Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id QAA13540 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 28 Jul 2000 16:01:31 +0100 From: "Chris Lofting" <ddiamond@ozemail.com.au> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Simple neural models Date: Sat, 29 Jul 2000 01:17:03 +1000 Message-ID: <LPBBICPHCJJBPJGHGMCIEELDCHAA.ddiamond@ozemail.com.au> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Importance: Normal In-Reply-To: <200007280217.WAA18284@mail2.lig.bellsouth.net> X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Joe's trichotomies:
focus/field/fringe
sign/signifier/signified
code/carrier/message
frequency/amplitude/waveform
He emphasises these in:
> You cannot reduce the focus to the field or fringe,
> the fringe to the focus or field, or the field to the focus or fringe.
> You cannot reduce the sign to the signified or signifier, the signifier
> to the sign or signified, or the signified to the sign or signifier. You
> cannot reduce the code to the carrier or the message, the carrier to
> the message or code, or the message to the code or carrier. You
> cannot reduce frequency to amplitude or waveform, amplitude to
> frequency or waveform, or waveform to amplitude or frequency, and
> in fact you have never done so, and lie when you maintain that you
> have, because it simply cannot be done.
This paragraph is of interest in that it may contain a fundamental
confusion, however this will become clearer after a summary of some
basics...
My emphasis (to summarise) is:
(1) we make maps by using recursive dichotomisations.
(2) these dichotomisations have a format, namely that of 1:many where the 1
is fixed and the many variable.
(3) we can symbolise dichotomisation in the form of A/~A.
In my earlier post I emphasised that trichotomies come out of the ~A, there
are no trichotomies in A in that you cannot take the trichotomy as a
fundamental, nor the dichotomy, these are always dealing with HARMONICS. The
A is the fundamental, the ~A all else.
Joe emphasises the irreducability of the trichotomies and I emphasise that
these CAN be reduced in that being harmonics they are reducable to the
fundamental. I have always emphasised the distinctions of whole, parts,
static relationships, dynamic relationships. These distinctions come from
simple recursive dichotomisation and we can see the source of Joe's
trichotomies when we apply the recursion:
basic dichotomy : A,~A
after first recursion: AA, A~A, ~AA, ~A~A
Note that we still have ONE A but the process has forced the emergence of a
~A that has been differentiated into THREE and this is the source of the
trichotomy.
ALL of Joe's trichotomies contain SECONDARY terms, HARMONICS of a
fundamental. Joe's emphasis is so aspects-oriented in his work that it leads
to the 'dumping' of the fundamental where these trichotomies are seen as if
fundamental, they are not. You cannot have the concepts of frequency,
amplitude, waveform WITHOUT a fundamental concept of a wave but you CAN have
the concept of a wave without knowledge of the particular aspects mentioned
(and we can add more aspects...)
Thus the FULL set of terms is always a TWO (A/~A) or a FOUR
(AA,A~A,~AA,~A~A) or an EIGHT etc etc. If you exagerate the ~A elements by
dropping the fundamental then you get THREE, SEVEN, FIFTEEN etc etc and this
is an error in that this can take you into ga-ga land if you take the THREE
as fundamental. Thus the trichotomies, any X-otomies, are reducable to a
dichotomy (A/~A) which can be reduced to the 'one' but that serves no
purpose since to analyse we need some degree of difference.
From a development perspective, Freud came up with the trichotomy of
ID,EGO,SUPEREGO and Charles Pierce came up with the trichotomy of firstness,
secondness, thirdness. BOTH failed to make the distinctions in
thirdness/SUPEREGO that the relational emphasis is too general, they failed
to emphasise the distinctions between STATIC relationships and DYNAMIC
relationships, thus the development pattern of ID, ID vs EGO, ID+EGO vs
SUPEREGO (IOW the ID+EGO of OTHERS)shows bifurcations at work. (with this in
mind, the elements of Joe's trichotomies can be mapped to parts, statics,
and dynamics; there is no fundamental stated and that is required in any
sort of analysis of meaning generation etc.)
I have consistantly emphasised the distinctions of BLEND (whole), BOND
(Static relationships), BOUND (parts), and BIND (dynamic relationships) and
have above demonstrated these patterns in Joe's trichotomies which IMHO lack
precision by leaving out the fundamental.
Furthermore, if you change levels of analysis, to make each element of the
trichotomy the fundamental then the SAME patterns will come out, the
distinction of a fundamental and its harmonics and the recursion of this
distinction making creates descriptive states that work along a binary tree
pattern, no trichotomies other than those you create out of harmonics. These
creations are the 'same' as we find in music, 3rds, 5ths, 7ths etc etc and
you cannot describe these without mentioning the KEY. Otherwise the world of
harmonics lacks grounding and you can create anything you like.
For whatever his reasons, Joe seems to find problems with the BBBB concepts,
I think the above may show the 'error' that is causing his problems, namely
the failure to 'see' hierarchic systems and the brain's use of PRIMARY and
SECONDARY distinctions; IMHO Joe is 'stuck' in the SECONDARY and tries to
interpret it as PRIMARY -- a mistake.
Chris.
------------------
Chris Lofting
websites:
http://www.eisa.net.au/~lofting
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~ddiamond
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