Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism
On 6 Nov 2017 at 5:30AM, John Collier wrote: In fact I would argue that the notion of information as used in physics is empirically based just as it is in the cognitive sciences. Our problem is to find what underlies both. Yes, there have already been serious attempts in this direction, though which may not yet have received due attention from the folks interested in the issue of information. One example is the entropy production fluctuation theorem by Gavin Crooks (1999). The agenda is on the distinction between states and events in thermodynamics. An essence is seen in the uniqueness of thermodynamics allowing for even the non-state or history-dependent variable such as heat. This perspective is powerful enough to precipitate a dependable synthesis out of integrating both the state and the process descriptions. When a microscopic system of interest contacts a heat bath, its development along an arbitrary trajectory of the state attributes of the system necessarily accompanies the associated event of heat flow either to or from the bath. If the trajectory is accompanied by the heat flow to the bath over any finite time interval, it would be far more likely compared with the reversed trajectory absorbing the same amount of heat flow from the bath. This has been a main message from Crooks’ fluctuation theorem. One practical implication of the theorem is that if the trajectory happens to constitute a loop, the likely loop must be the one having the net positive heat flow to the bath. For the reversed loop trajectory would have to come to accompany the same amount of heat flow from the bath back into the inside of the system, and that would be far less likely. Any robust loop trajectory appearing in biochemistry and biology must be either clockwise or anti-clockwise, and by no means an undisciplined mix of the two. A lesson we could learn from this pedagogical example is that thermodynamics is a naturalized tool for making macroscopic events out of the state attributes on the microscopic level irrespectively of whether or not it may have already been called informational. It is quite different from what statistical mechanics has accomplished so far. Something called quantum thermodynamics is gaining its momentum somewhere these days. Koichiro Matsuno From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of John Collier Sent: Monday, November 6, 2017 5:30 AM To: fis@listas.unizar.es Subject: Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism Loet, I have no disagreement with this. at least in the detailed summary you give. In fact I would argue that the notion of information as used in physics is empirically based just as it is in the cognitive sciences. Our problem is to find what underlies both. My mention of the Scholastics was to Pierce's version, not the common interpretation due to a dep misunderstanding about what they were up to. I recommend a serous study of Peirce on te issues of meaning and metaphysics. He wa deeply indebted to their work iin logic. Of course there may be no common ground, but the our project is hopeless. Other things you have said on this group lead me to think it is not a dead end of confused notions. In that case we are wasting our time. John ___ Fis mailing list Fis@listas.unizar.es http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism
Loet, I have no disagreement with this. at least in the detailed summary you give. In fact I would argue that the notion of information as used in physics is empirically based just as it is in the cognitive sciences. Our problem is to find what underlies both. My mention of the Scholastics was to Pierce's version, not the common interpretation due to a dep misunderstanding about what they were up to. I recommend a serous study of Peirce on te issues of meaning and metaphysics. He wa deeply indebted to their work iin logic. Of course there may be no common ground, but the our project is hopeless. Other things you have said on this group lead me to think it is not a dead end of confused notions. In that case we are wasting our time. John On 2017/11/05 7:58 PM, Loet Leydesdorff wrote: 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 <mailto:ag...@ncf.ca>> To: fis@listas.unizar.es <mailto: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
Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism
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
