RE: A Proposal for Wrapping Up - language information and time

Ted,

Plaudits for opening (or is it closing?) the kimono.

You remarked:

<I think Koichiro's proposal, if I understand it right is equally
<radical, to move the notion of "time" outside the framework of
<information, turning it into the metatool for the new science: a
<grammar for information.

One of the intriguing foreground questions is the entanglement
of time language and information. In quotidian experience
there is a Bermuda triangle (somewhere at the confluence of circadian
chronological and psychological time) in which time meets information
as they disappear together down the wormhole of relevance.
Yesterday's news is dwindling information and attention is predicated
on timeliness and timing (rather than good old Father Time).

Two questions emerge.

1. How then does info-time relate to the dimension of spacetime?
Is it (as for Edwina) an extension of material forms or 'more
than a tweak' in the materio-reductionist cosmogony?

2 If information has a 'syntax' which language theory is
appropriate for the crafting of our metatool?
Or do we invent our own?

Is Koichiro's promising notion a metaphor borrowed from
descriptive grammar or is it grounded in linguistic science?
(Bohm's 'rhematics' is an example of a half-baked linguistic
theory which went nowhere).

Shannonists will probably be more comfortable with MIT and
the Chomskyites, the cyberneticians with Peirce.
Others will feel more at home with Vygotsky or the nonlinear
tense of Whorf's Hopi Indians.

Koichiro's view that information is 'a broadcast with a tense'
is not far removed from Bohm's active/passive voice metaphor.

Is this gerundive time like the flickering frames of a cinematic
continuum 'project-ed' onto the screen of spacetime?
Avoidance of the particulate "the" word is to
be applauded ("the past, the present, the future" retired
in favour of passing presenting project-ing).

As Borges said "Time (like information) is
the river which carries me along but I am
the river".

Maybe a future model for FIS is a network of SIG's
to explore some of these fascinating issues next
time round and possibly come up with a suite of
metatools for the New Science.

John H

-----Original Message-----
From: Ted Goranson [mailto:tedg@sirius-beta.com]
Sent: Friday, 17 January 2003 11:01
To: Multiple recipients of list FIS
Subject: A Proposal for Wrapping Up

Friends--

I was expecting more discussion on Jerry's challenge. If I understand
it right, it is quite radical and reflects just the sort of high
level controversy I suggested we examine before we wrap up.

On one side, we have Jerry and a few others (I count myself here) who
claim that we need more than a tweak in existing paradigms, but whole
new abstractions, even whole new manners of abstraction. Opposed are
the vast majority of FISers who propose shifts of perspectives or new
metaphors within existing abstractions. The fulcrum of this
difference seems to be what approach one prefers for "escaping" the
foreground/background problem of "information." (I also admit that
when reading some of these clever more pragmatic positions, I find
them compelling as well.)

I suggest we log this as a worthwhile issue to be examined by future
activities. Let me propose some other grand controversies I perceived
in the prior discussion.

I think Koichiro's proposal, if I understand it right is equally
radical, to move the notion of "time" outside the framework of
information, turning it into the metatool for the new science: a
grammar for information. Some others independently developed this
notion -- it appeared in several forms during the discussions of
entropy, but the last few months have seen little of this radical
position, and the default discussion context seems to not attempt
something so expensive theoretically.

Periodically, another religious difference creeps in and then damps
down. I think we are roughly divided between those who consider the
first class citizen of information to be the "message" (and all of
its surrogates), while others propose a citizen based on "context,"
situated functionality or "system awareness." There are many
denominations on both sides of this chasm, unless I'm mistaken.

This divide is reflected in one superficially similar: the preferred
lever. Some champion "societal" even "cultural/emotional"
perspectives, while others cling to chemical or biological focii to
"inform" societal dynamics. This seems a profound difference to me,
so profound it colors everything.

In reviewing the last few years' messages (pretty vast, actually)
many seem occupied with similar basic religious divides, but the
ordinary problems of language, meaning and reality that have occupied
many great minds -- minds concerned more with discovery and
understanding than invention. I cannot say whether those are
reflections of the meatier controversies of our new agenda, the other
way around or relatively irrelevant distractions. I suspect the
latter.

Well, I think Pedro has allocated us another week or so to wrap this
up. Does anyone feel it beneficial to identify these types of
outstanding differences? Whether I have dissected the discussion
correctly is another issue, and I defer to more capable colleagues to
replace my suggestions with better ones.

Best, Ted