Re: Function, unfractionable as first principle

["Dan Fiscus" <***>]

Tim Gwinn wrote:

> Thanks, that helps me understand it better.
> This sounds somewhat along the lines of Don's alternate (M,R)-system that
> explicitly includes anabolic/catabolic pathways, which are integral to the
> diagram as a whole. Have you looked at that on his website?

Is this the same article as the one showing Gaia as an organism as
in closed to efficient cause? I saw this once but now cannot find it
on his site. Can you send the URL?

> The thing I wonder about is whether ways of causing a system to cease
> functioning is a good test for whether those ways tell us about what makes
> them what they are - what makes them 'alive'. There are many ways to break a
> system, but for complex systems most of them don't tell us anything useful
> about the organization of the system.

I see what you mean, but I still wonder if differential results from
the act of severing connections or relations or inter-dependency can
be an important kind of way to break a system that is informative.

For example, to
remove a carburetor from a car does not really cause either that
component or the whole car system to cease to be capable of
functioning - the part can be put back in the same car or another,
the car can get a new carburetor, and both can go on functioning
after the event of the severing of connection between part and whole.
We could say that event or disconnection is reversible. Also note that
the carburetor and car can exist in a kind of neutral limbo state or
stasis in which ceasing to function for a time (the stoppage of system
time?) does not jeopardize the ability to restart.

This kind of disconnection event, though, would not work for a
brain (the fact that it now works for hearts in some cases I think
is an artificial capability our modern medicine has - a trick that is
great, but is not sustainable over the long haul). In the case of
disconnecting the brain, both part and whole cease to function, the
severing of active, functional relationship between part and whole is
irreversible, and there is no neutral limbo state - continued function is
required for the capacity of continued function to exist.

Just playing around with it...

Dan