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Mentioned earlier I was reading Stuart Kauffman, and was impressed by his extending the story of life beyond the ubiquitous focus on DNA and genes. After that it’s been a bit of a roller-coaster, as this biologist covers psychology, philosophy and fundamental physics in his quest of Reinventing the Sacred – a common fault I find. Someone with “my theory” out to prove anyone else’s theory  is wrong by comparing the narrowest definitions of theirs with the broadest of his own. Cultured human nature these days in this world that focusses on disproof by criticism and fault-finding. Winning arguments by defeating the other. So sad.

Anyway, despite that stylistic complaint, the story does take a turn for the better – I’m about 3/4 through. Essentially he admits after a superficial review of everyone else’s theories – (and how more or less possible these seem to him – he’s betting on some quantum decoherence mechanism in brain functioning [!] for example) – that in fact most of these are immaterial to his main thesis, that continuing in the direction of physical reductionism is fundamentally misguided.

Evolution is not causally described, defined or determined by physics, not biological evolution, not conscious-mind evolution, not human intellectual-social-cultural-economic evolution. None of it. End of.

Evolution is essentially co-creative non-predictable natural-emergence process involving both upward (reductionist, Weinbergian) and downward (emergent, god-like) causation. There are no scientific laws where if X then Y will be the outcome in real human life.

(There is of course of good deal of mind-matter duality discussed in the middle-part of the book, and whilst Kauffman does buy free-will and self-conscious aspects as real and emergent in the way described (as I do), whatever the underlying levels of classical or quantum mechanisms involved, he does still seem to baulk at qualia remaining mysterious and undefined – the “how and what is the me doing the experiencing” aspect. Dennett is acknowledged in the foreword, but there are no actual references. Odd that he doesn’t buy the line that “reductionism is OK in moderation, but not too greedy it’s not the whole story” or the other Dennett view that “we are our memes”  …. yet …. reading on.)

(Also, he is very anti-algorithm and anti-game theory too – but in very narrow senses – wonder what he’d make of Hofstadter’s creativity too. Games where despite very small apparently reductionist algorithms, creative behaviour really does emerge. Unpredictable pre-adaptation is Kauffman’s main clinching argument, but this is identical to Hofstadter’s “Tabletop“.)

BTW – to state the obvious. The “sacred” is that mysterious god-like emergent creative self-organization of complex reality, not explained by scientific laws and causal logic (nor less by an actual personal agency god) but nevertheless real, reasonable and rational in the broad sense. The same “gift/master” ignored by the “servant/emissary”, to use McGilchrist quoting Einstein and Nietzsche.

[Post Note to Self – really must get to grips with how Supervenience differs from Emergence. Post post note : If Wikipedia is to be believed then Supervenience is in fact just the technical term for reductive (Weinbergian) causality – where all properties in a higher level of existence are determined causally by the state of properties in a lower level. Doh! I’m sure others – including Chalmers for example – had more subtle intentions. Anyway – this physical state view of ontology totally ignores any process view – the history of how something emergent at a higher level depends not only on the state of lower levels, but also on the process path it was arrived at. The key point being that that history in any one level can be influenced by higher level events as well as lower level states. Causality is two way – positive-feedback, auto-catalytic, physics-envious, etc …. see Ulanovicz after reading Kauffman …. why do the scientistic miss such common sense ? New post soon. Interestingly – close to finishing Ulanovicz – he says Supervenience has become so overloaded it is very confusing what people actually mean by it – he coins Suprafacience – more later. Also ultimately positive about Dennett’s, cranes upon cranes without Skyhooks, though he prefers his own less mechanical, more organic Vine analogy. History allows you to pull up the ladder, once you’ve made the new level stable and sustaining – looking back, archaeologists would struggle to find evidence of how you got there.]

In his own words, a very crude and primitive thesis from Steven Pinker. Maybe OK for purely “scientific” prose, but woeful on classic communication – rhetoric reduced to rules – Objective truth, you know, your reader doesn’t. Wonder what Pirsig would make of that?

(Strange critique of Strunk & White. Good rules – simple heuristics – always have paradoxes and exceptions – to be interpreted by wise people, not implemented by foolish automata.)

His Catch 22 – talking as if clear objective model and facts, without caveats, qualifiers or hedges is fine so long as your audience does indeed understand the headlines are just slogans and not actually objective facts. Cross-culture this can be deadly. Scientist to scientist – OK, contingency is built in. But, economist to policy maker ? The headline may be catchier, but the caveats matter. Similarly “the curse of knowledge” is the opposite of treat your reader as an equal – you always have to put yourself in the mind of your audience.

Some good points – the serial interface of language in relation to the semantic web of ideas. Ordering of subject before new / key information emphasis to finish. Lovely that he stumbles on is own words, recognising that the passive voice point is simply one of balance. ie Rules are good, just don’t apply them all the time. Rules are always flouted by the best writers – tacit evolving conventions, as he says.

The Q&A are very telling too. People are sceptical about the rules, they know quality is more than this. And, as he admits, simply evidence of caring counts for a lot. This is pure Pirsig.

Why do we have news ? So that people promoting their stories can justify funds and resources for their activities that generate the stories.

Interesting piece by two Russian colleagues Anatoly Levenchuk and Victor Agroskin interviewed for “Studia Humana” on Libertarian philosophy and activity in Russia. ISO15926, the core of my day job these days, gets an interesting mention.

Some day we hope to use .15926 software for conceptual modeling of a general praxeology framework to obtain a model good for theoretical studies and for education. Engineering is a good starting point for the study of complex human systems. And it is possibly the only area where definitive scientific results are within our reach, compared to social and government domains.

And also we pay special attention to the problem of social engineering. Specifically we always teach people that systems engineering or engineering management recipes are not good when you are working with public systems and systems of state rule. These methods are developed for private entrepreneurial domain and for artificial systems, and should remain where they belong. Humans are not a substance for engineering and their wishes and preferences are not the same as engineering requirements.

Interesting. Of course part of my thesis is that even in engineering (human ingenuity), the human social factors are at least as important as the scientific technology aspects.

[“Studia Humana is the multi-disciplinary peer reviewed journal of the Polish University of Information Technology and Management,  publishing valuable contributions on any aspect of human sciences including : analytic philosophy and philosophical logic, political economy, political science and sociology”]

Hat tip to David Gurteen for tweeting this link to Knoco on Working Out Loud.

Ricky Gervais too.

“We all have faith. eg I have faith in science & friends.”

Interesting interview with Mervyn King by Steph Flanders.

 Before the financial crisis of 2008, Sir Mervyn says, he had struggled to comprehend how policy makers had allowed the economic disasters of the interwar years to take place – now he understands all too well.

But interesting nevertheless on “simplistication” – wise economists always had important caveats to their headline slogans inevitably adopted as dogma by the policy-makers. eg Keynes and Hayek should be read as complementary not conflicting.

richarddawkins.net appears to be US focussed.

The mission of the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science is to support scientific education, critical thinking and evidence-based understanding of the natural world in the quest to overcome religious fundamentalism, superstition, intolerance and suffering.

That mission is encouraging for two reasons, despite the focus on critical-thinking and evidence-based understanding.

(1) It acknowledges Reason AND Science are two different things.

(2) It’s against religious fundamentalism specifically, but not against faith, theism or religion or any other philosophical positions generally.

Ultimately with this debate (when we make progress with sensible exchanges) it falls back to so what counts as Reason, Critical-Thinking and Evidence-Based, without being overly (fundamentally) scientistic about it. Not everything that counts can be counted or objectively measured necessarily. What counts is about values.

From BlueGiantBeer – The Diary of a Beer Tourist

One thing I have learnt about writing a blog over the past couple of months is that less is more. I have therefore dispensed with the reams of nonsense of the previous “About” section. It was written with the best of intentions but embodied the over elaborate, egotistical, drivel of blogging that I’ve come to thoroughly dislike.

Last week I was in Cask Pub and Kitchen in Brighton banging on to an unassuming couple about the “science” behind milk stout. They seemed to appreciate the impromptu beer lesson. When I explained that I was from Bristol they concluded that I must be some kind of beer tourist. It’s a good description of all the good beery people I’ve come to meet recently. Striving to try as much good beer in as many different locations as possible.

BlueGiantBeer is part diary, part resource and part self massaging ego stick. I hope you enjoy it.

“Beer. Now there’s a temporary solution.”
�” Homer J Simpson

Rang a chord with me, although as fellow beer tourist, I clearly went to BlueGiantBeer for the BrewDog story initially. My own blog has had a “Manifesto” since its inception (there weren’t ready-made about pages back when I started) and have several times edited down the over pompous verbosity – and still each time I look at it, I know I could do better, even now. It’s not that the aims were wrong, though clearly they do evolve, and their expression is refined to the essentials.

Less is more is a common thread here, but it’s also about simplification, which can only be done after understanding; after the journey through the process from naive to wise. Simplistication can be done anytime to fit a snappy 140 character sound-bite, but that doesn’t make them any good.

[Manifesto is a pompous word to claim in itself – but it does own up to there actually being an agenda – I have retained the link to the cringe-worthy original, along with the (slightly) improved latest text so that I (and you) can compare progress. Of course my footnote on every page also owns up to the contrast between undoubtedly lofty agenda vs admittedly puny individual contribution. ]

Hat tip to David Gurteen for the link.

[Post Note Update April 2015 see Charlie Hebdo, see Hebdo Twist, see Freedom Regained.]

Been thinking about people like Ricky Gervais and Frankie Boyle, and “rights” concerning insult and offence generally. If you are the court jester and your audience recognizes you as such, then being offensive is not just your right, but your duty – it’s in the job description (*), and traditionally you’d be given a silly hat or costume to wear just in case the it wasn’t  clear in the context that you are the jester. Different cultures have different distinguishing roles, for poets and mystics / shamans too, but the idea is the same. Limits are then simply matters of taste  between you in that role and your audience; a gratuitous stream of offence without apparent wit or irony, art or craft, or any point other than to offend, wears thin pretty quickly too.

There are two sources of confusion.

One, when such jesters start to appear as spokespeople or journalists on issues – like atheism in Ricky’s case, or any topic when writing in a mainstream publication in Frankie’s case. No doubt about Ricky’s commitment, and his right to express his imperfect knowledge and opinions on his subject, but there can be a blurring between his rights of expression as an individual and rights (duties *) as the court jester.

Secondly,  whilst people would normally agree no-one has a right never to be offended by anyone else, this does not however correspond to an individual human right to offend anyone else, anytime. Confusion arises when people trying to be funny when exercising their rights of expression, ironically or accidentally giving offence, also start to take advantage of increasing ease of publication via blogging / micro-blogging / youtube channels. It’s the audience that makes you the court jester. (In the same way as Breivik speaking for his perceived cause, doesn’t make him the spokesperson for an actual shared cause.) By definition the jester is in a socially controlled minority position, we can’t all adopt that role.

Not only is there no general right to offend, there is no general right to use angry violence either to perpetrate the offence (in Breivik’s case) nor in response to the offence taken (in the radical Moslem reaction to the recent YouTube offence – the point of the piece above.) Ironically I have just begun reading Joseph Anton, starting with the original fatwa against Salman Rushdie, another misappropriation of Moslem lore.

Specifically, being atheist doesn’t give anyone the right to offend a theist just because you disagree with their (apparent) position so much you think they must be mad or deluded. The right is to challenge and disagree, negotiate and debate for sure, but not to offend. Offence may be a last-resort attention-grabbing rhetorical weapon used sparingly, (more than sparingly if you are the relevant court-jester like Christopher Hitchens) but cannot be a basis for general discourse.

(*) One reason it’s a duty to offend by poking fun, is that since such behaviour is inappropriate for general and formal authoritative channels, it provides just such a channel for expression of the otherwise inexpressible. Whilst the king was looking down, the jester stole his thorny crown.