Re: complex

["John M" <***>]

Dear Tim,
good luck
You can start your 6 volume vocabulary with explenations (glossary) and then
the argiments with collegues within the RR terminology, as Steve, myself,
and the rest of us, finally you may have a language of terms+qualifiers to
start arguing with the rest of the world who use the same terms but do not
understand your qualifiers and thing quite differently. Of course all of
them are wrong, because we are right.
However: wrong or not, they constitute the "scientific establishment"
controling academia, the publishers, the governmental grants, the scientific
periodicals.
Which does not mean that we are the underdog: we are the outerdog.

I had a struggle for several years (during my chaos-favoring era) with
mathematically impaired minds on my distinction between linear and nonlinear
IN MY TERMS of chaos: nonlinear being chaotic, as "changes not proportional
arithmetically and not consequent in quality" vs the rest of the world,
where the 'not' is 'yes'. They just did not get under their skull that I use
the words (terms) in a different sense from: "linear is exp=1 and nonlinear
exp=not 1" .
(A Turing-applicable missile flight pattern software as 'simple'? -maybe for
you).

IMO we need changing, not mending.

Best regards

John M

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tim Gwinn" <***>
To: <***>
Sent: Tuesday, July 29, 2003 8:28 PM
Subject: Re: complex


> My preference is to add a qualifier prefix to "complex" in order to
> distinguish Rosennean types of complexity from the myriad other
> interpretations.
>
> So, I am thinking of something like:
> p-complex = predicatively complex (for all 'simple' or computable systems)
> ip-complex = impredicatively complex (for all Rosennean complex systems)
>
> This is quite easy to write, and allows people to immediately understand
> that one is talking about complexity, but in very specific terms.
>
> The drawback is that while predicativity vs. impredicativity is certainly
a
> well-defined way of distinguishing the two categories, using that
> characteristic as a defining qualifier might draw attention away from
other
> equally (or moreso) important distinctions between simple and complex
> systems.
>
> So....perhaps we use something closer to Rosen's definition for simple vs
> complex (EL p. 306) where simplicity is gauged in terms of simulability
> (Turing-computability) of all models, and Rosennean complexity is the
> failure of that requirement.
>
> In that case, we could use terms like:
> c-complex = computable complex
> nc-complex = noncomputable complex
>
> This also retains much of the etymological meaning of "complex": a
c-complex
> system will have entailment structures entwined only within the
constraints
> of computability of its models, whereas nc-complex systems can have more
> richly entwined entailment structures.
>
> Another alternative might be "r-complex" for "rosennean complex". And then
> perhaps "s-complex" for "simple" systems. But that also requires
separately
> defining "simple" and "rosennean".
>
> Just tossing out ideas....
>
> Regards,
> Tim
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: ROSEN Forum [mailto:*** Behalf Of Jeff
> > Pridaux
> > Sent: Tuesday, July 29, 2003 1:08 PM
> > To: ***
> > Subject: Re: complex
> >
> >
> > I agree with Mike's argument.  There is so much momentum with the non-
> > Rosennean usage of the term "complex" that the world isn't going to
adopt
> > The Rosennean definition of "complex" unless some practical application
of
> > it has such utility as to get everyones attention.
> >
> > Its kind of a question of if you are a launguage purist or not.
> > A language
> > purist may not want to "give up" on the word "complex".
>