Re: Evolutionary Science (and the evolution of mankind's
I lost the link between my question and thermodynamics, sorry, could I have it please? Eva From: Durant [EMAIL PROTECTED] You make it a no-win situation. So we If you are asking can "business as usual continue", the answer is NO. It IS a no-win situation. There are NO known exceptions to the laws of thermodynamics. One might as well expect to repeal gravity. Jay [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: TOC
I just pick one of the many fuzzyness and what gives the impression of a tedious pseudo-scientific bla-bla. Private property is inextricably part of our commons because it is part of our life support and social systems. Owners affect us all when they alter the emergent properties of our life support and social systems (alter their land) to "make a profit" -- cover land with corn or with concrete. The longest period of human sapiens still the period when private property did not exist (50k+ years) All this time they were having ever growing populations eventually all over the globe. If you say social laws are like physical laws, than if you are consistant, if humans may use the knowledge of the first to manipulate the physical reality, why shouldn't they be able to do the same with social reality? It seems obscene to seek out this catastrophic vision and sit back saying this is our fate. You totally ignore the ability to plan and to cooperate. There is no "innate capitalism", however ignorant you make me out, it couldn't have "evolved" in a few hundred years. People already made some effort to overthrow capitalism, after a much shorter rule, than feudalism. Given the right initial conditions it could have already worked. The more consciously is done, the more chance for a genuin - not bourgois - democracy to emerge. I cannot see the point of your dark fatalism, except a good reason to call everybody else stupid, and have a good excuse to sit back and do buggerall in comfort.. Eva Neighborhoods, cities and states are commons in the sense that no one is denied entry. Anyone may enter and lay claim to the common resources. One can compare profits to Hardin's "grass" when any corporation -- from anywhere in the world -- can drive down profits by competing with local businesses for customers. One can see wages as "grass" when any number of workers -- from anywhere in the world -- can enter our community and drive down wages by competing with local workers for jobs. Everywhere one looks, one sees the Tragedy of the Commons. There is no technological solution, but governments can act to limit access to the commons, at which time they are no longer commons. In the private-money-based political system we have in America, everything (including people) becomes the commons because money is political power, and all political decisions are reduced to economic ones. In other words, we have no true political system, only an economic system -- everything is for sale. Thus, America is one large commons that will be exploited until it is destroyed. [ This is from my latest newsletter. For more -- including references -- see www.dieoff.org ] Jay [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Evolutionary Science (and the evolution of mankind's
Here is the short version of the laws of thermodynamics: #1. You can't win. #2. You can't break even. #3. You can't even get out of the game. Jay I did some physics in my distant and fuzzy past, but I cannot remember these... Eva
RE: FW TOC?
Eva Durant wrote:
I thought these laws of thermodynamics operate in
a closed system. I don't know about our universe,
but Earth is not a closed system.
It sounds awfully mystical and speculative
("self organization is a property
of energy"??) what you are talking
about and I cannot see the link
into practical proposals.
Thomas:
Well Eva, your question is actually two questions in my opinion. Do the
laws of thermodynamics operate in a closed system? The scientific answer is
yes. In fact science as I understand it states the Universe with all it's
galaxies is a closed system and though you can look at small systems and
define them as open systems, they are nested in greater systems that are
closed.
Second question, "Is self organization a property of energy?" To answer
this, I went to the book, "The Web of Life" to see if I could find a
definitive answer without rereading the whole book or spending half my life
learning a whole bunch of stuff. Let me take a crack at it.
Quote from Page 85
Summarizing those three characteristics of self-organizing systems, we can
say that self-organization is the spontaneous emergence of new structures
and new forms of behavior in open systems far from equilibrium,
characterized by internal feedback loops and described mathematically by non
linear equations. (End of quote)
Now as I understand this, a bunch of atoms tend to self organize which
creates "new structures" and through the reality of these new structures,
"new forms of behavior" start to happen. This happens in "open systems"
that are "far from equilibrium. One of the characteristics of these new
structures is the appearance of "feedback loops" and that this whole process
can be described by non linear equations. The authors contention (and I
haven't finished the book yet) is that this is the definitive description of
living things. In other words, it is not evolutionary in the sense of
selection for survival that creates different life forms and their behavior
as much as it is the tendency for matter to "self organize". This self
organization follows "rules" most of which we probably haven't discovered
yet.
Now, this self organization seems to have some relationship to the concept
of "attractors"
Quote page 136
The qualitative analysis of a dynamic system, then, consists in identifying
the system's attractors and basins of attraction and classifying them in
terms of their topological characteristics. The result is a dynamical
picture of the entire system, called the "phase portrait."
Thomas
This concept "phase portrait" is a geometric method of presenting a visual
answer which shows where the "attractors are.
Quote Page 139
"to discover that strange attractors are exquisite examples of fractals."
Thomas
Fractals were discovered by a guy named Mandlebrot through the discovery of
"fractal geometry" an attempt to describe and analyze the complexity of the
irregular shapes in the world around us.
So to sum up this answer while trying to ignore the asymetrical times of
discovery. It seems that fractal geometry produces forms that are very
similar to what we see in real life, strongly indicating that living things
can be described mathematically which Newtonian physics cannot do. Fractals
have a direct relationship to attractors which can be represented through
another mathematical tool called non linear equations and which seem to
evolve out of the concept of self organization. Going the other way, it
seems one of the properties of chaotic systems is to self organize which
develops attractors which are the same as fractals which represent reality
very closely in living systems.
Therefore to answer your question, "Is self organization a property of
energy?" The answer is yes.
So, what's the big deal? Well, if you are expecting an answer that tells
you how to pay the rent, I don't have it and neither does all these
explanations. However, if we subscribe to the theory that to enhance our
survival, the closer to basic reality our "facts" are, then this relatively
new development proposes a set of ideas that lead to different assumptions
than we get from Newtonian physics and linear equations. If this is true,
then some of our current assumptions such as evolutionary theory, which we
use as a rational for a number of the systems that govern our life, like
economics, may be found to be based on false assumptions, creating the need
for change.
Respectfully,
Thomas Lunde
FW The Family Basic Income Proposal
Brad McCormick wrote in reply to a comment of mine re Marx getting a job instead of sitting around starving and theorizing: You bring out a very important consideration. To paraphrase an old Coca-Cola ad, what, at the back of our minds, all us scholars (in both senses of that word...) are looking to find, is a funding source, so we won't have to WASTE our lives and die an early death in "the mills". Am I correct that Engels helped "underwrite" Marx's work? I think that under my Proposal, the question he poses would be solved - for the benefit of all those creative people who can not find "a funding source". Respectfully, Thomas Lunde
Re: Dooms day
(Elinor:) The first thing I'd like to do is a bit tax on financial movements, which, would slow down some of the financial speculations. It has been tried in various countries, did not make a lot of difference. Our entrepaneurs complain, that that others make the profits they should have. That they are not allowed to make all the money that they would selflessly invest to provide millions of lovely jobs... I'm afraid, there is not a lot you can do for speedy improvement in the capitalist framework. We are at the point where most things have been tried and was found wanting. Eva [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Dooms day
On Mon, 9 Mar 1998, Durant wrote: (Elinor:) The first thing I'd like to do is a bit tax on financial movements, which, would slow down some of the financial speculations. It has been tried in various countries, did not make a lot of difference. Our entrepaneurs complain, that that others make the profits they should have. That they are not allowed to make all the money that they would selflessly invest to provide millions of lovely jobs... I'm afraid, there is not a lot you can do for speedy improvement in the capitalist framework. We are at the point where most things have been tried and was found wanting. Eva Ahem, for the record. To date the bit tax has not been tried. It is regularly criticized, especially by those who haven't looked at it in any detail. Ditto, for the Tobin tax. H. Wonder why?? arthur
Blood
As far as I know, Canada has always had free blood. We had some problems with our collection system, but not with getting it, otherwise.
Herschel Hardin howler
Re. "Herschel Hardin" Does anyone bother reading this portentious thread? Or are people posting without reading? A few days ago, a correspondent from British Columbia corrected the original correspondents, pointing out that they were talking about *Garret* Hardin, not Herschel Hardin. The difference is not without significance. Garret Hrdin was a brilliant biosociological writer of the late 1960's and early 1970's, who essentially developed sophisticated arguments against conventional approaches to social-economic amelioration. One admired his brilliance, but at the same time suspected that he was modernizing some of the "tooth and fang" arguments of 19th century biological determinists and their neo-conservative social brethern (Malthus, Spencer, Sumner. Calvin Coolidge). The world being what it is, nothing can be done except by drastic methods; drastic methods being too horendous to actually implement, we'd better accept the world at it is; having proven intellectually how deadlocked we actually are, we can and must resign ourselves to accepting not just the biological world as it is but the social-economic world as well. Nothing can be done -- c'est la vie -- faut de mieux, enrichez nous et apres nous, la deluge. This is terribly clever stuff, don't you think? Herschel Hardin, on the other hand, was a somewhat less clever (at least in his writings) but dedicated, and original, West Coast democratic socialist whose most significant work, A NATION UNAWARES, appeared in the early 1970's. He basically attempted a rewrite of Canadian economic history in terms of the possibilities of a society using its resources and traditions to try to shape its own destiny. Whether this is a forelorn hope, or not, in the period of apparent globalistic "triumph of the will" (in which we take the Sukarnos, Saddam Husseins, and Li Pengs more seriously as co-determiners of our destiny and the future of our economy and working people than the Chretiens et al.), it is hard to say. But, recalling Hardin (Herschel, that is) reminds one of the point that Shelley made early in the history of English socialism: that Prometheus must keep trying to help the people, no matter how often he is cast down from the mountain, no matter how gruesome his personal fate. I will reread Herschel Hardin, because I think he was/is very much in this latter tradition: keep trying, keep fighting, no matter what the odds and no matter how brilliantly you can argue yourself out of it. (I don't know Herschel Hardin personally, and don't really know what he has written since the 1970's, but heard recently that he was still active in Vancouver-area NDP politics and activism). So let's keep these two approaches separate, even if it takes a bit of care in our correspondence. Orwell (another "golden oldie") often wrote that, to begin with, it is necessary to be clear in one's view of society, to try to be scrupulously accurate, and to write in a manner that conveys this to others. Perhaps we might begin to apply this to the Internet age. S. Silverman
Re: TOC
Jay Hanson wrote: From: Durant [EMAIL PROTECTED] It seems obscene to seek out this catastrophic vision and sit back saying this is our fate. You totally ignore the ability to plan and to cooperate. I am not "seeking out" this vision. I am telling whoever will listen that this is what's in store for us. As far as the ability to "plan and cooperate" for the common good, we simply don't do that in America because it's considered "un-American". We practice in the Tragedy of the Commons social system -- every man for himself. Obviously, "plan and cooperate" is what we MUST do if we are to survive, but FIRST, I say again, FIRST we must confront the physical reality of our life on this finite planet. [snip] The most recent New York Times Sunday Magazine had an article about how *massive* computer power is employed to fill as many seats as possible on each flight by a major airline. Now, it seems clear to me that this is *a* form of social planning, and it suggests to me that, from a feasibility standpoint, at least, Soviet Central Planning was not so much wrong as ahead of its time. There is something equivocal about this global capitalist form of social planning: it does not function for the sake of social good (or even national interest) but rather to increase the market share of a "legal fiction" with no responsibility to anybody's welfare or wellbeing. That, however, does not seem to detract from the fact that it offers evidence that, at last, *central planning* can work, and that organized social intelligence can accomplish in fact what it has always promised in principle: a more intelligent management of resources than a mindless (or de-cephalated) process (the "market"). If ever there was a "free play of market forces", and, for better or worse, there may have been in the 18th century, it surely is not how the big airlines are maximizing seat occupancy numbers, except perhaps in some highly "derivitive" (isn't that a technical term of present-day investment banking?) and mathematically arcane [as opposed to "ordinary language"] sense. \brad mccormick -- Mankind is not the master of all the stuff that exists, but Everyman (woman, child) is a judge of the world. Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED] (914)238-0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua, NY 10514-3403 USA --- !THINK [SGML] Visit my website == http://www.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
Re: Herschel Hardin (The Tragedy of The Commons)
Jay Hanson wrote: [snip] It's Garrett Hardin, and perhaps you should read it again. [ http://dieoff.org/page95.htm ] [snip] Well, I finally *made* the time to reread the article, and I find it every bit as "good" as when I first read it years ago. I can find no clear evidence or even credible suggestions of any Reagan/Thatcherite ideology in this essay, and I see no way that it conflicts with existentialism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, sociology of knowledge, psychoanalysis or probably a large number of other endeavors to advance human self-knowledge, self-responsibility, self-accountability, etc. The references to such authors as Gregory Bateson and Paul Goodman should not give much comfort to Rush Limburger(sp?) Oleo(sp?) North, et al. The argument seems nuanced, and *open to the possibility that we may in future find better ways of handling matters than we currently can imagine* (John Wild and others': "man's openness to otherness"; the social constructoin of reality; originary imagination; etc.). Hardin criticizes both the working class and the capitalists. I don't find the example of bank robbery as a problem of commons felicitous, but nobody's perfect. The most important aspect of necessity that we must now recognize, is the necessity of abandoning the commons in breeding. And Hardin has the courage to assert this position not merely in terms of "necessity" but also in terms of the perservation of the optional goods which make *human* [symbolizing] life worth living: If our goal is to maximize population it is obvious what we must do: We must make the work calories per person approach as close to zero as possible. No gourmet meals, no vacations, no sports, no music, no literature, no art I think that everyone will grant, without argument or proof, that maximizing population does not maximize goods. Bentham's goal is impossible. I always thought that Bentham's "greatest good for the greatest number" meant maxmizing good * number, rather than maximizing good *and* maximizing number, as decoupled variables (which clearly they are not). But I have no interest in wasting energy on the target of Michel Foucault's eloquent analysis in _Discipline and Punish_. Where's the problem with GARRET Hardin's "The Tragedy of The Commons"? (I have read nothing else by Hardin, so, for all I know, it may not be representative of his thinking or he may have written it for some "ulterior" purpose, but if the road to hell is paved with good intentions, it is also surely possible that even bad intentions can produce good results despite themselves.) \brad mccormick -- Mankind is not the master of all the stuff that exists, but Everyman (woman, child) is a judge of the world. Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED] (914)238-0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua, NY 10514-3403 USA --- !THINK [SGML] Visit my website == http://www.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
RE: FW Selfish Genes
Dear Elinor, You wrote: The emergent properties is interesting; they only arise in certain situations, including the catalytic loop (closed network). Is that right? I'll have to go back and look at it again, but I see it as a development, a next step forward. Thomas: To close to bed time, however I'll look up the reference but memory states that their are three basic types of attractors, 1. Point attractors, corresponding to systems reaching a stable equilibrium. 2. Periodic attractors, corresponding to periodic oscillations. 3. Strange attractors, corresponding to chaotic systems Page 132 and on Page 133-34 Chaotic behavior is deterministic and patterned, and strange attractors allow us to transform the seemingly random data into distinct visible shapes. (end of quote) By being able to translate this data into a visual geometry, we can see that any chaotic situation from free atoms to a waterfall or a political collapse can be made visible through this geometry. We can, through this visual process, see that what appears beyond understanding is in fact in the process of re-organization into new forms and new behaviors. What helps us is the understanding of change from "point attractors which often represent a stable form, whether that is a house of a brick of gold, to periodic attractors which seem to indicate some understanding of cycles to strange attractors which give us some hope that when everything goes to hell, there is a way to put humpty dumpty back together again. I find that enormously refreshing. One of the things that I feel about 'systems theory' is that we haven't made a seminal discovery that unifies the various ideas/disciplines such as biology, chaos theory, fractals, feedback, etc.. We are still looking for our Newton but perhaps the strange attractor which is bringing order out of scientific chaos will soon be dense enough to call forth that unifying idea. Though I would be hard pressed to explain it, it would seem to me that the current resignation of Daniel Johnson created chaos and that Jean Charest is identified as a 'strange attractor' to many people who feel he is the only man who can challenge Lucien Bouchard. (sorry for the Canadian politics) However, the same thing seems to have happened recently in the US. The storm over Lewinsky seems to me to be a chaotic event (in that it may destroy a stable situation) and I would identify the strange attractor as Starr. Interesting ideas to play with. I have sent a message with a Family Basic Income Proposal File attached to FutureWork, but it does not seem to have moved through the system. Strange things happen and often an idea creates a rallying point way beyond the expectation of anyone or they don't but they provide the stimulus for people to argue against, either way they can act like a strange attractor. Like you, I would like to get it straight in my head but I don't think it's complete yet, it may take another 50 years to find the missing piece. Respectfully Thomas Lunde I would like to be able to answer the question, "Where do you live? by saying "Paradise". I once was able to say I lived in "Hope" BC and it always made me feel good to say, "I live in Hope", sort of a positive affirmation.
Re: [Fwd: Re: There are really only two kinds of knowledge]
From: Brad McCormick, Ed.D. [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Information about lawlike connections sets off a process of reflection in the consciousness of those whom the laws are about. Thus the level of unreflected consciousness, which is one of the initial conditions of such laws, can be transformed. Of course...a critically mediated knowledge of laws cannot through reflection alone render a law itself inoperative, but it can render it inapplicable." (Jurgen Habermas, KNOWLEDGE AND HUMAN INTEREST, Beacon Press, Boston, 1971, p. 310) This is not science. Jay
Hope
Thomas Lunde wrote: ... I once was able to say I lived in "Hope" BC and it always made me feel good to say, "I live in Hope", sort of a positive affirmation. Long ago I was canvassing in a provincial election and I returned several times to the walk-up apartment of an old geezer who was a good story teller and full of knowledge. His parting observation one day was: "You might be born in Chilliwack, sonny, but you *live* in Hope." -- Stephen Straker[EMAIL PROTECTED] Arts One / History (604) 822-6863 / 822-2561 University of British Columbia Vancouver, B.C.FAX: (604) 822-4520 CANADA V6T 1Z1home: (604) 733-6638 / 734-4464
