Hi Loet, I appreciate the rigor of your comments. I have some follow up responses interspersed below.
On Oct 30, 2014, at 2:11 AM, Loet Leydesdorff <l...@leydesdorff.net<mailto:l...@leydesdorff.net>> wrote: Dear colleagues, The metaphors are sometimes confusing. For example: Along the line of your argument, meaningfulness would be exclusive to dynamical systems where agency, purpose, and self-interest have emerged. I would further limit meaningfulness only to the cultural domain. Meaning can be provided by human agency. Sometimes meanings can be codified at the supra-individual level. The ascription of meaning by us to non-human behavior (of animals or molecules) does not mean that these non-human operate with meaning. As Maturana would say: it is “as if” a semantic domain is shaped (in second-order consensual domains). The evolution of communication systems is a long standing interest of mine, but I don’t see a reason to limit ‘the meaning of meaning’ this way. Evolved systems of communication result from coevolutionary dynamics that mold signals, which may have no meaning themselves without ‘agreement’ (sorry for pushing more metaphors here) in the ‘consensual domains’. It strikes me as arbitrary to parse evolved signals from encounters with other sources of information as potentially meaningful to a system. Wouldn’t you, for example, assign meaning to the sight of a tornado moving in your direction? I’m sure it would induce activity on your part. When such a system encounters a bit of physical information it might or might not apprehend the bit. A bit is dimensionless and not “physical”. Probabilistic entropy is different from physical entropy (S = k(B) * H). The physical dimension (Joule/Kelvin) is provided by the Boltzmann constant. Bits are thus non-physical: not res extensa, but res cogitans (cogitatum). Good point. That was a bad choice of words on my part. You could remove the word “bit” and still have my intended meaning. It can only apprehend the bit if something about the system's dynamics is changed as a result of the encounter. It would only be meaningful to that system if it is “a difference that makes a difference”. In other words, if the change in the system’s dynamics affects system function in some way, then that bit of information was meaningful to that system. This can lead to the measurement and testing of hypotheses. That would be great, but I am not convinced. I am portraying ‘meaning’ as subjective (internal) experience. We could test for changes in the state of a system as a consequence of encountering information, but how can we know if the system found it meaningful? Even personal reports from a human would be an imperfect measure. However, if meaning were to operationally defined as a responsive change in internal dynamics, then I think we could begin to measure it. The example of the gravitational pull of the sun on the earth can be considered in this framework. The first think I would say is that there are plenty of systems in and on the earth, but the planet itself does not necessarily constitute a system. This is an empirical question (depending on the research question). Systemness can be tested, using for example, the Markov property. I agree this should be possible, and I think it is a very important factor. A big rock floating in space does not imply an internal system that could apprehend or change dynamically in response to gravitational pull. On the other hand, dynamical geological processes within the earth, biological/ecological systems on the earth, or weather systems in the atmosphere might qualify; and these system could potentially apprehend and respond meaningfully to the sun’s gravitational pull. Very metaphorical “apprehension” and “response”. One could also use “react”? Or do you mean “significantly” instead of “meaningfully”? Significance can be tested statistically. You are right about the vagueness of my metaphors here. Consider the movements of neutrinos or cosmic radiation through your body. Some of them may move through without any affects on your structure (including the structures of your component parts, like individual molecules) or internal dynamics. Others might affect these things. I would say that you have not apprehended the things that did not affect you, and that structural affects without changes in internal dynamics would not be ‘meaningful’ to you. You also have sensory organs designed to detect and react to particular modes of information, which makes us prone to attach meaning to information apprehended through those particular modes and organs. For me, meaning need not be associated with consciousness or self-awareness. I would say that as a hurricane over the ocean moves over land, information in the form of a changed gradient strength (or changed heat input from the earth’s surface) is ‘meaningful’ to that hurricane because the internal dynamics of the hurricane change in response to this information. Regards, Guy Guy Hoelzer, Associate Professor Department of Biology University of Nevada Reno Phone: 775-784-4860 Fax: 775-784-1302 hoel...@unr.edu<mailto:hoel...@unr.edu>
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