Posted by
Nick Thompson on
Nov 02, 2009; 3:27am
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/Crutchfield-s-Is-anything-ever-new-tp3917261p3929747.html
What kind of levels are we talking about, here.
I guess I think that levels are logical. So A black bird is one level, a
bunch of black birds is another level, and warehouse full of bunches of
black birds another level. Ditto, a black bird, a flock of black birds,
and a sky full of flocks of blackbirds. What makes the individual-to-flock
level shift interesting is the manner in which the flock takes form
because the behavior of the birds varies with their positions within the
aggregate. Ditto the form of a pile of sand, for that matter.
Reading Glen concerning SCALE, I am thinking that scale and variance are
necessarily interrelated -- unless scale is just how big something is in
relation to the distance between the pole and the equator of the earth or
the length of the King's stride.
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University (
[hidden email])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> [Original Message]
> From: glen e. p. ropella <
[hidden email]>
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
[hidden email]>
> Date: 11/1/2009 9:44:31 AM
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Crutchfield 's "Is anything ever new?"
>
> Thus spake Ted Carmichael circa 10/30/2009 03:33 PM:
> > In response to Glen's comments, I would say that his differentiation
between
> > thoughts and actions is also a somewhat arbitrary choice of scale. I
agree
> > that how two people shoot a basketball is usually more easily translated
> > between them than how they calculate the product of two numbers. When I
> > shoot a basketball, I follow the same general procedure (knees bent, one
> > hand on the side of the ball and one hand behind it, etc) that other
people
> > do. But my physical structure is still different than another
person's, so
> > I have refined the general procedure to better match my physical
structure.
> > (Or not, since I usually miss the basket.)
>
> Yes, you're onto something, here. But I wouldn't consider it a matter
> of general vs. specific for throwing a basketball. Any general method
> you may think exists is an illusion. Let's say you're learning how to
> do it from a coach and several fellow players. For each other person
> you watch do it, their method is particular to _them_. In such a case,
> there is no general method. You may _imagine_ some illusory general
> method in your head. But when the method is executed, it is always
> particular.
>
> Now consider the coach's _description_ or model of the method. Even in
> that case, the description, the words, the actions the coach executes
> with his mouth and hands in an attempt to communicate an idea are
> particular to him. The descriptive actions are particular to him. Even
> in that case, there is no general method. Any general method you may
> think exists is pure fiction. What matters is the particular actions.
>
> Induction is a myth. [*]
>
> It's not general vs. specific. It is abstract vs. concrete. You're
> observation of either the coach's description or your fellow players'
> methods is chock full of errors and noise. In order to cope with such
> noise and translate from their actions to your actions, you have to fill
> in the blanks. You are totally ignorant of, say, how fast to twitch
> your eyes while you're maintaining focus on the basket... or how fast to
> twitch your hand/finger muscles while holding the ball. You can't
> observe those parts of the method when watching your fellow players.
> And such information is totally absent from the coach's description.
> So, you have to make that stuff up yourself.
>
> And you make it up based on your _particular_ concrete ontogenetic
> history. And, hence, when you execute the method, it is also particular
> to you.
>
> However, because your hands, fingers, and eye muscles are almost
> identical to those of your fellow players and your coach, the method is
> transferable despite the huge HUGE _HUGE_ number of errors and amount of
> noise in your observations.
>
> > Two different people calculating a product, however, may use two totally
> > different methods. One person may even have a larger grammar for this,
> > utilizing more methods for more types of numbers than the second person.
> > (In effect, he has more of his brain dedicated to these types of tasks,
> > which give him the power to have a larger "math" grammar.) So it's
probably
> > more precise to say: at a certain scale 'actions' can be mapped between
two
> > people but 'thoughts' cannot be.
>
> It's less a matter of scale than it is of noise and error. When
> calculating a product (or doing any of the more _mechanical_ -- what
> used to be called "effective" -- methods), the amount of noise and error
> in the transmission from one to another is minimized to a huge extent.
> Math is transferable from person to person for precisely this reason.
> It is _formal_, syntactic. Every effort of every mathematician goes
> toward making math exact, precise, and unambiguous.
>
> So, my argument is that you may _think_ that you have different methods
> for calculating any product, and indeed, they may be slightly different.
> But the amount of variance between, say, two people adding 1+1 and two
> people throwing a basketball is huge, HUGE, _HUGE_. [grin] OK. I'll
> stop that. Because (some) math is crisp, it's easier to fill in the
> blanks after watching someone do it.
>
> Now, contrast arithmetic with, for example, coinductive proofs. While
> it's very easy to watch a fellow mathematician add numbers and then go
> add numbers yourself. It's quite difficult to demonstrate the existence
> of a corecursive set after watching another person do it. (At least in
> my own personal math-challenged context, it's difficult. ;-) You can't
> just quickly fill in the blanks unless you have a lot... and I mean a
> LOT of mathematical experience lying about in your ontogenic history.
> Typically, you have to reduce the error and noise by lots of back and
> forth... "What did you do there?" ... "Why did you do that?" ... "What's
> that mean?" Etc.
>
> Hence, it's not a matter of scale. It's a matter of the amount of
> error, noise, and ignorance in the observation of the method. And it's
> not about the transfer of the fictitious flying spaghetti monsters in
> your head. It's a matter of transferring the actions, whatever the
> symbols may mean.
>
> > If you go down to the lower level processes, all of our neurons behave
in
> > approximately the same ways. So at this scale they can be mapped, one
> > person to another. I.e., when thinking, one of my neurons is just as
easily
> > mapped to one of your neurons as my actions are to your similar actions.
>
> Right. But similarity at various scales is only relevant because it
> helps determine the amount of error, noise, variance, and uncertainty at
> whatever layer the abstraction (abstracted from the concrete) occurs.
> Note I said "layer", not "level". The whole concept of levels is a red
> herring and should be totally PURGED from the conversation of emergence,
> in my not so humble opinion. ;-)
>
>
> * I have what I think are strong arguments _against_ the position I'm
> taking, here. But I'm trying to present the argument in a pure form so
> that it's clear. I'm sure at some point in the future when I finally
> get a chance to pull out those arguments, someone will accuse me of
> contradicting myself. [sigh]
>
> --
> glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095,
http://agent-based-modeling.com>
>
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