From: L-Soft list server at St. John's University (1.8c) To: Ian Pitchford Subject: File: "SCI-CULT LOG9612" Date: Sunday, September 27, 1998 10:19 AM ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 2 Dec 1996 11:40:54 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Robert Maxwell Young Subject: Call for papers on time and memory X-To: psa-public-sphere@sheffield.ac.uk Antithesis an interdisciplinary postgraduate journal of criticism, culture and theory Issue 8.2 Call for papers on the theme: 'Time and Memory' ARTICLES REVIEWS FICTION POETRY GRAPHICS Antithesis is seeking academic papers on the above theme, particularly articles relating this theme to the work of any of the following thinkers: Bergson, Freud, Lacan, Deleuze, Whitehead, Derrida, Heidegger, etc Issue 8.2 will also include a selection of the proceedings from the 'Time and Memory' conference (including the Deleuze Symposium) that was held in Melbourne in late September of 1996. Conference abstracts can be viewed at: http://cougar.vut.edu.au/~jongr/abstracts.html Deadline for Antithesis submissions: 10 January 1997 Articles (of up to 6000 words), poetry, fiction, reviews and graphics can be sent to: Antithesis English and Cultural Studies Department, University of Melbourne, Parkville Victoria 3052 Australia Submissions must include SSAE, two hard copies and a 3.5 floppy disc version For further information contact the above address or e-mail either of the following: gjones@essex.vut.edu.au GrahamJones@vut.edu.au Or consult the Antithesis Home page at: http://cougar.vut.edu.au/~jongr/antithesis.html Please copy this message and forward it to any interested parties or to any e-mail lists that you subscribe to. Thank you. __________________________________________ Robert Maxwell Young: robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk 26 Freegrove Rd., London N7 9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306 fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic Studies, University of Sheffield. Home page and writings: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/ US mirror site: http://rdz.stjohns.edu/human-nature/rmyoung/papers/index.html Process Press publications: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html 'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 5 Dec 1996 12:09:48 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Robert Maxwell Young Subject: Forum on history of neuroscience X-To: psa-public-sphere@sheffield.ac.uk HISTNEUR-L: The History of Neuroscience Forum. PURPOSE: HISTNEUR-L provides a forum for exchanging information on any aspect of the History of Neuroscience. It includes announcements, inquiries, and discussion on access to historical sources and their use and interpretation. AUDIENCE: Membership is open to anyone interested in neuroscience history, including but by no means limited to historians, scientists, students, instructors, curators, publishers, archivists, and librarians. The listserv is maintained for the benefit of the International Society for the History of the Neurosciences (ISHN), but is open to all (anyone with an e-mail account and an interest in the subject can subscribe without restriction). HOW TO SUBSCRIBE: To join the list (even though the term "subscribe" is used, there is not and will not be a fee), send an e-mail message to LISTPROC@LIBRARY.UCLA.EDU with the following request in the message area: SUBSCRIBE HISTNEUR-L [Yourfirstname, Yourlastname, institution] example: SUBSCRIBE HISTNEUR-L Russell Johnson, UCLA Be sure the message is contained in a single line in the message area; the subject line should be blank. You need not include the comma and the institutional identification, but the latter is helpful to the list moderator and other subscribers. Note that you do _not_ include your e-mail address, only your full name. This is because ListProc, the listserv software, automatically reads the return address on your subscription message and uses that as your e-mail address. Because of this, be sure to be logged on and to send the subscription request from the account or address to which you want HISTNEUR-L messages sent! FOR MORE INFORMATION, or if you have problems subscribing or issuing other commands, please contact the List Owner: Russell A. Johnson (310) 206-2336 Archivist, Science Collections University Research Library, UCLA Box 951575 Los Angeles CA 90095-1575 USA rjohnson@library.ucla.edu __________________________________________ Robert Maxwell Young: robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk 26 Freegrove Rd., London N7 9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306 fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic Studies, University of Sheffield. Home page and writings: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/ US mirror site: http://rdz.stjohns.edu/human-nature/rmyoung/papers/index.html Process Press publications: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html 'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 21:47:03 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Lucas Parra Subject: taking stand on Intellectual Property As we have entered the information age it appears fundamental for to me as a scientist and humanist to define my stands on the set of issues which is currently summarized under the term "intellectual property": Information is fragile and free. It is the ultimate product of human activity. It is not yours but the result of generations creating structure in an universe of increasing entropy. Create it, store it, use it, but never own it. Intellectual property is public property. In recent trade wars (USA/China) *private* intellectual property has been put in front of human rights as you would expect it from a neo-liberal world order, which seeks to extend the concept of "private property" of material goods to the realm of ideas. Modern society is loosing a historic opportunity to move from a competitive society to a cooperative society. It is currently not at all decided whether in an information society competition is more productive than cooperation. In history the free flow of information however has shown clearly to improve the existential living conditions of the human being. As a scientist and child of the Internet I have confirmed my believe that generous collaboration creates more and better than secretive greed. Lucas Parra ---------------------------------------- www.humanism.org/~lucas ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 06:10:51 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Robert Maxwell Young Subject: Book recommendation X-To: psa-public-sphere@sheffield.ac.uk From: ingram_b@ix.netcom.com Subject: Book Recommendation The following book may be of interest to some of you. I have no proprietary interests in it, but merely find it fascinating and especially relevant to anyone interested in education/training and media. Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass. The Media Equation: How People Treat Computers, Television, and New Media Like Real People and Places. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications and Cambridge University Press, 1996, 303 pp. >From the book jacket: "According to popular wisdom, humans never relate to a computer or a television program in the same way they relate to another human being. Or do they? In an extraordinary revision of received wisdom, Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass demonstrate convincingly in The Media Equation that interactions with computers, television, and new communication technologies are identical to real social relationships and to the navigation of real physical spaces. "Authors Reeves and Nass present the results of numerous psychological studies that led them to the conclusion that people treat computers, television and new media as real people and places. Their studies show that people are polite to computers; that they treat computers with female voices differently than male-voiced computers; that large faces on a screen can invade a person's body space; and that motion on a screen affects physical responses in the same way that real-life motion does. One of their startling conclusions is that the human brain has not evolved quickly enough to assimilate twentieth-century technology. The authors detail how this knowledge can help us better design and evaluate media technologies, including computer and Internet software, television entertainment, news and advertising, and multimedia. "Using everyday language, the authors explain their novel ideas in a way that will engage general readers with an interest in cutting edge research at the intersection of psychology, communication and computer technology. The result is that The Media Equation is an accessible summary of exciting ideas for modern times. As Bill Gates says, Nass and Reeves show us some 'amazing things'." CONTENTS Introduction 1 The Media Equation Media and Manners 2 Politeness 3 Interpersonal Distance 4 Flattery 5 Judging Others and Ourselves Media and Personality 6 Personality of Characters 7 Personality of Interfaces 8 Imitating Personality 9 Good versus Bad 10 Negativity 11 Arousal Media and Social Roles 12 Specialists 13 Teammates 14 Gender 15 Voices 16 Source Orientation Media and Form 17 Image Size 18 Fidelity 19 Synchrony 20 Motion 21 Scene Changes 22 Subliminal Images Final Words 23 Conclusions about the Media Equation Robert Ingram Ingram Communications 33717 Second Street Union City, CA 94587 (510) 475-7239 ingram_b@ix.netcom.com __________________________________________ Robert Maxwell Young: robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk 26 Freegrove Rd., London N7 9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306 fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic Studies, University of Sheffield. Home page and writings: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/ US mirror site: http://rdz.stjohns.edu/human-nature/rmyoung/papers/index.html Process Press publications: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html 'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 14:20:25 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Hobson Sherren Subject: SaC: Intellectual property Lucas Parra refers to the ... > > neo-liberal world order, which seeks to extend the concept of "private > property" of material goods to the realm of ideas. > > Modern society is loosing a historic opportunity to move from a > competitive society to a cooperative society. It is currently not at > all decided whether in an information society competition is more > productive than cooperation. In history the free flow of information > however has shown clearly to improve the existential living conditions > of the human being. > > As a scientist and child of the Internet I have confirmed my believe > that generous collaboration creates more and better than secretive > greed. > Bob Young recommends (independently; not in response to Lucas) ... > > Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass. The Media Equation: How People Treat > Computers, Television, and New Media Like Real People and Places. > > >From the book jacket: > "According to popular wisdom, humans never relate to a computer or a > television program in the same way they relate to another human being. > Or do they? In an extraordinary revision of received wisdom, Byron > Reeves and Clifford Nass demonstrate convincingly in The Media Equation > that interactions with computers, television, and new communication > technologies are identical to real social relationships and to the > navigation of real physical spaces. It might be interesting to consider these concepts of "generous collaboration" (remembering that there are recent analyses available of "the gift economy") and "real social relationships" in the context of Cameron and Barbrook's "The Californian Ideology". This latter, incidentally, is now also available in Italian, thanks to Pino Caputo, at the Chaos site: http://services.csi.it/~chaos/dieci.htm (highly recommended to readers of Italian). I'd also recommend the following analysis, which is probably only available in Italian, unfortunately: Lorenzo Cillario: L'Economia degli Spettri [The Spectral Economy] (1996 manifestolibri, ISBN 88-7285-086-X). In his first section, he develops his concept of "cognitive capitalism". At the end of the second section (The "Imperfect" Democracy of Capital), we find a discussion of "Forms and Property", based on C.B. Macpherson: Liberty and Property at the Origins of Bourgeois Thought. Of particular interest, in the above context, p. 117: "Modifications of property in relation with the 'cognitive' nature of goods": <> Sorry about the inelegant translation. Even if no-one is moved to follow up this 'link' immediately, I wanted to at least point it out (for future interest?). In particular, I note Cillario's reference to the mental dimension and the term 'projection', here, and hope there will eventually be some discussion of Bob Young's formulation of "Mental Space" in this labour-process perspective. Ciao Sherren ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 16:36:47 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Arie Dirkzwager Subject: Re: SaC: Intellectual property At 14:20 9-12-96 +0100, you wrote: >It might be interesting to consider these concepts of "generous >collaboration" (remembering that there are recent analyses available of >"the gift economy") and "real social relationships" in the context of >Cameron and Barbrook's >"The Californian Ideology". Could you give the (English) references? Thanks! Arie Prof.Dr.A.Dirkzwager, Educational Instrumentation Technology, Computers in Education. Huizerweg 62, 1402 AE Bussum, The Netherlands. voice: x31-35-6933258 FAX: x31-35-6930762 E-mail: aried@xs4all.nl {========================================================================} When reading the works of an important thinker, look first for the apparent absurdities in the text and ask yourself how a sensible person could have written them." T. S. Kuhn, The Essential Tension (1977). =========================================================================== Accept that some days you are the statue, and some days you are the bird. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 14:29:39 -0700 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Matt Chew Subject: Deteriorating with Consumption "But information is infinitely reproducible, they add; it's the first '= good' that does not deteriorate with consumption." Two points: Information can deteriorate as it is transmitted across socio-cultural = boundaries, as a result of translation, re-interpretation, and changing = context. Information can also deteriorate as falsification renders it 'obsolete'. = There is a lag time in information and technology transfer. For example, = even in U.S. natural resources management, we notice that there is still = sometimes a lag of as much as a generation in the conceptual models = underlying recent management plans. Which raises other interesting = questions about rates and modes of information transmission (and = information acceptance or rejection) even where current technology = operates... -MKC ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 18:09:19 -0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Matthew Baggott Subject: Re: SaC: Intellectual property In-Reply-To: <199612091324.FAA29174@itsa.ucsf.edu> I think there are obvious parallels between the tendency to theorize about "information" in the abstract sense (as if it has meaning outside a cultural context) and Richard Dawkins-style theories about genes. Both harmonize with a strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one would draw the boundary) culture. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 10 Dec 1996 16:11:00 +0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Brown, Alex" Subject: Re.Re: SaC: Intellectual property >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg Date: 10th December 1996 Matthew Baggott writes: "I think there are obvious parallels between the tendency to theorize about "information" in the abstract sense (as if it has meaning outside a cultural context) and Richard Dawkins-style theories about genes. Both harmonize with a strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one would draw the boundary) culture." Exactly. While we can consider information to be that property which in-forms or characterizes material or intellectual products, It cannot be isolated from the products themselves. It is immanent to them. Indeed we can only recognize 'information' as such as a regularity, pattern or statistical recurrence of certain characteristics in a large number of forms. Where is information? Information is 'nowhere'. There is no platonic realm where it exists of itself. If we want to see it, we look for the measurable similarities which inform experience and all of which are the product of human activity. The Dawkin's-style theories, as Matthew observes, suggest otherwise and when, as now, applied to society and culture in the form of the ubiquitous and contagious 'meme' travel 'through the air' so to speak. The pre-Einsteinian ether has been reconstituted as the memetic dimension where apparently we breath ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH US. Human history and ingenuity in the form of combining and recombining previous forms of behaviour or material into new cultural formulations (paradigms, theories, styles, genres), is here rendered superfluous. Apparently we are simply the vehicles for selfish genes in the biological dimension and equally selfish memes in the cultural and social dimension. What we have here, of course is a new theology - theobiology - where god (dethroned from his former celestial home by human thought) now resides in the genetic underworld and carries out its great plan from there. It is no coincidence that in a collection of memetic web pages on the net, there is a site devoted to - Wait for it! - Church of the Virus. The "strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one would draw the boundary) culture." to which Matthew refers is, I would suggest the need for a purposeful Maker to manipulate and drive the human system, an ever present consciousness, a teleology. Asian philosophies (Buddhism, Taoism) do not require such an interventionist watchmaker. The system grows, develops and changes by itself and within this there is some degree of human freedom and the positive or negative consequences of whatever actions we take. ("Empty and marvellous"). Are these genetic and memetic concepts a sign of intellectual exhaustion in the West? regards Alex Brown Singapore ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 10 Dec 1996 11:28:03 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Hobson Sherren Subject: SaC: Intellectual Property Arie Dirkzwager wrote in reply to my posting yesterday: > > At 14:20 9-12-96 +0100, you wrote: > > >It might be interesting to consider these concepts of "generous > >collaboration" (remembering that there are recent analyses available of > >"the gift economy") and "real social relationships" in the context of > >Cameron and Barbrook's > >"The Californian Ideology". > > Could you give the (English) references? Thanks! > Arie The latter has been available for some time at: http://www.wmin.ac.uk/media/HRC/ci/calif1.html I don't have the specific Gift Economy references with me (I'm at work and I'm not an accademic), but I believe the original is French ("L'economie de la Donnee"?). I thought it was by Andre' Gorz (of _Critique_of_Economic_Reason_ and _Metamorphosis_of_Labour_ fame) but I'm not so sure now, having done a net search. Perhaps someone else (French?) can help out, while I check what I've got at home? In any case, the concept seems to be in common useage: my rapid search turned up an amusing and possibly interesting (dated) discussion on the thread 'gift economy', by the Internet Marketing mail list, at: http://www.i-m.com/hyper/inet-marketing/archives/9502/0419.html Matt Chew comments; > Information can deteriorate as it is transmitted across socio-cultural = > boundaries, as a result of translation, re-interpretation, and changing = > context. I would agree with the substance: Cillario is in fact criticizing the simplistic picture of freely exchanged information. The concept of 'deterioration of information' may be better formulated in terms of 'transformation of meaning/significance'. I'm more in agreement with Matthew Baggott's point about > the tendency to theorize about "information" in the abstract sense > (as if it has meaning outside a cultural context). Surely the basis of this tendency is idealistic: a 'misplaced concreteness' or reification of historical, material, social relations. Or no? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 10 Dec 1996 09:18:14 -1000 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Donald Wessels Subject: Re: Re.Re: SaC: Intellectual property In-Reply-To: <96Dec10.000503hwt.370968(4)@relay2.Hawaii.Edu> On Mon, 9 Dec 1996, Brown, Alex wrote: > >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg > Date: 10th December 1996 > > Matthew Baggott writes: [snip] > > The Dawkin's-style theories, as Matthew observes, suggest otherwise and > when, as now, applied to society and culture in the form of the > ubiquitous and contagious 'meme' travel 'through the air' so to speak. > The pre-Einsteinian ether has been reconstituted as the memetic > dimension where apparently we breath ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH US. > Human history and ingenuity in the form of combining and recombining > previous forms of behaviour or material into new cultural formulations > (paradigms, theories, styles, genres), is here rendered superfluous. > Apparently we are simply the vehicles for selfish genes in the > biological dimension and equally selfish memes in the cultural and > social dimension. What we have here, of course is a new theology - > theobiology - where god (dethroned from his former celestial home by > human thought) now resides in the genetic underworld and carries out its > great plan from there. > Genetics and the concepts of memetics is not theology. Theology to my mind is a belief system that are sustained through political and psychological means. Theologies use evidence and critical thinking only as far as it supports a preconceived "theory." I don't see theological thinking occuring with Dawkin's concept of the meme. Not that there isn't anybody out there deifying these concepts. Although I am not thoroughly convienced that the concept of the meme is anything but a good socio-psychological analogy of genetic. Maybe Dawkins has hit upon on a real aspect on the algorithmic way thing that replicate act whether it is nucleic acids or intreging or comforting concepts > It is no coincidence that in a collection of memetic web pages on the > net, there is a site devoted to - Wait for it! - Church of the Virus. > We humans all to readily deify ourselfs, our concepts and institutions. > The "strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one > would draw the boundary) culture." to which Matthew refers is, I would > suggest the need for a purposeful Maker to manipulate and drive the > human system, an ever present consciousness, a teleology. Asian > philosophies (Buddhism, Taoism) do not require such an interventionist > watchmaker. The system grows, develops and changes by itself and within > this there is some degree of human freedom and the positive or negative > consequences of whatever actions we take. ("Empty and marvellous"). > > Are these genetic and memetic concepts a sign of intellectual exhaustion > in the West? > If you mean by "intellectual exhaustion" the concept of the big Watchmaker in the sky. Yes, I think the concept of God is being rendered superfluous. But, if you mean by "intellectual exhaustion" the concepts of genetics and memetics. No,especially as it relates to the science of genetics, these ideas will continue to bear intellectual fruit for sometime to come. > regards > > Alex Brown > Singapore > |Ubi dubium ibi liberta Philosophy is questions that may never be answered.| Religion is answers that may never be questioned. | Where there is doubt, | there is freedom. --J.J. Hahn --Latin proverb -------------------------------------------------- + -------------------- For Nature, heartless, witless Nature Will neither know nor care. | Donald F.Wessels,Jr -A.E. Housman | wessels@hawaii.edu ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 13:10:49 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Hobson Sherren Subject: SaC: Intellectual Property Returning to Lucas Parra's initial "stand": I'm sorry if my intervention diverted attention away from his main interest. I think he (and others) may be more interested in the following 'movement', which I came across while looking for references to the "gift economy": http://www.u-net.com/gmlets/ltsystem/advant.html home page: http://www.u-net.com/gmlets/ These "LETSystems" seem to be one approach to the practical economics of information exchange: I don't know how successful or praiseworthy. Their slogan is interesting: "Money is only information". Food for thought and critique, with overtones of F.A. von Hayek (The Use of Knowledge in Society) and Hahn's formulation of economic systems as information systems ... Ciao Sherren ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 10:05:42 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Valdusek@AOL.COM Subject: Re: gift economy In a message dated 96-12-11 00:47:36 EST, Hobson Sherren writes: on the gift economy << the original is French ("L'economie de la Donnee"?). I thought it was by Andre' Gorz (of _Critique_of_Economic_Reason_ and _Metamorphosis_of_Labour_ fame) >> The original French essay on this is Mauss, The Gift (translated into English- Free Press, Glencoe in US I believe). There's a lot of anthropological stuff on this. I also mention Titmus (?) book The Gift (?) on blood donation in modern UK as a study of gift-giving economy in a modern industrial society. Val Dusek ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 12:05:00 +0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Brown, Alex" >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg Date: 13th December 1996 Donald Wessels writes: "Genetics and the concepts of memetics is not theology. Theology to my mind is a belief system that are sustained through political and psychological means. Theologies use evidence and critical thinking only as far as it supports a preconceived "theory." I don't see theological thinking occuring with Dawkin's concept of the meme. What would you call a belief system which suggests that human beings are simply vehicles for something else's 'great plan' (in this case, its own reproduction)? When, as in the past: human effort and skill was regarded as directed to the 'greater glory' of a powerful non-human entity which not only created us but intervened in our lifes and in whose image we are made, we called that a religious belief. (Communication between ourselves and this entity was unpredictable to say the least). When as now: human effort and skill is regarded as directed to the 'greater expansion'' of a powerful non-human entity which not only created us but intervenes in our lifes and in whose image we are made, (DNA) we could call that a religious belief. (Communication between ourselves and this entity is so far non-exitant). The fact that this theobiology is cloaked in scientific garb is neither here nor there. Science just like religion is a cultural system and subject to unpredictable teleological whims just as it was in the past. In both cases there is a search for coherence, explanation and a comprehensive meaning to experience. The problem is that experience is notoriously fickle, random and difficult to 'frame'. So, to get meaning out of this flux we have to insert it into an ever-wider context. The only context for this physical world is the meta-physical world which we have always projected into existance since human symbolic thought first began. Why stop now? That projection carries with it our own sense of purpose which we ascribe to this metaphysical dimension. It must also have a purpose - which we call a teleology. The entity(s) which inhabit this metaphorical dimension have a plan (surprise, surprise, just like us). and what gives us meaning is that we are part of that plan. We don't have a choice. Although god is now dressed in genes, this is not a democracy. Donald says: "Not that there isn't anybody out there deifying these concepts" How true. Maybe even some of the scientists themselves. And: " Although I am not thoroughly convinced that the concept of the meme is anything but a good socio-psychological analogy of genetic." I don't know about genetics, but in the study of cultural systems there are better ways than this to get that coherent explanation of emergence, existance and transformation of cultural and social paradigms. "Maybe Dawkins has hit upon on a real aspect on the algorithmic way thing that replicate act whether it is nucleic acids or intreging or comforting concepts". If Dawkins was just spinning the idea around a bit, lateral thinking, 'what if' speculation, like why didn't nature invent the wheel, or whats at the centre of a black hole, that would be okay. A long and honourable tradition there. But if not.............? regards Alex Brown ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 12 Dec 1996 22:59:04 +0200 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Jean-Luc Gautero Subject: Re: SaC: Intellectual Property Hobson Sherren wrote >I don't have the specific Gift Economy references with me (I'm at work >and I'm not an accademic), but I believe the original is French >("L'economie de la Donnee"?). I thought it was by Andre' Gorz (of >_Critique_of_Economic_Reason_ and _Metamorphosis_of_Labour_ fame) but >I'm not so sure now, having done a net search. In the bibliography of Andre Gorz, I don't find neither "Economie de la donnee" nor "Economie du don" (which is a better french translation for gift economy, "Economie de la donnee" would be Datum Economy, or Economy of the given). In france, I think that the notion of gift was first developed by a french ethnologist, Marcel Mauss, who wrote "Essai sur le don", and it is now developed by a movement whose name is "Mouvement Anti Utilitariste dans les Sciences Sociales" (Anti utilitarian Movement in Social Sciences), animated by Alain Caille; I think they talk about gift economy, but I cannot find any book with this title. ------------------------------------------------------------ Jean-Luc Gautero - Centre de Recherches d'Histoire des Id=E9es =46acult=E9 des Lettres - Universit=E9 de Nice-Sophia Antipolis 98 Boulevard Edouard Herriot - BP 209 - 06204 Nice Cedex 3 Email: jgautero@hermes.unice.fr ------------------------------------------------------------ ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++ ++++ if you agree copy these 3 sentences in your own sig ++++ ++++ see: http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 15:45:23 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Hobson Sherren Subject: SaC: Gift Economy refs. You can find info about this Italian collection (literally: _The Gift: lost and refound_) at: http://www.mir.it/mlib/hdoc/0487.htm > Il dono perduto e ritrovato > > di G.Berthoud, J.T.Godbout, G.Nicolas, A.Salsano > > La dimensione personale e comunicativa del dono, > tra scambio mercantile e redistribuzione statale. I happened to bump into Marco Revelli (author of books and articles on questions around post-fordism, mondialization-globalization, and the third =non-profit= sector) this morning at a strike-demo supporting our metal-workers' contract-renewal demands ... it was he who drew Italian attention to "l'economia del dono". He tells me Godbout wrote the book about the Gift Economy I was trying to remember ... and he thinks it was translated into English. Meanwhile, I came across this amusing hyper-text "novel" ... http://www.cityscape.co.uk/users/cw97/alexla08.htm#e8 > > "Intellectual property is theft" "Teleworking is the freedom to manage capital > for capitalist" "The hacker is the today's freedom fighter" > > And so it went on a barrage of rocks thrown at random in the hope that one of > them will find a target. > > Polite applause greeted the end of Teller's talk. The chairman of the session > asked for three question and Alex let someone else ask the first two. As > Teller finished spewing out his standard sound bites as an answer to the > second question Alex spoke up. Ciao, Alex! Basta cosi'. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 17:15:56 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Giuseppe Caputo Subject: Re: SaC: Intellectual Property At 13.10 11/12/96 +0100, Sherren wrote: > Their slogan is interesting: >"Money is only information". >Food for thought and critique, with overtones of F.A. von Hayek (The Use >of Knowledge in Society) and Hahn's formulation of economic systems as >information systems ... > >Ciao >Sherren > I'd like to draw your attention about the project of the so-called "bit tax". To my knowledge it should a tax on every bit exchanged through the network. I think that this is a serious attack to the freedom of information exchange. It is a double attack if we think that we are running very fast to the "information society": everyone who cannot pay can be considered out of this future society. Probably they consider the products of thought as an "intellectual property", and like all kind of properties, must be taxed. In this case the slogan must be changed in: "Information is only money". And I believe that this will be the true slogan of the future European information society. Ciao Pino Caputo You can find further information about the bit tax at the following web sites: http://www.ispo.cec.be/hleg/bittax.html (in english: a paper by Luc Soete, the inventor) http://www.mclink.it/telelavoro/bittax.htm (in Italian: an interview with the same) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 12:05:59 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: de Bivort - Lawry Subject: Re: your mail In-Reply-To: <199612131648.LAA12126@umd5.umd.edu> Alex Brown is correct in saying that "Science just like religion is a cultural system and subject to unpredictable teleological whims just as it was in the past." But this does not mean that science and religion are the same, or operate the same way, or have the same functions, or same effects. Perhaps the concept of memes is being misunderstood here. Regarding memes, Alex Brown says: "When as now: human effort and skill is regarded as directed to the 'greater expansion'' of a powerful non-human entity which not only created us but intervenes in our lifes and in whose image we are made, (DNA) we could call that a religious belief. (Communication between ourselves and this entity is so far non-exitant)." Memes are not independent "entities" that have created us, or in whose image we are made. They are linguistic structures that people create (deliberately or not) that have certain properties: they "reproduce" via people repeating them, for example. If people don't repeat them, they do not get disseminated. Yes, they _can_ 'interfere' in our lives: When they do get repeated, they compete with other ideas that we may have to occupy the the appropriate place in our thoughts, i.e. to influence or inform us. Quite a bit of work has gone into memes, beyond what Dawkins came up with some time ago. None of it involves 'praying,' or spiritual connection, or faith (in the religious sense of the word, where acceptance and surrender of the self are formally based upon the functions of faith). It is true that, as with quite a few other cutting edge, high-potential areas of research, there are meme enthusiasts out there that are overly excited and exagerrate what memes are and how they work. For those who may want an example of a meme, I suggest the GOODTIMES virus, with which everyone on this list is probably (over)familiar with . Regards, Lawry ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 14 Dec 1996 14:00:00 +0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Brown, Alex" Subject: re.your mail:reply meme >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg Date: 14th December 1996 de Bivort-Lawry writes: "Alex Brown is correct in saying that "Science just like religion is a cultural system and subject to unpredictable teleological whims just as it was in the past." But this does not mean that science and religion are the same, or operate the same way, or have the same functions, or same effects." No. Science and religion are not 'the same', but I would suggest that they can usefully be regarded as similar - some things being the same, and some things being different. We can appreciate that their subject matter and thus language are clearly different,. However, there is a fundamental similarity in that both are attempts to find/impose coherence on experience. They both do that by the formulation of paradigms (beliefs systems, sets of permissible behaviours), which offer guidelines for future action. They both reduce the need for expensive (or sometimes dangerous) trial and error and, as a corrolary both make experience more comprehensible. The fact that these typical sets of behaviours (these paradigms) are cultural products and thus historical, means that they will change over time. Which of course they do. Sometimes this is in the form of crisis, revolution, heresies and schisms but most times by simple recombination of existing ideas to match new circumstances. At a more amusing level we can note that both have their heroes, authority figures, priesthoods, obscure terminologies, accumulated truths, rituals or strict methodologies (which can sometimes conflict with common sense), various liturgical instruments and costumes, the latter varying between simple white cotton coats to multicoloured silk and a strong sense of bonding between the members of the group. A last, and more serious point on this. I would suggest that what we have is the same human cognitive processes of selection and combination of the elements of their respective paradigms being played out in different domains/different subject matters and their respective languages. The result I would suggest is the production of metaphors of one another and key organizational and concptual similarities. And, unfortunately, the occassional slippage into teleologies. on de Bivort-Lawry's second point: "Perhaps the concept of memes is being misunderstood here..........Memes are not independent "entities" that have created us, or in whose image we are made. They are linguistic structures that people create (deliberately or not) that have certain properties: they "reproduce" via people repeating them, for example. If people don't repeat them, they do not get disseminated. Yes, they _can_ 'interfere' in our lives: When they do get repeated, they compete with other ideas that we may have to occupy the the appropriate place in our thoughts, i.e. to influence or inform us". If only memes were just that: 'linguistic structures", but the key issue here is that the memetic concept of information and cultural activity involves a direct metaphor of the self-replicating gene with its 'host(s).' Here the self-replicating 'entity' or IDEA jumps from host to host. The product of this activity is presumable human(?) society and culture. Note the following quotation from Aaron Lynch on alt . memetics:" When an idea "self- replicates," IT ACTS TO PRODUCE OR PRESERVE IDEAS that we call "the same idea." The resultant ideas can for now be called "self-replicated" ideas. MY question is: What is it that ACTS to produce or preserve ideas? The answer here seems to be that humans don't, but these neural representations, these ideas, these memes do. I really have covered the 'memetic' ground so to speak, there is a lot of it on the web but in my view the concepts, definitions and theories, are quite unable to explain the vast complexities of human culture. Note the following statement by the same author: "The biologists' > terminology is thus a metalanguage to the more concrete language of > nucleotide sequences. Yet for the evolution of ideas, no equally > understood concrete language has been discovered. Science has achieved > no direct observation of the neural encoding of ideas, which might have > provided us a precise language for discussing ideas. Indeed, even if we > knew in principle how to express ideas in terms of neurons, synapses, > etc., the description would likely be prohibitively complex. So instead > of language based on a concrete mechanism of information storage, we > must settle for an abstract representation of the information stored". I will leave you with a respnse of mine to that statement which puts my own 'cultural systems' approach to the issue of cultural reproduction and complexity: " This may be because these 'scientists' they are taking a somewhat limited view of the system they are looking at. Regarded as an ecological system, human society has a very extensive and 'concrete' language of ideas and of almost infinite storage capacity - namely, human culture, its products and social organization, (institutions and forms of behaviour). This is our exogenous memory and quite specifically defines our species identity and its changing character (history). Our ideas or our attempts to represent those ideas are directly encoded and written out in the shape of cultural products: architecture, music, art, science, media, social relations, literature and everything else which surrounds us and defines what we think and what we do. It is an inescapable environment created by our previous combinatory activity AND FROM WHICH WE LEARN.Culture in this sense is not something separate from human kind - it is what we are. The other aspect of this ecological/cultural systems approach is (as a fundamentally historical approach), that it clearly and concretely shows the transformations that have taken place in our perception of ourselves (ideas) and can quite clearly be analysed and understood. If we really want to understand how ideas are represented, combined and transformed, all we need to do is look 'out there' at the forms which we select and recombine to produce others - new ideas, paradigms, styles genres which act as general codes for future action". regards and apologies for the length too enthusiastic by far Alex Brown Singapore ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 14 Dec 1996 01:11:58 -1000 Reply-To: Donald Wessels Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Donald Wessels Subject: Re: your mail In-Reply-To: <96Dec13.064729hwt.370586(5)@relay2.Hawaii.Edu> On Thu, 12 Dec 1996, Brown, Alex wrote: > >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg > Date: 13th December 1996 > > Donald Wessels writes: > > "Genetics and the concepts of memetics is not theology. Theology to my > mind > is a belief system that are sustained through political and > psychological > means. Theologies use evidence and critical thinking only as far as it > supports a preconceived "theory." I don't see theological thinking > occuring with Dawkin's concept of the meme. > > What would you call a belief system which suggests that human beings are > simply vehicles for something else's 'great plan' (in this case, its own > reproduction)? Genes have no 'great plan' they reproduce only because they can. They simply do what they do because they can. I see no teleological implications in this mechanical process. There is no mind, only an algorithmic process constrained by natural selection, behind our genetic make-up. > > When, as in the past: human effort and skill was regarded as directed to > the 'greater glory' of a powerful non-human entity which not only > created us but intervened in our lifes and in whose image we are made, > we called that a religious belief. (Communication between ourselves and > this entity was unpredictable to say the least). When as now: human > effort and skill is regarded as directed to the 'greater expansion'' of > a powerful non-human entity which not only created us but intervenes in > our lifes and in whose image we are made, (DNA) we could call that a > religious belief. (Communication between ourselves and this entity is so > far non-exitant). What is religious belief? Does a belief become religious when it discribes something that has global implications of our place in nature and the forces, enforced by nature, that we have no control over. Or, does a belief become religious when the tenets of that belief are irrationally clunged to even when all available evidence shows that it is wrong. I daresay it is the latter. You seem to be of the opinion that it is the former. > > The fact that this theobiology is cloaked in scientific garb is neither > here nor there. Science just like religion is a cultural system and > subject to unpredictable teleological whims just as it was in the past. > In both cases there is a search for coherence, explanation and a > comprehensive meaning to experience. The problem is that experience is > notoriously fickle, random and difficult to 'frame'. Our experience, a product of our brains, has been characterized in a rather precise manner, its called Chaos theory. So, to get meaning > out of this flux we have to insert it into an ever-wider context. The > only context for this physical world is the meta-physical world which we > have always projected into existance since human symbolic thought first > began. Why stop now? That projection carries with it our own sense of > purpose which we ascribe to this metaphysical dimension. It must also > have a purpose - which we call a teleology. The entity(s) which inhabit > this metaphorical dimension have a plan (surprise, surprise, just like > us). and what gives us meaning is that we are part of that plan. We > don't have a choice. Although god is now dressed in genes, this is not a > democracy. > The meaning, in proper perspective, that science of genetics has imparted to us is that heritary is a chemical process that produces the proteins, sugars etc... of all the living things on this planet. This substance has no a plan for us, any more than the hardware and software of the Internet has plans for my message when I decide to send it. There is no way of knowing the path in which this message will take to reach you, and everyone else on this list. But, because of the constraints of the this global network it quite reliably delivered. DNA works in much the same way. The future path of its, and our, evolution is unpredictable. But, because of the constraints involved in natural selection DNA has no choice in which direction it will replicate it has to, because it has to, a mechanical, no mind, algorithmic process. DNA has no intents, nor does it intervene on our or even its own behalf it is just an exquisite replicator and carrier of information that happens to make living things thereby continuing the process of its own replication. I think, what many who attack evolution as religious fear is the fact the evolutionary process needs no special help from a Deity. It does what it does mechanically without the need of a Godhead to protect and guide it. [snip] |Ubi dubium ibi liberta Philosophy is questions that may never be answered.| Religion is answers that may never be questioned. | Where there is doubt, | there is freedom. --J.J. Hahn --Latin proverb -------------------------------------------------- + -------------------- For Nature, heartless, witless Nature Will neither know nor care. | Donald F.Wessels,Jr -A.E. Housman | wessels@hawaii.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 17:51:22 -1000 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Rick Allen Cain Subject: Re: SaC: Intellectual Property ---------- unsubscribe ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 05:55:38 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Robert Maxwell Young Subject: Special offer for _Science as Culture_ quarterly journal Science as Culture - the quarterly journal. We hope that subscribers to this forum will also subscribe to the print journal with which the forum is associated. There is a special offer at the moment - see below Science as Culture explores the role of expertise in shaping the values which contend for influence over the wider society. The journal analyses how our scientific culture defines what is rational, and what is natural. SaC provides a unique, accessible forum for debate, beyond the boundaries of academic disciplines and specializations. The journal and email forum are associated with a web site at http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/rmy/sac.html Editorial Board: Robert M. Young (Editor), Les Levidow (Managing Editor), Sarah B. Franklin, Pam Linn, Maureen Mcneil Advisory Panel: Tom Athanasiou, Roger Cooter, Ruth Schwartz Cowan, Stephen J. Cross, Norman Diamond, David Dickson, Karl Figlio, Marike Finlay, Donna Haraway, Ludmilla Jordanova, Anne Karpf, Douglas Kellner, Sonia Liff, Vincent Mosco, Dorothy Nelkin, David Noble, Don Parson, Barry Richards, Eveleen Richards, Kevin Robins, Roger Smith, Tony Solomonides, Judy Wajcman, Gary Werskey, Judith Williamson, Langdon Winner Contributors have included: Vincent Mosco, Donna Haraway, Langdon Winner, Richard Barbrook, Michael Chanan, Sarah Franklin, Michael Shortland, Steve Best & Douglas Kellner. Roger Smith, Slavoj Zizek, Mary Mellor, Scott L. Montgomery, Roger Silverstone, Bruce Berman, Ashis Nandy, Jack Kloppenburg, Jr, Les Levidow, Christopher Hamlin, Philip Garrahan & Paul Stewart, Maureen McNeil, Barbara Duden, Andrew Ross, Dennis Hayes, Kevin Robins & Frank Webster, David Pingitore, Jon Turney, Stephen Hill & Tim Turpin, Chunglin Kwa, Joel Kovel, David Hakken, Andrew Barry, Sharon Macdonald, Robert M. Young. The journal has published articles on mass-media representations of expertise, the political role of radio, human and agricultural biotechnologies, cultures of workplace automation, the metaphors central to scientific knowledge, artificial intelligence, images of the scientist in film and theatre, science museums, Post-Fordism, labour relations in high-tech Japan, etc. Science as Culture is published quarterly, and each issue contains 160 pages. Subscription may begin with any issue. (L1.00 British pound sterling = ca $1.63) Subscriptions for United Kingdom: L25 individual for four issues, L42.50 for eight issues; L50 institutional for four issues, L85 for eight issues. Overseas: L30 for four issues, L50 for eight issues. All prices include postage. Air Mail L10 extra.Orders to Science as Culture, 26 Fregrove Road, London, N7 9RQ Payment should be in sterling or US dollars or by credit card (Visa/Barclaycard/MasterCard). If payment is made in another currency, add the equivalent of L5. to cover conversion charges. Send for a free sample copy and for a free list of contents of all issues, specifying which are still available. Back issues are L7.50 each for non-subscribers, L4.00 for subscribers; L10.75 for institutions. Available from Science as Culture, 26 Freegrove Road, London N7 9RQ. Tel. +0171 609 0507 Fax. +0171 609 4837 email pp@rmy1.demon.co.uk. SPECIAL OFFER: SUBSCRIBE FOR TWO YEARS AND GET A COMPLETE SET OF 26 BACK ISSUES: TOTAL PRICE L100. EXISTING SUBSCRIBERS: EXTEND YOUR SUBSCRIPTION FOR 2 YEARS AND RECEIVE ANY NUMBER BACK ISSUES AT HALF THE L4.00 PRICE USUALLY CHARGED TO SUBSCRIBERS - L2.00 EACH. THIS OFFER IS ALSO AVAILABLE TO INSTITUTIONS FOR L175. This offer stands only as long as stocks last. __________________________________________ Robert Maxwell Young: robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk 26 Freegrove Rd., London N7 9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306 fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic Studies, University of Sheffield. Home page and writings: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/ Process Press publications: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html 'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 12:22:24 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "David A. Wallace" Subject: ICHIM '97 - Call for Papers Please excuse cross-postings CALL FOR PAPERS ICHIM97 @ LOUVRE.FR The Fourth International Conference on Hypermedia and Interactivity in Museums (ICHIM97) will be held at the Louvre in Paris, September 1-5, 1997. As with previous ICHIM conferences, the focus of the meeting will be on the ways in which hypermedia and interactive experiences can enhance museum visits and museum publications as well as serve as the foundation for enhanced curatorship and scientific research. Proposals to submit papers will be accepted through January 30, 1997. Papers are due in final form no later than May 15, 1997, in either French or English. Papers will be published in their original language, with abstracts in both French and English, and will be published in an edited trade paperback edition, given as part of conference registration but available after the conference for sale to the public. Proposals may be for: * individual papers (submit an abstract and speaker biography) * 1.5 hour session (submit a session description PLUS individual paper abstracts and biographies of a maximum 3 speakers, two speakers with a commentator preferred). Speakers must have agreed to participate and write papers. * 3.0 hour session (submit a session description PLUS individual paper abstracts and biographies of a maximum 5 speakers). Speakers must have agreed to participate and write papers. * a demonstration of a museum system by museum personnel (submit a description of the application). Commercial demonstrators should apply for the commercial exhibit. In general demonstrators will be expected to bring their applications on a laptop computer; large monitors and/or projection equipment will be available. Full details required for all proposed organizers, commentators, speakers and demonstrators include: Name Title Organization Address Phone Fax E-mail All conference participants must register for the conference. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: Museum Content: Digital capture and representation, multimedia and object database management, licensing Hypermedia Design: Interfaces, searching, navigation, linking methods, metaphors & object typologies Interactive Publications: Product development, delivery formats, marketing and distribution, online delivery systems Installations: Ergonomics, audiences, human-computer interaction Museum Applications: Conservation, education, multimedia documentation, rights management, membership and development, sales and marketing Evaluation: Formative evaluation, product pre-testing, summative evaluation, impact assessment, sales Collaboration: Museum/Industry partnerships, Museum/University & School partnerships, Standards Legal and Societal Impacts: Copyright, visual literacy & mediacy, the concept of museums, economic models, training A web site with conference details will be available in January 1997 at www.louvre.fr/ichim97 and at www.archimuse.com/ichim97. Respond to David Bearman, Conference Organizer, dbear@archimuse.com ------------------------------- David A. Wallace Archives & Museum Informatics 5501 Walnut Street, Suite 203 Pittsburgh, PA 15232-2311 USA voice: +1-412-683-9775 fax: +1-412-683-7366 email: daw@archimuse.com URL: www.archimuse.com ------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Dec 1996 15:05:00 +0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Brown, Alex" Subject: genes, mind,teleology >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg Date: 23rd. December 1996 In response to my statement/question: What would you call a belief system which suggests that human beings are simply vehicles for something else's 'great plan' (in this case, its own reproduction)? Donald Wessels writes: "Genes have no 'great plan' they reproduce only because they can. They simply do what they do because they can. I see no teleological implications in this mechanical process. There is no mind, only an algorithmic process constrained by natural selection, behind our genetic make-up." I totally agree with this statement. If only the theobiologists did. Donald: "What is religious belief? Does a belief become religious when it discribes something that has global implications of our place in nature and the forces, enforced by nature, that we have no control over. Or, does a belief become religious when the tenets of that belief are irrationally clunged to even when all available evidence shows that it is wrong. I daresay it is the latter. You seem to be of the opinion that it is the former". Yes. In my opinion it is LIKE the former, although customized to play down the natural/material world aspect and emphasize the psychological/cognitive demand for coherence in the face of the transient /random character of experience. Religion is one of several frameworks that do this. Others being science, art, literature, magic, movies, sport, music, dancing and the innumerable social rituals and fashions which give meaning to lived experience. Sport? Oh yes. In this and the others there is a clear and measurable framework which gives a total and coherent (admittedly fictiitous) experience FOR ONCE. Where else would we get such a perception - seeing the whole complicated slippery thing all at once: resolved one way or another. (One might of course experience this resolution on one's deathbed looking back on the events of one's life. Re-running the movie so to speak and knowing that within a few minutes it - namely you- will end). What humans do is to create FICTITIOUS COHERENCES which give definite limits and organization to experience. In sport, the frame is the rules of the game PLUS the fact that the game has a definite time limit - a chronological frame. Tension and unpredictability within that frame, but always finally resolved. Movies are time constrained. Pictures are physically framed. Religion is framed by permissible behaviours. Science, of course prides itself on being the arch-framemaker in terms of drawing tight boundaries around a given subject matter (de-contextualizing it) and applying very specific methodologies to its exploration. Like sport, it cannot predict the results of its activities beforehand only the fact that, given its self-imposed rules, there will be a result. ALL, however are attempts to get a definite handle on things no matter how temporary and thus imbue things with meaning and, by association, with purpose. Another nice thing is that it is fairly easy to define the nature of the frameworks for various domains. They are the similarities of behaviours that can be noted over time. In my view, therefore it has nothing to do with whether the behaviour or belief is 'rational' or 'irrational' anymore than such things worry me when I read a novel or watch a movie. Does it bother me that the scenario described there is impossible or never happened? No. Its value lies in the fact that it offers me and everyone else the one thing that we can't have 'for real' so to speak - a fully comprehensible (and total) experience. In the continual flux and one might almost say, boredom of things these various domains offer that unique possibility. Donald: "Our experience, a product of our brains, has been characterized in a rather precise manner, its called Chaos theory". Two comments: 1. Experience is a relationship - between mind (internal frames, paradigms, styles, etc) and environment (the collective paradigms). 2. Chaos Theory, as I understand it is a sub-set of Complex Systems Theory since the 'chaotic part' is simply a particular period(s) in the overall history of the system which over time shows an apparent fragmentation of the previous regularities in the behaviour of the system. Order, disorder exist at unpredictable points in time and for obscure reasons (in fact these are changes in environmental conditions). If Donald is saying that this is what experience looks like: well, maybe, but certainly not with any precision although we can see this emergence and fragmentation (in the chaos theory sense) as historical patterns of dominant and multiple paradigms within societies through time. It does not matter what the 'content' of the paradigms are. It is the occasional uniformity or plurality of social organization which is significant in complex systems terms. Donald: "The meaning, in proper perspective, that science of genetics has imparted to us is that heritary is a chemical process that produces the proteins, sugars etc... of all the living things on this planet. This substance has no a plan for us, any more than the hardware and software of the Internet has plans for my message when I decide to send it. There is no way of knowing the path in which this message will take to reach you, and everyone else on this list. But, because of the constraints of the this global network it quite reliably delivered. DNA works in much the same way. The future path of its, and our, evolution is unpredictable. But, because of the constraints involved in natural selection DNA has no choice in which direction it will replicate it has to, because it has to, a mechanical, no mind, algorithmic process. DNA has no intents, nor does it intervene on our or even its own behalf it is just an exquisite replicator and carrier of information that happens to make living things thereby continuing the process of its own replication." I absolutely agree with this. It is a beautifully elegant system. It is just a pity that the same impartial, recombinatory elegance is not mandatory in historical and sociological thought. Here, a naive need for reassurance in the form of the human presence, identity and constructive purpose (the watchmaker now disguised in genes), distorts the lens of theory. Donald: "I think, what many who attack evolution as religious fear is the fact the evolutionary process needs no special help from a Deity. It does what it does mechanically without the need of a Godhead to protect and guide it." Good heaven's. I hope I am not being accused of anti-evolutionary thought. Clearly, the (heavy - handed) irony of my previous statements on 'biotheology' or 'theobiology' may have been misconstrued. I am not now, nor have I ever been........................whatever I am being accused of . regards to Donald and Merry Christmas to all Alex Brown Singapore ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Dec 1996 18:41:19 -0500 Reply-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Michelle Christides Subject: Re: genes, mind, teleology. Part I Why is this discussion, going on for two weeks now and, once again, debunking theism so interesting to the believers in the soul-less mechanistic Universe? They certainly epitomize in their own beliefs the rubric of "Science-as-Culture," and for that I thank them. Since this derived somehow from the discussion of "Intellectual Property" perhaps I should include this refutation of my argument that Einstein's Energy-Matter theory of the Universe is what the Buddha understood 2500 years ago to be enLIGHTenment, in my book. I should do so, particularly, since Alex of Singapore compares, in one of these exerpts, the Western intellectual theories the discussants are refuting as an example of "Western intellectual exhaustion" with respect to the Eastern understanding of the Universe, that he characterizes as a system growing & changing by itself, "empty & marvelous." In case you have been preparing for the High Holidays with other benighted religious folk at this solstice celebrating the longest night of the year, I shall exerpt some of the discussion with my own comments in brackets [], effete Western Intellectual that I am. What started the flogging, particularly this time of year, of this dead horse again, which was once entitled, with scientific impartiality, "Science VS. Religion &/or Stupidity" was this e-mail [Date: 10th December 1996] from Alex Brown in reply to: > > Matthew Baggott writes: > "I think there are obvious parallels between the tendency to theorize > about "information" in the abstract sense (as if it has meaning outside > a cultural context) and Richard Dawkins-style theories about genes. > Both harmonize with a strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not > certain where one would draw the boundary) culture." > > Alex: > Exactly. While we can consider information to be that property which > in-forms or characterizes material or intellectual products, It cannot > be isolated from the products themselves. It is immanent to them. Indeed > we can only recognize 'information' as such as a regularity, pattern or > statistical recurrence of certain characteristics in a large number of > forms. Where is information? Information is 'nowhere'. There is no > platonic realm where it exists of itself. If we want to see it, we look > for the measurable similarities which inform experience and all of which > are the product of human activity. > [NOTA BENE, the surprising fact that the discussion of "intellectual property" is going to be transmogrified into our "dead horse" that Ian Pritchard and Arie Dirkswager so valiantly slaid at the end of summer. More surprisingly still, we are told "information is nowhere," perhaps like sound in a forest when there is no ear-drum to register the vibrations? Again, I apologize for my inferior Western intellect, I am just trying to understand what is going on in this Forum I joined. If I understand correctly, I am being informed that there is no meaning in information -- there are only patterns of regularity in material or intellectual products. Now we have two concepts, "products" and "property" -- the latter having been the original topic, "Intellectual Property," which I, IMHO, thought would have something to do with International Copyright Law as it would be extended to the Net.] Alex continues: > The Dawkin's-style theories, as Matthew observes, suggest otherwise and > when, as now, applied to society and culture in the form of the > ubiquitous and contagious 'meme' travel 'through the air' so to speak. > The pre-Einsteinian ether has been reconstituted as the memetic > dimension where apparently we breath ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH US. > [Once again, I was very far from the truth here given, in that I thought, as a specialist in the culture of Western Civilization, that, all memes aside, Human (vous voyez, Jacques Melot, pas besoin de se mettre en quatre pour developper l'usage d'une expression telle que "WERE-MAN"!) is a gregarious animal and learns from one another, something which I have been calling along with many misguided others, "zeitgeist" the spirit of the times. -- Now does this mean that our "collective spirit" or "consciousness" for those of you who prefer the modern, more secular term, implies a "pre-Einsteinian ether"? This is really complicated by the fact that "Dawkins-style theories" are the origin of this concept of a "memetic dimension" in which we (Humanity) "apparently . . . breath {sic: breathe} ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH {sic} US." -- Well, I DO acknowledge that my ideas have come full-blown into my head from my education. Is the metaphor of "memes" merely trying to characterize a regularity of pattern in the way this occurs culturally? Is this not just another "product" of information (getting us nowhere?)] Alex again: > Human history and ingenuity in the form of combining and recombining > previous forms of behaviour or material into new cultural formulations > (paradigms, theories, styles, genres), is here rendered superfluous. > Apparently we are simply the vehicles for selfish genes in the > biological dimension and equally selfish memes in the cultural and > social dimension. What we have here, of course is a new theology - > theobiology - where god (dethroned from his former celestial home by > human thought) now resides in the genetic underworld and carries out its > great plan from there. [Perhaps there is a lack of attention paid here to the previous discussion of this Forum. I personally posted some research into this question of consciousness and genetic encoding, and attempted to update the work of Carl Jung, who died just before the breakthrough research by Watson & Crick in that field. When we, as experts in our respective fields, get together in a Forum, such as this, it sometimes takes some homework on the part of the members to understand what each of us is trying to summarize of our own life-work for the other members. If I go to the trouble of summarizing the relevant research in my field, I would expect that anyone who subsequently summarizes the content would not trivialize it, as in the last three lines above, following "theobiology."] Alex cont.: > The "strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one > would draw the boundary) culture." to which Matthew refers is, I would > suggest the need for a purposeful Maker to manipulate and drive the > human system, an ever present consciousness, a teleology. Asian > philosophies (Buddhism, Taoism) do not require such an interventionist > watchmaker. The system grows, develops and changes by itself and within > this there is some degree of human freedom and the positive or negative > consequences of whatever actions we take. ("Empty and marvellous"). [My understanding from Buddhism is that "the system [which] grows, develops and changes by itself" IS CONSCIOUSNESS. LIGHT IS THE NUCLEUS OF MATTER. This was the Buddha's awakening that enabled him to conclude that the Universe is both expanding and contractiong 2500 years ago. The "Shining Emptiness" of SHUNYATA is the Consciousness preceding the Big Bang. Empty though it may be, it follows the form of its own LAWS, enabling Science to find its regularity in patterns we are now culturally defining as "products of information." Truly marvelous.] ALEX AGAIN: > Are these genetic and memetic concepts a sign of intellectual exhaustion > in the West? > > Dec. 13th, Science just like religion is a cultural system and subject to > unpredictable teleological whims just as it was in the past. In both > cases there is a search for coherence, explanation and a comprehensive > meaning to experience. The problem is that experience is notoriously > fickle, random and difficult to 'frame'. So, to get meaning > out of this flux we have to insert it into an ever-wider context. The > only context for this physical world is the meta-physical world which we > have always projected into existance since human symbolic thought first > began. Why stop now? That projection carries with it our own sense of > purpose which we ascribe to this metaphysical dimension. It must also > have a purpose - which we call a teleology. The entity(s) which inhabit > this metaphorical dimension have a plan (surprise, surprise, just like > us). and what gives us meaning is that we are part of that plan. We > don't have a choice. Although god is now dressed in genes, this is not a > democracy. > [HoHoHo! Are the conclusions drawn here all a joke? Anyway, democracy in our exhausted W. intellectual conceptualization has come to mean "the lowest common denominator" in honor & integrity and "the highest common denominator" in income & assets. The discussion of "Science VS. Religion" has at least granted that the God of us religious gullibles is no longer an old man on a throne. Maybe next year we will be accorded some common twenty-first century usage for the definition of "religion." However, whether we choose to be "part of the plan" or not is definitely still a freedom we enjoy, as Milton put it: "to rule in Hell or serve in Heav'n" -- it is the LAW of the Shining, Empty Consciousness that we must serve, not the Narcissism which favored evolution through the animal law of the jungle. Human is just entering a new stage in evolution and it's taking us several millenia (a blink of an eye with respect to the age of the species) to do so. Further, if you're going to talk about psychological terms such as symbols and projections, why not observe simply the logic of your argument? You switch back and forth between literal and symbolic thinking, {cf.: Gerald Edelman, *Bright Air, Brilliant Fire* -- on "first and second order" thinking} when you talk about the sloppy thinking of your opponents, those who do not share your *beliefs* which you draw as scientific conclusions.] > Donald says: "Not that there isn't anybody out there . . . > Dec. 14th e-mail, Alex quotes & replies to: de Bivort-Lawry writes: > "Alex Brown is correct in saying that "Science just like religion is a > cultural system and subject to unpredictable teleological whims just as > it was in the past." > > But this does not mean that science and religion are the same, or > operate the same way, or have the same functions, or same effects." > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Dec 1996 18:54:18 -0500 Reply-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Michelle Christides Subject: Re: genes, mind, teleology. Part II Cont. > Alex: > No. Science and religion are not 'the same', but I would suggest that > they can usefully be regarded as similar - some things being the same, > and some things being different. We can appreciate that their subject > matter and thus language are clearly different,. However, there is a > fundamental similarity in that both are attempts to find/impose > coherence on experience. They both do that by the formulation of > paradigms (beliefs systems, sets of permissible behaviours), which offer > guidelines for future action. They both reduce the need for expensive > (or sometimes dangerous) trial and error and, as a corrolary both make > experience more comprehensible. The fact that these typical sets of > behaviours (these paradigms) are cultural products and thus historical, > means that they will change over time. Which of course they do. > Sometimes this is in the form of crisis, revolution, heresies and > schisms but most times by simple recombination of existing ideas to > match new circumstances. At a more amusing level we can note that both > have their heroes, authority figures, priesthoods, obscure > terminologies, accumulated truths, rituals or strict methodologies . . . [Ah! even more subtle sophistication! here the discussants are acknowledging that any ordering of experience is a belief-system.] > de Bivort-Lawry: > Memes are not independent "entities" that have created us, or in whose > image we are made. They are linguistic structures that people create > (deliberately or not) that have certain properties: they "reproduce" via > people repeating them, for example. If people don't repeat them, they do > not get disseminated. . . . > > Alex: If only memes were just that: 'linguistic structures", but the key > issue here is that the memetic concept of information and cultural activity > involves a direct metaphor of the self-replicating gene with its 'host(s).' > Here the self-replicating 'entity' or IDEA jumps from host to host. The > product of this activity is presumable human(?) society and culture. . . . > > Alex quoting Aaron Lynch: > "The biologists' terminology is thus a metalanguage to the more concrete > language of nucleotide sequences. Yet for the evolution of ideas, no equally > understood concrete language has been discovered. Science has achieved > no direct observation of the neural encoding of ideas, which might > have provided us a precise language for discussing ideas. Indeed, > even if we knew in principle how to express ideas in terms of > neurons, synapses, etc., the description would likely be > prohibitively complex. So instead of language based on a concrete > mechanism of information storage, we must settle for an abstract > representation of the information stored". > > > I will leave you with a respnse of mine to that statement which puts my > own 'cultural systems' approach to the issue of cultural reproduction > and complexity: > > " This may be because these 'scientists' they are taking a somewhat > limited view of the system they are looking at. Regarded as an > ecological system, human society has a very extensive and 'concrete' > language of ideas and of almost infinite storage capacity - namely, > human culture, its products and social organization, (institutions and > forms of behaviour). This is our exogenous memory and quite specifically > defines our species identity and its changing character (history). Our > ideas or our attempts to represent those ideas are directly encoded and > written out in the shape of cultural products: architecture, music, art, > science, media, social relations, literature and everything else which > surrounds us and defines what we think and what we do. It is an > inescapable environment created by our previous combinatory activity AND > FROM WHICH WE LEARN.Culture in this sense is not something separate from > human kind - it is what we are. The other aspect of this > ecological/cultural systems approach is (as a fundamentally > historical approach), that it clearly and concretely shows the > transformations that have taken place in our perception of ourselves > (ideas) and can quite clearly be analysed and understood. If we really > want to understand how ideas are represented, combined and transformed, > all we need to do is look 'out there' at the forms which we select and > recombine to produce others - new ideas, paradigms, styles genres which > act as general codes for future action". > [This is a succinct definition of cultural reproduction & complexity that is the core of agreement for our Forum on Science-as-Culture. If we are going to progress in our coming together with our various contributions, why take off on tangents like those when you draw conclusions based on your definitions of certain contents in "religious" belief-systems, as above? As a final example of what I mean, I exerpt the discussion below from today's Dec. 23, e-mail exchange:] > Donald: "Our experience, a product of our brains, has been characterized > in a rather precise manner, its [sic: it's] called Chaos theory". > > Alex: > Two comments: 1. Experience is a relationship - between mind (internal > frames, paradigms, styles, etc) and environment (the collective > paradigms). 2. Chaos Theory, as I understand it is a sub-set of Complex > Systems Theory since the 'chaotic part' is simply a particular period(s) > in the overall history of the system which over time shows an apparent > fragmentation of the previous regularities in the behaviour of the > system. Order, disorder exist at unpredictable points in time . . . > > Donald: "The meaning, in proper perspective, that science of genetics > has imparted to us is that heritary [sic: heredity] is a chemical > process that produces the proteins, sugars etc... of all the living > things on this planet. This substance has no a plan for us, any more > than the hardware and software of the Internet has plans for my message > when I decide to send it. [Look at the logic of the last sentence above: First of all, the *meaning* is drawn that "the substance has no plan for us, any more than the hardware and software of the Internet . . ." The reference is misplaced in the analogy, it should be the "I decide to send it" on the "hardware and software of the Internet," created by human beings. IF WE FOLLOW THIS ANALOGY, THEN WHO IS THE PROPER REFERENT FOR THE GENETIC "SUBSTANCE"? Who is sending the message in our genetic encoding, if this analogy be correct in the first place?] Donald: > There is no way of knowing the path in which this message will take > to reach you, and everyone else on this list. But, because of the > constraints of the this global network it quite reliably delivered. DNA > works in much the same way. The future path of its, and our, evolution > is unpredictable. But, because of the constraints involved in natural > selection DNA has no choice in which direction it will replicate it has > to, because it has to, a mechanical, no mind, algorithmic process. > > DNA has no intents, nor does it intervene on our or even its own behalf > it is just an exquisite replicator and carrier of information that > happens to make living things thereby continuing the process of its own > replication." > > Alex: > I absolutely agree with this. It is a beautifully elegant system. It is > just a pity that the same impartial, recombinatory elegance is not > mandatory in historical and sociological thought. Here, a naive need for > reassurance in the form of the human presence, identity and > constructive purpose (the watchmaker now disguised in genes), distorts > the lens of theory. > [Perhaps the "pity that the same impartial, recombinatory elegance is not mandatory in historical and sociological thought" is the case -- is for the same evident reasoning that the two of you are applying here: you yourselves are drawing conclusions from reasoning by false analogies, as above. When you describe the DNA "recombinatory elegance" or the "cultural reproduction & complexity" you know your facts. When you draw your conclusions, you too are wearing the very cultural blinders that you have described, when you humourously drew the parallel between science and religion. Setting aside the sides that we are on, "the watchmaker now disguised in genes" is a false attribution to some profound research that is going on in the "No Body's Land" between Science and Cultural Studies (a.k.a., Humanities, Social "Sciences"). Strip your conclusions down to the laws of Logic, isolate the referents, the antecedents, the propositions, the analogies you make, and you will find the "cultural blinders." The UNconscious, by definition, is what you are NOT conscious of. In sum, it is a question of RESPECT -- there seems to be little here for researchers in the NON-sciences; yet, you are not, by the conclusions that you draw, giving their research much study.] Donald: "I think, what many who attack evolution as religious fear is > the fact the evolutionary process needs no special help from a Deity. It > does what it does mechanically without the need of a Godhead to protect > and guide it." ["Evolutionary process"? What if the Laws of the Universe ARE the Consciousness -- and vice versa? Are you not restricting us to your OWN definition of "Deity"? You say "attack evolution" -- does that mean that "religious" people are *only* those who believe in the Old Man on a Throne in the Sky who created ex nihilo? Don't you think that those people who believe in that are themselves evolving out of existence with the ideas that are somehow (memes or otherwise) taking over the generations still alive today? Do we have to talk about them anymore on this Forum as representing the "religious" point of view? Are you not flogging this dead horse of "anti-evolutionaries"? Michelle Christides http://www.vgernet.net/jungsoul/index.html ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Dec 1996 14:02:00 +0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Brown, Alex" Subject: re. re. genes,mind >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg Date: Christmas Eve 1996 In order to restore the tranquility of the season I would like to clear up some unfortunate misunderstandings that seem to exist in Michelle Christides posting: Michelle writes: 1. "Why is this discussion, going on for two weeks now and, once again, debunking theism so interesting to the believers in the soul-less mechanistic Universe? Possibly because the participants find the discussion interesting. No one is 'debunking theism'. I raised the religious issue as a criticism of what I consider to be a particular kind of teleological theorizing in cultural/memetic (biological) thinking. The criticism, in other words, was not of religion, but of what I regard as the theory of a 'soul-less' (dehumanized) mechanistic (biologizing) Universe (human society and culture). I would have thought there were similarities in our positions in this respect. 2. M: "................ perhaps I should include this refutation of my argument that Einstein's Energy-Matter theory of the Universe is what the Buddha understood 2500 years ago to be enLIGHTenment, in my book....." I'm not sure what the problem is here or where the refutation is. I would have thought by now such parallels between physics and Buddhist thought were fairly well understood (for anyone who has looked at both). There is certainly nothing in the text of the postings which suggests otherwise. 3. M: ".... I should do so, particularly, since Alex of Singapore compares, in one of these exerpts, the Western intellectual theories the discussants are refuting as an example of "Western intellectual exhaustion" with respect to the Eastern understanding of the Universe, that he characterizes as a system growing & changing by itself, "empty & marvelous." My question about the possibility of 'Western intellectual exhaustion' was rhetorical and provoked by what I regarded as a somewhat overly-conscious and deterministic explanation of the formation of human culture and social institutions (eg. ev. psych, selfish gene and memetic theory). My reference to Eastern philosophies was a different but related point that they do not pursue such an approach. (Hardly an anti-religious idea on my part). 4. M: "What started the flogging, particularly this time of year, of this dead horse again, which was once entitled, with scientific impartiality, "Science VS. Religion &/or Stupidity" was this e-mail [Date: 10th December 1996] from Alex Brown.........................[NOTA BENE, the surprising fact that the discussion of "intellectual property" is going to be transmogrified into our "dead horse" that Ian Pritchard and Arie Dirkswager so valiantly slaid at the end of summer". This is not the 'dead horse' (which is thoroughly deceased, late, stiff, and gone to the great grazing grounds in the sky). This is another horse, but having the quality of 'horseness' makes it resemble its dead companion in some but not all respects. In other words this is a different discussion which is NOT about science v religion, but about information, genetics, teleology, science as culture, memetics, cultural (re)production and numerous other related subjects. In other words it is a particular recombination of the many fields discussable on this list. Fields which we may have walked through before but from a different direction (and noted the horses therein). 5. M: "More surprisingly still, we are told "information is nowhere," perhaps like sound in a forest when there is no ear-drum to register the vibrations? ......... " Yes. As I said in my posting there is no 'platonic realm' where information exists in some pure state. It is immanent to the material and social forms which it characterizes/organizes. 6. M: "If I understand correctly, I am being informed that there is no meaning in information -- there are only patterns of regularity in material or intellectual products. No. I am afraid you have misunderstood this one. Information IS meaning since it denotes the patterns of similarity and/or difference, regularities/irregularities, probabilities/improbabilities, uniformities and pluralities of character by which we can categorize and conceptualize experience. 7. M: "I thought, as a specialist in the culture of Western Civilization, that, all memes aside, Human (vous voyez, Jacques Melot, pas besoin de se mettre en quatre pour developper l'usage d'une expression telle que "WERE-MAN"!) is a gregarious animal and learns from one another, something which I have been calling along with many misguided others, "zeitgeist" the spirit of the times. -- Now does this mean that our "collective spirit" or "consciousness" for those of you who prefer the modern, more secular term, implies a "pre-Einsteinian ether"?" Yes. human beings are gregarious and do learn from each other. This is carried out by a process of communication and exchange of forms of experience and behaviours between the members of a society. This collective and cumulative activity results in the formation of paradigmatic forms in the various domains of activity that make up a society and that these become the imitative sources for future activity. Not the most radical or conytroversial idea in the world I would have thought. So what is the problem here? My point was to criticise the crypto-telepathic aspects of memetic theory. 8. M: "This is really complicated by the fact that "Dawkins-style theories" are the origin of this concept of a "memetic dimension" in which we (Humanity) "apparently . . . breath {sic: breathe} ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH {sic} US." While the missing 'e's are simply a technical problem for me, they are clearly a sadly significant issue for Michelle and possibly even symbolic (or not). 9. M: " Well, I DO acknowledge that my ideas have come full-blown into my head from my education." If we stretch the concept of education over the many years it takes place in one form or another and widen it to include the many places, people, books, movies, TV programmes, discussions, crises, joys, moments of reflection and the madness of crowds and the countless images and sensations we have experienced, it is fairly obvious that our ideas are a combination and recombination of many different experiences we have throughout our lives. These do not rattle around independently in our brain. They are continuously integrated and differentiated into conceptual categories.(The dream state offers a peek at the apparently arbitrary nature of this merging/categorization process). We are not just the sum of our experiences. We are quite naturally creating and recreating ourselves in interaction with our environment and this is called learning. But learning is not an additive process: eg. ("so many full-blown ideas stored today, sir"), but a recombinatory process. 10. M: "Perhaps there is a lack of attention paid here to the previous discussion of this Forum." No. Different discussion in the same general field. (See point 4 above). 11. M: "...... If I go to the trouble of summarizing the relevant research in my field, I would expect that anyone who subsequently summarizes the content would not trivialize it, as in the last three lines above, following "theobiology." See point 10 above and point 4 above. I have no idea why you think your work is being 'summarized' or thus 'trivialized' in these discussions. I am sorry to say that no one was referring to your work. 12. M: "HoHoHo! Are the conclusions drawn here all a joke? No. But I would suggest that some degree of humour is necessary here and there, even in the most serious topics, otherwise we end up with a crushing literalness and rigidity of reception to other people's ideas. Thus, the Lord of the Dance (Hinduism) or "Meeting they laugh and laugh, the forest grove, the many fallen leaves" (Basho). 13. M: "Further, if you're going to talk about psychological terms such as symbols and projections, why not observe simply the logic of your argument? You switch back and forth between literal and symbolic thinking.....". Yes. True. The logic is there, believe me, but the descriptive/explanatory conjunction is obviously still too compressed within adjacent sentences. A matter of time and personal inclination, I'm afraid. I will try to created more 'digital gaps' in the semantics of the text. (Make it a bit more 'Anglo'. That was a joke) 14. M: "when you talk about the sloppy thinking of your opponents, those who do not share your *beliefs* which you draw as scientific conclusions." Oh dear. I'm afraid you really have got it badly wrong here. This was never said, implied or thought about. (Check the text and I won't tell anyone you said this). In fact, this phrase if I remember comes from the science v religion discussion which I was not involved in, but noted a certain flaming quality to the postings. I find it useful to take a more open and relaxed attitude to reading other peoples' texts' otherwise I project things into it which are not there, my own perceptions get in the way and I might miss something useful and informative. regards from a warm Christmas Singapore Alex Brown Two monks - one old/one young - wandering through deep and cold winter snows see a small shrine up ahead. They reach it and get inside. Empty apart from a statue of Buddha. The older monk takes the wooden statue, chops it up and lights a fire with it. The younger monk is shocked and after a while complains to the old monk that this action was surely sacriligious. "Warm your hands" says the old monk. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Dec 1996 23:16:34 -0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: H-NEXA Editor Michael Gregory Subject: Rejected posting to SCIENCE-AS-CULTURE@SJUVM.STJOHNS.EDU To: and From: H-NEXA Editor Michael Gregory Subject: Problems with MSU [Please report to me any lost posts - MG] Cc: Katherine Branstetter Late Sunday night, the MSU system went down and remained inoperative until 9:30 this morning. The H-Net system could not function without MSU, so we shut down also. Listserv is attempting to clear itself of the backlog, but we received numerous messages that digests to some addresses did not get delivered. We are unsure of the number of lost messages. If you receive questions about non-delivery of messages or posts sent in and not posted, please explain this to your subscribers. Listserv has a tremendous backup at this point and we are monitoring it to be certain that it continues to work throughout the holiday with no problems. Hopefully all will be cleared up very quickly. Thanks for your patience. Jackie Kent (for Vickie Banks and Dave Halsted who are away enjoying the holidays with family) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Dec 1996 23:22:15 -0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: H-NEXA Editor Michael Gregory Subject: Re: genes, mind, teleology. Part I Why is this discussion, going on for two weeks now and, once again, debunking theism so interesting to the believers in the soul-less mechanistic Universe? They certainly epitomize in their own beliefs the rubric of "Science-as-Culture," and for that I thank them. Since this derived somehow from the discussion of "Intellectual Property" perhaps I should include this refutation of my argument that Einstein's Energy-Matter theory of the Universe is what the Buddha understood 2500 years ago to be enLIGHTenment, in my book. I should do so, particularly, since Alex of Singapore compares, in one of these exerpts, the Western intellectual theories the discussants are refuting as an example of "Western intellectual exhaustion" with respect to the Eastern understanding of the Universe, that he characterizes as a system growing & changing by itself, "empty & marvelous." In case you have been preparing for the High Holidays with other benighted religious folk at this solstice celebrating the longest night of the year, I shall exerpt some of the discussion with my own comments in brackets [], effete Western Intellectual that I am. What started the flogging, particularly this time of year, of this dead horse again, which was once entitled, with scientific impartiality, "Science VS. Religion &/or Stupidity" was this e-mail [Date: 10th December 1996] from Alex Brown in reply to: > > Matthew Baggott writes: > "I think there are obvious parallels between the tendency to theorize > about "information" in the abstract sense (as if it has meaning outside > a cultural context) and Richard Dawkins-style theories about genes. > Both harmonize with a strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not > certain where one would draw the boundary) culture." > > Alex: > Exactly. While we can consider information to be that property which > in-forms or characterizes material or intellectual products, It cannot > be isolated from the products themselves. It is immanent to them. Indeed > we can only recognize 'information' as such as a regularity, pattern or > statistical recurrence of certain characteristics in a large number of > forms. Where is information? Information is 'nowhere'. There is no > platonic realm where it exists of itself. If we want to see it, we look > for the measurable similarities which inform experience and all of which > are the product of human activity. > [NOTA BENE, the surprising fact that the discussion of "intellectual property" is going to be transmogrified into our "dead horse" that Ian Pritchard and Arie Dirkswager so valiantly slaid at the end of summer. More surprisingly still, we are told "information is nowhere," perhaps like sound in a forest when there is no ear-drum to register the vibrations? Again, I apologize for my inferior Western intellect, I am just trying to understand what is going on in this Forum I joined. If I understand correctly, I am being informed that there is no meaning in information -- there are only patterns of regularity in material or intellectual products. Now we have two concepts, "products" and "property" -- the latter having been the original topic, "Intellectual Property," which I, IMHO, thought would have something to do with International Copyright Law as it would be extended to the Net.] Alex continues: > The Dawkin's-style theories, as Matthew observes, suggest otherwise and > when, as now, applied to society and culture in the form of the > ubiquitous and contagious 'meme' travel 'through the air' so to speak. > The pre-Einsteinian ether has been reconstituted as the memetic > dimension where apparently we breath ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH US. > [Once again, I was very far from the truth here given, in that I thought, as a specialist in the culture of Western Civilization, that, all memes aside, Human (vous voyez, Jacques Melot, pas besoin de se mettre en quatre pour developper l'usage d'une expression telle que "WERE-MAN"!) is a gregarious animal and learns from one another, something which I have been calling along with many misguided others, "zeitgeist" the spirit of the times. -- Now does this mean that our "collective spirit" or "consciousness" for those of you who prefer the modern, more secular term, implies a "pre-Einsteinian ether"? This is really complicated by the fact that "Dawkins-style theories" are the origin of this concept of a "memetic dimension" in which we (Humanity) "apparently . . . breath {sic: breathe} ideas - or, rather, THEY BREATH {sic} US." -- Well, I DO acknowledge that my ideas have come full-blown into my head from my education. Is the metaphor of "memes" merely trying to characterize a regularity of pattern in the way this occurs culturally? Is this not just another "product" of information (getting us nowhere?)] Alex again: > Human history and ingenuity in the form of combining and recombining > previous forms of behaviour or material into new cultural formulations > (paradigms, theories, styles, genres), is here rendered superfluous. > Apparently we are simply the vehicles for selfish genes in the > biological dimension and equally selfish memes in the cultural and > social dimension. What we have here, of course is a new theology - > theobiology - where god (dethroned from his former celestial home by > human thought) now resides in the genetic underworld and carries out its > great plan from there. [Perhaps there is a lack of attention paid here to the previous discussion of this Forum. I personally posted some research into this question of consciousness and genetic encoding, and attempted to update the work of Carl Jung, who died just before the breakthrough research by Watson & Crick in that field. When we, as experts in our respective fields, get together in a Forum, such as this, it sometimes takes some homework on the part of the members to understand what each of us is trying to summarize of our own life-work for the other members. If I go to the trouble of summarizing the relevant research in my field, I would expect that anyone who subsequently summarizes the content would not trivialize it, as in the last three lines above, following "theobiology."] Alex cont.: > The "strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one > would draw the boundary) culture." to which Matthew refers is, I would > suggest the need for a purposeful Maker to manipulate and drive the > human system, an ever present consciousness, a teleology. Asian > philosophies (Buddhism, Taoism) do not require such an interventionist > watchmaker. The system grows, develops and changes by itself and within > this there is some degree of human freedom and the positive or negative > consequences of whatever actions we take. ("Empty and marvellous"). [My understanding from Buddhism is that "the system [which] grows, develops and changes by itself" IS CONSCIOUSNESS. LIGHT IS THE NUCLEUS OF MATTER. This was the Buddha's awakening that enabled him to conclude that the Universe is both expanding and contractiong 2500 years ago. The "Shining Emptiness" of SHUNYATA is the Consciousness preceding the Big Bang. Empty though it may be, it follows the form of its own LAWS, enabling Science to find its regularity in patterns we are now culturally defining as "products of information." Truly marvelous.] ALEX AGAIN: > Are these genetic and memetic concepts a sign of intellectual exhaustion > in the West? > > Dec. 13th, Science just like religion is a cultural system and subject to > unpredictable teleological whims just as it was in the past. In both > cases there is a search for coherence, explanation and a comprehensive > meaning to experience. The problem is that experience is notoriously > fickle, random and difficult to 'frame'. So, to get meaning > out of this flux we have to insert it into an ever-wider context. The > only context for this physical world is the meta-physical world which we > have always projected into existance since human symbolic thought first > began. Why stop now? That projection carries with it our own sense of > purpose which we ascribe to this metaphysical dimension. It must also > have a purpose - which we call a teleology. The entity(s) which inhabit > this metaphorical dimension have a plan (surprise, surprise, just like > us). and what gives us meaning is that we are part of that plan. We > don't have a choice. Although god is now dressed in genes, this is not a > democracy. > [HoHoHo! Are the conclusions drawn here all a joke? Anyway, democracy in our exhausted W. intellectual conceptualization has come to mean "the lowest common denominator" in honor & integrity and "the highest common denominator" in income & assets. The discussion of "Science VS. Religion" has at least granted that the God of us religious gullibles is no longer an old man on a throne. Maybe next year we will be accorded some common twenty-first century usage for the definition of "religion." However, whether we choose to be "part of the plan" or not is definitely still a freedom we enjoy, as Milton put it: "to rule in Hell or serve in Heav'n" -- it is the LAW of the Shining, Empty Consciousness that we must serve, not the Narcissism which favored evolution through the animal law of the jungle. Human is just entering a new stage in evolution and it's taking us several millenia (a blink of an eye with respect to the age of the species) to do so. Further, if you're going to talk about psychological terms such as symbols and projections, why not observe simply the logic of your argument? You switch back and forth between literal and symbolic thinking, {cf.: Gerald Edelman, *Bright Air, Brilliant Fire* -- on "first and second order" thinking} when you talk about the sloppy thinking of your opponents, those who do not share your *beliefs* which you draw as scientific conclusions.] > Donald says: "Not that there isn't anybody out there . . . > Dec. 14th e-mail, Alex quotes & replies to: de Bivort-Lawry writes: > "Alex Brown is correct in saying that "Science just like religion is a > cultural system and subject to unpredictable teleological whims just as > it was in the past." > > But this does not mean that science and religion are the same, or > operate the same way, or have the same functions, or same effects." > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Dec 1996 13:41:34 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Arie Dirkzwager Subject: Concepts, was: genes, mind, teleology. At 23:22 23-12-96 -0800, Michael Gregory wrote: >Why is this discussion, going on for two weeks now and, once again, >debunking theism so interesting to the believers in the soul-less >mechanistic Universe? They certainly epitomize in their own beliefs the >rubric of "Science-as-Culture," and for that I thank them. This discussion turns (again?) to be quite fundamental to our approach of "Science-as-Culture". Still I think sloppy use of words are confusing it. Let's try to have each word denotate the "same" concept to us all. What does this mean, as we can observe that NO two concepts, especially when sustained by different brains (individuals), are the same? A concept is always a concept ABOUT something, I propose to define two concepts to be the "same" when the discussants agree that they are "about" the same "something" (whether this something "exists" or not, "exist" as such is a concept about something's way-of-being). Only then we can scrutinize in what way two "same" concepts differ and judge between differing concepts which one is the better one about that "something". In this process concepts are changed, as are their relations, to generate a conceptual framework that "maps" the something the concepts are about. The concept "Science" is about such conceptual framework and about it's building by human (scientific) activity. I would like to imply in this concept also the application of science, a.o. in technology. The word "Culture" is ethymotologically related to "Cult", which refers to human (religious) activity: the cult of some "god". I like to think of ALL human activity (including science) as (having this) "cultural" (aspect). Then an important question becomes: "What cult is practised in that activity?", especially interesting when we have to do with an atheist. Is it the cult of self-fulfillment in a materialistic or spiritual sense? Is it a cult in which money is the measure of all things (sometimes called the cult of Mammon)? etc.. From the viewpoint Religion->Cult->Culture the concept "god" becomes important: does some "god" "exist"? What concept "X" takes the function of the concept "god" in our cult(ure)? Then the question (quite personal to the scientist) becomes: "What "X" is our science the cult of?", or rather: "What "X" should our science be a cult of?". Different answers (concepts about this "X") are possible. My proposal would be to agree that those concepts are all the "same" in that they are concepts about the one God (mind the capital) who warned us NOT to make *images* of Him, or of any creature, to aim our cult at. As far as any concept is an "image" I think OUR (subjective) concept *about* God should be empty (it can't or should not exist). On the other hand, in the tradition of Abraham, Isaak, Jacob, the prophets and Jesus Christ and His apostles we may "assume" that this God made Himself known to us and thus there is no NEED for us to build our own image of Him. Starting from knowing Him (and consequently "Loving Him above all and our neighbour as ourselves, which is the same) we can and should build our culture including science, as a cult of Him. Merry X-mas to you all! Arie PS. >What started the flogging, particularly this time of year, of this dead >horse again, which was once entitled, with scientific impartiality, >"Science VS. Religion &/or Stupidity" 1. The dead horse was in the "VS. Religion", NOT in the "VS. Stupidity". I think the above is a contribution to science, especially VS. Stupidity. Let me know why when you don't agree. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Dec 1996 23:53:53 -0000 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Stephen Dewey Subject: Saying hello, making a point.... >Why is this discussion, going on for two weeks now and, once again, >debunking theism so interesting to the believers in the soul-less Well, some of us, who have only just joined this mailing list, never saw the prior discusssions, so this is as fresh as a daisy to me. (BTW [intro time] I'm Steve Dewey, no affiliations, no papers, no academic credentials beyond my BSc degree - BSc in Society and Technology - just here to lurk. I joined this list to refresh my interest in things society-ish and technicology-ish.) What's never ceased to amuse me since joining this mailing list is that the Intro message to this list suggests that it is a list not merely for academics but for interested lay-were-people, and goes on to suggest that contributors write in a "non-technical way" or similar sentiment... So far, I still get an urge to scratch my head and frown meaningfully at the screen... Perhaps I'll ascend to a higher plane having followed another couple of weeks of discussion here... As an aside, isn't it in the nature of a mailing list/newsgroup/wotever, for topics to be endlessly recycled? The memberships of such lists is usually in a state of flux, so.... Cheers SteveD ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Dec 1996 01:33:37 +0000 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Jonathan Morris Subject: Re: genes, mind, teleology. Part I I do not enjoy being afflicted by theobabble - either pseudo-science or mainstream religeous. The vigour of the responses to the faith-filling-in-the-gaps campus is a joy. H-NEXA Editor Michael Gregory wrote: > ...[snip]... > Why is this discussion, going on for two weeks now and, once again, > debunking theism so interesting to the believers in the soul-less > mechanistic Universe? They certainly epitomize in their own beliefs the > ...[snip]... I can only say how delighted I am to find the army of intellectualism getting even on the theology battleground! For most of my life I have been afflicted with the opinions of Christian bigots. Theology is so attractive because it is so comforting. If _reason_ cannot unify the complete spectrum of current knowledge it is seductively comforting to apply theobabble dressings over to gaps. Seductive and WRONG. The only cure for incomplete knowledge is scientific study and reasonable deduction. > ...[snip]... > This is really complicated by the fact that "Dawkins-style theories" are > the origin of this concept of a "memetic dimension" in which we > (Humanity) "apparently . . . breath {sic: breathe} ideas - or, rather, > THEY BREATH {sic} US." -- Well, I DO acknowledge that my ideas have > come full-blown into my head from my education. Is the metaphor of > "memes" merely trying to characterize a regularity of pattern in the way > this occurs culturally? Is this not just another "product" of > information (getting us nowhere?)] > ...[snip]... IMHO Dawkins presented an exposition on the filtering effect of a random environment, in both micro and macrocosms, on a genetic pattern which displayed an opportunistic algorithm. Essentialy, Dawkins worshipped at the shrine of cause and effect. This explains why your thoughts are a result of your experience and why _original_ thought is so rare and so cherished. Even _original_ can only be defined as _of obscure origin and of arcane development_ in this context. In this scenario, memes are an effect not a cause and are a convenient mechamism for explaining the appearance of _effect_ without getting involved with the _cause_ mechanism. This is because information is shown as present by the application of information - that is _its effect_. > ...[snip]... > Alex cont.: > > The "strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one > > would draw the boundary) culture." to which Matthew refers is, I would > > suggest the need for a purposeful Maker to manipulate and drive the > > human system, an ever present consciousness, a teleology. Asian > > philosophies (Buddhism, Taoism) do not require such an interventionist > > watchmaker. The system grows, develops and changes by itself and within > > this there is some degree of human freedom and the positive or negative > > consequences of whatever actions we take. ("Empty and marvellous"). > > [My understanding from Buddhism is that "the system [which] grows, > develops and changes by itself" IS CONSCIOUSNESS. LIGHT IS THE NUCLEUS > OF MATTER. This was the Buddha's awakening that enabled him to conclude > that the Universe is both expanding and contractiong 2500 years ago. > The "Shining Emptiness" of SHUNYATA is the Consciousness preceding the > Big Bang. Empty though it may be, it follows the form of its own LAWS, > enabling Science to find its regularity in patterns we are now > culturally defining as "products of information." Truly marvelous.] > While I definately feel that philosophy is needed in order to provide a meaning to _science_, I get very uneasy about serious reference to religeous thinking from our (relatively) violent and barbaric world history. The human drive to fill in the gaps is so strong that any distraction from a pure approach to science is likely to rapidly seduce the thinker into inefficiency. IMHO it seems that the discussion of this subject should be undertaken with extreme caution and discipline. -- >- Jonathan Morris >- >- Everyone has the right to an opinion >- ...but not everyone's opinion is right! ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1996 16:49:21 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Jesper Hoffmeyer Subject: Re: genes, mind,teleology Donald Wessels wrote: >"Genes have no 'great plan' they reproduce only because they can. They >simply do what they do because they can. I see no teleological >implications in this mechanical process. There is no mind, only an >algorithmic process constrained by natural selection, behind our genetic >make-up." And Alex Brown joined: > >I totally agree with this statement. If only the theobiologists did. I should like to make a comment on this. But let me first make clear that although I am a kind of biologist I have no sympathy with Dawkin's meme theory which I think implies an unacceptable reification of the content of the mind. It seems clear to me that even my own ideas are never quite the same the next time they emerge in my head. They grow or shrink, they are infected by other ideas, or they have changed their emotional moiety. Ideas don't have this unambiguous steadiness which could legitimize that we treat them as recombinatorial mental units or mental genes. Even the very idea of the gene illustrates this. The concept of the gene was introduced by the Danish geneticist W. Johannsen in 1903 (or appr). But Johannsen's gene was very different from any of the differing gene-concepts which are now current. Thus, Johannsen was very anxious to underline that the gene must not be thought of as a material thing - a view he compared with the way ignorant peasents of his time thought there were hidden horses inside the locomotive! According to Johannsen the gene was nothing but a unit for calculation. Furthermore, while embryologists thought of the gene as a unit for explaining the development of a trait during ontogeny, geneticists thought of the gene as a unit for transmission of traits between generations. Only because the geneticists won this war (mostly thanks to the elegance of the Watson-Crick helix model) did the gene gradually materialize itself in the form of a sequence of nucleotide bases at a distinct location on the chromosomes. I also agree with Alex Brown that "Information is 'nowhere'. There is no platonic realm where it exists of itself." Of course, if we think of information in the sense of Shannon's information theory, then information becomes a measurable quantity. But this kind of information has very little to do with information as the term is used in everyday language. A sentence like "I like her cooking" has no objective content of information, since we can only know what it means if we also know the context in which it is used. If, for instance, we were seated among cannibals the sentence might have a very dramatic meaning, which would be extremely rare in a European use of the sentence. Information is created rather than transmitted, and the only reason why this can work is that we share both natural and cultural history. Now, the concrete comment I want to make to the quote given above has to do with the fact (as I take it to be) that "genetic information" cannot be understood objectively neither. Biologists do not use the term heriditary information in the sense of Shannon information. They use it in the sense of mental information, i.e. as information relevant to the survival project of the organism. Genes do not mean anything in themselves. In the prototyope case of the sexually reproducing species it is up to the fertilized egg (or growing embryo) to interpret the genome, i.e. reading the instructions hidden in the DNA code and carrying them out by constructing the individual. If one gene is compared to one word, the human genome contains ca 100.000 words - probably more than the bible. The DNAism of genetics is probably as much of a false reification as is Dawkins' Meme-ism Therefore I agree with the first part of the quote: "Genes have no 'great plan'" Of course not. It is not for genes or for words to have plans. Organisms may have plans and human speakers certainly have plans. But I disagree with the second part of this same sentence: "they reproduce only because they can. They simply do what they do because they can" This seems to me to be an oversimplification. In fact, genes "do" nothing. DNA is a very inert molecule, the only thing it does is to wait for the proteins to select a place for opening it, copying it, bringing the copy (mRNA) to the protein factory outside the nucleus, folding the nascent peptide chains into a distinct three-dimensional structure and finally, but not least, transporting the newborn protein to the right location in the cell. More important, the whole dynamics of living systems are based on the interaction between the digital (word-like) code of DNA and the analog (body-like) code of the physical organism. It is this strange self-referring code-duality which makes up for the extraordinary creativity of (organic) evolutionary systems. People tend to think that natural selection is a mechanical explanation for this process. But natural selection is no such thing since it does not explain how it became itself established. To explain this we will have to explain how in the first place code-dual systems could arise on our planet. (Natural selection presupposes a surplus production of organism, but why at all do organisms care to produce offspring? This must first be explained) I do not think this will raise insurmountable problems but it takes us back to the second law of thermodynamics (the entropy-law). And there is very little reason to believe that this whole process is algorithmic in nature. The kind of systems we are talking about here are prone to be pushed into chaos dynamics, which means that the randomnes of initial conditions effectively precludes determinism. In a modern understanding of the second law of thermodynamics highly organized systems would be expected to appear spontaneously since such systems produces entropy faster than simpler systems do. In itself this does perhaps not fully explain that living systems actually did arise, but it assures us that the physical conditions for such an event was present. And if we add to this Stuart Kauffman's "combinatorial chemistry" I think we can feel assured that life is not at all, as Jacques Monod told us 25 years ago, such an alien thing in our universe. My main point is the following: The second law of thermodynamics is not a plan in the sense that it stipulates the future of the planet. But it seems to imply an inherent property of our universe to produce systems exhibiting increasing degrees of semiotic competence or freedom. Nobody planned us to be here - or so I believe - but we fit nicely into the way of our universe. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- University of Copenhagen Institute of Molecular Biology, The Biosemiotics Group Jesper Hoffmeyer tel +45 3532 2032 Solvgade 83 fax +45 3532 2040 DK-1307 Copenhagen K e-mail hoffmeyer@mermaid.molbio.ku.dk http://www.molbio.ku.dk/MolBioPages/abk/PersonalPages/Jesper/Hoffmeyer.html --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1996 14:42:09 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: de Bivort - Lawry Subject: Re: genes, mind,teleology In-Reply-To: <199612261548.KAA32336@umd5.umd.edu> Jesper Hoffmeyer says: "But let me first make clear that although I am a kind of biologist I have no sympathy with Dawkin's meme theory which I think implies an unacceptable reification of the content of the mind. It seems clear to me that even my own ideas are never quite the same the next time they emerge in my head. They grow or shrink, they are infected by other ideas, or they have changed their emotional moiety. Ideas don't have this unambiguous steadiness which could legitimize that we treat them as recombinatorial mental units or mental genes." Agreed, ideas are flexible and flexed continuously. This is not at all incompatible with the ideas of memes, of course. Memes operate at the level of scoiety or culture. They are _not_ the same as 'ideas in the brain.' Memes, too are flexible and flexed, but the characteristic that distinguishes them from other, non-memetic linguistic constructs, is that they have structural properties that enable them to self-replicate (in society or culture), self-disseminate and defend themselves better than other non-memetic constructs. Regards, Lawry de Bivort ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1996 13:29:00 +0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Brown, Alex" Subject: re. re. genes/mind >From Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg Date: 27th December 1996 1. Firstly a note of thanks for Jesper Hoffmeyer's exposition of the development of the genetic/life system paradigm. However, I got stuck on one of the points he made and would appreciate a clarification. He says: " In a modern understanding of the second law of thermodynamics highly organized systems would be expected to appear spontaneously since such systems produces entropy faster than simpler systems do." (and): "...The second law of thermodynamics is not a plan in the sense that it stipulates the future of the planet. But it seems to imply an inherent property of our universe to produce systems exhibiting increasing degrees of semiotic competence or freedom". If entropy is, (as I understand it) the tendency to disorganization, how could highly organized systems emerge from a highly entropic state at all, spontaneously or otherwise? ("........since such systems produce entropy faster......"). Everything is running down hill. I could understand that a compensatory process of increasing organization (through some interactive process between the components of the system) might cancel the effects of entropy in the system, but I don't think that is being said here. So - ? The other thing I thought was that entropy was only a significant factor in closed systems which could not import energy from their environment, whereas the systems being discussed here are open systems. Can you clear this up for me (and,presumably others)? 2. Both Jesper and Lawry de Bivort's comments on the status/stability/locus and changability of ideas in my view suggests a complex and rich problem looking for a solution. Another posting, maybe. regards to all Alex Brown ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1996 15:57:44 -0600 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: "Frank E. Durham" Subject: Re: re. re. genes/mind Dear Sci-Cult listees, At 01:29 PM 12/27/96 +0800, Alex Brown:browna@tp.ac.sg wrote: >1. Firstly a note of thanks for Jesper Hoffmeyer's exposition of the >development of the genetic/life system paradigm. However, I got stuck on >one of the points he made and would appreciate a clarification. He says: > >" In a modern understanding of the second law of thermodynamics highly >organized systems would be expected to appear spontaneously since such >systems produces entropy faster than simpler >systems do." (and): "...The second law of thermodynamics is not a plan >in the sense that it stipulates the future of the planet. But it seems >to imply an inherent property of our universe to produce systems >exhibiting increasing degrees of semiotic competence or freedom". > >If entropy is, (as I understand it) the tendency to disorganization, how >could highly organized systems emerge from a highly entropic state at >all, spontaneously or otherwise? ("........since such systems produce >entropy faster......"). Everything is running down hill. I could >understand that a compensatory process of increasing organization >(through some interactive process between the components of the system) >might cancel the effects of entropy in the system, but I don't think >that is being said here. So - ? The other thing I thought was that >entropy was only a significant factor in closed systems which could not >import energy from their environment, whereas the systems being >discussed here are open systems. > >Can you clear this up for me (and,presumably others)? > >2. Both Jesper and Lawry de Bivort's comments on the >status/stability/locus and changability of ideas in my view suggests a >complex and rich problem looking for a solution. Another posting, maybe. > >regards to all > >Alex Brown > Here are a couple of comments about the 2nd law of thermodynamics that might help with Alex Brown's questions. Please excuse the physicist's pedantic tone; it only masks the inherent nervousness of the open complex subsystem. The 2nd law is a global conjecture (as broadly confirmed as conservation of energy, but based on statistical rather than on simpler dynamical arguments) which asserts that the total disorder (consistently and mathematically defined) must increase for the universe considered as a many-particle system. That modifer _total_ is crucial: subsystems that are open (interact with the rest of the world) may operate to increase their order, provided some other subsystems lose more order than that. For Earth it is not bad bookkeeping to say that the ordered flow of sunlight over many years ultimately keeps us going. "Us" means open, complex systems that must generate disorder for homeostasis--more so for growth. It does not follow that the world is headed for death, nor that all of history is the story of degradation. Nor does it follow, from the principles of physics, that life will continue. (Never mind the anthropic principle. Please.) This message and all like it are bought at a price. So speaks the 2nd law of thermodynamics. Best wishes to all, Frank Durham Tulane University ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 28 Dec 1996 21:12:39 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Robert Maxwell Young Subject: Re: New site about Auguste Comte and positivism (fwd) >Colleagues: On an appropriately positivist note, cheers for COCTA and the >New Year -- with stalwart greetings and all best wishes, Fred > >---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1996 00:33:04 -1000 >From: Emmanuel Lazinier >To: Webmaster@NewsBank.com, robesch@beacon.regent.edu, > STXSCHMAUS@harpo.cns.iit.edu, jeffcoul@ACS1.BU.EDU, fredr@hawaii.edu, > soc40001@frank.mtsu.edu, Andy.Gilpin@uni.edu, junnever@runet.edu, > LFucaloro@csupomona.edu >Subject: New site about Auguste Comte and positivism > >I'm pleased to inform you of the beginning of an experimental site about >Auguste Comte and positivism: >http://clotilde.home.ml.org >The site is also the site of the "International Positivist Society". >It is currently mostly in French, but will be made progressively bilingual. >It includes : Comte's choosen texts, Comte's mottos, a complete bibliography >of comtean positivism, bio-bibliographies of disciples, and much more. >Emmanuel Lazinier >president of the IPS __________________________________________ Robert Maxwell Young: robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk 26 Freegrove Rd., London N7 9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306 fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic Studies, University of Sheffield. Home page and writings: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/ Process Press publications: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html 'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Dec 1996 22:26:00 -0800 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: H-NEXA Editor Michael Gregory Subject: M/III Symposium X-To: John Gary Daynes , Chris Vaughan , Richard Landes , Ken Nolley , "James P. Niessen" , Daniel Eisenberg , "Sharon D. Michalove" , Daniel Snowman , ccs@uiuc.edu, pfritzsc@staff.uiuc.edu, H_NET_DIR@apsu01.apsu.edu, asociate@h-net.msu.edu, HBOOKS@h-net.msu.edu, H-REVIEW@h-net.msu.edu Millennialists! We are gathering some momentum, _Gratia Dei_. If I have left anyone off this list, please notify me offline at . I have lost Kristin Solas' email address; could someone at BU or elsewhere forward it to me? For general discussion of the M/III possibilities, please post to the list , which may gain us a few more people interested in this project. My esteemed colleague Geoffrey Green has sent me some bibliographic items to get the ball rolling. If you have other titles or articles, please post them to the list. Comments, evaluations and outright reviews are encouraged. Please post them to H-NEXA. It is possible more extended reviews may be picked up by HBOOKS/H-REVIEW for wider distribution on H-NET. It is also possible to volunteer to review, and receive a copy of a book from HBOOKS. In such cases, please provide full information about the book, yourself (including your mail and email addresses, telephone number, Fax, etc., together with a brief description of your interest in the subject and your expertise). The final decision to provide a review copy will be made by HBOOKS, but requests should be sent to me offlist. The decision to post on H-REVIEW will be made by that editorial committee. Geoffrey Green's titles are the following (please note that Daniel Snowman's co-edited text is first on the list, and that he is a member of our preliminary planning group): _Fins de Siecle_, edited by Asa Briggs and Daniel Snowman, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996 _Millennium III, Century XXI_, by Peter Stearns, New York: Westview Press, 1996 _Millennium_, by Felipe Fernandez-Armesto, New York: Scribner, 1995 _Fin-de-Siecle Vienna, Politics and Culture_, by Carl Schorske, New York: Knopf, 1980 Also, please post any conference, symposium or other event pertaining to M/III directly to the H-NEXA list. It will make for clearer concatenation and H-NEXA Web logs if we retain the "M/III" subject line. Happy New Year to all, and remember -- the Millennial new year is right around the corner. Augurri! shout the runners with their torches as they cross Florence's Ponte Vecchio. Mike Gregory Michael Gregory Editor, H-NEXA: The Science-Humanities Convergence Forum ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 29 Dec 1996 12:13:03 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Arie Dirkzwager Subject: Re: S-a-C X-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net Hi Michelle! (I send this message also to the list hoping for a learned discourse on the fundamentals of science-as-culture). At first sight I thought your message difficult to grasp - it's not yet clear to me how we differ and where we agree, may be because we are speaking different languages. Still I'll try to give my comments hoping we can clear things up. At 13:13 28-12-96 -0500, Michelle Christides wrote: >I do believe .... that the >Power behind the Big Bang was the Intelligence of the Universe and that >life itself reflects the Big Bang as E = mc2. Why do you say "behind"? I could understand (and refute) "before" or "causing" the Big Bang. I can't think of anything like the "Intelligence" *of* the Universe, I do see the Universe "becoming" conscious of itself at the locus of mankind acting "intelligent", I doubt that this consciousness can be characterized as E=mc2, but you say "reflects", what do you mean by that? >From Newton and Bacon to >Planck and Feynemann, there is no separation in their minds between the >knowledge sought from Nature and/or the Universe and its meaning to us, >the seekers. "meaning" is the difficult concept here. I'd rather say knowledge *about* ... (the Universe as a whole and its separate parts and aspects), not "sought *from*" but "acquired by interacting with". This "knowledge" is subjective and might be WRONG in its relation to whatever-it-is-"about" (the objective). Knowledge consists of concepts "about ... (a.o. relations)" and relations between concepts: a certain set of concepts entails other concepts. This entailment makes up their "meaning" in my opinion. As far as I understand what you are saying the problem is that (some) scientists strip their scientific concepts from their relation with ("meaning" in the context of -) philosophical and religious concepts, while just THESE very concepts disclose the full "meaning" of the universe and our human existence. >It is the dissociation between Science and its meaning >that has created the antagonism between Human and Nature that we see in >the state of the environment today. Don't you rather mean dissociation between Science and Religion/philosophy? When there is a fundamental "concept" of the Creator as distinguished from His creation (the "Universe" CONTAINING "Human" and "Nature" tailored to each other) and one doesn't believe in the Creator this concept is secularized to the distinction between "Human" and "Nature" as opposed to each other: an antinomic antagonism. This leads some to think of scientists as creators of the universe (which they are not) instead of as creators of ("correct" and/or "incorrect") *knowledge* ABOUT the universe (which they are). In my opinion the basic "correct" knowledge is that the universe (including time and temporality) is God's creation. Do you agree? >"[D]iscourse resonates with reason, with method, with purpose. . . . As >idealized in Western culture's vision of classical Greece, expression >was valued as a means to some . . . greater end. For Aristotle, >expression was not simply for its own sake but, rather, was discourse in >the service of the civic good, or . . . the shaping of character." >Collins & Skover, *The Death of Discourse.* Boulder: Westview Press, >1996, p. xix. Agree. I may add that discourse (intra- and inter-individual) is the process of creating and shaping concepts and their cognitive relations. not (only) "in the service of the civic good" or "the shaping of character", but primarily to open-up all secrets of the universe and make them consciously known and applied to make the whole universe praise consciously and completely enlightened its Creator - that's the "meaning" of Science AND Philosophy, mankind having the tough task to develop the both in a responsible way evading fallacies. In that way (science as) culture is the "right" cult, as I argued before it is a cult anyway. > I was not condemning the repetition of the topic of lively debate last >September. New members (welcome, Steve!) might enjoy the stimulation, >if it were, in fact, at the qualitative level of *philosophical* >argument that we expect the level of *scientific* argument to be on this >Forum. That's part of my motivation (apart from developing concepts and ways of thinking in common discourse) to continue this discussion. >I want a 21st century definition of RELIGION on this Forum! NO! I'm NOT >going to go away. I've studied my Science too. Arie and I are on the >same side, but I've also studied my Philosophy. Are you familiar with H.Dooyeweerds three volume "A New Critique of Theoretical Thought" and Vollenhoven's "History of Philosophy"? I studied philosophy too ;-) >AND I was the >*only* one in a class of 350 at The University of Michigan (the 3rd >ranking University in the US) to get an A on the Astronomy final exam, >so there! And I did my Ph.D. psychology "Cum Laude" ;-) >RELIGION means to "tie together" the inner world of subjective >consciousness with the outer world of objective experience. I don't agree with this definition. This "inner" and "outer" world ARE already "tied together", that is a given within the universe. Religion is the subjective side of the relation between the Creator and the created (i.c. the human being). Subjectively we may deny the Creator, what remains is religion "tied to" something or someone else, may be (ones own) "inner consciousness" or "the Intellect of the Universe" or "Human reason and scientific methodology" or whatever we like to name it. A "cult" is the subjective expression of a religion. We should be(come) conscious of what or who our "god(s)" is (are), of what we are "tied to", of our "religion". >As an >example, the fine post today of Jesper Hoffmeyer, concerning genetics >and possible semiotics -- can contribute something to ME for MY PERSONAL >WORLD-VIEW AS IN WELTANSCHAAUNG & AUSSEINANDERSETSUNG. Every *great* >scientist has had an understanding of these two concepts for which the >German words serve far better than our present misunderstanding of the >true meaning of religion. I still prefer the term "religion" as the basic determinant of ones "Weltanschauung" and "Auseinandersetzung". When religion lacks philosophers have a serious problem! Arie ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 29 Dec 1996 12:40:23 -0500 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Robert Maxwell Young Subject: Philosophy and Literature, including Sokal I would appreciate it if Phil-Lit members would repost this message on other appropriate lists. --Thanks, D.D. ********************************************** In the new, 20th anniversary issue of Philosophy and Literature, Alan Sokal, the NYU physicist whose parody article stunned the fashionable, jargon-drenched field of cultural studies, returns to explain why he did it. Also in this special twentieth-anniversary issue, Michael Wood, Ihab Hassan, Martha Nussbaum, and Alexander Nehamas join over a dozen other fine writers on Kafka's parables, love in Wuthering Heights, the death rattle of literary theory, science and art, the fabrication of Jane Austen's racism, the Bad Writing Contest (the world's ugliest academic prose), and much more. Here's the complete table of contents, followed by subscription information. ********************************************** PHILOSOPHY AND LITERATURE Volume 20 October 1996 Number 2 _________________________________________ Twentieth Anniversay Issue Contents Editorial: Truth Matters by Denis Dutton and Patrick Henry Articles: Negative Capability Reclaimed: Literature and Philosophy Contra Politics by Ihab Hassan Kafka's China and the Parable of Parables by Michael Wood Transgressing the Boundaries: An Afterword by Alan D. Sokal Empirical Questions Deserve Empirical Answers by Colin Martindale Wuthering Heights: The Romantic Ascent by Martha Nussbaum Mere Reading by Eva T. H. Brann The View from Gadshill by Francis Sparshott Guided Rapid Unconscious Reconfiguration in Poetry and Art by Roger Seamon Moving Literary Theory On by Wendell Harris >From Work to Work by Paisley Livingston Between Scientism and Conversationalism by Susan Haack Is Literature Self-referential? by Eric Miller Critical Discussions: Nietzsche as Self-made Man by Alexander Nehamas Advocacy, Therapy, and Pedagogy by John E. MacKinnon Deep Therapy by Diskin Clay Reviews: Walter E. Broman, Dmitry Khanin, Thomas Leddy, John Goodliffe, C.S. Schreiner, Richard Freadman, Jack Kolb, Kevin Melcionne, Anthony J. Cascardi, Robert Grudin, Carol S. Gould, Roger Seamon, Paul M. Hedeen, David Novitz, William Walker, Gordon Teskey, Bela Szabados Bookmarks: What Are Editors For? by Denis Dutton ********************************************** PHILOSOPHY AND LITERATURE An interdisciplinary journal of literary and philosophical studies sponsored by Whitman College and published by The Johns Hopkins University Press "Few journals are more likely to entice the reader into new areas, persuade him or her to read new books, find out about new theories, rethink old assumptions." --Julia Annas, Times Literary Supplement "Unfailingly elegant." --Rick Perlstein, Lingua Franca Philosophy and Literature has now for two decades explored the dialogue between literary and theoretical studies and philosophy. It dares to be different by: * offering a constant source of fresh, stimulating ideas in the aesthetics of literature, theory of criticism, philosophical interpretation of literature, and literary treatment of philosophy * publishing a lively, wide-ranging assortment of essays, notes, and reviews written in clear, jargon-free prose * challenging the cant and pretensions of academic priesthoods and the fashions and inanities of contemporary intellectual life. "An indispensable journal, neither a hybrid nor a compromise. Contains articles that philosophers recognize as philosophical and that literary critics and theorists recognize as appropriate to their discipline. It is interdisciplinary in the best sense, and since it favors no particular school of thought, it dares to publish articles that are original. I look forward to each issue with keen anticipation." --Noel Carroll, University of Wisconsin "When I was first introduced to Philosophy and Literature, I was delighted by the breadth of topics, the depth of the analyses and, above all, the serious attempts to write about philosophy and literature in a way that enriched both and placed them in each other's service instead of pitting them against one another. I have continued to be pleased and impressed over the years by the journal's steadfast refusal to be ruled by the latest fashions, to monger the latest jargon, and to confuse outrageousness with profundity." --Robert C. Solomon, University of Texas Recent articles include: The Philosopher's Seduction: Hume and the Fair Sex / Faking Your Way to Tenure / Lolita and Aristotle's Ethics / Objectivity and Interpretation / Suppose Theory is Dead / Camus's Meursault and Sartrian Irresponsibility / The Empire Writes Back--With a Vengeance / Reports of the Death of the Author / The Canon Defended / Will Aesthetics Be the Last Stronghold of Marxism? / Tragedy and the Tender-Hearted / Borges on Immortality / The Complexities of Contradiction / Deconstructing "Ideology" / The Plain Style and Its Detractors / Wordsworth and "A New Condition of Philosophy" / The Logic of Decay / Bakhtin's Ethical Vision / What Gilles Deleuze Has to Say to Battered Women / Imagined Worlds and the Real One: Plato, Wittgenstein, and Mimesis / Postmodern Grief / Ulysses and Vacuous Pluralism / Moonstruck, Or How to Ruin Everything / Gender in The Gay Science / Subtlety and Moral Vision in Fiction / Emma, Anna, Tess: Skepticism, Betrayal, and Displacement / Horror, Helplessness, and Vulnerability / What's Wrong with Philosophers? / Computer as Component: Heidegger and McLuhan / The Misuse of Nietzsche in Literary Theory / What's Postmodern, Anyway? / In Praise of True Pluralism / Beauty is Fun and Fun Beauty / Making a Mess of Kant / Freeloading Off the Social Sciences / Zarathustra is a Comic Book / How Sexist is Sartre? / Cervantes at the Frontiers of Difference / Halpern Leivick, the Holocaust, and Responsibility / The World Is Not a Novel / Hermeneutics of Suspicion / Late-Marxist, Post-Poststructuralist Critical Nebulosity TO ORDER: Enter your subscription to Philosophy and Literature today. For fastest service, order by MasterCard or Visa using the 800 number, fax, or email: * Call toll-free 1-800-548-1784, 8 a.m.-5 p.m., Eastern Time * FAX: (410) 516-6968 * Email: jlorder@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu--specify Philosophy and Literature, length of subscription (one or two years), MasterCard or Visa card number, expiration date, and your name, address, and daytime phone number. Two Years (Volumes 20 and 21): $44/Individuals, $86/Institutions One Year (Volume 19): $22/Individuals, $43/Institutions, $17/Students (include photocopy of current ID) Foreign Postage for Subscriptions: Canada & Mexico, $3.00/yr., Outside North America, $5.50/yr. MARYLAND RESIDENTS ADD 5% TAX CANADIAN RESIDENTS ADD 7% GST [GST #124004946] Be sure to include your full name, mailing address (with ZIP+4), and daytime phone number if we have any questions. Johns Hopkins University Press PO BOX 19966 BALTIMORE, MD 21211 __________________________________________ Robert Maxwell Young: robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk 26 Freegrove Rd., London N7 9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306 fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic Studies, University of Sheffield. Home page and writings: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/ Process Press publications: http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html 'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 29 Dec 1996 20:49:01 -0500 Reply-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Michelle Christides Subject: Of Dead Discourse & Horses: on Science-as-Culture. Hello Arie, Since you posted the letter I withheld from the Forum, but forwarded to you, I'm posting it here with clarifications on the points you bring up. I hope this will not cause confusion. I've omitted my private asides to you (but my degree is similar to yours). Of Dead Discourse & Horses: on Science-as-Culture It once was the purview of Science to apply philosophical questions to the results of research and investigation. From Newton and Bacon to Planck and Feynemann, there is no separation in their minds between the knowledge sought from Nature and/or the Universe and its meaning to us, the seekers. It is the dissociation between Science and its meaning that has created the antagonism between Human and Nature that we see in the state of the environment today. The spirit of scientific and philosophical (once one and the same) inquiry was called "discourse." The word itself is meaningless to us today. Philosophy today is considered effete and Science today is considered a double-edged sword, if not actually the Sword of Damocles hanging over our heads by a thin thread. "[D]iscourse resonates with reason, with method, with purpose. . . . As idealized in Western culture's vision of classical Greece, expression was valued as a means to some . . . greater end. For Aristotle, expression was not simply for its own sake but, rather, was discourse in the service of the civic good, or . . . the shaping of character." Collins & Skover, *The Death of Discourse.* Boulder: Westview Press, 1996, p. xix. I became exasperated by the two weeks' of posts to which Alex and Donald were the main, though not the only, contributors, because, I felt that, if we were all gathered together in a large auditorium, shall we say, Forum, we would not make such rude statements, which seem to pass as normative, not only in this Forum but in the Net discussion-groups in general. It seemed to me that I had a "deja-vu" of this from last September. I was not calling the topic of scientific inquiry into the Intelligence (or lack thereof) of the Universe a "dead horse," but I WAS CALLING the dragging in of the subject, whether or not it was indicate> by the logical sequence of argument, a "dead horse." Flogging such a hapless beast is the antithesis of true discourse: ". . . [S]kills like the ability to enjoy a complex argument, for instance, or to perceive nuances, or to keep in mind large amounts of significant information, or to remember today what someone said last month, or to consider strongly and carefully argued opinions in defiance of what is conventionally called 'balance' shrivel in a commercial medium of 'emotional hyperbole . . . and blandness of opinion.'" {"Why Watch It Anyway?" p. 38. [Television] -- art critic Robert Hughes.} I was not condemning the repetition of the topic of lively debate last September. New members (welcome, Steve!) might enjoy the stimulation, if it were, in fact, at the qualitative level of *philosophical* argument we expect the level of *scientific* argument to be on this Forum. Unfortunately, it did not seem as though anything that was said about "deity/god" and/or "religion" showed even a reading of the basic philosophical works that make an educated person in our culture. It was a "pop culture" recapitulation of argument that is repeated generation after generation, as though ideas permit reinvention from the beginning, whereas we would all be "intellectually exhausted" if we had generation after generation to reinvent the wheel. This is not the spirit of Science that will make the inquiry of this Forum fruitful for any of us. I commended Alex's description of culture and its transmission in Part II, of my post, while at the peak of my pique. Nor do I wish to make him the principal recipient of this critique; and I thank him for his reply, although it exacerbates my complaint that there is a certain demeaning of intellect going on in the very mode that those demeaned are being accused of operating in. I pointed out that Alex's description of cultural transmission was the sort of thing that we could all come together and build upon. Is that not the purpose of discourse? Alex did not remember my post last September in which I quoted his post and that of Steve (Wilcox?) of Albany, NY, on information systems. Part of the definition above of discourse is to keep a basic continuity, "remembering what was said last month," for progress to be made. Since I had addressed him in that post, I assumed he would remember it, IF he had read it. IF he hadn't, it could be because when I quoted Carl Jung at length on archetypes and suggested it was the conscious experience of our genetic encoding, he may have read no further to reach the passage weaving into his post. Since, he did in fact summarize the concept of the experience of genetic encoding in our consciousness as images, as projecting God now "celestially dethroned" and "residing in the genetic underworld," and as a "watchmaker in genes" either he was refuting something that is in the zeitgeist (in a way that demeaned those who would put forth such a concept), or that he unconsciously remembered the post I had specifically addressed in response to his own last September. If he did not read my intellectual contribution, then I would have to wonder why he would read the post in which I get downright mad at being demeaned intellectually for 1. being a historian & sociologist -- > (Alex refers to us: "It is just a pity that the same impartial, > recombinatory elegance is not mandatory in historical and sociological > thought. Here, a naive need for reassurance in the form of the human > presence, identity and constructive purpose (the watchmaker now > disguised in genes), distorts the lens of theory.") 2. being a theist, and as a consequence, characterized *by definition* as in exerpt I. at the end of this message, below. Further, I shall reply only to one other instance in which he again shows that perhaps unconscious tendency *not unique to him in this Forum* to demean the intellect of others -- and I again quote him directly at the end of this, so that nothing I say here can be refuted IF SUBSTANTIATED BY DIRECT QUOTATIONS. I am sure no one in this Forum would demean anyone personally, if we actually met in an auditorium. Nonetheless, Alex calls attention to the only two corrections I made of "typographical errors" -- as there were no more nor less than the average number (many) in e-mail, why would I choose to put the "e" on "ideas breath us"? The answer is, of course, that there are many non-native English-speaking members of this Forum who would have a great deal of difficulty translating such a concept, if they looked the word up in a dictionary of their own language and could not distinguish between the noun and the verb. I thought it would be obvious that I corrected only that abstruse expression as well as an unrecognizable "typo" of the word "heredity" later in Donald's post. which was also in a garbled sentence that I left alone, as I did all the other typos. It seemed, after the repetition of certain definitions of god or deity and religion, that everyone who harbored a belief in the Intelligent Universe was being characterized as anthropomorphizing -- projecting some inner need onto the patterns in Nature or the Universe. FOR THIS REASON ALONE, I took pains to exerpt these passages, so that I would not be accused of drawing conclusions that were not there in the posts. Naturally, I was anyway. Jonathan Morris expressed the opinion that: "The only cure for incomplete knowledge is scientific study and reasonable deduction." He went on, as has Donald Wessels, to identify the backers of "religion" as the "Christians" (fundamentalists) who have plagued all of us at one time or another. I really am GALLED to think that I have to be categorized, by reason of theism, with literal (first-order) thinkers. Apparently, as Robert Hughes, has said about discourse, the problem in achieving it in a Forum, such as this one, is that people have to be willing to read beyond the sentence in which they identify the writer as someone in the "theobabble camp." Did anyone bother to read "Part II" in which I point out that Alex has some very important common-ground staked out for us all to meet and build upon? I personally have experienced the Power of the Intelligence of the Universe, Anyone capable of second-order thinking should not imply that all theists believe in an old man in the sky on a throne, nor even an underworld consciousness dressed in genes. I simply flew off the handle on the 23rd of December, when, after reading for two weeks such derivations of meaning from the concatenations of topics, I was then insulted as a historian and sociologist who doesn't have the "elegant recombinatory" intellectual prowess to observe the rules of information patterning to derive meaning, but was projecting a divine plan as my own expectation as a theist into science, & was wished a "Merry Christmas"! I AM CALLING FOR a 21st century definition of RELIGION on this Forum. Many a theist and many an atheist have properly conducted inquiry into the question of the Intelligence of the Universe. For Science to over- come its commercial misuse, scientists must learn the great intellectual heritage of our culture in order to regain the capacity to engage in discourse about the use of Science and its influence on culture. RELIGION means to "tie together" the inner world of subjective consciousness with the outer world of objective experience. As an example, the fine post of Jesper Hoffmeyer, concerning genetics and semiotics -- can contribute something to ME for MY PERSONAL WORLD-VIEW AS IN WELTANSCHAAUNG & AUSEINANDERZETSUNG. Every *great* scientist has had an understanding of these two concepts for which the German words serve far better than our present *mis*-understanding of the *true* meaning of religion. It's a moot point whether history would have been any better without religion. We would've still had stupidity. Just remember that we have congregated in this Forum for discourse to a purpose, which is to pool our knowledge, perhaps to achieve a qualitative understanding of Science-as-culture, that we would not achieve separately. None of us have had to present our resumes to one another, and that's a good thing -- we each have to read with an open mind and with the same DUE RESPECT for every member of this Forum, scientist or not. This requires us to think on our own, without external social evaluations, such as prejudice AGAINST ALL religion. In this way we can resurrect discourse and possibly take flight with the creative inspiration of Pegasus. Michelle Christides > Exerpt I. > >ALEX: Apparently we are simply the vehicles for selfish genes in the > > biological dimension and equally selfish memes in the cultural and > > social dimension. What we have here, of course is a new theology - > > theobiology - where god (dethroned from his former celestial home by > > human thought) now resides in the genetic underworld and carries out its > > great plan from there. > > > > The "strong conceptual bias in Western (? I'm not certain where one > > would draw the boundary) culture." to which Matthew refers is, I would > > suggest the need for a purposeful Maker to manipulate and drive the > > human system . . .Are these genetic and memetic concepts a sign of > > intellectual exhaustion in the West? > > > > The only context for this physical world is the meta-physical world which we > > have always projected into existance since human symbolic thought first > > began. Why stop now? That projection carries with it our own sense of > > purpose which we ascribe to this metaphysical dimension. It must also > > have a purpose - which we call a teleology. The entity(s) which inhabit > > this metaphorical dimension have a plan (surprise, surprise, just like > > us). and what gives us meaning is that we are part of that plan. We > > don't have a choice. Although god is now dressed in genes, this is not a > > democracy. > > > > Michelle: Are the conclusions drawn here all a joke? . . . > > II. > > ALEX (in reply to my post): I raised the religious issue as a criticism > > of what I consider to be a particular kind of teleological theorizing in > > cultural/memetic (biological) thinking. The criticism, in other words, > > was not of religion, but of what I regard as the theory of a 'soul-less' > > (dehumanized) mechanistic (biologizing) Universe (human society and > > culture). . . . There is certainly nothing in the text of the postings > > which suggests otherwise. . . . ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 30 Dec 1996 10:20:02 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Arie Dirkzwager Subject: Re: Of Dead Discourse & Horses: on Science-as-Culture. X-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net At 20:49 29-12-96 -0500, Michelle Christides wrote: >Hello Arie, > >Since you posted the letter I withheld from the Forum, but forwarded to >you, I'm posting it here with clarifications on the points you bring >up. I hope this will not cause confusion. I've omitted my private >asides to you (but my degree is similar to yours). Sorry Michelle, I couldn't detect any "clarifications". I would appreciate it when you would reply to my message on this list quoting what you are reacting to: causes the least "confusion". Otherwise I'm afraid this valuable discourse comes to a dead end. I won't repeat my reply to your letter as I posted it already on this list. Arie ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 31 Dec 1996 07:23:24 -0500 Reply-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Michelle Christides Subject: Re: Of Dead Discourse & Horses: on S-a-C. Hi Arie, This is "in reply to the reply" you sent to the list before my post (which I had forwarded to you with a private message) reached the server (it was down). Re: your message today -- you're still ahead of me by one post! I was just trying to clear up my text on discourse for language difficulties, before I got to this. Arie Dirkzwager wrote: > > Hi Michelle! > (I send this message also to the list hoping for a learned discourse > on the fundamentals of science-as-culture). > At first sight I thought your message difficult to grasp - it's not > yet clear to me how we differ and where we agree, may be because we are > speaking different languages. Still I'll try to give my comments hoping we > can clear things up. Arie, the first reply you make concerns a philosophical inquiry that is way ahead of the critique of discourse I am making in the post to the list. It was from the message I sent to you in addition to the list-post. I would like to postpone discussion of the following, because, in stating my own conclusions from what I know, I was sharing with you privately why I am a theist. If I reply to the following before we distinguish between philosophical inquiry, or "discourse," and the "philosophy of Science," which is generally treated as the methodology of Science, I could justifiably be accused of shallow discourse myself! > At 13:13 28-12-96 -0500, Michelle Christides wrote: > >I do believe .... that the > >Power behind the Big Bang was the Intelligence of the Universe and that > >life itself reflects the Big Bang as E = mc2. > > Why do you say "behind"? I could understand (and refute) "before" or > "causing" the Big Bang. I can't think of anything like the "Intelligence" > *of* the Universe, I do see the Universe "becoming" conscious of itself at > the locus of mankind acting "intelligent", I doubt that this consciousness > can be characterized as E=mc2, but you say "reflects", what do you mean by that? Now to get into what I mean by the philosophical inquiry of discourse: > > >From Newton and Bacon to > >Planck and Feynemann, there is no separation in their minds between the > >knowledge sought from Nature and/or the Universe and its meaning to us, > >the seekers. > > "meaning" is the difficult concept here. I'd rather say knowledge > *about* ... (the Universe as a whole and its separate parts and aspects), > not "sought *from*" but "acquired by interacting with". This "knowledge" is > subjective and might be WRONG in its relation to whatever-it-is-"about" (the > objective). Yes, indeed. You've hit the nail on the head! This is the crux of the "meaning" (in discourse, this is a kind of "chasing one's own tail," so to speak, to use what we are defining as part of the definition!) of the word "religion." The whole "problem" that we are dealing with in "culture" is the qualitative aspect of the *subjective* way of knowing with respect to (vis a vis) the *objective* way. Now this latter way pertains to the methodology of Science, what is commonly known as "the philosophy of Science." However, the splitting off of Science from Philosophy as we call them now, occurred along the line of the subjective-objective ways of knowing. This is the very source of the problem in Western epitemology. Referring again to Edelman's *Bright Air, Brilliant Fire,* the "qualia" of conscious experience (the subjective) is inherent in the interpretive functions of the right side of the brain. As psychologists, you and I would refer to the "introversion" of the person who approaches the world with the attitude of applying external experience to self-knowledge. This is the attitude of the "mystic." The "heroic" attitude of "extraversion" is generally that of applying the inner world knowledge to the external. I am keeping this as simple as possible, as you undoubtedly can guess, for the sake of discussion. Science, as the objective method par excellence, is objective, and consequently, "heroic." Now, when we refer to someone as a "mystic" or "hero," we are applying "qualia" -- simply a "scientific word for meaning." I am aware, logically, how frustrating it is to argue philosophically like this, because we are in fact, in a "closed universe" of language. We are, so to speak, "pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps," to arrive at the meaning of the link between the subjective and objective. Interestingly, the latest brain research tells us that the left and right brain hemispheres in women are more integrated (by the corpus collassum) than in men. The language-emotional and spatial-thinking functions are roughly speaking in opposite hemispheres. Other rough divisions have ascribed these dominant sides to artists and scientists, respectively. The integration, again, is in Jungian terms, a "transcendent function." The integration of opposites is usually called (subjectively!) "wisdom." This is the best (21st-century) definition I can offer the Forum for now. Meaning and wisdom are related by the integration of the subjective ad objective -- and this was once the purpose of philsophical inquiry, before the methodology of science came to be its own end in itself. That is the split, or psychologically speaking, the "dissociation" -- a pathological state when it occurs in the human personality BTW -- that is too much a part of the present Academic *divisions* in Western transmission of culture. Arie: The Knowledge consists of concepts "about ... (a.o. relations)" and > relations between concepts: a certain set of concepts entails other > concepts. This entailment makes up their "meaning" in my opinion. As far as > I understand what you are saying the problem is that (some) scientists strip > their scientific concepts from their relation with ("meaning" in the context > of -) philosophical and religious concepts, while just THESE very concepts > disclose the full "meaning" of the universe and our human existence. Ya, that's it in a nutshell. > > >It is the dissociation between Science and its meaning > >that has created the antagonism between Human and Nature that we see in > >the state of the environment today. > > Don't you rather mean dissociation between Science and > Religion/philosophy? When there is a fundamental "concept" of the Creator as > distinguished from His creation (the "Universe" CONTAINING "Human" and > "Nature" tailored to each other) and one doesn't believe in the Creator this > concept is secularized to the distinction between "Human" and "Nature" as > opposed to each other: an antinomic antagonism. This leads some to think of > scientists as creators of the universe (which they are not) instead of as > creators of ("correct" and/or "incorrect") *knowledge* ABOUT the universe > (which they are). In my opinion the basic "correct" knowledge is that the > universe (including time and temporality) is God's creation. Do you agree? Well, Arie, I don't mean to be "cagey" here, but if I start to argue from my conclusions, I'll be back doing what I'm protesting about with respect to "dead discourse and horses." Let me quote Ramakrishna: "It is not Creation that is an illusion. The illusion is that it is all Creation." I would take this to *mean* WHAT I HAVE EXPERIENCED which is that the *radiance of my pure consciousness* IS the *fabric of the Universe.* Further, (oh-oh, I'm getting into it in spite of myself) the London Times used this expression from Goethe (*fabric of the Universe*) to refer to "Einstein's Discovery," when announcing the purport of his Theory of Relativity in 1905. Yes, it certainly is an antinomy. > > >"[D]iscourse resonates with reason, with method, with purpose. . . . As > >idealized in Western culture's vision of classical Greece, expression > >was valued as a means to some . . . greater end. For Aristotle, > >expression was not simply for its own sake but, rather, was discourse in > >the service of the civic good, or . . . the shaping of character." > >Collins & Skover, *The Death of Discourse.* Boulder: Westview Press, > >1996, p. xix. > > Agree. I may add that discourse (intra- and inter-individual) is the > process of creating and shaping concepts and their cognitive relations. not > (only) "in the service of the civic good" or "the shaping of character", but > primarily to open-up all secrets of the universe and make them consciously > known and applied to make the whole universe praise consciously and > completely enlightened its Creator - that's the "meaning" of Science AND > Philosophy, mankind having the tough task to develop the both in a > responsible way evading fallacies. In that way (science as) culture is the > "right" cult, as I argued before it is a cult anyway. > > > I was not condemning the repetition of the topic of lively debate last > >September. New members (welcome, Steve!) might enjoy the stimulation, > >if it were, in fact, at the qualitative level of *philosophical* > >argument that we expect the level of *scientific* argument to be on this > >Forum. > > That's part of my motivation (apart from developing concepts and > ways of thinking in common discourse) to continue this discussion. > > >I want a 21st century definition of RELIGION on this Forum! NO! I'm NOT > >going to go away. I've studied my Science too. Arie and I are on the > >same side, but I've also studied my Philosophy. > > Are you familiar with H.Dooyeweerds three volume "A New Critique of > Theoretical Thought" and Vollenhoven's "History of Philosophy"? I studied > philosophy too ;-) Sorry, Arie, I am painfully ignorant of the contribution of your compatriots, except in the areas of painting, hydroelectricity and bicycles. Could you give us a "bird's eye view" of what you're referring to? > > >RELIGION means to "tie together" the inner world of subjective > >consciousness with the outer world of objective experience. > > I don't agree with this definition. This "inner" and "outer" world > ARE already "tied together", that is a given within the universe. TRUE! But we don't act on this in educating, or transmitting our knowledge of the Universe to, people. Actually, we don't treat the inner world as a "reality"! -- the source of a good deal of our psychological problems as individuals, and accordingly, of our pathological culture today -- I fear another outbreak of mass psychoses as in the two World Wars, now being staved off until the economic system breaks down completely. Religion > is the subjective side of the relation between the Creator and the created > (i.c. the human being). Subjectively we may deny the Creator, what remains > is religion "tied to" something or someone else, may be (ones own) "inner > consciousness" or "the Intellect of the Universe" or "Human reason and > scientific methodology" or whatever we like to name it. Psychologically, what you are describing in the paragraph above is the neurotic repetition of inflation and alienation which is evident in the mass culture and pandemic in individuals presenting for psychotherapy today. A "cult" is the > subjective expression of a religion. We should be(come) conscious of what or > who our "god(s)" is (are), of what we are "tied to", of our "religion". Hmmmm! "A 'cult' is the subjective expression of a religion." This could be a profound definition of where "religion" as most people have been using the word on this Forum, goes wrong. When "religion" abandons the "wisdom function" and becomes merely subjective (literal thinking and reasoning by inner world analogies). Wisdom derives from integrating the opposites of the objective and subjective and transcending them with *meaning* that is *within* the laws of the Universe and Its Consciousness (is there an antonym to 'antinomy' -- shall we coin one? How about 'synomy'!) > > I still prefer the term "religion" as the basic determinant of ones > "Weltanschauung" and "Auseinandersetzung". When religion lacks philosophers > have a serious problem! > > Arie It's really a problem of language. All the old language has become contaminated with erroneous meaning for those raised in this three-century transition between the pre-scientific world and however we may end in the new millenium -- I simply pray that we don't throw the baby of our great Culture out with the bathwater and become a Science-as-Pop-Culture society. Thanks, Arie, Michelle ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 31 Dec 1996 17:47:24 +0100 Reply-To: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture Sender: Sci-Cult Science-as-Culture From: Arie Dirkzwager Subject: Re: Of Dead Discourse & Horses: on S-a-C. X-To: jungsoul@vgernet.net A very Good, New Year to you, Michelle, (and to all readers of this message). I'll try to give a short reply to your valuable comments. First remark: I wonder if your Jungian approach is a "religious" starting point or if it is embedded in a theist religion - what do you mean by "theism"? At 07:23 31-12-96 -0500, you wrote: >If I reply to the following before we >distinguish between philosophical inquiry, or "discourse," and the >"philosophy of Science," which is generally treated as the methodology >of Science, I could justifiably be accused of shallow discourse myself! > >> At 13:13 28-12-96 -0500, Michelle Christides wrote: >> >I do believe .... that the >> >Power behind the Big Bang was the Intelligence of the Universe and that >> >life itself reflects the Big Bang as E = mc2. >> >> Why do you say "behind"? I could understand (and refute) "before" or >> "causing" the Big Bang. I can't think of anything like the "Intelligence" >> *of* the Universe, I do see the Universe "becoming" conscious of itself at >> the locus of mankind acting "intelligent", I doubt that this consciousness >> can be characterized as E=mc2, but you say "reflects", what do you mean by > that? Let's get things straight: "methodology" is "about" (meta) the "way" (hodos) scientists should go to get valid results. Then it is quite important to know the landscape of this way and the means by which we travel it, a matter of "philosophical inquiry" that has as its base the religious "opinion" about the universe: what is its origin and fabric, what is its structure that we are able to "know" at all? In my view "philosophy of Science" is more fundamental than just its methodology, its about the ontological conditions of science and methodology is largely derived from that. So let's not postpone this part of the discourse. >Now to get into what I mean by the philosophical inquiry of discourse: >The whole "problem" that we are dealing with in >"culture" is the qualitative aspect of the *subjective* way of knowing >with respect to (vis a vis) the *objective* way. Now this latter way >pertains to the methodology of Science, what is commonly known as "the >philosophy of Science." However, the splitting off of Science from >Philosophy as we call them now, occurred along the line of the >subjective-objective ways of knowing. This is the very source of the >problem in Western epistemology. Following Dooyeweerd (I'll return to that) I think the fundamental fallacy is starting from some subjective vs. objective dichotomy. To us, being "subjects" there is no "objective" way, although we can (subjectively) set and accept rules that define a scientific methodology (or a "methodology" for any other than scientific activity - meditation and mysticism? art? - that is to be valued as much as science. The term "object" has to do with the objective qualities of things surrounding the subjects: e.g. percievable color to percieving subjects, mallable material to the sculptor, measurable phenomena to the physicist etc.: the "..able" is the sign of there being an object to be known (and admired and used etc.) by the subject. This concept of a wonderful world with objects is destroyed by the idea that all objectivity stems from our subjective acting in an "objective" way. >Referring again to Edelman's *Bright Air, Brilliant Fire,* the "qualia" >of conscious experience (the subjective) is inherent in the interpretive >functions of the right side of the brain. As psychologists, you and I >would refer to the "introversion" of the person who approaches the world >with the attitude of applying external experience to self-knowledge. >This is the attitude of the "mystic." The "heroic" attitude of >"extraversion" is generally that of applying the inner world knowledge >to the external. I am keeping this as simple as possible, as you >undoubtedly can guess, for the sake of discussion. Science, as the >objective method par excellence, is objective, and consequently, >"heroic." Now, when we refer to someone as a "mystic" or "hero," we are >applying "qualia" -- simply a "scientific word for meaning." I can't agree as I think you're too much impressed by the fallacious dichotomy between "conscious experience" (subjective) and "external experience" (objective), in line of Descartes distinction of two "substantalia", mind and matter? >I am aware, logically, how frustrating it is to argue philosophically >like this, because we are in fact, in a "closed universe" of language. No, language is an open systen in the whole of the universe, we are inventing and modifying language to be able to speak *about* this world of which language is a part. >We are, so to speak, "pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps," to >arrive at the meaning of the link between the subjective and objective. Like baron von Munchhausen dragging himself out of the swamp by his own hair? I don't believe that at all and I think this figure is needed only because the "subjective" and "objective" were seen as separated and this dichotomy is taken to be the fundament of ontology, which is a fallacy. >Interestingly, the latest brain research tells us that the left and >right brain hemispheres in women are more integrated (by the corpus >collassum) than in men. The language-emotional and spatial-thinking >functions are roughly speaking in opposite hemispheres. Other rough >divisions have ascribed these dominant sides to artists and scientists, >respectively. The integration, again, is in Jungian terms, a >"transcendent function." Of the corpus collassum? I'd rather not call that "transcendent"! >before the methodology of science came to be its own end in >itself. I would add: and opposed itself to religion and philosophy, not seeing that it was founded itself in an irrational belief in human reason, the subject as the origin of all objectivity. >That is the split, or psychologically speaking, the >"dissociation" -- a pathological state when it occurs in the human >personality BTW -- that is too much a part of the present Academic >*divisions* in Western transmission of culture. Agree, but I think this "split" hardly can be avoided when one looks for "God" (or the Supreme Power or whatever you call it) within the universe, denying that He is the Creator of the WHOLE of the universe, including (the potentiality of human) consciousness. The real "split" is between the Creator and the universe, when that "split" is accepted the creation (universe) can be seen as a coherent whole and no "dissociations" are needed. At least that's my opinion and experience. >Well, Arie, I don't mean to be "cagey" here, but if I start to argue >from my conclusions, I'll be back doing what I'm protesting about with >respect to "dead discourse and horses." Let me quote Ramakrishna: "It >is not Creation that is an illusion. The illusion is that it is all >Creation." I would take this to *mean* WHAT I HAVE EXPERIENCED which is >that the *radiance of my pure consciousness* IS the *fabric of the >Universe.* Further, (oh-oh, I'm getting into it in spite of myself) the >London Times used this expression from Goethe (*fabric of the Universe*) >to refer to "Einstein's Discovery," when announcing the purport of his >Theory of Relativity in 1905. Please don't be cagey: I like openly thinking together and exchanging arguments and experiences in the discourse! I thought Buddha taught EVERYTHING is "illusion". I can agree as long as it is not opposed to some (may be vulgar) "reality", for then the fallacious dichotomy poppes up again. I don't see a contradiction with the stand that "everything" is created with laws that maintain the structure and the coherent functioning of "everything", set by the Creator (the *fabric of the Universe* of which Einstein discovered and formulated one in physics: e=mc2). Penrose (The Emperors New Mind) suggested ways how quantum physics could be expanded to "explain" not only matter and energy but also "mind" and consciousness, but science is not yet that far. Probably your experience of the "radiance of pure consciousness" anticipates that? >> Are you familiar with H.Dooyeweerds three volume "A New Critique of >> Theoretical Thought" and Vollenhoven's "History of Philosophy"? I studied >> philosophy too ;-) > >Sorry, Arie, I am painfully ignorant of the contribution of your >compatriots, except in the areas of painting, hydroelectricity and >bicycles. Could you give us a "bird's eye view" of what you're >referring to? Difficult. The essence is (I think) the recognition that all human thinking is based upon and steered by religious beliefs: man is a religious being, he can deny this but he can't undo it. When the Creator isn't recognized beliefs and faith are misdirected towards something created that consequently is seen as "Absolute". The universe is a structured whole in which different equivalent modalities of functioning can be distinguished, none has any priority over others, there is no basic dichotomy in the universe. Dooyeweerd distinguishes fifteen modalities, each with its own laws, from the arithmetic, spatial, mechanical-energetic-physical, biological, psychical, logical, technical-historical, up to economical, juridical, ethical, and pisteutic. "subjects" in the earlier aspects are "objects" in the later ones. Earlier aspects anticipate later ones: the square root of two is not an original (arithmetic) number: it get its meaning from the spatial as the length of the diagonal of a square, it's a number that anticipates upon the spatial modality. Those relations are to be discovered by science, the Greecs had lots of difficulty recognizing sqrt(2) as a number, so have we with imaginary numbers that refer to the physical aspect. Vollenhoven starts with a "correct" ontology, in line with Dooyeweerd, and writes a history of philosophy describing each school of philosophy as an ontologically given (possibility or) way of thinking. When philosophers don't see the fundamentals of ontology they go astray, Vollenhoven shows and makes understandable in what way. Far too short a birds-eye-view to do them justice, but I'll be happy to answer any questions. >> I don't agree with this definition. This "inner" and "outer" world >> ARE already "tied together", that is a given within the universe. > >TRUE! But we don't act on this in educating, or transmitting our >knowledge of the Universe to, people. Actually, we don't treat the >inner world as a "reality"! -- the source of a good deal of our >psychological problems as individuals, and accordingly, of our >pathological culture today -- I fear another outbreak of mass psychoses >as in the two World Wars, now being staved off until the economic system >breaks down completely. Agree, we fallaciously oppose the "inner world" to "reality". I think the crucial thing is that we should recognize ALL modalities as equally important, the economic aspect is far too heavily weighted nowadays. Donald Raadt c.s. initiated a methodology of Systems Design based upon Dooyeweerds philosophy: very promising, he acknowledges all modalities in designing a system. >Religion >> is the subjective side of the relation between the Creator and the created >> (i.c. the human being). Subjectively we may deny the Creator, what remains >> is religion "tied to" something or someone else, may be (ones own) "inner >> consciousness" or "the Intellect of the Universe" or "Human reason and >> scientific methodology" or whatever we like to name it. > >Psychologically, what you are describing in the paragraph above is the >neurotic repetition of inflation and alienation which is evident in the >mass culture and pandemic in individuals presenting for psychotherapy >today. We seem to agree very much! > A "cult" is the >> subjective expression of a religion. We should be(come) conscious of what or >> who our "god(s)" is (are), of what we are "tied to", of our "religion". > >Hmmmm! "A 'cult' is the subjective expression of a religion." This >could be a profound definition of where "religion" as most people have >been using the word on this Forum, goes wrong. When "religion" abandons >the "wisdom function" and becomes merely subjective (literal thinking >and reasoning by inner world analogies). "To know God is (the beginning of) all wisdom" (and denying Him is the origin of all stupidity: in that way subjective religion goes wrong) >Wisdom derives from >integrating the opposites of the objective and subjective I shouldn't start with such "opposites" and "derive" wisdom from their "integration", I doubt very much if one could succeed with such a fallacious stating point. >and >transcending them with *meaning* that is *within* the laws of the >Universe and Its Consciousness (is there an antonym to 'antinomy' -- >shall we coin one? How about 'synomy'!) "Antinomos" = against the laws. What about "responsible and observing/obedient" as antonym? Thanks for your upright comments, Michelle! Warm regards, Arie