Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

[Prof David West]

Naw back at ya. I am not picking a fight or being contentious just to be
contentious. I am trying to be a little dog nipping at the heels of
assumptions and presuppositions.

Because this list is not a scholarly forum where you spend an exquisite
amount of time picking your words and making your statements as precise
as possible I am assuming that your language reveals said
assumptions/presuppositions. So when you use rational man, I think you
really deep down mean exactly that. And when you shy away from that as
in the post I am responding to, you still cannot get away from your core
position.

We have two people with two idiosyncratic opinions. Each communicates
his/her opinion to the other and they interact trying to discern what
each other means in order to see if their individual opinions are the
same, or somewhat the same, or substantially the same.  If the
conversation leads both parties to agreeing with each other that their
individual opinions are really the same, shared, opinion — even if
stated somewhat differently — voila, we have Truth. I think this is a
fair restatement of what you say (and say when channeling Pierce).

However ... the first imposition on the process focuses on the language
we use to communicate/interact. I believe that Pierce, you, and all of
the scientists and mathematicians and CS types on this list are going to
insist on using a very narrow set of languages and would prefer just one
- mathematical logic. Definitely one with well defined terms and
formalized grammar, i.e. one that is "rational."

Well of course you say; how else could we proceed?

Well, one possibility is that you come over and we drop acid together -
or better yet the one hallucinogen derived from the Ariocarpus cactus
that empirical evidence suggests yields consensual hallucinations - and
we use that 'language' to see if our opinions converge.

You are nuts, you say.

AHA! I say. You are privileging YOUR means of communication and
simultaneously asserting that Truth can only be found within the set of
possible conversations conducted using YOUR language and YOUR rules of
conversation/interaction.

Now, let us return to your signal. Imagine we have a thousand people
listening to it. 999 of them use your statistical/probability tests and
agree that is is simply noise - a random signal. I, on the other hand,
recognize that the signal is the voice of God, speaking the Language of
the Birds, and He is giving me clear and precise knowledge.

So what is True? Is the signal noise or is it knowledge?

And further suppose that I write some bad free verse that manages to
bypass the conscious and speak directly to the subconscious and the 999
slowly begin to agree with my position vis a vis the signal? At what
point does the Truth shift from noise to knowledge? (BTW, I would argue
that their simply agreeing with me based on what they understand of my
poetry, is insufficient - they must actually experience and directly
perceive the signal before we can be accord.)

The main point I made in my polemic, and continue to make: Pierce,
science, 'reasonable and rational' beings can never find more than local
Truth, for themselves, and it is immoral to impose that Truth on others.

Ceding a point - Pierce, and scientists, are not wrong when they assume
that their approach leads to truth as long as they restrict the domain
of application to things like Physics, Math, and Logic. I vehemently
react, negatively, when they blithely assert that the same approach is
appropriate for finding truth in epistemology, morality, social
conventions, public policy, governance, etc. etc.

dmw

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017, at 10:39 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Naw.  Come on Dave.  You're just picking a fight!  I don't meed the
> "rational man" at all.  All I need is that people either will, or will
> not, share an opinion in the very long run, and that opinion, by
> definition, if shared, is what we mean by truth.  And the edge I am
> talking about here is emotional.  I  am not pressing this view with the
> ferocity that you take me for.  Persistence, perhaps, but not ferocity.  
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David
> West
> Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 12:44 AM
> To: [hidden email]
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely
> Nothing!”
>
> Hi Nick,I write from Vienna. I will be back in Utah next week and at
> FRIAM for a couple of weeks starting in mid-December. You can apply cold
> compresses then, or just toss me in a snow bank.
>
> The "edge" that you do not recognize is present in your response. First,
> you propose a probabilistic/statistical "method" for discovery of the
> 'certainty' of a property of the signal. Why? What makes that method
> privileged? I.e. what is it about Probability that merits using it as a
> Philosopher's Stone? More egregious is the use of the term "rational man"
> — this is what I meant about allowing only some individuals at the
> conversational table.
>
> see you in December
>
>
> On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 11:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> > David,
> >
> > Somebody has obviously riled you up, wherever you have gone to.  
> > Please come back so I can administer cold compresses.
> >
> > I can recognize in what you write below the vague outlines of things I
> > have said about Peirce, but your representation of me has a kind of
> > edge I don't think I ever would have given it.  Try this:  Imagine
> > that you have a fancy antenna and that it is picking up a signal from outer space.
> >  Imagine you are interested in the frequency of the signal.  Now, I
> > say, the signal can either be random or systematic.  Let's say that
> > the last ten readings on the signal give you a reading of 256hz +/- 1
> > hz.  Now, it's entirely possible that such a sample of measurements could be
> > produced by a random signal.    But now let us double the number of
> > readings, and let us also notice that the variation of the
> > measurements has also diminished by the square root of two.  Now double again, and
> > diminish the variation once again by root 2.    And so on.  While we both
> > would have to recognize that there is no certainty that the signal is
> > not random, still the probabliliy keeps increasing that such a sample
> > is drawn from a population of measurements with a mean of 256hz.  It's
> > that way with truth.  It's quite possible that our experience is
> > random, and no amount of consistency  can ever convince a rational man
> > that the randomness of any particular chain of experiences is not random.
> > However, as experience increases in consistency, the same rational man
> > will be more likely to bet that that chain of experiences will be
> > confirmed in the very long run of human experiences.  On Peirce,s
> > account, that is what it means to say that something "is the truth"  
> > It is to bet that this string of experiences that we are now in the
> > midst of will be confirmed in the very long run of human experience.
> >
> > Notice that I never asserted, for a certainty, that there is anything
> > at all that is True.  I only gave a Pragmatic[ist] definition of what
> > truth would be if there ever were any.
> >
> > Come back.  We miss you.
> >
> > Nick
> >
> > Nicholas S. Thompson
> > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University
> > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David
> > West
> > Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2017 4:02 PM
> > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> > <[hidden email]>
> > Subject: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”
> >
> > Two caveats: first, this might better be a private communication with
> > Nick since he is the one with the temerity to first (at least in the
> > past few weeks) use the word 'Truth', although it has been implicit in
> > a lot of recent threads; and second, the following contains a lot of
> > assertions and assertions are, at minimum,  ‘Truthy’ in nature, but I
> > am making no such claim, as will be explained later.
> >
> > There can be no Truth.
> >        Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated
> > - ‘truths’ are possible.
> >        Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there
> > might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only
> > ephemeral ‘truths’ are possible.
> >        All is Maya (illusion) and all Truth and all truths are equally
> > illusory.
> >
> > There is no / are no means for discovering Truth even if It existed.
> >        To go all postmodern on you: what means/method died and ceded
> > privilege and sole possession of the ‘Royal Road’ to math, logic,
> > scientific method, rhetoric, and “reason?”
> >
> > There is no / are no means for expressing, and therefore communicating
> > or sharing, Truth; were It to exist.
> >        Trivially, this is merely an expression of the first line of the
> > Tao de Ching: “Tao Tao not Tao.”
> >        More importantly it is a generalization of what Peter Naur said
> > about software and software development. Specifically that a program
> > was the expression of a consensual theory share among those that
> > developed it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the
> > humans engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be
> > reduced to documentation and therefore cannot be
> > transmitted/communicated to other minds. (Actually, transmission would
> > be possible extant telepathy and simultaneously, empathy.)
> >
> > As I have understood Nick’s interpretation of Pierce I find him to be
> > an intellectual terrorist and his approach useful only for
> > establishing orthodoxy and dogma. A prime reason for believing this is
> > that the ‘conversation’ espoused by Pierce (and Nick) cannot be global
> > – every living person at once – and therefore can only result in a
> > consensus of the few that that is to be imposed on all. A second
> > reason for this belief is that the only ones allowed at the
> > conversational table are those proficient in and willing to abide by specific rules of discussion.
> > This is application of my postmodern stance expressed above.
> >
> > A corollary of my antipathy towards Pierce, a favorite quote from Hesse:
> > “Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and be
> > their own judges; obey the laws. Other’s sense their own laws within
> > them.”  Hesse was speaking of ethics but I would extend his notion to
> > epistemology and metaphysics.
> >
> > None of the preceding is Truth, merely my truth. Accepting same
> > essentially makes me a sociopath; but, I hope, an amiable one.
> >
> >
> > ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe
> > at St. John's College to unsubscribe
> > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
> >
> >
> > ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe
> > at St. John's College to unsubscribe
> > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe
> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove
>
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

[Nick Thompson]

Hi, Dave,

 

See larding below.  I have to say, this still doesn't quite sound like you.

 

Nick

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Monday, October 16, 2017 12:27 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Naw back at ya. I am not picking a fight or being contentious just to be contentious. I am trying to be a little dog nipping at the heels of assumptions and presuppositions.

 

Because this list is not a scholarly forum where you spend an exquisite amount of time picking your words and making your statements as precise as possible I am assuming that your language reveals said assumptions/presuppositions. So when you use rational man, I think you really deep down mean exactly that. And when you shy away from that as in the post I am responding to, you still cannot get away from your core position.

[NST==> This I would characterize as an approach to discourse roughly equivalent to “in vino veritas”.  It is the assumption that the most accurate representation of a person’s view of the world is its most unguarded presentation.  Notice that your sentence above presumes a truth of some matter, “Thompson’s Real View”.  So far as I am concerned, that presumption concedes the ONLY POINT I have been arguing for in our discussion … so far.  It concedes the MEANING of the word “truth”.  You will notice that unlike yourself, I have not in this conversation EVER argued (yet) for the truth of any matter, other than what we are referring to when we refer to truth.  <==nst]

 

We have two people with two idiosyncratic opinions. Each communicates his/her opinion to the other and they interact trying to discern what each other means in order to see if their individual opinions are the same, or somewhat the same, or substantially the same.  If the conversation leads both parties to agreeing with each other that their individual opinions are really the same, shared, opinion — even if stated somewhat differently — voila, we have Truth. I think this is a fair restatement of what you say (and say when channeling Pierce).

[NST==>No, David.  It is absolutely Unfair, and I am surprised to hear your say it.   When we speak of truth, we speak of something beyond anything that you, or I, or any particular group of people might believe.  But, contra Descartes, we do not speak of anything outside of all possibility of human experience.  What we speak of is that humans will converge on in the very long run, if indeed they ever converge.  No convergence, no truth, because, on Peirce’s account, that is what the term, truth, means.  Please, David, do not continue beyond this point in this message without acknowledging that my thesis is a thesis about the MEANING of the term, Truth.  And that we have not yet begun the discussion concerning whether there exists any such thing.  Until we see eye to eye on that, the discussion is stupid.  It would be like a discussion in which I would say, “a unicorn is a horse with a horn in the middle of it’s nose” and you keep replying, “NO, NICK.  There ARE no unicorns.  Until we have agreed on a definition of a unicorn, the question of its existence cannot even come up.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <==nst]

 

However ... the first imposition on the process focuses on the language we use to communicate/interact. I believe that Pierce, you, and all of the scientists and mathematicians and CS types on this list are going to insist on using a very narrow set of languages and would prefer just one

- mathematical logic. Definitely one with well defined terms and formalized grammar, i.e. one that is "rational."

[NST==>You are posing here as the romantic outlier, a pose that both Glen and Marcus, and many others of us would like to contend you for.  All I can say is, if everybody on the list agrees with me, why am I arguing with them all.   <==nst]

 

Well of course you say; how else could we proceed?

 

Well, one possibility is that you come over and we drop acid together - or better yet the one hallucinogen derived from the Ariocarpus cactus that empirical evidence suggests yields consensual hallucinations - and we use that 'language' to see if our opinions converge.

 

You are nuts, you say.

[NST==>It would be convenient for your argument if I said that, but I don’t.  I would say only that at 80 I have a hard enough time moving through my world without taking hallucinogens, and so I probably won’t do that.  Also, I can’t immediately think of any reason why accuracy of perception or happiness would arise from mucking with my cognitive capacities, such as they are.  It aint much, but it’s what I got.  <==nst]

 

AHA! I say. You are privileging YOUR means of communication and simultaneously asserting that Truth can only be found within the set of possible conversations conducted using YOUR language and YOUR rules of conversation/interaction. [NST==>I haven’t [yet] said anything about how truth is found; only something about how it is defined.  <==nst]  

 

Now, let us return to your signal. Imagine we have a thousand people listening to it. 999 of them use your statistical/probability tests and agree that is is simply noise - a random signal. I, on the other hand, recognize that the signal is the voice of God, speaking the Language of the Birds, and He is giving me clear and precise knowledge.[NST==>Well, you are welcome to that knowledge.  I guess I agree with Peirce that knowledge is, at its root, social.  So, idiosyncratic knowledge is kind of a contradiction in terms.  <==nst]   

 

So what is True? Is the signal noise or is it knowledge?

 

And further suppose that I write some bad free verse that manages to bypass the conscious and speak directly to the subconscious and the 999 slowly begin to agree with my position vis a vis the signal? At what point does the Truth shift from noise to knowledge? (BTW, I would argue that their simply agreeing with me based on what they understand of my poetry, is insufficient - they must actually experience and directly perceive the signal before we can be accord.)[NST==>Well, assuming that you have accepted my DEFINITION of truth as that upon which the human community of inquiry will agree in the very long run, we can ask for what constitutes EVIDENCE that something is true.  çnst]   

 

The main point I made in my polemic, and continue to make: Pierce, science, 'reasonable and rational' beings can never find more than local Truth, for themselves, and it is immoral to impose that Truth on others.[NST==>You sentence only makes sense if you havre already stipulated to my DEFINTION of truth, right?  <==nst]   

 

Ceding a point - Pierce, and scientists, are not wrong when they assume that their approach leads to truth as long as they restrict the domain of application to things like Physics, Math, and Logic. I vehemently react, negatively, when they blithely assert that the same approach is appropriate for finding truth in epistemology, morality, social conventions, public policy, governance, etc. etc.

[NST==>If that is the case, then Peirce would assert, I think, that there is no truth of such matters. He disliked literary criticism and other fashion-driven enterprises for just that reason.   However, I think he and perhaps some of his followers, believed that opinion with respect to some of the matters you mention above will in fact stabilize in the very long run.  If it would, then indeed there is, by definition, a truth of these matters, also.

 

Nick <==nst]

 

dmw

 

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017, at 10:39 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Naw.  Come on Dave.  You're just picking a fight!  I don't meed the

> "rational man" at all.  All I need is that people either will, or will

> not, share an opinion in the very long run, and that opinion, by

> definition, if shared, is what we mean by truth.  And the edge I am

> talking about here is emotional.  I  am not pressing this view with

> the ferocity that you take me for.  Persistence, perhaps, but not ferocity.

>

> Nick

>

> Nicholas S. Thompson

> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University

> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

>

>

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David

> West

> Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 12:44 AM

> To: [hidden email]

> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely

> Nothing!”

>

> Hi Nick,I write from Vienna. I will be back in Utah next week and at

> FRIAM for a couple of weeks starting in mid-December. You can apply

> cold compresses then, or just toss me in a snow bank.

>

> The "edge" that you do not recognize is present in your response.

> First, you propose a probabilistic/statistical "method" for discovery

> of the 'certainty' of a property of the signal. Why? What makes that

> method privileged? I.e. what is it about Probability that merits using

> it as a Philosopher's Stone? More egregious is the use of the term "rational man"

> — this is what I meant about allowing only some individuals at the

> conversational table.

>

> see you in December

>

>

> On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 11:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> > David,

> >

> > Somebody has obviously riled you up, wherever you have gone to. 

> > Please come back so I can administer cold compresses.

> >

> > I can recognize in what you write below the vague outlines of things

> > I have said about Peirce, but your representation of me has a kind

> > of edge I don't think I ever would have given it.  Try this: 

> > Imagine that you have a fancy antenna and that it is picking up a signal from outer space.

> >  Imagine you are interested in the frequency of the signal.  Now, I

> > say, the signal can either be random or systematic.  Let's say that

> > the last ten readings on the signal give you a reading of 256hz +/-

> > 1 hz.  Now, it's entirely possible that such a sample of measurements could be

> > produced by a random signal.    But now let us double the number of

> > readings, and let us also notice that the variation of the

> > measurements has also diminished by the square root of two.  Now double again, and

> > diminish the variation once again by root 2.    And so on.  While we both

> > would have to recognize that there is no certainty that the signal

> > is not random, still the probabliliy keeps increasing that such a

> > sample is drawn from a population of measurements with a mean of

> > 256hz.  It's that way with truth.  It's quite possible that our

> > experience is random, and no amount of consistency  can ever

> > convince a rational man that the randomness of any particular chain of experiences is not random.

> > However, as experience increases in consistency, the same rational

> > man will be more likely to bet that that chain of experiences will

> > be confirmed in the very long run of human experiences.  On Peirce,s

> > account, that is what it means to say that something "is the truth"

> > It is to bet that this string of experiences that we are now in the

> > midst of will be confirmed in the very long run of human experience.

> >

> > Notice that I never asserted, for a certainty, that there is

> > anything at all that is True.  I only gave a Pragmatic[ist]

> > definition of what truth would be if there ever were any.

> >

> > Come back.  We miss you.

> >

> > Nick

> >

> > Nicholas S. Thompson

> > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University

> > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

> >

> >

> > -----Original Message-----

> > From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof

> > David West

> > Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2017 4:02 PM

> > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group

> > <[hidden email]>

> > Subject: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

> >

> > Two caveats: first, this might better be a private communication

> > with Nick since he is the one with the temerity to first (at least

> > in the past few weeks) use the word 'Truth', although it has been

> > implicit in a lot of recent threads; and second, the following

> > contains a lot of assertions and assertions are, at minimum, 

> > ‘Truthy’ in nature, but I am making no such claim, as will be explained later.

> >

> > There can be no Truth.

> >        Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated

> > - ‘truths’ are possible.

> >        Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there

> > might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only

> > ephemeral ‘truths’ are possible.

> >        All is Maya (illusion) and all Truth and all truths are equally

> > illusory.

> >

> > There is no / are no means for discovering Truth even if It existed.

> >        To go all postmodern on you: what means/method died and ceded

> > privilege and sole possession of the ‘Royal Road’ to math, logic,

> > scientific method, rhetoric, and “reason?”

> >

> > There is no / are no means for expressing, and therefore

> > communicating or sharing, Truth; were It to exist.

> >        Trivially, this is merely an expression of the first line of the

> > Tao de Ching: “Tao Tao not Tao.”

> >        More importantly it is a generalization of what Peter Naur said

> > about software and software development. Specifically that a program

> > was the expression of a consensual theory share among those that

> > developed it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of

> > the humans engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot

> > be reduced to documentation and therefore cannot be

> > transmitted/communicated to other minds. (Actually, transmission

> > would be possible extant telepathy and simultaneously, empathy.)

> >

> > As I have understood Nick’s interpretation of Pierce I find him to

> > be an intellectual terrorist and his approach useful only for

> > establishing orthodoxy and dogma. A prime reason for believing this

> > is that the ‘conversation’ espoused by Pierce (and Nick) cannot be

> > global – every living person at once – and therefore can only result

> > in a consensus of the few that that is to be imposed on all. A

> > second reason for this belief is that the only ones allowed at the

> > conversational table are those proficient in and willing to abide by specific rules of discussion.

> > This is application of my postmodern stance expressed above.

> >

> > A corollary of my antipathy towards Pierce, a favorite quote from Hesse:

> > “Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and

> > be their own judges; obey the laws. Other’s sense their own laws

> > within them.”  Hesse was speaking of ethics but I would extend his

> > notion to epistemology and metaphysics.

> >

> > None of the preceding is Truth, merely my truth. Accepting same

> > essentially makes me a sociopath; but, I hope, an amiable one.

> >

> >

> > ============================================================

> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at

> > cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe

> > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

> > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

> >

> >

> > ============================================================

> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at

> > cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe

> > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

> > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

>

> ============================================================

> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe

> at St. John's College to unsubscribe

> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

>

>

> ============================================================

> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe

> at St. John's College to unsubscribe

> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

 

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

[Prof David West]

Nick, at the risk of a mere dialogue that would be better served face to face in a month or so, I will respond.  All the time with a friendly smile on my face and a desire for common understanding in my heart.

I won't re-lard, but respond in order:

1-  I was going to use 'in vino veritas,"but as an example of a language (drunken babble is a language of sorts) that you would not accept as a vehicle for communication intended to result in convergence. But the point of what I said is simply to impute intent on your part when selecting which words you use to convey your thoughts. [See comment 2-.]

I did not "presume the truth of some matter." I made an assertion and, as noted in my initial post the only truth in such a thing is purely local to me, not shared. But all assertions / declarative statements — including yours — share this same 'local truthiness' and are not to be taken as assertions of shared, or possible shared, notions that, if they converged, would take on the property of "truthy."

2- I made no mention of "belief" and so I am mystified as to why the first sentence of your response makes a point of " beyond what you I / any group might believe." I did use the term opinion, which in colloquial and common use is often a synonym for belief — however, I used the term only because you used it first in describing Pierce's approach. When I read your use of the term, I took it as a stand-in for one or more of the following: experience, observation, measurement, calculation, even analysis. I intended to use the word in the same exact way. Perhaps I misunderstood your intent when you used the word.

True, the core thesis you present is an operational defintion of "truth" but that intent to define is embedded in, and the rest of the thread is engaged in, the use of that operational definition to determine if some proposition or the other is truthy.

3- It is not a pose. My antipathy for rule, convention, certitude in almost any form is very real and very essential to my sense of self. You have no comprehension of the sense of alienation this conviction engenders.

It is not that everyone agrees with you, but that you all share at least one thing in common and that is your acceptance of the "rational" world view that has dominated, not only science, but Western culture in general since the inception of the "Age of Reason." There remains lots of divertissement within the realm of the rational to assure pleasant passage of time for all.

4- Clever self deprecation simply obfuscates the fact that you see no utility in pursuing conversation / sharing experience / seeking convergence unless those efforts are undertaken within and are consistent with your particular world-view. I am being quite uncharitable here as I know my assertion is not always true at least in degree. You might take up meditation (altered state of consciousness ahead) or you might go to church (at least as long as the church in question was not fundamentalist requiring reptilephilia and glossallalia.)

5- Re: convergence on things like public policy, a simple example.  Say we both study biological organisms and we not things like a change in environment, creating a new, exploitable niche, will prompt bio-organisms to adapt (even evolve) to exploit that niche. We further observe human beings - as biological organisms and converge on the "truth" that they are biological organisms.  We have 'converged' in our understanding and have established truth. (?) At this point our observations / experiences diverge. Your study leads you to believe that humans are biotes PLUS something else. I, being a sociopath, cannot share those experiences, observations, analyses, or conclusions.  We sit down to discuss public policy  - the need for welfare perhaps - and we are immediately stuck because we have no common ground, common "language" with which to proceed and hence no convergence is possible and no truth as to the matter.

I would see welfare as a case of "feeding the bears," certain to lead to nothing except the proliferation of dependent bears as they, being biological organisms, adapt to exploit the "welfare niche." You would see it quite differently. But, how do we proceed? What process would you (or Pierce) suggest be used? Or do we simply acknowledge that we have no basis for convergence and therefore, no 'truth' is possible? I would be OK with that, but no one else will. Instead each faction will insist on the certitude/truth of their respective opinion and insist that public policy be grounded in their idiosyncratic truth.

The preceding is an extreme example, especially as to the reason we cannot find a common language and proceed, somehow, to convergence. But, at least, it has the virtue of a concrete embedded difference that prevents convergence. Too often, in almost all public policy debate the inhibiting difference is simply a refusal to listen to the other and insisting that the only means for finding convergence is everyone adopting one side's language and worldview and crafting the conversation on that basis.

dmw

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017, at 01:26 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Hi, Dave,

 

See larding below.  I have to say, this still doesn't quite sound like you.

 

Nick

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Monday, October 16, 2017 12:27 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Naw back at ya. I am not picking a fight or being contentious just to be contentious. I am trying to be a little dog nipping at the heels of assumptions and presuppositions.

 

Because this list is not a scholarly forum where you spend an exquisite amount of time picking your words and making your statements as precise as possible I am assuming that your language reveals said assumptions/presuppositions. So when you use rational man, I think you really deep down mean exactly that. And when you shy away from that as in the post I am responding to, you still cannot get away from your core position.

[NST==> This I would characterize as an approach to discourse roughly equivalent to “in vino veritas”.  It is the assumption that the most accurate representation of a person’s view of the world is its most unguarded presentation.  Notice that your sentence above presumes a truth of some matter, “Thompson’s Real View”.  So far as I am concerned, that presumption concedes the ONLY POINT I have been arguing for in our discussion … so far.  It concedes the MEANING of the word “truth”.  You will notice that unlike yourself, I have not in this conversation EVER argued (yet) for the truth of any matter, other than what we are referring to when we refer to truth.  <==nst]

 

We have two people with two idiosyncratic opinions. Each communicates his/her opinion to the other and they interact trying to discern what each other means in order to see if their individual opinions are the same, or somewhat the same, or substantially the same.  If the conversation leads both parties to agreeing with each other that their individual opinions are really the same, shared, opinion — even if stated somewhat differently — voila, we have Truth. I think this is a fair restatement of what you say (and say when channeling Pierce).

[NST==>No, David.  It is absolutely Unfair, and I am surprised to hear your say it.   When we speak of truth, we speak of something beyond anything that you, or I, or any particular group of people might believe.  But, contra Descartes, we do not speak of anything outside of all possibility of human experience.  What we speak of is that humans will converge on in the very long run, if indeed they ever converge.  No convergence, no truth, because, on Peirce’s account, that is what the term, truth, means.  Please, David, do not continue beyond this point in this message without acknowledging that my thesis is a thesis about the MEANING of the term, Truth.  And that we have not yet begun the discussion concerning whether there exists any such thing.  Until we see eye to eye on that, the discussion is stupid.  It would be like a discussion in which I would say, “a unicorn is a horse with a horn in the middle of it’s nose” and you keep replying, “NO, NICK.  There ARE no unicorns.  Until we have agreed on a definition of a unicorn, the question of its existence cannot even come up.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <==nst]

 

However ... the first imposition on the process focuses on the language we use to communicate/interact. I believe that Pierce, you, and all of the scientists and mathematicians and CS types on this list are going to insist on using a very narrow set of languages and would prefer just one

- mathematical logic. Definitely one with well defined terms and formalized grammar, i.e. one that is "rational."

[NST==>You are posing here as the romantic outlier, a pose that both Glen and Marcus, and many others of us would like to contend you for.  All I can say is, if everybody on the list agrees with me, why am I arguing with them all.   <==nst]

 

Well of course you say; how else could we proceed?

 

Well, one possibility is that you come over and we drop acid together - or better yet the one hallucinogen derived from the Ariocarpus cactus that empirical evidence suggests yields consensual hallucinations - and we use that 'language' to see if our opinions converge.

 

You are nuts, you say.

[NST==>It would be convenient for your argument if I said that, but I don’t.  I would say only that at 80 I have a hard enough time moving through my world without taking hallucinogens, and so I probably won’t do that.  Also, I can’t immediately think of any reason why accuracy of perception or happiness would arise from mucking with my cognitive capacities, such as they are.  It aint much, but it’s what I got.  <==nst]

 

AHA! I say. You are privileging YOUR means of communication and simultaneously asserting that Truth can only be found within the set of possible conversations conducted using YOUR language and YOUR rules of conversation/interaction. [NST==>I haven’t [yet] said anything about how truth is found; only something about how it is defined.  <==nst]  

 

Now, let us return to your signal. Imagine we have a thousand people listening to it. 999 of them use your statistical/probability tests and agree that is is simply noise - a random signal. I, on the other hand, recognize that the signal is the voice of God, speaking the Language of the Birds, and He is giving me clear and precise knowledge.[NST==>Well, you are welcome to that knowledge.  I guess I agree with Peirce that knowledge is, at its root, social.  So, idiosyncratic knowledge is kind of a contradiction in terms.  <==nst]   

 

So what is True? Is the signal noise or is it knowledge?

 

And further suppose that I write some bad free verse that manages to bypass the conscious and speak directly to the subconscious and the 999 slowly begin to agree with my position vis a vis the signal? At what point does the Truth shift from noise to knowledge? (BTW, I would argue that their simply agreeing with me based on what they understand of my poetry, is insufficient - they must actually experience and directly perceive the signal before we can be accord.)[NST==>Well, assuming that you have accepted my DEFINITION of truth as that upon which the human community of inquiry will agree in the very long run, we can ask for what constitutes EVIDENCE that something is true.  çnst]   

 

The main point I made in my polemic, and continue to make: Pierce, science, 'reasonable and rational' beings can never find more than local Truth, for themselves, and it is immoral to impose that Truth on others.[NST==>You sentence only makes sense if you havre already stipulated to my DEFINTION of truth, right?  <==nst]   

 

Ceding a point - Pierce, and scientists, are not wrong when they assume that their approach leads to truth as long as they restrict the domain of application to things like Physics, Math, and Logic. I vehemently react, negatively, when they blithely assert that the same approach is appropriate for finding truth in epistemology, morality, social conventions, public policy, governance, etc. etc.

[NST==>If that is the case, then Peirce would assert, I think, that there is no truth of such matters. He disliked literary criticism and other fashion-driven enterprises for just that reason.   However, I think he and perhaps some of his followers, believed that opinion with respect to some of the matters you mention above will in fact stabilize in the very long run.  If it would, then indeed there is, by definition, a truth of these matters, also.

 

Nick <==nst]

 

dmw

 

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017, at 10:39 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Naw.  Come on Dave.  You're just picking a fight!  I don't meed the

> "rational man" at all.  All I need is that people either will, or will

> not, share an opinion in the very long run, and that opinion, by

> definition, if shared, is what we mean by truth.  And the edge I am

> talking about here is emotional.  I  am not pressing this view with

> the ferocity that you take me for.  Persistence, perhaps, but not ferocity.

>

> Nick

>

> Nicholas S. Thompson

> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University

> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

>

>

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David

> West

> Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 12:44 AM

> To: [hidden email]

> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely

> Nothing!”

>

> Hi Nick,I write from Vienna. I will be back in Utah next week and at

> FRIAM for a couple of weeks starting in mid-December. You can apply

> cold compresses then, or just toss me in a snow bank.

>

> The "edge" that you do not recognize is present in your response.

> First, you propose a probabilistic/statistical "method" for discovery

> of the 'certainty' of a property of the signal. Why? What makes that

> method privileged? I.e. what is it about Probability that merits using

> it as a Philosopher's Stone? More egregious is the use of the term "rational man"

> — this is what I meant about allowing only some individuals at the

> conversational table.

>

> see you in December

>

>

> On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 11:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> > David,

> >

> > Somebody has obviously riled you up, wherever you have gone to. 

> > Please come back so I can administer cold compresses.

> >

> > I can recognize in what you write below the vague outlines of things

> > I have said about Peirce, but your representation of me has a kind

> > of edge I don't think I ever would have given it.  Try this: 

> > Imagine that you have a fancy antenna and that it is picking up a signal from outer space.

> >  Imagine you are interested in the frequency of the signal.  Now, I

> > say, the signal can either be random or systematic.  Let's say that

> > the last ten readings on the signal give you a reading of 256hz +/-

> > 1 hz.  Now, it's entirely possible that such a sample of measurements could be

> > produced by a random signal.    But now let us double the number of

> > readings, and let us also notice that the variation of the

> > measurements has also diminished by the square root of two.  Now double again, and

> > diminish the variation once again by root 2.    And so on.  While we both

> > would have to recognize that there is no certainty that the signal

> > is not random, still the probabliliy keeps increasing that such a

> > sample is drawn from a population of measurements with a mean of

> > 256hz.  It's that way with truth.  It's quite possible that our

> > experience is random, and no amount of consistency  can ever

> > convince a rational man that the randomness of any particular chain of experiences is not random.

> > However, as experience increases in consistency, the same rational

> > man will be more likely to bet that that chain of experiences will

> > be confirmed in the very long run of human experiences.  On Peirce,s

> > account, that is what it means to say that something "is the truth"

> > It is to bet that this string of experiences that we are now in the

> > midst of will be confirmed in the very long run of human experience.

> >

> > Notice that I never asserted, for a certainty, that there is

> > anything at all that is True.  I only gave a Pragmatic[ist]

> > definition of what truth would be if there ever were any.

> >

> > Come back.  We miss you.

> >

> > Nick

> >

> > Nicholas S. Thompson

> > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University

> > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

> >

> >

> > -----Original Message-----

> > From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof

> > David West

> > Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2017 4:02 PM

> > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group

> > <[hidden email]>

> > Subject: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

> >

> > Two caveats: first, this might better be a private communication

> > with Nick since he is the one with the temerity to first (at least

> > in the past few weeks) use the word 'Truth', although it has been

> > implicit in a lot of recent threads; and second, the following

> > contains a lot of assertions and assertions are, at minimum, 

> > ‘Truthy’ in nature, but I am making no such claim, as will be explained later.

> >

> > There can be no Truth.

> >        Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated

> > - ‘truths’ are possible.

> >        Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there

> > might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only

> > ephemeral ‘truths’ are possible.

> >        All is Maya (illusion) and all Truth and all truths are equally

> > illusory.

> >

> > There is no / are no means for discovering Truth even if It existed.

> >        To go all postmodern on you: what means/method died and ceded

> > privilege and sole possession of the ‘Royal Road’ to math, logic,

> > scientific method, rhetoric, and “reason?”

> >

> > There is no / are no means for expressing, and therefore

> > communicating or sharing, Truth; were It to exist.

> >        Trivially, this is merely an expression of the first line of the

> > Tao de Ching: “Tao Tao not Tao.”

> >        More importantly it is a generalization of what Peter Naur said

> > about software and software development. Specifically that a program

> > was the expression of a consensual theory share among those that

> > developed it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of

> > the humans engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot

> > be reduced to documentation and therefore cannot be

> > transmitted/communicated to other minds. (Actually, transmission

> > would be possible extant telepathy and simultaneously, empathy.)

> >

> > As I have understood Nick’s interpretation of Pierce I find him to

> > be an intellectual terrorist and his approach useful only for

> > establishing orthodoxy and dogma. A prime reason for believing this

> > is that the ‘conversation’ espoused by Pierce (and Nick) cannot be

> > global – every living person at once – and therefore can only result

> > in a consensus of the few that that is to be imposed on all. A

> > second reason for this belief is that the only ones allowed at the

> > conversational table are those proficient in and willing to abide by specific rules of discussion.

> > This is application of my postmodern stance expressed above.

> >

> > A corollary of my antipathy towards Pierce, a favorite quote from Hesse:

> > “Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and

> > be their own judges; obey the laws. Other’s sense their own laws

> > within them.”  Hesse was speaking of ethics but I would extend his

> > notion to epistemology and metaphysics.

> >

> > None of the preceding is Truth, merely my truth. Accepting same

> > essentially makes me a sociopath; but, I hope, an amiable one.

> >

> >

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[Steve Smith]

Dave -

You and I have not spent much time face to face discussing any matters, much less ones as grave as "truthiness" and "the welfare state" and "convergence via means, rational or otherwise" but the conviction with which you made many statements in this treatise is compelling and perhaps its own example of the topic at hand.  Following your point-numbering below...

1. I find your (counter) example of "en vino veritas" to miss the point of the quote.   I take the point to be that sometimes one must lower their inhibitions with wine (or exhaustion or extreme passion, or another drug of choice) to speak more directly to their own personal (local?) truth (rather than adjust it to fit the presumed "shared truth" of the participants?).   Maybe this is a precise example of what you and Nick are trying to discuss here.  Perhaps you truly believe (without a doubt and not to be persuaded, now way, no how) that alcoholic spirits simply undermine the imbibers ability to express themselves clearly, whilst I believe that to be only part of the effect and that the lowered inhibitions *sometimes* trumps the loss of linearity of thought and facility of expression to yield "veritas".   The asyncrony and psuedonymity of online discussions has a similar effect for some, I find.

3. "My antipathy for rule, convention, certitude in almost any form is very real and very essential to my sense of self. You have no comprehension of the sense of alienation this conviction engenders."  

    This statement is both incredibly familiar, yet equally foreign to me.   I might want to claim that I might have a parallel comprehension of the alienation *built in*? to this conviction?  This is the aspect of Libertarianism that I identify most strongly with, or am most moved by, in spite of having found few if any "card carrying Libertarians" that don't just drive me up the wall with their lack of compassion or ability to *live* their ideal of "enlightened self interest" (not intended as bait for Glen to remind me the fallacy/falsity of this reserved term in my lexicon, but I'm open to it if necessary).  

This point is *divergent* from the "truth about truthiness" I think, but perhaps is important because it is about *conviction* which might displace *truth* in some way?  To the extent that "conviction" and "truth" imply answers, I find them both a distraction from "finding the right question".

You also reference " the "rational" world view that has dominated, not only science, but Western culture..."  but I'm not clear on what you consider to be the complement to that?  Surely it is more than the "wishful thinking" babble many of us has become accustomed to hearing from many who deliberately eschew "rational thinking".   I don't wish to be painted with the brush of being confined TO the strictly western/linear/rational mode, but neither do I care for the psychadelic colors that usually pass for the alternative.

4)  What IS required before two, independent, conscious beings can take up a dialog which at least has the opportunity to be convergent?  In my own view, perhaps all we can hope for is to weave a roughly parallel braid of observations, assertions and chains of logic tying them together, not unlike the braided F Ring of Saturn?   Drunken babble rarely seems to have convergence *as a goal*, however, the very narcissistic nature of that mode sometimes allows those listening to the babbler to understand their position/opinion/feelings/beliefs more acutely than in a "rational dialogue intended to yield convergent understanding".

5) Feeding the bears" or "Your study leads you to believe that humans are biotes PLUS something else. I, being a sociopath, cannot share those experiences, observations, analyses, or conclusions."
    I'm not sure what your working definition of sociopath is in this case, but if I take it as literally as I can using my own definition, I would surmise that you mean: "It is convenient to ME (dmw) to draw a simplified analogy between humans living in a complex socioeconomy to the ecosystem of a national park or suburban intrusion on wildlands and thereby justify my pre-existing judgement that helping those in apparent need is a fundamentally flawed idea, sure to yield *more* rather than *less* suffering".    The point being that your analogy (and any other arguments) are contrived or chosen to support your pre-formed conclusion, rather than being an honest reflection of the logic used to get to that conclusion.

I have felt (roughly) as I caricature your position (in the past), but was always uncomfortable with the huge gap between the source and the target of this metaphor.   I *still* believe that within a competitive (pseudo) "free market economy", that systems which undermine the motivation to participate directly in the productivity of the larger system are risky and should be thought through very carefully with those issues in mind.  This is not the same as predicting that every recipient of welfare will simply adapt to become MORE dependent on welfare and ultimately (like bears habituated to living among humans) need to be handled by even more extreme (incarceration, etc.).  In our (possible) transition to a post-consumerist/capitalist economy, ideas like "guaranteed minimum income" look pretty much identical to "welfare", yet perhaps make more sense if one recognizes that we might be approaching a level of mechanization which literally displaces the need for *most* human effort in the production of basic needs.   I would suggest that your mode of thinking is more likely to lead to "dumping excess humans" into the hoppers of the Soylent Green factory to feed the remainder while there is a chance that there is a "return to the Garden of Eden" possible if in fact, the need for human toil has reduced as much as it seems to have.

In the spirit of this thread, the question might be truthiness and convergence?   I can listen to your arguments against "welfare", but those which I have already mulled thousands of times, probably won't pull me back toward your position (having been somewhat aligned with yours as I understand it).   But can YOU listen to my arguments?  Perhaps you feel you have "heard them all" and dismiss them like the bleatings of a bleeding heart tourist trying to feed Wonder Bread to a Grizzly through the window of their car in Yellowstone and blaming the Park Administration for "not taking better care of these bears!".  

I would claim that as long as we stick to the metaphor/analogy of "welfare" as "humans feeding bears", we probably *won't* learn anything new from one another.   Is learning something new similar to convergence?   My (never-ending) discussions with Glen (here and elsewhere) and a few others in my life follow the pattern alluded to, of convergence to a braided ring which is dynamic and ever changing in detail but still remains relatively coherent in general form.

In summary:  I agree with you (if I understand) that a single, shared truth, is at best a construct of convenience, a strawman shared understanding *similar* enough to a collection of our separate, *personal understandings* to allow communication, and that communication needn't promise convergence, but perhaps it needs some level of *coherence* to motivate anyone to proceed?   I hear you indicating that when others insist on strict convergence it is something of a show stopper for you, and while I feel the same pressure, my response is *usually* to look at their desire for convergence to allow *me* to look for some coherence, and perhaps to persuade them to accept the *dynamic convergence* implied by my braided planetary ring.  I engage with others to (hopefully) learn something new, and accept our *differences* as (potentially) useful hints of where I have something fundamental to change my thinking on.   Those fundamental shifts are rare enough, but critical to me to remaining vital as a human being.  New insights were cheap and easy to come by in my adolescence but after a few mini-careers and a couple of college degrees and a couple of partners and a couple of children, I found them very scarce.   I still find them somewhat scarce, but in the dearest of ways...   which draws me to those who I *don't* share that much understanding with, on the off chance they have something new to offer me.

And that's the Truth!

- Steve

On 10/17/17 5:03 AM, Prof David West wrote:

Nick, at the risk of a mere dialogue that would be better served face to face in a month or so, I will respond.  All the time with a friendly smile on my face and a desire for common understanding in my heart.

I won't re-lard, but respond in order:

1-  I was going to use 'in vino veritas,"but as an example of a language (drunken babble is a language of sorts) that you would not accept as a vehicle for communication intended to result in convergence. But the point of what I said is simply to impute intent on your part when selecting which words you use to convey your thoughts. [See comment 2-.]

I did not "presume the truth of some matter." I made an assertion and, as noted in my initial post the only truth in such a thing is purely local to me, not shared. But all assertions / declarative statements — including yours — share this same 'local truthiness' and are not to be taken as assertions of shared, or possible shared, notions that, if they converged, would take on the property of "truthy."

2- I made no mention of "belief" and so I am mystified as to why the first sentence of your response makes a point of " beyond what you I / any group might believe." I did use the term opinion, which in colloquial and common use is often a synonym for belief — however, I used the term only because you used it first in describing Pierce's approach. When I read your use of the term, I took it as a stand-in for one or more of the following: experience, observation, measurement, calculation, even analysis. I intended to use the word in the same exact way. Perhaps I misunderstood your intent when you used the word.

True, the core thesis you present is an operational defintion of "truth" but that intent to define is embedded in, and the rest of the thread is engaged in, the use of that operational definition to determine if some proposition or the other is truthy.

3- It is not a pose. My antipathy for rule, convention, certitude in almost any form is very real and very essential to my sense of self. You have no comprehension of the sense of alienation this conviction engenders.

It is not that everyone agrees with you, but that you all share at least one thing in common and that is your acceptance of the "rational" world view that has dominated, not only science, but Western culture in general since the inception of the "Age of Reason." There remains lots of divertissement within the realm of the rational to assure pleasant passage of time for all.

4- Clever self deprecation simply obfuscates the fact that you see no utility in pursuing conversation / sharing experience / seeking convergence unless those efforts are undertaken within and are consistent with your particular world-view. I am being quite uncharitable here as I know my assertion is not always true at least in degree. You might take up meditation (altered state of consciousness ahead) or you might go to church (at least as long as the church in question was not fundamentalist requiring reptilephilia and glossallalia.)

5- Re: convergence on things like public policy, a simple example.  Say we both study biological organisms and we not things like a change in environment, creating a new, exploitable niche, will prompt bio-organisms to adapt (even evolve) to exploit that niche. We further observe human beings - as biological organisms and converge on the "truth" that they are biological organisms.  We have 'converged' in our understanding and have established truth. (?) At this point our observations / experiences diverge. Your study leads you to believe that humans are biotes PLUS something else. I, being a sociopath, cannot share those experiences, observations, analyses, or conclusions.  We sit down to discuss public policy  - the need for welfare perhaps - and we are immediately stuck because we have no common ground, common "language" with which to proceed and hence no convergence is possible and no truth as to the matter.

I would see welfare as a case of "feeding the bears," certain to lead to nothing except the proliferation of dependent bears as they, being biological organisms, adapt to exploit the "welfare niche." You would see it quite differently. But, how do we proceed? What process would you (or Pierce) suggest be used? Or do we simply acknowledge that we have no basis for convergence and therefore, no 'truth' is possible? I would be OK with that, but no one else will. Instead each faction will insist on the certitude/truth of their respective opinion and insist that public policy be grounded in their idiosyncratic truth.

The preceding is an extreme example, especially as to the reason we cannot find a common language and proceed, somehow, to convergence. But, at least, it has the virtue of a concrete embedded difference that prevents convergence. Too often, in almost all public policy debate the inhibiting difference is simply a refusal to listen to the other and insisting that the only means for finding convergence is everyone adopting one side's language and worldview and crafting the conversation on that basis.

dmw

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017, at 01:26 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Hi, Dave,

 

See larding below.  I have to say, this still doesn't quite sound like you.

 

Nick

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Monday, October 16, 2017 12:27 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Naw back at ya. I am not picking a fight or being contentious just to be contentious. I am trying to be a little dog nipping at the heels of assumptions and presuppositions.

 

Because this list is not a scholarly forum where you spend an exquisite amount of time picking your words and making your statements as precise as possible I am assuming that your language reveals said assumptions/presuppositions. So when you use rational man, I think you really deep down mean exactly that. And when you shy away from that as in the post I am responding to, you still cannot get away from your core position.

[NST==> This I would characterize as an approach to discourse roughly equivalent to “in vino veritas”.  It is the assumption that the most accurate representation of a person’s view of the world is its most unguarded presentation.  Notice that your sentence above presumes a truth of some matter, “Thompson’s Real View”.  So far as I am concerned, that presumption concedes the ONLY POINT I have been arguing for in our discussion … so far.  It concedes the MEANING of the word “truth”.  You will notice that unlike yourself, I have not in this conversation EVER argued (yet) for the truth of any matter, other than what we are referring to when we refer to truth.  <==nst]

 

We have two people with two idiosyncratic opinions. Each communicates his/her opinion to the other and they interact trying to discern what each other means in order to see if their individual opinions are the same, or somewhat the same, or substantially the same.  If the conversation leads both parties to agreeing with each other that their individual opinions are really the same, shared, opinion — even if stated somewhat differently — voila, we have Truth. I think this is a fair restatement of what you say (and say when channeling Pierce).

[NST==>No, David.  It is absolutely Unfair, and I am surprised to hear your say it.   When we speak of truth, we speak of something beyond anything that you, or I, or any particular group of people might believe.  But, contra Descartes, we do not speak of anything outside of all possibility of human experience.  What we speak of is that humans will converge on in the very long run, if indeed they ever converge.  No convergence, no truth, because, on Peirce’s account, that is what the term, truth, means.  Please, David, do not continue beyond this point in this message without acknowledging that my thesis is a thesis about the MEANING of the term, Truth.  And that we have not yet begun the discussion concerning whether there exists any such thing.  Until we see eye to eye on that, the discussion is stupid.  It would be like a discussion in which I would say, “a unicorn is a horse with a horn in the middle of it’s nose” and you keep replying, “NO, NICK.  There ARE no unicorns.  Until we have agreed on a definition of a unicorn, the question of its existence cannot even come up.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <==nst]

 

However ... the first imposition on the process focuses on the language we use to communicate/interact. I believe that Pierce, you, and all of the scientists and mathematicians and CS types on this list are going to insist on using a very narrow set of languages and would prefer just one

- mathematical logic. Definitely one with well defined terms and formalized grammar, i.e. one that is "rational."

[NST==>You are posing here as the romantic outlier, a pose that both Glen and Marcus, and many others of us would like to contend you for.  All I can say is, if everybody on the list agrees with me, why am I arguing with them all.   <==nst]

 

Well of course you say; how else could we proceed?

 

Well, one possibility is that you come over and we drop acid together - or better yet the one hallucinogen derived from the Ariocarpus cactus that empirical evidence suggests yields consensual hallucinations - and we use that 'language' to see if our opinions converge.

 

You are nuts, you say.

[NST==>It would be convenient for your argument if I said that, but I don’t.  I would say only that at 80 I have a hard enough time moving through my world without taking hallucinogens, and so I probably won’t do that.  Also, I can’t immediately think of any reason why accuracy of perception or happiness would arise from mucking with my cognitive capacities, such as they are.  It aint much, but it’s what I got.  <==nst]

 

AHA! I say. You are privileging YOUR means of communication and simultaneously asserting that Truth can only be found within the set of possible conversations conducted using YOUR language and YOUR rules of conversation/interaction. [NST==>I haven’t [yet] said anything about how truth is found; only something about how it is defined.  <==nst]  

 

Now, let us return to your signal. Imagine we have a thousand people listening to it. 999 of them use your statistical/probability tests and agree that is is simply noise - a random signal. I, on the other hand, recognize that the signal is the voice of God, speaking the Language of the Birds, and He is giving me clear and precise knowledge.[NST==>Well, you are welcome to that knowledge.  I guess I agree with Peirce that knowledge is, at its root, social.  So, idiosyncratic knowledge is kind of a contradiction in terms.  <==nst]   

 

So what is True? Is the signal noise or is it knowledge?

 

And further suppose that I write some bad free verse that manages to bypass the conscious and speak directly to the subconscious and the 999 slowly begin to agree with my position vis a vis the signal? At what point does the Truth shift from noise to knowledge? (BTW, I would argue that their simply agreeing with me based on what they understand of my poetry, is insufficient - they must actually experience and directly perceive the signal before we can be accord.)[NST==>Well, assuming that you have accepted my DEFINITION of truth as that upon which the human community of inquiry will agree in the very long run, we can ask for what constitutes EVIDENCE that something is true.  çnst]   

 

The main point I made in my polemic, and continue to make: Pierce, science, 'reasonable and rational' beings can never find more than local Truth, for themselves, and it is immoral to impose that Truth on others.[NST==>You sentence only makes sense if you havre already stipulated to my DEFINTION of truth, right?  <==nst]   

 

Ceding a point - Pierce, and scientists, are not wrong when they assume that their approach leads to truth as long as they restrict the domain of application to things like Physics, Math, and Logic. I vehemently react, negatively, when they blithely assert that the same approach is appropriate for finding truth in epistemology, morality, social conventions, public policy, governance, etc. etc.

[NST==>If that is the case, then Peirce would assert, I think, that there is no truth of such matters. He disliked literary criticism and other fashion-driven enterprises for just that reason.   However, I think he and perhaps some of his followers, believed that opinion with respect to some of the matters you mention above will in fact stabilize in the very long run.  If it would, then indeed there is, by definition, a truth of these matters, also.

 

Nick <==nst]

 

dmw

 

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017, at 10:39 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> Naw.  Come on Dave.  You're just picking a fight!  I don't meed the

> "rational man" at all.  All I need is that people either will, or will

> not, share an opinion in the very long run, and that opinion, by

> definition, if shared, is what we mean by truth.  And the edge I am

> talking about here is emotional.  I  am not pressing this view with

> the ferocity that you take me for.  Persistence, perhaps, but not ferocity.

>

> Nick

>

> Nicholas S. Thompson

> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University

> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

>

>

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David

> West

> Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 12:44 AM

> To: [hidden email]

> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely

> Nothing!”

>

> Hi Nick,I write from Vienna. I will be back in Utah next week and at

> FRIAM for a couple of weeks starting in mid-December. You can apply

> cold compresses then, or just toss me in a snow bank.

>

> The "edge" that you do not recognize is present in your response.

> First, you propose a probabilistic/statistical "method" for discovery

> of the 'certainty' of a property of the signal. Why? What makes that

> method privileged? I.e. what is it about Probability that merits using

> it as a Philosopher's Stone? More egregious is the use of the term "rational man"

> — this is what I meant about allowing only some individuals at the

> conversational table.

>

> see you in December

>

>

> On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 11:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> > David,

> >

> > Somebody has obviously riled you up, wherever you have gone to. 

> > Please come back so I can administer cold compresses.

> >

> > I can recognize in what you write below the vague outlines of things

> > I have said about Peirce, but your representation of me has a kind

> > of edge I don't think I ever would have given it.  Try this: 

> > Imagine that you have a fancy antenna and that it is picking up a signal from outer space.

> >  Imagine you are interested in the frequency of the signal.  Now, I

> > say, the signal can either be random or systematic.  Let's say that

> > the last ten readings on the signal give you a reading of 256hz +/-

> > 1 hz.  Now, it's entirely possible that such a sample of measurements could be

> > produced by a random signal.    But now let us double the number of

> > readings, and let us also notice that the variation of the

> > measurements has also diminished by the square root of two.  Now double again, and

> > diminish the variation once again by root 2.    And so on.  While we both

> > would have to recognize that there is no certainty that the signal

> > is not random, still the probabliliy keeps increasing that such a

> > sample is drawn from a population of measurements with a mean of

> > 256hz.  It's that way with truth.  It's quite possible that our

> > experience is random, and no amount of consistency  can ever

> > convince a rational man that the randomness of any particular chain of experiences is not random.

> > However, as experience increases in consistency, the same rational

> > man will be more likely to bet that that chain of experiences will

> > be confirmed in the very long run of human experiences.  On Peirce,s

> > account, that is what it means to say that something "is the truth"

> > It is to bet that this string of experiences that we are now in the

> > midst of will be confirmed in the very long run of human experience.

> >

> > Notice that I never asserted, for a certainty, that there is

> > anything at all that is True.  I only gave a Pragmatic[ist]

> > definition of what truth would be if there ever were any.

> >

> > Come back.  We miss you.

> >

> > Nick

> >

> > Nicholas S. Thompson

> > Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University

> > http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

> >

> >

> > -----Original Message-----

> > From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof

> > David West

> > Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2017 4:02 PM

> > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group

> > <[hidden email]>

> > Subject: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

> >

> > Two caveats: first, this might better be a private communication

> > with Nick since he is the one with the temerity to first (at least

> > in the past few weeks) use the word 'Truth', although it has been

> > implicit in a lot of recent threads; and second, the following

> > contains a lot of assertions and assertions are, at minimum, 

> > ‘Truthy’ in nature, but I am making no such claim, as will be explained later.

> >

> > There can be no Truth.

> >        Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated

> > - ‘truths’ are possible.

> >        Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there

> > might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only

> > ephemeral ‘truths’ are possible.

> >        All is Maya (illusion) and all Truth and all truths are equally

> > illusory.

> >

> > There is no / are no means for discovering Truth even if It existed.

> >        To go all postmodern on you: what means/method died and ceded

> > privilege and sole possession of the ‘Royal Road’ to math, logic,

> > scientific method, rhetoric, and “reason?”

> >

> > There is no / are no means for expressing, and therefore

> > communicating or sharing, Truth; were It to exist.

> >        Trivially, this is merely an expression of the first line of the

> > Tao de Ching: “Tao Tao not Tao.”

> >        More importantly it is a generalization of what Peter Naur said

> > about software and software development. Specifically that a program

> > was the expression of a consensual theory share among those that

> > developed it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of

> > the humans engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot

> > be reduced to documentation and therefore cannot be

> > transmitted/communicated to other minds. (Actually, transmission

> > would be possible extant telepathy and simultaneously, empathy.)

> >

> > As I have understood Nick’s interpretation of Pierce I find him to

> > be an intellectual terrorist and his approach useful only for

> > establishing orthodoxy and dogma. A prime reason for believing this

> > is that the ‘conversation’ espoused by Pierce (and Nick) cannot be

> > global – every living person at once – and therefore can only result

> > in a consensus of the few that that is to be imposed on all. A

> > second reason for this belief is that the only ones allowed at the

> > conversational table are those proficient in and willing to abide by specific rules of discussion.

> > This is application of my postmodern stance expressed above.

> >

> > A corollary of my antipathy towards Pierce, a favorite quote from Hesse:

> > “Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and

> > be their own judges; obey the laws. Other’s sense their own laws

> > within them.”  Hesse was speaking of ethics but I would extend his

> > notion to epistemology and metaphysics.

> >

> > None of the preceding is Truth, merely my truth. Accepting same

> > essentially makes me a sociopath; but, I hope, an amiable one.

> >

> >

> > ============================================================

> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at

> > cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe

> > http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

> > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

> >

> >

> > ============================================================

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>

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[Roger Critchlow-2]

I looked at Dave's listicle of truths about truths and the semi-disclaimer that, despite their imperative statement, that they weren't to be taken as truth.  Then I ran into this essay, https://electricliterature.com/what-i-dont-tell-my-students-about-the-husband-stitch-690899157394, which is the second time one of Machado's stories has crossed my trail in the past weeks.

This brought me to the idea that our primary form of social interaction is gas lighting each other.  Not in the sense that we are trying to drive each other crazy by hiding evidence of the truth, but because we are continually trying to persuade each other of truths.   And we do this persuading by calling attention to or away from different aspects of our shared existence. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

-- rec --

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017 at 5:23 PM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Great contribution, Robert.  I will cause us all to mull. 

 

Thank you,

 

Nick

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Robert Wall
Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 1:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>

Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Steven writes:

 

What of examples of convergent evolution where similar structures (with similar form and function) appear to arise independently.   I would not claim that they all arise *from the same theory* (or that anything "arises" from theory) but rather that the same theoretical abstractions around form/function and utility can be "reverse engineered" or "discovered" or "recognized".   

 

A common example is the multiple emergence of "camera-like" eyes in cephalapods, vertebrates, and jellyfish.  An even more ubiquitous example is Carbon Fixation via the C4 Photosynthetic Process (this example comes from my research to try to keep up with Guerin's dual-field/gradient babble in the domain of mitochondria/chloroplast metabolic duality) which has apparently been "discovered" or "invented" tens of times...   

 

Nick responds to Steven with:

 

Unfortunately for us, there is a fly in this ointment.  The basic chemistry and molecular genetics of vision is highly conserved, also.  So, an alternative theory might be (and Dave might be about to offer it) is that mode of vision we earthly organisms use was hit upon early and precluded the development of an infinite number of better ones.   

 

I was highly intrigued by this assertion and, so, did more digging and found this version of that "truth"-- 

 

National Geographic: Jellyfish and human eyes assembled using similar genetic building blocks (2008).

 

The eyes of the box jellyfish tell us yet again that important innovations, such as eyes, evolve by changing how existing groups of genes are used, rather than adding new ones to the mix.

 

This is not inconsistent with Nick's assertion but it is not inconsistent with Steven's either if I understand both.  In the biological context, and in addition to the ideas of randomness, natural selection, and a whole lot of time, there are the biological hardware and the software here to consider along with the idea of a teleonomic programmer ... kind of like Marcus' programmer with a discernable personality: 

 

According to this analysis (Nautilus 2016) concerning the Hox gene circuit, there doesn't seem to be enough time for randomness (i.e., blindly groping) to be explanatory. The numbers tend to say this would be absurd. 

 

Take, for example, the discovery within the field of evolutionary developmental biology that the different body plans of many complex organisms, including us, arise not from different genes but from different networks of gene interaction and expression in the same basic circuit, called the Hox gene circuit. To get from a snake to a human, you don’t need a bunch of completely different genes, but just a different pattern of wiring in essentially the same kind of Hox gene circuit. For these two vertebrates there are around 40 genes in the circuit. If you take account of the different ways that these genes might regulate one another (for example, by activation or suppression), you find that the number of possible circuits is more than 10700. That’s a lot, lot more than the number of fundamental particles in the observable universe. What, then, are the chances of evolution finding its way blindly to the viable “snake” or “human” traits (or phenotypes) for the Hox gene circuit? How on earth did evolution manage to rewire the Hox network of a Cambrian fish to create us?

 

So, it seems that nature's methodology seems more akin to design engineering than development from scratch (subgenomic?); that is, creating new applications (biological inventions) from a rearrangement of the parts (e.g., atoms, molecules, genes) of existing parts.  This also seems consistent with Nick (something is conserved|reused--genes, including regulatory ones that seem to quicken adaptation), Marcus (seeing this Hox gene circuit as the preference of the programmer), Dave [Heraclitus, Henri Bergson, and Alfred North Whitehead] ("Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only ephemeral ‘truths’ are possible."), Steven ("What of examples of convergent evolution where similar structures (with similar form and function) appear to arise independently. " e.g., jellyfish eye versus the human eye.), and Jeremy England:

 

If [Jeremy] England’s approach stands up to more testing, it could further liberate biologists from seeking a Darwinian explanation for every adaptation and allow them to think more generally in terms of dissipation-driven organization. They might find, for example, that “the reason that an organism shows characteristic X rather than Y may not be because X is more fit than Y, but because physical constraints make it easier for X to evolve than for Y to evolve,”

​  ---

Scientific America: A New Physics Theory of Life [2014]

​.​

 

This theory of England's seems to resonate with Dave's "Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated- ‘truths’ are possible." 

 

But is there any "truth" to be found in physics, chemistry, or biology then?  Is it all context dependent?  Postmodern like?  For example, we live in this universe with these initial conditions and so these possible resulting laws, so, all ultimate truth is to be reducible to physics ...  

 

From his books I have read, American theoretical physicist Lee Smolin, I think, would say that even these laws are ephemeral.  Time (measured or psychological?) is the only fundamental truth.  Everything else is emergent, even space.  With this realization, Smolin asserts, physics takes on a new and interesting paradigm that seem to converge to testable hypotheses with a more conceptual economy--Occam's Razor.

 

But maybe this is why Nick says "For these reasons, I shy away for using these evolutionary examples in these sorts of arguments. " 

 

Perhaps, observed physical phenomena and theories about those phenomena based on those instrumented human observers converge only in human consciousness ... and in statistical experiments ... allowing Nick's "Philosopher Stone" to be so predictive the more we observe and measure. 😊  Surely, reality does not care what we think it is ... but we have a desperate need to see consistency to at least feel in control. Our axiom-borne theories and  models are monuments to this "affliction."

 

Dave writes:

 

That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the humans engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be reduced to documentation and therefore cannot be transmitted/communicated to other minds. (Actually, transmission would be possible extant telepathy and simultaneously, empathy.)

 

Anyway, for what it is worth, I find this thread intriguing and will be interested where it goes from here ...  I really do not think that this will converge to a simple, single truth.  As Frank contributes:

 

Nick, David: you are both correct.

 

How can that be?!  What would pragmatic Peirce say ...? 😊

 

Cheers,

 

Robert

 

 

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017 at 11:05 AM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi Steven,

 

As somebody who is fond of Long Run Convergence, I am inclined to like your “eye” example.  It would seem that that organisms have agreed, over the long haul, on a solution to the problem of vision.  A VERY long haul.

 

Unfortunately for us, there is a fly in this ointment.  The basic chemistry and molecular genetics of vision is highly conserved, also.  So, an alternative theory might be (and Dave might be about to offer it) is that mode of vision we earthly organisms use was hit upon early and precluded the development of an infinite number of better ones.   

 

For these reasons, I shy away for using these evolutionary examples in these sorts of arguments. 

 

And remember:  from my point of view, this is hot an argument about the facts of the matter, but only an argument about Meaning.  Peirce is quite clear that that there doesn’t need to be any actual truth of any actually matter.  He only asserts that if there were such a thing, it would take the form of a convergence of opinion in the asymptotic sense…. The very long run. 

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 9:42 AM

To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Without trying to make a strong point in support of either end of this argument (as I understand it) but rather add some extra fodder.

 

What of examples of convergent evolution where similar structures (with similar form and function) appear to arise independently.   I would not claim that they all arise *from the same theory* (or that anything "arises" from theory) but rather that the same theoretical abstractions around form/function and utility can be "reverse engineered" or "discovered" or "recognized".  

 

A common example is the multiple emergence of "camera-like" eyes in cephalapods, vertebrates, and jellyfish.  An even more ubiquitous example is Carbon Fixation via the C4 Photosynthetic Process (this example comes from my research to try to keep up with Guerin's dual-field/gradient babble in the domain of mitochondria/chloroplast metabolic duality) which has apparently been "discovered" or "invented" tens of times...  

 

Platonists might believe in fundamental reality being in the domain of "Abstract Theory" but I believe the opposite... that "Theory" is entirely a construct of consciousness and is a "meta-pattern" which is useful to consciousness for prediction and explanation but irrelevant to the structures they describe/explain themselves.

 

Dave writes:

 

> Specifically that a program was
> the expression of a consensual theory share among those that developed
> it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the humans
> engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be reduced to
> documentation and therefore cannot be transmitted/communicated to other
> minds. (Actually, transmission would be possible extant telepathy and
> simultaneously, empathy.)

I often wear the hat of reverse engineer regarding large programs.

While it may not be the case that a theory can be inferred from the artifact alone, one can write unit or system level tests that are objective about the behavior of the program.   One can learn from other sources about the body of theory in the community, and one can establish good and bad practices in the structure and interpretation of computer programs as artifacts.  After years of working on such programs, I'd go so far as to say I could some infer things about the author's personality, and I can say I've been right after meeting them too.   It is important to note what is not done as much as what is done.

 

If something is illusory, it is the consensual theory that supposedly arises when people cooperate.   Because of different levels of attention and literacy, a group of people in the same room can have very different ideas about what they are doing and why.   The only thing that really holds them together are consequential logical constraints in their work products.

 

Marcus

---

From: Friam [hidden email] on behalf of Prof David West [hidden email]
Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 12:44:27 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Hi Nick,I write from Vienna. I will be back in Utah next week and at
FRIAM for a couple of weeks starting in mid-December. You can apply cold
compresses then, or just toss me in a snow bank.

The "edge" that you do not recognize is present in your response. First,
you propose a probabilistic/statistical "method" for discovery of the
'certainty' of a property of the signal. Why? What makes that method
privileged? I.e. what is it about Probability that merits using it as a
Philosopher's Stone? More egregious is the use of the term "rational
man" — this is what I meant about allowing only some individuals at the
conversational table.

see you in December


On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 11:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> David,
>
> Somebody has obviously riled you up, wherever you have gone to.  Please
> come back so I can administer cold compresses. 
>
> I can recognize in what you write below the vague outlines of things I
> have said about Peirce, but your representation of me has a kind of edge
> I don't think I ever would have given it.  Try this:  Imagine that you
> have a fancy antenna and that it is picking up a signal from outer space.
>  Imagine you are interested in the frequency of the signal.  Now, I say,
> the signal can either be random or systematic.  Let's say that the last
> ten readings on the signal give you a reading of 256hz +/- 1 hz.  Now,
> it's entirely possible that such a sample of measurements could be
> produced by a random signal.    But now let us double the number of
> readings, and let us also notice that the variation of the measurements
> has also diminished by the square root of two.  Now double again, and
> diminish the variation once again by root 2.    And so on.  While we both
> would have to recognize that there is no certainty that the signal is not
> random, still the probabliliy keeps increasing that such a sample is
> drawn from a population of measurements with a mean of 256hz.  It's that
> way with truth.  It's quite possible that our experience is random, and
> no amount of consistency  can ever convince a rational man that the
> randomness of any particular chain of experiences is not random.
> However, as experience increases in consistency, the same rational man
> will be more likely to bet that that chain of experiences will be
> confirmed in the very long run of human experiences.  On Peirce,s
> account, that is what it means to say that something "is the truth"  It
> is to bet that this string of experiences that we are now in the midst of
> will be confirmed in the very long run of human experience. 
>
> Notice that I never asserted, for a certainty, that there is anything at
> all that is True.  I only gave a Pragmatic[ist] definition of what truth
> would be if there ever were any.
>
> Come back.  We miss you.
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David
> West
> Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2017 4:02 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> [hidden email]
> Subject: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”
>
> Two caveats: first, this might better be a private communication with
> Nick since he is the one with the temerity to first (at least in the past
> few weeks) use the word 'Truth', although it has been implicit in a lot
> of recent threads; and second, the following contains a lot of assertions
> and assertions are, at minimum,  ‘Truthy’ in nature, but I am making no
> such claim, as will be explained later.
>
> There can be no Truth.

> n       Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated
> - ‘truths’ are possible.
> n       Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there
> might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only ephemeral
> ‘truths’ are possible.
> n       All is Maya (illusion) and all Truth and all truths are equally
> illusory.
>
> There is no / are no means for discovering Truth even if It existed.
> n       To go all postmodern on you: what means/method died and ceded
> privilege and sole possession of the ‘Royal Road’ to math, logic,
> scientific method, rhetoric, and “reason?”
>
> There is no / are no means for expressing, and therefore communicating or
> sharing, Truth; were It to exist.
> n       Trivially, this is merely an expression of the first line of the
> Tao de Ching: “Tao Tao not Tao.”
> n       More importantly it is a generalization of what Peter Naur said

> about software and software development. Specifically that a program was
> the expression of a consensual theory share among those that developed
> it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the humans
> engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be reduced to
> documentation and therefore cannot be transmitted/communicated to other
> minds. (Actually, transmission would be possible extant telepathy and
> simultaneously, empathy.)
>
> As I have understood Nick’s interpretation of Pierce I find him to be an
> intellectual terrorist and his approach useful only for establishing
> orthodoxy and dogma. A prime reason for believing this is that the
> ‘conversation’ espoused by Pierce (and Nick) cannot be global – every
> living person at once – and therefore can only result in a consensus of
> the few that that is to be imposed on all. A second reason for this
> belief is that the only ones allowed at the conversational table are
> those proficient in and willing to abide by specific rules of discussion.
> This is application of my postmodern stance expressed above.
>
> A corollary of my antipathy towards Pierce, a favorite quote from Hesse:
> “Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and be
> their own judges; obey the laws. Other’s sense their own laws within
> them.”  Hesse was speaking of ethics but I would extend his notion to
> epistemology and metaphysics.
>
> None of the preceding is Truth, merely my truth. Accepting same
> essentially makes me a sociopath; but, I hope, an amiable one.
>
>
> ============================================================
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[Marcus G. Daniels]

Dave writes:

 

“3- It is not a pose. My antipathy for rule, convention, certitude in almost any form is very real and very essential to my sense of self. You have no comprehension of the sense of alienation this conviction engenders.”

 

And yet the From line says “Prof David West”.  Back to anarchist school for you. 

 

Marcus

 

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[gepr]

Whew!  Fantastic thread!  I'm grateful to be able to witness it.

I'd like to point out that Peirce (and as Dave points out, many of us) are what I'd call "Grand Unified Modelers" (GUMmers): those who think there is, in R. Rosen's terms a "largest model" ... a penultimate language that if we could only learn and speak *that* language, what Nick's describing as Peirce's defn of "truth" would be accurate.

Solomon Feferman has worked on this problem and his (now old) initial submission is described here:

  Gödel, Nagel, minds and machines
  https://math.stanford.edu/~feferman/papers/godelnagel.pdf

It's probably important to read the whole thing.  But you could just jump to section "5. One way to straddle the mechanist and anti-mechanist positions."

It's also useful to note that Lee Rudolph submitted a relevant piece awhile back: "Logic in Modeling", wherein he cites Soare's definition of a "computation", which requires it be *definite* ... i.e. that all variables be bound, which would outlaw Feferman's "schematic axioms".  (... if I understand correctly ... I am not a logician, mathematician, or meta-mathematician... so your results may vary.)

Peirce's (and Nick's) insistence on the definiteness/fixedness of the universe's "formal system S", is what lies at the heart of the disagreement between Nick and Dave.  I think it's also important to point out that BOTH Nick and Dave COULD BE wrong.  Dave's idea that "mathematical logic" is impoverished may not be right if something like Feferman's solution could work.  And Nick's idea that convergence within the universe's formal system, S, implies truth may be wrong if something like the problem Feferman (and Dave) are trying to solve actually is the case.

--
☣ gⅼеɳ

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[Nick Thompson]

Thanks, Roger,

 

Your post revealed a stupid typo in my message to Robert which I now want to correct.

 

“IT will cause us to mull”

 

I have found the conversation about “Truth”  baffling because  it seems that others want to have a conversation about whether any T exists without coming to any preliminary understanding of what “T” means.   Now, in insisting that we seek that preliminary conversation, I perhaps am validating Dave’s accusation that I am demanding that the conversation take a particular form that presupposes that it will reach my favored conclusion.  But here is where you might help:  Let it be the case that instead of first defining terms we just launch into a discussion of whether there is any T in the world, how would we know when we had an answer if we had NOT previously come to an agreement about the meaning of “T”?  So, OK.  Let’s say our discussion method is to drop acid.  So after 12 hours of sweats and keenings we all agree that we have found T.  What happens when we come off the drug?  And even knowing how often engineers screw up, would you rather cross a bridge designed by engineers or one designed by FRIAMMERS on LSD? 

 

From my point of view, the conversation keeps misfiring.  I keep offering a definition of T, a statement of what we have in mind when we say, “T”.  And people keep disagreeing with me WITHOUT giving an alternative definition of “T.”    I get that they think that there is no such thing as “T”; what I don’t get I what they mean when they say that. 

 

How is the boat?  It must be something, there in the harbor.  October light.  When do the shrink-wrappers come?  I hope not too soon.

 

Has Glen’s warning caused you to disconnect from the web?  If I don’t hear from you, I will assume that the answer is, “Yes!”

 

Nick

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Roger Critchlow
Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2017 10:27 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

I looked at Dave's listicle of truths about truths and the semi-disclaimer that, despite their imperative statement, that they weren't to be taken as truth.  Then I ran into this essay, https://electricliterature.com/what-i-dont-tell-my-students-about-the-husband-stitch-690899157394, which is the second time one of Machado's stories has crossed my trail in the past weeks.

 

This brought me to the idea that our primary form of social interaction is gas lighting each other.  Not in the sense that we are trying to drive each other crazy by hiding evidence of the truth, but because we are continually trying to persuade each other of truths.   And we do this persuading by calling attention to or away from different aspects of our shared existence. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

 

-- rec --

 

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017 at 5:23 PM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Great contribution, Robert.  I will cause us all to mull. 

 

Thank you,

 

Nick

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Robert Wall
Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 1:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>

Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Steven writes:

 

What of examples of convergent evolution where similar structures (with similar form and function) appear to arise independently.   I would not claim that they all arise *from the same theory* (or that anything "arises" from theory) but rather that the same theoretical abstractions around form/function and utility can be "reverse engineered" or "discovered" or "recognized".   

 

A common example is the multiple emergence of "camera-like" eyes in cephalapods, vertebrates, and jellyfish.  An even more ubiquitous example is Carbon Fixation via the C4 Photosynthetic Process (this example comes from my research to try to keep up with Guerin's dual-field/gradient babble in the domain of mitochondria/chloroplast metabolic duality) which has apparently been "discovered" or "invented" tens of times...   

 

Nick responds to Steven with:

 

Unfortunately for us, there is a fly in this ointment.  The basic chemistry and molecular genetics of vision is highly conserved, also.  So, an alternative theory might be (and Dave might be about to offer it) is that mode of vision we earthly organisms use was hit upon early and precluded the development of an infinite number of better ones.   

 

I was highly intrigued by this assertion and, so, did more digging and found this version of that "truth"-- 

 

National Geographic: Jellyfish and human eyes assembled using similar genetic building blocks (2008).

 

The eyes of the box jellyfish tell us yet again that important innovations, such as eyes, evolve by changing how existing groups of genes are used, rather than adding new ones to the mix.

 

This is not inconsistent with Nick's assertion but it is not inconsistent with Steven's either if I understand both.  In the biological context, and in addition to the ideas of randomness, natural selection, and a whole lot of time, there are the biological hardware and the software here to consider along with the idea of a teleonomic programmer ... kind of like Marcus' programmer with a discernable personality: 

 

According to this analysis (Nautilus 2016) concerning the Hox gene circuit, there doesn't seem to be enough time for randomness (i.e., blindly groping) to be explanatory. The numbers tend to say this would be absurd. 

 

Take, for example, the discovery within the field of evolutionary developmental biology that the different body plans of many complex organisms, including us, arise not from different genes but from different networks of gene interaction and expression in the same basic circuit, called the Hox gene circuit. To get from a snake to a human, you don’t need a bunch of completely different genes, but just a different pattern of wiring in essentially the same kind of Hox gene circuit. For these two vertebrates there are around 40 genes in the circuit. If you take account of the different ways that these genes might regulate one another (for example, by activation or suppression), you find that the number of possible circuits is more than 10700. That’s a lot, lot more than the number of fundamental particles in the observable universe. What, then, are the chances of evolution finding its way blindly to the viable “snake” or “human” traits (or phenotypes) for the Hox gene circuit? How on earth did evolution manage to rewire the Hox network of a Cambrian fish to create us?

 

So, it seems that nature's methodology seems more akin to design engineering than development from scratch (subgenomic?); that is, creating new applications (biological inventions) from a rearrangement of the parts (e.g., atoms, molecules, genes) of existing parts.  This also seems consistent with Nick (something is conserved|reused--genes, including regulatory ones that seem to quicken adaptation), Marcus (seeing this Hox gene circuit as the preference of the programmer), Dave [Heraclitus, Henri Bergson, and Alfred North Whitehead] ("Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only ephemeral ‘truths’ are possible."), Steven ("What of examples of convergent evolution where similar structures (with similar form and function) appear to arise independently. " e.g., jellyfish eye versus the human eye.), and Jeremy England:

 

If [Jeremy] England’s approach stands up to more testing, it could further liberate biologists from seeking a Darwinian explanation for every adaptation and allow them to think more generally in terms of dissipation-driven organization. They might find, for example, that “the reason that an organism shows characteristic X rather than Y may not be because X is more fit than Y, but because physical constraints make it easier for X to evolve than for Y to evolve,”

​  ---

Scientific America: A New Physics Theory of Life [2014]

​.​

 

This theory of England's seems to resonate with Dave's "Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated- ‘truths’ are possible." 

 

But is there any "truth" to be found in physics, chemistry, or biology then?  Is it all context dependent?  Postmodern like?  For example, we live in this universe with these initial conditions and so these possible resulting laws, so, all ultimate truth is to be reducible to physics ...  

 

From his books I have read, American theoretical physicist Lee Smolin, I think, would say that even these laws are ephemeral.  Time (measured or psychological?) is the only fundamental truth.  Everything else is emergent, even space.  With this realization, Smolin asserts, physics takes on a new and interesting paradigm that seem to converge to testable hypotheses with a more conceptual economy--Occam's Razor.

 

But maybe this is why Nick says "For these reasons, I shy away for using these evolutionary examples in these sorts of arguments. " 

 

Perhaps, observed physical phenomena and theories about those phenomena based on those instrumented human observers converge only in human consciousness ... and in statistical experiments ... allowing Nick's "Philosopher Stone" to be so predictive the more we observe and measure. 😊  Surely, reality does not care what we think it is ... but we have a desperate need to see consistency to at least feel in control. Our axiom-borne theories and  models are monuments to this "affliction."

 

Dave writes:

 

That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the humans engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be reduced to documentation and therefore cannot be transmitted/communicated to other minds. (Actually, transmission would be possible extant telepathy and simultaneously, empathy.)

 

Anyway, for what it is worth, I find this thread intriguing and will be interested where it goes from here ...  I really do not think that this will converge to a simple, single truth.  As Frank contributes:

 

Nick, David: you are both correct.

 

How can that be?!  What would pragmatic Peirce say ...? 😊

 

Cheers,

 

Robert

 

 

On Sun, Oct 15, 2017 at 11:05 AM, Nick Thompson <[hidden email]> wrote:

Hi Steven,

 

As somebody who is fond of Long Run Convergence, I am inclined to like your “eye” example.  It would seem that that organisms have agreed, over the long haul, on a solution to the problem of vision.  A VERY long haul.

 

Unfortunately for us, there is a fly in this ointment.  The basic chemistry and molecular genetics of vision is highly conserved, also.  So, an alternative theory might be (and Dave might be about to offer it) is that mode of vision we earthly organisms use was hit upon early and precluded the development of an infinite number of better ones.   

 

For these reasons, I shy away for using these evolutionary examples in these sorts of arguments. 

 

And remember:  from my point of view, this is hot an argument about the facts of the matter, but only an argument about Meaning.  Peirce is quite clear that that there doesn’t need to be any actual truth of any actually matter.  He only asserts that if there were such a thing, it would take the form of a convergence of opinion in the asymptotic sense…. The very long run. 

 

N

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 9:42 AM

To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Without trying to make a strong point in support of either end of this argument (as I understand it) but rather add some extra fodder.

 

What of examples of convergent evolution where similar structures (with similar form and function) appear to arise independently.   I would not claim that they all arise *from the same theory* (or that anything "arises" from theory) but rather that the same theoretical abstractions around form/function and utility can be "reverse engineered" or "discovered" or "recognized".  

 

A common example is the multiple emergence of "camera-like" eyes in cephalapods, vertebrates, and jellyfish.  An even more ubiquitous example is Carbon Fixation via the C4 Photosynthetic Process (this example comes from my research to try to keep up with Guerin's dual-field/gradient babble in the domain of mitochondria/chloroplast metabolic duality) which has apparently been "discovered" or "invented" tens of times...  

 

Platonists might believe in fundamental reality being in the domain of "Abstract Theory" but I believe the opposite... that "Theory" is entirely a construct of consciousness and is a "meta-pattern" which is useful to consciousness for prediction and explanation but irrelevant to the structures they describe/explain themselves.

 

Dave writes:

 

> Specifically that a program was
> the expression of a consensual theory share among those that developed
> it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the humans
> engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be reduced to
> documentation and therefore cannot be transmitted/communicated to other
> minds. (Actually, transmission would be possible extant telepathy and
> simultaneously, empathy.)

I often wear the hat of reverse engineer regarding large programs.

While it may not be the case that a theory can be inferred from the artifact alone, one can write unit or system level tests that are objective about the behavior of the program.   One can learn from other sources about the body of theory in the community, and one can establish good and bad practices in the structure and interpretation of computer programs as artifacts.  After years of working on such programs, I'd go so far as to say I could some infer things about the author's personality, and I can say I've been right after meeting them too.   It is important to note what is not done as much as what is done.

 

If something is illusory, it is the consensual theory that supposedly arises when people cooperate.   Because of different levels of attention and literacy, a group of people in the same room can have very different ideas about what they are doing and why.   The only thing that really holds them together are consequential logical constraints in their work products.

 

Marcus

---

From: Friam [hidden email] on behalf of Prof David West [hidden email]
Sent: Sunday, October 15, 2017 12:44:27 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Hi Nick,I write from Vienna. I will be back in Utah next week and at
FRIAM for a couple of weeks starting in mid-December. You can apply cold
compresses then, or just toss me in a snow bank.

The "edge" that you do not recognize is present in your response. First,
you propose a probabilistic/statistical "method" for discovery of the
'certainty' of a property of the signal. Why? What makes that method
privileged? I.e. what is it about Probability that merits using it as a
Philosopher's Stone? More egregious is the use of the term "rational
man" — this is what I meant about allowing only some individuals at the
conversational table.

see you in December


On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 11:50 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

> David,
>
> Somebody has obviously riled you up, wherever you have gone to.  Please
> come back so I can administer cold compresses. 
>
> I can recognize in what you write below the vague outlines of things I
> have said about Peirce, but your representation of me has a kind of edge
> I don't think I ever would have given it.  Try this:  Imagine that you
> have a fancy antenna and that it is picking up a signal from outer space.
>  Imagine you are interested in the frequency of the signal.  Now, I say,
> the signal can either be random or systematic.  Let's say that the last
> ten readings on the signal give you a reading of 256hz +/- 1 hz.  Now,
> it's entirely possible that such a sample of measurements could be
> produced by a random signal.    But now let us double the number of
> readings, and let us also notice that the variation of the measurements
> has also diminished by the square root of two.  Now double again, and
> diminish the variation once again by root 2.    And so on.  While we both
> would have to recognize that there is no certainty that the signal is not
> random, still the probabliliy keeps increasing that such a sample is
> drawn from a population of measurements with a mean of 256hz.  It's that
> way with truth.  It's quite possible that our experience is random, and
> no amount of consistency  can ever convince a rational man that the
> randomness of any particular chain of experiences is not random.
> However, as experience increases in consistency, the same rational man
> will be more likely to bet that that chain of experiences will be
> confirmed in the very long run of human experiences.  On Peirce,s
> account, that is what it means to say that something "is the truth"  It
> is to bet that this string of experiences that we are now in the midst of
> will be confirmed in the very long run of human experience. 
>
> Notice that I never asserted, for a certainty, that there is anything at
> all that is True.  I only gave a Pragmatic[ist] definition of what truth
> would be if there ever were any.
>
> Come back.  We miss you.
>
> Nick
>
> Nicholas S. Thompson
> Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
> Clark University
> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David
> West
> Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2017 4:02 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
> [hidden email]
> Subject: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”
>
> Two caveats: first, this might better be a private communication with
> Nick since he is the one with the temerity to first (at least in the past
> few weeks) use the word 'Truth', although it has been implicit in a lot
> of recent threads; and second, the following contains a lot of assertions
> and assertions are, at minimum,  ‘Truthy’ in nature, but I am making no
> such claim, as will be explained later.
>
> There can be no Truth.

> n       Nothing IS except in context and therefore only local – situated
> - ‘truths’ are possible.
> n       Until the Universe achieves  ‘heat death’ (at which time there
> might be a single Truth), everything changes and therefore only ephemeral
> ‘truths’ are possible.
> n       All is Maya (illusion) and all Truth and all truths are equally
> illusory.
>
> There is no / are no means for discovering Truth even if It existed.
> n       To go all postmodern on you: what means/method died and ceded
> privilege and sole possession of the ‘Royal Road’ to math, logic,
> scientific method, rhetoric, and “reason?”
>
> There is no / are no means for expressing, and therefore communicating or
> sharing, Truth; were It to exist.
> n       Trivially, this is merely an expression of the first line of the
> Tao de Ching: “Tao Tao not Tao.”
> n       More importantly it is a generalization of what Peter Naur said

> about software and software development. Specifically that a program was
> the expression of a consensual theory share among those that developed
> it. That “theory” exists almost entirely in the minds of the humans
> engaged in building the theory; and, that theory cannot be reduced to
> documentation and therefore cannot be transmitted/communicated to other
> minds. (Actually, transmission would be possible extant telepathy and
> simultaneously, empathy.)
>
> As I have understood Nick’s interpretation of Pierce I find him to be an
> intellectual terrorist and his approach useful only for establishing
> orthodoxy and dogma. A prime reason for believing this is that the
> ‘conversation’ espoused by Pierce (and Nick) cannot be global – every
> living person at once – and therefore can only result in a consensus of
> the few that that is to be imposed on all. A second reason for this
> belief is that the only ones allowed at the conversational table are
> those proficient in and willing to abide by specific rules of discussion.
> This is application of my postmodern stance expressed above.
>
> A corollary of my antipathy towards Pierce, a favorite quote from Hesse:
> “Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and be
> their own judges; obey the laws. Other’s sense their own laws within
> them.”  Hesse was speaking of ethics but I would extend his notion to
> epistemology and metaphysics.
>
> None of the preceding is Truth, merely my truth. Accepting same
> essentially makes me a sociopath; but, I hope, an amiable one.
>
>
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[Marcus G. Daniels]

Roger writes:

 

“This brought me to the idea that our primary form of social interaction is gas lighting each other.  Not in the sense that we are trying to drive each other crazy by hiding evidence of the truth, but because we are continually trying to persuade each other of truths.”

 

We hear complaints here periodically about how annoying it is that people are `pithy’.  First of all, let’s separate situations in which autonomy is desired and attention is scarce, from willing participation in a discussion.   In the first circumstance, being pithy is a way of communicating “Please leave me the f*** alone.”, or  I have no time (or limited time) for this.”   It is deliberately to flow-regulate communication bandwidth because the utility seems to be low.

 

Then there is are situations as in this article, in which it is hard to exhibit skepticism because it is posed as horrible -- a dystopian misogynistic insight into the male brain that cannot be qualified or deconstructed.   The Trump Access Hollywood tape was similar because it was put out as if it was sufficient evidence and not just evidence – to me it was more the campaign’s immediate absence of shame or regret that made it clear it was true this is how he thinks, and of course evidence from other women that came later.   He used it to consolidate consensus amongst his ranks by normalizing it, which is shocking in how well that worked.

 

I think women are often thought to be the usual victims of gas lighting, but I would say the reverse happens under the guise of  hypothetical or anecdotal male motivations like in the article.   (As opposed to childish nervous humor that can arise in awkward or overwhelming situations.)   Is it surprising that some men are accused “You are bad, despicable, untrustworthy and mean”, that they just don’t respond very well?   There’s an appropriate amount of accusation, and it needs to be followed by consideration of counter-argument.  (In this case, say, the possibility that husband had real terror over the degree of an apparent injury.)   When that back and forth doesn’t happen, then people just start gas lighting one another, and divisions deepen.

This also reminds me of the objection to safe spaces at universities and the (supposed) danger of protecting snowflakes who should protect themselves by engaging in argument.  But in that situation the real question is who has the power and whether it is being used to intimidate.   If there are minority groups of people that have no way to speak without being ganged-up on and humiliated, yes, they do deserve protection by university policy, or at least some edgy bodyguards.   But if they are just white guys spouting far-right garbage in a conservative, white-dominated community, no they do not need protection by policy.  They are already safe. 

 

I spent much time as young person hanging out in the university park blocks going after the Christian apologists.  But they were the ones gas lighting the passers-by.   Being an anti- gas lighter – a demolisher of belief -- is not being a gas lighter.   The complement of the gas-lighted message and it is a bigger, freer space, not a manipulation of innocents.

 

Marcus

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[Nick Thompson]

Thanks, Glen, for your generous and thoughtful post, but please be careful.

 

...And Nick's idea that convergence within the universe's formal system, S, implies truth ....

 

 

You actually misstate my position, as I understand it.  Nick's assertion so far implies no truth, anymore than his discussion of Unicorns implies the existence of Unicorns.  In some ways, Nick’s assertion is MORE ARROGANT than you suppose.  It is an assertion concerning what “WE” mean by truth.  It asserts only that If any Truth exists, that is what it would look like.  You (or anybody else, for that matter) can prove me wrong by asserting another definition of Truth, but so far nobody has done that. 

 

Or am I completely off the rails, here.

 

Nick  

 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2017 11:21 AM
To: FriAM <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

 

Whew!  Fantastic thread!  I'm grateful to be able to witness it.

 

I'd like to point out that Peirce (and as Dave points out, many of us) are what I'd call "Grand Unified Modelers" (GUMmers): those who think there is, in R. Rosen's terms a "largest model" ... a penultimate language that if we could only learn and speak *that* language, what Nick's describing as Peirce's defn of "truth" would be accurate.

 

Solomon Feferman has worked on this problem and his (now old) initial submission is described here:

 

  Gödel, Nagel, minds and machines

  https://math.stanford.edu/~feferman/papers/godelnagel.pdf

 

It's probably important to read the whole thing.  But you could just jump to section "5. One way to straddle the mechanist and anti-mechanist positions."

 

It's also useful to note that Lee Rudolph submitted a relevant piece awhile back: "Logic in Modeling", wherein he cites Soare's definition of a "computation", which requires it be *definite* ... i.e. that all variables be bound, which would outlaw Feferman's "schematic axioms".  (... if I understand correctly ... I am not a logician, mathematician, or meta-mathematician... so your results may vary.)

 

Peirce's (and Nick's) insistence on the definiteness/fixedness of the universe's "formal system S", is what lies at the heart of the disagreement between Nick and Dave.  I think it's also important to point out that BOTH Nick and Dave COULD BE wrong.  Dave's idea that "mathematical logic" is impoverished may not be right if something like Feferman's solution could work.  And Nick's idea that convergence within the universe's formal system, S, implies truth may be wrong if something like the problem Feferman (and Dave) are trying to solve actually is the case.

 

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☣ gⅼеɳ

 

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[gepr]

Perfectly stated, Marcus!

It might also be useful to note that drugs like LSD, whether Dave meant them this way or not, are VERY good belief demolishers.  This is, I think, the heart of why psilocybin helps some terminally ill finish their lives in a happier state.  I also think it's why cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) is more successful than most other talk therapies, because a crucial component is to challenge one's absolutist and/or apocalyptic language.  (I.e. they encourage you to replace "I can't stand it when" with "I have trouble when" ... etc.)

The benefit of (at least methodological) pluralism is, precisely, to help "crack the cosmic egg" we often find ourselves trapped in ... one that we've often built for ourselves, even.

On 10/17/2017 10:45 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
> I spent much time as young person hanging out in the university park blocks going after the Christian apologists.  But they were the ones gas lighting the passers-by.   Being an anti- gas lighter – a demolisher of belief -- is not being a gas lighter.   The complement of the gas-lighted message and it is a bigger, freer space, not a manipulation of innocents.


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[gepr]

On 10/17/2017 10:50 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
>  by asserting another definition of Truth, but so far nobody has done that. 

Heh, now you're playing a new game! 8^)  Plenty of us *have* provided other definitions of truth.  As in active listening exercises, perhaps you could make an attempt to describe a naive realist's definition of truth that differs from Peirce's?  Or perhaps you could describe Hoffman's interface perception theory (which I think is an alternative to what you're saying Peirce's is)?

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[Nick Thompson]

Ach!  I don't mean to play a game.  I come by my deafness honestly, as anybody who has sat with me at FRIAM will attest.

Is it really the case that people have said, "By truth I mean ...." and I have missed it.  If so, I do apologize.  

Taking up your challenge as penance:  A Naïve realist would, I suppose, say that there is a real world out there that we have clues to.  Sometimes we get it right; sometimes we get it wrong.  It's a dualist position because there are two kinds of stuff in the world, the world stuff out there and the mind stuff in here.  Truth can apply to both kinds of stuff.  I E, there is a truth-of-the-matter with respect to what you think or what I think, as well as a truth of the matter with respect to whether what we think is true of the world.

As for Hoffman, I don't know.  

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of g??? ?
Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2017 12:25 PM
To: FriAM <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

On 10/17/2017 10:50 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
>  by asserting another definition of Truth, but so far nobody has done
> that.

Heh, now you're playing a new game! 8^)  Plenty of us *have* provided other definitions of truth.  As in active listening exercises, perhaps you could make an attempt to describe a naive realist's definition of truth that differs from Peirce's?  Or perhaps you could describe Hoffman's interface perception theory (which I think is an alternative to what you're saying Peirce's is)?

--
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[gepr]

Excellent!  So, now, if we listen to Dave with some empathy, we can ask him if his "local truth" is similar to the naive realist's "with respect to what you or I think"?  Dave?

FWIW, I predict Dave will respond with something like the assertion that locality (scope) is set by the language.  And so, it's less about what one *thinks* and more about the platform/context/truth-preserving-machine in which the people find themselves squirming around.  If such truth-scope is defined in that way, then we're a lot closer to Peirce's concept of reality being whatever consequences our language *deduces* to ... whatever sentences are evaluated as true in that language.  And, here Dave and Peirce agree.  Change the language, and you change what evaluates to true in that language.


On 10/17/2017 11:41 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Taking up your challenge as penance:  A Naïve realist would, I suppose, say that there is a real world out there that we have clues to.  Sometimes we get it right; sometimes we get it wrong.  It's a dualist position because there are two kinds of stuff in the world, the world stuff out there and the mind stuff in here.  Truth can apply to both kinds of stuff.  I E, there is a truth-of-the-matter with respect to what you think or what I think, as well as a truth of the matter with respect to whether what we think is true of the world.

--
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[Prof David West]

truth is — the persistence of a particular wiring path in an immensely
complicated, and otherwise dynamic, web of connections among billions of
sensors capturing input and hundreds of thousands of effectors
generating output from one state of the sensors-web-effectors to
another.    truth is a 'failure', a 'defect';  a means for avoiding
constant re-establishment of the entirety of the web in response to
constantly changing inputs / values of inputs.

Truth isn't.

To anthropomorphize the definition: truth is behavior that persists
because the individual fails to re-evaluate the totality of
inputs/outputs/connections that, in some previous state of that
individual, first established the particular behavior. Like cancer,
these persistences can be relatively benign, sometimes fatal, but they
are always a defect.

Nothing about language or thought, but a hint of the truth-preserving
machine in which people squirm that Glen described.

It is certainly possible for one sensor-web-effector state machine to
"infect" another, i.e. stimulate a second machine to replicate the
behavior. If that happens we have 'convergence' which is nothing more
than collective 'fault'/ 'defectiveness'.

As to dualism/ naive-realism - I give no more truck to Descartes than
Nick. Perhaps, ala Vedism, once in the near infinite past there was
'mind-stuff' and 'matter-stuff' and perhaps once again in the near
infinite future that dualism will be re-established. But in the meantime
issues of dualism tend not to edification.

dave


On Tue, Oct 17, 2017, at 12:54 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:

> Excellent!  So, now, if we listen to Dave with some empathy, we can ask
> him if his "local truth" is similar to the naive realist's "with respect
> to what you or I think"?  Dave?
>
> FWIW, I predict Dave will respond with something like the assertion that
> locality (scope) is set by the language.  And so, it's less about what
> one *thinks* and more about the platform/context/truth-preserving-machine
> in which the people find themselves squirming around.  If such
> truth-scope is defined in that way, then we're a lot closer to Peirce's
> concept of reality being whatever consequences our language *deduces* to
> ... whatever sentences are evaluated as true in that language.  And, here
> Dave and Peirce agree.  Change the language, and you change what
> evaluates to true in that language.
>
>
> On 10/17/2017 11:41 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> > Taking up your challenge as penance:  A Naïve realist would, I suppose, say that there is a real world out there that we have clues to.  Sometimes we get it right; sometimes we get it wrong.  It's a dualist position because there are two kinds of stuff in the world, the world stuff out there and the mind stuff in here.  Truth can apply to both kinds of stuff.  I E, there is a truth-of-the-matter with respect to what you think or what I think, as well as a truth of the matter with respect to whether what we think is true of the world.
>
> --
> ☣ gⅼеɳ
>
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[Nick Thompson]

Dave,

Sounds like your definition of truth is a lot like Peirce's definition of "belief" -- "a believe is a conception upon which we are prepared to act".  So, Peirce's belief, like West's Truth, is presumably local.  Beliefs can be shared but they don't have to be to be beliefs.  

So, on your account, Truth is defined as local.  Can Truths be shared?  Or, for the purposes of your definition of truth, each truth is unique to the person who holds it.  Does a truth have to be unique to a person to be a truth?  

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2017 2:19 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

truth is — the persistence of a particular wiring path in an immensely complicated, and otherwise dynamic, web of connections among billions of sensors capturing input and hundreds of thousands of effectors generating output from one state of the sensors-web-effectors to
another.    truth is a 'failure', a 'defect';  a means for avoiding
constant re-establishment of the entirety of the web in response to constantly changing inputs / values of inputs.

Truth isn't.

To anthropomorphize the definition: truth is behavior that persists because the individual fails to re-evaluate the totality of inputs/outputs/connections that, in some previous state of that individual, first established the particular behavior. Like cancer, these persistences can be relatively benign, sometimes fatal, but they are always a defect.

Nothing about language or thought, but a hint of the truth-preserving machine in which people squirm that Glen described.

It is certainly possible for one sensor-web-effector state machine to "infect" another, i.e. stimulate a second machine to replicate the behavior. If that happens we have 'convergence' which is nothing more than collective 'fault'/ 'defectiveness'.

As to dualism/ naive-realism - I give no more truck to Descartes than Nick. Perhaps, ala Vedism, once in the near infinite past there was 'mind-stuff' and 'matter-stuff' and perhaps once again in the near infinite future that dualism will be re-established. But in the meantime issues of dualism tend not to edification.

dave


On Tue, Oct 17, 2017, at 12:54 PM, gⅼеɳ ☣ wrote:

> Excellent!  So, now, if we listen to Dave with some empathy, we can
> ask him if his "local truth" is similar to the naive realist's "with
> respect to what you or I think"?  Dave?
>
> FWIW, I predict Dave will respond with something like the assertion
> that locality (scope) is set by the language.  And so, it's less about
> what one *thinks* and more about the
> platform/context/truth-preserving-machine
> in which the people find themselves squirming around.  If such
> truth-scope is defined in that way, then we're a lot closer to
> Peirce's concept of reality being whatever consequences our language
> *deduces* to ... whatever sentences are evaluated as true in that
> language.  And, here Dave and Peirce agree.  Change the language, and
> you change what evaluates to true in that language.
>
>
> On 10/17/2017 11:41 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> > Taking up your challenge as penance:  A Naïve realist would, I suppose, say that there is a real world out there that we have clues to.  Sometimes we get it right; sometimes we get it wrong.  It's a dualist position because there are two kinds of stuff in the world, the world stuff out there and the mind stuff in here.  Truth can apply to both kinds of stuff.  I E, there is a truth-of-the-matter with respect to what you think or what I think, as well as a truth of the matter with respect to whether what we think is true of the world.
>
> --
> ☣ gⅼеɳ
>
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[gepr]

Well, to be clear, I think the idea of your sensor-web-effector individuals squirming in a machine is perfectly consistent with Peirce's conception of reality.  The disconnect lies in the extent to which that machine (in which the sensor-web-effector individuals squirm) is "fixed once and for all", as Feferman puts it.  Peirce's conception of reality seems to rely on that fixation, that definiteness, the one, fixed, master structure in which we all swim.  Feferman's observation that working mathematicians are at once Platonic, yet don't limit themselves to any single formalism, seems to argue from your perspective: that reality is not fixed, definite, and if a sensor-web-effector individual becomes fixated AS IF the reality in which it swims were fixed, then that limited delusion is what it calls "truth" (a truth, the truth, etc.).  Rosen would agree with you as well, by claiming that our mathematics, logic, and "inferential entailment" methods are impoverished when compared to reality ("causal entailment").

But it's important to look at Peirce's synoptic understanding of logic and math.  A good example is his existential graphs, which encompassed more than first order logic, including higher-order and modal logic.  My guess is Peirce would readily entertain ideas like Feferman's schematic axiomatic systems as a way to enrich our logics so as to handle the dynamism of working mathematicians, and perhaps that pointed out by you or Rosen.


On 10/17/2017 01:18 PM, Prof David West wrote:
> Nothing about language or thought, but a hint of the truth-preserving
> machine in which people squirm that Glen described.


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[Steve Smith]

Dave sez:
> It is certainly possible for one sensor-web-effector state machine to
> "infect" another, i.e. stimulate a second machine to replicate the
> behavior. If that happens we have 'convergence' which is nothing more
> than collective 'fault'/ 'defectiveness'.
>
It sounds as if you believe that resonance, mode locking, phase locking,
tidal locking, etc.  are somehow defective ways for systems to
interact.   I can agree that they are modestly less interesting than
more chaotic systems.   While *I* might find a marching (esp. if they
are goose-stepping) army aberrant (and abhorrent), I might find a
*marching band* or *synchronized swimmers* or a dance-troupe following a
choreography (e.g. Cirque de Soliel perfomance) somehow beautiful.  And
I would suggest these are examples of what you are judging as
"defective"?   I suppose that since only a *subsystem* of the units
(dancers/musicians/soldiers) are mode/phase-locked for the duration of
the march/performance, that this is only a partial example and therefore
only *partially* defective/faulty?

I believe it is in the liminal space which fills the near-locality of a
shared "dialect" where the interesting stuff happens, not unlike in
dynamical systems' "edge of chaos".   I agree with the technical
expression that any "statement of Truth" is a defect, but that does not
mean that it doesn't gesture in the direction of, or roughly
circumscribe, or provide a proxy for a more transcendent "truth".    One
*might* argue that each individual has a private, idiosyncratic dialect
of "the same language", and that interaction amongst individuals whose
dialects are similar enough to intend to agree/discuss/converge/??

I would claim that a well formed question suggests a family of "answers"
and thereby hints at what we want to believe in as "truth".

This paper may (or may not) offer some perspective on the evolution of a
language/dialect and teh convergence/coherence issue.

https://www.researchgate.net/project/Coherence-Convergence-and-Change-A-Sociolinguistic-Variationist-Approach-to-Dialect-and-Standard-Language-Use-in-Swabia

- Steve

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[Prof David West]

Steve,

My definition refers to a single system - a single system and is not
intended to suggest anything about interacting systems, nor anything
external to itself. I do assume that this system is contained within a
complex system which is the source of the input signals detected by the
sensors. I similarly assume that the effectors may transmit signals to
the containing system but want to leave that aside for the moment.

I could metaphorically equate my system to a neural network brain within
the skin of a human being — but again would prefer to simply focus on my
system in a non-anthropomorphized manner; just to keep things simple and
to avoid the potential for diversions into side conversations.

I am also using neural networks - without naming things as such - again,
to avoid distractions, this makes explanations clumsier, but it serves
my purpose for the moment.

The connecting web can route any input to any output, using a near
infinite number of pathways. More importantly it can route any
combination of inputs to any combination of outputs along any of the
near INFINITE (I yell only to point out the combinatorial explosion of
pathways) number of routes (circuits).

Now imagine that this system is an organism and that the connection of
some [input | set of inputs | pattern of inputs] to [an| set of |
pattern of] outputs increases its survival potential. Further imagine
that this system is highly dynamic and acutely optimized to assure than
and and all input/s are conveyed to the most useful output/s (with
useful being simply the increase or maintenance of survival potential.
The web of input-output connects can be 'rewired' in "real time," i.e.
in whatever unit of time exists between receipt of the next inputs.

Now imagine that a/some sensors seem to receive the same input over and
over again and, due to "fatigue" they either shut down and fail to relay
the input to the web, or they lock into constantly sending the same
input value to the web without regard to whatever was actually sensed.
System fault.

Similarly, a particular pathway (set of pathways) are utilized more
often when receiving a particular pattern of inputs and those pathways
channelize, essentially become fixed. System fault because the ability
of the system to adapt is impaired. This would be particularly evident
if the pattern of inputs begins to subtly change, but change enough that
the pattern of outputs should be modified and they are not.

Whenever these faults occur, the system as a whole starts behaving as if
A (set of inputs) IS B (set of outputs). That simply use of the verb 'to
be' is my definition of "truth," and it is purely local  because it is a
condition/state of the individual system.

Very quickly - imagine several such systems interacting. Your marching
band for example. For each member of the band as a single organism (of
the type discussed above) all the other members of the band are simply
part of a containing complex system. When each of the individual systems
are using their innate ability to route the 'right' inputs to the
'right' outputs the outcome can be cacophony that morphs into an
exquisite performance. But when individual systems start to fail -
establish truthiness - start to "mail in" their part of the overall
performance, the band as a whole and your enjoyment of their performance
is bound to suffer.

davew



On Tue, Oct 17, 2017, at 04:58 PM, Steven A Smith wrote:

> Dave sez:
> > It is certainly possible for one sensor-web-effector state machine to
> > "infect" another, i.e. stimulate a second machine to replicate the
> > behavior. If that happens we have 'convergence' which is nothing more
> > than collective 'fault'/ 'defectiveness'.
> >
> It sounds as if you believe that resonance, mode locking, phase locking,
> tidal locking, etc.  are somehow defective ways for systems to
> interact.   I can agree that they are modestly less interesting than
> more chaotic systems.   While *I* might find a marching (esp. if they
> are goose-stepping) army aberrant (and abhorrent), I might find a
> *marching band* or *synchronized swimmers* or a dance-troupe following a
> choreography (e.g. Cirque de Soliel perfomance) somehow beautiful.  And
> I would suggest these are examples of what you are judging as
> "defective"?   I suppose that since only a *subsystem* of the units
> (dancers/musicians/soldiers) are mode/phase-locked for the duration of
> the march/performance, that this is only a partial example and therefore
> only *partially* defective/faulty?
>
> I believe it is in the liminal space which fills the near-locality of a
> shared "dialect" where the interesting stuff happens, not unlike in
> dynamical systems' "edge of chaos".   I agree with the technical
> expression that any "statement of Truth" is a defect, but that does not
> mean that it doesn't gesture in the direction of, or roughly
> circumscribe, or provide a proxy for a more transcendent "truth".    One
> *might* argue that each individual has a private, idiosyncratic dialect
> of "the same language", and that interaction amongst individuals whose
> dialects are similar enough to intend to agree/discuss/converge/??
>
> I would claim that a well formed question suggests a family of "answers"
> and thereby hints at what we want to believe in as "truth".
>
> This paper may (or may not) offer some perspective on the evolution of a
> language/dialect and teh convergence/coherence issue.
>
> https://www.researchgate.net/project/Coherence-Convergence-and-Change-A-Sociolinguistic-Variationist-Approach-to-Dialect-and-Standard-Language-Use-in-Swabia
>
> - Steve
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

[Nick Thompson]

David,

Just checking:  I have a hard time following the model in detail, but it sounds like what you mean by "truth" is very like what I mean by "belief".  For me, a belief is a "local truth".  

So, that being the case,  what is the name of the thing that you say doesn't exist, the thing that other people call, T-with-a-capital Truth   Are you asserting that there is no stable purchase point beyond what I would call, "individual belief".  When a group of people coalesces around a belief, what would you call that?  (Shared belief?)  Are all shared beliefs of the same quality? (Group think?)

Now please remember -- nobody seems to understand this point -- that as of the moment I have made no argument for the EXISTENCE of anything beyond local truth.  

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/


-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2017 12:59 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Truth: “Hunh! What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing!”

Steve,

My definition refers to a single system - a single system and is not intended to suggest anything about interacting systems, nor anything external to itself. I do assume that this system is contained within a complex system which is the source of the input signals detected by the sensors. I similarly assume that the effectors may transmit signals to the containing system but want to leave that aside for the moment.

I could metaphorically equate my system to a neural network brain within the skin of a human being — but again would prefer to simply focus on my system in a non-anthropomorphized manner; just to keep things simple and to avoid the potential for diversions into side conversations.

I am also using neural networks - without naming things as such - again, to avoid distractions, this makes explanations clumsier, but it serves my purpose for the moment.

The connecting web can route any input to any output, using a near infinite number of pathways. More importantly it can route any combination of inputs to any combination of outputs along any of the near INFINITE (I yell only to point out the combinatorial explosion of
pathways) number of routes (circuits).

Now imagine that this system is an organism and that the connection of some [input | set of inputs | pattern of inputs] to [an| set of | pattern of] outputs increases its survival potential. Further imagine that this system is highly dynamic and acutely optimized to assure than and and all input/s are conveyed to the most useful output/s (with useful being simply the increase or maintenance of survival potential.
The web of input-output connects can be 'rewired' in "real time," i.e.
in whatever unit of time exists between receipt of the next inputs.

Now imagine that a/some sensors seem to receive the same input over and over again and, due to "fatigue" they either shut down and fail to relay the input to the web, or they lock into constantly sending the same input value to the web without regard to whatever was actually sensed.
System fault.

Similarly, a particular pathway (set of pathways) are utilized more often when receiving a particular pattern of inputs and those pathways channelize, essentially become fixed. System fault because the ability of the system to adapt is impaired. This would be particularly evident if the pattern of inputs begins to subtly change, but change enough that the pattern of outputs should be modified and they are not.

Whenever these faults occur, the system as a whole starts behaving as if A (set of inputs) IS B (set of outputs). That simply use of the verb 'to be' is my definition of "truth," and it is purely local  because it is a condition/state of the individual system.

Very quickly - imagine several such systems interacting. Your marching band for example. For each member of the band as a single organism (of the type discussed above) all the other members of the band are simply part of a containing complex system. When each of the individual systems are using their innate ability to route the 'right' inputs to the 'right' outputs the outcome can be cacophony that morphs into an exquisite performance. But when individual systems start to fail - establish truthiness - start to "mail in" their part of the overall performance, the band as a whole and your enjoyment of their performance is bound to suffer.

davew



On Tue, Oct 17, 2017, at 04:58 PM, Steven A Smith wrote:

> Dave sez:
> > It is certainly possible for one sensor-web-effector state machine
> > to "infect" another, i.e. stimulate a second machine to replicate
> > the behavior. If that happens we have 'convergence' which is nothing
> > more than collective 'fault'/ 'defectiveness'.
> >
> It sounds as if you believe that resonance, mode locking, phase
> locking, tidal locking, etc.  are somehow defective ways for systems
> to interact.   I can agree that they are modestly less interesting
> than more chaotic systems.   While *I* might find a marching (esp. if
> they are goose-stepping) army aberrant (and abhorrent), I might find a
> *marching band* or *synchronized swimmers* or a dance-troupe following
> a choreography (e.g. Cirque de Soliel perfomance) somehow beautiful.  
> And I would suggest these are examples of what you are judging as
> "defective"?   I suppose that since only a *subsystem* of the units
> (dancers/musicians/soldiers) are mode/phase-locked for the duration of
> the march/performance, that this is only a partial example and
> therefore only *partially* defective/faulty?
>
> I believe it is in the liminal space which fills the near-locality of
> a shared "dialect" where the interesting stuff happens, not unlike in
> dynamical systems' "edge of chaos".   I agree with the technical
> expression that any "statement of Truth" is a defect, but that does
> not mean that it doesn't gesture in the direction of, or roughly
> circumscribe, or provide a proxy for a more transcendent "truth".    
> One
> *might* argue that each individual has a private, idiosyncratic
> dialect of "the same language", and that interaction amongst
> individuals whose dialects are similar enough to intend to agree/discuss/converge/??
>
> I would claim that a well formed question suggests a family of "answers"
> and thereby hints at what we want to believe in as "truth".
>
> This paper may (or may not) offer some perspective on the evolution of
> a language/dialect and teh convergence/coherence issue.
>
> https://www.researchgate.net/project/Coherence-Convergence-and-Change-
> A-Sociolinguistic-Variationist-Approach-to-Dialect-and-Standard-Langua
> ge-Use-in-Swabia
>
> - Steve
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe
> at St. John's College to unsubscribe
> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove


============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove