Doug Renselle (renselle@on-net.net)
Wed, 26 Nov 1997 18:58:09 +0100
Hi Martin and TLS,
Terms:
AI - Artificial Intelligence
DQ - Dynamic Quality
GEB - Goedel, Escher, Bach
OS - Operating System
QM - Quantum Mechanics
SOM - Subject Object Metaphysics
SQ - Static Quality
TLS - The Lila Squad
The segments in the post from the religious-talk newsgroup are
interesting. It is clear that the thinking there is Smoothening.
This is getting old, I know, but Smoothening is about ONE (the
objective) truth. That means ONE (the objective) context.
(Aside: For those of you who do not like the word 'proselytize,' I need
to declare my intentions here. I am an MoQ proselyte! So when I use
that word, please think of me that way, which in your context may be for
better or for worse.)
When you consider the infinite contexts of the multiverse and attempt to
map them on to a single context you reap an abundance of paradice (my
plural for paradox). Just for example, consider all the contexts of all
the civilizations on all the planets in all the universe. I estimate
there are greater than 10^40 civilizations in our local universe alone.
Each of these is as large or larger than Earth's planetary
civilization. Now extend that to the multiverse which very likely
composes an infinity of universes like ours.
I am using this very wide scope example because of Maggie's admitted
problem of not being able to see the forest for the trees. Some of us
can't see the trees for the grass and so on... Again, the issue is
context and the mapping of context onto one or many domains.
(The vast majority of SOMites map to Earth, and thus in Hofstadter's
terms become Earth chauvinists. Most SOMites are Earth-, human-, and
one-life-centric, just to mention a few of their centricities. To me,
this is limited thinking caused by the SOM culture. This is what Pirsig
denigrates about SOM in Lila.)
Pirsig, Hofstadter, Alexander, and the founders of QM have given us a
better way to deal with this: Many truths, and thus many contexts.
Logic combined with any language operating in a biformal sentient and
denying many truths results in paradice. (Can't you just see the SOM
neon lights pointing and pointing and pointing toward -> PARADICE?)
Martin, thanks for sharing that post! It spawns some really interesting
ideas. My guess is that the author of that post read Pirsig or other
similar metaphysicians, but did not attribute. If he invented the
levels, we need to ask him to join TLS (we should anyway).
Per your question about Hofstadter: I read GEB. I read portions of his
Metamagical Themas. In past posts on TLS I quoted segments from each of
these. Hofstadter is into, guess what? PATTERNs!! In his world,
patterns are the result of an MoQ-like process. In his research he
limits himself to the patterns of intellect, though. His goal is AI. I
tried to get him interested in TLS, but he rejected my attempts. His
loss.
Hofstadter's protégés abound. One is at SFI (Santa Fe Institute), and
she is brilliant. Her work too is on/about AI. Many attempts were made
to automate recursive transformational grammars. Several researchers
attempted to automate Noam Chomsky's work. Most failed, thus the
appropriate emphasis on patterns.
I am not certain of this, but I believe Hofstadter's work on
self-referent (recursive) language forms and his attendant publication
of those in Scientific American and Metamagical Themas resulted in the
spate of computer viruses which arose in the '80s. He essentially
showed software 'engineers' HOW to build viruses. That seemed worse at
the time, but now we see it as better because an industry arose to
protect our environments from harmful viruses. (Do you see the parallel
here of the cultural immune system and the Brujo?) Note that viruses
can be constructive or destructive. Unfortunately, they gained the
latter reputation. We do not call the constructive ones viruses now.
We call them agents. Some fascinating work is underway on (intentional)
virus-spawning OSs. Again, see any parallels to the four levels?
Here are the books I know of that Hofstadter wrote:
o GEB - Goedel, Escher, Bach; An Eternal Golden Braid; This is a
storehouse of Pirsig-relevant material.
o Metamagical Themas - Mostly articles from his work in Scientific
American.
o The Mind's I - coauthored with Dennett; mostly on AI. (Magnus will
love this, if he hasn't already read it.)
o Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies - most recent; I am reading
now.
Another pattern/context guru mentioned in TLS recently by Dave Thomas is
Christopher Alexander. Alexander started my thinking on the issue of
singular vs. multiple contexts in 1980.
Here are the books I know of which Alexander wrote:
o Notes on the Synthesis of Form - As far as I know this is his first
book. Absolutely excellent. It started a massive wave of change in
Object-Oriented methodologies. It affected architectural thinking more
than others.
o The Timeless Way of Building - 1st vol. He defines PATTERNs here in a
way that the software weenies can develop component objects in a new
way. I read this one about 4 years ago. I can tell you now and
unequivocally that Platt, Diana, and Mark would love this text. It
emphasizes both DQ and SQ.
o A Pattern Language - 2nd vol. I am in this one now.
o The Oregon Experiment - 3rd vol.
I think he wrote many more.
The above books complement Pirsig's work. All are superb and open new
avenues of thought. Caveat: Pirsig rejected Notes on the Synthesis of
Form out of hand in a letter to me dated 24Jan96. My opinion is that he
should have spent a little more time with the book and its successors.
Alexander is more MoQ than SOM, IMhO. Scan The Timeless Way of
Building, and see if you agree.
Thanks for sharing Martin!
Mtty,
Doug Renselle.
-- Martin Striz wrote: > > Hello Lila Squad, > > I was reading through my school's 000.marshall.religious-talk > newsgroup > when I came across this posting: > > -------------------------------------------------------- > > Relay-Version: ANU News - V6.1B10 04/18/95 OpenVMS AXP; site hobbit > Path: marshall.edu!not-for-mail > Newsgroups: 0.marshall.religious-talk > Subject: Re: paradox in religion > Message-ID: <1997Nov20.083957.14913@hobbit> > From: Raymond A Bailey <bailey9@users.marshall.edu> > Date: 20 Nov 97 08:39:57 EST > References: <> References: <1997Nov14.085259.14752@hobbit> > <> <1997Nov14.130223.14763@hobbit> > <> <1997Nov17.074425.14789@hobbit> <> <1997Nov17.074425.14789@hobbit> <1997Nov19.164804.14900@hobbit> > Distribution: world > Nntp-Posting-Host: users.marshall.edu > X-Newsreader: TIN [UNIX 1.3 unoff BETA 970424; alpha OSF1 V4.0] > Lines: 75 > > : Just like the Rick's statement, if it's true, it's false. However, > : since it is exclusively self-referential, if it is false, then it's > : true. How can this be? Is the statement true or false? Or is it > : meaningless? No, it is not meaningless, or otherwise we would not > : be able to conclude that if it's true, it's false, and if it's > false, > : it's true. > > : ~~~~~~ > : But the above addresses paradox from an exclusively > : philosophical/logical perspective. What is paradox to religion? > : Does paradox have value? I find paradox to be valuable as an > : intellectual exercise (plus it can be fun). But is paradox of > : deeper significance in religion? Any thoughts? > > : --Chad > > I've been thinking about this problem for a while (since Dr. Bady's > post), > and I think I can only offer two comments, neither of which may be > truly > meaningful. > > First, I doubt seriously you'll be able to isolate any truths in > todays > average religion that exist in a paradoxical state. > > There is an interesting study of paradox in a book by Dougas > Hofstader > called "GEB" affectionately, or properly "Godel, Escher, Bach: The > Eternal > Golden Braid". First let me offer an unequivocal recommendation for > this > book. Paradox usually comes about when a statement or idea spans two > logical "layers", if you will. Heres a rudimentary diagram that I use > frequently: > > --------------------------- > Intellectual? > --------------------------- > Social (gleeful colonies of organisms) > --------------------------- > Biological (organisms) > --------------------------- (certainly more substrata in > here) > Physical (atoms) > --------------------------- > > There's no kind of wishwash newage metaphysics here, these layers > simply > describe "orders" of existence, or complexity in evolution. It's often > possible that social "truths" can conflict with biological ones in > ways > that seem paradoxical. For example human beings are equipped, by god > supposedly, with reproductive facilities, yet social truths (perhaps > most > noticeably during the victorian era) were rock solid on the fact that > they > were cursed instruments and really shouldn't be used. That's my idea > of a > paradox, but it's > very easily resolved when you consider the meaning of the two truths > individually. There are two layers of meaning at work in that > statement- > two systems. One uses the other as a foundation but is not a function > of > it. > > Language is the cause of paradox; it's difficult for one language, > especially in the course of one statement, to resolve schizm (for lack > of a > better word) between formal layers of complexity. Hofstader has a more > elegant presentation of this idea that deals with AI programming > languages > that are often forced to resolve issues occurring on different logical > layers in a program. There's a great deal of talk about pushing and > popping > and such. > > Shooting from the hip, however, I can level all sorts of things that > I > find somewhat paradoxical at Christians, specifically. It's because > Christianity is the only religion I'm intimately familiar with that > constantly delivers mandates about the nature of the universe, and > other > stuff like that. One of those ideas is that if some God created the > Universe in a well thought out way, why then, isn't the path to a > closer > relationship with God the study of his Universe? It seems instead that > Christians (a good portion of them anyway) tend to reject all the > truths > we're able to determine, even though they were extrapolated by nothing > more > than the very Universe that all-mighty, all seeing, ad nauseaum God > himself > has created for us to mingle around in. That doesn't fit the simple > idea of > paradox that I think we all agree on elegantly, but it certainly has > the > effect of making me throw my arms into the air (perhaps even > delivering a > stream of expletives) each time I think of it. > > I don't think such paradoxes in Christianity can be resolved, > primarily > because I think Christianity has a very limited lifespan when faced > with > the overwhelming evidence produced by the diligent study of the > Universe in > which we live. > > -- > --------------------------------------------- > R. Andrew Bailey, Jaded > Sr. Systems Programmer, MU Computing Services > http://www.marshall.edu/~bailey9/ > > -------------------------------------- > > Is anyone familiar with Douglas Hofstader? I can't determine from the > wording whether the author invented these levels himself or got them > from > Hofstader, in either case, it just struck me that someone else divided > reality into these subsets. > > martin >-- "That figure whose attitude best expresses the passion that moves it is most worthy of praise."Leonardo da Vinci, MS 2038, Biblioteque Nationale, Paris, 29v.
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