KARL JASPERS FORUM

TA 63 (Leslie / Rees)

Commentary 25 (to C19, Muller)

0-D FROM THE AT PERSPECTIVE
by Joseph Johnson
3 January 2004, posted 18 January 2004

<1>
TA-1 HJFM[1]: "The mind as a whole escapes objective studies because belief in mind-independent reality is self-contradictory and by definition excludes subjective experience (awareness, 'consciousness') from reality. . . . This conceptual difficulty can be counteracted by acknowledging that all mental and world structures arise within an unstructured origin-and-matrix for knowledge-structures and beliefs. The mind's experience is thus at the center of reality."

TA-63 C19 HJFM <2>: "Since I see the 0-D method as a - so far the only - solution to the mind-brain question (see TAs 1 and 45), I believe it should be further pursued."

<2>
JJ- While 0-D is relevant, I think the problem will not clarify without a larger more inclusive concept such as abstraction theory (AT). As to MIR, I have trouble keeping track of the meaning of mind, apparently no easier to define than consciousness. The meaning of mind that I discuss below asserts the causal efficacy manifest through choice. But causal efficacy raises the issue of options in choice, freedom of choice, who/what is choosing, and to what purpose, so the question seems unanswerable on any scale that does not redefine natural order of cosmos as a unitary and coherent whole that includes both objective and subjective experience, a view currently rejected by science. Clearly there is no room for causal mind in the present definition of natural order. As words are metaphors without absolute meaning, arguing the reality of small concepts is meaningless unless from the perspective of a metaphor of the whole. While any metaphor of the whole will remain only a metaphor, an hypothesis, it rationalizes any discussion of the lesser parts.

<3>
In other words, if mind has causal efficacy, then who are we? If we are not independent of the whole of natural order then we must be its evolving agent - so in what sense are 'we' 'free'? What options are implied by choice, and why, and to what end? I agree that 'apeiron,' or unstructured matrix of mental structures is most relevant to the question of causal efficacy of choice, but it seems unsupported, inadequate, unless set within the total context of 'natural order as a whole,' relating all the questions within that defined context.

<4>
If MIR is interpreted to mean that mind is so lacking in reality that it has no causal efficacy, this lays upon the several sciences the burden of accounting not only for natural artifacts but no less for the world of cultural artifacts. Perhaps someone can describe from the perspective of physical science the inevitability of, say, the Pietà. To illustrate that implausibility, we review how science manages its descriptions of the inevitables of natural artifacts:

<4.1>
To explain the emergent properties of several hundred kinds of sub-atomic particles following creation, the laws and rules of high-energy physics were written. Some time after creation, with the subsequent evolution of system complexity arising from large-scale mixing of these simpler units, there arose some 92 kinds of elements, each with unique properties also described by physics.

<4.2>
Through further large-scale processes, these elements began to mix and form the more complex systems, the compounds. These have emergent properties that the language of physics neither anticipates nor describes. This new level of complexity is described by the language and science of chemistry. If we look at the inner workings of chemistry, we still find physics supporting the emergent properties, (physical-chemistry) but, again, having no language for them.

<4.3>
Later, some of the chemical compounds form the much more complex self-replicating organic systems with emergent properties not predictable on the basis of inorganic chemistry. We find both physical and chemical principles at work sustaining the inner details of these organisms (bio-physics and bio-chemistry), but having no language for, and in no way predicting their emergent properties, and so necessitating the rise of the biosciences.

<4.4>
Organic systems are unique in that their potential for system complexity is essentially indefinite. Countless levels of organic system complexity have already emerged and there is quite literally no way to know how many more will arise or what their emergent properties might be. Surely science has no theory that will tell us. We raise the picture in our mind of a new science for each emergent level of system complexity, a science for every species of plant and animal that ever existed and will ever exist - a new science for each, in the same way that chemistry followed upon physics, and biology followed upon chemistry. Given the complexity of mind as an example, any emergent property, i.e. any thought or concept or experience exists as a constellation of neural potentials that is continually morphing as it touches learned emotional labels that direct further morphing and, ultimately, behavior. The idea that science can hope to identify the levels of complexity of such fleeting and subtle processes, let alone enumerate all their possibilities is preposterous. And complexities and their emergent properties just propagate indefinitely beyond as cultural artifacts through the creativity of mind.

<4.5>
To put it quite simply, there is no finite set of processes or any finite description (science) that will completely realize or describe the total potential expression (emergent properties) of natural order.

THE IMPLICATION IS THAT NATURAL ORDER IS FUNDAMENTALLY SUBJECTIVE.

<5>
Paragraphs 4.1 - 4.5 above describe increasing levels of 'natural' system complexity that have one thing in common: every increased level of system complexity and its emergent properties is nothing other than a more refined expression of a single ineffable implicit necessity (apeiron). The relation of the simpler expression, as physics, to the more complex expression, as chemistry, is as 'the same idea given more refined expression in a more complex context.' The novelty in this evolution, as in any evolution, is the subjective sense of 'direction,' suggesting the notion of purpose and meaning in the series of refinement, after refinement, after refinement. The sense of purpose is further enhanced by the fact that increasing system complexity is achieved against the logic of the second law of thermodynamics and across billions of years by exploiting the ubiquitous sources of energy in star/planet systems that just happen to be the most plentiful large structures in the cosmos.

<6>
Serious reflection will show that the relation between the simpler expression and the more complex expression throughout natural order is precisely the same relationship as the abstract to its particular expression. It is exactly the pattern of mental activity in human creativity, from the abstract to the more refined particular, the abstract being the 'analysis' of the particular connecting the idea or necessity to its expression. If the order of nature were otherwise, nature would have selected for other mental faculties rather than the analytic/synthetic processes to manipulate abstractions that have given us such great material power.

<7>
The only difference between the creativity of nature and the creativity of mind is that while 'we' generally know the idea or 'abstract' to which we try to give ever more refined expression, we cannot identify the implicit necessity behind the serial increases in 'nature's complexity.' We quantify nature's complexity, and we see that each simper level sustains the higher as physics to chemistry to biology, but there is nothing to tell us the purpose of the evolution of complexity; nothing, that is, until we analyze its footprint across the eons.

<8>
What is known objectively of nature's evolution through levels of complexity is that it expresses the structure of natural order as a whole. The basic relational element of this structure is an abstraction ladder (yes, that basic elemental relationship we learned about in general semantics 101), while the whole is an indefinite depth of these elements, spread across an indefinite breadth of particulars. One can imagine a pine tree like field. The indefinite depth implies an indefinitely high, all-inclusive abstract subjective imperative at the top of the field, of which every cosmic particular in the field is a more or less refined expression. The implicit subjective necessity (apeiron) is of course nowhere 'signed' in nature - no writing across the sky - so cannot be made explicit.

<9>
However, there is one very informative thing that we CAN do. Because natural order is a coherent unity that embraces both the objective and the subjective worlds as complements of the same imperative, we can approach arbitrarily close to at least a metaphoric representation (in terms of experience) of the qualities of apeiron by an objective analysis of fourteen billion years of its expression.

<10>
Again, the abstraction ladder structure of natural order implies an ineffable implicit subjective necessity (apeiron), while the act of creation suggests plausible 'intent' to give expression to that necessity. As we see, the history of that intent is the history of increasing levels of system complexity, all the more spectacular as a very creative and sustained effort against the second law of thermodynamics. Increasing system complexity can only be driven by high and persistent levels of available energy, together with organic chemistry and temperate environments; hence the logical and quite striking ubiquity of star/planet systems as the most common structure of cosmos to support this evolution. While the organic chemical process to create the first self-replicating system has no more than a non-zero probability of occurring, if this is multiplied by an infinity of possibilities, the probability approaches '1.'

<11>
But what is the direction of this evolution into biological complexity? Obviously it has not resulted simply in huge gobs of complex protoplasm. Instead, it has exploited its potential for complexity as a 'flexibility or adaptability' to fill every possible ecological niche. Having filled every niche, the resulting biosphere converts solar energy into a vast garden, even reservoirs of chemical energy. Chemical energy was then able to support mobile systems. Mobile systems, the animals, were then able to evolve more complex brains with memories of great varieties of experience that could learn natural order by abstracting likenesses among differences, making them increasingly adaptable to change and the hazards of a capricious environment. It seems to follow that system complexity will continue to evolve toward emergence of an active agent that will ultimately overcome all obstacles and carry forward the evolution of system complexity indefinitely, utilizing the limitless cosmic resource. But the operative logic in the early evolution of mental faculties for the perception of natural order is natural selection with its competition and conflict. This poses a truly cosmic contradiction, a cosmic 'moment of truth,' as it were, as it threatens the continued evolution of system complexity.

<12>
Natural selection for the evolution of mental faculties benefits from competitive conflict at the same time that it gives mind increasingly sophisticated access to knowledge of natural order and so physical power. It was inevitable that at some point there would be so much physical power in the hands of competing individuals as to threaten the survival of the species, or Mutually Assured Destruction. For the moment, we have survived that very real threat, but the point has been reached where mind absolutely must transcend the self-centered primordial instinct of conflict in order to realize the collective creativity of all minds. This would require a major and very unlikely paradigm shift for any living creature, given the very creative selective logic of conflict. Indeed, it is only the human mind that has the capacity to understand the crisis in its truly cosmic terms and (hopefully) to realize that it represents a positive and constructive opportunity of truly cosmic import. The current problems we face are a preordained rite of passage into a most hopeful and transforming future.

<13>
The problem to be overcome is the primordial subjective confusion of countless 'self-centers of the universe,' relatively mindless individuals surviving through conflict over limited resources. With the emergence of evolved mind, anarchy and conflict have become obsolete and now seriously endanger the further evolution of system complexity.

<14>
Fortunately, we find the larger more inclusive organisms of 'civil orders' arising in our midst, but even they compete for survival. The civil orders most likely to become the immortal guardians and sponsors of the evolution of system complexity are those who do four things best. First, civil order must suppress anarchy and internal conflict. In return for this inhibition it must offer its members the justice of equality under the law. Second it must cultivate the well-being and the creativity of every individual. Third it must manage an economy that will realize the creative synergies of all, in order not only to overcome threats of a capricious nature but to spread life and mind far and wide across the resources of cosmos. Fourth, it must forever refine its own culture and assure that, without fail, the best of it is passed down the generations.

<15>
The justice of 'equality under the law' for self-centered individuals is hardly arbitrary. Essentially, it is Einstein's solution to the same subjective problem of general relativity, the problem of confused and conflicting frames of reference. In the language of physics it is the problem of symmetry. The solution to the symmetry problem is that all laws must look the same from every perspective; "that all frames of reference are equivalent." While the competitive struggle of early life selected for analytical faculties of mind, nature selected no less for emotional sensitivities that rewarded the recognition of abstracts of symmetry such as justice, harmony, beauty, and love. These are the values, born of need, which began to bind us to the earliest civil orders of family, clan, tribe, etc. Once the equal applicability of the law to every individual is assured, and anarchy suppressed, then the remaining constructive obligations of civil order are to further refine the 'content' of the laws such that they not only bear equally, but also embody the qualities of the higher abstracts of symmetry. We might say that our more constructive emotions seem expressions of the implicit qualities of apeiron, given that the one sustains the purpose of the other-by definition.

<16>
Our emotional experience of the higher abstracts of symmetry are metaphors of some of the unstructured qualities of 'ground' or apeiron that guide our more constructive creativity that sustains the indefinite evolution of system complexity. It is just here that we have completed the development of our model specifying the objective context of natural order of cosmos as a whole, and the role of mind. Having done so reveals the ambiguity of objective metaphors based on the illusion of separateness:

<17>
Paradoxically, we still think of ourselves independently as 'we' while at the same time asserting here that the implicit imperative of cosmic process as a whole is the indefinite evolution of system complexity, and that mind is its most evolved creative agent. This places 'we' in the same category as, say, chemistry, which is the local 'creative agent' giving rise to biological systems, etc. 'We' obviously make choices that will determine our survival, but what is our relation to the whole, and what is our freedom in making those choices? Who/what are we?

<18>
Bringing several thoughts together here, the fundamental choice to be made by mind is the conscious and deliberate choice of transcendence of the illusion of separateness; to acknowledge the fundamental subjective unity of all of mind at the highest level, a unity that has its ground in the higher abstracts of symmetry. It is the choice to reject conflict, and to consign competition to the corporations, the artificial life-forms of the marketplace. In this sense there are two kinds of 'I.' The 'I' who clings to the self-centered delusion will persist in anarchy and conflict with all of his/her great and increasing physical powers and will ultimately self-destruct (MAD). In the process, he/she will argue that life has no purpose, anyway, so physical means become ends in themselves, and devil take the hindmost. The more evolved 'I' will declare him/herself to be an (aspiring though not infallible) agency of the whole and will favor and respect choices of self-sacrifice and altruism. The new 'I' will understand such choices as being 'free,' and that selfish choices are not free, but are determined by instinct. Thus, the same choice can be free or not free, depending on who or what we think we are.

<19>
What should be clear is that a given brain can be disposed to either perspective and even to change by conscious choice, so neither view is physically determinate. To appreciate this, we need only return to <4.4> above, and ask science to define the objective difference between the two. The best science can say is that the subjective and the objective realms are complementary, where the objective realm is no more than the limited means of realizing the implicit subjective necessity. The price paid to enjoy differences through imposed limits is the impossibility of fully expressing the subjective implicit within the objective particular. Again, natural order is fundamentally subjective.

<20>
In this sense, every choice we make reflects or denies this fundamental choice in varying degrees. Self-centered choices reflect domination by our instinct, no empathy for the whole, and no will to contribute to sustaining the evolution of system complexity. From an objective viewpoint, the spirit of the transcendent choice is 'to live for the benefit of the whole'. Whether mind evolves and survives on planet Earth is very much a matter conscious choices to be made by evolving agencies of the cosmic imperative. The certainty that mind will evolve and survive is 'determined' not by mechanical certainty of determinate neural process, but by the small probability of 'creative acts of deliberate right choice' anywhere, multiplied by innumerable possibilities across our world as well as across the boundless cosmos.

<21>
If all the foregoing is from the objective perspective, what can we say of the entire model from the subjective viewpoint of purpose ? Quite simply, purpose seems to be self-realization; the indefinitely more refined expression of whatever abstract qualities may be implicit in ground/aperion. Then we need to ask what was so unstable/unsatisfactory with the ground state of omniscience/ omnipotence that required such expenditure of energy in creation? The purpose served seems to be to create and sustain the mindful agent whose own creativity then is able to adapt to or overcome capricious nature in order to spread itself indefinitely throughout cosmos and so continue the process until the last star winks out. The journey seems to be everything.

<22>
All of this seems to suggest complementary objective and subjective interpretations. From the objective view, it is enough to say that the ground state of the invariant dynamic symmetry was 'unstable.' From the subjective view, creation was the flight of mind from eternal sameness (solitary confinement?) into the precious illusions of countless differences arising from imposed dimensional limits. Gained are the possibilities of experiencing an endless variety of differences, endless novelty, mystery, and the challenge to bring into the world the endlessly higher qualities of ground - and all of this adventure to be shared in the garden of the biosphere with countless creative minds of varied talents and perspectives.

<23>
Given these complementary objective and subjective models of the whole of natural order, it is hard to miss the implication that the rise of mind is the point of the arrow of cosmic process. Mind's evolution into the higher abstracts of symmetry is the transcendent path of the arrow that sustains us as integral agents of the endless cosmic journey of self-realization.

<24>
Having offered a modern perspective on both objective and subjective interpretations of the structure of natural order, what of the historical dimension ? History could not wait for Einstein's symmetry solution to the subjective problem of conflicting self-centers, yet we survive. We note that early history is less about knowledge than about emotion and intuition, expressed through the infinitely plastic medium of metaphor. With the advent of the religions, the higher more constructive emotions were identified and given explicit meaning in relation to human survival and happiness, all in contrast to self-centered conflict and competition. The lessons of the religions were given expression in divine mandates surprisingly like the symmetry solution to the problem of conflict, including the Golden Rule, ethics, harmony, love, etc. While the several religions have often gone to war over their differences, they seem to share a subtle theme reflected in the structure of natural order as argued here. Perhaps all we need are some updated metaphors.

<25>
To put it simply, to sustain the indefinite evolution of system complexity, it is absolutely essential that the competitive logic of natural selection, so constructive in the evolution of our analytic faculties, be transcended in order to realize the synergies of cooperative creativity. The problem is that transcendence cannot be other than conscious and deliberate choice.

<26>
If we choose to be integral agents of the natural order of the cosmos, then we will realize that our self-centered choices are the obsolete choices of the competitive instinct and so were not free, not because neurology is determinate, but because we did not know then what we know now. After a long life, one looks back on one's sorry book of such choices and their painful lessons. Truly free choices are those transcendent creative acts, great and small, that tend to sustain the whole through justice, harmony, beauty, respect, and love for all life. Due to inherent limitations, no mind will make right choices every time, but it seems that simple understandings of matters set forth here might make people perceive a new reality, a new and boundless world of possibilities, when they look in the mirror each morning.

--------------------------------

Joseph Johnson