[Fis] Towards a 3φ integrative medicine

Thu May 19 20:02:44 CEST 2016

Dear Plamen and FIS Colleagues,

Discussing on integrative attempts in medicine is really challenging. I do not think that the marriage proposed by Stan, yoking medicine with semiotics in films grounds, will have much progeny. Rather, if we disentangle medical practice from biomedical research we have at least a little less confusing panorama. Actually I think most of Plamen's views on 3φ are mostly in the research direction. Given that we are playing with the "3" I will make just another three suggestions.

1. In foundation matters, rather than caring about criticality or autopoiesis, I would demand and search for a new CELL THEORY. The present state of that venerable theory is just awful, even more with the updating of the "Central Dogma" proposed by Francis Crick decades ago. It has caused some furore that Templeton Foundation has just financed a big project devoted to that purpose: updating that venerable theory a little beyond Darwinian classical strictures. (Not "anti" Darwinian but somehow "post"). If informational views were properly incorporated... (big If). We tried to do something in that style for a European Project, but we did not pass the 2nd cut.

2. In physiological matters, there is much to say from criticality, balancing, symmetry, symmetry breaking and restoration, network science, etc. Some time ago there was a "Physiome" European Project, "From Molecules to HumanKind" trying to capture the whole map of physiological regulation. But in my impression it is a bioengineering repository of models and resources. It could be done differently. The emphasis by Alex, Plamen on criticality and of mine on signaling would not be too bad complementary directions.

3. Finally, on integration, I would propose "knowledge recombination" instead. The usual way to understand integration is unbounded, without space-time limits, like the processing of a Turing Machine. Rather the human practice of knowledge, and paradigmatically medicine, is characterized by a growing difficulty in integration matters within dozens and dozens of disciplines. Heterogeneous fields of knowledge can hardly be integrated at all. What living beings have had to rely upon is "recombination"--either genetically, neuronal, or socially. It is the unending combination of fragments of heterogeneous pieces of knowledge brought into action not randomly but in space-temporal frameworks that allow the mutual cross-fertilization. The idea, developed specifically for the biomedical arena can be discussed at length in [Information 2011, 2, 651-671; doi:10.3390/info2040651] and in [Scientomics: An Emergent Perspective in Knowledge. Organization. Knowledge Organization. 39(3), 153-164. 2012]. In philosophical terms it is sort of a realization of Ortega y Gasset's perspectivism... the peculiar phenomenology of the great Spanish philosopher.

Better if I stop here. Greetings to all--Pedro

________________________________
De: Fis [fis-bounces at listas.unizar.es] en nombre de Dr. Plamen L. Simeonov [plamen.l.simeonov at gmail.com]
Enviado el: miércoles, 18 de mayo de 2016 11:39
Para: Karl Javorszky
Cc: fis
Asunto: Re: [Fis] Towards a 3φ integrative medicine

One more thing on the example with the heart failure. If you go to a cardiologist with the same problem, s/he will prescribe a series of exampinations related to your heart only (checking your blood pressure, EEG & EMG tests incl. 24h recording and physical performance tests,  etc.). Rarely you can expect a blood sample analysis related to some kidney or liver failure, or a cervical examination because of a possible supply shortage of the vertebral artery (in case you have reported accompanying headaches) because of a grown bone spur with the first examination. Finally, depending on all these tests you will usually obtain a pill prescription to keep yopur blood pressure low for the rest of your life and some advise to avoid salty and spicy food. Period. If you at some point in time give up to find out and fix the real cause(s) for this "simple" heart failure, it is your problem, and not the one of the physician or the insurance company.

Now let's turn to the giraffe and the okapi and see how they have managed to develop a strong heart with the evolution:
http://science.psu.edu/news-and-events/2016-news/Cavener5-2016
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/genes-reveal-clues-to-giraffes-long-neck/.
http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2016/160517/ncomms11519/full/ncomms11519.html

Thus, science can still give important clues to solving problems, incl. what is a bonus or threat, but it is not the only source. The central issue is the integration of knowledge and sign(al)s about the operation and interaction of whole body systems, I think.

Best,

Plamen

On Wed, May 18, 2016 at 8:56 AM, Dr. Plamen L. Simeonov <plamen.l.simeonov at gmail.com<mailto:plamen.l.simeonov at gmail.com>> wrote:

This is an interesting question, Karl. Without giving a full account, I think there can be said the following.
It is usually not the (chemical) nature of a substrate or the availability of an external source that makes it a poison, but its ratio.
Small amounts are harmless, larger amounts are dangerous. But there is no general recipe to detect harms.
If you stay for 15 minutes on the sun (UV light) this will stimulate the production of vitamin D in your body which in turn will stimulate the strengthening of your bones. But if you stay longer, there is a danger of a sunstroke or melanoma. Our brains simply do not obtain all these alarming signals from damaging the (skin) cells to the production and cumulation of toxic substances. We have specific organs to sense color, smell and taste, but not radiation.

The problem with contemporary (allopathic) medicine is that it is basically symptomatic and the diagnosis is usually reductionistic, detecting one source of damage related to the failed organ (heart, kidney, liver, etc.) associated with the ailment; so is the therapy, until a second or a third failure are detected and medicated sequentially and independently from each other. Yet, in most cases, the failures are occurring at the same time in multiple organs and systems, but we do not have the information about that to act, or the information comes too late and on an isolated place, covering the other alarm signals under the threshold of detection by the organism.

However, if you go to a TCM practitioner with the complaint of e.g. heart palpitations as a symptom of restlessness after examining your pulse and tongue, you will obtain three medications (herbs): one for lowering the blood pressure, one for detoxifying the kidneys and one for detoxifying the liver. In addition to that you may become an acupuncture session for regulating the “qi/chi flow" inside the body - a substance which is a complete mystery for science - and a prescription of what to eat and how to sleep.

So, decrypting the body sign(al)s in their multiplicity as result of the interaction of systems and organs is the clue. Regarding human bodies as licked buckets that need to be repaired from multiple punches is probably a good metaphor.

Best,

Plamen

____________________________________________________________

On Wed, May 18, 2016 at 12:44 AM, Karl Javorszky <karl.javorszky at gmail.com<mailto:karl.javorszky at gmail.com>> wrote:

Just a small detail on the information density of food (air, water, sensory input, etc.) in medicine:

The DNA has a high informational value for the organism. Can it be said that poison has also an informational value?

Can the de-constructive effect of a substance quantified based on the same semiotic system of references as the constructive effect of a substance can be referred to in that same system of references?

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