It has seemed to me that there is a bit of a parallel to the thing Nick does that I mostly post objections to (and that I read Glen as objecting to, though I should only speak for myself), and the thing Kuhn does that I object to in reading him.
So I’ll talk about Kuhn (TK): In Structure of Scientific Revolutions, TK plays sociologist, and comments on power structures, economies of scale, thoughtlessness, exploitation at the expense of exploration until one’s back is completely against a wall, and other such sociological phenomena. No argument from me, against all that's happening. Also in Venture Capital, consumer behavior, finance, religion, political movements, cults, instigation and prosecution of wars, etc. Indeed, were I to describe it in _any_ area of the interplay of individual and group cognition, I could take up TK’s characterization and not change much (sometimes nothing at all) except the name of the subject matter. But along the way in that sociology, TK treats the role of scientific empiricism as if it were somehow just given, and one can refer to it as an adjudicator (a kind of toss-off), without any attention to whether it actually is given, whether it is hard, or whether the indefiniteness of that problem of _reasoning_ and _analysis_ plays any role in when people think they can exploit versus when they decide as clans that they are forced to explore (so, I am granting much of the rest of the structure of TK’s sociological picture, and not pursuing the many places I think he errs in imposing it). TK’s passing-over-in-silence of this dimension is more striking, since the previous generation or two of philosophers of science had mainly wanted to worry about that question, and had clearly run aground on giving a good analysis of it, though they made many practically sensible and apt observations in the general direction. To me, if there is anything that makes describing the pursuit of scientific understanding a topic to write about under its own name, as opposed to writing a completely generic treatment that might have a title like Mass Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, or perhaps bookended by something titled The Wisdom of Crowds, the nature of the reasoning problem of what constitutes empiricism would be at the center of putting “science” in the title of that monograph. To come back to the Nick/Glen exchange, I don’t mind that lens grinders look at lenses, while hopefully they also sometimes look through them to decide what good criteria are for grinding strategies. (Indeed, I don’t think anybody in the list would argue against the need for both). It’s also perfectly fine to write very general treatises on human behavior. So, TK’s book could have been entitled People are Often Lazy in Ways that Make Them Effectively Stupid, and That Can Lead to Cycles, and I could then have reviewed the book as a useful if not terribly surprising sociological analysis. I tend to take those things as established for so long by now. that repeating them isn’t so engaging, and I itch to move on toward differences in the substrate, where maybe we can say new things that weren’t said before. It is tempting to laugh at the way Nick deliberately refuses to take Glen’s meaning; where when Glen argues that one should look through the lens in the sense of meaning-making, Nick claims innocently to understand that as looking through the lens at (invented?) Freudian-style emotional motives. There will never be a thrust that gets through that parry, we have watched it for decades. All good fun. I do want to distill and call out from the thread what seem to me to be several clean formulations of questions that interest me, and that seem still very open: From SteveS: Scientific language is a lossy compression layer over a high-dimensional formal plenum, not a generative metaphor system. (I would modify that it has elements of both — as I know Steve already intends — and that their co-traveling is one of the interesting aspects) and then: What might we know anecdotally of the contexts where generative metaphors are used in recognizing new models for observed phenomena? From DaveW: ... the proper, even essential and inevitable, use of metaphor is as and "exploratory tool (epistemic scaffold). (that whole note actually). Hard to offer good content in reply to these, because that would require an actual insight, as does all work that might become satisfying. I like the well-articulated problem, though. Eric > On Mar 20, 2026, at 14:51, glen <[email protected]> wrote: > > This seems like a fantastic attempt! It's still layered with sophistry. > You're saying I've stripped you of the capacity or interest. Yet that's > clearly not true. You're reifying a thought experiment, a counterfactual. > That's fine. > > The attempt to look at the world naively is a good one, though, even if what > you're looking at is the *presentation* of my meaning ("anger", "contempt", > "rage", troll metaphor, etc.). It's good to strip away layers of the > narrative like that to see if you can view something naively, "objectively". > But it's still an analysis of the presentation, not the target of the > arrangement of lenses and mirrors I tried to assemble. > > IDK. I've done all I can, I think. My intent was to circumscribe and directly > target why Schmulik would/will eventually ghost you: because you look at his > metaphor instead of through it. > > I'd like to leave off congratulating you on the attempt in the hopes that > you'll do it again later, in some other context, but without adding the > pedantic counterfactual. Just for grins, I'll add that a medium dose of > psychedelics, in the proper set & setting of course, can help doff one's > debilitating obsessions. And I recommend shrooms. You can buy the spores on > the internet. They're legal pretty much anywhere. And grow them in your > closet. Doing so adds a little connection to nature and the plant to help > layer the trip. Cleanse your doors of perception! 8^D > > > On 3/20/26 11:21 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote: >> Ok, Glen, You win. You have stripped from me any capacity or interest in >> how metaphors mean, the limits of what they do and don't convey. I am in >> that state. Now, without reference or exploration of any metaphor, please >> help me understand what you meant by the following passage: >> */But if you actually want to *understand* what some other agent is trying >> to say, you read *through* their text. You use it as a lens. If, every time >> you picked up your eyeglasses, you only looked *at* the lenses, those >> glasses would be useless as a tool. Every time you meet a missive focusing >> on the metaphors used, you are explicitly/purposefully misunderstanding the >> author. If metaphors are a tool, you're ignoring their tool-ness. You >> promote the means/tool to an end. [⛧] /* >> It's funny, because before you stripped me of my ability to think about >> metaphors, I thought I understood you precisely. You want me to take life >> just as it presents itself. Ok. I can do that, sort of. It's what I do >> most of the time. As we both know, there is nothing simple about how the >> world presents itself. There is always a past and a future and the naive >> present is always an amalgam of the two. We live neither in nor for the >> moment. But I will hum along. What do I see in this case? Well, first I >> naively see anger and contempt. I could try to mitigate that experience, by >> examining the text, but no, I am not permitted to do that in this world of >> naive perception. What I see, is a man incoherent with ... rage? What I >> see is a creature lurking in the dark moist crevaces under a bridge >> shouting, "Who's that treading over my bridge?" Thats what I naively see. >> But none of that is helpful to me in trying to reap the benefit of your >> prodigious mind. So I try to NOT take what I see naively to be all that is >> there to be seen. I say to myself, this is a man who has given me some >> really great working metaphors. This is a man whose thought is respected >> widely by people whose thought I respect. Before he stripped my of my >> analytical powers, I was led to try and squeeze every bit of juice out of >> the dry- skinned fruit he grumpily proffered. Now, I just see an angry man >> living in an incoherent world. >> Please, please Glen give me back my powers of analysis so I can see you as I >> used to see you. >> N >> On Fri, Mare 20, 2026 at 7:28 AM glen <[email protected] >> <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: >> Fools have more to say, and more impact, than, for example, nit-picking >> grammar nazis. >> Anyway, here is the counterargument, AGAIN! OK. I grant you all 5 of your >> points. As a fan of postmodernist approaches, the examination of every layer >> of every narrative in the stack *can* be worthwhile and interesting, >> especially for academics. I'm glad you are also a postmodernist. >> But if you actually want to *understand* what some other agent is trying >> to say, you read *through* their text. You use it as a lens. If, every time >> you picked up your eyeglasses, you only looked *at* the lenses, those >> glasses would be useless as a tool. Every time you meet a missive focusing >> on the metaphors used, you are explicitly/purposefully misunderstanding the >> author. If metaphors are a tool, you're ignoring their tool-ness. You >> promote the means/tool to an end. [⛧] >> People use their deeply embedded metaphors to communicate. If all you can >> do is yap about their metaphors, you are blocking their ability to >> communicate and your ability to understand what they mean. >> I'll turn your moral back around on you. You can choose to ignore my >> counter argument, yet again. Or you can tell me why it's more important to >> look at the lens than through the lens. [⛤] >> [⛧] A good analogy, here, is that of paraphilia >> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paraphilia >> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paraphilia>>. You have a fetish. Rather than >> a metaphor *enhancing* your ability to see the world, you've fetishized >> them. You think the metaphor *is* the world. Like a fetishist, you're >> aroused by the tool, not the objective. >> [⛤] I can shunt a counter-counter argument in advance. In a mostly >> rhetorical world, if you merely look *through* the metaphor, you're at risk >> of being a victim of purposefully designed narratives, intended to exploit >> or mislead you. Therefore, a critical thinker must *also* look at the >> lenses, not merely through them. But this argument fails because if you >> can't even look through the lens in the first place, then you can never >> critically analyze how it [mis]directs your gaze. So the *first* and primary >> skill is to be able to look *through* metaphors. Looking at them is a >> secondary skill. And, like the grammar nazis, a fetish for the form >> preemptively excludes an understanding of the function. >> On 3/19/26 1:10 PM, Nicholas Thompson wrote: >> > 1. Metaphors are everywhere. We can disclaim them all we like, but >> they are deeply embedded in the way in which we proceed from thought to >> thought. They lurk in how professionals talk to one another and also in the >> manner in which professionals talk to the public. >> > 2. There is a lot of evidence these days that scientists have "lost" >> the public. This is a very dangerous situation. My suspicion is that this >> has to do with the metaphors we use when we talk to the public about what we >> do. >> > 3. We all seem to agree that there is truth and falsehood disguised >> in every metaphor. >> > 4. Given the ambiguity of metaphors, I am interested in a method for >> understanding their role in thought and communication, particularly in >> understanding the manner in which truth and falsehood is deployed in them. >> How are we to distinguish between a better and a worse metaphor if all >> contain elements of falsehood. What am I to take from your metaphor? What >> are you to take from mine? >> > 5. Given the entanglement of truth and falsehood in metaphor, it's >> worth exploring distinctions between what implications a speaker intends by >> a metaphor, what the coherence of the metaphor can logically sustain by way >> of implication, and what implications hearers take from the metaphor. >> -- > > > -- > ¡sıɹƎ ןıɐH ⊥ ɐןןǝdoɹ ǝ uǝןƃ > ὅτε oi μὲν ἄλλοι κύνες τοὺς ἐχϑροὺς δάκνουσιν, ἐγὰ δὲ τοὺς φίλους, ἵνα σώσω. > > .- .-.. .-.. / ..-. --- --- - . .-. ... / .- .-. . / .-- .-. --- -. --. / ... > --- -- . / .- .-. . / ..- ... . ..-. ..- .-.. > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom > https://bit.ly/virtualfriam > to (un)subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > FRIAM-COMIC > https://linkprotect.cudasvc.com/url?a=http%3a%2f%2ffriam-comic.blogspot.com%2f&c=E,1,uq75YT_QCctYTsQ1GSYr7BYtVwlAoxF9iJif_DYxhg3zF8kpgtcBSKDKBQ61OQZjeL6y6TCWsD4KcJzK9gChs0k7-prM1nWHMTuSIGhknNr7sA,,&typo=1 > archives: 5/2017 thru present > https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/ > 1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
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