Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id VAA11861 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 18 Apr 2001 21:04:25 +0100 From: <joedees@bellsouth.net> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2001 15:06:49 -0500 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: The Tipping Point Message-ID: <3ADDAD89.28068.549B02@localhost> In-reply-to: <20010418110532.B11172@ii01.org> References: <3ADC5862.25994.30C1CB@localhost>; from joedees@bellsouth.net on Tue, Apr 17, 2001 at 02:51:14PM -0500 X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.12c) Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On 18 Apr 2001, at 11:05, Robin Faichney wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 17, 2001 at 02:51:14PM -0500, joedees@bellsouth.net wrote:
> > On 17 Apr 2001, at 15:13, Robin Faichney wrote: > > > > That
> TV/camera dynamic can also be made to feedback, (and change the > > >
> picture sent to it), by pointing the camera at the monitor. > > >
> Controlling the 'tipping points' of luminosity and color can result >
> > > in some rather beautifully kinetic images. > > > > True. I've
> done that myself. But does that makes it a better analogy > > in this
> case? > > > Of course it does, though still not perfect, as the camera
> and the > TV cannot decide where on the screen to focus; this requires
> the > freely willed choice of one of us human causal nexi.
>
> In other words, it misses the central issue.
>
Well, a grain of sand, or a pile of it, doesn't have free choice, either,
but the pile DOES possess a structure which is greater than the
sum of its parts ( all the interrelationships between them must be
considered). In fact, the genesis of the tipping point idea came
about with catastrophe theory (CATASTROPHE THEORY by V. I.
Arnold, pub.1986 by Springer-Verlag is a good source), and
informed the SDIC (Sensitive Dependence on Initial Conditions) so-
called 'Butterfly Effect" found in chaos and complexity theory.
>
> > Surely the support given by the rest of the grains in an
> > interrelated pile of them is significant; along with the
> > gravitational coefficient that both knits them together as a gestalt
> > and establishes the slope of the tipping point, indeed, the MOST
> > significant.
>
> Tell us just what it is, in the behaviour of any one grain, that
> cannot be fully explained by its own properties and the interactions
> with its immediate neighbours and gravity.
>
Why those immediate naighbors are in the positions that they are
in to influence the target grain the way they do. That has to do
with the grains surrounding THEM, and so on, to involve the whole
pile. Lines of gravity-induced potential energy suffuse the whole
structure.
>
> > > > interesting- leading me to wonder if 'effect' is not the
> > > > illusion.
> > >
> > > Only if you take "ultimate" to be implied, and if so, then "cause"
> > > is equally illusory. These are mere links in a chain, or,
> > > slightly more accurately, nodes in a net of influence, which in
> > > one sense is simply the settling of the universe into the state of
> > > maximum entropy.
> > >
> > Can't have that; that'd be unsuperdeterministic. Everything is
> > always ordered in a superdeterministic universe; the shackles of
> > causality imprison forever <snicker>.
>
> The prison's in your mind, Joe, not mine.
>
I'm no superdeterminist; I was lampooning it. You must be willfully
obtuse not to pick up that fact, or pettily malevolent to recognize
yet ignore it.
>
> > > > >So how can you also claim that events on one level influence
> > > > >those on another, when the former *is* the latter?
> > > >
> > > > At any reasonable level of explanation, calling the universe the
> > > > ultimate cause is unwise, if not untrue.
> > >
> > > That's absolutely true. This only works at the very highest
> > > level, and of course, as I keep saying over and over again, the
> > > concept of causation only really works -- or, at least, works best
> > > -- if both cause and effect are at the same level. The universe
> > > (at one moment) causes only the universe (at the next moment).
> > >
> > And everything in it, such as the P-E pairs?
>
> I quote:
> > > as I keep saying over and over again, the concept of
> > > causation only really works -- or, at least, works best -- if both
> > > cause and effect are at the same level.
>
> > > Actually, there is a very close parallel between the claims that
> > > (a) a conscious decision causes neural activity, and (b) the
> > > universe causes any particular event within it -- despite Joe's
> > > disparagment of the latter notion. Both are top-down causation,
> > > and both, in my view, are entirely *in*valid.
> > >
> > Then you repudiate the Buddhist doctrine of co-dependent
> > origination, which asserts precisely what you just denied. If one
> > tosses a whole ball, all of the ball's parts tend to tag along, even
> > if you weren't touching them during your toss.
>
> That's because they're tied together, Joe. No magic required! :-)
>
Aren't all those dynamically recursive pattern configurations tied to
the substrate from which they emerge? Why, yepperz! And just
like the whole ball travels when you just touch a part in your toss,
the emergent configurational part can decide to move attention and
the neural pathways in the material substrate will register same.
>
> > (P-E pairs are an
> > exception because they're not connected to anything else but each
> > other).
>
> Indeed.
>
> > If you choose to look at something, your visual cortex is
> > selectively accessed, and neural pathways are used as a matter of
> > course, but the decision to do so both logically and empirically
> > precedes the selective pathway stimulation.
>
> Diagonal causation.
>
Does not account for spatiotemporal succession between cause at
one level and effect at another, which PET-scans voluminously
record; smoke and mirrors pseudosolution.
>
> > It's been mereologically known for lo
> > these many years, and now we have beau coup PET-scans to
> > corroborate same for the course and efficacy of human
> > consciousness; PET-scans which Robin continues to dismiss,
> > dispute, misinterpret, misconstrue, and/or ignore.
>
> Results which are perfectly explained by the concept of diagonal
> causation which Joe continues to dismiss, dispute, misinterpret,
> misconstrue, and/or ignore.
>
You invoke diagonal causation, while denying vertical causation,
like someone who worships Jesus but denies Jehovah.
>
> > > > But there is also some real reason for
> > > > this scientific ape to deal with the universe from a single
> > > > perspective.
> > >
> > > Why should any particular perspective be given precedence?
> > >
> > If, and only if, its adoption is more useful to
> > understanding/explaining that which is being studied than its
> > absence, or the adoption of an alternative view.
>
> So you agree with me that selection of the best perspective depends
> upon the context.
>
But I also state that more complex phenomena cannot be
explained by recourse to the vocabulary used to explain simpler
ones; to attempt to do so is simplistic and reductionistic. You
need to read Daniel C. Dennett's THE INTENTIONAL STANCE and
Stephen Stich's FROM FOLK PSYCHOLOGY TO COGNITIVE
SCIENCE.
> --
> Robin Faichney
> Inside Information shatters the walls of mental prisons -
> http://www.ii01.org
>
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>
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This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
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For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
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