ABSTRACT

In R10 Muller makes some comments that I feel need correction since they seem to be based on some misconceptions possibly caused by my style of writing. Rather than 'lump' everything together I intend to respond 'bit by bit' and so enable the sorting of chaff from wheat.

This particular response deals with some comments made by Muller in his response concerning Wholes and Aspects (section D)

<1>
In section (D) Muller takes issue with the determination of a template operating prior to what he calls 'unstructured' experience. My point is that ANY consideration of 'unstructured' experience will be structured and so the 'unstructured' is only theoretical and only determinable within a context set by the template; it has no 'meaning' until 'viewed' through the veil of the template. At best it takes on a genotypal form of 'potentials' in that from it come the expression of wholes and aspect, but note that my description 'imposes' structure on the 'unstructured' prior to it becoming 'unstructured' and so all discussion is 'meaningless' to the extent that it can be ignored.

<2>
The extension of this is to consider that experience as 'we' know it is 'structured' from the start and this structure is maintained through changes in scale. Working within a context set by genetics this seems to be the case in that the genes seem to 'set-up' the new-born child with a range of possible responses to possible experiences and so there is nothing 'new' but only things that are 'novel'. As we develop, so the lack of experiences that would go towards enabling the expression of a potential eventually leads to those areas that have been set aside for specific experiences being 'stolen' by other neural networks or just 'culled'. If we shift levels and look at genetics operating at the cellular level so we see the SAME pattern in that each cell is an expression (phenotype) of a range of potential cell-types (genotype) and the determination is set by context. Thus all possible cell-types are included in our genes as are all of the possible ranges of experiences for our sensory systems (ie detectable frequencies etc These are extended by our technology but their structure 'the same'.)

<3>
The 'generic' structure of 'whole/aspects' distinctions emerges as we change scales from the single neuron to neural nets and so on. I have emphasised that due to the presence of hierarchy the template operates at ALL levels of analysis and if we 'zoom-in' to the cellular level so we can see in the structure of a single neuron the whole/aspects, specifics/generals, pattern at work in that the dendrites of the neurons serve to gather information in an aspectual manner, the soma controls the moment when the 'potential' information is expressed, and the axon enables the expression; so we move from generals to a specific and specific to generals, the latter in that the neuron axon links to dendrites of other neurons allowing for feedback and so 'weight setting'. This 'setting of weights' applies to the dendrites and creates bias and so dendrite-resident patterns that can influence soma determinations of 'when' to fire.

<4>
The single neuron exists in a 1:many form (axon/dendrites) and changing scale maintains this form throughout until it is 'abstracted' into whole/aspects, specific/generals, reductionist/illusionist and so on...Adding feedback allows for bi-directional functions and so axon activity can go towards 'controlling/guiding' dendrite-derived patterns that elicit firing.

<5>
It is well documented that neural activity is synchronised such that the specific firing of a single neuron is 'copied' at a different scale by the synchronised firing of neurons in a network; the network is in fact a 'huge' neuron except that it is distributed in that it does not exist as a 'physical' thing but only as the result of a grouping of 'like' things.

<6>
If we extend this process within a hierarchic system so we have oscillations in that a general-specific process feeds into another general-specifics process at the next level of the cone/pyramid. This level can then 'feedback' to the lower levels or feed-forward to the next level.

<7>
These whole/aspects processes occur at ALL levels within 'us'. At the micro level we deal with the single neuron and at the macro level with 'the word' or the meaning that the smell of a rose elicits. This 'subjective' experience HAS STRUCTURE that allows for us to share the experience even if we cannot share the same 'space'; at least we can share the same 'information' and this information is 'coloured' by whole/aspects structuring -- both learnt (nurture) and given (nature).

Chris Lofting.
<clo@fmsc.com.au>