Wednesday 16 January 2008

Throwing overboard relentlessly whatever is remotely connected with what is not agreed now.

Single individuals, as well as all the structures built and maintained by individuals, have a tendency, for various reasons, to hold on to old practices and ignore the new. Such a tendency, to whatever degree is adhered to, suppresses progress and hinders natural development based on notions that what have worked well in the past, it works in the present and it will work in the future. Its influence becomes overriding and suppresses new ideas.

Usually development reaches a plateau, as the premises for their rise in the first place, presented as the initial conditions, confine and determine the extent to which they can develop or even the kinds of development possible. These initial conditions which can be taken as the foundations of the system(s) built, do not offer any room for further development. Any further development is impossible. Further development is only possible by acting on the very foundations that the system(s) are built. Shaking at the very foundations of the built system(s).

An example of such process is provided by the rise in France of the Bourbaki movement in the 1930s among young mathematicians, presented in this article from PlanetMath website.

The system comprising the state of mathematics in France at that period pushed young mathematicians toward a complete overhaul on the way mathematics were taught as they felt that older mathematicians were holding on to old practices and ignoring the new.

As it is stated:

"Bourbaki felt that the old mathematical divisions were no longer valid comparing them to ancient zoological divisions. The ancient zoologist would classify animals based on some basic superficial similarities such as “all these animals live in the ocean”. Eventually they realized that more complexity was required to classify these animals. Past mathematicians had apparently made similar mistakes : “the order in which we (Bourbaki) arranged our subjects was decided according to a logical and rational scheme. If that does not agree with what was done previously, well, it means that what was done previously has to be thrown overboard.”"

The notion, of throwing overboard what was done previously, if that does not agree with what is agreed in the present, no matter how widespread and deep-rooted it might appear to be. That goes along at every scale, even at the level of a single individual in its efforts to acquire meaning accomplished by the eclectic use of language and the subsequent application of that meaning to deal with everyday life phenomena.

"Someone should stick to language, as far as the words, the symbols used, serve their purpose, in achieving meaning, and then words should be discarded, thrown away."

Amending old and tried practices, ideas that held true in the past, instead of tampering with the initial conditions, the foundations, it will only alter superficially a given system, as the limits have already been reached. As what is required is to advance to the next stage, a higher state in the system's development where new, innovative ideas will find room to flourish and proliferate.

The prerogative of acting on the initial conditions is professed by the chaotic systems development. The sensitive dependence on a system's initial conditions, where tiny perturbations have drastic effects in the final outcome of a state. A force that is unstoppable and able to carry forward whatever changes have touched and are about the initial conditions of any given system.

Any attempts to stifle such drive, goes against the premises of natural development, futile attempts of a system in its dying throes to perpetuate its existence, destined to fail as it stands against a much larger force.

Thursday 10 January 2008

Worlview thoughts

What is a worldview and how can it affect an individual's life? An interesting approach , which from my point of view, I find it as portraying inner drives of everyone, is given in this Principia Cybernetica Project website.

"This philosophy tries to answer the fundamental questions, which every person reflecting about the world and his or her place in it has been asking throughout the ages."

Every individual reflecting about the world and its place in it. Be that the individual in the past, the present and the future. Such big questions with so little to go about, the human mind, it is no wander it brings about nagging feelings, anxiety and frustration, despair. A void impossible to fill. We can not but give up, resign, going about living life, as it has been said, indulge in almost everything human senses can devour, carnal lust, love, wealth, power. Loose itself in what has been termed happiness, a vague notion, widely open to interpretation for almost any individual in the world about. Everything possible as long as we can avoid these nagging unanswerable questions, coming back again and again to haunt us day by day. The more some one is involved in entertaining its senses the farther away from this state of uneasiness someone is, and even manage to shove it in some deep recess of our mind as we build lives filled with tasks and duties and responsibilities, alas the questions and their effect to emerge without notice whenever there is a brake.

to consume and the possibilities given by the modern society almost never to be alone wherever we are.

Quite a lot of people have convinced themselves that they do not need to answer the questions or have replaced them. Avoid the questions,but they can not get away. But instead of avoiding it is more ... (cleansing) to attempt to give the answers, each one in its own way. It greatly helps to (drive) to answer by being informed. Knowledge. Learning.

what is frightening is the realisation after each act, how incapable to replace what knowledge can provide

as soon as is left by its own, the individual falls instantly, prey to its talons . It has been termed loneliness and every individual avoids it at all costs(like the plague).

Existential problems which at different time periods have competed against ideological currents from the opposite ends of the political spectrum and lost to the nagging problems of survival prevailing only to submerge that any survival issues have to be solved taking in account the stance of individuals towards the problems existence itself brings forward. Any stance (the way each individual sees its place in the world and the role it plays) defines and determines the individual's actions.

Over the years knowledge has accumulated which it can be used towards answering many of the problems existence has brought forward. That knowledge has to become part of each individual in its attempt to ... (clear up) any misconceptions that are currently used to guide their lives. This will lessen the confusion and provide perspective for each to use. It will also become common, common perspective which it can be used to build or re-build societies.

There is too much hubris in people's lives emanating what individuals have employed in their attempts to answer existential problems and these are based in the concept of belief and the existence of good and evil. There is no common approach and it can not be any common answers in what portrays good or bad as it means a totally different thing for each individual and it is futile to impose and at the same time to accept by any individual any common interpretation of good and evil. It creates clashes not only between individuals but within the individual itself which it greatly undermines its resolve and compromises its stance and adds to the individual's confusion.

Societies have realised that learning is the key to the betterment of its structure and have introduced ideas like life-long learning, however its scope is short-sighted and its efforts of implementation are half-hearted. This is because the measure introduced is within the current prevailing framework of monetisation and its purpose to induce individuals who have been left outside the economic infrastructure ... to fill up their time and becoming less of burden for the society or state.

My thoughts drove into an inquiry of existentialism and I found this article in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. The incessant drive of the author to mention almost everyone remotely connected with the subject of existentialism, as if that would make a difference, alienated me towards its contents till I got a glimpse of:

"What makes this current of inquiry distinct is not its concern with 'existence' in general, but rather its claim that thinking about human existence requires new categories not found in the conceptual repertoire of ancient or modern; ..."

My thoughts as well, on that matter and not only. There are around, and adhered to, many concepts which I regard as baggage in need to be shed off, and get rid of. Like what I read in

"... it is not enough to know all the truths that natural science could tell us."

This appeal to truth I find it unjustifiable, a language construct with no content at all, used in a context inappropriate to the meaning it carries and spawns inconsistencies. Inconsistencies which result in a lot of strife in human interactions. Because its adverse effects in human relationships its use should be abandoned. We should never bring that forth to justify our actions.

Saturday 5 January 2008

While in the making of a dynamic world(view).

It is daunting to place yourself in front of such huge numbers and attempt to comprehend, and subsequently make sense out of it. To attempt to embrace, engulf such complexity. You can not. Your mind, your brain is not equipped to work with such multiplicity but instead it can work with quantities that are manageable, manageable size(s).

for yourself at first hand, and the sense you attribute to your immediate surroundings, the environment and the individuals in that environment, with which with some of them you rub shoulders with, in your daily life and with others you share the same space and indirectly their/our actions assume a collective quality and determine, define how each other relates to one another and provide meaning for all to make and acquire sense of the world.

To transcend beyond your immediate surroundings,

in either space or time dimension

in its time dimension take a step back and let the world pass by you, and observe the trajectories run by your/their lives of its capacity,

use your imagination and fly out of your world and see your world below unfolding its actions, see yourself taking part in these actions, being part of the actions (activities), and as you go higher and you will see the worlds in the vicinity, observe and record yourself and the others around you in this bigger picture, try to assess your place and the significance of your actions and others around you, to the individuals in that wider view, see what is the effect of your actions in this wider view as well as the effect of their actions to yourself and others around you. You will notice what is and what is not makes any difference for other individuals in this wider view, as the details of daily lives are lost from this distance and what is left the strong sets of details (features), the stronger features, the things we call routine, the things and thoughts that are endlessly repeated and therefore leave a stronger mark. All of our aspirations and higher ideals are lost and what remains are what someone or ourselves would call prescriptions, prescribed and directed by our need to conform, as it is prescribed by the norms of the society we belong to, the standard which we identify ourselves with. Any aberrations from the trodden paths are not discernible, are not distinguishable.

Of course we can not transcend and can rely wholly (unquestionably) in a wanton imagination. Instead we rely on a more directed imagination, as we construct the lives of individuals in remote areas, by being informed by word-to-mouth, news and stories in the media, be that TV news bulletins, newspaper stories, books, cinema films and television series. And we use all this information as fodder for our imagination to build, side-by-side with our own life trajectories, the life trajectories of all the people of the world. Trajectories, which like our own, trace paths driven by the same inspirations and motives, no matter how remote these trajectories might appear to us, or whether we are able to distinguish the inspirations they are driven by, since when we are looking at them from high up, their individual details are fading, becoming obscure.

We have to make room for adjustments to accommodate the thought that we all follow the same basic principles, that our lives are driven by the same motives that their lives are driven by. A connected world view that makes sense of the world, by including our own and everyone else's lives together.

if you go even higher you will see the whole world and again even more details will be lost, our lives could not be seen at all but what can be seen is our common lives intermingled, the individual details totally lost.


Delivering education, not in the way is practiced today, tied in the wagon of monetisation. We had enough of this. There is enough gross national product to sustain all the inhabitants in a nation and as well as other nations. Any further economic development of any of the developed countries, and any claim about that is an under the table passing of an effort to channel wealth to the coffers of very few individuals. That is not the kind of economic activity human individuals need.

What is that it came to my mind ? Interesting. Applying the so-called scientific methods for explaining human behaviour. OUf, it doesn't say much. It is for humans to adapt methodologies that are valid according to the website I was reading yesterday. Which it was about validity. It is in particular the part that deals with the measurement of a quantity, especially the part that say that we should make sure that what is measured is what we want want or need to measure or something along these lines. The idea is if we claim we want find x quantity and we devise ways to find in the real world how we can find about this quantity, we have to make sure that what we said we are going to measure is what we measure. (fuck you)
How did I come with this idea? I was thinking about this scene with the lesbian women, where a partner accused the other member of the partnership as being cruel. And the accused burst out in tears. Beyond the fact that feminism stopped what was used to be, an oppressed's struggle for emancipation, once achieved the male chauvinism was replaced by extra feminist individuals, who emulated their oppressors. But the emulated chauvinist did not forget its biological identity and burst into tears, yes as women do. If the tears is a measure of an event it is interesting to know what they actually measure. So it goes along the validity of the measurements, or valid measurements, just. The idea needs to be refined. And it can be generalised further as most of our emotional outburst are unexplainable and if are regarded as measurements of our emotions, to be valid we should think of, of what emotion is measured. In each particular time.

Extract to substantiate the above:

"For instance, virtually all social research involves measurement or observation. And, whenever we measure or observe we are concerned with whether we are measuring what we intend to measure or with how our observations are influenced by the circumstances in which they are made."



I hope Giuliani's reference to acquiring more gains as other states enter the sequence of primaries to be proven wrong and to push him further to the bottom of he barrel never himself as well as the views he aspires to be put aside and be forgotten for ever.

if the election is after all these promising ideals is finally lost I am thinking that the young generation will be lost for years to come
they will be lost for another generation

the big body of lawyers which they are taking advantage of the shortcomings of language (reference for language in net3) as they can manipulate to serve their purpose despite the legislation that is there to deter abuse

and the so-called global market which is practiced within the limited walls of a handful of stock exchanges has surpassed itself and lost control. It has become a game that a handful of individuals play on the backs of the rest of the individuals in the world. It does not serve any purpose other than protecting whatever has been gained insofar by these few individuals. There is not a free market as such but a handful of big corporations that their only drive it is to become stronger and stronger and in the process treat humanity as their hopeless pawns, in their minds not worth but to endure their whims. Whims since their is no content in their acts but an ... void that they try hopelessly to fill. Because they can not but be what they are, individuals as everybody else, and carry in their brains simplified minds.

"Η ζωή, βέβαια, είναι αντιφατική. Οι όποιες δυσκολίες παρουσιάζει, τις συνοδεύουν η εμφάνιση νέων δυνατοτήτων. Ο παγκόσμιος καπιταλισμός βρίσκεται σήμερα σε πορεία πρακτικής υπέρβασης των νεοφιλελεύθερων δογμάτων που κυριάρχησαν τα τελευταία 25 χρόνια. Η αγοραία αντίληψη για την προτεραιότητα της αγοράς βρίσκεται σε υποχώρηση. Το ΠΑΣΟΚ όφειλε να έχει φέρει στη Βουλή νόμο με τον οποίο θα διασφάλιζε σε μια εποχή που ονομάζω ως εποχή «προστατευτικής παγκοσμιοποίησης» τις ελληνικές στρατηγικές επιχειρήσεις. Να τις προστατέψει πριν απ’ όλα, από ενέργειες τάχατες ιδιωτικοποίησης μέσω των οποίων θα καταλήξουν αυτές στα χέρια τρίτων κρατών και όχι κάποιας «αφηρημένης αγοράς». Όφειλε, επίσης, να φέρει στη Βουλή νόμο για την φορολόγηση των υπερκερδών και τον έλεγχο της τοκογλυφίας και των αεριτζήδων «της μεσολάβησης». Τέλος να προτείνει και να προωθήσει ειδικά μέτρα διασφάλισης της έννομης λειτουργίας των ασφαλιστικών ταμείων, αλλά και μέτρα προστασίας του παιδιού, καθώς και καταπολέμησης της φτώχειας στα πλαίσια μιας πολιτικής ενάντια στις εσωτερικές ανισότητες που παράγει η παγκοσμιοποίηση. Διότι όπως δείχνουν όλες οι διεθνείς μελέτες η φτώχεια αποτελεί εμπόδια ενίσχυσης των ρυθμών ανάπτυξης μιας χώρας."

To protect what is theirs.
No system ever devised was there to proliferate free thinking, new ideas. Their struggle was always to promote their ideas, as at some particular time were new, and once achieving prominence, from then on their struggle was to continue (perpetuate) their dominance suppressing any new ideas from wherever they were coming from.
The systems built were not meant to be the hives where new ideas flourish, but the strengthening of their now dominant new ideas.

Free market reached a point where any new it carried along and carried it along are exhausted and now it is the time to keep everything gained in the process in whatever way possible. Employing whatever means possible, even means abhorred and detested and fought against before. Before their rise to dominance (power).
There so much legislation introduced in societies, states, in their attempt to (continue) (survive) perpetuate their prominence (dominance) ingenuity from their parts plays a significant role and continues to devise new legislation to hold on to the taken.


servant to interests that present situations of monetization sinks your nation into disrepute

and it is what in this website makes a difference and raises the point that no legislation is ever enough to change a system but the education of individuals is what will make the difference, and legislation should be regarded as a transitory measure till the individuals have not further need for.

That any change could not come from above, a change would come from below, and the leaders are there to interpret the ideas that prompted them forth and tread along the guidelines given by the individuals in a society.

Continuing on the subject or one thing led to another. I need these references to Erich Fromm and the Guardian website.

So norms are sentences? With practical import? They are action-oriented? They do not describe, explain or express but they prescribe? Prescriptions like commands, permissions and prohibitions? Society rules are norms. They direct our actions. How to act and behave. The laws are prescriptions of individuals actions.

"Imperative sentences are the most obvious way to express norms, but declarative sentences also do it very often, as is the case with many laws."

"Those norms purporting to create obligations (or duties) and permissions are called deontic norms (see also deontic logic). The concept of deontic norm is already an extension of a previous concept of norm, which would only include imperatives, that is, norms purporting to create duties. The understanding that permissions are norms in the same way was an important step in ethics and philosophy of law."

Obigations, duties, permissions, orders, commands.

"While objective truths are final and static, subjective truths are continuing and dynamic."

What is that again? Static and dynamic? Objective truths static and subjective as dynamic? Though I care little for the truth dimension what I find intrigging is the assumption and the properties attributed to the obective/subjective pair. Objective has a finality, yes. And can be regarded as static. Static from the sense that it does not change. Its state remains the same. And if taken by how all individuals regard the objective, an objective stance, something that stands outside of them, something that it is the same for all, and by that virtue static and final and unchanged. In contrast with the subjective view that constantly changes, a dynamic state, in transition, continually changing. Does that reflect the acquisition of knowledge? When it starts, being a subjective product, the opinion, belief of an individual constantly changing, in a sense. Is it primarily having to do with the truth? The objective truth being the final and static? Can it be?

The whole thing smells of chaos. Chaos being dynamic constantly changing. Subjective (truth?) identifying with the chaotic. And what about objective? Being static? Static can not be accepted. There is no static view. No static state unless you freeze it. Tear it out from its phase space. Does that say anything for the objective? Or the truth? Static in a sense of a photograph not a movie. Does not take into account what preceded it and what it follows from it. The connections with what surrounds it are severed. Everything is connected with each other. It is the part and whole continuum.

That brings again the point. Is it about 'objective', with whatever tag it comes along, or just 'objective truth' that is branded as 'final and static'? Does 'final and static' addresses the 'truth' and not the 'objective'? And if it is meant for 'truth' what are the implications? For truth. 'Truth' is 'final and static'? Or if it is 'objective truth' is 'final and static' and if it is 'subjective truth' is 'continuing and dynamic'. Is the whole idea about 'truth' an illusion? Something invented by the abuse or over-reliance in language?

There is no reason(?) in pondering about it. It is insignificant. One of these inconsistencies brought about by the main characteristic of language being a ... system that suffers from godelitis. Going about in loops.

Is the whole thing a gimmick? A play with words?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth#Kierkegaard

"In that respect, "a scientifically or rationally valid statement means that the power of reason is applied to all the available data of observation without any of them being suppressed or falsified for the sake of a desired result". The history of science is "a history of inadequate and incomplete statements, and every new insight makes possible the recognition of the inadequacies of previous propositions and offers a springboard for creating a more adequate formulation."

"Fromm also asserted that few people in modern society had respect for the autonomy of their fellow human beings, much less the objective knowledge of what other people truly wanted and needed."