Re: Re: Idealism vs Materialism : Idealism and the Differentiating Element
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From: owner-standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG [mailto:owner-standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG]On Behalf Of azamat abdoullaev
Sent: Tuesday, 22 March 2005 8:12 AM
To: Gary Berg-Cross
Cc: standard-upper-ontology@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: Idealism vs Materialism : Idealism and the Differentiating Element
Materialism-Idealism distinction is the result of an innate tendency of the human mind to all sorts of dichotomy and duality. This opposite division is a bad heritage of classic metaphysics, born by the confused polarity of all things as abstract, ideal realities (froms, ideas) and material, physical realities.
The use of dichotomisation to derive meaning is inherent in the species, and in 'lower' life forms that have neuron-derived brains - even the small zebra fish makes the same distinctions as we do re KNOWN/UNKNOWN, and showing asymmetry in the development from the unknown to the known, from the unlabelled to the labelled. IOW dichotomy processing is not something restricted to *our* minds, it is rooted in the neurology and as such is core to information processing. Our consciousness has inherited the properties and methods of applying dichotomies recursively and as such we exaggerate things even more through rich label creation through refined differentiating/integrating processes.
There are TWO types of dichotomy, asymmetric and symmetric. The 'opposite' forms you mention come out of differentiating, over-exaggeration of distinction to make things 'clear'. The form reflects working within a level of hierarchy where, in general, all elements are the same, in particular we wish to extract their differences - this gives us patterns of guassian distributions - e.g. IQ differences across all members of the species (and so the SAME element). These +1/-1 dichotomies reflect a symmetric perspective, competitive to force the point - push AWAY and in that pushing elicits the bell curve. (the absolute value of the dichotomy reflects the sameness of 1/1)
Change the dichotomy to an asymmetric type and we span levels of a hierarchy, we get into detecting SAMENESS across DIFFERENCES. This moves us into a spectral perspective, power law stuff. QUALITATIVELY we deal with the local/universal, worthless/priceless, 0/infinity etc etc (this reflects a PULSE perspective as compared to a WAVE perspective)
The use of OPPOSITES aids in parts analysis, clear differentiations of elements of the whole - BUT, with the development of consciousness so the benefits of parts analysis, of perpetual mediations, has led to the development of us and our collective 'overlaying' the planet 'as is'.
Lower the energy and things get 'closer', the focus is more cooperative, integrating, than competitive, more complementing. Due to this dichotomy-driven perspective having its apparent roots in the neuron and its differentiating(FM)/integrating(AM) dynamic, so it spans all levels of information processing to a degree where individuals are born with 'biases' in expression and collectives go on to express those biases such that some are more 'competitive' in approach, others more 'cooperative' in approach.
Any core ontology has to cover this dimension where differentiate/integrate is applied recursively to give us, at the unconscious levels, core qualities used to communicate meanings - the language of the vague - that, as we move 'up' the hierarchy of expression, become represented in symbols/metaphors.
Charles Peirce recognised the need to understand the neurology through his concern, after reading Broca's research, about how his left-handedness could affect his thinking.
Since we can map the basic qualities used in Mathematics and Logic to the recursion of differentiating/integrating, so we source core elements used at the level of symbols as representitive of patterns derived from our sensory experience of reality - and so elements sourced in our unconscious. Out of that unconscious realm develops the ever differentiating realm of consciousness and with it the realm of universals in the form of labels. At that level, the diversity possible will drown out any long term perspectives since the diversity is LOCAL in context but universal in text (the more the focus on differentiting so the more we use stereotyping etc to communicate)
Consciousness, through its idealisation skills with take patterns derived from 'mindless' growth dynamics, and so distorted forms, and turn them into idealised forms and in that idealism project a sense of the 'spiritual' onto 'out there' - there is no need for such an action.
Chris.
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