not specific
enough; the system(s) of reference have to be specified and we also are able
to specify what is integrating and what is differentiating. In general, one
can expect a trade-off between organization and self-organization of the
information flows.

 

In the case of interhuman communication, I suggest that the codes of
communication are self-organizing and differentiating; whereas they have to
be organized by individuals reflexively in instantiations (action). The
self-organizing codes are second-order attributes to the communications (and
not the communicators), structural, and therefore selection mechanisms; the
differentiation drives the communication so that it can increasingly process
complexity. The trade-offs generate tensions.

 

I read Mark's comments as a reference to the tradition of the "Dialectics of
Enlightenment": when communication tends to take over control, this
generates also alienation at the level of the individual because the
communication differentiates, while the individual wishes to integrate. Marx
expressed this as the relation between exchange and use value: exchange
value is the reflection on the abstract market of "human" use value. The
market can be considered as an interhuman communication (exchange) system
guided by a symbolically generalized code of communication (e.g., price).
Capitalism is based on the inversion of the cycle Commodity-Money-Commodity
into Money-Commodity-Money (Geld-Ware-Geld).

 

Bateson is interested in personal development ("mind") and (organizational)
action. From the perspective of the communication, individual minds provide
the sources of variation. Variation is needed for further developing the
communication. Reflexively, action also reproduces structure and retains
organization. All these relations are to be further specified, in my
opinion. 

 

Finally, I would like to say that this is not a dialectics. It is
increasingly obvious that at least three mechanisms are needed for complex
systems formation; for example: triadic closure and the generation of mutual
information/redundancy among three or more dynamics. The vertical
differentiation in levels A., B, and C is also not incidental. In the case
of two, we obtain co-evolution models that explain mutual shaping, but not
yet complex systems that may go into crises, globalize, etc. Trialectics,
Triple Helix, .., etc. 

 

Best, 

Loet

 

PS. This was my second email for this week. L.

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor Emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] [Fwd: Re: Information is a linguistic description of structures]--T...

[Loet Leydesdorff]

in other words, it's time we confess in science just how little we know
about language, that we explore language's mysteries, and that we use our
discoveries as a crowbar to pry open the secrets of this highly contextual,
deeply relational, profoundly communicational cosmos.

 

Dear colleagues,

 

The vernacular is not sufficiently codified to contain the complexity of the
sciences. One needs specialized languages (jargons) that are based on
symbolic codification. The codes can be unpacked in elaborate language; but
they remain under re-construction. The further differentiation of codes of
communication drives the complexity and therefore the advancement of the
sciences as discursive constructs.

 

This cultural evolution remains rooted in and generated by the underlying
levels. For example, individuals provide variety by making new knowledge
claims. Since the selection is at the level of communication, however, this
level tends to take over control. But not as an agent; it further
differentiates into different forms of communication such as scientific
discourse, political discourse, etc. Sociologists (Parsons, Luhmann) have
proposed "symbolically generalized media of communication" which span
horizons of meaning. "Energy", for example, has a meaning in science very
different from its meaning in political discourse. Translations remain of
course possible; local organizations and agents have to integrate different
meanings in action (variation; reproduction).

 

In my recent paper on the Self-organization of meaning (at
http://arxiv.org/abs/1507.05251 ), I suggest to distinguish between three
levels (following Weaver): A. (Shannon-type) information processing ; B.
meaning sharing using languages; C. translations among coded communications.
The horizontal and vertical feedback and feedforward mechanisms (entropy
generation vs. redundancy generation in terms of increasing the number of
options) are further to be specified.

 

Hopefully, this contributes to our discussion. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor Emeritus, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 <mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net> l...@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  <http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/> SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  <http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/> Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  <http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html> ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  <http://www.bbk.ac.uk/> Birkbeck, University of London;


 <http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en>
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ=en

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Answer to Mark. Phenomenology and Speculative Realism

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues,

 

Without wishing to defend Husserl, let me try to formulate what is according
to my knowledge core to his contribution. The message is that the
transcendental intersubjectivity is phenomenologically present in our
reality. He therefore returns to Descartes' (much rejected) distinction
between res extensa and res cogitans. Intersubjectivity is res cogitans. It
is not being like in the Latin esse, but it remains reflexively available.
Thus, we cannot test it. The philosophy of science which follows (in The
Crisis) is anti-positivistic. The intersubjectivity is constructed and we
live in these constructions.

 

Descartes focused on the subjective Cogito. According to him, we meet in the
doubting, the Other as not limited and biologically constrained, that is,
God or the Transcendency. Husserl shifts the attention to the cogitatum:
that about what we are in doubt. We no longer find a hold in Transcendency,
but we find the other as other persons. Persons relate to one another not
only in being, but also in terms of expectations. This was elaborated as
dual contingency (among others, by Parsons). The dynamics of
inter-personal expectations, for example, drive scholarly discourses, but
also stock exchanges.

 

Alfred Schutz was a student and admirer of Husserl, but he did not accept
the Cartesian duality implied. He writes: As long as we are born from
mothers ... He then developed sociological phenomenology (Luckmann and
others), which begins with the meta-individual phenomena. This is close to
Mannheim's position: one cannot analyze the content of the sciences
sociologically, but only the manifestations. The strong program in the
sociology of science (SSK: sociology of scientific knowledge) positioned
that socio-cognitive interests can explain the substantive development of
the sciences (Bloor, Barnes, and others) in the 1970s. It returns to a kind
of materialism.

 

Luhmann criticized Husserl for not taking the next step and to consider
meaning (Sinn) as constructed in and by communication. In my opinion, this
is an important step because it opens the realm of a communication theory
based on interhuman interactions as different from basing theories
(micro-foundationally) on human agency (e.g., the homo economicus or
agent-based modelling). The communications can be considered as first-order
attributes to agents; the analysis of communications is in terms of
second-order attributes; for example, codes of communication. This is very
much the domain of the information sciences (although Luhmann did not see
this connection).

 

In sum, phenomenological is sometimes used as an appeal to return to the
phenomena without invoking explaining principles a priori. The question,
however, remains whether our intuitions, imaginations, etc. are also part of
this reality. Are they limited (constrained; enabled?) by material
conditions or epi-phenomenological consequences of them? Husserl's critique
of the modern sciences was the reduction of the very concept of reality to
res extensa (that what is). Derivatives of esse such as ontology dominate
the scene. Shannon-type information, however, is the expected uncertainty in
a distribution. Thus, we stand on common ground that does not exist. J

 

Note that this discussion is different from the one about being versus
becoming (Prigogine), but also shares some aspects with it. Is
life/biology considered as a monad different from physics that studies
nature as a given? How can one perhaps distinguish scientific domains in
these terms?

 

Best,

Loet

 

 

-Original Message-
From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Robert E.
Ulanowicz
Sent: Sunday, August 02, 2015 1:04 AM
To: Joseph Brenner
Cc: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Answer to Mark. Phenomenology and Speculative Realism

 

Dear Joseph et al.,

 

I'm afraid I can't comment on the adequacy Husserlian phenomenology, as I
never could get very far into Hursserl. I would just add that there is also
a variety of phenomenology associated with thermodynamics and engineering.

 

The generic meaning of phenomenology is the study of phenomena in
abstraction of their eliciting causes. This applies to almost all of
classical thermodynamics and much of engineering. The idea is to describe
the behavior of systems in quantitative fashion. If the resulting
mathematical description proves reliable, it becomes a phenomenological
description. PV=nRT is such a description. Too often physicists try to
identify thermodynamics with statistical mechanics, an action that is
vigorously eschewed by engineers, who claim the field as their own.

 

I have spent most of my career with the phenomenology of quantified
networks, where phenomena such as intersubjectivity (if I correctly
understand what is meant by the term) thoroughly pervades events.

 

Of course, I'm feathering my own nest when I say that I believe that the
only *current* fruitful way to approach systems biology is via such
phenomenology! 

Re: [Fis] Information Foundation of the Act--F.Flores L.deMarcos

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

I read your paper with interest. Since my interest is “information”, I focused 
on this concept. 

 

1.  If I correctly understand, you define information as the 2-log of the 
number of options. I would be inclined to call this the maximum information 
content of an act, using H(max) = 2log(N); in which N is the number of options. 
You do so too at the top of p. 29 (line 1). You organize this under the 
subtitle “Obervation of information”, whereas I would be inclined to consider 
this as the specification. An observation of the number of options used in an 
act would lead to a number lower than the “pure information value”, since not 
all options are always used.

 

2.  If the information value is equal to the logarithm of the number of 
options, the concept of information only serves analytically as a 
transformation rule for expressing the number of options in bits. The two (N of 
options and n of bits) are coupled to each other in terms of the logarithmic 
transformation.

 

3.  At several places, one parameter is not logarithmically transformed 
while others are. For example, at the bottom of p. 25, the 106 people are 
whole-number counted in the multiplication under Presentation 19. One could 
argue that who of the one million people acts, adds another dimension to the 
possible combinations, and should therefore also be brought under the 
logarithm. Are options exclusively individual, and never social?

 

4.  Is the computational rule in this formula correct given that log(a*b) = 
log(a) + log(b). You compute 16 bits * log(10); but 16 bits is also the result 
of taking a logarithm. (The 16 bits represent the number of options of a human 
body.) Should not you compute the 2log([2^16] * 10)? Or alternatively (16 + 
log(10))?

 

5.  On p. 28, you move from the conversation of information in isolated 
systems (line 11) to “the rule of the conversation of information for multiple 
acts”. But human agency is not an isolated system, in my opinion. We are 
coupled through our communications which generate non-linear loops. For 
example, one can expect the other to entertain expectations about oneself like 
one entertains expectations about the other (Parsons; Luhmann). In sum, the 
argument that action is only bodily and in relation to artifacts (as isolated 
systems) seems questionable to me. Or is this your “materialistic” assumption 
(p. 1: “Matter is potentiality;” …). Why would not the potentiality of matter 
contain a plurality (multiplication?) of options?

 

It may be difficult to communicate given different starting points. Please, 
correct me if I misunderstood you.

 

Best,

Loet

 

On Wed, Jul 22, 2015 at 1:33 PM, Pedro C. Marijuan pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es 
wrote:


The informational foundation of the act
Fernando Flores
Lund University
fernando.flo...@kultur.lu.se

Luis de-Marcos
University of Alcalá
luis.demar...@uah.es

See the whole text at: http://fis.sciforum.net/resources/

 

Our introducing paper (35 pages) presents a theory that quantifies the 
informational value of human acts. We argue that living is functioning against 
entropy and following Erwin Schrödinger we call this tendency “negentropy”. 
Negentropy is for us the reason behind “order” in social and cultural life. 
Further, we understand “order” as the condition that the world reaches when the 
informational value of a series of acts is low. Acting is presented as a set of 
decisions and choices that create order and this is the key concept of our 
understanding of the variation from simplicity to complexity in human acts. The 
most important aim of our theory is to measure non-economic acts trying to 
understand and explain their importance for society and culture. In their turn 
such a theory will be also important to understand the similarities and 
differences between non-economic and economic acts. 
We follow the classical concept according to which informational value is 
proportional to the unlikelihood of an act. To capture the richness of the 
unlikelihood of human acts we use the frequency theory of probability developed 
by Ludwig von Mises and Karl Popper. Frequency theory of probability allows us 
to describe a variety of acts from the must most “free” to the least “free” 
with respect to precedent acts. In short, we characterize human acts in terms 
of their degree of freedom trying to set up a scale of the information and 
predictability carried out in human decisions. A taxonomy of acts is also 
presented, categorizing acts as destructive, mechanical, ludic or vital, 
according to their degree of freedom (complexity). A formulation to estimate 
the informational value in individual and collective acts follows. The final 
part of the paper presents and discuss the consequences of our theory. We argue 
that artifacts embed information and that modernization can be understood as a 
one-way process to embed acts of high levels of complexity in simple devices. 

Re: [Fis] The Same and Not the Same

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Joe, 

The semantic aspects are external to the Shannon perspective (by
definition). However, Weaver (1949) gives openings. (I discuss this
extensively in the paper at http://arxiv.org/abs/1507.05251.) Mutual
redundancy can be defined as a measure of the imprint of meaning processing
on the communication of information. Meaning itself cannot be measured, but
hypothesizing meaning processing enables one to specify expectations about
higher order loops. 

The dimensionality remains in bits of information. The probability
distribution, however, becomes multi-variate when next-order loops are
added: instead of p(i), for example, p(ijk)

Best,
Loet


Loet Leydesdorff 
Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)
l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU, University of Sussex; 
Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
Beijing;
Visiting Professor, Birkbeck, University of London; 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

-Original Message-
From: Joseph Brenner [mailto:joe.bren...@bluewin.ch] 
Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2015 9:07 AM
To: u...@umces.edu; John Collier
Cc: l...@leydesdorff.net; 'Fernando Flores'; fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: The Same and Not the Same

Dear Bob and All,

I have found many useful things in the recent postings, especially Bob U.'s
point about the parsing of entropy into two components, mutual information
and residual entropy; /qualitatively/, information and entropy are
(epistemologically) antithetical, and, I might add, ontologically
contradictorial. Also John's point about loops not being computable, as one
might expect if they reflect the evolution of real processes.

But what about mutual information itself? Mutual information is defined, I
believe, as a measure of the mutual dependence of random variables. But
suppose the variables or process elements are not random, but there is still
mutual dependence. What about the information content here?

Perhaps in this context, I can ask again the question of whether it makes
sense to 'parse' /information/ itself into two interactive components that
differ in their dimensionality, with meaning associated with the emergent
component with the higher dimensionality.

Curious,

Joseph


- Original Message -
From: Robert E. Ulanowicz u...@umces.edu
To: John Collier colli...@ukzn.ac.za
Cc: l...@leydesdorff.net; 'Joseph Brenner' joe.bren...@bluewin.ch;
'Fernando Flores' fernando.flo...@kultur.lu.se; fis@listas.unizar.es
Sent: Monday, July 27, 2015 9:25 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Answer to the comments made by Joseph


 Folks

 I know there is a long legacy of equating information with entropy, 
 and dimensionally, they are the same. Qualitatively, however, they are 
 antithetical. From the point of view of statistical mechanics, 
 information is a *decrease* in entropy, i.e., they are negatives of each
other.

 This all devolves back upon the requirement that *both* entropy and 
 information require a reference state. (The third law of 
 thermodynamics.) Once a reference distribution has been identified, 
 one can then quantify both entropy and information. It actually turns 
 out that against any reference state, entropy can be parsed into two 
 components, mutual information and conditional (or residual) entropy. 
 Change the reference state and the decomposition changes.
 http://people.clas.ufl.edu/ulan/files/FISPAP.pdf (See also Chapter 5 
 in
 http://people.clas.ufl.edu/ulan/publications/ecosystems/gand/.)

 Cheers to all,
 Bob

 Folks,

 Doing dimensional analysis entropy is heat difference divided by 
 temperature. Heat is energy, and temperature is energy per degree of 
 freedom. Dividing, we get units of inverse degrees of freedom. I 
 submit that information has the same fundamental measure (this is a 
 consequence of Scott Muller¡¯s asymmetry principle of information. So 
 fundamentally we are talking about the same basic thing with 
 information and entropy.

 I agree, though, that it is viewed from different perspectives and 
 they have differing conventions for measurement.

 I agree with Loet¡¯s other points.

 John

 


___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Answer to the comments made by Joseph

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear John and colleagues,

 

So fundamentally we are talking about the same basic thing with information
and entropy.

 

The problem is fundamentally: the two are the same except for a constant.
Most authors attribute the dimensionality to this constant (kB). 

 

From the perspective of probability calculus, they are the same. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Answer to the comments made by Joseph

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Joe,

 

a) information is more than order; there is information in absence
(Deacon), in disorder, in incoherence as well as coherence;

 

The absent options provide the redundancy; that is, the complement of the
information to the maximal information [H(max)].

 

See also my recent communication (in Vienna) or at
http://arxiv.org/abs/1507.05251 

 

b) information is not the same as matter-energy, but it is inseparable
from it and reflects its dualistic properties; 

 

Information is dimensionless. It is coupled to the physics of matter-energy
because S = k(B) * H. 

k(B) provides the dimensionality (Joule/Kelvin) and thus the physics. In
other domains of application (e.g., economics), this coupling [via k(B)] is
not meaningful.

 

c) information is both energy and a carrier of meaning, which is not, in
my humble opinion, a hard physicalist approach; 

 

Meaning provides more options to the information and thus increases the
redundancy. In the case of reflexivity and further codification of meanings,
the generation of redundancy can auto-catalytically be reinforced
(Ulanowicz).

 

Best,

Loet

 

d) it remains to be shown that digitalism or computationalism is or could be
the natural language for the description of the non-digital world, that is,
of the complexity of the world that is of interest. Rafael Capurro has
talked about the 'digital casting' of the world that we (or most of us) use
in our daily lives, but this philosophical concept, with which I agree, is
not a scientific description of the physics of informational processes as
such. The best synthesis here of which I am aware is the
Informational-Computationalism of Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic and even that is a
framework, not an ontology.

e) it is possible to use probabilities to describe the evolution of real
processes, as well as as a mathematical language for describing acts;

f) your presentation of a parameter designated as 'freedom' is indeed
original, but it is a classificatory system, based on bits. It will miss the
non-algorithmic aspects of values. I am suspicious of things that have
infinite levels and represent 'pure' anything; 

g) I do not feel you have added value to human acts by designating them as
∞-free This may not be intended as doctrine but it looks like it.

h) your conclusions about informational value are correct from what I will
call a hard neo-capitalist ;-) standpoint, but I am sure you agree there are
other ones.

 

In trying to learn through association with this FIS group, I have come to
believe that Informational Science is unique in that it can capture some of
the complexity of nature, culture and society. It is not a 'hard
simplification' as you suggest some sciences are.  The concept of (its)
foundations is very broad, and it can and should include careful binary
analyses such as the one you have made. However, I am pleading for a more
directed positioning of your approach with respect to others. Is this an
acceptable basis for you for continuing the debate?

 

Thank you again,

 

Joseph

- Original Message - 

From: Fernando Flores mailto:fernando.flo...@kultur.lu.se  

To: fis@listas.unizar.es 

Sent: Thursday, July 23, 2015 3:58 PM

Subject: [Fis] Answer to the comments made by Joseph

 

Hello everybody:

 

I will answer to the comments made by Joseph and Luis will answer to the
comments made by Moisés.

 

Dear Joseph:

 

Thank you for your comments. We are not sure about the usefulness of
identifying “information” (order) with “mater”. In this sense we are
very carefully to avoid any hard physicalist approach. In this sense we
believe with Norbert Wiener: 

The mechanical brain does not secrete thought “as the liver does bile”, as
the earlier materialist claimed, nor does it put it out in the form of
energy, as the muscle puts out its activity. Information is information, not
matter nor energy. No materialism, which does not admit this, can survive at
the present day.

An informational description of the world must stand as a new branch of
science in which “digitalism” will be the natural language.  Of course as
any other science, it is a simplification of the complexity of
nature/society/culture. I believe that we are shown that we are very
conscious about the risks of a hard simplification, and that is why we
introduced that idea of freedom in a chain of acts and use probability as
mathematical language. We considered the vital acts as ∞-free.

 

 

 

Fernando Flores PhD

Associate Professor

History of Ideas and Sciences

Lund University

 


  _  


___
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

Re: [Fis] It-from-Bit and information interpretation of QM

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Koichiro: “In order to make them decidable or meaningful, some qualifier must 
definitely be needed. A popular example of such a qualifier is a subjective 
observer.”

 

“A difference that makes a difference” for a qualifier, thus requires 
specification of: 

1.  The first difference; 

2.  The second difference; 

3.  The qualifier (e.g., the observer).

 

The first difference can be measured using Shannon-type information, since a 
probability distribution can be considered as a set of (first-order) 
differences. Brillouin tried to specify the second difference as a ΔH. ΔH can 
also be negative (“negentropy”). But how does one proceed to the measurement?

 

Best, 

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London; 

 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Koichiro Matsuno
Sent: Saturday, June 27, 2015 9:04 AM
To: 'John Collier'; 'fis'
Subject: Re: [Fis] It-from-Bit and information interpretation of QM

 

At 4:00 AM 06/27/2015, John Collier wrote:

 

I also see no reason that Bateson’s difference that makes a difference needs to 
involve meaning at either end.

 

[KM] Right.  The phrase saying “a difference that makes a difference” must be a 
prototypical example of second-order logic in that the difference appearing 
both in the subject and predicate can accept quantification. Most statements 
framed in second-order logic  are not decidable. In order to make them 
decidable or meaningful, some qualifier must definitely be needed. A popular 
example of such a qualifier is a subjective observer. However, the point is 
that the subjective observer is not limited to Alice or Bob in the QBist 
parlance. 

 

   Koichiro

 

 

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

[Fis] FW: Your submission has been published in Sciforum [sciforum-004690]

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Fyi. Best,

Loet

 

From: conferen...@mdpi.com [mailto:conferen...@mdpi.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, June 23, 2015 10:34 AM
To: l...@leydesdorff.net
Cc: conferen...@sciforum.net
Subject: Your submission has been published in Sciforum [sciforum-004690]

 

 http://sciforum.net/ Sciforum 

Dear Professor Leydesdorff,

Your submission has been published in Sciforum.

Submission ID: sciforum-004690
Title: Mutual Redundancies and Triple Contingencies among Perspectives on 
Horizons of Meaning
Author: Loet Leydesdorff
Conference: ISIS Summit Vienna 2015—The Information Society at the Crossroads
Section: Conference Stream ICPI 2015

Public version: 
http://sciforum.net/user/submission/bc7cdde3d766a41a52123baf579a580a

Your manuscript submission:
http://sciforum.net/conference/70/paper/2843

Kind Regards,
Your ISIS 2015 Organizing Team

Sciforum.net is a platform published and maintained by MDPI AG.
For support, e-mail i...@sciforum.net or call +41 61 683 77 34.

MDPI AG
Klybeckstrasse 64
CH-4057 Basel
Switzerland

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

[Fis] Mutual Redundancies and Triple Contingencies among Perspectives on Horizons of Meaning

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues,

 

I uploaded my presentation entitled Mutual Redundancies and Triple
Contingencies among Perspectives on Horizons of Meaning

at the conference of International Society for Information Studies, Vienna,
3-7 June 2014; Session: Integration of the Philosophy of Information and
Information Science, to:

http://figshare.com/articles/Mutual_Redundancies_and_Triple_Contingencies_am
ong_Perspectives_on_Horizons_of_Meaning/1439441 

 

Best, 

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London;


 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] What are information and science?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

 

I see informational processes as essentially being proto-scientific – how is 
any science not an informational process? 

 

The sciences, in my opinion, are different in terms of what is communicated. As 
Maturana noted, the communication of molecules generates a biology. Similarly, 
the communication of atoms generates a chemistry, etc. The communication of 
words and sentences generates the interhuman domain of communication. One can 
also communicate in terms of symbolic media such as money. This can be 
reflected by economics.

 

Thus, the sciences are different. The formal perspective (of the mathematical 
theory of communication) provides us with tools to move metaphors heuristically 
from one domain to another. The assumption that the mathematics is general is 
over-stated, in my opinion. One has to carefully check and elaborate after each 
translation from one domain to another. In this sense, I agree with 
“proto-scientific”.

 

Best,

Loet

 

 

First, I think this places me in the camp of Peirce's view. Second, I am unsure 
of how to regard the focus on higher-order interdisciplinary discussions when 
a much more essential view of lower-order roles (i.e., What are science and 
information?) has not been first established.

 

From my naive view I find myself wondering how informational process is 
not the ONE overarching discipline from which all other disciplines are born 
(is this too psychological of a framework?). As such, I argue for one great 
discipline . . . and thus wouldn't try to frame my view in terms of science, 
mostly because I am unclear on how the term science is being formally used 
here. Thoughts?



 



Marcus Abundis

about.me/marcus.abundis


  http://d13pix9kaak6wt.cloudfront.net/signature/colorbar.png 

  



 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] RV: THE FOURTH GREAT DOMAIN OF SCIENCE: INFORMATIONAL? (R.Capurro)

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

For the measurement of interdisciplinarity, one can use, for example,
Rao-Stirling diversity which is defined as follows (Rao, 1982; Stirling,
2007): 

 

Δ = Σij pi pj dij   (1)

 

where dij is a disparity measure between two classes i and j-the categories
are in the case below journals-and pi is the proportion of elements assigned
to each class i. As the disparity measure, we use the distances on an
aggregated journal-journal citation map (Leydesdorff, Heimeriks,  Rotolo,
in press; Leydesdorff, Rafols,  Chen, 2013). 

 

For example, 23 publications can be retrieved as of today with the search
string au=Marijuan P* at WoS. The journal map is as follows: 

 

cid:image001.gif@01D09216.E78CE210

 

and the Rao-Stirling diversity (interdisciplinarity) of this set is 01282.

 

If I repeat the analysis with the search string au=leydesdorff l*, I
retrieve 270 documents; Rao-Stirling diversity is 0.0805.

 

 

cid:image002.gif@01D09216.E78CE210

 

In other words, Leydesdorff is more prolific than Marijuan in terms of WoS
publications, but Marijuan's portfolio is more interdisciplinary than
Leydesdorff's. 

 

One finds the relevant software at
http://www.leydesdorff.net/portfolio/index.htm 

Reference:

Leydesdorff, L., Heimeriks, G.,  Rotolo, D. (2015 (in press)). Journal
Portfolio Analysis for Countries, Cities, and Organizations: Maps and
Comparisons http://arxiv.org/abs/1502.05676 . Journal of the Association
for Information Science and Technology. 



oledata.mso
Description: Binary data
___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Fwd: Chuan's reply11 - THE FRONTIERS OF INTELLIGENCE SCIENCE: Information Implementation Operator

[Loet Leydesdorff]

PS. You can see the table in html. L.

 

Dear Joe, 

 

As tragic events repeatedly show, their origin is often not the lack of 
information in the simple sense, but the lack of structures (or structurations) 
in people capable of implementing it. These structures or capacities are also 
information in the complex sense, of course, but they also can be considered as 
a form of intelligence. 

 

One can consider the network of relations among intelligent agents from this 
perspective. The network can be written as a matrix or a two-dimensional 
probability distribution that contains uncertainty (expressable, for example, 
in bits of information). In order to retain information, the networks have to 
endure over time and thus one obtains a three-dimensional array of information 
of networks stacked (with time subscripts). In order to act “intelligently”, 
the networks have to be able to restructure themselves in the present using one 
more degree of freedom à four-dimensional probability distribution.

 

Within this array in four dimensions, one can distinguish between trajectories, 
regimes, Markov chains, evolutionary changes, etc.

 


first

dimension

second 
dimension

third

dimension

fourth 
dimension


Operation

variation

 

selection

 

stabilization, retention

globalization and self-organization


Nature

entropy; disturbance

extension; network

localized trajectory

identity or regime


Character of operation

probabilistic; uncertain

deterministic; structural

reflexive; reconstructive

globally organized; resilient


Appearance

instantaneous and volatile

spatial;

multi-variate

historically contingent

emerging 
hyper-cycle


Unit of analysis

change in terms of relations

latent

positions

stabilities during history

virtual expectations


Type  of analysis

descriptive registration

multi-variate analysis

time-series analysis

non-linear dynamics

 

 

Source: Leydesdorff, L. (2001). A Sociological Theory of Communication: The 
Self-Organization of the Knowledge-Based Society. Parkland, FL: Universal 
Publishers; at http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN 
http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBNbook=1581126956 
book=1581126956; p. 99.

 

Best, 

Loet

 

I believe more attention should be paid explicitly to such structures to enable 
people to recognize and use them against the inevitable forces opposing that 
(keeping to a schedule, not 'frightening' people, etc.) Calling responsible 
behavior intelligent might facilitate the exercise of it.

Best regards,

Joseph   


 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Concluding the Lecture?

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Bob (and colleagues), 

 

It seems to me that you drive the problem home by signaling that the use of
the word “information” is very loose in many of our debates. Actually, you
argue – if I correctly understand – that this is rich: words only obtain
meaning within a sentence, and one can import “information” in differently
phrased sentences. :)

 

The concept that is missing in this context is “codification”. The word
“information” cannot only be used loosely, but also as a reference to a
concept with meaning from theoretical perspectives. I understood that in
Chinese, one has two words for information: “sjin sji” and “tsjin bao”; the
former being Shannon-type information, and the latter also meaning
intelligence. 

 

It seems to that Terry’s information concept in these discussions is rather
Shannon-type. He adds the point that information is relative to maximum
information (which can also be precisely defined using Shannon). The
difference between maximum information and maximum information is
redundancy. Weaver (1949) already noted that in addition to engineering
noise, one may have semantic noise or – equivalently – semantic redundancy
if, for example, the sources of noise are correlated; for example, in
language. This refinement can go further in scholarly discourse where the
use of language is restricted.

 

Thus, I don’t agree that the journey is the purpose in itself; the objective
is to move information theory forward as a scientific enterprise. “Wo
Begriffe fehlen, fuegt zur rechten Zeit ein Wort sich ein.” :)

 

Best wishes, 

Loet

 

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London;


 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Bob Logan
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2015 3:07 PM
To: Pedro C. Marijuan
Cc: 'fis'
Subject: Re: [Fis] Concluding the Lecture?

 

Thanks Pedro for your remarks. We have not reached our destination as you
point out but the important thing is to enjoy the journey which I certainly
have. It is inevitable that with such a slippery concept as information that
there will be different destinations depending on the travellers but what I
like about FIS in general and the dialogue that Terry prompted in particular
is the interesting ideas and good company I encountered along the way. As
for your remark about searching where there is light I suggest that we pack
a flashlight for the next journey to be led by our tour guide Zhao Chuan.
One common theme for understanding the importance of both information and
intelligence for me is interpretation and context (figure/ground or
pragmatics). Thanks to all especially Terry for a very pleasant journey. -
Bob

__

 

Robert K. Logan

Prof. Emeritus - Physics - U. of Toronto 

Chief Scientist - sLab at OCAD

http://utoronto.academia.edu/RobertKLogan

www.physics.utoronto.ca/Members/logan
http://www.physics.utoronto.ca/Members/logan 

www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert_Logan5/publications
http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert_Logan5/publications 

 

 

 

 

 





 

On 2015-01-30, at 8:25 AM, Pedro C. Marijuan wrote:





Dear Terry and colleagues,

At your convenience, during the first week of February or so we may put an
end to the ongoing New Year Lecture --discussants willing to enter their
late comments should hurry up. Your own final or concluding comment will be
appreciated.

Personally, my late comment will deal with the last exchange between Bob and
Terry, It is about the point which follows:  ...there was no thesis other
than the word information is a descriptor for so many different situations
and that it is a part of a semantic web - no roadmap only a jaunt through
the countryside of associations - a leisurely preamble. 
In my own parlance, we have been focusing this fis session on the
microphysical foundations of information (thermodynamic in this case) which
together with the quantum would look as the definite foundations of the
whole field, or even of the whole great domain of information. But could
it be so? Is there such thing as a unitary foundation? My impression is
that we are instinctively working where the light is, reminding the trite
story of the physicists who has lost the car keys and is looking closest to
the street lamp.  The point I suggest is that the different informational
realms are emergent in the strongest sense: almost no trace of the
underlying

Re: [Fis] Information-as-Process

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Steven and colleagues, 

 

I did not (yet) study your approach. Is there a paper that can be read as an 
introduction?

 

It seems to me that one can distinguish between formal and substantial theories 
of information. Shannon’s mathematical theory is a formal apparatus: the design 
and the results do not yet have meaning without an interpretation in a 
substantial context. On the other side, a theory about, for example, 
neuro-information is a special theory. One can in this context use information 
theory as a statistical tool (among other tools). Sometimes, one can move 
beyond description. :)

 

The advantage of information theory, from this perspective of special theories, 
is that the formal apparatus allows us sometimes to move between domains 
heuristically. For example, a model of the brain can perhaps be used 
metaphorically for culture or the economy (or vice versa). The advantages have 
to be shown in empirical research: which questions can be addressed and which 
puzzles be solved?

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London; 

 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

 

From: stevenzen...@gmail.com [mailto:stevenzen...@gmail.com] On Behalf Of 
Steven Ericsson-Zenith
Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2014 10:13 PM
To: l...@leydesdorff.net
Cc: Joseph Brenner; fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Information-as-Process

 

The problem with this approach (and approaches like it) is that it is 
descriptive and not explanatory. The distribution of the shape, in my model, 
can be described, perhaps, but the process or action decision point and 
response covariance is impossible to consider. 

 

It is for this reason that I use holomorphic functors and hyper-functors in 
which I can express the explicit role of a base universal (per gravitation).

 

Nor is it clear to me that this is what Joe referred to as information as 
process.

 

On Mon, Dec 8, 2014 at 10:20 PM, Loet Leydesdorff l...@leydesdorff.net 
mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net  wrote:

Dear colleagues, 

 

Shannon’s information theory can be considered as a calculus because it allows 
for the dynamic extension. Theil (1972)—Statistical decomposition analysis 
(North Holland)—distinguished between static and dynamic information measures. 
In addition to Shannon’s statical H, one can write: 

 

 

 

in which can be considered as the a posteriori and the a priori distribution. 
This dynamic information measure can be decomposed and aggregated. One can also 
develop measures for systemic developments and critical transitions. In other 
words, information as a process can also be measured in bits of information. Of 
course, one can extend the dimensionality (i) for the multivariate case (ijk…), 
and thus use information theory for network analysis (including time).

 

Best,

Loet

 

References:

*Leydesdorff, L. (1991). The Static and Dynamic Analysis of Network 
Data Using Information Theory. Social Networks, 13(4), 301-345. 

*Theil, H. (1972). Statistical Decomposition Analysis. Amsterdam/ 
London: North-Holland.

 

 


  _  


Loet Leydesdorff 

Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London; 

 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es 
mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es ] On Behalf Of Steven Ericsson-Zenith
Sent: Monday, December 08, 2014 10:22 PM
To: Joseph Brenner
Cc: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Information-as-Process

 

I am a little mystified by your assertion of information as process. What, 
exactly, is this and how does it differ fro information in general (Shannon). 
Is it related to Whitehead's process notions?

 

In terms of neuroscience it is important to move away from connectionism and 
modern computational ideas I believe. It is not clear to me how information 
theory can be applied to the operation of the brain at the synaptic level 
because

Re: [Fis] Information-as-Process

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

Shannon’s information theory can be considered as a calculus because it allows 
for the dynamic extension. Theil (1972)—Statistical decomposition analysis 
(North Holland)—distinguished between static and dynamic information measures. 
In addition to Shannon’s statical H, one can write: 

 

 

 

in which  can be considered as the a posteriori and  the a priori distribution. 
This dynamic information measure can be decomposed and aggregated. One can also 
develop measures for systemic developments and critical transitions. In other 
words, information as a process can also be measured in bits of information. Of 
course, one can extend the dimensionality (i) for the multivariate case (ijk…), 
and thus use information theory for network analysis (including time).

 

Best,

Loet

 

References:

*Leydesdorff, L. (1991). The Static and Dynamic Analysis of Network 
Data Using Information Theory. Social Networks, 13(4), 301-345. 

*Theil, H. (1972). Statistical Decomposition Analysis. Amsterdam/ 
London: North-Holland.

 

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Emeritus University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;  
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of 
Sussex; 

Guest Professor  http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; 
Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London; 

 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en 
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en

 

From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Steven 
Ericsson-Zenith
Sent: Monday, December 08, 2014 10:22 PM
To: Joseph Brenner
Cc: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Information-as-Process

 

I am a little mystified by your assertion of information as process. What, 
exactly, is this and how does it differ fro information in general (Shannon). 
Is it related to Whitehead's process notions?

 

In terms of neuroscience it is important to move away from connectionism and 
modern computational ideas I believe. It is not clear to me how information 
theory can be applied to the operation of the brain at the synaptic level 
because the actions and the decisions made are made across the structure and 
not at a single location. 

 

Recognition, for example, is not a point event but occurs rather when a 
particular shape is formed in the structure (of the CNS, for example) and is 
immediately covariant with the appropriate response (another shape) which may 
be characterized as a hyper-functor (which may or may not include neurons and 
astrocytes in the brain).

 

Regards,

Steven

 

  

 

On Fri, Dec 5, 2014 at 4:39 AM, Joseph Brenner joe.bren...@bluewin.ch 
mailto:joe.bren...@bluewin.ch  wrote:

Dear Carolina,  Bob L., Bob U., Sören and Krassimir,

First of all thanks to Carolina for having launched a most interesting thread, 
of which I have changed the title since the issues are broader than that of 
Neuroinformation alone, as Francesco has noted.

My first point is a response to Sören since I feel his book does not address 
Information-as-Process as 'physically' as I think necessary. His reference to 
the use of this term by Buckland (on p. 77 not 87), (which I had missed when 
first reading /Cybersemiotics/), however, is followed by a reference to 
information processing. (He later states that a new metatheory is required to 
replace the information processing paradigm, and he proposes Peircean 
semiotics, whereas I have proposed Logic in Reality.) I also note that Buckland 
places Information-as-Process in the 'Intangible' column of his matrix and one 
can question the ontological meaning of this.

In the compendium /Philosophers of Process/. 1998. Browning and Myers (eds.). 
New York: Fordham University Press, Peirce is represented by four papers: The 
Architecture of Theories, The Doctrine of Necessity Examined, The Law of 
Mind  and Man's Glassy Essence. Unfortunately, in none of these is the word 
'process' used, let alone described as a concept. 'Process' is not an entry in 
the COMMENS Digital Companion to C. S. Peirce, edited by Bergman and Paavola, 
so the most one can say is that process was not a common concept in Peirce. If 
Information-as-Process is to be developed as a concept, I doubt that Peirce's 
semiotics will help.

In the notes of both Bob. L and Bob U., however, one finds workable properties 
than can be assigned to Information-as-Process, the verb-noun dialectic and the 
concept of real trophic exchange. Krassimir's concept of information being 
dynamic (a process) or static depending on what it reflects does not give as 
complete a notion as I would like that information is /in-itself/ a process, 
even it reflects (refers to) static or abstract objects

Re: [Fis] MAXENT applied to ecology

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Bob, 

 

I read your paper (Information, 2011) with much interest. I agree that
meaning is not directly observable in terms of probability distributions,
but remains as you so nicely express apophatic. In the social sciences, we
not only have different meanings, but also different horizons of meaning
(Husserl).

 

Formulas 2a (Shannon) and 2b (Kullback-Leibler) are traditional. Could you,
please, provide me with a reference for the derivation of Eq. 2c at p. 627?

 



 

Many thanks in advance. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

 

Loet Leydesdorff 

University of Amsterdam

Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 

Honorary Professor, SPRU, University of Sussex; 

Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
Beijing;

Visiting Professor, Birkbeck, University of London; 

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en  

 

 

 

-Original Message-
From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Robert E.
Ulanowicz
Sent: Saturday, September 27, 2014 6:25 PM
To: John Collier
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] MAXENT applied to ecology

 

Dear John,

 

I came across the article and wrote to John Harte. My email to him and his
kind response are appended below.

 

I brief, I believe John is on the correct pathway, and it is one that I have
been treading for some 35 years now. I think, however, that one cannot
simply apply statistical entropy in an unconditional way. Like physical
entropy, statistical entropy has meaning only in a relative sense. That is,
it can only be measured with respect to some reference situation (cf., the
third law of thermodynamics). (We've been over this together in connection
with the Brooks and Wiley hypothesis.)

 

By invoking a reference state (even if that state should be reflexive, as is
done with weighted networks), one discovers that statistical entropy alone
does not parse out order from disorder. Once such parsing has been made, one
may then follow the course of order and disorder, in the context of the
chosen reference state.

 http://people.biology.ufl.edu/ulan/pubs/FISPAP.pdf
http://people.biology.ufl.edu/ulan/pubs/FISPAP.pdf

 

John did not suggest a solution to my ignorance about the almost constant
proportion between constraint and indeterminism in ecosystem trophic
networks. Maybe someone on FIS can suggest one?

 

Peace,

Bob

 

Subject: Re: Ecological thermodynamics

From: John HARTE  mailto:jha...@berkeley.edu jha...@berkeley.edu

Date: Fri, September 26, 2014 9:03 am

To: Robert Ulanowicz  mailto:u...@umces.edu u...@umces.edu

 

Dear Bob,

 

I am in South Africa, Cape Town region, on sabbatical and enjoying immensely
the wildlife and botanical preserves, and especially traipsing through the
fynbos.  Off to Chile next week for a month.

 

I have thought about trophic networks and maxent only to the extent that I
realized that the linkage distribution across nodes in most real networks
does indeed follow (with some scatter of course)) a Boltzmann distribution.
But I have shied away from looking at what theory has to say about flow
rates between nodes because the data are so spotty.

 

Recently I have been working with a graduate student on a state-counting
approach, a la Boltzmann,to understanding competitive coexistence. It turns
out the method actually predicts the dependence of demographic rates on
population sizes.  The outcome differs somewhat from the variety of

dependences found in the usual Lotka-Volterra type models.What's

interesting to me is that, as in your work, a quantitative and testable
tradeoff arises for populations, in this case between the capacity to adapt
under evolution and capacity to survive under competition.

 

I enjoy reading your papers!

 

Cheers,

 

John

 

John Harte

Professor of Ecosystem Sciences

ERG/ESPM

310 Barrows Hall

University of California

Berkeley, CA 94720 USA

 

On Thu, Sep 25, 2014 at 7:06 AM, Robert E. Ulanowicz 
mailto:u...@umces.edu u...@umces.edu wrote:

 

 Dear John,

 

 I notice that you have made considerable headway with applying MAXENT 

 to ecological theory. I was thinking you might find interesting some 

 results we have observed that might be of help in your search for global
metrics.

 

 In particular, we have discovered that weighted networks of trophic 

 exchanges fall within a very narrow range as regards the ratio of 

 mutual information and conditional entropy. (See Figure 7 on p1089 of

  http://people.biology.ufl.edu/ulan/pubs/Dual.pdf
http://people.biology.ufl.edu/ulan/pubs/Dual.pdf.) Admittedly, this 

 observation is based on sketchy data, but if it does hold up, then 

 Equations (5) below the figure might suggest a method superior to 

 MAXENT (for ecosystems only, of course) for estimating missing data?

 

 On the other hand, notice that the variable F as defined in Equation 

 (4) bears strong resemblance to the entropy formalism, except

[Fis] Information, Meaning, and Intellectual Organization ; preprint available

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Information, Meaning, and Intellectual Organization
http://arxiv.org/abs/1406.5688 
in Networks of Inter-Human Communication


The Shannon-Weaver model of linear information transmission is extended with
two loops potentially generating redundancies: (i) meaning is provided
locally to the information from the perspective of hindsight, and (ii)
meanings can be codified differently and then refer to other horizons of
meaning. Thus, three layers are distinguished: variations in the
communications, historical organization at each moment of time, and
evolutionary self-organization of the codes of communication over time.
Furthermore, the codes of communication can functionally be different and
then the system is both horizontally and vertically differentiated. All
these subdynamics operate in parallel and necessarily generate uncertainty.
However, meaningful information can be considered as the specific selection
of a signal from the noise; the codes of communication are social constructs
that can generate redundancy by giving different meanings to the same
information. Reflexively, one can translate among codes in more elaborate
discourses. The second (instantiating) layer can be operationalized in terms
of semantic maps using the vector space model; the third in terms of mutual
redundancy among the latent dimensions of the vector space. Using Blaise
Cronin's oeuvre, the different operations of the three layers are
demonstrated empirically. 

 

http://arxiv.org/abs/1406.5688 

 

** apologies for cross-postings

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ University of
Sussex; 

Guest Professor Zhejiang Univ. http://www.zju.edu.cn/english/ , Hangzhou;
Visiting Professor, ISTIC,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html
Beijing;

Visiting Professor, Birkbeck http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ , University of London;


http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en hl=en  

 

___
Fis mailing list
Fis@listas.unizar.es
http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] [Feedforward II and Anticipation] Joseph Brenner

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear John and Joseph,

Let me use my second option this week to side with you against those who
wish to replace substantive theorizing with modelling. The issue is, in my
opinion, *which* hypotheses one needs and can elaborate when developing
discursive knowledge (e.g., in physics or sociology).

The hypotheses are entertained in disccourses and can be reflected by
agency. I wished to deny the fruitfulness of the ontological assumptions
made in the Logic of Reality--disguised as energetic dynamics--because
this hypothesis can only be stated as an act of believe.

Instead of believes, one can participate in discourses developing systems
of rationalized expectations.
(I'll be silent fo the remainder of this week. :-)  But I thought that I
had to prevent a misunderstanding.)

Best,
Loet



On Tue, Feb 18, 2014 at 1:43 PM, John Collier colli...@ukzn.ac.za wrote:

  I would concur completely with what Joseph says here. I have never
 understood the tendency to replace the world with models of it when we can
 interact directly with the world in a brute, unmediated way: it can really
 surprise us sometimes, no matter how sophisticated our models. Those
 familiar with the work of C.S. Peirce will see that I am just invoking his
 most basic reason underlying his realism. This is also the message of our
 book: *Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalized*, though I don't
 agree with everything in it.

 There are several problems with the models view, I think: 1) what Joseph
 raised, 2) our models can contain information about the world even if they
 are not fully accurate, allowing for correction rather than replacement
 (sequential idealism, as one of my colleagues has called it), and 3) our
 models are seldom complete, and often not even fully consistent, so they
 are always open-ended and subject to revision and greater clarity; this is
 another major point that Peirce pressed (his article, How to make our ideas
 clear is a good source). If we just add clarity without external
 motivation, then we are playing word (or symbol) games, which can be fun,
 no doubt.

 John



 At 12:27 PM 2014-02-18, Joseph Brenner wrote:

 Dear Loet and Colleagues,

 In this most interesting comment by Loet, there is a fascinating inversion
 of roles! Laplace told Louis XV that I don't need the hypothesis of God,
 something, let us say, rather abstract compared to the solar system. Loet
 is telling us, however, that what he does not need is the hypothesis of an
 external reality of energy, since he can explain 'everything' with a set of
 discursive perspectives, which I consider far too abstract.

 My position is that I do not need the hypothesis of abstract,
 epistemological perspectives that are not grounded in reality. I do not
 know exactly what this is, nor everything about it, but I know some things
 and understand some real dynamics of their evolution. If a system (such as
 Loet's) excludes all of these as ungrounded beliefs, something may be
 missed in the understanding of complex processes, e.g., information.

 Loet is, perhaps, closer to Newton in his attitude to his own (Loet's)
 system: Hypotheses non fingo. I'll go with Laplace.

 Best wishes,

 Joseph

 - Original Message -
 *From:* Loet Leydesdorff l...@leydesdorff.net
 *To:* Joseph Brenner joe.bren...@bluewin.ch
 *Cc:* fis fis@listas.unizar.es
 *Sent:* Monday, February 17, 2014 9:32 PM
 *Subject:* Re: [Fis] Fw: [Feedforward II and Anticipation] Joseph Brenner

 Dear Joseph,

 The energetic terms are external referents to the communication
 (scholarly discourse). These external referents can differently be
 codified; for example, in terms of thermodynamics or various forms of
 physics (e.g., in terms of classical physics). The dynamic properties can
 only be studied from one discursive perspective.or another.

 The ontological status that these dynamics are nevertheless attributed in
 your logic in reality requires an act of belief in an external reality
 that is assumed to be given (so that can enter into the dialectics of
 logic in reality.)
 Je n'ai pas besoin de cette hypothese-la.

 Best wishes,
 Loet


 On Sun, Feb 16, 2014 at 11:51 AM, Joseph Brenner joe.bren...@bluewin.ch 
 wrote:
  Dear Loet,

  I am still hoping that there will be more comments on both my original
 note
  and your significant emendation of it, for which many thanks. Here is my
  response to you now. I have, more than before, the feeling that you have
  agreed that LIR can add something to the sufficiency of the overall
 picture.
  Three things might make this even clearer:

  1. You wrote:
   From this perspective, the reality in Logic in Reality (LIR) is res
   cogitans:  an inter-human construct about which we remain uncertain.

  JEB: But LIR applies also INTRA-human constructs, that is how human agents
  change one another, including their expectations. Thus,

 2.   The codes in the reflexive communications can be considered as the
   (hypothesized!) eigenvectors of the networks

Re: [Fis] Fw: [Feedforward II and Anticipation] Joseph Brenner

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Joseph,

The energetic terms are external referents to the communication
(scholarly discourse). These external referents can differently be
codified; for example, in terms of thermodynamics or various forms of
physics (e.g., in terms of classical physics). The dynamic properties can
only be studied from one discursive perspective.or another.

The ontological status that these dynamics are nevertheless attributed in
your logic in reality requires an act of belief in an external reality
that is assumed to be given (so that can enter into the dialectics of
logic in reality.)
Je n'ai pas de cette hypothese-la.

Best wishes,
Loet





On Sun, Feb 16, 2014 at 11:51 AM, Joseph Brenner joe.bren...@bluewin.chwrote:

 Dear Loet,

  I am still hoping that there will be more comments on both my original
 note
  and your significant emendation of it, for which many thanks. Here is my
  response to you now. I have, more than before, the feeling that you have
  agreed that LIR can add something to the sufficiency of the overall
 picture.
  Three things might make this even clearer:

  1. You wrote:
   From this perspective, the reality in Logic in Reality (LIR) is res
   cogitans:  an inter-human construct about which we remain uncertain.

  JEB: But LIR applies also INTRA-human constructs, that is how human agents
  change one another, including their expectations. Thus,

 2.   The codes in the reflexive communications can be considered as the
   (hypothesized!) eigenvectors of the networks of relations among
 expectations (carried
   by human minds).

  JEB: Same comment as above. The logical values of actuality and
 potentiality
  of real process elements, which include communications, have the
 dimensions
  of vectors.

  3.   However, this reality has the epistemological status of a
 hypothesis,
   whereas you seem to reify it and identify it with nature (energy?) as
 a
 given. From my
   perspective, this presumes a reduction of the complexity using the
 communicative codes of
  physics and biology. There is nothing against this coding, but it can be
  considered as one among an alphabet of possible ones.

  JEB: This is an interesting expression of our different points of view.
 You
  see my approach as reducing complexity and reifying 'this reality' and I
  think it is your approach that reduces and reifies it!! Perhaps we are
 both
 right!!
  Logic in Reality does not deal with a /certain/ complexity, which can be
  associated with complicated epistemological entities or states. Your
 theory
  seems to me to abstract away qualitative, energetic highly complex
  relational/cognitive states that are outside the hypothesis.

   The specific reduction to the perspective of a sociology of
 expectations
   enables us to study the dynamics among differently coded expectations in
 other domains.

  JEB: If one includes, in the zoo of expectations, their dynamics in
  energetic terms, one does not have to see the 'zoology' of expectations as
 a
  reduction. It is already and remains open since the dynamics is not only
  between the coded expectations or other cognitive features but their
  critical, non-coded dynamic properties. Application to all domains in
 which
  there are significant dynamic interactions follows naturally. The dynamics
  of LIR, however, is not a standard non-linear dynamics but rather an
  extension of the concept of recursion as you and Dubois use it.

  As I have remarked previously, but rephrasing it now the interpretation of
  reality as involving a process of coding is something that I see necessary
  for epistemology but not necessary for ontology. The entire Peircean
  structure can be seen as a 'coding', and this makes it attractive to many
  people because it seems manageable, but I much prefer yours.

  I look forward very much to your comments on the above.

  Best,

  Joseph

  - Original Message -
  From: Loet Leydesdorff l...@leydesdorff.net
  To: fis@listas.unizar.es
  Cc: 'Joseph Brenner' joe.bren...@bluewin.ch
  Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2014 11:53 AM
  Subject: RE: [Fis] [Feedforward II and Anticipation] Joseph Brenner
 
 
  Dear Joseph and colleagues,
 
  I owe you a reply on the last mail in which you counter-positioned our
 two
  approaches. I agree with some of what you say; for example, replacing the
  concept of circularity by saw-tooth or spiral evolution. In my opinion,
  the
  two arrows have to be specified instead of being attributed to all living
  and cognitive systems (as you state a few sentences later). What is
  evolving?
 
  My interest is in the evolution of expectations. Expectations can be
  entertained by discourses (or other inter-human communication systems)
 and
  be reflected (and reconstructed) specifically by human agency. Different
  from other species, the expectations can be codified and therefore
 operate
  at the supra-individual level. For example, many of your statements can
 be
  considered as the specification of theoretically

Re: [Fis] Fw: Responses

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

This discussion and reading the beautiful book of Bob Logan entitled What
is information? (shortly forthcoming) made me go back to reading MacKay
(1969) once more. I cannot find the distinction that makes a difference as
it is quoted by Floridi (2005) -- and thereafter repeated by many -- so that
I think that the honour goes to Bateson (1973) for a difference which makes
a difference. MacKay, however, makes the point, for example, on p. 136 that
the sentence S is a source of information is incomplete. It must always
be completed (even if sometimes implicitly) in the form 'S is a source of
information to receiver R'. Two sentences later he calls this significant
information that must be capable of embodying and abiding by an agreed
code or symbolic calculus.

Elsewhere, he distinguishes this substantive concept of information from
amounts of information that can be measured using (Shannon's) information
theory. It seems to me that any discourse (physics, biology, psychology,
sociology, etc.) can be further informed specifically in terms that are
defined within and relevant to the specific discourse. This accords with the
intuitive sense of information as meaningful information: meaningful for a
discourse.

Shannon's definition of information is counter-intuitive, but it provides us
with a calculus that has major advantages. Katherine Hayles suggested that
the two concepts can be compared with the discussion of whether a glass is
half-full or half-empty. A Chinese colleague (Wu Yishan) once told me that
in Chinese one has two words: sjin sji and tsin bao which correspond
respectively to Shannon's and Bateson's definitions of information.

A substantive definition of information (e.g., as a distinction that makes a
difference for a receiver) requires the specification of the concept in a
theory about the receiving system. This definition is therefore a priori
system-specific; for example, for some of us this system is physics; for
others it is biological discourse. At this level, one can again abstract
from the substance and use Shannon's IT as entropy statistics. Sometimes,
this allows us to explore the use of algorithms developed in one field
(e.g., biology) in another (e.g., sociology). Concepts such as autopoiesis
or auto-catalysis have carried these functions.

For example, in the context of Ascendency Theory, Bob Ulanowicz showed how
one can use the mutual information in three dimensions as an indicator of
systemness. I use that as a systems indicator when operationalizing the
triple helix of university-industry-government relations. Such translations
of metaphors are always in need of further elaboration because the
theoretical context changes and thus the specification of what the
information means. However, the advantage to be able to measure in bits
(nats or dits) frees us from the philosophical confusion about what
information is. 

In my opinion, information can only be defined within a discourse. The
mathematical definition of Shannon has specific functions which enable us to
combine with different discourses (among which, specifically physics since S
= k(B)*H). H, however, is dimensionless and defined as the expected
information content of a message *before* it is received. It is yet to be
provided with meaning. One could consider this meaninglesness as the
specific difference of a mathematical concept of information. (Perhaps, it
is easier to use uncertainty for this mathematical concept.)

Best wishes,
Loet

-Original Message-
From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Robert E. Ulanowicz
Sent: Tuesday, January 21, 2014 8:45 PM
To: Christophe
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] Fw: Responses


 The reason of being of information, whatever its content or quantity, 
 is to be used by an agent (biological or artificial).

Dear Christophe,

In making this restriction you are limiting the domain of information to
communication and excluding all information that inheres in structure
per-se. John Collier has called the latter manifestation enformation, and
the calculus of IT is quite effective in quantifying its extent.
Perhaps John would like to comment?

Cheers,
Bob U.


___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Fw: Isms Healing the Subject-Object split

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Hans, Joe, and colleagues, 

 

Healing the subject-object divide from the perspective of personal
experiences as advocated here, seems let's say meta-scientific to me. I
don't think that there is a logic in reality. Analytical distinctions and
arguments (instead of personal experiences) are needed. 

 

Because it is Monday morning, I cc to the list. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ University of
Sussex; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html Beijing;

Visiting Professor, Birkbeck http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ , University of London.
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en hl=en  



 

From: Hans von Baeyer [mailto:henrikrit...@gmail.com] 
Sent: Sunday, January 12, 2014 11:30 PM
To: Loet Leydesdorff
Cc: Joseph Brenner; Pedro C. Marijuan
Subject: Re: [Fis] Fw: Isms Healing the Subject-Object split

 

Loet, the verb heal is used on all kinds of fissures -- not only in
medicine.  Biologist, geologists, and metallurgist describe the closing of a
crack as healing.  The word can be used transitively or intransitively: The
doctor healed her leg.  The crack in the fuselage seems to have healed. 

 

It means made whole  The subject-object split is a fundamental divide, at
least for physicists.  It may also be a mistake.

 

Hans

 

On Sun, Jan 12, 2014 at 1:58 PM, Loet Leydesdorff l...@leydesdorff.net
wrote:

Dear Joseph, (offline)

 

IMHO, experiences are not so important since easily mistaken. More important
are arguments (which of course have to be theoretically informed). One tests
hypotheses (expectations) against carefully designed observations in
experimental settings. 

 

I don't believe in such healing: it is a metaphor from medicine. What or
who is healed? 

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ University of
Sussex; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html Beijing;

Visiting Professor, Birkbeck http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ , University of London.
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en hl=en  

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Joseph Brenner
Sent: Sunday, January 12, 2014 7:05 PM
To: fis; Hans von Baeyer; Pedro C. Marijuan
Subject: [Fis] Fw: Isms Healing the Subject-Object split

 

Dear All, 

 

I think I have discovered what it was that was bothering me about QBism: it
was only the particular 'detour' through atomic physics that Hans made, that
is, one that requires Bayesian probability to describe its terms (see New
Year Lecture). Here are two key tenets of QBism, however, with which I
completely agree: 1) personal experience is put front and center in any
description of the world, we now see, solving the problem of the apparent
simultaneity of the perception of the Now by two individuals. 2) it goes a
long way toward healing the subject/object split, which has been effective
for physical science, but has also impeded progress toward a more inclusive,
holistic understanding of the world.

 

I think it is wonderful that Hans von Baeyer puts these forth as desirable
and necessary objectives for scientists. This is indeed a long way. In my
view, we can look at the physics itself again and make further progress
towards a holistic understanding of the world. This is what Logic in Reality
tries to do, and the tools are a non-standard, non-Bayesian probability that
excludes the classical limits of 0 and 1; 2) a generalization of the
dualities of physics to higher levels of reality;  3) the removal of other
classical 'splits' that have been just as toxic for progress: between time
and space, simultaneity and succession, cause and effect, energy and
information; and 4) the introduction of a third term that is emergent from
the original two. We thus have, for example, subject, object and
subject-object. The latter is not static, but can behave as a new subject or
object in this evolutionary picture. 

 

Unlike all other logics, Logic in Reality is not topic-neutral, but defines
experiential notions of quality and value, providing a (more) scientific
foundation for individual and collective moral responsibility.

 

As you know, there is no 'literature' on the above other than my recent book
and articles and the original books and papers by Lupasco and Nicolescu. But
I am encouraged by Hans' work to think that the key points of LIR

Re: [Fis] Fw: Responses

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Having a proper view of physics among the many possible is critical to
placing information theory on a sound basis. I have proposed Logic in
Reality as one way of giving meaning to the statement that energy and
information processes are non-separably related and how they are related.
Are there others?

 

Dear Joseph, 

 

It seems to me that there is at least one alternative: Shannon's
mathematical theory of information. Information is then defined as
content-free. Thermodynamic entropy (physics) is the special case that H is
multiplied by the Boltzmann constant and thus one obtains the dimensionality
of S. (S = kB * H). Information theory, however, can also be used in other
contexts such as economics (Theil, 1972). It does not have a realistic
interpretation such as in your argument.

 

From such a more differentiated perspective, concepts (e.g., electrons) do
not exist, but are meaningful and codified within theories. There can be
sufficient evidence (in physical theorizing) to assume (for the time being)
that the external referents (electrons) exist. The logic is not in reality,
but in the argument, and one cannot jump to the (ontic) conclusion of
existence.

 

Thus, perhaps the sentence we all agree . (with you?) is a bit premature. 

 

Best, 

Loet

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Social constructivism

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues,

 

Perhaps, the rainbow argument is opening a window to constructivism. The
definitions of poverty or IQ, for example, guide us in our perceptions of
reality and the possibilities of measurement. One can measure IQ because the
concept is discursively constructed and codified. The nature of the
codification process may be different among the sciences (e.g., between
social and natural sciences), but not the need to construct discursively and
to codify scholarly communication in processes of validation.

 

Best wishes, 

Loet

 

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Hans von Baeyer
Sent: Wednesday, January 08, 2014 12:52 AM
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: [Fis] Social constructivism

 

Stan asks: Would we be justified in viewing QBism the latest venture of
[social] constructivism? 

 

WOW, I sure hope not!  While it is true that there are fads in science, and
that the direction of research is influenced to some degree by the society
that funds it and consumes its fruits, I think that the underlying
methodology distinguishes socially constructed models of reality from
scientific ones.  Social constructions use arguments that play no role in
any account of the scientific method as it applies to the Natural Sciences
(as opposed to the Social Sciences). 

 

Some examples: Deutsche Physik referred to the ethnicity of scientists,
Lysenkoism adduced ideological goals; Creationism appeals to scripture;
Feminist Science Studies consider the gender of scientists. 

 

QBism does not change any of the impressive successes of quantum mechanics.
It simply says that quantum mechanics is a very complex, abstract encoding
of the experiences of generations of scientists interacting with atomic
systems. It disenfranchises a physicist from knowing what an electron spin,
for example, REALLY is, while celebrating her ability to predict correctly,
albeit probabilistically, what to expect in the next experiment. She and her
predecessors have created an abstract model, and validated it by appeal to
experiments, without appeal to any of the other considerations listed above.


 

In conversation with Joseph Brenner and others I have used the rainbow as a
metaphor. The rainbow is a phenomenon that everyone experiences slightly
differently, but that we all agree on. The scientific model that explains
it is very complicated and highly abstract.  Is the rainbow real?  It
certainly does not exist when nobody is looking.  It is, in the end, a
personal experience.  For me the experience is enhanced considerably by my
understanding of the scientific model of it, because it allows me to look
for and discover details I had never noticed, but I would not presume to say
I know what YOUR experience of it is.  Maybe you are thinking of Iris or
Noah, and feeling awe or curiosity, and remarking on its (apparently)
immense size and variable brightness.

 

QBism suggests that we look at the world as consisting of rainbows -- an
ensemble of complex phenomena about which we know some things, but whose
essences we cannot capture.  The QBist says: I don't know what the world is.
All I know is what I experience in my interactions with the world, as they
are illuminated and modified by what I have learned from other people, past
and present, who have had similar experiences and encoded them in the
succinct language of mathematics. 

 

Hans 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Article on panpsychism

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

Ulanowicz' measure can be considered as a measure of redundancy. We work
with it to study synergy (or lack of it) in university-industry-government
relations (since meeting with Ulanowicz at a meeting in Toronto in 2001).
See also:

Loet Leydesdorff and Inga Ivanova, Mutual Redundancies in Inter-human
Communication Systems: Steps Towards a Calculus of Processing Meaning
http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849 , Journal of the American Society for
Information Science and Technology (in press);
http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849 .

Best,

Loet

-- Forwarded message --
From: John Collier colli...@ukzn.ac.za
Date: Sat, Jan 4, 2014 at 11:46 PM
Subject: Re: [Fis] Article on panpsychism
To: Joseph Brenner joe.bren...@bluewin.ch, fis fis@listas.unizar.es



Joseph,

I take your points.In particular a more refined study of brain function is
required to refine understanding of the functionality of consciousness.
However, Bob Ulanowicz has used a similar measure for studying ecosystems,
and it has proven to be of considerable value there. I realize that what is
useful in one discipline might not be in another even if the mathematics
apply, but establishing some basic measures, though it does not tell us
everything we might want to know (and people do have different questions
they want to answer, to complicate things), one has to start somewhere in
any rigorous approach, and usually it is at a pretty general point like phi.
In any case, I have found Ulanowicz' measure to be a good starting point for
understanding functionality in ecosystems, and phi might also be a starting
point for more refined measures in consciousness studies. Incidentally, the
work referred to in the blog entry (which is original, published Jan. 1
2014) is from 2009, and that is probably based on work that was originally
published earlier. 

I have subscribed to Scientific American since 1965 or so, and I don't
recall it ever containing original work in articles on areas with which I
was familiar. As I pointed out in my comment, Leibniz came up with pretty
much the same idea a long time ago, distinguishing between confused and
clear perceptions, with the latter only involved in what might be called
self-consciousness. There isn't much genuinely new under the sun.

I agree that the phi measure is flat, but I see one of the advantages of
information theory is that it can linearize the nonlinear once we understand
what information is and how it flows. Just as more refinement of levels is
required to understand consciousness, the same can be said of Ulanowicz'
measure and levels in ecology, but that doesn't mean the gross measure is
useless by any means. I am looking at ways to articulate his measures in
ecological hierarchies along the lines of my work on natural instance (as
opposed to general) hierarchies, hoping to get more local measures of
functionality and competing functionalities at different levels in
hierarchies. I have argued that we need to look at this in mental
hierarchies, and I would guess that there are hierarchies within
consciousness as well that have sometimes competing functionalities.

I am a big fan of Damazio.

John

At 03:23 AM 2014/01/04, Joseph Brenner wrote:



Dear John,
 
The Koch article is worth reading as a kind of statement within the current
reductionist paradigm I believe it is necessary to get beyond. It is all the
more insidious because of Koch's research credentials, but it contains all
the 'push-button' words that I have seen in his previous work, as well as
that of others. Two of these are, in this connection, 'measure' and
'integration'. That 'the mental is too radically different to arise
gradually from the physical' is a hypothesis, and begs the questions 'does
it?' and 'why shouldn't it?' Despite your comment on the utility of his
measure, it seems much too scalar to represent anything fundamental.
 
There is no indication of the essentiality of properties of process and
interaction in the concept of information used by Koch. It also opens the
door, as I said in my previous note, to misinterpretations supporting
anti-realist positions. I conclude that the lessons the article offers about
how to think about subjective experience are (ideologically) biased and miss
the necessary connection between subjective and objective.
 
In his 2010 book, Self Comes to Mind, Anthony Damasio discusses how the
consciousness is constructed as a result of what he calls master
interoceptive processes that occur between the multiple structures at the
level of the brain stem and the cerebral cortex. He first defines a
protoself as an integrated collection of separate neural patterns that
map, moment by moment, the most stable aspects of the organism's physical
structure. The nuclei of the homeostatic processes involved generate one of
the two key components of the self - the feelings of knowing. The other
component, derived from non-homeostatic processes in the brain stem,
generate object saliency

Re: [Fis] The Communication Man

[Loet Leydesdorff]

 However, most of Loet's text is discursive, with ample freedom of
construction, and the parts associated to scientific conceptualizations do
not become very relevant --in my opinion they provide a loan of apparent
rigor. Besides the topic of discussion in his message is slightly twisted:
the initial communication and life becomes scientific communication
and biology... I do not want to be negative, rather pointing that there is
a different communication strategy at work. Well, finally the respective
rigor is in the eye of the beholder.

 

Dear Pedro, 

 

I take the liberty to react shortly to your message: I agree that we use
different paradigms, but for those of you who are interested in the rigorous
math I gave a reference to The Communication of Expectations and Individual
Understanding: Redundancy as Reduction of Uncertainty, and the Processing of
Meaning http://ssrn.com/abstract=2358791  where the derivation is both in
terms of the entropy statistics and in terms of the computation of
anticipatory systems. 

 

(I consider email exchanges as less codified, but more explanatory.)

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ SPRU, University of
Sussex; Visiting Professor,  http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html
ISTIC, Beijing;

Visiting Professor,  http://www.bbk.ac.uk/ Birkbeck, University of London.
 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en  



 

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] The Communication Man

[Loet Leydesdorff]

 The purport of metabolism is change, not only burning carbon-hydrogen
bonds. 
But perhaps we might all prefer communicating is life; life is
communicating.

Dear Joseph, 

In my opinion, communicating exhibits a dynamics very different from living.
For example, you have the freedom to write communicating is life and I can
counter that this is not true (communicating is not life). We may then be
able to communicate or not. We can also stop communicating, without stopping
life.

Similarly the statement information is constraints and constraints are
information is too grandiose. We can model a constraint on the information
exchange as a conditional probability distribution. It follows that H(x|y) 
H(x) or more precisely: H(x|y) = H(x) - T(xy). Transmission between two
dynamics is a crucial (and quantifiable) concept.

Best,
Loet


___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] social flow. Finding correspondences

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Joseph writes:

I think that the pessimism of Loet and Christophe could be helped by looking
for dynamic relations at the different levels that are grounded in basic
physics and chemistry, namely ones of changing actuality and potentiality.
The dynamics are not /the same/, but if they have some common principle, we
have something at least to work with. We do take over the biological model
in its totality, but that portion of it which applies throughout nature. The
couplings (Loet) are probably not simple dependency relations, but
interactive relations involving presence and absence, along the lines of
Deacon. Christophe is right that we do not understand completely the human
entities within which information flow occurs, but the rules (Luhn) they
follow are not necessarily totally different or mysterious. Someone with an
oversized ego, A, is going to behave accordingly until he runs, inevitably,
into some resistance (someone with a bigger ego, B). The subsequent dynamics
will follow the same pattern as at lower levels, A's usual behavior will be
potentialized at the expense of B's. Under good conditions, the A and B
interaction will produce an emergent behavior, AB, in which, however, the
original 'egos' have not totally disappeared. If this line is followed,
there is not a total, but a minimum continuity in the form of the
interactions between non-life and life. Information is in this form.

 

I doubt that this is a fruitful assumption: anticipations of future states
invert the time axis against recursions to previous states in historical
(biological) developments. Communication of models enables discourses to
entertain expectations of future states that can be used by reflexive agents
to reconstruct current ones. 

 

We elaborate this in: Loet Leydesdorff, Inga Ivanova, and Mark Johnson, “The
Communication of Expectations and Individual Understanding: Redundancy as
Reduction of Uncertainty, and the Processing of Meaning” (in preparation,
but available as preprint at
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2358791 ). The generation
of more possible states (increasing redundancy) operates very different in
cultural systems because of the possibility to refer to horizons of meaning.


 

I am afraid that this is my second posting for this week. -L 

 

Best,

Loet

 

 

Best,

 

Joseph

 

 

- Original Message - 

From: Loet Leydesdorff mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net  

To: fis@listas.unizar.es 

Sent: Sunday, November 24, 2013 8:18 AM

Subject: Re: [Fis] social flow

 

Dear colleagues, 

 

It seems to me that one can use models from biology to study inter-human
communication; but inter-human communication is not alive. The dynamics are
non-linear, but probably very different from the dynamics among molecules. 

 

For example, counterfactual orders can be shaped culturally among us such as
the rule of law. This cannot be reduced to biological principles (such as
survival of the fittest). The dynamics of expectations are very different
from that of historical events.

 

The psychological may be mediating reflexively between the cultural and the
biological, with a dynamics of itself. Without the individual reflections on
perceptions, the social distribution of expectations would not be
reproduced. However, one cannot reduce these structural couplings to
dependency relations, in my opinion. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

Reference:

Niklas Luhmann http://ssrn.com/abstract=2355880 ’s Magnificent
Contribution to the Sociological Tradition: The Emergence of the
Knowledge-Based Economy as an Order of Expectations, in: Nachtflug der Eule:
150 Stimmen zum Werk von Niklas Luhmann. Gedenkbuch zum 15. Todestag von
Niklas Luhmann (8. Dezember 1927 Lüneburg - 6. November 1998 Oerlinghausen),
Magdalena Tzaneva (Ed.). Berlin: LiDi Europe Verlagshaus, 2013;
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2355880 .

 

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of PEDRO CLEMENTE MARIJUAN FERNANDEZ
Sent: Saturday, November 23, 2013 9:53 PM
To: Joseph Brenner; Roly Belfer
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] social flow

 

Dear FIS colleagues,

Many thanks for the comments exchanged. 
Welcome to Roly, the first party of the Xian's conference publishing in the
list (I mean concerning the invited speakers, as Bi-Lin who also posted
recently was a Xian participant too). I agree with Roli's interpretation and
Joseph's points, and also with the direction started by John. It is one of
the few times we are producing interesting ideas on social information
infrastructures. Perhaps at the time being the received wisdom on
communication  social information is not working terribly well.  For
instance, Jakobson six communication functions could be perfectly collapsed
into three, or expanded into nine... I have found a similar relativity in
the not so many approaches to cellular / biological communication.
One of the essential points to reconsider is, in my opinion

Re: [Fis] social flow

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

It seems to me that one can use models from biology to study inter-human
communication; but inter-human communication is not alive. The dynamics are
non-linear, but probably very different from the dynamics among molecules. 

 

For example, counterfactual orders can be shaped culturally among us such as
the rule of law. This cannot be reduced to biological principles (such as
survival of the fittest). The dynamics of expectations are very different
from that of historical events.

 

The psychological may be mediating reflexively between the cultural and the
biological, with a dynamics of itself. Without the individual reflections on
perceptions, the social distribution of expectations would not be
reproduced. However, one cannot reduce these structural couplings to
dependency relations, in my opinion. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

Reference:

Niklas Luhmann http://ssrn.com/abstract=2355880 ’s Magnificent
Contribution to the Sociological Tradition: The Emergence of the
Knowledge-Based Economy as an Order of Expectations, in: Nachtflug der Eule:
150 Stimmen zum Werk von Niklas Luhmann. Gedenkbuch zum 15. Todestag von
Niklas Luhmann (8. Dezember 1927 Lüneburg - 6. November 1998 Oerlinghausen),
Magdalena Tzaneva (Ed.). Berlin: LiDi Europe Verlagshaus, 2013;
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2355880 .

 

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of PEDRO CLEMENTE MARIJUAN FERNANDEZ
Sent: Saturday, November 23, 2013 9:53 PM
To: Joseph Brenner; Roly Belfer
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] social flow

 

Dear FIS colleagues,

Many thanks for the comments exchanged. 
Welcome to Roly, the first party of the Xian's conference publishing in the
list (I mean concerning the invited speakers, as Bi-Lin who also posted
recently was a Xian participant too). I agree with Roli's interpretation and
Joseph's points, and also with the direction started by John. It is one of
the few times we are producing interesting ideas on social information
infrastructures. Perhaps at the time being the received wisdom on
communication  social information is not working terribly well.  For
instance, Jakobson six communication functions could be perfectly collapsed
into three, or expanded into nine... I have found a similar relativity in
the not so many approaches to cellular / biological communication.
One of the essential points to reconsider is, in my opinion, the lack of
connection between communication and life itself. Without entering
self-production of the living there can be no sense, no meaning. The notion
of information flow (rather than the signal) has helped me to cohere the
cellular intertwining scheme. But, little problem, how can the gap to the
human dimension be crossed? Essentially human communication is not logical,
but bio-logical... amorphously structured around the advancement of one's
life, and that includes masterminding well organized motor apparatuses, as
those involved in language production and language interpretation
(cerebellar computation). Logics is a byproduct of this motor/perceptual
system underlying our concepts and the interlinking of our exchnges, which
becomes mastermined by the fitness demands within social groups --responding
to Bi-Lin's off line comments too. Actually most of our social exchanges are
supradetermined by status, self-image, ambitions, affinity, collective
identities, deception, self-deception, attraction, etc. Rather than noise,
it is life itself!
Haven't we a lot of work to be done in these essential matters?

best ---Pedro

  _  

De: Joseph Brenner [joe.bren...@bluewin.ch]
Enviado el: jueves, 21 de noviembre de 2013 20:22
Para: Roly Belfer; PEDRO CLEMENTE MARIJUAN FERNANDEZ
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Asunto: Re: [Fis] social flow

Dear Roly, Dear Pedro,

 

Thank you for taking this thread in a for me very interesting direction. As
you know, interesting means what I find my logical system can confirm,
improve, validate, etc. The two notes share one feature that one might
criticize, namely, that they deal essentially with present, conscious
material, whereas information flow almost  by defintion seems to involve
components that are absent, potential, unconscious, etc.

 

Similarly, the application of the Square of Opposition in Roly's reference
would at first sight appear to be explanatory, but on closer inspection, I
find everything reduced back to binary logic, arrows in a box. What has to
be added, pace Jakobson, is some notion of the actual dynamics of what Roly
calls a mutual relateable framework. And let's not be too greedy: let's
get the pairwise interactions right and then see where we can go with more
complex ones.

 

Cheers,

 

Joseph

 

 

 

- Original Message - 

From: Roly Belfer mailto:avi...@gmail.com  

To: Pedro C. Marijuan mailto:pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es  

Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es 

Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2013 4:44 PM

Subject: Re: [Fis] social flow

 

Re: [Fis] social flow

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

It seems to me that one can use models from biology to study inter-human
communication; but inter-human communication is not alive. The dynamics are
non-linear, but probably very different from the dynamics among molecules. 

 

For example, counterfactual orders can be shaped culturally among us such as
the rule of law. This cannot be reduced to biological principles (such as
survival of the fittest). The dynamics of expectations are very different
from that of historical events.

 

The psychological may be mediating reflexively between the cultural and the
biological, with a dynamics of itself. Without the individual reflections on
perceptions, the social distribution of expectations would not be
reproduced. However, one cannot reduce these structural couplings to
dependency relations, in my opinion. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

Reference:

Niklas Luhmann http://ssrn.com/abstract=2355880 ’s Magnificent
Contribution to the Sociological Tradition: The Emergence of the
Knowledge-Based Economy as an Order of Expectations, in: Nachtflug der Eule:
150 Stimmen zum Werk von Niklas Luhmann. Gedenkbuch zum 15. Todestag von
Niklas Luhmann (8. Dezember 1927 Lüneburg - 6. November 1998 Oerlinghausen),
Magdalena Tzaneva (Ed.). Berlin: LiDi Europe Verlagshaus, 2013;
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2355880 .

 

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of PEDRO CLEMENTE MARIJUAN FERNANDEZ
Sent: Saturday, November 23, 2013 9:53 PM
To: Joseph Brenner; Roly Belfer
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] social flow

 

Dear FIS colleagues,

Many thanks for the comments exchanged. 
Welcome to Roly, the first party of the Xian's conference publishing in the
list (I mean concerning the invited speakers, as Bi-Lin who also posted
recently was a Xian participant too). I agree with Roli's interpretation and
Joseph's points, and also with the direction started by John. It is one of
the few times we are producing interesting ideas on social information
infrastructures. Perhaps at the time being the received wisdom on
communication  social information is not working terribly well.  For
instance, Jakobson six communication functions could be perfectly collapsed
into three, or expanded into nine... I have found a similar relativity in
the not so many approaches to cellular / biological communication.
One of the essential points to reconsider is, in my opinion, the lack of
connection between communication and life itself. Without entering
self-production of the living there can be no sense, no meaning. The notion
of information flow (rather than the signal) has helped me to cohere the
cellular intertwining scheme. But, little problem, how can the gap to the
human dimension be crossed? Essentially human communication is not logical,
but bio-logical... amorphously structured around the advancement of one's
life, and that includes masterminding well organized motor apparatuses, as
those involved in language production and language interpretation
(cerebellar computation). Logics is a byproduct of this motor/perceptual
system underlying our concepts and the interlinking of our exchnges, which
becomes mastermined by the fitness demands within social groups --responding
to Bi-Lin's off line comments too. Actually most of our social exchanges are
supradetermined by status, self-image, ambitions, affinity, collective
identities, deception, self-deception, attraction, etc. Rather than noise,
it is life itself!
Haven't we a lot of work to be done in these essential matters?

best ---Pedro

  _  

De: Joseph Brenner [joe.bren...@bluewin.ch]
Enviado el: jueves, 21 de noviembre de 2013 20:22
Para: Roly Belfer; PEDRO CLEMENTE MARIJUAN FERNANDEZ
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Asunto: Re: [Fis] social flow

Dear Roly, Dear Pedro,

 

Thank you for taking this thread in a for me very interesting direction. As
you know, interesting means what I find my logical system can confirm,
improve, validate, etc. The two notes share one feature that one might
criticize, namely, that they deal essentially with present, conscious
material, whereas information flow almost  by defintion seems to involve
components that are absent, potential, unconscious, etc.

 

Similarly, the application of the Square of Opposition in Roly's reference
would at first sight appear to be explanatory, but on closer inspection, I
find everything reduced back to binary logic, arrows in a box. What has to
be added, pace Jakobson, is some notion of the actual dynamics of what Roly
calls a mutual relateable framework. And let's not be too greedy: let's
get the pairwise interactions right and then see where we can go with more
complex ones.

 

Cheers,

 

Joseph

 

 

 

- Original Message - 

From: Roly Belfer mailto:avi...@gmail.com  

To: Pedro C. Marijuan mailto:pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es  

Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es 

Sent: Thursday, November 21, 2013 4:44 PM

Subject: Re: [Fis] social flow

 

Re: [Fis] reply to Loet

[Loet Leydesdorff]

S: Yes. These 'windows' are the channels for constraint imposition from
level to level -- transactions, not direct interactions -- between them.
The lower, faster acting, level provides 'data' constructed as ensemble data
by the higher level, while the higher level imposes relatively continuous
constraints upon the lower level.

 

In short, there IS need for hierarchy, properly understood.

 

Dear Stan, 

 

This is the case for natural systems and engineered systems (Herbert Simon).
However, above the individual the hierarchy is inverted because collectively
the communication is faster than the individual can reflexively follow. The
complexity and speed of communication can be enhanced by codification. The
cultural system operates in terms of expectations (from the perspective of
hindsight) and therefore against the entropy law. 

 

Thanks otherwise!

 

Best,

Loet

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] Discussion Recap.

[Loet Leydesdorff]

 Ok, but in order to understand the emerging macro-variables of the social
structure, one must always take into account the whole cognitive
capabilities of the individual. 

Dear Raquel and colleagues,

It seems to me that this misses the point that the non-linear dynamics of
the macro-system do not require that specific individuals participate at all
levels, in all dimensions, and at all times concurrently. One can only
access this system of expectations (horizons of meaning) insofar as has
developed cognitive competencies in relevant dimensions. 

For example, one cannot be an expert in all sciences at the same time
because of the different literatures. Thus, the social has a dimension of
its own (as cogitatum) which is reflexively accessible to cogitantes (us).
There is no need for reductionism. Luhmann, for example, used the concept of
interpenetration for this interfacing between meanings available at the
supra-individual and individual levels. I would take from him that the
interface can be considered as an operational coupling (in language and
symbols) that adds to the structural coupling between the social and
psychological. 

No need for reductionism or hierarchy! The dynamics operate in parallel with
windows on each other. One can try to specify the mechanisms of these
windows.

Best,
Loet


___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] THE SOCIOTYPE: SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS AND BEYOND

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Loet, your criticism is very accurate, thanks. But I really think, as said
Jorge, that our sociality has to have a fairly stable structure, that is to
say, lower and upper limits that feed our mental wellbeing. It's not
fixed, of course, but individuals become integral embodiments of emotions,
and most of the active components of these emotions reside in our social
environment. Evolutionarily we have developed this social dependence, and
therefore the absence of such bonds, or the feeling of not having them, is
devastating to our health --both physical and mental, as emphasized by
numerous studies.

Dear Raquel: 

Expectations of social structure are extremely stable without
materialization. For example, the expectation of the rule of law. These are
anchored/reflected in codes of communications. One does not have to appeal
to a global brain. It seems a mystification to me. 

Of course, the social expectations when codified leave footprints behind in
the form of institutions. For example, courts and parliaments as places
where one enacts the rule of law.

Best,

Loet

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] THE SOCIOTYPE: SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS AND BEYOND

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Raquel, 

 

I agree with the distinction genotype-phenotype-sociotype, but the metaphor
of a global brain is in my opinion not so fortunate. Different from an
individuum, the social can be considered as a dividuum or, in other words, a
distribution of agents that contains uncertainty. The brain is an
integration mechanism, whereas the social can also differentiate using, for
example, a division of labor. 

 

The differentiation of the social in terms of codes of communication has
become prevailing in modern pluriform societies. We have means to map these
differences in the semantics.

 

Best, 

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ University of
Sussex; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html Beijing;
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en hl=en  



 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Raquel del Moral
Sent: Friday, September 27, 2013 1:32 PM
To: fis
Subject: [Fis] THE SOCIOTYPE: SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS AND BEYOND

 

THE SOCIOTYPE: SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS AND BEYOND
Raquel del Moral 
(Bioinformation Group, IACS)

 

Some years ago in one of the FIS sessions
(https://webmail.unizar.es/pipermail/fis/2006-March/001309.html), Pedro
pointed at the triad genotype-phenotype-sociotype and emphasized the
importance of a structure of social bonds around the individual. Precisely
by developing further the Sociotype concept, as a new construct that
describes both the structural  dynamic aspects of the individual's
relationships, I am advancing a PhD Thesis. Also supported by a Ministry of
Science and Innovation's biomedical project, our group is carrying out an
empirical research work in order to develop a questionnaire able to measure
the sociotype, the network of relationships of the person, in order to
correlate it with mental health and risk (loneliness) situations.




THE SOCIOTYPE: OVERALL PANORAMA 
Our work discusses the pertinence of a sociotype construct, both
theoretically and empirically oriented. The term, based on the conceptual
chain genotype-phenotype-sociotype, suggests the existence of an
evolutionary ‘preference’ in the human species for some determined averages
of social organization and communication relationships. Although human
individuals become highly adaptive and resilient concerning the
implementation of their sociality, a core pattern, or “sociotype” might be
established for their networking relationships. The sociotype appears as a
structural/relational pattern which is actively looked for, and the absence
of which provokes predisposition towards feelings of loneliness and
unhappiness. The prospect of establishing numerical characteristics for that
pattern, both structural and dynamic, does not look too farfetched.
Hypothesis such as the “social brain” have already advanced robust
structural data. From the biomedical point of view, properly framing the
sociotype hypothesis and putting it into empirical test could be a timely
enterprise. As a number of contemporary studies on social networks have
reported, perceived isolation and loneliness feelings turn out to be an
unrewarding condition for individuals, an unwanted state, and also a risk
factor for their health. In our times, the social changes derived from the
economic globalization, the new communication technologies, and the
demographic transition towards elderly populations have implied dramatic
changes in the social relationships of entire communities. Given the absence
of efficient psychosocial indicators, an empirical search on the relational
phenomenon throughout the sociotype lens might provide useful orientations
for mental health and quality of life policies.

OUR SOCIALITY
Sociality is an obvious trait of the human species. Most of the evolutionary
and cultural novelties of our past refer to essential aspects of sociality
--e.g. origins of language, emotional communication, group behavior, morals
and ethics, religious and legal codes, political institutions, and so on.
Hypothesis such as the “social brain” have contributed to advance a new
bond-centered approach on the evolutionary emergence of human sociality. The
presence of a series of significant regularities in the size and structures
of social groups, notwithstanding their remarkable variability, suggests the
plausibility of a “deep structure” of social bonding for the human species.
There seems to be an average of social networking, with very ample upper and
lower limits, concerning the number and classes of bonding relationships
that an individual is able to maintain meaningfully. The finding of
networking regularities

[Fis] Redundancy Generation in University-Industry-Government Relations; preprint version

[Loet Leydesdorff]

With many thanks to Bob Ulanowicz! 
Best, Loet



  _  



Redundancy Generation in University-Industry-Government Relations:
http://arxiv.org/abs/1308.3836 
The Triple Helix Modeled, Measured, and Simulated


 

A Triple Helix (TH) of bi- and trilateral relations among universities,
industries, and governments can be considered as an ecosystem in which
uncertainty can be reduced auto-catalytically. The correlations among the
distributions of relations span a vector space in which two vectors (P and
Q) represent sending and receiving, respectively. These vectors can also
be understood in terms of the generation versus reduction of uncertainty in
the communication field that results from interactions among the three
(bi-lateral) communication channels. We specify a set of Lotka-Volterra
equations between the vectors that can be solved. Redundancy generation can
then be simulated and the results can be decomposed in terms of the TH
components. Among other things, we show that the strength and frequency of
the relations are independent parameters. Different components in terms of
frequencies in triple-helix systems can also be distinguished and
interpreted using Fourier analysis of the empirical time-series. The case of
co-authorship relations in Japan is analyzed as an empirical example; but
triple contingencies in an ecosystem of relations can also be considered
more generally as a model for redundancy generation by providing meaning to
the (Shannon-type) information in inter-human communications. 

 

Inga Ivanova (a) and Loet Leydesdorff (b)

 

(a) Far Eastern Federal University, Department of International Education 
Department of Economics and production management, Office 514, 56 Aleutskaya
st., Vladivostok 690950, Russia; inga@mail.ru .

 

(b) University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam School of Communications Research
(ASCoR), 

Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam, the Netherlands;
l...@leydesdorff.net  mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net 

 

** apologies for cross-postings

http://arxiv.org/abs/1308.3836 

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] About FIS 2005

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

It seems to me that a difference that makes a difference (or a distinction)
generates another option in the system of reference and thus adds to the
redundancy instead of the Shannon-type information. 

The information is not in the DNA strings, but in the distribution of the
bases in the DNA strings. 

The confusion is generated because informing us introduces us implicitly
as a system of reference. However, we provide meaning to the information and
thus generate redundancies (other and possibly new options). The channels
are then changed, but not the information. The information is contained in a
series of differences or, in other words, a probability distribution. 

 

If one considers a difference which makes a difference directly as
information instead of a redundancy, one can no longer measure in terms of
bits of information and thus one loses the operationalization and the
possibility of measurement in information theory. In other words,
information theory then becomes only philosophy. 

 

Best,

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)

Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
Honorary Professor, SPRU,  http://www.sussex.ac.uk/spru/ University of
Sussex; Visiting Professor, ISTIC,
http://www.istic.ac.cn/Eng/brief_en.html Beijing;
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJ
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en hl=en  



 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of John Collier
Sent: Monday, April 15, 2013 4:37 PM
To: Bob Logan; y...@pku.edu.cn
Cc: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] About FIS 2005

 

Bob, Xueshan, others,

This is an issue that I think more terminological than anything else, and I
think that there is no correct answer. The problem is more to find the
relations between different uses of information that are current in science
( Kinds of Information in Scientific Use
http://www.triple-c.at/index.php/tripleC/article/view/278/269 . 2011.
cognition, communication, co-operation. Vol 9, No 2
http://www.triple-c.at/index.php/tripleC/issue/view/22  ). For example in
astrophysics and cosmology it is useful to speak of information as a
conserved quantity that is related to energy but is not the same (not two
sides of the same coin as some would have it). 

Tom Schneider has done a lot of work on molecular machines (
http://schneider.ncifcrf.gov/ http://schneider.ncifcrf.gov/ ) in which he
sees a computational model using information to keep track of computations
as useful. Sure it al is grounded in energy, but this is not the most
perspicacious way to view what happens in these macromolecular interactions.
I have argued in Information in biological systems
http://web.ncf.ca/collier/papers/Information%20in%20Biological%20Systems.pd
f  (Handbook of Philosophy of Science, vol 8, Philosophy of Information
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/bookdescription.cws_home/716648/descriptio
n#description , 2008, Chapter 5f)  that we should distinguish between the
instrumental use of information in biology and a substantive use, in which
information is treated as such by the system. This is a stronger requirement
than in the astrophysical and cosmological uses of information (in a
different substantive way, and also stronger than Schneider's use). This is
a useful distinction in biology, or so I argue. However, in an earlier
paper, Intrinsic Information http://web.ncf.ca/collier/papers/intrinfo.pdf
(1990)  I argued that in order to understand what it is to mean that we get
information about the world, we must understand what it is that makes the
world capable of providing us with information. This leads to a natural
description of the world as containing information (see also Dretske,
knowledge and the flow of information, and Barwise and Perry, Situations and
Attitudes and following work of theirs) that flows into our minds, given the
right coordination. See also Barwise and Seligman, Information Flow for a
general account not mind dependent. 

What you want to treat as information depends very much on what you are
considering and how. I would argue that a unified theory of information
should recognize all of these usages, and put them in their place relative
to each other. Some usages, I believe, are dispensable in some context, and
some may be dispensable in all contexts. But I doubt that information talk
can be dispensed with entirely in favour of energy talk when boundary
conditions are important to system behaviour. This happens especially with
complex systems, but physicists have  found it useful in talking about
boundary conditions of black holes, among other things, that aren't
obviously complexly organized.

John

At 02:43 PM 2013/04/15, Bob Logan wrote:



Dear Xueshan - re Nalewajski's conjecture that molecular systems have

Re: [Fis] Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic evidence

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Bob, 

I now read the book: the description of autocatalysis is very convincing. It
really clarifies how a triple helix (of university-industry-government
relations) can operate in generating synergy (reducing uncertainty). 

You then go on with Average Mutual Information (AMI). You don't mention
that AMI (that most of us call mutual information) is necessary positive
since a Shannon-type information, but that mutual information in more than
two dimensions can be negative and thus used as an indicator of synergy or
autocatalysis.

I usually make reference for this to Ulanowicz (1986, pp. 143 ff.). Is that
methodologically the same argument? I assume so. Or have you taken these
measurement issues also further?

Best,
Loet


Loet Leydesdorff 
Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR), 
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam. 
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-842239111
l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ ;
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en 

-Original Message-
From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Robert Ulanowicz
Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2013 4:44 PM
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic
evidence

I'm most grateful to both Bob L. for sharing his manuscript with FIS and to
Loet for his new ms on 3-D mutual information. (I am on the road, but will
read it as soon as I return home.)

It's so gratifying to live long enough to see these leads in information
theory taken up by others and improved upon. I've been working with them for
over 30 years, and it was beginning to look as though my interest had been
in vain. Thanks so much for paying attention!

Most now dismiss Shannon-type information as incapable of treating
meaning, when, in fact, we have only begun to fathom the potentialities of
multi-dimensional and conditional forms of the Shannon formulation.
Carry-on!

There is an ambiguity in the meaning of redundancy in IT that I perhaps am
responsible for. Conventional IT refers to redundancy as repetition of
outcomes. In that sense it is connected with mutual information. I have
always used the term to refer to multiplicity of pathways, or functional
redundancy (as Henri Atlan called it). In that sense it is quantified by
the conditional entropy. Of course, mutual information and conditional
entropy are complementary attributes. I think Loet is using redundancy in
the traditional sense.

Ed is quite correct in his disagreement with the 3rd Window. He has
convinced me that most of what I had labeled Newtonian in my book was more
the work of Leibniz and Euler of the school of Berliner Mechanik. I now
labor to set the record straight.

Best regards to all!
Bob U.

Quoting Loet Leydesdorff l...@leydesdorff.net:

 Dear Bob,



 I should perhaps have clarified that in the text of which I sent the 
 abstract around yesterday, I formulate at p. 10 (in honour of Bob 
 Ulanowicz) as follows:



 With the same enthusiasm which Krippendorff (2009a) reports about 
 Ashby (1969), one of us embraced this potentially negative sign in the 
 mutual information in three dimensions as an indicator of potential 
 reduction of uncertainty in Triple-Helix configurations once it was 
 brought to his attention by Robert Ulanowicz, who had used the same 
 indicator in the context of his ascendancy theory in mathematical biology
(Ulanowicz, 1986:
 143). This same indicator is used across disciplines (see for an overview:
 Jakulin, 2005) and sometimes called configurational information, but 
 it has remained controversial because it is poorly understood. As 
 noted, a signed information measure cannot be interpreted in Shannon 
 information theory, whereas alternative frameworks for its 
 appreciation have remained ill-defined (Krippendorff, 1980, 2009a and b).



 arXiv:1301.6849 http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849  [pdf 
 http://arxiv.org/pdf/1301.6849 ]

 Mutual Redundancies in Inter-human Communication Systems: Steps 
 Towards a Calculus of Processing Meaning



 Does the issue return in the book? Our argument is that this mutual 
 information is a redundancy and can then be integrated into the 
 framework of the mathematical theory of communication.



 Best wishes,

 Loet



   _

 Loet Leydesdorff

 Professor, University of Amsterdam
 Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR), Kloveniersburgwal 
 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam.
 Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-842239111  
 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ; 
 http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ ; 
 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en
 http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en



 From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es 
 [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Bob Logan
 Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2013 5:02 AM
 To: fis
 Subject: Re: [Fis] Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research

Re: [Fis] [Fwd: SV: Science, Philosophy and Information. An Alternative Relation] S.Brier

[Loet Leydesdorff]

How does one measure the synergy among three discourses? 
That is an interesting question within information theory (as part of both
science and philosophy).

Best,
Loet


-Original Message-
From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Pedro C. Marijuan
Sent: Monday, February 11, 2013 4:29 PM
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: [Fis] [Fwd: SV: Science, Philosophy and Information. An Alternative
Relation] S.Brier

 Original Message 
Subject:SV: [Fis] Science, Philosophy and Information. An
Alternative 
Relation
Date:   Thu, 07 Feb 2013 20:32:04 +0100
From:   Søren Brier sb@cbs.dk
To: joe.bren...@bluewin.ch joe.bren...@bluewin.ch, Pedro Clemente 
Marijuan Fernandez pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es, fis@listas.unizar.es
fis@listas.unizar.es, John Collier colli...@ukzn.ac.za
References: 6043399.89641360255002322.javamail.webm...@bluewin.ch



Dear Joseph

 

I go for each of the three nominally independent disciplines are not 
independent, but that each provides a dynamic ontological and 
epistemological link to the other two, more or less strong or actual 
depending on the extent to which one wishes to emphasize certain aspects 
of knowledge. Science without philosophy is stupid but philosophy 
without science is blind. I am for a synergetic interaction.

 

 

Best wishes

 

  Søren Brier

 

Professor in the semiotics of information, cognition and commmunication 
science,

department of International Business Communication, Copenhagen Business 
School,

Dalgas Have 15, 2000 Frederiksberg, Denmark,

 

 

 

 

*Fra:* fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es 
[mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] *På vegne af *joe.bren...@bluewin.ch
*Sendt:* 7. februar 2013 17:37
*Til:* Pedro Clemente Marijuan Fernandez; fis@listas.unizar.es; John Collier
*Emne:* [Fis] Science, Philosophy and Information. An Alternative Relation

 

Dear FIS Colleagues,

The formation of the the Society for the Philosophy of Information at 
the University of Hertfordshire is announced in the link in John's note. 
It includes the announcement and Call for Papers of the International 
Conference on the Philosophy of Information to be held in Xi'An, China 
in October, 2013, sponsored by both the above Society, led by Professor 
Luciano Floridi and the Institute for the Philosophy of Information in 
Xi'An under the direction of Professor Wu Kun.

This increased activity in the area of the philosophy of information 
(another major Workshop is planned this Spring) raises the issue of the 
relation between the science and philosophy of information as well as of 
the philosophy of science. I am aware of and agree with the position 
expressed by Pedro that information science in the FIS framework should 
emphasize scientific research in the sense of knowledge that is 
quantifiable and/or provable. However, I do not believe that either he 
or others of you intend to exclude rigorous qualitative knowledge, 
especially as it concerns the dual nature of information.

The ubiquitous presence of information in all disciplines, as emphasized 
by Wu, suggests an alternative relation linking philosophy, science and 
information that is NOT one of simple hierarchical inclusion or 
possession (of). One possibility is to say that it is information that 
links philosophy and science, but this formulation perhaps fails to 
recognize the general properties of the latter two.

Another possibility is to say that each of the three nominally 
independent disciplines are not independent, but that each provides a 
dynamic ontological and epistemological link to the other two, more or 
less strong or actual depending on the extent to which one wishes to 
emphasize certain aspects of knowledge.

I look forward to your comments regarding the pros and cons of such a 
conception. Thank you.

Best wishes,

Joseph

Ursprüngliche Nachricht
Von: colli...@ukzn.ac.za mailto:colli...@ukzn.ac.za
Datum: 04.02.2013 18:57
An: fisfis@listas.unizar.es mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es
Betreff: [Fis] Society for the Philosophy of Information

http://www.socphilinfo.org/


--
Professor John Collier 
colli...@ukzn.ac.za mailto:colli...@ukzn.ac.za
Philosophy and Ethics, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 4041 South Africa
T: +27 (31) 260 3248 / 260 2292   F: +27 (31) 260 3031
http://web.ncf.ca/collierhttp://web.ncfhttp://web.ncf.ca/collier.ca/coll
ier 
http://web.ncf%3chttp:/web.ncf.ca/collier%3e.ca/collier

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

 


-- 
-
Pedro C. Marijuán
Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group
Instituto Aragonés de Ciencias de la Salud
Centro de Investigación Biomédica de Aragón (CIBA)
Avda. San Juan Bosco, 13, planta X

Re: [Fis] Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic evidence

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Bob, 

 

I should perhaps have clarified that in the text of which I sent the
abstract around yesterday, I formulate at p. 10 (in honour of Bob Ulanowicz)
as follows:

 

With the same enthusiasm which Krippendorff (2009a) reports about Ashby
(1969), one of us embraced this potentially negative sign in the mutual
information in three dimensions as an indicator of potential reduction of
uncertainty in Triple-Helix configurations once it was brought to his
attention by Robert Ulanowicz, who had used the same indicator in the
context of his ascendancy theory in mathematical biology (Ulanowicz, 1986:
143). This same indicator is used across disciplines (see for an overview:
Jakulin, 2005) and sometimes called configurational information, but it
has remained controversial because it is poorly understood. As noted, a
signed information measure cannot be interpreted in Shannon information
theory, whereas alternative frameworks for its appreciation have remained
ill-defined (Krippendorff, 1980, 2009a and b).

 

arXiv:1301.6849 http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849  [pdf
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1301.6849 ]

Mutual Redundancies in Inter-human Communication Systems: Steps Towards a
Calculus of Processing Meaning 

 

Does the issue return in the book? Our argument is that this mutual
information is a redundancy and can then be integrated into the framework
of the mathematical theory of communication.

 

Best wishes, 

Loet

 

  _  

Loet Leydesdorff 

Professor, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR), 
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam. 
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-842239111
 mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net l...@leydesdorff.net ;
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ http://www.leydesdorff.net/ ;
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en
http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYJhl=en 

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Bob Logan
Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2013 5:02 AM
To: fis
Subject: Re: [Fis] Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic
evidence

 

Dear Colleagues - I was very moved by Robert Ulanowicz's book A Third Window
- I saw parallels with the work of McLuhan and a project I co-authored with
Stuart Kauffman and others. That resulted in the attached paper. Some of you
on FIS  will receive this email post twice as I do not know who all is on
FIS - I am sending this post to all folks that were copied on emails to or
from Robert Ulanowicz.

I hope you will find time to read my paper and sent me your comments. If you
like this paper I have another that I submitted to Zygon that deals with
matters spiritual and theological also stimulated by Robert Ulanowicz's A
3rd Window. I would be happy to send it to you.

 

with kind regards to all - Bob Logan

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

Re: [Fis] FW: Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic evidence

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear colleagues, 

 

It seems to me that this notion of constraint can be compared with
Maturana's structural coupling. 

 

How would one operationalize it in terms of information theory? The
constraint is different from a condition, because a conditional
probability distribution also implies the notion of a difference when
compared with the unconditioned probability distribution. This difference is
equal to the transmission and thus an operation - that is, operational
coupling - would be implied. 

 

How to conceptualize a structural constraint? It seems to me a selection
rather than a variation. Using the word information therefore seems square
to the Shannon-concept of information, but words are not the issue, in my
opinion.

 

Best wishes,

Loet

 

PS. This discussion may be a bit lamed by the constraint imposed on this
list of only two messages/week. Thus, if you reply, I can only reply
off-line. J L.

 

 

From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Christophe Menant
Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2013 2:35 PM
To: lo...@physics.utoronto.ca
Cc: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: [Fis] FW: Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic
evidence

 

Dear Bob,

Your paper is interesting. And there is a point on which I would appreciate
knowing a bit more. It is about the way you use the word constraint. 
Here are the understandings I got from your paper (your last paragraph):
1) Constraint  as information: 
- biotic information is nothing more than the constraints that allows a
living organism to harness energy from its environment to propagate its
organization.
- I do not know where the energy comes from to build the constraints but
the constraints are the information.
- That  constraint, that vital piece of information was the spark that
ignited the biosphere.
2) Constraint as part of a system transforming energy into work:
- a living organism must be able through constraints to do work with the
energy it imports from its environment 
- where does the energy come from to build the constraints to turn
environment energy into the work needed by an organisms to achieve its
metabolism 
3) Constraint as constructing information: 
- foundation which views information as the construction of constraints.
4) Constraint as allowing a finalized work: 
- an aleatoric event took place in which a constraint emerged that allowed
a collection of organic molecules to do the work necessary to propagate
their organization. 
These usages of the word look as gravitating around information and
energy/work. But perhaps you mean something else as the word can be used in
many different ways. (as you may remember, I use it as characterizing the
nature of a system:  http://cogprints.org/6279/2/MGS.pdf
http://cogprints.org/6279/2/MGS.pdf) 
It would interesting you tell us a bit more about the way you position the
word in your approach.
Thanks in advance
Christophe 

 

  _  

From: lo...@physics.utoronto.ca
Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2013 23:02:17 -0500
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] Cognitive Effects of Cognitive Research: Photographic
evidence

Dear Colleagues - I was very moved by Robert Ulanowicz's book A Third Window
- I saw parallels with the work of McLuhan and a project I co-authored with
Stuart Kauffman and others. That resulted in the attached paper. Some of you
on FIS  will receive this email post twice as I do not know who all is on
FIS - I am sending this post to all folks that were copied on emails to or
from Robert Ulanowicz.

I hope you will find time to read my paper and sent me your comments. If you
like this paper I have another that I submitted to Zygon that deals with
matters spiritual and theological also stimulated by Robert Ulanowicz's A
3rd Window. I would be happy to send it to you.

 

with kind regards to all - Bob Logan

 

 

 

__

 

Robert K. Logan

Chief Scientist - sLab at OCAD

Prof. Emeritus - Physics - U. of Toronto 

www.physics.utoronto.ca/Members/logan

 

 



___ fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis

[Fis] Mutual Redundancies in Inter-human Communication Systems [preprint]

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Mutual Redundancies in Inter-human Communication Systems:
http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849 
Steps Towards a Calculus of Processing Meaning


 

Loet Leydesdorff and  Inga A. Ivanova 

 

Assuming that meaning cannot be communicated, we extend Shannon's
mathematical theory of communication by defining mutual redundancy as a
positional counterpart of the relational communication of information.
Mutual redundancy indicates the surplus of meanings that can be provided to
the exchange of information in reflexive communications. In the
three-dimensional case (e.g., a Triple Helix of
university-industry-government relations), mutual redundancy is equal to
mutual information [R(xyz) = T(xyz)]; but when the dimensionality is even,
the sign is different. We generalize to the measurement in N dimensions.
Using Luhmann's social-systems theory and/or Giddens' structuration theory,
mutual redundancy can be provided with an interpretation in the sociological
case: different meaning-processing structures code and decode with other
algorithms. A surplus of (absent) options can then be generated that add
to the redundancy. Luhmann's functional (sub)systems of expectations or
Giddens' rule-resource sets are positioned mutually, but can be coupled
operationally in events or instantiated in actions. Shannon-type
information is generated by the mediation. The structures are
re-positioned towards one another as sets of (potentially counterfactual)
expectations. 

 

Preprint avaliable at http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.6849 

 

[1] Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR), University of
Amsterdam, Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam, The Netherlands;
l...@leydesdorff.net; 

[2] Department of International Education  Department of Economics and
production management, Far Eastern Federal University, Office 514, 56
Aleutskaya st., Vladivostok 690950, Russia; inga@mail.ru.

 

___
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis