<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body bgcolor="#ffffff"><div><div style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;">Dear Joseph,<br><br>This is great! I'm sympathetic to the view that a reconnection with physics is necessary and I too worry about the political implication of Luhmann's ideas, powerful work though I find it. I've started reading Logic in Reality, but am finding it quite hard.<br><br>I have a question about "specificity" which relates to your "discontinuities". One of the central issues in physics is the broken symmetry of nature. In biological systems and art it manifests as fibonacci. In physics it may provide a link between relativity and quantum mechanical theory. Is specificity a break in symmetry? <br><br>The challenge is to speak of specificity (in time, space, matter) whilst maintaining that our speaking (the discourse) is part of a set of relations within which the specific is identified. I agree that Spencer Brown (and Luhmann) can't do this because he flattens the specific into a general process. Peirce I can't reject completely because his fascination with quaternions suggests that he was chasing a kind of spiral logic, which may be correct (but he didn't get there). How does Lupasco do this? Is there a better notation?<br><br>There are, for example, specific moments in the unfolding of a symphony where the symmetry is broken. It gives rise to new ideas which would not have happened if the break was not there. There seems to be a logic to this.<br><br>Does Lupasco have a trick to articulate this? How does he avoid generalisation?<br><br>Best wishes,<br><br>Mark</div></div><div dir="ltr"><hr><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">From: </span><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;"><a href="mailto:joe.brenner@bluewin.ch">Joseph Brenner</a></span><br><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">Sent: </span><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;">08/11/2017 18:29</span><br><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">To: </span><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;"><a href="mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es">fis</a></span><br><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">Cc: </span><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;"><a href="mailto:javierweiss@gmail.com">javierweiss@gmail.com</a></span><br><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold;">Subject: </span><span style="font-family: Calibri,sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;">[Fis] Fw: Fw: Idealism and Materialism - and Empiricism</span><br><br></div>
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<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Dear Jose Javier,</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Thank you very much for your constructive response
to my note. I respect your view of Luhmann and his constructivism (?),
which you have certainly correctly summarized in a few words. </font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">However, what the Lupasco theory of actuality and
potentiality does is to offer some ontological basis for both, grounded in
physics and is hence in my opinion hence worthy of some modicum of our
attention. It <em>is </em>possible to talk about reality without the pretty
little diagrams and calculus of Spencer-Brown.</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">
<div><font face="Arial"><font size="2">Luhmann talks about the "constant interplay"
between actual and potential, their <em>ineinanderstehen</em>, but there is no
functional relation to the mundane properties of real physical systems. As Loet
showed at the time, Luhmannian structures can be defined <em>analytically</em>,
but that is not enough for me. And a key point: why 'constant'
interplay? Is there something wrong, or is it just too real, to include
discontinuities as equally important as
continuities?</font></font></div></font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial"><font size="2">It should be clear that I completely disagree
with the place given to Luhmann in current thought. Luhmann perhaps deserves
some historical credit for basing his theory on information. However, I
follow Christian Fuchs who said in 2006 that "The function of Luhmann's theory
for society is that it is completely useless".</font></font></div>
<div><font face="Arial"><font size="2"></font></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial"><font size="2">Society does not "contain" human beings:
society is a group of human beings composed of individuals and the group and
their contradictorial relations and dynamics. Luhmann stated that the
"ground of being" is at the same time actuality and potentiality, but tells us
nothing about their nature and rules for their evolution. Meaning cannot be a
<em>unity</em> of actualization and potentialization (or re- and re-). In unity,
the two lose their necessary specificity and basis for change. Luhmann took
human beings as agents out of his system, and replaced them with abstractions.
Fascist ideology is not far away.</font></font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">If people would spend 1/20 the time on Lupasco that
they do on Pierce and Luhmann, . . .</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Best regards,</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Joseph </font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div style="font: 10pt/normal arial; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal;">----- Original Message -----
<div style="background: rgb(228, 228, 228); font-color: black;"><b>From:</b> <a title="javierweiss@gmail.com" href="mailto:javierweiss@gmail.com">Jose Javier
Blanco Rivero</a> </div>
<div><b>To:</b> <a title="joe.brenner@bluewin.ch" href="mailto:joe.brenner@bluewin.ch">Joseph Brenner</a> </div>
<div><b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, November 08, 2017 11:20 AM</div>
<div><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Fis] Fw: Idealism and Materialism - and
Empiricism</div></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><br></div>
<p dir="ltr">Dear Joseph,</p>
<p dir="ltr">Luhmann's concept of meaning (Sinn) is defined exactly as the unity
of the difference between actuality and potentiality. Maybe there an answer can
be found.<br>Besides, Luhmann's Sinn can also be translated as information since
it regards redundancy and selection. Luhmann self referred to Sinn (which I'd
rather to translate as sensemaking) as information processing. </p>
<p dir="ltr">Best regards</p>
<div class="gmail_quote">El nov 8, 2017 6:59 AM, "Joseph Brenner" <<a href="mailto:joe.brenner@bluewin.ch">joe.brenner@bluewin.ch</a>> escribió:<br type="attribution">
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-width: 1px; border-left-style: solid;"><u></u>
<div lang="JA" vlink="purple" link="blue" bgcolor="white">
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Dear Colleagues,</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">This is simply to register a dissenting opinion,
for similar reasons, with the last two notes, if nothing else to say that
there can be one:</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">1. Regarding John C.'s view of the value of
Pierce, there can be no common ground. Scholastic, propositional logic is part
of the problem. His metaphysics has no ground in physics. Only Pierce's
intuitions, to which he gives less value, have some value for me.</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">2. Koichiro presents some good science, but it is
misapplied. Nothing tells us that information, or another complex natural
process, evolves according to the trajectories that he describes:
</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"><font color="#1f497d">Any robust loop trajectory
appearing in biochemistry and biology must be either clockwise or
anti-clockwise, and by no means an undisciplined mix of the
two.<u></u><u></u></font></font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Rather, like this discussion, such processes
follow follow a 'mix' but is by no means undisciplined, even if it is partly
backwards and forwards at the same time. Such scare words should not be used.
<em>Pace </em>John, I think what underlies both has been found in part, and it
is the linked movement of systems from actual to potential and <em>vice versa.
</em></font></div>
<div><em><font face="Arial" size="2"></font></em> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">What is missing from <em>my</em> picture, since
no-one seems to point to it, are the detailed values of the path from
actuality to potentiality, which themselves may go from maxima to minima, as
discussed by Michel Godron. Michel has left us . . .</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Best regards,</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Joseph</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div style="font: 10pt/normal arial; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal;">----- Original Message -----
<div style="background: rgb(228, 228, 228);"><b>From:</b> <a title="CXQ02365@nifty.com" href="mailto:CXQ02365@nifty.com" target="_blank">Koichiro Matsuno</a> </div>
<div><b>To:</b> <a title="fis@listas.unizar.es" href="mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es" target="_blank">fis@listas.unizar.es</a>
</div>
<div><b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, November 08, 2017 1:18 AM</div>
<div><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Fis] Idealism and Materialism</div></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><font face="Arial" size="2"></font><br></div>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'>On 6
Nov 2017 at 5:30AM, John Collier wrote:<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">In fact I would argue that the notion of
information as used in physics is empirically based just as it is in the
cognitive sciences. Our problem is to find what underlies both.</span><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'>
Yes, there have already been serious attempts in this direction, though which
may not yet have received due attention from the folks interested in the issue
of information.<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'>
One example is the entropy production fluctuation theorem by Gavin Crooks
(1999). The agenda is on the distinction between states and events in
thermodynamics. An essence is seen in the uniqueness of thermodynamics
allowing for even the non-state or history-dependent variable such as heat.
This perspective is powerful enough to precipitate a dependable synthesis out
of integrating both the state and the process descriptions.
<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'>
When a microscopic system of interest contacts a heat bath, its development
along an arbitrary trajectory of the state attributes of the system
necessarily accompanies the associated event of heat flow either to or from
the bath. If the trajectory is accompanied by the heat flow to the bath over
any finite time interval, it would be far more likely compared with the
reversed trajectory absorbing the same amount of heat flow from the bath. This
has been a main message from Crooks’ fluctuation theorem. One practical
implication of the theorem is that if the trajectory happens to constitute a
loop, the likely loop must be the one having the net positive heat flow to the
bath. For the reversed loop trajectory would have to come to accompany the
same amount of heat flow from the bath back into the inside of the system, and
that would be far less likely. Any robust loop trajectory appearing in
biochemistry and biology must be either clockwise or anti-clockwise, and by no
means an undisciplined mix of the two.<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'>
A lesson we could learn from this pedagogical example is that thermodynamics
is a naturalized tool for making macroscopic events out of the state
attributes on the microscopic level irrespectively of whether or not it may
have already been called informational. It is quite different from what
statistical mechanics has accomplished so far. Something called quantum
thermodynamics is gaining its momentum somewhere these days.
<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'>
Koichiro Matsuno<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style='color: rgb(31, 73, 125); font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;'><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<div>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-US" style='color: windowtext; font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;'>From:</span></b><span lang="EN-US" style='color: windowtext; font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;'>
Fis [mailto:<a href="mailto:fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es" target="_blank">fis-bounces@listas.<wbr>unizar.es</a>] <b>On Behalf Of </b>John
Collier<br><b>Sent:</b> Monday, November 6, 2017 5:30 AM<br><b>To:</b> <a href="mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es" target="_blank">fis@listas.unizar.es</a><br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Fis] Idealism
and Materialism<u></u><u></u></span></p></div></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><u></u><u></u></span> </p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">Loet, I have no disagreement with this. at least in the
detailed summary you give. In fact I would argue that the notion of
information as used in physics is empirically based just as it is in the
cognitive sciences. Our problem is to find what underlies
both.<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">My mention of the Scholastics was to Pierce's version, not
the common interpretation due to a dep misunderstanding about what they were
up to. I recommend a serous study of Peirce on te issues of meaning and
metaphysics. He wa deeply indebted to their work iin
logic.<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">Of course there may be no common ground, but the our
project is hopeless. Other things you have said on this group lead me to think
it is not a dead end of confused notions. In that case we are wasting our
time.<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">John<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US"><u></u><u></u></span> </p></div>
<p></p><font face="MS PGothic"></font><font face="MS PGothic"></font>
<hr>
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