Robert Rosen

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Robert Rosen

Nick Thompson
All,

Ok, so my questions about Rosen are of a really fundamental nature. You guys are already WAY down the track.  

In fact, could somebody clarify, in terms that a former english major would understand, what it means to say,

"organisms are closed to efficient causation."  
I read it and I read it and I READ it and it just doesnt STICK!

Would that amount to saying that Rosen believes that nothing is entailed by the fact that you just poked a tiger with a pool cue?  Whereas, much is entailed by saying that you have just poked a pool ball with the same cue?   If I changed the words above from "entailed by" to "implied by" or "inferable from", does Rosen get off the boat?   Would anybody who accepted "organisms are closed" claim be willing to enter a tiger's cage with a pool cue KNOWING THAT the tiger had just been poked with the same pool cue?  

For the new year,  I dream of a world in which no two people are allowed to argue  in  my electronic presence until the key  AGREEMENTS  that make their argument possible are made explicit.  That is probably amounts to asking you all to be as dumb as I am.  Hey!  I can ask!  

Nick


OTHER STUFF FROM THIS THREAD

>
>


------------------------------

Message: 10
Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2007 08:43:31 -0800
From: "Gus Koehler" <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Robert Rosen
To: "'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'"
<friam at redfish.com>
Message-ID: <000001c84a39$f2e9d0a0$6401a8c0 at EA5E71A6DE4A4D9>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

A Living System Must Have Noncomputable Models
A. H. Louie

Abstract: Chu and Ho's recent paper in Artificial Life is riddled with
errors. In particular, they
use a wrong definition of Robert Rosen's mechanism. This renders their
"critical assessment" of
Rosen's central proof null and void.
http://www.panmere.com/rosen/Louie_noncomp_pre_rev.pdf

Gus Koehler, Ph.D.
President and Principal
Time Structures, Inc.
1545 University Ave.
Sacramento, CA 95825
916-564-8683, Fax: 916-564-7895
Cell: 916-716-1740
www.timestructures.com
Save A Tree - please don't print this unless you really need to.


-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Joost Rekveld
Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2007 5:34 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Robert Rosen

Hi,

apparently these articles have given rise to rebuttals, see http://
www.panmere.com/?cat=18 for a survey of this discussion.

I read 'Life Itself' a while ago, found it extremely interesting but not an
easy read either. Later I read some of the essays from 'Essays on Life
Itself", which helped. The biggest problem with Rosen's writing was for me
that it is very concise; for a layman (like me) it would have been good to
have a bit more flesh around his central argument, in the form of historical
references and examples.

Later I discovered the writings of Howard Pattee (an essay in the first
Artificial Life proceedings) and Peter Cariani (his thesis from
1989 <http://homepage.mac.com/cariani/CarianiWebsite/Cariani89.pdf>
and a later article for example <http://homepage.mac.com/cariani/
CarianiWebsite/Cariani98.pdf>.
I found both their writings more digestible.

hope this helps,

Joost.

On Dec 29, 2007, at 5:03 AM, Russell Standish wrote:

> By all means have a discussion. Rosen is not an easy read, nor easy to
> talk about even. I have some grumbles with Rosen, which I mention in
> my paper "On Complexity and Emergence", but these are fairly muted.
> There've been some interesting articles recently in Artificial Life by
> Chu & Ho that appear to disprove Rosen's central theorem. I suspect
> their rather more rigourous approach crystalises some of my grumbles,
> but I haven't found the time yet to try out the analysis more formally
> myself.
>
> Cheers
>
> On Fri, Dec 28, 2007 at 08:41:43PM -0700, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
>> All,
>>
>> On the recommendation of somebody on this list, I started reading
>> Rosen's Life Itself. It does indeed, as the recommender suggested,
>> seem to relate to my peculiar way of looking at such things as
>> adaptation, motivation, etc. The book is both intriguing and
>> somewhat over my head. Pied Piperish in that regard. So I am
>> wondering if there are folks on the list who wold like to talk about
>> it. By the way, does the fact that I am attracted to Rosen make me a
>> category theorist? I am told that that is somewhat to the left of
>> being an astrologer.
>>
>> Nick
>>


-------------------------------------------

Joost Rekveld
----------- http://www.lumen.nu/rekveld

-------------------------------------------

"This alone I ask you, O reader, that when you peruse the
account of these marvels that you do not set up for yourself
as a standard human intellectual pride, but rather the great
size and vastness of earth and sky; and, comparing with
that Infinity these slender shadows in which miserably and
anxiously we are enveloped, you will easily know that I have
related nothing which is beyond belief."
(Girolamo Cardano)

-------------------------------------------






============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org




------------------------------

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Robert Rosen

Russell Standish
On Sun, Dec 30, 2007 at 11:32:33AM -0700, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
> All,
>
> Ok, so my questions about Rosen are of a really fundamental nature. You guys are already WAY down the track.  
>
> In fact, could somebody clarify, in terms that a former english major would understand, what it means to say,
>
> "organisms are closed to efficient causation."  
> I read it and I read it and I READ it and it just doesnt STICK!
>

You probably read about Aristotle's four causes - this is the origin
of the term efficient causation.

"closed to efficient causation" in my mind simply says that something
is its own cause. If we ask why does this chicken exist, the answer is
because of an egg existing. When we ask why did the egg exist, the
answer is because a chook exists (adult chicken). Causation in this
sense is closed.

When you ask any question about the causation of life, you ultimately
come back on youself. The meaning of life is life itself. It exists
because it can.

I hope this explanation makes some kind of sense. I beleive that much
of Rosen's tortured explanation was trying to formalise this fairly
simple and obvious idea. It is worth comparing and contrasting it with
the notion of autopoiesis, which is a little better developed.

Cheers

--

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A/Prof Russell Standish                  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
Mathematics                        
UNSW SYDNEY 2052                 hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au
Australia                                http://www.hpcoders.com.au
----------------------------------------------------------------------------


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Robert Rosen

Günther Greindl
In reply to this post by Nick Thompson
Dear Nick,

have you read this?:

http://www.panmere.com/rosen/closed_eff.htm#en01

and this:
http://www.panmere.com/rosen/mhout/msg00412.html

I think this clears it up - the concept is not so mysterious after all ;-)

I think this "organisms are closed to efficient causation" is just a
descriptive principle - if Rosen says you can't compute it anyway, in
what sense would it be a formalization?

Apart from that, I don't yet see why it shouldn't be computable, but I
have not yet found the time to read the Chu Ho Paper and the Louie rebuttal.

The only thing off the top of my head which comes to my mind is Kleene's
Recursion principle - a proof that every formal system can reproduce
itself, so why not also an (M,R) system?

(But again Caveat: I have not read the above papers yet, maybe I am
missing the point ;-))

Regards,
G?nther


Nicholas Thompson wrote:

>
> All,
>  
> Ok, so my questions about Rosen are of a really fundamental nature. You
> guys are already WAY down the track.
>  
> In fact, could somebody clarify, in terms that a former english major
> would understand, what it means to say,
>  
> "organisms are closed to efficient causation."  
> I read it and I read it and I READ it and it just doesnt STICK!
>  
> Would that amount to saying that Rosen believes that nothing is entailed
> by the fact that you just poked a tiger with a pool cue?  Whereas, much
> is entailed by saying that you have just poked a pool ball with the same
> cue?   If I changed the words above from "entailed by" to "implied by"
> or "inferable from", does Rosen get off the boat?   Would anybody who
> accepted "organisms are closed" claim be willing to enter a tiger's cage
> with a pool cue KNOWING THAT the tiger had just been poked with the same
> pool cue?
>  
> For the new year,  I dream of a world in which no two people are allowed
> to argue  in  my electronic presence until the key  AGREEMENTS  that
> make their argument possible are made explicit.  That is probably
> amounts to asking you all to be as dumb as I am.  Hey!  I can ask!
>  
> Nick
>  
>  
>
>     OTHER STUFF FROM THIS THREAD
>
>      >
>
>      >
>      
>      
>     ------------------------------
>      
>     Message: 10
>     Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2007 08:43:31 -0800
>     From: "Gus Koehler" <gus at timestructures.com>
>     <mailto:<gus at timestructures.com>>
>     Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Robert Rosen
>     To: "'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'"
>     <friam at redfish.com> <mailto: <friam at redfish.com>>
>     Message-ID: <000001c84a39$f2e9d0a0$6401a8c0 at EA5E71A6DE4A4D9>
>     Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>      
>     A Living System Must Have Noncomputable Models
>     A. H. Louie
>      
>     Abstract: Chu and Ho's recent paper in Artificial Life is riddled with
>     errors. In particular, they
>     use a wrong definition of Robert Rosen's mechanism. This renders their
>     "critical assessment" of
>     Rosen's central proof null and void.
>     http://www.panmere.com/rosen/Louie_noncomp_pre_rev.pdf
>     <http://www.panmere.com/rosen/Louie_noncomp_pre_rev.pdf>
>      
>     Gus Koehler, Ph.D.
>     President and Principal
>     Time Structures, Inc.
>     1545 University Ave.
>     Sacramento, CA 95825
>     916-564-8683, Fax: 916-564-7895
>     Cell: 916-716-1740
>     www.timestructures.com <http://www.timestructures.com>
>     Save A Tree - please don't print this unless you really need to.
>      
>      
>     -----Original Message-----
>     From: friam-bounces at redfish.com <mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com> [
>     mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com
>     <mailto:mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com> ] On Behalf
>     Of Joost Rekveld
>     Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2007 5:34 AM
>     To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
>     Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Robert Rosen
>      
>     Hi,
>      
>     apparently these articles have given rise to rebuttals, see http://
>     <http://>
>     www.panmere.com/?cat=18 <http://www.panmere.com/?cat=18> for a
>     survey of this discussion.
>      
>     I read 'Life Itself' a while ago, found it extremely interesting but
>     not an
>     easy read either. Later I read some of the essays from 'Essays on Life
>     Itself", which helped. The biggest problem with Rosen's writing was
>     for me
>     that it is very concise; for a layman (like me) it would have been
>     good to
>     have a bit more flesh around his central argument, in the form of
>     historical
>     references and examples.
>      
>     Later I discovered the writings of Howard Pattee (an essay in the first
>     Artificial Life proceedings) and Peter Cariani (his thesis from
>     1989 < http://homepage.mac.com/cariani/CarianiWebsite/Cariani89.pdf>
>     <http://homepage.mac.com/cariani/CarianiWebsite/Cariani89.pdf>>
>     and a later article for example < http://homepage.mac.com/cariani/
>     <http://homepage.mac.com/cariani/>
>     CarianiWebsite/Cariani98.pdf>.
>     I found both their writings more digestible.
>      
>     hope this helps,
>      
>     Joost.
>      
>     On Dec 29, 2007, at 5:03 AM, Russell Standish wrote:
>      
>      > By all means have a discussion. Rosen is not an easy read, nor
>     easy to
>      > talk about even. I have some grumbles with Rosen, which I mention in
>      > my paper "On Complexity and Emergence", but these are fairly muted.
>      > There've been some interesting articles recently in Artificial
>     Life by
>      > Chu & Ho that appear to disprove Rosen's central theorem. I suspect
>      > their rather more rigourous approach crystalises some of my
>     grumbles,
>      > but I haven't found the time yet to try out the analysis more
>     formally
>      > myself.
>      >
>      > Cheers
>      >
>      > On Fri, Dec 28, 2007 at 08:41:43PM -0700, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
>      >> All,
>      >>
>      >> On the recommendation of somebody on this list, I started reading
>      >> Rosen's Life Itself. It does indeed, as the recommender suggested,
>      >> seem to relate to my peculiar way of looking at such things as
>      >> adaptation, motivation, etc. The book is both intriguing and
>      >> somewhat over my head. Pied Piperish in that regard. So I am
>      >> wondering if there are folks on the list who wold like to talk
>     about
>      >> it. By the way, does the fact that I am attracted to Rosen make
>     me a
>      >> category theorist? I am told that that is somewhat to the left of
>      >> being an astrologer.
>      >>
>      >> Nick
>      >>
>      
>      
>     -------------------------------------------
>      
>     Joost Rekveld
>     ----------- http://www.lumen.nu/rekveld <http://www.lumen.nu/rekveld>
>      
>     -------------------------------------------
>      
>     "This alone I ask you, O reader, that when you peruse the
>     account of these marvels that you do not set up for yourself
>     as a standard human intellectual pride, but rather the great
>     size and vastness of earth and sky; and, comparing with
>     that Infinity these slender shadows in which miserably and
>     anxiously we are enveloped, you will easily know that I have
>     related nothing which is beyond belief."
>     (Girolamo Cardano)
>      
>     -------------------------------------------
>      
>      
>      
>      
>      
>      
>     ============================================================
>     FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>     Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>     lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>     <http://www.friam.org>
>      
>      
>      
>      
>     ------------------------------
>      
>     _______________________________________________
>     Friam mailing list
>     Friam at redfish.com <mailto:Friam at redfish.com>
>     http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>     <http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com>
>      
>      
>     End of Friam Digest, Vol 54, Issue 25
>
>     *************************************
>
>      
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

--
G?nther Greindl
Department of Philosophy of Science
University of Vienna
guenther.greindl at univie.ac.at
http://www.univie.ac.at/Wissenschaftstheorie/

Blog: http://dao.complexitystudies.org/
Site: http://www.complexitystudies.org


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Robert Rosen

Phil Henshaw-2
In reply to this post by Russell Standish
Nick, what got my interest is the similarity of meaning between 'closed
to efficient causation' and  'have their own behavior', the property of
physical organisms we constantly have to remind ourselves of whenever
dealing with organisms...

Phil Henshaw                       ????.?? ? `?.????
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
680 Ft. Washington Ave
NY NY 10040                      
tel: 212-795-4844                
e-mail: pfh at synapse9.com          
explorations: www.synapse9.com  


> -----Original Message-----
> From: friam-bounces at redfish.com
> [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Russell Standish
> Sent: Sunday, December 30, 2007 4:56 PM
> To: nickthompson at earthlink.net; The Friday Morning Applied
> Complexity Coffee Group
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Robert Rosen
>
>
> On Sun, Dec 30, 2007 at 11:32:33AM -0700, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
> > All,
> >
> > Ok, so my questions about Rosen are of a really fundamental nature.
> > You guys are already WAY down the track.
> >
> > In fact, could somebody clarify, in terms that a former
> english major
> > would understand, what it means to say,
> >
> > "organisms are closed to efficient causation."  
> > I read it and I read it and I READ it and it just doesnt STICK!
> >
>
> You probably read about Aristotle's four causes - this is the
> origin of the term efficient causation.
>
> "closed to efficient causation" in my mind simply says that
> something is its own cause. If we ask why does this chicken
> exist, the answer is because of an egg existing. When we ask
> why did the egg exist, the answer is because a chook exists
> (adult chicken). Causation in this sense is closed.
>
> When you ask any question about the causation of life, you
> ultimately come back on youself. The meaning of life is life
> itself. It exists because it can.
>
> I hope this explanation makes some kind of sense. I beleive
> that much of Rosen's tortured explanation was trying to
> formalise this fairly simple and obvious idea. It is worth
> comparing and contrasting it with the notion of autopoiesis,
> which is a little better developed.
>
> Cheers
>
> --
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> --------------
> A/Prof Russell Standish                  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> Mathematics                        
> UNSW SYDNEY 2052                 hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au
> Australia                                http://www.hpcoders.com.au
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> --------------
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>




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Robert Rosen

Phil Henshaw-2
In reply to this post by Russell Standish
Well, feedback loops begin and end too, and that displays an even greater 'inefficiency' for causation... Just plane old bloody gaps.  The rub is that systems of loops originate for no efficient cause.  That's why I turned the sci method around to warch them since it's clear we can't explain them.

Phil
 
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

-----Original Message-----
From: Russell Standish <[hidden email]>

Date: Mon, 31 Dec 2007 08:56:01
To:nickthompson at earthlink.net,       The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Robert Rosen


On Sun, Dec 30, 2007 at 11:32:33AM -0700, Nicholas Thompson wrote:
> All,
>
> Ok, so my questions about Rosen are of a really fundamental nature. You guys are already WAY down the track.  
>
> In fact, could somebody clarify, in terms that a former english major would understand, what it means to say,
>
> "organisms are closed to efficient causation."  
> I read it and I read it and I READ it and it just doesnt STICK!
>

You probably read about Aristotle's four causes - this is the origin
of the term efficient causation.

"closed to efficient causation" in my mind simply says that something
is its own cause. If we ask why does this chicken exist, the answer is
because of an egg existing. When we ask why did the egg exist, the
answer is because a chook exists (adult chicken). Causation in this
sense is closed.

When you ask any question about the causation of life, you ultimately
come back on youself. The meaning of life is life itself. It exists
because it can.

I hope this explanation makes some kind of sense. I beleive that much
of Rosen's tortured explanation was trying to formalise this fairly
simple and obvious idea. It is worth comparing and contrasting it with
the notion of autopoiesis, which is a little better developed.

Cheers

--

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A/Prof Russell Standish                  Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
Mathematics                        
UNSW SYDNEY 2052                 hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au
Australia                                http://www.hpcoders.com.au
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org


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Robert Rosen

glen ep ropella
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

sy at synapse9.com on 01/02/2008 08:51 AM:
> Well, feedback loops begin and end too, and that displays an even
> greater 'inefficiency' for causation... Just plane old bloody gaps.
> The rub is that systems of loops originate for no efficient cause.
> That's why I turned the sci method around to warch them since it's
> clear we can't explain them.

I disagree.  First, to say that feedback loops begin and end is an
_assumption_ of a discrete ontology.  I.e. feedback loops may not have a
beginning or an end, they may merely be bounded.

Second, most of what people seem to point at when they use the phrase
"feedback loop" is an aggregation of phenomena caused by an aggregate
set of mechanisms.  Hence, even if the ontology is discrete or
discretizable, we may not be able to discuss them in the same language
(attributes, properties, predicates, operators, etc.) we use to discuss
the phenomena and mechanisms of which they're composed.  And further,
not only may we need a different language, they may not even give rise
to the same categorization of actual behaviors.  I.e. the components can
be very different from the composition.  To conflate the two is to
commit the fallacy of composition/division.

And third, we might posit that "feedback loop" is _merely_ an ascription
having nothing to do with the ontology and _everything_ to do with our
psychology.  I.e. "feedback loops" may not actually exist except as a
convenient lexical structure we use to describe the world.

In the first case, we can't make the logical leap to say that feedback
loops have no efficient cause.  In the second case, the cause of the
loops is _complex_... and we've had that discussion recently.  And in
the third case, feedback loops do have an efficient cause... _us_. [grin]

I'm not saying that any of these are true; but they are certainly
defensible positions... as defensible as the assertion that the loops
have no efficient cause.

- --
glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846, http://tempusdictum.com
When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things
to be bought and sold are legislators. -- P.J. O'Rourke

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Robert Rosen

Phil Henshaw-2

Glen,
You write:

>
> sy at synapse9.com on 01/02/2008 08:51 AM:
> > Well, feedback loops begin and end too, and that displays an even
> > greater 'inefficiency' for causation... Just plane old bloody gaps.
> > The rub is that systems of loops originate for no efficient cause.
> > That's why I turned the sci method around to warch them since it's
> > clear we can't explain them.
>
> I disagree.  First, to say that feedback loops begin and end
> is an _assumption_ of a discrete ontology.  I.e. feedback
> loops may not have a beginning or an end, they may merely be bounded.

Yes, sure, that's an option of interpretation, but does it fit with the
rest of what I was saying?   I think there's an interpretation that fits
the data of nature better than any other, so it's reached as a
'conclusion' not as an 'assumption'.   For example, can you offer any
example of physical growth (accumulative change) without a beginning and
end?

> Second, most of what people seem to point at when they use
> the phrase "feedback loop" is an aggregation of phenomena
> caused by an aggregate set of mechanisms.  Hence, even if the
> ontology is discrete or discretizable, we may not be able to
> discuss them in the same language (attributes, properties,
> predicates, operators, etc.) we use to discuss the phenomena
> and mechanisms of which they're composed.  And further, not
> only may we need a different language, they may not even give
> rise to the same categorization of actual behaviors.  I.e.
> the components can be very different from the composition.  
> To conflate the two is to commit the fallacy of composition/division.

Complex systems are always poorly represented by our models, but does
that restrict them, or just us?  :-)  It's completely normal to discover
that in describing one physical thing you often need a combination of
different languages of description.  For example, you might describe
something's chemistry, it's appearance and its various roles in its
environment.  They're all useful, especially together, though each is
highly incomplete and they hardly connect at all in terms of the
formalities of each mode of description.

>
> And third, we might posit that "feedback loop" is _merely_ an
> ascription having nothing to do with the ontology and
> _everything_ to do with our psychology.  I.e. "feedback
> loops" may not actually exist except as a convenient lexical
> structure we use to describe the world.

Well, certainly a term needs to be understood so that when one persons
uses it another person can know what is being referred to.  But isn't
that a normal problem with language, not an inherent flaw in language?
In this case I'm using 'feedback loop' in a way I thought would be
understood, from your referring to the physical model of the 'chicken &
egg' cycle.  It wasn't that clear perhaps.  I meant it to refer to the
type of feedbacks we commonly find in nature, not a theoretical
construct.   Like the chicken & egg cycle, all cycles in natural systems
seem to develop and decay by transient accumulative change processes.
The name 'feedback' gets attached since they generally fit the model of
exponential-like accumulative change.  Can you think of any regular
cycle that does not begin and end with accumulative processes on scales
that make them untraceable?

>
> In the first case, we can't make the logical leap to say that
> feedback loops have no efficient cause.  In the second case,
> the cause of the loops is _complex_... and we've had that
> discussion recently.  And in the third case, feedback loops
> do have an efficient cause... _us_. [grin]

I draw the conclusion that natural system feedbacks have no efficient
cause since it's 'inefficient' to have causes separated from effects.
With growth systems there are usually time lags between cause and
effect, so any 'cause' is instrumentally disconnected from the process
that follows it.  Growth systems also usually have complex emergent
properties with a complexity not evident in the original environment,
and so outside cause fails to be 'efficient' for requisite variety too.

In the case of a real physical growth system you'd be quite right to say
that any feedback loop we can define has us as its efficient cause.   A
physical system's own feedback loops are indeed complex.  For talking
about them it seems you need words that take their meaning from what
they refer to rather than be defined so they can't.  That's an issue, of
course.

Then I think the best of all evidence is the myriad physical systems
that hide their designs inside themselves.  That's very 'inefficient'
isn't it, to have things designed and operating according to principles
that are universally invisible from outside?  Isn't that typical for
physical systems though?

>
> I'm not saying that any of these are true; but they are
> certainly defensible positions... as defensible as the
> assertion that the loops have no efficient cause.

When you talk about 'defensible' but ambiguous positions I'm reminded of
questions like whether trees falling in the woods make a sound if no one
hears them.   The interest in that question seems to rest entirely on
the argument for either position being completely 'incontrovertible',
i.e. defensible by being impossible to contradict.  To me people seem
interested in that because it turns on whether the universe is composed
of information or things.  If just information, then the unobserved
falling tree makes no sound.  If you approach the world as composed of
things, then it does.  Why anyone would even wonder about that might be
that our mental pointers to physical things get mazes of self-references
attached to them, so our thoughts can wander without end looking for
what's real, and find nothing but themselves to connect to.   When you
strip the interpretations from the pointers, they can work again.   I
find it gives reality great substance, and having pointers reliably lead
to where there are new things to discover very useful.

Do you think Rosen is thinking at all about this issue?  It sounds like
he's looking at an equally central problem of explanation I think.

Cheers,  

Phil

>
> - --
> glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846, http://tempusdictum.com
> When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the
> first things to be bought and sold are legislators. -- P.J. O'Rourke
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Robert Rosen

glen ep ropella
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Phil Henshaw on 01/02/2008 09:25 PM:
> Yes, sure, that's an option of interpretation, but does it fit with
> the rest of what I was saying?   I think there's an interpretation
> that fits the data of nature better than any other, so it's reached
> as a 'conclusion' not as an 'assumption'.   For example, can you
> offer any example of physical growth (accumulative change) without a
> beginning and end?

Hmmm.  I suppose that depends on the way "beginning" and "ending" are
measured.  It seems to me that _nothing_ real has a beginning or end.
Our models of things begin and end; but, the things themselves don't
seem to.

For example, I can say that "my dad" was born.  Then many years later,
he died.  But when did "my dad" begin?  Was he "my dad" when he was a
zygote?  A fetus?  A gleam in my grand dad's eye?  Same questions apply
about when he ended.  In fact, the difference between an embryo and a
fetus presents just such an example of physical growth without a
beginning or an end.  We don't know when the fetus "began" and our
cut-off point for "fetus" is artificially designed to coincide with birth.

The same is true of any unit you can think of.  Sure, by measuring the
thing according to some model, you can point to a beginning and end...
according to your _model_.  But, is the thing being measured actually
beginning and ending?  Or is it just the way you measure it that results
in the measurements?

By that reasoning, I can simply pick a model of the world where nothing
ever ends and nothing ever begins... i.e. a model that says the world is
everywhere continuous.  Forces in distant galaxies impact me to some
non-zero extent (though they may be _negligible_ for any given purpose).
 Events in the distant past caused me to, say, get some more coffee...
at least to some extent.

So my answer is:  Sure.  Tell me what model you'd like me to use and I
can pick a growth process that has neither a beginning nor an end.

> Complex systems are always poorly represented by our models, but does
>  that restrict them, or just us?  :-)

That's easy:  Both, because we are part of the super-system that
includes the sub-system being studied.

> Well, certainly a term needs to be understood so that when one
> persons uses it another person can know what is being referred to.
> But isn't that a normal problem with language, not an inherent flaw
> in language? In this case I'm using 'feedback loop' in a way I
> thought would be understood, from your referring to the physical
> model of the 'chicken & egg' cycle.  It wasn't that clear perhaps.

It's not that it's unclear.  It's that the meaning you're using isn't
concrete.  It's abstract.  A "feedback loop" cannot be picked up,
manipulated, eaten, twisted into a pretzel, etc.  Hence, it is not concrete.

As an abstract thing, all that remains is to figure out whether the
thoughts triggered by others by the phrase "feedback loop" are roughly
equivalent to the thoughts triggered in you when you see the phrase
"feedback loop".

Now, concrete things have a natural mechanism for correcting errors in
the thoughts of those that manipulate them.  E.g. if you pick up a rock,
roll it around in your hands, toss it up in the air, drop it on your
foot, etc.  Then I pick it up, roll it around, etc.  There's a good
chance that equivalent thoughts pop up when we think about that rock.
And we can use the concreteness of the rock to whittle down any
differences by designing standard methods for handling the rock.

But with abstract things like "feedback loop", it's much more difficult.
 The only methods for ensuring our thoughts are equivalent when the
phrase is uttered is to talk about it for extended periods, probably
with several conversations (possibly including quizzing each other).  We
can also help bring the thoughts closer by indirectly using concrete
artifacts like drawings, computers, etc.  ("Point to the feedback loop!" ;-)

I posit that, in most people, the thoughts evoked by "feedback loop" are
going to be very different, primarily because most people don't work
very closely together with most other people.  Sure, some people work
closely with some other people.  But, by and large, an abstract thing
like a "feedback loop" will mean very different things to different people.

And one of the main differences will be in thinking about the beginning
and the ending of any given feedback loop.

> Can you think of any regular cycle that does not begin and end with
> accumulative processes on scales that make them untraceable?

I don't really understand what you're asking for.  Perhaps if you gave
me an example of a regular cycle that has a clear beginning and a clear
ending?

> I draw the conclusion that natural system feedbacks have no efficient
>  cause since it's 'inefficient' to have causes separated from
> effects. With growth systems there are usually time lags between
> cause and effect, so any 'cause' is instrumentally disconnected from
> the process that follows it.  Growth systems also usually have
> complex emergent properties with a complexity not evident in the
> original environment, and so outside cause fails to be 'efficient'
> for requisite variety too.
>
> In the case of a real physical growth system you'd be quite right to
> say that any feedback loop we can define has us as its efficient
> cause.   A physical system's own feedback loops are indeed complex.
> For talking about them it seems you need words that take their
> meaning from what they refer to rather than be defined so they can't.
> That's an issue, of course.
>
> Then I think the best of all evidence is the myriad physical systems
> that hide their designs inside themselves.  That's very 'inefficient'
>  isn't it, to have things designed and operating according to
> principles that are universally invisible from outside?  Isn't that
> typical for physical systems though?

You seem to be using the word "efficient" as it's used in everyday
language rather than as the peculiar meaning it takes on when used in
the phrase "efficient cause".  An "efficient cause" need not be
efficient.  Such a cause needs only to meet Aristotle's (or Robert
Rosen's) definition of such causes.

>> I'm not saying that any of these are true; but they are certainly
>> defensible positions... as defensible as the assertion that the
>> loops have no efficient cause.
>
> When you talk about 'defensible' but ambiguous positions I'm reminded
> of questions like whether trees falling in the woods make a sound if
> no one hears them.   The interest in that question seems to rest
> entirely on the argument for either position being completely
> 'incontrovertible', i.e. defensible by being impossible to
> contradict.

I apologize.  That's not how I intend it.  When I say something is
defensible or reasonable, I mean that a diligent person can make a
persuasive argument that it's true.  The introduction of a contrary fact
can demolish such defensible positions, turning them indefensible.  But
absent such contrary facts, the position is defensible.  And any given
topic can tolerate several defensible but contradictory positions.

> To me people seem interested in that because it turns on whether the
> universe is composed of information or things.  If just information,
> then the unobserved falling tree makes no sound.  If you approach the
> world as composed of things, then it does.

Not necessarily.  If the whole universe is information, then we
(observers) are information.  And if we're information, then other
things (also information) might also be like us.  Hence, if a tree falls
in the forest and no human is there but some non-human information
globule with the power to observe is present, then it still makes a sound.

So, even if the world is composed entirely of information, the tree
(information) may make a sound even if no "one" is there to hear it.
For example, even though wood molecules (also information) can't _hear_,
they can certainly react to the physical pressures (also information)
that might result from the falling tree.  I.e. the tree, itself, is an
observer or is composed of observers .... even if it's dead.

In short, everything being information doesn't change the answer.
Events can either be sensed by an observer or they can't, regardless of
what the universe is composed of.

> Why anyone would even wonder about that might be
> that our mental pointers to physical things get mazes of
> self-references attached to them, so our thoughts can wander without
> end looking for what's real, and find nothing but themselves to
> connect to.   When you strip the interpretations from the pointers,
> they can work again.   I find it gives reality great substance, and
> having pointers reliably lead to where there are new things to
> discover very useful.
>
> Do you think Rosen is thinking at all about this issue?  It sounds
> like he's looking at an equally central problem of explanation I
> think.

Yes.  He explicitly talks about this (meters and observables) in
Fundamentals ... as well as Life Itself.  The presentation in
Fundamentals ... is more explicit.

- --
glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846, http://tempusdictum.com
There's no sense in being precise when you don't even know what you're
talking about. -- John Von Neumann

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Robert Rosen

Phil Henshaw-2
Glen

>
> Phil Henshaw on 01/02/2008 09:25 PM:
> > Yes, sure, that's an option of interpretation, but does it fit with
> > the rest of what I was saying?   I think there's an interpretation
> > that fits the data of nature better than any other, so it's reached
> > as a 'conclusion' not as an 'assumption'.   For example, can you
> > offer any example of physical growth (accumulative change)
> without a
> > beginning and end?
>
> Hmmm.  I suppose that depends on the way "beginning" and
> "ending" are measured.  It seems to me that _nothing_ real
> has a beginning or end. Our models of things begin and end;
> but, the things themselves don't seem to.

There are several ways, but since they involve physical things rather
than definable things the reasoning is different.  With physical things
there are recognizable ridges and valleys.  An inflection point on a
curve is a ridge or valley in the derivative.  Like with ( ??.o? ?  and
? `o.?? ) the o's of the beginning and ending developmental phases can
be considered the definable beginning and end and.  Then the indefinable
part attached includes all you can find connected to them.   That
provides an efficiently reconstructable natural definition of beginning
and end.  The more useful part may come later, when you realize that
once you have (??.o) there's simply no avoiding ( o? ? `o.??)coming
right along.   Once you see growth you can expect to see the other three
phases of a whole system life-cycle.
 
> For example, I can say that "my dad" was born.  Then many
> years later, he died.  But when did "my dad" begin?  Was he
> "my dad" when he was a zygote?  A fetus?  A gleam in my grand
> dad's eye?  Same questions apply about when he ended.  In
> fact, the difference between an embryo and a fetus presents
> just such an example of physical growth without a beginning
> or an end.  We don't know when the fetus "began" and our
> cut-off point for "fetus" is artificially designed to
> coincide with birth.

Well, you can choose.  Do you want to apply the rule to your dad as a
whole or to some part?   One of the unobservable but theoretically real
thresholds I like for the beginning of an organism is the time when the
egg opens its cell wall for just one sperm.  I don't know how many
organisms that actually works for, but I think it works for humans.

>
> The same is true of any unit you can think of.  Sure, by
> measuring the thing according to some model, you can point to
> a beginning and end... according to your _model_.  But, is
> the thing being measured actually beginning and ending?  Or
> is it just the way you measure it that results in the measurements?

What you're talking about is the maturation of your concept of beginning
and ending and hoping that it settles down with something reliable and
definite and not just some arbitrary opinion measure or something.  For
the many things that begin with growth it's fairly easy to be clear
about it.  That then provides a very large set of examples that other
things can be judged by.  I think, though I'm not completely sure, that
everything that begins and ends some other way will turn out to be
trivial, but that needs remain undetermined until it is.

> By that reasoning, I can simply pick a model of the world
> where nothing ever ends and nothing ever begins... i.e. a
> model that says the world is everywhere continuous.  Forces
> in distant galaxies impact me to some non-zero extent (though
> they may be _negligible_ for any given purpose).  Events in
> the distant past caused me to, say, get some more coffee...
> at least to some extent.

What would be wrong with considering the world without beginnings or
ends is that you're establishing fact without evidence.   I choose to
avoid that since it is clearly unproductive.  Otherwise you're just
dwelling on incontrovertible conjectures for which there is no evidence,
and that gets boring.

> So my answer is:  Sure.  Tell me what model you'd like me to
> use and I can pick a growth process that has neither a
> beginning nor an end.

Try one, any one.   If all your data shows is the beginning and end of
your recorder being turned on, then you can indeed say that you have not
found the beginning or end of the system in question, just of your
record.  All you can ever associate with anything identifiable is what's
connected to it, and that never proves much about what's not connected.

 

> > Complex systems are always poorly represented by our
> models, but does  
> > that restrict them, or just us?  :-)
>
> That's easy:  Both, because we are part of the super-system
> that includes the sub-system being studied.
>
> > Well, certainly a term needs to be understood so that when
> one persons
> > uses it another person can know what is being referred to.
> But isn't
> > that a normal problem with language, not an inherent flaw
> in language?
> > In this case I'm using 'feedback loop' in a way I thought would be
> > understood, from your referring to the physical model of
> the 'chicken
> > & egg' cycle.  It wasn't that clear perhaps.
>
> It's not that it's unclear.  It's that the meaning you're
> using isn't concrete.  It's abstract.  A "feedback loop"
> cannot be picked up, manipulated, eaten, twisted into a
> pretzel, etc.  Hence, it is not concrete.

One of the puzzling enduring experiences of nature is looking inside
things to see how they work only to find a whole lot of empty space and
an impossible puzzle.  For centuries now we've been looking at systems
that way, seeing the people and unable to find the community, for
example.  Then we look in people and find a whole lot of things that
know exactly what to do and have no instructions.   We expect to find
inside nature's machines something like the mechanisms of the machines
we build, and only find what mostly looks like an empty box.  

The feedback loops I'm talking about are highly concrete, but they're in
the animation of the whole, and vanish from view when you only look at
the parts.  They don't work on paper, and they don't have any particular
dimensionality at all, unless you project an image of them.  You can see
where they operate from growth curves and you can trace them as far as
your budget allows.   They're physical things.  In the same way as
economies are money in motion, that don't exist if it stops, so are
physical things all energy in motion.   It sounds all wrong, but the
apparent fact is that nothing has any parts, only movement.

>
> As an abstract thing, all that remains is to figure out
> whether the thoughts triggered by others by the phrase
> "feedback loop" are roughly equivalent to the thoughts
> triggered in you when you see the phrase "feedback loop".

But even more important is to look at WHEN the responding thoughts
arise.  There's always a time lag, a class 'A' gap in efficient
causation.  What that means is the 'received' thought is not received at
all, but reinvented, and the gap in efficient cause prevents determining
whether the sent and received message are even similar.  There do seem
to be some higher orders involved, of course.   With repetition we can
agree on appropriate choices of words for commonly observable things,
for our mental pointers to physical things, but we'll never know each
other's thoughts it seems, and without a physical world for each of our
pointers to point to, then no cross check at all.



> Now, concrete things have a natural mechanism for correcting
> errors in the thoughts of those that manipulate them.  E.g.
> if you pick up a rock, roll it around in your hands, toss it
> up in the air, drop it on your foot, etc.  Then I pick it up,
> roll it around, etc.  There's a good chance that equivalent
> thoughts pop up when we think about that rock. And we can use
> the concreteness of the rock to whittle down any differences
> by designing standard methods for handling the rock.
>
> But with abstract things like "feedback loop", it's much more
> difficult.  The only methods for ensuring our thoughts are
> equivalent when the phrase is uttered is to talk about it for
> extended periods, probably with several conversations
> (possibly including quizzing each other).  We can also help
> bring the thoughts closer by indirectly using concrete
> artifacts like drawings, computers, etc.  ("Point to the
> feedback loop!" ;-)

To me ??.?? ? `?.?? is a sign to a physical object that classifies 4
types of feedback loops.  If those familiar irreversible kinds of become
recognized it will be as useful for checking each other's pointers to
complex systems that do that as tossing around a rock.  

>
> I posit that, in most people, the thoughts evoked by
> "feedback loop" are going to be very different, primarily
> because most people don't work very closely together with
> most other people.  Sure, some people work closely with some
> other people.  But, by and large, an abstract thing like a
> "feedback loop" will mean very different things to different people.

Sure, most people don't watch to see how things begin and end.
Thinking in circles that get somewhere is quite difficult, and rational
minds were maybe not made for that.   When we see circular causation
that is getting somewhere it does often trigger visceral experience
though, so I'll employ that too.  

> And one of the main differences will be in thinking about the
> beginning and the ending of any given feedback loop.
>
> > Can you think of any regular cycle that does not begin and end with
> > accumulative processes on scales that make them untraceable?
>
> I don't really understand what you're asking for.  Perhaps if
> you gave me an example of a regular cycle that has a clear
> beginning and a clear ending?

A bell, perhaps, you whack it and it rings. Any measure you have of it
will display ??.?? ? `?.?? and those turning points will be traceable to
changes in the emergent mechanisms of energy flow.

>
> > I draw the conclusion that natural system feedbacks have no
> efficient  
> > cause since it's 'inefficient' to have causes separated
> from effects.
> > With growth systems there are usually time lags between cause and
> > effect, so any 'cause' is instrumentally disconnected from
> the process
> > that follows it.  Growth systems also usually have complex emergent
> > properties with a complexity not evident in the original
> environment,
> > and so outside cause fails to be 'efficient' for requisite variety
> > too.
> >
> > In the case of a real physical growth system you'd be quite
> right to
> > say that any feedback loop we can define has us as its efficient
> > cause.   A physical system's own feedback loops are indeed complex.
> > For talking about them it seems you need words that take
> their meaning
> > from what they refer to rather than be defined so they
> can't. That's
> > an issue, of course.
> >
> > Then I think the best of all evidence is the myriad physical systems
> > that hide their designs inside themselves.  That's very
> 'inefficient'
> >  isn't it, to have things designed and operating according to
> > principles that are universally invisible from outside?  Isn't that
> > typical for physical systems though?
>
> You seem to be using the word "efficient" as it's used in
> everyday language rather than as the peculiar meaning it
> takes on when used in the phrase "efficient cause".  An
> "efficient cause" need not be efficient.  Such a cause needs
> only to meet Aristotle's (or Robert
> Rosen's) definition of such causes.
>
> >> I'm not saying that any of these are true; but they are certainly
> >> defensible positions... as defensible as the assertion
> that the loops
> >> have no efficient cause.
> >
> > When you talk about 'defensible' but ambiguous positions
> I'm reminded
> > of questions like whether trees falling in the woods make a sound if
> > no one hears them.   The interest in that question seems to rest
> > entirely on the argument for either position being completely
> > 'incontrovertible', i.e. defensible by being impossible to
> contradict.
>
> I apologize.  That's not how I intend it.  When I say
> something is defensible or reasonable, I mean that a diligent
> person can make a persuasive argument that it's true.  The
> introduction of a contrary fact can demolish such defensible
> positions, turning them indefensible.  But absent such
> contrary facts, the position is defensible.  And any given
> topic can tolerate several defensible but contradictory positions.
>
> > To me people seem interested in that because it turns on
> whether the
> > universe is composed of information or things.  If just
> information,
> > then the unobserved falling tree makes no sound.  If you
> approach the
> > world as composed of things, then it does.
>
> Not necessarily.  If the whole universe is information, then we
> (observers) are information.  And if we're information, then
> other things (also information) might also be like us.  
> Hence, if a tree falls in the forest and no human is there
> but some non-human information globule with the power to
> observe is present, then it still makes a sound.

But if the universe were 'information' would its missing pieces exist
when they're unknown? They shouldn't should they?  Otherwise you no
longer have a useful definition of information.  If they exist when
they're unknown then they must be physical.  Certainly one of the most
enduring features of nature is that good hints of where to look helps
you find stuff, and anywhere you look closely you find much more than
you initially realized was there.   These are features of ordinary
physical stuff, no?

>
> So, even if the world is composed entirely of information, the tree
> (information) may make a sound even if no "one" is there to
> hear it. For example, even though wood molecules (also
> information) can't _hear_, they can certainly react to the
> physical pressures (also information) that might result from
> the falling tree.  I.e. the tree, itself, is an observer or
> is composed of observers .... even if it's dead.

So you seem to be calling physical things, that are discoverably complex
beyond our imagination, to be information.  That seems to be discarding
the useful definition of information, as either located in a mind or
conveying an aspect of one thing to another.   Now you're talking about
information as physical stuff, and positing that information is not only
a pointer to where the cookie jar is, but also the cookies.  Anything
that is everything is nothing in particular as far as I can tell.


> In short, everything being information doesn't change the
> answer. Events can either be sensed by an observer or they
> can't, regardless of what the universe is composed of.

It seems to be composed of organized motion, which may disappoint a
common 100,000 year old assumption, perhaps, but seems to be correct
none the less.
 

> > Why anyone would even wonder about that might be
> > that our mental pointers to physical things get mazes of
> > self-references attached to them, so our thoughts can
> wander without
> > end looking for what's real, and find nothing but themselves to
> > connect to.   When you strip the interpretations from the pointers,
> > they can work again.   I find it gives reality great substance, and
> > having pointers reliably lead to where there are new things to
> > discover very useful.
> >
> > Do you think Rosen is thinking at all about this issue?  It sounds
> > like he's looking at an equally central problem of explanation I
> > think.
>
> Yes.  He explicitly talks about this (meters and observables)
> in Fundamentals ... as well as Life Itself.  The presentation
> in Fundamentals ... is more explicit.

I should read it... What's 'Fundamentals'?  

For me fundamentals are the pointers out into the fog that I learn to
trust will connect me with something I didn't make up on my own.  I can
invent an ontology around them, but that's artificial, and not what they
are, where to find them or where they come from.  I don't think they
come from my discovery of them either (over and over and over!) but are
just ordinary stuff.  What would Ocham not like about that?   When I'm
curious I can even observe the 'non-efficient' causation of my own
ideas.  How they develop exposes their independent growth eruptions and
fading decays.  Since they develop and decay on their own in the same
manner as every other kind of organization they seem made of ordinary
stuff too. :-)

Phil

>
> - --
> glen e. p. ropella, 971-219-3846, http://tempusdictum.com 
> There's no sense in being precise when you don't even know
> what you're talking about. -- John Von Neumann
>
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