[Fis] Anticipatory Systems

[Stanley N Salthe]

Pedro --
Continuing with the Aristotelian causal categories:
Putting in context, here: causes of dialog (two-way flow):

What? (interlocutor) depends upon to what/whom, and depends upon response
FORMAL cause

Why? ( purpose)   FINAL cause     [maintained, but often modulated or
reinforced]

 How? (style, mood, manners)   MATERIAL causes    [may change even while
interlocutor stays the same]

 How long? (duration of the engagement, transitions -- energy expended)
EFFICIENT cause


You might wonder why I keep insisting upon this seemingly old fashioned
formulation, and the reason, in general, is this: I have found that many
texts in several discourses leave out one or more aspect of the whole.

STAN

On Sun, Oct 21, 2018 at 2:58 PM Pedro C. Marijuan <pcmarijuan.iacs at aragon.es>
wrote:

> Dear FIS Collegues,
>
> In my second of the week I am responding to the recent comments.
>
> To Loet: Of course there might be many "imperatives" around. Focusing on
> the "cellular" (versus atomic or molecular ones you mention) is due to
> several reasons: the cell contains an inner description , "coding", of its
> active components; it changes its composition of active elements according
> to the demands of the environment regarding the advancement of its own life
> course; it "senses" the environment itself before activating specific gene
> expression cascades. A watershed in signaling has been the fact that
> hundreds of substances may be felt by "simple" bacteria, which was unknown
> until last 15 years or so (the revolution of the "one component systems").
> The cell not only evolves, it also "returns": all multicellular are
> inexorably bound to return to unicells for their reproduction. It is a
> fascinating aspect, coupled with epigenetic changes...  and together with
> many other recent discoveries, the need of a new evolutionary theory has
> become deeply felt by quite many researchers; besides a number of them make
> "informational" style considerations. Well, to conclude, If any molecule or
> atom can do similar "informational" things, please tell me. I will
> surrender to their "imperative".
>
> To Jerry: Thanks for the appreciation. I cannot object the logico-formal
> path you propose, but is it feasible? I really doubt that a new way of
> thinking could emerge by logically bridging those different disciplines;
> the magnitude is more than enormous. My argument is that the most pressing
> problems in the informational arena (susceptible of being "bridged") refer
> to cell-cycle logics of signaling, and human life advancement and social
> communication strategies. Narratives are not the sceintific subject per se,
> but only in their tight relationship with the advancement of our own
> individual lives. Tales, comedies, tragedies, operas, novels, lullabies,
> media, today propaganda ... are natural units with different calibers that
> are useful for different life situations. In all cases the universal
> reference is the advancement of the life course. Stories provide us with a
> unique mirror to the inner dynamics of human nature. The scientific
> approach has not realized that our urge to understand the world and to
> imagine stories is something as much governed by laws as the structures of
> the atom or the genome (as Booker puts!). Similarly, couldn't we describe
> as "molecular narratives" the developmental trajectory of one of our cells
> after 30 or 40 divisions with progressive modifications due to signaling,
> epigenesis, extracellular matrix, niche, and physical force&adhesion?
>
> To Stan: Thanks for incorporating the four Aristotelian causes below. But
> do you think they are useful or well suited for communicational phenomena?
> Rather they respond better to the single agent or designer arranging a
> piece of the inanimate world to his/her plans. See the traditional metaphor
> of the sculptor carving out the statue. But communication and narratives
> could be different.  Seemingly they respond better to questions such as:
> What? (Content) To whom? (interlocutor) Why? (reasons or purpose) How?
> (style, moods, manners) How long? (duration of the engagement,
> transitions). I think that when cells indulge in their molecular narratives
> or when we do communicate with our stories the causal analysis becomes
> different from the Aistotelian frame. It could be a good point to search
> out.
>
> Best wishes to all
> --Pedro
>
>  El 19/10/2018 a las 15:49, Stanley N Salthe escribió:
>
> On the topic of information as narration:
>
> Information as Narrative (would involve serial ‘statements’)
>
> Formal cause (of narrative) ...  the presence of available channels (in
> nature and/or culture) for informative energy flows
>
> Material cause ...  available energy gradients for required actions
> generating the narrative
>
> Efficient cause(s) ...  serial actions having sequential cumulative
> effects on the result of information flow in such a channel
>
> Final cause ...  anticipated subsequents as effects of the narrative
>
>      (Anticipation requires system survival over a period of time, during
> which impingements were survived, sometimes by way of internal modification
> -- Rosen, 1985, Anticipatory Systems)
>
> STAN
>
>
>
>
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>
> --
> -------------------------------------------------
> Pedro C. Marijuán
> Grupo de Bioinformación / Bioinformation Group
> pcmarijuan.iacs at aragon.eshttp://sites.google.com/site/pedrocmarijuan/
> -------------------------------------------------
>
>
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