Sunday 30 November 2008

"Economically viable", a phrase which should be eradicated from the minds of the people.

Threads that led to these thoughts

- Windfall Earnings for Minimal Services: As gov’t bleeds OFWs dry
- The Big Insurance Scam
- Amassing wealth. A crime against humanity.

"Economically viable", a phrase which should be eradicated from the minds of the people, along with whatever it symbolizes, whatever notions, ideas, practices or even concepts is associated with. It opens up wider routes to think about, what the role of states and governments is. Gives a wider perspective what the states and governments supposed to do.

It is directly connected with the most revered tenets of chaos embodied in the phrase 'butterfly's wing flap', the tiny change that should be effected in societies, at the level of the single individual, which will radically re-structure the societal complexities current, and adjust the social fibre to only amenable to states, emergent for that matter, where the human individual is at its core.

Its goal to proliferate human values, values for which any association with monetisation, any attempt to be looked at with economic criteria would be regarded, as is, an insult in the minds of the people and therefore scornfully rejected.

There is no need to appeal to the good will of any individual regardless its position or its clout, planetarch, read currently Barack Obama, presidents, prime ministers, ministers, governments and state officials as the authorities structures already in place, fought hard and gained by the struggle of innumerable individuals, our forefathers in countless generations before us, taken and not given, will assure that any change, minuscule by the matters of societies scales, in the minds of people, is sufficient to effect the re-structuring, societies should undergo.

Saturday 29 November 2008

I am not the same person I was a moment ago. Why?

... follow up a trajectory ... rigidly adhered ... rigidly structured consciousness ... concept deepens ... properties previously ignored, gain focus ... rise in a prominent position ... new stimuli are allowed in ... a different view is seen ... a different kind of consciousness ... paradigm shift ... new dimensions are revealed ... my previous self seems alien to my current self ... I do not recognize 'me' in the past ...

Tuesday 25 November 2008

Bootlegging, a term for delving into the chaotic world of creativity and innovation.

My search on leads on bootstrapping led to the term of bootlegging. Interesting connotations out of the the Wikipedia entry on bootlegging that gives another aspect of the word chaotic, one that does not agree with the commonly held notion of mayhem and destruction

"The main reason for the occurrence of bootlegging is the lack of ‘free space’ for creativity. In particular rigid planning ignores the nature of experimental trial and error research. Bootlegging, as a kind of self-regulating element, bridges the mechanistic world of organisation (hierarchy, project proposals, MBO, decisions can only be made after some initial findings) with the chaotic world of creativity and innovation. The theory of path dependency explains why bootleg innovations are (most often) in line with the strategic objectives of the firm: corporate competencies define the search paths for its future. In this respect are the learning processes, beside the tangible output of bootlegging beneficial for the firm."

So, bootlegging refer to as the way out of the conundrum of the lack of 'free space' for creativity? That was brought about by the rigid planning this form of human activity favours? No wonder. Being scared to loose whatever is thought as being accomplished, among them the cushy jobs, the office in the corner (why did I think of that?).

Is that so, or is it borne out of the competitiveness in that sector which instead of promoting, it stifles innovation? That everything they do is geared towards making up a penny, the economically viable prerogative. Services, products and lives of individuals take up a second place, lost in the chase for the monies as they are strained through a monetising sieve that if it does not restrict, it barely lets them through.

Constantly loosing touch of what is of value for human individuals, as gradually reach or reached the point that services and products become irrelevant, as it can be anything, even human excrement as long as it yields profits.

What difference does it make whether bootleg innovations are 'in line with the strategic objectives of the firm'? They would never be. The corporate world's only objective, strategic or not, is to make lots and lots of money. What kind of 'free space' for creativity can be accommodated there? Creativity extremely warped and distorted. It can hardly be recognised as such.

It is clearly a practice that they are ashamed of, as they called it bootlegging, a word borrowed from a distasteful past. Their origins.

The whole societal construct held by fragile, precarious threads that a snap is imminent, and will lead the construct to collapse?

A thought in need of pondering. It follows up what I read years ago, which in my mind is connected with the word, bootstrapped. Though that word came up in my mind with a meaning different for what the author in that paper used it for.

The bootstrapped mentioned by this author, was used to explain reality as a construction being created out of nothing, and sustained in existence, by being bootstrapped to its origins by future events. I do not know whether actually I give a full or even a partial account of what the author implied, mostly haphazard recollections in an attempt to re-create the image portrayed by the author's words.

I feel very little sense coming out from this recollection. However

But why did I? In my mind, assumed it to be, a way to explain the current state of societies in the world?

As if, the principles monetising societies are sustained by, are instantiated by the acts of individuals, who simultaneously resent what is supported.

Monetising societies as being the whole, the emergent product out of a series of unwilling, half-hearted, resented acts of the units-agents, the individuals amidst them?

Their thoughts, their minds, their feelings, every inch in them, being against, what by their acts effectively sustain? What they can be without?

They have to give support what they want to destroy, what they despise?

The whole structure is suspended by unwilling acts of individuals, a volatile construct held in place by so fragile, precarious threads which at any moment might snap? And the whole construct will descent into oblivion?

Friday 21 November 2008

Consciousness surpass infinities, to grasp emergence instantiating imagination?

Threads that laid the path

- The uses of infinity: a philosopher looks at emergent phenomena in physics
- Thoughts about the origins of imagination?
- Chapter 2 The foundations of science are shaking

An extract from 'The uses of infinity: a philosopher looks at emergent phenomena in physics'

"`Emergence', and its contrary reduction, are buzz-words in both physics and philosophy. Both physicists and philosophers disagree about the extent to which we can understand large-scale or complex phenomena in terms of their microscopic parts. Examples include both everyday phenomena like the freezing and boiling of liquids, and fancy ideas like fractals. In this talk, Jeremy Butterfield will pour some oil on these troubled waters. First, he will adopt the philosopher's usual tactic of distinguishing different senses of the contentious terms. Then he will use examples such as freezing and fractals to describe how we understand emergent phenomena by appealing to various kinds of infinity."

what I find interesting, is the appeal to 'various kinds of infinity' for understanding emergent phenomena. The connection with scale is intriguing, coming out from the mention of 'understand large-scale or complex phenomena in terms of their microscopic parts'. Infinities inherent in each scale level, which in sensical(?) terms, points toward infinities of parts that make up the emergent entities, in each successive level.

The infinity, let's say for the sake of following up the thought, of strings which give rise to the quantum particle entities, the somewhat next level up in the scale. Infinities of microscopic parts chunked-up in bundles, easier to handle and the same goes for entities, in each level of emergence organisation, what is referred to as the various kinds of infinities.

It brought into mind thoughts that occurred to me some time ago and recorded them in 'Thoughts about the origins of imagination?' post

"Shrinking to the quantum level, expanding to cosmos, slowing down to Planck time speeding up to eons, journeying back and forth to the beginning and the end of time? The foundations of imagination? Are there no bounds?"

infinities traversed effortlessly? What our mind, our consciousness can handle? Revealed to us, by way of the faculty of imagination? Traces of omnipotence?

Thursday 20 November 2008

Human experience. What if, our human resolving time was on a par with the resolving time of a fast electronic device?

Threads that led to these thoughts

- Coherence
- Decoherence, the measurement problem, and interpretations of quantum mechanics

A fundamental attribute of the human cognitive apparatus? One that determines the kind of experience amassed? It guides experience? Human resolving time T is responsible for the instantiation of experience? Experience is what is, because of our resolving time

"Suppose that the waves are detected by an apparatus with resolving time T, that is, T is the shortest interval between two events for which the events do not seem to be simultaneous."

Our cognitive apparatus, with our senses, with its own resolving time T, the time length, the time interval between two events that is needed in order to make out each, as been distinct from the other. Definiteness, at stake? During which, we will be able to resolve the events as being separate. To discern the information that each event carries. The separateness of the events, as distinct entities. The information discerned is used to build experience. It determines its depth and breadth and its accuracy. Wholesome experience?

Phase?

Experience, as such described , it defines observation. It provides the foundation of our subjectiveness.

In the Answers.com entry of coherence it mentions that

"For the human eye and ear, T is about 0.1 s, while a fast electronic device might have a T of 10 billionths of a sec (10^-10 s). If the relative phase δ(t), given by Eq. (3), does not, on the average, change noticeably during T, then the waves are coherent."

Human resolving time T should bear a significance on the way we see the world. How would a fast electronic device with a T of 10 billionths of a sec (10^-10) would see the world? What would the world look to us, if we had an equivalent resolving time T as that of a fast electronic device?

Highly coherent to a fast electronic device? But incoherent to the human ear? Coherent waves in phases that represent states? Superposition of states? The observer?

In 'Decoherence, the measurement problem, and interpretations of quantum mechanics'

"In fact, scientists most righly claim that the purpose of science is to describe human experience, not to describe “what really is”; and as long as we only want to describe human experience, that is, as long as we are content with being able to predict what will be observed in all possible circumstances (. . . ) we need not postulate the existence—in some absolute sense—of unobserved (i.e., not yet observed) objects lying at definite places in ordinary 3-dimensional space."

If science can only describe human experience, then what would science be, if instead of our familiar human resolving time T, our cognitive apparatus had the resolving time of a fast electronic device? Would our fast electronic device equipped human resolving time, have revealed and made part of our experience, any currently unobserved objects?

Wednesday 19 November 2008

Building up a list of 'quantum chaos' links.

Connections to these thoughts

- Abstractions and their significance.
- Quantum Chaos, Martin Gutzwiller, Scientific American, January 1992


A case brought forward about quantum chaos

"At about the time of Poincare's seminal work on classical chaos, Max Planck started another revolution, which would lead to the modern theory of quantum mechanics. The simple systems that Newton had studied were investigated again, but this time on the atomic scale. The quantum analogue of the humble pendulum is the laser; the flying cannonballs of the atomic world consist of beams of protons or electrons, and the rotating wheel is the spinning electron (the basis of magnetic tapes). Even the solar system itself is mirrored in each of the atoms found in the periodic table of the elements. Perhaps the single most outstanding feature of the quantum world is its smooth and wavelike nature. This feature leads to the question of how chaos makes itself felt when moving from the classical world to the quantum world. How can the extremely irregular character of classical chaos be reconciled with the smooth and wavelike nature of phenomena on the atomic scale? Does chaos exist in the quantum world'? Preliminary work seems to show that it does. Chaos is found in the distribution of energy levels of certain atomic systems; it even appears to sneak into the wave patterns associated with those levels. Chaos is also found when electrons scatter from small molecules. I must emphasize, however, that the term 'quantum chaos' serves more to describe a conundrum than to define a well-posed problem. "

No solid base? Quantum chaos not been irrevocably confirmed or in a milder version surely footed? The term only used to describe a conundrum faced up with, a curiosity but not the processes, quantum processes, themselves?

"Considering the following interpretation of the bigger picture may be helpful in coming to grips with quantum chaos. All our theoretical discussions of mechanics can be somewhat artificially divided into three compartments [see illustration] although nature recognizes none of these divisions. Elementary classical mechanics falls in the first compartment. This box contains all the nice, clean systems exhibiting simple and regular behavior, and so I shall call it R, for regular.
Also contained in R is an elaborate mathematical tool called perturbation theory which is used to calculate the effects of small interactions and extraneous disturbances, such as the influence of the sun on the moon's motion around the earth. With the help of perturbation theory, a large part of physics is understood nowadays as making relatively mild modifications of regular systems. Reality though, is much more complicated; chaotic systems lie outside the range of perturbation theory and they constitute the second compartment. Since the first detailed analyses of the systems of the second compartment were done by Poincare, I shall name this box P in his honor. It is stuffed with the chaotic dynamic systems that are the bread and butter of science. Among these systems are all the fundamental problems of mechanics, starting with three, rather than only two bodies interacting with one another, such as the earth, moon and sun, or the three atoms in the water molecule, or the three quarks in the proton. Quantum mechanics, as it has been practiced for about 90 years, belongs in the third compartment, called Q.
"

Mechanics, stretching that notion wider, to include anything that is described by, and, as systems such as social, mental, psychological and therefore social, mental, psychological mechanics? Attempting such an act based broadly on chaos self-similarity principle, and even further, by its virtue to go ahead and look at social, mental, psychological mechanics in novel ways?

And what about that elaborate mathematical tool called perturbation theory, which is used to calculate the effects of small interactions and extraneous disturbances to regular systems? Could it be of any use in social, mental, psychological systems? Or should we take stalk of what Henri Poincare surmised, as it is mentioned in the same website.

"So thereafter, the great French mathematician-astronomer-physicist Henri Poincare surmised that the moon's motion is only mild case of a congenital disease affecting nearly everything. In the long run Poincare realized, most dynamic systems show no discernible regularity or repetitive pattern. The behavior of even a simple system can depend so sensitively on its initial conditions that the final outcome is uncertain."

That there is, no discernible regularity or repetitive pattern, in most dynamic systems. That the behaviour of even a simple system can depend so sensitively on its initial conditions, that the final outcome is uncertain. Even a simple system? What is simple, but a construct, our minds devise, by removing all information contained in a system, or object, apart from what our minds deem as necessary? And being doing it, on and on, in individual or collective level alike? An act of abstraction that help us gain knowledge?

The necessary information, within the range defined by the maximum of our cognitive apparatus potential and the minimum needed for the overall information to make sense. What our minds can handle, but in reality systems possess a lot more information than we actually see (likened to a tip of the iceberg?), observe, and by virtue of that, no system is as simple as it looks, and therefore, it can not be predicted, as Henri Poincare surmised.

Is that a blessing or a curse? It is certainly a blessing.

So perturbation theory, dealing with the minute differences, in initial conditions. A precursor of that feature of chaos? I remember reading about mathematical calculations of hard problems, riddled with infinities, which perturbation theory have been removing. Does these menacing infinities have anything to do with the dynamics of chaotic states? In a way, describing the pull or push to the path of an unfolding trajectory? That is pulled towards infinity?

And what could we make out of the statement

"With the help of perturbation theory, a large part of physics is understood nowadays as making relatively mild modifications of regular systems."

or even

"The main connection between R and P is the Kolmogorov-Arnold-Moser (KAM) theorem. The KAM theorem provides a powerful tool for calculating how much of the structure of a regular system survives when a small perturbation is introduced, and the theorem can thus identify perturbations that cause a regular system to undergo chaotic behaviour."

How much can a system take? When a small perturbation is introduced? A small change of rule, or norm or a habit? Referring to the quality of the perturbation. Its overall effect in a regular system or just a system. Taken in to account that from all the perturbations possible, it is bound to be, that only a few would actually have a profound effect on the structure of a regular system, the state of a system, the stable state attractor. Most of the perturbations would have a negligent effect.

Why did I think about conservative values? The attractors, which we will not want to change? Content with the status-quo? We do not want changes.

Saturday 8 November 2008

The minds we make overall stupid despite being generated by an underlying remarkable ability to draw inferences?

Threads which spontaneously associated and brought out these thoughts

- FROM SIMPLE ASSOCIATIONS TO SYSTEMATIC REASONING: A Connectionist representation of rules, variables, and dynamic bindings using temporal synchrony
- Abstract
- Neural processes beat rational thinking.
- Consciousness a byproduct of brain functions? Or even so a waste product?
- Hints for imperfect minds?
- Tractable and intractable computations human individuals are faced with.
- Unconscious knows better ... Indulge yourself.
- Neurons have built-in solving power, churning out solutions fast. Better keep consciousness away.
- Chaos in my mind. Channels tapped
- The brain, as a quantum computer?
- Human individual, a quantum mechanical entity?
- Would the mind know but would not tell?
- Is thinking an automatic process?
- Unconscious knows better ... Indulge yourself.
- You are stupid, he is stupid, she is stupid, they are stupid ... I am stupid ... We are all stupid!!!
- The human mind is an invaluable asset to be wasted by the monetising societies


What is that? There is a wealth of knowledge out there and bit by bit is dug out. At least from my personal perspective as pioneering individuals did and do the digging in the first place.

The title 'From simple associations to systematic reasoning: A connectionist encoding of rules, variables, and dynamic bindings using temporal synchrony' impressed me, though having only the abstract limits my exposure. Hoomf, I spoke to soon, I got the pdf.


The authors Lokendra Shastri and Venkat Ajjanagadde, published this paper in 1993, in the 'Behavioral & Brain Sciences' journal, Volume 16 Issue (03). Their objective coming out in the following extract from the abstract. of the paper,

"We show how a connectionist network can encode millions of facts and rules involving n-ary predicates and variables, and perform a class of inferences in a few hundred msec."

Their 'connectionist network' handles millions of data, data that, as I could gather, are not simple ones or twos but a lot more complex, facts and rules. Without the need to refer to the n-ary predicates and variables, in order to grasp the complexity of the data and the enormity of the task, and despite all that, it performs inferences in a few hundredths of a msec.

Their network is outstanding just for its own sake, but the main reason, I focus on that, is because their 'connectionist network', is put forth, in order to simulate or emulate, (whatever), our brain. The human mind. Everyone's mind.

As they admit

"Human agents draw a variety of inferences effortlessly, spontaneously, and with remarkable efficiency -"

effortless, spontaneous, efficient hallmarks and

" — as though these inferences are a reflex response of their cognitive apparatus."

Reflex responses? No need to consciously think, to produce these inferences, without being accompanied by a feeling of ownership, that we are the owners of these responses. Which thereafter, puts into perspective the function of our consciousness, its role being to assure us that a tree is a tree and not something else. Only a pat in the shoulder.

Whereas the hard task of dealing with the harshness of life, the intractable computations we face in our daily lives, is left upon an underlying level of consciousness, be called unconscious or subconscious, or any other term someone feels comfortable with, as either of them have bundles of meanings with tarnished or distracting connotations. The main feature is that underlies our familiar, cherished consciousness, which certainly we are not aware of, when at work, or we were taught, indoctrinated, or learned not to be aware of, to ignore it. Myself, I let it do the work for me.

"Furthermore, these inferences are drawn with reference to a large body of background knowledge. This remarkable human ability seems paradoxical given the results about the complexity of reasoning reported by researchers in artificial intelligence."

A remarkable human ability but despite that, it seems paradoxical? Unreal?
The reason they are dumbfounded is because, as they state

"How can a system of simple and slow neuron-like elements represent a large body of systematic knowledge and perform a range of inferences with such speed?"

In other words, how can a system, (read: human individual), can be stupid and at the same time brilliant.