[Fis] Acknowledgments--ends and beginnings

[Pedro C. Marijuán]

Hi Stu--and colleagues,

Coincidentally with your message I was reading  McLuhan's "Man and 
Media" (1979):

/"I am suggesting that the Club of Rome is really talking to the old 
nineteenth-century situation of quantity and hardware and ignoring 
completely the effect of software information on the human psyche. The 
rip-off of human psychic resources by new media may far exceed the 
dangers involved in energy shortages from hardware."
/
/
/
Literally, it is not a bad suggestion regarding the irrationality of 
some present ideological policies (I have a dramatic video showing the 
destruction of a beautiful Spanish landscape by hundreds of windmills). 
And taking the citation symbolically, it might be arguing for a 
liberation of the informational discourse out from the physicalist 
stance. So, the "end" you have achieved with Andrea Roli about the 
non-deducibility of the evolving biosphere may represent another 
argument for a genuine liberation from the "science of the hardware".

The scientific discourse, as regularly practiced, is supported by a 
limited number of concepts-arguments that are cohered into a "point of 
view", caught into a shared "perspective" (in the sense of philosopher 
Ortega y Gasset). Thus, devoting most of our argumentative resources to 
arriving at the "end", when we have already confirmed that end from 
different points of view, seems to demand an alternative--a "beginning" 
strategy starting to build out from there. We may leave aside the burden 
of physicalist questions and conundrums --still deep unsolved ones-- and 
try to advance the "informational point of view" or the "informational 
perspective"--out from new "principles" (beginnings). My own bet is from 
reflection about the basic biological organization towards the many 
other realms based on information-communicating agents, of course 
including the careful scrutiny of our societies' psychic resources as 
McLuhan points.

A new point of view, informational, where many disciplines would 
converge in co-creating it, could parallel and complement the 
monopolistic historic influence of the "hardware" science... And in 
order to clarify misunderstandings about implementing a new 
reductionism, the whole knowledge edifice appears as an enormous social 
combinatorics enterprise, where an unending mixing occurs,  and where 
the frequent overstretching of successful theories becomes an 
intellectual toxic. To socially better playing this combinatorics of 
perspectives, getting free of the mentioned monopolistic influence would 
be quite convenient. Curiously we count with a historical Saint Patron-- 
Ramon Llull (or Raimundo Lulio, or Raimundus Lullus) who developed in 
13th Century his wonderful Ars Combinatory, or Ars Magna. He even 
devised a mechanical contraption of rotating boards to help exploring 
the combinatoric universe of faith, philosophy, logic...

Hope not having gone too astray.
Best--Pedro


El 15/01/2024 a las 16:25, Stuart Kauffman escribió:
> Thanks Krassimir. Yes Thinking Life. I will soon complete an article 
> with Andrea Roli: Is the Emergence of Life an Expected Phase 
> Transition in the Evolving Universe?” and will share it with the 
> group. In it, quite to my surprise, I think we demonstrate that John 
> von Neumann’s famous self reproducing machine is badly mistaken about 
> how living cells reproduce. It is all very odd. If we are correct, the 
> software hardware distinction does not apply to living cells. But the 
> software hardware distinction surely applies to Universal Turning 
> Machines. How can both be true?
>
> It seems a deep new puzzle. It may be related to Aristotle’s Four 
> Causes and how they can be true, but not, I suspect, for reproducing 
> cells. Very odd.
>
> Best to all,.
>
> Stu
>
>> On Jan 15, 2024, at 3:18 AM, Krassimir Markov <itheaiss at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Dear Stu,
>> Thanks for the reply.
>> I was able to find your lecture and interview on the web and got my 
>> questions answered. I have no more questions for you.
>> I completely agree with you that "Life is a mystery", but I am 
>> convinced that it will be revealed by another, greater mystery - The 
>> Thinking Life!
>> Therefore, let us follow the wisdom of the Bulgarians, who say:
>> "The vineyard wants a hoe, it won't a prayer!"
>> Keep working!
>>
>> Dear Lou,
>> Thank you very much for the interesting presentation. Category theory 
>> is yet to become more relevant, especially in the modeling of 
>> intellectual processes and activities.
>> I have some doubts about using the metaphor of quantum physics to 
>> model them.
>> Especially considering the drive to break away from the physical 
>> paradigm.
>> It's really strange, on the one hand we don't want physics, and on 
>> the other hand we are firmly attached to the idea of the quantum brain.
>>
>> Dear Gordana,
>> Thanks for the very timely idea to discuss some computing issues.
>> It would be especially interesting to me if there were time and 
>> opportunities to discuss the current state of cognitive computing.
>>
>> With respect,
>> Krassimir
>>
>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!V6lDotogGzIgUM-lQThGsblH7v88CvMWSOaT006jqG8fIUnRc2FaHBGXrGYdgUjFmeLd25Q-JMpEKcOELUM$> 
>> 	Няма вирусиhttps://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.avast.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!VMzuBX-y4k493xvV3PXHYpCw8-PyS4pNC7RPU-KZGyI0OA7ROGgUNh60N3a5nbiQC9IY1lojPCnVgDl1iLGyM2-a2gCi$  
>> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!V6lDotogGzIgUM-lQThGsblH7v88CvMWSOaT006jqG8fIUnRc2FaHBGXrGYdgUjFmeLd25Q-JMpEKcOELUM$> 
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Fis mailing list
>> Fis at listas.unizar.es
>> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
>> ----------
>> INFORMACI�N SOBRE PROTECCI�N DE DATOS DE CAR�CTER PERSONAL
>>
>> Ud. recibe este correo por pertenecer a una lista de correo 
>> gestionada por la Universidad de Zaragoza.
>> Puede encontrar toda la informaci�n sobre como tratamos sus datos en 
>> el siguiente enlace: 
>> https://sicuz.unizar.es/informacion-sobre-proteccion-de-datos-de-caracter-personal-en-listas
>> Recuerde que si est� suscrito a una lista voluntaria Ud. puede darse 
>> de baja desde la propia aplicaci�n en el momento en que lo desee.
>> http://listas.unizar.es
>> ----------
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Fis mailing list
> Fis at listas.unizar.es
> http://listas.unizar.es/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/fis
> ----------
> INFORMACIÓN SOBRE PROTECCIÓN DE DATOS DE CARÁCTER PERSONAL
>
> Ud. recibe este correo por pertenecer a una lista de correo gestionada por la Universidad de Zaragoza.
> Puede encontrar toda la información sobre como tratamos sus datos en el siguiente enlace: https://sicuz.unizar.es/informacion-sobre-proteccion-de-datos-de-caracter-personal-en-listas
> Recuerde que si está suscrito a una lista voluntaria Ud. puede darse de baja desde la propia aplicación en el momento en que lo desee.
> http://listas.unizar.es
> ----------




-- 
Este correo electrónico ha sido analizado en busca de virus por el software antivirus de Avast.
https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.avast.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!VMzuBX-y4k493xvV3PXHYpCw8-PyS4pNC7RPU-KZGyI0OA7ROGgUNh60N3a5nbiQC9IY1lojPCnVgDl1iLGyM2-a2gCi$ 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listas.unizar.es/pipermail/fis/attachments/20240115/897b02f1/attachment-0001.html>