Re: causing trouble, active/passive

[John Kineman <***>]

Judith et al.

I basically agree with this, but would hold out a caveat regarding the
following:

JR:Models don't show up in the natural world until complexity reachesthe
dimension of living systems (biology). this is why these concepts are
soalien to physicists.

The way I put this elsewhere is that natural models in the physical view
are trivial (except at the quantum scale). They are synonymous with the
structures they model because it is all based on their commuting fully
with states. I don't say they aren't there, in natural physical systems,
but their complexity has been reduced by commutation. So, as you say,
they become uninteresting to the physicist. But, by recognizing the
presence of models in this degenerate state, we can develop a more
general theory that applies to everything, and that is extremely
important. It also allows us to associate complexity with modelling,
which I think is important too. Perahps also because of my partial
familiarity with that territory (physical science) I don't hesitate to
invade there. And, if I may quibble farther, I think the whole
measurement problem that RR developed into the modeling relation applies
extremely well to quantum phenomenon, which today is the core of
physics. The difference is that physicists seem to dislike the idea of
functions and instead try to explain what is going on by creating an
imaginary pseudo-world in many dimensions (or realities) that is as
closed and commuting as the classical one was supposed to be. That would
be irrelelvant in biology, where we are more concerned with what the
whole functions do than how many dimensions would be required to predict
them from first principles, which could never be made practical in
biology even if it were achievable.

JJK

Judith Rosen wrote:

> John M. wrote:
>
>
> > excellent idea, the non-human modeler. I have an example:
> > a photograph. It is a reduced model (e.g. no smell included)
> > of the visual boundaries-enclosed modeling. Momentarily I
> > am at a loss to mention another one - product of not some
> > *conscious activity* (like the camera, or say a bee-raindance
> > provided information of flowers - to say extremes). I was
> > looking for a model 'made' by a stone or a glalxy... Sorry.
> > Do you think conscious activity can only lead to models?
>
> Any organism other than a human being is a "non-human modeler" in a certain
> sense. Complexity itself, is a model creator/generator. Any example created
> by human beings, like your photograph, is only a model because of human
> consciousness. As such, I think it muddies the water rather than clarifying
> things. Models don't show up in the natural world until complexity reaches
> the dimension of living systems (biology). this is why these concepts are so
> alien to physicists. Models, functions, anticipation, life: These are all
> properties of complex systems of a certain dimension of complex
> organization.Contemporary physics deals with systems of lesser complexity
> than biology does, but the common feature is complexity.
>
> Judith

--
© 2004 John J. Kineman
all rights reserved