LS Re: Retrospect


Hugo Fjelsted Alroe (alroe@vip.cybercity.dk)
Wed, 1 Oct 1997 04:05:55 +0100


In response to Jason and Bo, on my mail on the levels.

Jason:
I will have to postpone a larger explication of Bateson until I get better
time (whatever that means :-) I have not read Capra's latest book, I did not
value his first books that much, though.

> At this early
>"objective" level we can find the physical correlates to our sensory and
>emotional experiences. Resorting to the popular computer analogy, our
>neurological system is the "hardware" upon which our "software" runs.

I agree with Bo on being reluctant towards this metaphor. I think the
reasons for the sharp distinction between hard- and software in traditional
computers are to be found in the engineering-like method of constructing
working computers - it is easier to maintain control of what is happening.
The distinction seems to disappear in neural nets - or?

>At the next level of abstraction, our social influences come into play. An
>important point to note here (IMHO) is the fact that all value patterns from
>this point on are "subjective" in their nature. They have no independent
>material embodiment outside of the inorganic and biological patterns that they
>depend upon and influence.

Maybe I am a bit more radical than you here, at least I dont like the
'independent material embodiment' phrase. If you by this mean that the
physical or inorganic 'things' are necessarily material then I disagree. By
this I mean that even at the inorganic level there are no such thing as
'independent things with properties'. The 'properties of things' idea
reflects the subject-object distinction on higher levels, it is a SOM idea
of the physical world. Even on the physical levels new relations are formed
(the term value is perhaps not appropiate here) and when we call such
relations properties we are prone to forget the might-have-been's and the
may-be's of other relations. The reason why this evolutionary aspect of the
physical reality has mainly been overlooked, I take to be the predominance
of determinism in the history of natural philosophy and physics, arising
from either the idea of the world being eternal or the idea of the world
being created. The evolutionary view of the world is a very recent
phenomenon (though we can find traces in ancient Greece too) and there is a
long way to go before it has transformed the way we view the world and our
language as an integrated part of this worldview.

> Because the MoQ subsumes the SOM, much of
>the wisdom and insight contained in this heritage may be applied to our
present
>endeavor with little or no translation.

I am far from optimistic on this. Knowledge entails the presumptions
entertained in bringing out the knowledge. I agree that some areas of
knowledge can be used without much change, but these areas are those where
objectivism is a justifiable presumption and hence areas where humans do not
play a part. On all the areas where we do play a part, we have to reevaluate
the intellectual heritage, - and these areas are those with which we should
be most concerned.

Bo:
I pretty much agree.

Thanks for your response
Hugo

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