Re: [Fis] consilience of limited observers

Dear colleagues,

Just a couple of points (while thinking on how to further respond to Malcom's).

Looking again at the medieval system of knowledge, that circle of seven
disciplines (Trivium plus Quatrivium) with philosophy/religion at the
center as a sort of "hub", we might consider that that very hub was
providing the overall (internal) 'consilience' to the other radial
disciplines ---like the nuclear role of maths, logics, etc. demanded by our
contemporary disciplines. However, there is a nice component of the Trivium
called "Rhetorics" that was playing quite a strategic role: providing the
practitioner with the art of persuasion, the art of weighing the arguments
provided by the other heterogeneous disciplinary contents... And not far
from the rhetorical "truth" technics --remember that "Disputatione" was the
central way to verify knowledge-- a fascinating medieval philosopher and
mathematician, the Spaniard Raimundus Lulius (Raymond Lull), attempted an
Ars Magna by mechanically producing all kind of possible logical arguments
using them in a combinatoric way, somehow with their 'weighs' included.
Anecdotally, it was ridiculed by Swift in his Gulliver novel... It is a
pity that the curious (very advanced, in my opinion) modality of
interdisciplinary "consilience" attempted by all that rhetorical
armamentum was discredited along the advancement modern scientific
revolution (physically centered). Today, perhaps the Wilsonian consilience
could be taken in this direction too, but not very well established, with
shaky foundations. But it may epitomize the consilience I call
inter-multi-trans-pluri, etc.

A second point taken from a historical excursion of Jared Diamond on the
Pascua islanders, may illuminate a global use of consilience not well put
yet into use, and maybe independent of the previous one. As Diamond
relates, centuries of competition among islander clans showing their
comparative power in megalitic constructions, implying surprisingly
advanced technics (knowledge experstise) and undeniable aesthetical appeal,
lead to completely deplete the ecosystems of the island. All the 'natural
capital' was put into 'artefacts', and exhausted... a parable for Diamond
about our own industrial civilization. In spite of all its advancement, how
much global 'consilience' had the Pascua's social knowledge system? And our
own?

best

Pedro

PS. Koichiro's "new physics" observations look to me very coherent with
these intriguing absences in our contemporary system of knowledge.
Received on Fri Oct 22 11:58:47 2004