Tuesday, September 8, 2009

A new science of certainty

The following are tentative thoughts I am now putting together in a "new science of certainty": A fresh look and new perspective on what we understand and why.


I promise to clarify these ideas at length in a simple to understand and comprehensive way, but currently, this is just a list of points for people who are familiar with advanced physics, biology, philosophy, ecology, and also consiousness. I wish to connect these with sociology, cognitive psychology, and yes: history and culture.


Originally, I thought I would be working on this list within a week and a half, adding and editing it daily. I changed my mind and decided to pursue other projects of mind, and continue here only occasionally. Sorry.


a. Looking from the future to the past:
Teleology - the explanation of something happening, not as "caused by something", but rather as happening "in order to reach some objective" has been avoided by science at all costs, ever since Galileo and probably a while before that. Science has choosen the "cause and effect" paradigm, against Aristotle's "final cause" . But ever since special relativity, and more so following recent discoveries in particle physics and the development of new paradigms in Chaos theory and Evolutionary Algorithms and Emergence theory, this simplified paradigm of forward-only time, as well as the simplified Darwinian evolutionary "survival of the fittest" theory is begging for an update. In the field of evolution for example, it is clear that simple environmental survival is not the complete answer. Even though un-natural selection IS the way for man (and woman) to create blue parakeets, or better wheat, still, "natural selection" is not the only way in which the kingdom of nature evolves.
As proven in recent discoveries in the field of Genetics, extra-genetic evolution exists, including new extensions to Baldwin Effect. All this is not to say that evolution does not explain how we (people and the surroundings) came to be what we are, but rather to point out that it can be useful to change the point of view on the same known phenomena of the world (commonly called science), and look at it from the other side - the future.

b. Considering future certainty (or: Tracing reality in retrospective):
The science of uncertainty - is the basis for most of science today. The field of statistics deals with the uncertain, and brings about the paradigm of "the law of large systems". Entropy, one of the first discoveries of the study of thermodynamics, is essential to understanding the universe according to science. According to research and calculations, heat - or "untapped energy" will always be lost from any system. So that within time the whole universe is cooling down. This is not just an interesting fact, it is a running assumption, on which much of "hardcore" science relies, and it has an extreme affect on today's philosophy and
pessimistic mindset.

But in reality, this "paradox" - where we see organized systems of life and organized forms of physical existence everywhere we look, and in fact we ourselves are an organized type of life form, despite the fact that everything is "Going back to dirt" (I wrote that only in a way of speaking) - despite the fact that entropy must grow with every flow of energy, spreading it out further in a way that it cannot be retrieved.

In reality we see that computer designed "genetic algorithms" with no memory whatsoever create fantastic shapes and behaviors, with a much less complex source of interactivity and with much less intensive quantities of possibilities than the real world.

It seems to me that the "missing link" is the fact that within every statistic shuffle of reality - be it matter, ideas, politics or any other field, there will always be the statistics of SOME sort of order. And THAT has never been taken into consideration.

To put it another way: When you shuffle a box of sand in a random way for long enough - what are the chances that a YOUR face will emerge in the sand, with all your features perfectly put? Of course we would all agree that the chances are effectively zero.

But what are the chances that SOME sort of shape that may look to someone as SOME sort of face of someone or of some animal will occur. The answer is: Look up at the sky. Those clouds are not drawing a dog for you - unless you believe in reading clouds.

The possibility of receiving spontaneous order - from a non ordered system or receiving power and work from a dispersed energy system. ... To be continued.


c. Spontaneous order

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Looking forward to the next bit.

- Aangirfan