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Reactive vs. Anticipatory

Hi John M.

I agree with your first two points (although I notice you used mathematics to "prove" your point-- Isn't that sort of against your policy?) I'll let the "strawman" comment slide for now...

However, this next one requires further discussion:
John M. wrote;
Pray: which one is your position:
1. the organism (fish etc in your examples) is
analyzing the outcome of its hypothetical behavior and
decides to change it in a way that looks the most
lucrative, OR:
2. it KNOWS about the dangers and the better ways how
to act? Then the question is: Is it a collective
consent of the species living on 3 continents or is it
a concensus of a summit meeting?

I think it goes another way: there are influences from
the ambiance and changes (mutations?) occur in ALL
directions and qualities ALL the time. The changed
variants get lucky (proliferate faster) or unlucky
(die out). The lucky ones can be seen by the
reductionist scientists, later on, because the dead
don't show up. So the conclusion is: THIS SPECIES
CHANGED ITS PATTERN.

Are those really the only options you think there are?

Your description of adaptation is a purely reactive one, where only random accident can be the agent of change in organisms. In contrast, the two options you offer to me are both talking about a thought process, as if I'm suggesting that all behavior of organisms is somehow based on an organism "knowing" something. That's not what I'm saying at all and I don't think any of those options is correct. It's certainly true that, in some organism species, a thought process and learning are definitely a factor in generating behavior (and it's also clearly a boon to survival). But all organisms are anticipatory, even those without a brain. It's not a thought process, it's a behavior pattern generated, in Robert Rosen's view, by the presence of information in the organization of the system. Behavior that is generated by interaction with information can be referred to as model-based behavior and even the most primitive organisms exhibit such behavior patterns.

Judith

Web address: http://www.rosen-enterprises.com
BioTheory: An electronic journal of general science based on the Relational (Rosennean) Complexity Paradigm
On Nov 7, 2005, at 10:46 PM, John M wrote:

Judith, HI!

If I add some "negative" sounding items to a certain
number of items it will act as a positive addition.
3arguments + 5arguments make 8 arguments, whether No 6
is called a 'negative' content or not.
Sincerely: your Strawman.

Then again I don't believe that 'bio-semiotics' or any
other chapter we use could include items not yet
discovered (i.e. not yet included in our so-far
achieved epistemic enrichment in our mental
development). However such - still unknow/n/able items
can (and do) influence an outcome, do we know about it
or not.
Well, it is different if someone is omniscient.I'm
not.
*
"...the organism will simply change a behavior
pattern in order to avoid damage...
Pray: which one is your position:
1. the organism (fish etc in your examples) is
analyzing the outcome of its hypothetical behavior and
decides to change it in a way that looks the most
lucrative, OR:
2. it KNOWS about the dangers and the better ways how
to act? Then the question is: Is it a collective
consent of the species living on 3 continents or is it
a concensus of a summit meeting?
I think it goes another way: there are influences from
the ambiance and changes (mutations?) occur in ALL
directions and qualities ALL the time. The changed
variants get lucky (proliferate faster) or unlucky
(die out). The lucky ones can be seen by the
reductionist scientists, later on, because the dead
don't show up. So the conclusion is: THIS SPECIES
CHANGED ITS PATTERN. Indeed it is a continuation of
the species, not the same one, as nothing stays intact
in nature, everything changes. Unless, of course, we
resort at an "intelligent Design" (ha ha).
The way you described does not even occur in humans of
educated thinking smart participation groups, becuase
there are emotions, greed, powermonging, welath,
politics, religion, nationality, gender, and 100 other
factors blinding the views. "Thinking" (what I deny
from the 'self-organizing' natural species) and
'changing patterns in order to...' is not the way how
evolution occurs - even in societal entities. We would
have an ideal social etc. world.
*
Anticipate we can within the known circumstances only.

Newton could not include in his anticipations the weak
force effect doscovered a century or two later. It is
relational, drawn on what already is knowable. And my
stereotype: 1000 ears ago less was knowable than now
and 1000 years from now more will be.

I hope this is a dialogue, not a debate (on another
list this distinction was argued lately).

Regards
John




--- Judith Rosen <***> wrote:

Jamie Rose and John M. dialogue:
"... even entailed-systems harbor functional
negatives
in the scope of all possible entailigs.<
I would add: this is the power of our ignorance
about
many of the 'beyond-boundary' (unobserved, maybe
not
yet even discovered) factors. So I would call
those
'negatives' really positives in addition to what
we
consider.

"Negative" and "Positive" are in the eye of the
beholder; it's all
relational and it's context dependent.

Isn't it "bio-semiotics" which attempts to
understand what anything is
perceived as by various different organisms or by
components within
organisms (endocrine systems, for example)? An
attempt to imagine what
some zooplankton "sees" in its native environment or
how two heart
cells communicate the electrical rhythm for a beat
in unison, etc.?
From a bio-semiotic point of view, then, any
seeming "negative" will,
at the same time, almost certainly be a positive as
well-- if not for
the organism on the negative side of the situation,
perhaps for the
offspring of the organism, or for the species... or
perhaps for a
different organism, altogether (as in predator/prey
situations). Or,
perhaps the organism will simply change a behavior
pattern in order to
avoid damage and then the negative can be perceived
differently. It
seems to me that this is partly how adaptation
works. Just as
evolution has been partly based on "function change"
in various aspects
of a living system's organization (a "swim bladder"
in a fish evolved
into "lungs"), it is also based on a living system's
ability to exploit
the positives out of any change in circumstances, or
else modify some
aspect of self, in order to rebalance optimality. I
think it's all part
of the capability that being organized as an
anticipatory system can
achieve in an interactive, relational universe.

Judith

Web address: http://www.rosen-enterprises.com
BioTheory: An electronic journal of general science
based on the
Relational (Rosennean) Complexity Paradigm
On Nov 7, 2005, at 10:50 AM, John M wrote:

Jamie,

with my 'mental blockage' for the unrestricted
(total)
interconnections, I keep the possibility open that
all
we MAY know today is insufficient for anticipating
the
possibilities for the next change - (in practical
cases mostly true, but I don't care for
practicality
when I speculate theroy) - I have a remark on you
viruses:
..."destruction
of virues is incomplete and presses them to
mutate
into more virulant strains. ...<

The model of a virus is just that, a pattern, a
view,
a limited description of whatever 'science' finds
relevant. There are always subtle differences not
even
acknowledged in most cases, some resistent to the
applied antibiotics (or whatever), which survive
the
"attacj" of the medics. So the habitat is emtied
from
most of the competitors and the survivals have a
blanket windfall space for proliferatio. And they
do.
The subsequent examination finds "the same model"
virus live and kicking in spite of the proven
drugs.
So what happened: the answer is exactly what you
wrote
however untrue. Wait a minute: you wrote "mutate"
and
in some respect that is true: from a small variant
it
HAS "mutated" into a majority. With the rest
missing.
"... even entailed-systems harbor functional
negatives
in the scope of all possible entailigs.<
I would add: this is the power of our ignorance
about
many of the 'beyond-boundary' (unobserved, maybe
not
yet even discovered) factors. So I would call
those
'negatives' really positives in addition to what
we
consider.

Just nitpicking

John M



--- James N Rose <***>
wrote:

Anticipatory Systems 'project toward', not 'away
from',
conditions and goals. So though entailment
processes
bi-/omni- directed components, the net trend of
systems
goes forward through time to 'new attainables'.

When 'mind' contributes to decisions, where plans
can be based on all sort of happenstantially
chosen
criteria, the possibilities open up for 'non well
contemplated' results, or, results with limited
value .. like: lets have a world with no viruses
or cholesterol; like: lets have a world where
produced food is chemically altered to never
biodegrade, so that it can always be eated.

With the (disappointing) result that destruction
of virues is incomplete and presses them to
mutate
into more virulant strains. With the
(disappointing)
result that people ingest the bio-degrading
prevention
chemicals and become perpetually sick and
hyperallergetic
- though the pharmaceutical companies love it
because
it gives them an excuse to push expensive
anti-allergens
to fight the symptoms from eating "improved"
food.
Just like he was disappointed by 'reductive
thinking',
even entailed-systems harbor functional negatives
in the scope of all possible entailigs.

Just musing on what he might have pondered.

Jamie








Judith Rosen wrote:
Jamie Rose wrote:

I image your dad found it both exciting and
disappointing -
that systems entail toward the future, but
the nature
of such futures are open for manipulation.

Why "disappointing"? And do all systems really
"entail toward the
future"? That's an intriguing thought. I suppose
it depends on how
we define our terms, but my intuition is that
only
living systems
entail toward the future, whereas all other
systems don't so much
"entail toward" as "entail FROM".

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