<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Dear Pedro,<div class="">I would like to speak to your question again.</div><div class="">You ask about the nature of the subject/person (in the LoF dialogue and/or beyond that discussion).</div><div class="">Certainly that book and our discussions in language presuppose a subject like us who can read and reason and make distinctions as we make them. </div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">We also look out on our worlds and see other makers of distinctions in a wider sense of the term - Bacteria, Eukaryotes, Multicellulars, Mammals and their Central Nervous System, and so on. And we are always looking at these through our own eyes, and thinking about the autonomy of such subjects. Indeed we think about and work with and live in our world recognizing the autonomy of other human subjects.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">And we know that our language is a communal construction.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Yet we each, perhaps as a construction of that language, adhere to the notion of a personal subject.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">So the nature of “personal subject” is something that we can each explore and possibly communally via language and community.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">In the book LoF and in the literature of cybernetics there is talk of the “observer”, as though we knew what this meant.</div><div class="">We do not know.</div><div class="">And not knowing, we can regard this notion as subject (sic) for research.</div><div class="">To ask about the nature of the observer is the same (I suggest) as to ask about the nature of distinction.</div><div class="">Best,</div><div class="">Lou</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><div><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Jan 23, 2025, at 1:30 PM, Pedro C. Marijuán <<a href="mailto:pedroc.marijuan@gmail.com" class="">pedroc.marijuan@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class="">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" class="">
<title class="">Re: [Fis] "Percepts" and self-reference and meaning -
[chaotic issues]</title>
<div class="">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Dear Lou and FIS Colleagues,</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Let me ask you just a couple of
questions on the subject implicit in your distinction scheme. I
assume it is human, an enlightened logician. And this person makes
use of an unfettered system of perception --jumping then from
percepts to concepts, as you say, and achieving a higher state of
consciousness and problem solving via emptiness and the Heart
Sutra. Right? No thought collective instances are intervening or
involved, at least directly. And no ostensible limitations are
precluding advancement of thought... And about other possible
'distinctional' subjects, i.e. non-human subjects --Bacteria?
Eukaryotes? Multicellulars? Mammals and their Central Nervous
System?</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">One could state, too succinctly, that
any of these living entities have adapted to their niche by
abducing or intercepting ad hoc information flows, which in the
basis become sort of molecular-recognition distinctions that are
processed in successive steps and finally elaborated into meanings
that adaptively change the ongoing behavior and selfproduction
processes. So... it is about surviving via the information flows
adaptively catched from the niche, which in the human case is a
social niche. <br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Further, we humans have developed an
amazing knowledge system of several thousand disciplines, where
distinctions pile up on distinctions, assembled into theoretical
constructs, experimental methods and multifarious approaches. The
actual ways and means to move within that gigantic tangle have
been pragmatism, traditions, and bureaucracy. Lots of the latter
as we know well from the institutions in charge of knowledge
handling. Right. But nowadays we have a new invitee to the chaotic
"Fiesta of Knowledge": AI. <br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">In what extent this new invitee will
get free of the most conspicuous knowledge limitations of our
individual minds? What kind of information flows will enter into
its gut and what kind of new 'meanings' will be produced?
Unfortunately, almost nobody is interested in the nuclear matter
that has forced us into a Babel of spattering disciplines, into
unending explanatory/'translatory' exchanges: our entrenched
cognizing limitations. We prefer, and take refuge into, the
security of the well-framed 'microscope'. <br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">I assume this at the other extreme of
logical underpinnings, sorry, but in my eyes it has some
relation...</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Best--Pedro<br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix"><br class="">
</div>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">El 20/01/2025 a las 8:46, Louis
Kauffman escribió:<br class="">
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid:C90CC866-9B74-4902-95E9-FCF48731EB22@gmail.com" class="">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" class="">
Dear Jason,
<div class="">I have already answered this in some other ways, but
lets try again.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Diagrams</div>
<div class="">(a) A diagram is not particularly static. It could
be a movie or an injunction to make a movie.</div>
<div class="">It could be a dance or a ritual, a temple or a war.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">That is how you might view the diagrams about
topology of DNA recombination.</div>
<div class="">And it is in that mode that diagrammatic work and
the possibility of creating a diagram from the “microword” by
electron microscopy, led to the understandings about </div>
<div class="">Knotted DNA and topological enzymes. These in turn
have had an effect at some medical levels since if your topo
enzymes do not work, your cells cannot divide and you die.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class=""><a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.excedr.com/resources/topoisomerase-overview*:*:text=In*20pharmaceuticals*2C*20topoisomerases*20are*20used,anticancer*20therapeutics*20other*20than*20chemotherapy__;I34lJSUlJSUlJSU!!D9dNQwwGXtA!VN3_KOI3NVnHHrQCUBhk-CmKe_3eXVjVC6CDnsTgT_aqTDe_YRSaOTbYTVnZXUUn-RfO2h_ygvadEF65$" class="" moz-do-not-send="true">https://www.excedr.com/resources/topoisomerase-overview#:~:text=In%20pharmaceuticals%2C%20topoisomerases%20are%20used,anticancer%20therapeutics%20other%20than%20chemotherapy</a>.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">So here you have a real example of how diagrammatic
topological mathematics is closely allied with applications that
can save lives.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(b) For the design of quantum algorithms and all
things quantum field theoretic we use diagrams quite
intensively.</div>
<div class="">The same is true for working out the reactions that
lead to the bomb. So diagrams can also be used to kill en masse,
as can all of language.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(c) Written language is a work of diagrams. Those
little characters you string together are stylized diagrams,
rather static by themselves. And if you live in China or Japan
your </div>
<div class="">Language is an incredible pastiche of diagrams.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(d) Actually all of mathematics is a pastiche of
diagrams for all sorts of conceptual and calculational purposes.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(e) I refer you to C.S. Peirce for the role of
diagrams and signs in thought.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(f) The greatest masters of diagrams in Cybernetics
were Strafford Beer and Humberto Maturana. Perhaps you see some
value in their work.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(f) The GUI that began with Mac and infiltrated PC
is the </div>
<div class="">diagrams of finitely nested boxes </div>
<div class="">that are the basis of the distinctions and
indications of LOF.</div>
<div class="">LOF is about distinctions and indications. </div>
<div class="">Its diagrams are just a particular representation of
that. </div>
<div class="">Mac uses these diagrams and never had to pay any
royalties to GSB.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Religion</div>
<div class="">(g) The Heart Sutra explains clearly how to use the
unmarked state (emptiness) to solve all human problems. </div>
<div class="">That it has not been applied to this end is not the
fault of either GSB or the Buddha.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(h) I am aware that no matter what I say, </div>
<div class="">someone will complain </div>
<div class="">about something </div>
<div class="">that comes up for them </div>
<div class="">when we get near to no-thing. </div>
<div class="">That is the nature of it.</div>
<div class="">Believe it or not, </div>
<div class="">I am not an advocate of the absolute binary
distinction. </div>
<div class="">It is in contrast to what cannot be said.</div>
<div class="">See the quote below that fell into my email from
Malcolm Dean.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">
<blockquote style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; border: none; padding: 0px;" class="">
<blockquote style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; border: none; padding: 0px;" class=""><span style="font-size: x-small; font-style: italic;" class=""><a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://books.google.com/books?id=oI9hwgEACAAJ__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!VN3_KOI3NVnHHrQCUBhk-CmKe_3eXVjVC6CDnsTgT_aqTDe_YRSaOTbYTVnZXUUn-RfO2h_yggIa9BkE$" class="" moz-do-not-send="true">https://books.google.com/books?id=oI9hwgEACAAJ</a>
</span><a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://bleuje.com/mp4set/2019/2019_25.mp4__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!VN3_KOI3NVnHHrQCUBhk-CmKe_3eXVjVC6CDnsTgT_aqTDe_YRSaOTbYTVnZXUUn-RfO2h_ygkOzwPOE$" target="_blank" class="" moz-do-not-send="true">GIF by <span class="gmail-il">Etienne</span> <span class="gmail-il">Jacob</span></a><i class=""> used to illustrate Bits forming an Information
process.</i><br class="gmail-Apple-interchange-newline">
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">"The <b class="">tentative and
non-black-and-white nature of categorization</b> is
inevitable, and yet <b class="">the act of categorization
often feels perfectly definite and absolute</b> to the
categorizer, since many of our most familiar categories
seem on first glance to have <b class="">precise and sharp
boundaries</b>, and this naïve impression is encouraged
by the fact that people’s everyday, run-of-the mill use of
words is seldom questioned; in fact, every <b class="">culture
constantly, although tacitly, reinforces the impression
that words are simply automatic labels that come
naturally to mind and that belong intrinsically to
things and entities</b>. If a category has fringe
members, they are made to seem extremely quirky and
unnatural, suggesting that nature is really <b class="">cut
precisely at the joints by the categories that we know</b>.
The resulting illusory sense of the <b class="">near-perfect
certainty and clarity of categories</b> gives rise to
much confusion about categories and the mental processes
that underlie categorization. The idea that category
membership always comes in shades of gray rather than in
just black and white <b class="">runs strongly against
ancient cultural conventions</b>and is therefore
disorienting and even disturbing; accordingly, it gets
swept under the rug most of the time." </div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
</div>
<div class="">(i) Oh, and what did you think Hofstader was about?</div>
<div class="">Did you think that he was bragging about the clarity
and perfection of logic? </div>
<div class="">He was telling you the story of how logic in the
hands of human understanding</div>
<div class="">slayed the Jabberwock of the completeness of
formality.</div>
<div class="">Don’t worry. You are not the only one who did not
listen.</div>
<div class="">We sell you fake word makers to do your job.</div>
<div class="">And in the year of our T, you can buy
cryptocurrency, watches and bibles from your leader.</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class=""><i class="ydp72b1ecb8yiv5762753745">"<a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks01/0100021.txt__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!VN3_KOI3NVnHHrQCUBhk-CmKe_3eXVjVC6CDnsTgT_aqTDe_YRSaOTbYTVnZXUUn-RfO2h_yglukToEj$" class="ydp72b1ecb8yiv5762753745" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" moz-do-not-send="true">It was one
of those pictures</a> which are so contrived that the eyes
follow you about when you move."</i></div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Best,</div>
<div class="">Lou</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
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</blockquote><p class=""><br class="">
</p>
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