Re: opinions vs knowledge - The Cave is Constructed

Dear Jerry, Ted and all,
If I adressed the wrong collegue, I am really sorry, but the incoming postings are often in a very confusing order.. but certainly you are right at this point and I will try to avoid such error.
Concerning my answers, I do not pretend to give finished answers or precise propositions, I only express my opinions (based on my personnal experience and knowledge concerning our subject) like everybody does in this forum.

I only would like to comment following sentence:

It is crucial to distinguish between empirical information with supporting correspondence relations and (philosophical) abstractions about nature.

I agree, but what we really do is: we collect empirical data by analysis (this means dividing our "object" of observation) and put these data together to an information, based on our (philosophical) abstraction of nature. Of course the result of empirical analysis is not the same thing as our abstaction about nature, but they are definitively linked together, at least in some aspect through the analytical method we apply. What seems crucial to me is exactly to try to understand both sides: where it is crucial to distinguish and where it is crucial to see the intrinsic links between both.
In fact, with this topic we touch an important point: how autopietic systems act together to form complex systems? operationnly closed systems show a great capacity of selforganisation, but they are able to combine and form higher levels of complexity. human individuals formando societies, are good examples for that. The point is that their great capacity of selforganisation, makes it dificult to see and understand whats the "logic" of their relations.
regards
Norbert
Received on Fri Sep 13 14:12:50 2002