Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Dear Koichiro, Your peripheral remarks were not so to me, but exactly the further grounding in physics that I for one feel necessary. I would like to focus on two statements I found particularly relevant: If information has anything significant in its own right and can stand alone irrespective of whether or how it may become analytically accessible, on the other hand, one must go beyond the stipulation of the standard model. The logical system I am proposing does nothing too far outside the standard model. It focuses on the dualities and self-dualities of energy as metaphysically significant, with the inherent oppositional relation - distinguishable co-existing actualities and potentialities - as the basis for information. ...why not take up carbon chemistry as one more concrete example going beyond the hurdle? So far as we know, there has been no attempt for determining both carbon compounds as the building pieces of biology and chemical affinity latent in them in a mutually consistent manner. Logic in Reality provides a consistent interpretation of the latent affinity of chemical compounds in terms of residual unsaturated potentialities that are the resultant of those of the atoms, which result in turn from those at the lowest quantum level. This reality is equivalent to the information carried to higher levels of complexity that is necessary for the emergence of new forms and processes. It is the latent affinity (potentiality) of carbon-nitrogen-oxygen-sulfur compounds that enable them to be the building blocks of biology. The reason that I call this approach a logic rather than just a restatement of the underlying chemical physics is that one maintains its principles when entering the epistemological domain, eliminating as far as possible the barrier between epistemology and ontology that has been the source of so much , well, difficulty. Koichiro's note talks to the basic question Kevin and I posed, the reality + causal efficacy of fluctuons. More evidence for or against will be easier to evaluate with this in hand. Thank you and best wishes, Joseph - Original Message - From: Koichiro Matsuno To: fis@listas.unizar.es Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2010 5:55 AM Subject: Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model Folks, Kevin Kirby's opening remark on the Fluctuon model of Michael Conrad shed light on the role of information in physics and beyond. Here is some peripheral remark of my own, though a bit lengthy. 1) Practicing physics may look informational in exercising its own specification without saying so explicitly. A case in point is the renormalization scheme as demonstrated in quantum electrodynamics (QED). QED is quite self-consistent in specifying and determining the values of both the electric charge of an electron and its mass. Tomonaga-Schwinger have successfully set up a descriptive scheme of synchronizing the multiple times presiding over the virtual processes which might violate conservation laws in between in the light of the uncertainty principle in energy and time. The synchronization that is faithful to observing all the relevant conservation laws is an act of making both determinations of the mass under the influence of the electric charge and of its reversal coincidental, that is, the act of making both ends meet. A neat expression of the synchronization is seen in Dyson's equation in terms of Feynman's diagram. In short, the physical parameter called a mass or an electric charge is internally specified, determined and measured as such in the renormalization scheme of QED. So far, so good. 2) Michael felt some uneasiness with the renormalization scheme since the notion of information remains redundant and secondary at best there. Although the definitive values of the mass and the electric charge might seem informational to the experimentalist who intends to measure them externally, an electron in QED can already be seen to measure and fix them internally on its own. In the physical world describable in one form of renormalized scheme or another, that is to say, in the standard model of physics, information is merely a derivative from something more fundamental. The standard physicist has a good excuse for marginalizing information. If information has anything significant in its own right and can stand alone irrespective of whether or how it may become analytically accessible, on the other hand, one must go beyond the stipulation of the standard model. A notorious case that has strenuously kept defying the renormalization project of whatever kind attempted so far is quantum gravity, which was Michael's primary concern. Self-consistent scheme of justifying quantum gravity is required to reach continuity (gravity) as starting from discontinuity (quantum) and at the same time to reach discontinuity as starting from continuity even
Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Dear FISers, Thanks to Kevin and Joseph for their excellent texts --and to the many other responding parties. For my own argumentation purposes I find very useful the comments from Stan, Kevin Clark, Koichiro. There are three different aspects I would like to deal with. Given my burden of nasty complicate tasks, I have to leave them as open questions to try to formulate better in the future, or maybe to be kindly dealt with by other parties. About the formalism to deal with entropies: How does the treatment of entropies by Michael in his Adaptability Theory --extended by the fluctuon model into the microphysical realm-- relate with the contemporary quantum information theory, and the qubits stuff? Given that it was initially conceived from the ecological perspective, can it be connected with Bob Ulanowicz's conceptualization of energy flow and diversity (and his tentative variational principle?) The paper by Kevin on Biological adaptibilities and quantum entyropies (BioSystems 64, 2002, 33-41) is an excellent portal for this question. Gravitation and the quantum--and information. There are plenty of theories on quantum gravitation to compare with the ideas in the fluctuon model, and to try to link with the information discussion. Given the curious biological penchant of Lee Smolin (The Life of the Cosmos,1997, Three roads to Quantum Gravity, 2000) and the relative clarity of his discussions on string theory and other approaches, I am very tempted to take some of his ideas on Calabi-Yau (manifolds) spaces as an ultimate Planckian scenario where energy and information collide and only elementary distinctions survive. They are communicable in some open dimensions, but not in the other closed ones... the idea of information as distinction on the adjacent is realized there; also in Smolin's discussions on information in black holes, birth of baby universes, etc. Could this frame of thought be put in agreement with the formal underpinnings of the fluctuon model --as far as I know, inspired by Josephson fluxons or electron solitons in quantum tunneling? It goes beyond my reach. Percolation --and the all pervasive and reverberating circulation of the perpetual disequilibrium as Koichiro as put. This aspect of Michael's thought was fascinating for me, a vertical but terribly heterogeneous scenario of information flows. Given that Joseph and Stan have made neat statements from different angles about a hierarchical structure of levels, I contend in favor of the general predominance of the heterarchical scheme. When we leave the narrow confines of a discipline, or the boundaries of an experimental setting, everything comes together again... Given the limitations of our individual cognition, those vagaries in the environment are not accidental, but fundamental--and they percolate in our collective cognition and in our social use of the sciences. I agree with Joseph (I think) in the need of a more cogent logic for the real and not only for the formal-theoretical. Part of the problem is that this artificial contention of percolation has been treated differently in each major discipline. See for instance Peter Denning views on Computational Science-versus Information Science. Echoing McLuhan centennial, couldn't we call this problem as the irrenunciable mosaic structure of information percolation? Thanking the patience, Pedro -- - Pedro C. Marijuán Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group Instituto Aragonés de Ciencias de la Salud Avda. Gómez Laguna, 25, Pl. 11ª 50009 Zaragoza, Spain Telf: 34 976 71 3526 ( 6818) Fax: 34 976 71 5554 pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es http://sites.google.com/site/pedrocmarijuan/ - ___ fis mailing list fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Folks, Kevin Kirby's opening remark on the Fluctuon model of Michael Conrad shed light on the role of information in physics and beyond. Here is some peripheral remark of my own, though a bit lengthy. 1) Practicing physics may look informational in exercising its own specification without saying so explicitly. A case in point is the renormalization scheme as demonstrated in quantum electrodynamics (QED). QED is quite self-consistent in specifying and determining the values of both the electric charge of an electron and its mass. Tomonaga-Schwinger have successfully set up a descriptive scheme of synchronizing the multiple times presiding over the virtual processes which might violate conservation laws in between in the light of the uncertainty principle in energy and time. The synchronization that is faithful to observing all the relevant conservation laws is an act of making both determinations of the mass under the influence of the electric charge and of its reversal coincidental, that is, the act of making both ends meet. A neat expression of the synchronization is seen in Dyson's equation in terms of Feynman's diagram. In short, the physical parameter called a mass or an electric charge is internally specified, determined and measured as such in the renormalization scheme of QED. So far, so good. 2) Michael felt some uneasiness with the renormalization scheme since the notion of information remains redundant and secondary at best there. Although the definitive values of the mass and the electric charge might seem informational to the experimentalist who intends to measure them externally, an electron in QED can already be seen to measure and fix them internally on its own. In the physical world describable in one form of renormalized scheme or another, that is to say, in the standard model of physics, information is merely a derivative from something more fundamental. The standard physicist has a good excuse for marginalizing information. If information has anything significant in its own right and can stand alone irrespective of whether or how it may become analytically accessible, on the other hand, one must go beyond the stipulation of the standard model. A notorious case that has strenuously kept defying the renormalization project of whatever kind attempted so far is quantum gravity, which was Michael's primary concern. Self-consistent scheme of justifying quantum gravity is required to reach continuity (gravity) as starting from discontinuity (quantum) and at the same time to reach discontinuity as starting from continuity even on an experimental basis. 3) The analytical tool Michael employed was conservation laws paraphrased in terms of elementary perturbation theory as Kevin noted. While the standard model is grounded upon the likelihood that all the relevant conservation laws could eventually be met insofar as one is lucky enough to encounter a specific form of synchronization, the Fluctuon model squarely faces up to the situation that there is no chance of expecting such a fortunate synchronous coincidence. Substantiating each conservation law on energy or momentum is a must in any case, while asking simultaneous fulfillment of all the relevant conservation laws is too much. What is unique to the Fluctuon model is its emphasis on the participation of persistent and itinerant disequilibrium or a Fluctuon in implementing conservation laws internally, though there is no room for it in the mind of the standard physicist. This perpetual disequilibrium is all pervasive and reverberating up and down and from left to right and back. 4) Once I asked Michael that while graviton is nice in its ambition of going beyond the standard model of physics, why not take up carbon chemistry as one more concrete example going beyond the hurdle? So far as we know, there has been no attempt for determining both carbon compounds as the building pieces of biology and chemical affinity latent in them in a mutually consistent manner. His reply was this. Right, but I want to cover more even though it may look crazy to many. That is an issue of quantum gravity and life. Anyway, life is short. Granted. Best, Koichiro Matsuno ___ fis mailing list fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Dear Joe, Please let me start by repeating my idea that fluctuons are its, that is, energy in some form. If (mathematical) idealism is anti-realist, this is certainly not what I would consider Conrad's theory to be. Stan comes to the same conclusion, that fluctuons are its, but this suggests to him a non-materialist conception of information. This is a first place where something like another logic is needed that can incorporate the material-energetic and non-material aspects of information. Can this issue not simply be solved by returning to Shannon's concept of information. Bits of information are dimensionless. In S = k(B) H, the Boltzmann constant provides the dimensionality. One should not confuse this mathematical concept of information with the biologically inspired concept of information as a difference which makes a difference (Bateson). This is observed information by a system which can provide meaning to the information. I would not call this anti-realist, but anti-positivist. The specification in the mathematical discourse remains res cogitans (as different from res extensa). All of physics also has this epistemological status. All other science, too, but sometimes positivism is ideologically prevailing. Best wishes, Loet _ Loet Leydesdorff 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/ ___ fis mailing list fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Dear all, Regarding the very interesting discussion of it from bit and vice versa. Usually each level of information processing (semantic, algorithmic, implementational) presupposes some it in which bit is implemented. In computing, recursions must have a bottom. Could it be the case that on the very fundamental level, it and bit cannot be distinguished at all? They simply are an it-bit like in Informational Structural Realism of Floridi who (using different reasoning) argues that reality is an informational structure. Fluctuons being quantum-mechanical phenomena have already dual wave-particle nature. Why cannot they be it-bit as well? Best, Gordana From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Loet Leydesdorff Sent: den 25 september 2010 10:48 To: 'Joseph Brenner'; 'Stanley N Salthe'; fis@listas.unizar.es Subject: Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model Dear Joe, Please let me start by repeating my idea that fluctuons are its, that is, energy in some form. If (mathematical) idealism is anti-realist, this is certainly not what I would consider Conrad's theory to be. Stan comes to the same conclusion, that fluctuons are its, but this suggests to him a non-materialist conception of information. This is a first place where something like another logic is needed that can incorporate the material-energetic and non-material aspects of information. Can this issue not simply be solved by returning to Shannon's concept of information. Bits of information are dimensionless. In S = k(B) H, the Boltzmann constant provides the dimensionality. One should not confuse this mathematical concept of information with the biologically inspired concept of information as a difference which makes a difference (Bateson). This is observed information by a system which can provide meaning to the information. I would not call this anti-realist, but anti-positivist. The specification in the mathematical discourse remains res cogitans (as different from res extensa). All of physics also has this epistemological status. All other science, too, but sometimes positivism is ideologically prevailing. Best wishes, Loet Loet Leydesdorff Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR), Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam. Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-842239111 l...@leydesdorff.net mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ ___ fis mailing list fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Dear Rafael, Ø Otherwise bits turns into digital metaphysics Not necessarily if we take that dual nature seriously. They are both waves and particles. I have also written in that sense several times, among others in http://mdh.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:120541/FULLTEXT01 Dear Loet, Ø The it-part is in the structure which assumes the specification of a system of reference. In evolutionary terms: structure is deterministic/selective; Shannon-type information measures only variation/uncertainty. I agree with you. And complementary part bit comes from its dynamics. Best, Gordana Best wishes, Gordana From: Rafael Capurro [mailto:raf...@capurro.de] Sent: den 25 september 2010 11:55 To: Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic Cc: Loet Leydesdorff; 'Joseph Brenner'; 'Stanley N Salthe'; fis@listas.unizar.es Subject: Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model dear Gordana just because the bit-view of reality one possible view is. Otherwise bits turns into digital metaphysics. Floridi: he is contradictory. He says/said that the infosphere is not the cybetspace, then yes, then no... Then he says that forms are on a higher level of abstraction that bit-forms... which is what Plato would say and said (but much better than Floridi), the digital infosphere being only one possibility of forms, then he says... best Rafael Dear all, Regarding the very interesting discussion of it from bit and vice versa. Usually each level of information processing (semantic, algorithmic, implementational) presupposes some it in which bit is implemented. In computing, recursions must have a bottom. Could it be the case that on the very fundamental level, it and bit cannot be distinguished at all? They simply are an it-bit like in Informational Structural Realism of Floridi who (using different reasoning) argues that reality is an informational structure. Fluctuons being quantum-mechanical phenomena have already dual wave-particle nature. Why cannot they be it-bit as well? Best, Gordana From: fis-boun...@listas.unizar.esmailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Loet Leydesdorff Sent: den 25 september 2010 10:48 To: 'Joseph Brenner'; 'Stanley N Salthe'; fis@listas.unizar.esmailto:fis@listas.unizar.es Subject: Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model Dear Joe, Please let me start by repeating my idea that fluctuons are its, that is, energy in some form. If (mathematical) idealism is anti-realist, this is certainly not what I would consider Conrad's theory to be. Stan comes to the same conclusion, that fluctuons are its, but this suggests to him a non-materialist conception of information. This is a first place where something like another logic is needed that can incorporate the material-energetic and non-material aspects of information. Can this issue not simply be solved by returning to Shannon's concept of information. Bits of information are dimensionless. In S = k(B) H, the Boltzmann constant provides the dimensionality. One should not confuse this mathematical concept of information with the biologically inspired concept of information as a difference which makes a difference (Bateson). This is observed information by a system which can provide meaning to the information. I would not call this anti-realist, but anti-positivist. The specification in the mathematical discourse remains res cogitans (as different from res extensa). All of physics also has this epistemological status. All other science, too, but sometimes positivism is ideologically prevailing. Best wishes, Loet Loet Leydesdorff Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR), Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam. Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-842239111 l...@leydesdorff.net mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ ___ fis mailing list fis@listas.unizar.esmailto:fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis -- Prof.em. Dr. Rafael Capurro Hochschule der Medien (HdM), Stuttgart, Germany Capurro Fiek Foundation for Information Ethics (http://www.capurro-fiek-foundation.org) Director, Steinbeis-Transfer-Institute Information Ethics (STI-IE), Karlsruhe, Germany (http://sti-ie.de) Distinguished Researcher in Information Ethics, School of Information Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA President, International Center for Information Ethics (ICIE) (http://icie.zkm.de) Editor in Chief, International Review of Information Ethics (IRIE) (http://www.i-r-i-e.net) Postal Address: Redtenbacherstr. 9, 76133 Karlsruhe, Germany E-Mail: raf...@capurro.demailto:raf...@capurro.de Voice: + 49 - 721 - 98 22 9 - 22 (Fax: -21) Homepage: www.capurro.dehttp://www.capurro.de ___ fis mailing list fis@listas.unizar.es https://webmail.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
Re: [Fis] Revisiting the Fluctuon Model
Folks -- Comments upon Kirby’s Brenner’s ‘Opening Remarks’ (1) I used Conrad’s early information-based work in developing my conception of the scale/compositional hierarchy as applied to material systems. As a materialist, I may have ‘mis-read’ his work. I think this now, upon glimpsing this ‘fluctuon theory’, which is clearly not a materialist construct. Rather, it seems to lie in the realm of mathematical idealism. Admittedly, materialism may turn out to have been a ‘wrong turn’ in our attempts to understand the universe. Information itself may not be a materialist proposition! My own thinking is really ‘bit’ from ‘it’! Then, fluctuons may really be ‘its’, and not ‘bits’! Surely ‘bits’ emerged into the world with information theory, crisp as that is. I argue that any development must go from vaguer to more definite, as with any embryo. Bits ain’t vague. Or, tell me HOW they are vague. Fluctuons as limned here seem pretty vague to me – perhaps because language cannot reach their mathematical crispness! We do not yet have a fuzzy version of cosmology, I suppose. “Vertical flows” directly “up and down” the scale hierarchy contradicts one of the principles of that hierarchy in application, which requires transduction of information in order to cross scales (example: a higher level constructs statistical representations of lower level dynamics). That, of course would be in the ‘manifest, material world’. And it is precisely ‘information flows’ that would be interdicted at scale changes. “Percolation networks” to foster a “logical approach” to information flows across hierarchically organized compartments may seem OK in math. “Interaction” between manifest organisms and the “unmanifest vacuum” is tantalizing, but… in information theory? “Fascinating and rich”, yes. That these unmanifest communications are “not susceptible to being washed out by thermal fluctuations”, I suppose follows from the definition of ‘unmanifest’, but organisms seem to be manifest. What are we reaching for here? Transcendence of material limitations as the world goes sour on us? STAN Let me add that in my evening musings, I do entertain thoughts that might well be more crisply informed by fluctuon theory! On Fri, Sep 24, 2010 at 7:49 AM, Pedro C. Marijuan pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es wrote: (The previous message was truncated, sorry. I am sending it again. ---P.) *THE NATURE OF MICROPHYSICAL INFORMATION:* *REVISITING THE FLUCTUON MODEL* *Kevin G. Kirby *Department of Computer Science Northern Kentucky University (US) *Joseph Brenner* International Center for Transdisciplinary Research Paris (France) 1. OPENING REMARKS (Kevin Kirby) In the standard view, taken for granted so completely it is rarely articulated, the fundamental physics of particles and fields is a mere platform for life. Physics and biology are surely deeply different: the extreme ends of the scales simply don't match up. For example, the notion that somehow the incompatibility of general relativity with quantum physics has some relevance for life seems nonsensical. But is it? In a series of papers published throughout the 1990s, Michael Conrad put together a theory in which life was, as he often put it, an image of the underlying physics of the universe. The mere title of one of the final papers in the series, and the title of the book he wanted to write, Quantum Gravity and Life, seems almost like a non sequitur. And indeed, the theory he put forth was difficult. But the claim I would like to put forward is that there are deep ideas here that -- even if the full details of the theory are not correct or not well-defined-- help us reach a more satisfying theory of information in the natural world. Tragically, Conrad passed away in 2001, and was unable to complete his book. Yet a very thorough description remains of his ideas in a series of sixteen papers from 1989 through 1998. This work centered on what he called fluctuon theory. The main exposition was in a series of papers Fluctuons I,II, III published in Chaos, Solitons and Fractals during 1993-1996. For the purposes of this discussion, two briefer papers can be recommended as providing good summaries of his ideas here: * Conrad, M., 1995, Multiscale synergy in biological information processing. Optical Memory and Neural Networks 4(2), 89-98. * Conrad, M., 1998, Quantum gravity and life, BioSystems 46, 29-39. The fluctuon theory asserts that the universe is a kind of giant homeostat, but one in which the ground state is always in flight. The universe slides in and out of consistency. His starting point was the Dirac sea of negative energy particles: his vacuum was a plenum. There was more than one sea. One was of electrons and positrons, where photons are chains of such pairs. The gluons of the strong nuclear force were to be chains in a quark/anti-quark sea. Gravitons were chains that arose from all massive