Dear colleagues,
I agree with most of what is said, but it does not apply to social systems
because these -- and to a lesser extent also psychological ones -- operate
differently from the hierarchical formations that are generated "naturally".
That is why we oppose "nature" to "culture" in the semantics: cultural (and
social) systems enable us to model the systems under study and this changes
the hierarchical order. I understand that Maturana et al. argue that the
next-order systems always model the lower-order ones, but then the word
"model" is used metaphorically. The model (e.g., the biological) model
enables us to reconstruct the system(s) under study to such an extent that
we are able to intervene in these systems, e.g. by using a technology. This
inverts the hierarchy.
Thus, let me write in Stan's notation: biological {psychological {social}}
-- or is this precisely the opposite order, Stan? -- then our scientific
models enable us to change nature, for example, by building dykes like in
Holland and thus we get: social {biological} since the ecological changes
can also be planned in advance.
While lower-order systems are able to entertain a model of the next-lower
ones -- and even have to entertain a model -- human language enables us not
only to exchange these models, but also to study them and to further codify
them. The further codification sharpens the knife with which we can cut into
the lower-level ones. We are not constrained to the next-order lower level,
but we can freely move through the hierarchy and develop different
specialties accordingly (chemistry, biology, etc.). Scientists are able to
adjust the focus of the lense. This is a cultural achievement which was
generated naturally, but once in place also had the possibility to
distinguish between genesis and validity. No lower-level systems can raise
and begin to answer this question. And doubling reality into a semantic
domain that can operate relatively independently of the underlying
(represented) layer increases the complexity which can be absorbed with an
order of magnitude.
The issue is heavily related to the issue of modernity as a specific form of
social organization. While tribes ("small groups") can still be considered
using the "natural" metaphor, and high cultures were still organized
hierarchically (with the emperor or the pope at the top), modern social
systems set science "free" to pursue this reconstruction in a
techno-economic evolution. "All that is solid, will melt into air" (Marx).
Because of our biological body, we are part of nature, but our minds are
entrained in a cultural dynamics at the supra-individual level ("culture")
which feeds back and at some places is able increasingly to invert the
hierarchy.
With best wishes,
Loet
_____
Loet Leydesdorff
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-20- 525 3681
<mailto:loet@leydesdorff.net> loet@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/
Now available:
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The Challenge of Scientometrics
_____
From: fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of John Collier
Sent: Monday, February 05, 2007 5:18 PM
To: Jerry LR Chandler; fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [Fis] Re: fis Digest, Vol 501, Issue 5
Hi folks,
I'll take a few minutes from my moving and dealing with academic emergencies
at UKZN to make a comment here.
Jerry brings up a point that keeps arising in the literature one constraints
and information. Recall that Shannon said that they are the same thing. That
is a clue.
Loet and I dealt with this issue previously on this list about a year ago
when he claimed that social communications channels open up new
possibilities (analogous to Jerry's position here), and I asked him why this
was so, since any further structure must reduce the possibilities, not
increase them. We each promoted out view for a while, and then stopped, as
it wasn't going anywhere. The reason is that there is nowhere to go with
this issue. Both positions are correct, and they do not contradict each
other; they are merely incompatible perspectives, much like Cartesian versus
polar coordinates. The positions are not logically incompatible, but
pragmatically incompatible, in that they cannot both be adopted at the same
time. This is a fairly common phenomenon in science. In fact I wrote my
dissertation on it. There is a paper of mine, Pragmatic Incommensurability,
in the Proceedings of the Philosophy of Science Association 1984 (PSA 1984)
that goes into the issue in more detail, but not as much as in my thesis. I
am kind of bored with the issue at the issue at this point, but it keeps
coming up, so I'll say a bit more.
Stan's bracket formulation is a logical restriction (constraint), with the
outer bracketed items logically restricting the inner ones. It is a neat
formulation for a system developed by W.E. Johnson in his book Logic, in
which he called the inner elements determinates and the outer ones
determinables. The idea is a basic one in the Philosophy business, and these
are the technical terms used there, although they are somewhat awkward,
being relative terms, and also not words used with their English meaning.
Jerry's problem is that if the chemical opens up a huge range of
possibilities not available to the physical, how can we call the physical a
constraint on the chemical. I once asked Stan a similar question, and he
gave me an answer that satisfied me enough not to pursue the issue. The
answer requires a distinction concerning constraints (which, recall, is
logically equivalent to information -- any connotative difference being
irrelevant to my point here). My colleagues and coauthors Wayne Christensen
and Cliff Hooker once referred to the difference between restricting and
enabling constraints. The former restrict possibilities, while the latter
are required in order to make things possible -- mush produces nothing. But
there is no essential difference -- context, if anything, makes the
difference. I say 'if anything' because in many cases constraints
(indistinguishable from information by logic alone) do both: restrict and
enable. There is no paradox here -- they are two sides of the same coin. A
Taoist like me sees them as Yin and Yang -- the Yang element is the defined
and restrictive, active, controlling part, while the Yin is the open,
receptive and enabling part. We cannot view the same thing as both Yin and
Yang at the same time (we can talk about it in the abstract, in the same way
that we can talk about Cartesian and polar coordinates together, and even
transform them on in to the other), but the thing itself is both, and the
transformations between Yin and Yang have a logical form that is predictable
and determinate. Just so with restricting and enabling constraints -- we can
learn to transform one into the other, both in thought and in practice.
I will now demonstrate this with Jerry's cases (though the ideas are hardly
peculiar to Jerry's cases)
At 05:16 PM 05/02/2007, Jerry LR Chandler wrote:
To: Igor / Ted / Stan
First, Igor.
I found your perspective here to be 180 degrees off from mine!
On Feb 5, 2007, at 6:01 AM, fis-request@listas.unizar.es wrote:
Reply to Steven and Ted
By "genetic constraints" I assume you simply mean that we have certain
capacities and are not omnipotent. Is not conflict and war an indicator of
our individual failure to manage social complexity? Or would you argue that
war is social complexity management?
I was referring to the hypothesis that we have the propensity to function in
relatively small groups bind by strong cultural bonds.
>From my perspective, enriched by chemical relations,
genetic system serve as fundamentally creative activities.
Genetic networks are not an amalgam of soft concepts, rather a genetic
network is a discrete interdependent network of chemical relations.
The enumeration of the creative genetic network is complete for some
organisms, some species.
In Aristotelian logical terms, the position of the species is between the
individual "point" and the "genus".
It is the chemical capacity to create species that I find to be absent from
your narrative.
Thus, I would re-phrase your hypothesis generating sentence:
From:
I was referring to the hypothesis that we have the propensity to function in
relatively small groups bind by strong cultural bonds.
To:
"I was referring to the hypothesis that genetic networks have the creative
capacity to function in very large associations that are linked together by
very weak bonds."
There is no difference between the two statements -- the scope in the 'from'
case is the Yang side of things, but in the 'to' case it is the Yin side.
One pays attention to the Yang aspects, and the other to the Yin aspects.
Both propensities are there, and the stronger the Yang propensity the more
it transforms into the Yin, and vice versa. Given a finite information
capacity, these are the only two possible dynamics, and they trade off
against each other. Now, if we have an expanding information capacity (phase
space), as Kaufman, Brooks and Wiley, Layzer, Landserg, Frautschi, Davies
and other notables have seen, we can get both together, though they still
trade off one against the other.
Ted's comment seems to be based on a some recent innovations in the
mathematics of hierarchies. The issue of how we select the meaning for our
symbols of representations of the world can be a very complicated one. The
profound limitations that linear and quasi - linear mathematics places on
the symbolic carrying capacity of signs may be relevant to Ted's statement.
But, I am not certain of the origins of his views.
Jerry, I think the way this is worded is not quite consistent with the
perspective you are promoting. We don't "select" the meaning of our symbols,
except perhaps in fairly formal contexts. If we did it would be very hard to
be usefully creative, I am sure you agree -- we could only select what we
already have a template for -- see my Dealing with the Unexpected from the
CASYS meetings examples.
Stan's comment deserves to be attended to.
"The many
complexities facing us as society can be parsed as follows, using a
specification hierarcy:
{physical constraints (material/chemical constraints {biological
constraints {sociocultural constraints}}}}."
As I search for the substance in this comment, I focus on what might be the
potentially misleading usage of the term "parsed." Nor, do I understand
why brackets, signifiers of separations, are used in this context.
I have no idea what it would mean to "parse" a "material / chemical
constraint" in this context.
See note on W.E. Johnson above. That is the standard source for the logic
here, and it is universally accepted among those who know it.
Indeed, chemical logic functions in exactly the opposite direction.
The creative relations grow with the complexity of the system. Is this not
what we mean by evolution?
But so do the constraints or restrictions, as Stan has been arguing for
years now. There is no inconsistency in both happening.
On a personal note to Stan: We have been discussing similar concepts since
the inception of WESS more than 20 years ago and it does not appear that we
are converging! :-) :-) :-) Unless you choose to embrace the creative
capacities of chemical logic, I fear your mind is doomed to the purgatory of
unending chaotic cycles, searching for a few elusive or perhaps imaginary
"fixed points." ;-) :-) :-( !!!
And there is no convergence. There are fixed points -- there have to be or
all we can have is mush -- but they are not where the action is. On the
other hand, the 'action' occurs only because of receptivity to being worked
on or guided by constraints that must relatively fixed. The divergence is
there in reality, and the place where there is convergence is beyond our
ability to grasp with an argument. I am sure that Stan knows this.
John
_____
Professor John Collier
collierj@ukzn.ac.za
Philosophy and Ethics, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 4041 South Africa
T: +27 (31) 260 3248 / 260 2292 F: +27 (31) 260 3031
http://www.ukzn.ac.za/undphil/collier/index.html
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Received on Tue Feb 6 08:39:32 2007
