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Re: MR as ontological, Fechner

Hi Judith and all,

Thanks you for catching this. You are right. I slipped into this habit which was prevalent in the VCU discussion, but which I myself argued against. I noticed the statement when re-reading the post, but wondered if anyone would catch it.

To clarify:  In my interpretation of these matters, mechanisms are obviously (proximally) not complex, but RR shows how they are detected (or obtained, depending on whether you approach it epistemologically or ontologically) from a commutation of an MR, i.e., a complex system that has been short-circuited itself to operate in lock-step between the FS and NS. In the epistemological sense, we thus detect mechanisms and define what they look like, and can say unequivocally "they are not complex."

But there is an ontological sense, the theory can be taken as general, and thus explanatory (not just indicative) of mechanisms (i.e., all of physics and material science). Thus "biology can inform physics," as RR claimed. What does it inform physics about? Could be just a new class of system physics couldn't handle, or could be fundamentals in the MR. But since RR claimed that his view was the more general and physics a sub-set, it should be clear that biology is informing physics about a better view of reality. One of the big problems in phyiscs is getting from obviously complex quantum behavior to obviously classical behavior in large systems. Since it started by studying big systems behaving classically, all the traditions are constructed about that - which turns out to be the simpler case. One is want to start over, so physics tries to explain the complex world of quantum behaviors (and other complex systems) in terms of mechanisms. It is like Ptolemy's model of the solar system - as RR says, it gets increasingly impossible to do the more one tries. The modeling relation offers great hope in this. If MR is a better view of the foundation of reality, then you only need a context to force it to commute and you get physical reality. Such a context can be generated by physical organization of matter with space-time implications. One can also imagine a different kind of context (organization) arising, an organic one that allows metabolism and repair functions to exist (M-R systems) and begin replicating (organisms). This extends the theory of living systems to the general case, but does not then claim that mechanical systems are complex except in their most primitive origins (e.g., the quantum world, if one thinks that way).

The confusion comes, which I thought was prevalent in the VCU discussion, of calling everything complex at a proximal level. That a rock is complex because you can relate to it in many different ways, i.e., from any number of MRs beween our mind and the object. That interpretation I reject on the basis that the word "rock" refers to the external object which we know to behave classically. The human-rock system is a different system than the "rock." Now QM implies that the rock is non-classical but on extremely long time scales. That there is a vanishingly small probability that it may suddenly relocate itself stochastically due to the sum of all quantum uncertainties. If large objects did this (some have been demonstrated in the lab - Bose-Einstein matter), we would have to call them complex in the same sense that the idea  applies to quantum "wavicles.". But what the VCU interpretation was getting at I called (in my 1999 ISSS paper) "subjective complexity." In other words, it is complexity of the human-rock system, where the human is providing the rock model, not the rock. This is also epistemological complexity. Without this idea, one can get lost in the philosophy of Berkeley, where everything is "there" because of my observation, which is not reasonable in the everyday world.

So, only at the ontological limits is an interpretation where the phrase "everything is complex" appears true. This is in the ultimate case, where we know from philosophy that it is no longer possible even to retain the idea of an external world in any theory. So, this is why I stress the importance of ontological view in changing our perception of reality - it offers an avenue for integration of existing theories and has enormous social implications. In that view, we are talking about fundamental origins of all we know, where it all came from. If instead we were to keep the idea of origins with anything non-complex, that is a mechanism. But you can only get a mechanism by having it commute with a model - so there must also be models. If the models didn't exist in relationship from the beginning it is impossible to recover a modeling relation later, or to use it in quantum theory because one cannot get functions out of material itself. If we say, well functions "emerge" from the organization of material (that was one of Rosen's ideas), it is still impossible to say where "organization" of material begins except with the first appearance of material. We can talk about specific kinds of organization emerging later, but not organization (i.e., formality) itself. At this very fundamental, philosophical level, everything is thus describably by a theory of ontological complexity, as in RRosen's approach, based initially on living systems. Then the traditional problem of explaining how complex life emerged from mechanism is reversed, to now explaining how mechanisms materialize from a complex MR. That turns out to be easy and elegant, and thus it is arguably the parsimonious view. It is unfortunate (professionally) in this case that this new science taken on its own implications contradicts tradition and agrees more with ancient philosophical perspectives, particularly from the East that have become associated in the West with fanciful religions. Having spent some time studying those traditions, for this reason and others, I believe the ancients understood complexity but had trouble distinguishing mechanisms, which seem counter-intuitive from that view, particularly when the view is instituionalized in a religious practice or spiritual philosophy. As a result, they tended to treat everything as proximally complex, i.e., vitalism, panpsychism, etc. and that is what Western science had to overthrow. But the core of their philosophy was essentially correct, I think and the revolution went too far by trowing everything out can inventing a theory of nothing but machines. Each person has to react to that in their own way, and I am sure RR had many difficulties with such associations and inappropriate claims, which I hope I can distinguish myself from making.

Here's a quote from AS:
"In coming to grips with the idea of a natural system, we must necessarily touch on some basic philosophical questions, on [of?] both an ontological and an epistemological character. This is unavoidable in any case, and must be confronted squarely at the outset of a work like the present one (its on page 45!), because one's tacit presuppositions in these areas determine the character of one's science. It is true that many scientists find an explicit consideration of such matters irksome, just as many working mathematicians dislike discussions of foundations of mathematics. Nevertheless, it is well to recall a remark by David Hawkins: "Philosophy may be ignored but not escaped; and those who most ignore least escape."

He then proceeds to discuss how percepts, which are describably in terms of modeling relations,  form the basis for time itself! So the MR is general, where complexity is its natural condition and mechanisms are its "degenerate" case (RR's term).

Hope this helps - Does that fit better with your understanding???

Yours,

J. Kineman

PS I was reading the introduction to AS today and see it clearly segregates itself for biological systems at the begining, but then discovers the theory to be general. Particularly RR's comments that physics (mechanism) should be seen as the subset of complex systems. That statement alone makes it unavoidable to think of complexity being the foundation of the universe (whereas mechanism is now imagined to be the foundation of the universe). I believe he was unequivocal about this, however careful in how it was presented, knowing probably too much about people's sensitivity in this regard.

Extending this view, physical nature then appears as a result of percepts - an "illusion" if you are mystical about it, but one that we participate in, so it is real enough to us. Commutation of an MR is analogous to collapse of a wave function (not the same, analogous), so there is hope of explaining quantum phenomena in terms of modeling relations rather than truly mystical probability functions. I think the confusing part is only with classical mechanisms - which are most of what people are interested in. One can say there is no need to invoke an MR there, and then force it to commute so it essentially disappears, but then one has a problem explaining how phenomena scale to the sub-atomic. The popular interpretation is unavoidable, that mechanisms are not whole systems!!! If we were to consider their full extension in time, we would recover complexity (as we do in cosmology). These are indeed big ideas.

If RR did not intend all this generally (at some point in its development), then he was guided by unseen forces to establish an extremely consistent theory with surprisingly general implications. That is entirely possible. In doing a really good analysis of one class of systems, one has no way of knowing in advance if a theory will turn out to be general. I think the view will eventually be widely embraced as a general theory (view). Recall that Einstein rejected the direct implications of his own theory, arguing aginst it (notably with Bohr: "Albert, you have to change your view of reality.") for the remainder of his life. What Einstein was against was the fragmentation of reality into a duality. His problem was "God doesn't play dice." In other words reality must know what it is doing somehow. But QM couldn't capture that, leaving reality fundamentally uncertain. Now, years after Einstein, Rosen has provided the means by which reality can be made whole again. He accomplished what Einstein struggled to achieve for 40 years.. The answer was as simple as Einstein's first insight about relativity;  it is that natural causality includes entailment relations with formal systems themselves. - ie. we abandon Platonic dualism in favor of a systemic relational reality.

What do you think? I don't mean to speculate too far about the personal views the man, whom I didn't know except through his writings. Does any of this fit with your recollections?

Sincerely,

John Kineman


Judith Rosen wrote:
John K. wrote:
  
In particular, Rosen identifies everything as being complex.
    

I need clarification on this statement, John. My father only identified
everything ALIVE as being complex. That's the only guarantee you will have--
that if it is alive, then you know without checking that it is complex. It
doesn't follow the other way. The notion that all of the material world is
complex was asserted by others--but imputed to Robert Rosen-- and was a
claim that I DISputed as being asserted by my father. His only assertion in
that direction was that atoms are complex as he uses the term. But he made a
clear distinction between systems that were complex because of their
organization and other systems, created out of atoms, of course, but which
had an organization that fell short of his definition of complexity. This
has been a source of misunderstanding all along with his work and has led to
some big disagreements! But it is true, nonetheless.

The question for most people seems to be; How can a system be non-complex if
it has other systems, complex systems, even living systems, in it's
organization as "components"? You actually phrased the answer beautifully in
an earlier post regarding how the global ecosystem is not an organism. So I
need clarification on what you mean by the above statement or I don't
understand.

Judith


He says
  
that organisms are complex because they involve modeling relations in
their existence (ontology). That is very clear in AS.  I'm looking for
references to make the logical connection to saying that complexity is
generally explained that way for all "natural systems." If not, there is
a problem with the theory, but Rosen didn't emphasize that connection
except in discussing organisms. Still, there is no alternative
explanation for complexity proposed. The means of detecting it
(non-commutation of one's model of the subject system) and explaining it
(the subject systems own internal model of "self and environment") are
the same, which is a consistent theory since humans are "natural
systems." But mechanisms either (a) do not contain internal models of
themselves and their environment, or (b) contain internal models that
have been forced to commute. Alternative (b) would be the most
consistent interpretation. That also is what affords a translation into
quantum process. (This summarizes the earlier discussion on MR as
    
ontology).
  
So, it is clear that in the case of mechanisms - which are most of what
science has studied to date - panpsychism would not apply, either
because it is not there (option a) or because it has been
short-circuited (option b). I tend to favor option b for explaining
material existence as emerging from complex natural systems.

Since this makes distinctions and explains origins formally, it is
definitely not "panpsychism," where the "ism" refers to an already
established philosophy that we can reference historically. If this is
confusing, think of the word "positivism." This refers to a historical
school of epistemology that you can look up in the library. But we can
use the work "positive" in many new ways without being tarred with
"positivism." Similarly, we can discuss psyche in nature.

-jjk

Dan Fiscus wrote:

    
Mike,

Looks good on first scan. I'll read it. Reminds me of "teleomechanist"
school in Germany, de Chardin's "Heart of Matter", Bateson's "Mind
and Nature" and his "pattern that connects", plus the history and
ideas help for what I am into. Not to mention Rosen...

Thanks for the article...

Dan

McIntyre, Mike S. wrote:

      
I have been following this discussion between Tim Gwinn and
John Kineman with interest.  I myself favor panpsychism, so
naturally I tend to side with John's position here.

Here is a link to an article about Gustav Theodor Fechner
(1801-1887), written by Michael Heidelberger, which may be
of interest in this context.  Heidelberger describes Fechner's
approach as a form of non-reductive materialism.

http://www.homestead.com/dogbreedersguild/files/fechner.pdf

Regards,
Mike McIntyre