Re: Conscious Layer Speculations

Fisers

As a behavioral ecologist with a general systems approach, I have been
watching this conference with increasing interest. I enter here in response
to Ted Goranson's move to "jump-start" the conference. Focus is on the
perspectives from which we view the problem of consciousness, and the
interdisciplinary interfaces where we formulate both the problems and the
approaches to their solutions.
The interfaces between psychology, anthropology, endocrinology, and
pharmacology are crucial to a behavioral science approach to the problem of
consiousness. Here, consciousness manifests itself from three perspectives:
 
1) Inside, looking out,
2) Outside, looking in and
3) Inside, looking in.

Inside looking out is basic because this is the first, and most immediate,
way that individuals view the world. Effects of hormones and the inadequacy
of language to describe these effects are two exceedingly difficult
problems from the "inside, looking out perspective".

Outside, looking in, is the dominant approach of science and technology.
Mathematics and game theory, add power tools to scientific language.
Nevertheless, consciousness has characteristics that frustrate most
conventional mechanistic approaches. Mutual causality, non hierarchical
levels, opponent processes organization and extremely complex positive and
negative feedback systems, all combine to produce a labyrinth of obstacles
to a universally acceptable definition of "information". Add to this the
territorial imperatives that are the excess baggage of specialties, and the
sociology of science emerges as a significant factor.

Inside, looking in is by far the most difficult perspective of the three.
Self-reference plays havoc with conventional logical analysis. Identity and
identity functions lead to fuzzy boundaries that create nightmares for
classification systems.

Despite the obvious complexity that arises as a consequence of viewing the
problem from all three perspectives simultaneously, we can make progress.

First, a division of labor, similar to the gnome project is necessary. We
should be careful not to confuse divisions of labor with divisions of
nature. I suggest we formulate our approaches in terms of functional units.
So that we can meet at the interfaces between disciplines and discuss the
variables that describe, predict and control information.

William S. Dockens III
Department of Psychology
Uppsala University

At 11:56 AM 10/13/98 -0100, Ted Goranson wrote:
>Fisers--
>
>For some reason, the "virtual conference" has not taken off in this
>session. Let me try to jump-start the traffic by extending my introductory
>message with some provocative speculations.
>
>You'll recall that we supposed that there are two kinds of information,
>Info (1) which is the ordinary kind, but which I wish in the present
>context to limit to kinds of abstractions and messages that support (the
>mechanics of) a science and Info(2) the impetus to organize. I submit that
>they are different and the challenge is to have them merge, which is more
>likely possible in the social layer.
>
>Here are the speculations:
>
>1. Existence of info(2) posits a requirement (not just a tendency) for
>organization. That organization is always increasing.
>
>2. When a system exceeds a certain complexity, it creates new abstractions
>within which it can work. Thus, for instance, molecules "grow" into cells.
>The laws of these "vertical" layers are wholly determined by the
>abstractions of their generators.
>
>[The combination of these two would seem to imply that the existence of
>elementary particles in our universe mandates the existence of life.]
>
>3. The laws which codify these new abstraction spaces (and ideally the
>mechanism which defines them) will be the most basic discoverable laws.
>This is to say that the mapping between info(1) and (2) will be not in
>terms of information per se, but the definition of the abstraction spaces
>which define information. Since Category Theory is the mathematics of
>abstraction, it may provide some useful formal techniques.
>
>4. The abstractions that define consciousness are what merges info(1) and
>(2), or more precisely: that layer is where info(1) emerges from (2). That
>is why this layer is of particular attention.
>
>5. Almost certainly, the primitives of interest, the abstractions we noted,
>bear no intuitive relationship to the apparent units of "horizontal"
>organization. Values, Ethics and Morals might be useful as an
>information-based organizational principle at the social layer, or peptide
>bonds at the biochemical layer (and so onŠ). The real challenge to my mind
>is to find the underlying abstract principles that:
>
>a. drive the various, useful horizontal mechanisms
>
>b. create new abstraction spaces at vertical boundaries, and (most
>important for FIS)
>
>c. in particular at one boundary, define info(1) and thus science.
>
>6. Quite possibly, the layers are not single-threaded. For instance, the
>biological layer might build several types of "societies" or other higher
>order organizations.
>
>7. Also possibly, the layers are circular, so that the info(1), science, as
>a higher level creates a "law" space where universal laws are sustained,
>feeding the physics layer.
>
>8. The abstract primitives are symmetry-based and geometric in the sense
>that general relativity and the standard model are, and opposed to quantum
>mechanics, modal logics and probability.
>
>That should be controversial enough to spark a dialog. These are not firmly
>held ideas, but speculations thrown out for discussion. Everything depends
>on the consciousness of the "top" layer which we are discussing.
>
>Best, Ted
>
>_____________
>Ted Goranson
>Sirius-Beta, Virginia Beach USA
>757/426-6704, fax 757/721-0781
>
>
>
>
Received on Thu Oct 15 06:07:16 1998