This discussion, along with Re:
nature -> "human brain" -> "language terms" ==>> knowledge
?,
has wandered over
considerable ground but a question
was raised along the way about “how then we should model
meaning?.”
One issue was can
"knowledge" ("reality" yes, but not "knowledge") exist independently of the
brain?
A simple counter question
occurred to me, “if such knowledge can[t be defined how why are trying to build
processable ontologies ? Isn’t that
a endeavor to capture meaning outside of the
brain?
John Sowa covered this in
passing, noting that our computer applications include “knowledge”
JS> First, knowledge is
certainly codifiable in a way that
solves a great many problems. Every
program ever written
does that, and there are an enormous number of
very
successful ones. But each of those programs solves a
particular
special case. The problem we face is to
relate those special cases by
general principles.
JS>And that is where the difficulties
lie.
Peirce’s distinction between REAL and TRUE may be helpful to some of us
in ontological community discussion
with an aim to building up usable knowledge .
Perice "The
real, then, is that which, sooner or later, information and reasoning would
finally result in, and which is therefore independent of the vagaries of me
and you. Thus, the very origin of
the conception of reality shows that this conception essentially involves the
notion of a community, without definite limits, and capable of a definite
increase of knowledge" (CP 5.311).
To
elaborate further this is now he addressed the distinction between opinions on
the true, and the real in "How to
Make Our Ideas Clear ":
"The opinion which is fated to be ultimately agreed to
by all who investigate, is what we mean by the truth, and the object represented
in this opinion is the real. That is the way I would explain reality" (CP
5.407). ….
Peirce continues later with
"reality is independent, not necessarily of thought in
general, but only of what you or I or any finite number of men may think about
it," ….(that), "though the object of the final opinion depends on what that
opinion is, yet what that opinion is does not depend on what you or I or
any man thinks" (CP 5.408). underlining is mine for
emphasis
Which brings me, at least,
back to John’s opinion that he
accuracy of any scientific hypothesis
JS> does not
depend
> on who or what discovered it or on any methods
of thinking,
> any techniques of problem solving, or any
apparatus that
JS> he, she, or it might have used to
arrive at the hypothesis.
I can understand this in light of Peirce’
efforts to define clear thinking, which we need in Ontology building.
To conclude
with yet another Peircian quote.
Here’s one he used on the path to a 3rd way between the
realists and idealist.
The
philosophical problem is to resolve two contradictory claims about the basis of
reality:
- the principal thesis of
realism - there is a reality that exists independently of our representations
of it or
- Idealism claim that what we perceive as
real dependent is upon our
(usually expressed as mental) representations of “it”.
As James Liszka observed the
clash of the two theses is nicely expressed in Peirce's "Consequences of the
Four Incapacities ":
"...there is no thing which is in-itself
in the sense of not being relative to the mind, though things which are relative
to the mind doubtless are, apart from the relation" (5.311).
Liszkae
called this 3rd way a discursive realism to distinguish it
from the later effort of Rorty or
Foucault, in which there is neither a privileged discourse, nor can any
representational system that can mirror a reality external to such a system
- what might be called the
discursive idealism. Someone may
able to drawn up the realism to idealism continuum, which seems to be as
embedded in our discussions as the ontology
continuum.
Gary Berg-Cross
-----Original Message-----
From:
owner-standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG on behalf of Chris
Lofting
Sent: Sun 3/20/2005 6:45 AM
To:
standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Cc:
Subject:
Idealism vs Materialism : Idealism and the Differentiating
Element
Hi Avril,
> -----Original
Message-----
> From:
owner-standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
> [mailto:owner-standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG]On Behalf Of
> Avril Styrman
> Sent: Sunday, 20
March 2005 4:08 AM
> To: Chris Lofting
> Cc:
standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
> Subject: RE: nature ->
"human brain" -> "language terms" ==>> knowledge
>
?
>
>
> Dear Chris,
>
> please analyze
thoroughly the idealism-materialism debate with IDM,
> so that I don't
have to read any more books about it.
Jeeze, a *thorough* analyse on
this list!? Ummm.. lets keep it 'vague' for
the moment in that since
we are dealing with the Language of the Vague lets
start 'vague' through
the use of differentiating and so a focus on contrast.
The Oxford
dictionary definition of differentiating is:
"differentiate v.
1
distinguish, discriminate, contradistinguish, separate, contrast,
oppose,
set off or apart, tell apart: They must learn how to differentiate
one
species from another.
2 modify, specialize, change, alter,
transform, transmute, convert, adapt,
adjust: All organisms possess the
power to differentiate special organs to
meet special needs."
What
is not clearly emphasised here, from a QUALITATIVE perspective, is
the
association of differentiation and of PUSHING AWAY others to assert
self or
some 'point'. As such there is a sense of 'clear identification'
and in that
identification a sense of EXAGGERATION of A from ~A. (in our
brains we can
see this difference between single context thinking,
associated with a
'fundamental' harmonic within which play all of the
others, and multi
context, 'mindless' processes where there is little
exaggeration of A from
all of its harmonics. See comments and refs
in
http://www.iimetro.com.au/~lofting/myweb/general.html - as such one part
contains all of the POTENTIALS, and
the other part ACTUALISES one
perspective from the others, sets the key if
you like, the tone - what we
see here at the level of consciousness is
patterns of FM/AM processing where
the "A" of A/~A is FM and so very clear,
FM stereo but being so is LOCAL)
This process of exaggeration IMPLIES a
difference in energy utilisation
where to 'make the point' to differentiate
A from ~A requires an increase in
energy expenditure, be it for a
millisecond or a millennium. (thinking is
not free - our brains burn about
4 to 15 watts of power overall - our bodies
are usually as 'bright' as a 60
to 75 watt light bulb. as we think of 'new'
things so covalent/ionic bonds
are broken/established in the brain and so
generate
heat)
PHYSIOLOGICALLY, and so usually unconscious to our experience,
the increase
in energy reflects an increase in bandwidth to 'make the
point' clear,
obvious, precise. This increase in bandwidth will DECREASE
the notion of
thermodynamic time, it will marginalise time into something
at most
mechanistic and at best 'forgotten' - time becomes something
slowable,
stoppable, even considered reversible. This emphasis is due to
the increase
bandwidth where we focus on NOW. As such, time is felt as a
sense of the
'eternal' - a STATIC focus emerges that favours
differentiation, to make a
'point', to assert A over ~A, I need to 'freeze'
it.
In our brains XOR-type thinking does this - (see the page on
paradox
processing - http://www.iimetro.com.au/~lofting/myweb/paradox.html) where a
'static' form is extracted from a complex
pattern - the problem in the
particular sensory 'paradox' examples is that
that form appears to share
space with another and that, in the realm of
XOR, is a no-no. So - given the
failure of bandwidth to sort out the
problem, to resolve the 'paradox', we
fall back on TIME to resolve the
issue, our brains 'oscillate' across the
elements expressed in the
'paradox' as we try to reduce an irreducible.
The MAIN focus here is on
explicitly identifying the ONE over all else to a
degree we over-exaggerate
that 'point', to a degree we make it a universal
when compared to all else.
This focus is supposed to be temporary, LOCAL, in
that once the point is
made so all energy is reduced, we fall back to our
more energy-conserving
nature, our species-nature.
To experience this referred-to subjective
time distortion that can come with
differentiating you need to speed
yourself up. Play a mindless shoot-em-up
computer game can do it, or go
driving on the freeway and then drive off the
freeway onto normal city
streets. Check your comfort level and your speed.
You will find that when
sped up/down so your sense of time has changed due
to the increase/decrease
in energy expenditure required as you control the
joystick/car etc. This
change will AFFECT your decisions and so thinking in
general - IOW it can
affect your reflections on reality such that the
FEELING of the 'eternal'
is formalised into the 'reality' of the eternal,
the static, and so
unchanging.
As one refines skills, so one will habituate and so any
differentiating, any
mediation by consciousness, will disappear to become
instinct/habit or
packed into a symbol - a representation and that can
include 'instinctive'
recognition of the sense of the eternal regardless of
its 'truth' or not.
Note that the XOR(differentiating) 'drive', being a
focus on clarity
introduces the notion of PRECISION - the differentiating
attempts to replace
a current perspective with a 'BETTER' one and as such
there is a bias to
focus on REPLACEMENT. I say this now since it will
emerge later when mapped
to its complement - COEXISTENCE.
In the
context of differentiating, and so a focus on mediation processes
in
general, there is a mapping of any act of DELAY with the presence of
some
form of awareness (see examples in J Libet's work (2004)"mind time").
This
delay is about 0.5 seconds in 'real time' overall and appears to
reflect
MEDIATION activity - once one has habituated to whatever one is
mediating,
so the delay disappears. As such, there is a relationship of
consciousness
dynamics, increased energy dynamics, and differentiating
overall (WITHIN
differentiating there is integrating but that area will be
covered later).
The mindless (or semi-aware) 'species-nature' dynamic
is where the ability
to go past a sensation, into its parts, allows for
refinement of any
responses to that sensation. As such, stimulus/response
gives way to
stimulus/considered_response that in turn folds back into
stimulus/response
but now with fine details, finer levels of discrimination
and so finer
choices in response.
In addition to all of the above, a
fundamental concept that appears to come
out of exaggerated focus on
consciousness is the concept of the spiritual,
the transcendental, and
neurologically there is a focus on the delay factor
(sourced all the way
down at the level of the neuron, just not necessarily
'conscious') working
as a tool for mediation and for ESCAPE. As such, with
this focus on
XOR-ing, differentiating, pushing-away, comes the notion
of
escape.
Escape comes in two forms - the reactive where we back
away from something
not caring where we are going, only concerned with
getting away from 'here',
and the proactive, where we CHOOSE where to go,
to escape to. Thus from the
notion of escape comes the notion of FREEDOM
and with that notion comes a
focus on exploiting 'freedom' as well as
'protecting' it.
Note that all of this 'cutting' done in
differentiating, freedom-seeking,
precision, will create borders - and what
lives on borders? Complexity/chaos
dynamics and so the concept of
emergence/transcendence/phase-transition etc
etc.... IOW we can detect a
link here of differentiating with the notion of
spiritual (regardless of
'fact' or 'fiction') in the context of
transcendence (that focus on
'betterment' drives things - and so capitalism
is the 'best fit' of an
economic system to these processes, as democracy is
the 'best fit' as a
political system)
What is implied here? A property of differentiating
is the formation of
fundamentalist groups where the natural fragmentation
that comes with the
differentiating (recall all of that complexity/chaos
input to things) forces
isolationism. Combine that with the differentiated
form of the 'spiritual'
and these groups can be religious or secular in
their fundamentalism.
What else emerges? The fragmentation, together
with high energy expenditure
and a focus on 'betterment', elicits
competition and a focus on
universalisation - the precision means
EVERYTHING needs a label, but since
there is so much, so UNIVERSALS are
used - communication is more along the
lines of using stereotyping etc. We
see here a transition from the 'organic'
but vague nature of the species to
the 'mechanistic' but precise nature of
the conscious species. With this
concentration, this distillation, of
species qualities in general into
particular individuals comes a focus on
each individual becoming a
universal. This ultimate form of fragmentation
focuses on self-autonomy,
being self-sufficient and so not dependent upon,
nor responsible for,
anyone else.
With this hugely competitive focus develops technology.
That technology
elicits data that reflects 'best practice' dynamics. Those
dynamics are
incorporated into each individual's general behaviour (iow we
all need to
adopt the latest in weapon systems etc to 'keep up'). From here
we have
different outsides, SAME insides. What do we get with this form
of
structure? Phase transition; the individuals start to group (at
the
corporate level this is in monopolies and corporations developing their
own
perspectives of reality - they are now starting to build their own
schools,
pensioner resorts, and so promotion of the corporation as its 'own
little
world')
Can we see this sort of behaviour in other life
forms? Yes - flocking
behaviour where individuals making LOCAL distinctions
elicit a non-local
expression in the behaviour of the collective. The
difference is that in
phase transition all the individuals start to 'think
alike'.
Dominating all of the above is a focus on clear identification
of
individual/collective - to an extreme of exaggerating that identity
and
associate it with some 'universal' sense of the 'spiritual' -
IOW
consciousness is considered 'originating'.
With this comes
fundamentalism, the 'religious right', and other
'specialist' perspectives
that can reflect elements of another property of
over-differentiating -
psychosis, where we disappear totally into our own
'little world'. Note
here that the strong focus on XOR-ing, on
differentiating converts all
meaning from a semantics position to a
concentrated form of semantics we
label as syntax - all that matters is
one's location, one's position in the
hierarchy (using logic operators, the
XOR focus gives way to the IMP
operator - the only asymmetric operator in
the set of logic operators - and
in our brains the bias is asymmetric
overall)
Given all of the
above, to which would you associate
differentiating/XOR?
more:
idealism / , /
n.
1 the practice of forming or following after ideals, esp.
unrealistically
(cf. realism).
2 the representation of things in ideal
or idealized form.
3 imaginative treatment.
4 Philos. any of various
systems of thought in which the objects of
knowledge are held to be in some
way dependent on the activity of mind
(cf.
realism).
OR
materialism / / n.
1 a tendency to
consider material possessions and physical comfort to be
more important
than spiritual values.
2 Philos. a the opinion that nothing exists but
matter and its movements and
modifications. b the doctrine that
consciousness and will are wholly due to
material agency.
3 Art a
tendency to lay stress on the material aspect of
objects.
?
|