Replying to Loet. Well, I may or may not be be a nominalist (which kind?)
in the sense that I believe that qualia are actual as universals, and that
evolution has created entities -- us -- that can experience them, or focus
them, acutely. This is the same as universals created by language -- such
as 'space', 'heat', etc., all of which do relate to experience but not to
specific objects.
However, I also believe that each species of sentient beings has its own
'take' on actuality, lives in its own 'umwelt', and so my sense of, for lack
of a better term, a 'numinous realm' may be conditioned by my own sense
organs, and further conditioned again by my cultural heritage. Thus, I am
constructed as: {physico-chemical world {biology {primate {culture {my
experience}}}}}, showing the layers of information affording me.
STAN
On Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 10:32 AM, Loet Leydesdorff <l...@leydesdorff.net>wrote:
> Dear Joe, Stan, and colleagues,
>
>
>
> It occurred to me that this is in a certain sense a repeat of the
> nominalism/realism discussion. With his heavy emphasis on being/not-being,
> Joe is on the realist side, while Stan’s qualia are nominalistic. I assume
> that they don’t dwell around like the Greek Gods, but are reflexive
> constructs shaped in scholarly discourse that clarifies them. This
> discussion makes also clear to me why Joe’s approach is called “Logic in
> Reality” and not “Reality in Logic”. Eventually, the grounding has a
> direction.
>
>
>
> I would consider the vagueness as tangential to the scholarly discourse;
> the external referent. The further specification – the updating of
> hypotheses – enables us to define new puzzles and thus perhaps to improve
> the specification. This reality (as cogitatum part of res cogitans) cannot
> be captured with derivatives from “esse”. One would need derivatives from
> “frangere” – fractals, fragments, fragile – for the understanding. The
> models remain volatile albeit more symbolically generalized than common
> language.
>
>
>
> With best wishes,
>
> Loet
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Loet Leydesdorff
>
> Professor, University of Amsterdam
> Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR),
> Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam.
> Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-842239111
> l...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/
>
>
>
> *From:* fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es]
> *On Behalf Of *Stanley N Salthe
> *Sent:* Thursday, November 04, 2010 3:05 PM
> *To:* fis@listas.unizar.es
> *Subject:* [Fis] Fwd: [Fwd: Discussion Colophon] From J.Brenner
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: *Stanley N Salthe* <ssal...@binghamton.edu>
> Date: Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 10:03 AM
> Subject: Re: [Fis] [Fwd: Discussion Colophon] From J.Brenner
> To: "Pedro C. Marijuan" <pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es>
>
>
> A comment on Joseph's concluding statement: It seems clear to me that
> there is a world of qualia (spiritual realm, sentience, Peirce's 'universal
> mind', whatever). I believe that the connection between this and the
> physical/material world has increased in sharpness/definiteness at certain
> locales (like the earth) during the development of the universe. It does
> not, however, seem plausible that this connection is made 'from the bottom
> up' via the QM realm, as in Conrad's 'fluctuons'. The glut of levels in the
> material world just presents too many barriers for that to be the case.
> Development generally goes from vaguer to increasingly more definite, and
> our awareness of qualia likely has had that kind of development,
> individually during our ontogeny.
>
>
>
> STAN
>
> On Thu, Nov 4, 2010 at 6:24 AM, Pedro C. Marijuan <
> pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es> wrote:
>
> (For unknown reasons this message didn't went through last Tuesday---P.)
>
> -------- Mensaje original --------
>
> *Asunto: *
>
> The Fluctuon Model; Colophon
>
> *Fecha: *
>
> Tue, 02 Nov 2010 12:44:48 +0100
>
> *De: *
>
> Joseph Brenner <joe.bren...@bluewin.ch> <joe.bren...@bluewin.ch>
>
> *Responder a: *
>
> Joseph Brenner <joe.bren...@bluewin.ch> <joe.bren...@bluewin.ch>
>
> *Para: *
>
> Pedro C. Marijuan <pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es> <pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es>,
> fis <fis@listas.unizar.es> <fis@listas.unizar.es>
>
>
>
> Dear All,
>
>
>
> Pedro has asked me to renew with an earlier FIS Group practice and write a
> colophon for our discussion of the fluctuon model of Michael Conrad.
> Actually, not much has happened with regard to evidence for or against.
> There is a lot of information in the latest Stan<>Loet exchange, however,
> that has made the exercise worthwhile. There has also been a discussion of
> fluctuations, but essentially of fluctuations in *our* thermodynamic
> world. Most interesting, but of no direct help with the original task.
>
>
>
> I therefore now exercise my editorial authority by offering, by way of
> colophon, and with his agreement, the notes of a discussion I had with Pedro
> in Beijing. They were not and are not proposed as science, information
> science or other; but I like to think they are more than just opinion. For
> people, and I assume that is some of us, who have ever pondered such "deep"
> issues, these notes may suggest some ideas and comments. For others, for
> whom talk of Being and Nothingness or Non-Being, *pace* Sartre, is pure
> nonsense, pure non-information, I have some sympathy. The only point I would
> take issue with is the "pure" . . .
>
>
>
> 1. We are aware of our atoms and molecules and those of others through our
> adjacencies to them. They have Being for us; they are "Being". The
> corresponding changes in their states constitute information at several
> levels.
>
>
>
> 2. Our atoms and molecules are composed of "strings" of which we are
> *not*aware. They have no Being for us, they are "Non-Being". Whether any
> fluctuations or changes in strings can constitute information is not clear.
>
>
>
> 3. Non-Being has been described both scientifically and traditionally, *
> e.g.* the "Mind of God", the quantum vacuum, "holomovement".
>
>
>
> 4. Spontaneity and indeterminism (randomness) are possible, but only in
> Non-Being. These are reflected in Being only in radioactive decay and
> in catastrophic cosmological phenomena (black holes). The shifts of
> perspective in this note are non-random.
>
>
>
> 5. We in Being are aware of the existence of Non-Being, therefore, as
> something internal and external to us at the same time. The LIR Principle of
> Dynamic Opposition (PDO) describes this epistemological and ontological
> state-of-affairs as real and logical.
>
>
>
> 6. Non-Being is not and does not have to be aware of itself nor of us here
> in Being. We take care of that little function for it.
>
>
>
> 7. The influence of Non-Being and its changes, *e.g.*, in local
> information content. which are not perceived by nor interact with us in the
> usual manner, may be due to our awareness of Non-Being, which is a *kind*of
> information about it, causally effective. Conrad claims that interactions
> with Non-Being (the unmanifest world) also exist and can influence
> biological states. These two perspectives may or may not converge.
>
>
>
> 8. In either case, the information content of vacuum fluctuations and the
> informational content of our awareness/understanding of it and them are, by
> the PDO, and at the current state of knowledge, the same and not the same.
>
>
>
> 9. The existence of a direct energetic (thermodynamic) relationship or
> information transfer between Being and Non-Being, as in the fluctuon
> model, below the quantum level, remains an open question, but such a
> relationship may not be necessary as a basis for information theory.
>
>
>
> 10. An alternate basis is available in the self-duality and dualities of
> energy, at and above the quantum level, in Being alone. The "information" in
> point 7. can be just a projection.
>
>
>
> Best wishes,
>
>
>
> Joseph
>
>
>
> --
>
> -------------------------------------------------
>
> Pedro C. Marijuán
>
> Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group
>
> Instituto Aragonés de Ciencias de la Salud
>
> Avda. Gómez Laguna, 25, Pl. 11ª
>
> 50009 Zaragoza, Spain
>
> Telf: 34 976 71 3526 (& 6818) Fax: 34 976 71 5554
>
> pcmarijuan.i...@aragon.es
>
> http://sites.google.com/site/pedrocmarijuan/
>
> -------------------------------------------------
>
>
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