Re: [Fis] (no subject)

 Dear Loet,
 
I have been following this one and others extremely interesting discussion
threads since I joined the FIS-list. But your latest comment on Jerry's
thoughts provoked me to respond directly as I see something that looks like
a potential danger (would it be a commonly accepted truth) to the science.
What prompted me is your last sentence: "my answer would be negative because
this would restore a kind of wholeness that I consider as religiously
motivated." Sure, I understand that this is your attitude and everybody is
free to have own opinion therefore it is not you whom I want to address this
message, but the very idea of avoiding any "possibly being religiously
motivated" developments in science. What makes me think that it hides a
danger are numerous examples from a post-Soviet space where this very
motivation indeed was a compulsory rule of the ideology and policies of the
science of those not-so old days.
 
As a result the Big-bang theory in Russia and neighbouring countries has
been considered to be fake for an incredibly long period. The same was with
the entire sciences of cybernetics, genetics and all relating theories. The
only answer to "why" was - all these theories and sciences are capitalistic
and religiously motivated and therefore are not conformal with
scientific-materialistic worldview... As you understand this situation
virtually killed any developments in these sciences and related theories in
the former Soviet space for several decades. Although nor Big-bang theory
neither sciences of cybernetics or genetics were religiously motivated...
 
In fact I find Jerry's ideas very important as scientists from different
fields still miss the holistic point in worldview and sometimes, I would say
 naively expect that properties of atoms or cells that constitute systems of
higher hierarchies do not influence emerging new properties in those systems
 Thence we have "strange unexplored Territories" or mismatches between
theories of some sciences. Although it has been used to be widely accepted
for already several decades among close branches of sciences that natural
systems explored are somehow similar: physicists and chemists used to say
that nuclear reactions in principle are similar to chemical ones, ecologists
(e.g. Odum) state that response to stress in ecosystems is in principle
similar to the response of an individual, etc... I think these similarities
are indeed very interesting points to be deeper investigated using
intellectual tools of the science of cybernetics and related branches.
 
Seasons greetings !
With best regards
Viktoras Didziulis
 
-------Original Message-------
 
From: loet@leydesdorff.net
Date: 2003 m. gruodis 28 d. 13:29:48
To: "jlrchand@erols.com"@relay.unizar.es; jlrchand@pop.mail.rcn.net;
fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: [Fis] (no subject)
 
Dear Jerry,
 
Thank you for these interesting quotations from Whitehead.
 
Apologies for the following misunderstanding:
 
>I am puzzled on how one would fit chemical philosophy into such a
>mathematical philosophy. Chemistry philosophy is grounded on ratio's
>of small whole numbers and neither nuclei or electrons can be
>distributed into "1/2 + 1/2". Loet's post suggests that we need to
>look carefully at how the marketing of information is tied to simple
>mathematical operation of addition.
 
The example of 50/50 was just chosen to explain how information theory is
grounded in probability theory. The addition is generated because by
definition the sum of the probabilities is equal to unity. Additionally, the
Shannon formulas are so elegant because they are based on simple summations
(to the maximum of the maximum entropy of a system under study).
 
In chemical systems the distributions are more complex than 50/50. However a
distribution can always be expected to contain an information. This
description of the system is different from the chemical one. It generates
an information-theoretical model of the system. The system under study is
specified in terms of its operation: what is communicated when the system
communicates? What is redistributed? This remains epistemologically the
specification of an expectation.
 
Observations can be generated by specifying "how" the system is expected to
operate. One can then ask whether this operation can also be indicated. The
specification of an indicator may lead to the measurement. Thus, this is not
a philosophy of mathematics or a philosophy of chemistry, but the
specification of a cybernetics program. The measurements improve and update
our expectations. In principle, a third question can be to ask for the "why"
of what one observes using the indicators thus specified. This leads to
substantive theorizing in the subject domain under study.
 
Each subject domain can thus be developed into a special theory of
communication. This accords with your nice quotations from Whitehead. The
mathematical theory of communication provides us with the formal methodology
 Of course, one can also use other statistics. The advantages of using the
mathematical theory of communication, however, are manifold. For example,
one can elegantly combine the multi-variate perspective (complexity) with
the time series perspective in order to develop the instruments of measuring
complex dynamics.
 
Thus, my contribution is not to be misunderstood as a philosophical one. The
philosophical question would be whether one expects a general theory of
communication to be possible. My answer would be negative because this would
restore a kind of wholeness that I consider as religiously motivated.
 
With kind regards,
 
 
Loet
 
Loet Leydesdorff
Science & Technology Dynamics, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
Tel.: +31-20-525 6598; fax: +31-20-525 3681
 
http://www.leydesdorff.net/ ; [email protected]
http://www.upublish.com/books/leydesdorff.htm
 
 
_______________________________________________
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
http://webmail.unizar.es/mailman/listinfo/fis
.

_______________________________________________
fis mailing list
fis@listas.unizar.es
http://webmail.unizar.es/mailman/listinfo/fis
Received on Mon Dec 29 15:34:30 2003