Scientific Basis - The Science of MERLIN
{An Interactive Exploration of the Other Half of the Universe through Pattern, Information, Intelligence and Consciousness - V1.1 Copyright 2005}
A CURRICULUM FOR THE 21st CENTURY
AN INTERACTIVE EXPLORATION OF THE OTHER HALF OF THE UNIVERSE THROUGH PATTERN,
INFORMATION, INTELLIGENCE, CONSCIOUSNESS
By - GEORGE
HART
VERSION 1.1
COPYRIGHT
2005
NUMBER - OBJECTIVITY - EXPERIMENT -
CONTROL - PATTERN - RELATIONSHIP - INTERACTION - PARTICIPATION
A curriculum for the 21st century? An interactive
exploration of the other half of the universe through pattern, information,
intelligence, and consciousness?
What is this concept? Simply that there are many elements of present-day
science, commerce and beyond which could be pulled into a single comprehensible
perspective that is currently lacking. We in general, and students in
particular, have arrived at a point where it is literally confusing to try to
reach an understanding of all the simultaneously burgeoning fields of knowledge.
Terminal compartmentalization and specialization is a capitulation to the
frustrating futility of trying to integrate it all into a central vision. For
centuries The Church in the west provided such a vision. Subsequently science,
and especially physics, provided that perspective. Now these former frameworks
seem no more than shattered shards and no structure has arisen to replace them.
Paradoxically that structure has in fact fully developed, but in keeping with
one aspect of its nature it is largely invisible.
Like fish in the ocean that have no way of seeing the water which constantly
surrounds them, astoundingly little academic awareness is directed to the sea of
pattern and information which constitutes the ocean of existence we move
through. This is a particularly rich moment when a radical increase in the
understanding of what is essentially "going on" in the existence around us and
how we experience it, can be triggered by pointing out an integrating
perspective which is at once obvious but as yet largely unseen. We stand as a
saturated solution ready to instantly crystallize once a seed is provided.
That perspective, that realization, is sorely needed if education is to be
experienced as anything more than an overwhelming barrage of loosely connected
and ever expanding topic areas which simply no longer fit in the years available
for schooling. A new approach is possible which would restore the renaissance
sense of a comprehensible universe encompassed by a basic set of first
principles from which all else flows. It would at the same time remove the
artificial barrier which prevents science as we know it from moving into new
areas of knowledge which it has hitherto branded as heresy, simply because it
lacked the fundamental conceptual tools needed to think about those. Too many
people, and too many highly intelligent people, have had incontrovertible
experiences in the realm of the transpersonal to accept science's condemnation
of it all as fraud and delusion. For those who have experienced phenomena in
that realm, all science's charge does is to highlight the inadequacy of science
as currently constituted. We can no longer live in the world of Newton's falling
apple. We never could. There was always far more happening here than mere
mechanics. But now the limitations of that paradigm are becoming impossibly
constraining, and they no longer speak to the essence of our experience of the
ordinary, let alone the extraordinary.
In our own lifetimes we have moved from a world of mechanics to one of
information, in ways large and small. The vending machines of our youth were
monuments to mass and momentum where coins would be identified, change made, and
products dispensed on the basis of Newtonian principles. Today (thanks to
inflation-both financial and intellectual) what is identified is often paper
money, recognized on the basis of pattern using optics and microprocessors. And
often the "product" is a duplication or reworking of information as in a Xerox
photocopier or the compilation of a selection of songs from an optical disk onto
a cassette tape. Things have really shifted, the viewpoint informing our
educational approach has not.
Before presenting a schematic of a proposed curriculum I would like to take you
on a brief overflight of the vast territory which can clearly be regarded as
aspects of the new science of information. Some of this we have discussed
before. But I think it is useful to take this tour through the territory, for I
suspect that on the journey the same pattern which has become so clear to me
will spontaneously emerge for you with little didactic prompting on my part.
Perhaps the most telling place to start is in recreation. Whatever has permeated
thoroughly to that level has embedded itself deeply in our reality. It will also
suggest how broadly defined "information" has become.
In a sense other than which Marshall McLuhan originally intended, the medium
often contains an implicit message in its very form—especially when that form
changes. This has occurred in several recreational areas where the technique of
information storage has undergone a radical change-breaking free of a storage
mode that echoed the reality originally being captured, and substituting one
that overtly delivers the message that we're dealing with pure information
here—and anything is possible. As long as movies consisted of little sequential
images, and records had a vibrational structure engraved in their surface the
time play of information which was occurring was camouflaged.
But with the advent of first the VCR and the CD player and now DVD’s and iPods
the last tethers to unprocessed reality were broken, and the true nature of what
was occurring was revealed. It was as large a step as our first step on the
moon, and it was probably no coincidence that they were essentially synchronous
in the timetable of history. For historical bounds were loosed in both
instances. As one of the Apollo astronauts phrased it so well, the curve of
evolution was bent and there is an important implicit message in the fact that
the primary, in fact almost the sole, use of space has been for information
gathering or transmission using satellites.
In the shift from the tracking of the material stylus to the immaterial probing
of the green laser light of the CD player devouring bits at incomprehensible
rates a discontinuity of monumental proportions entered the flow of history. And
in the same way video-recording made images and time itself far more plastic
than had ever been imagined possible. At a superficial level to be sure, but a
noteworthy level nonetheless, the earlier popular debate about the relative
merits of BETA vs. VHS VCR recording, and the more recent ones about PCs vs.
Macs, signaled a cognizance of and a comfort with a new world of information.
This common sophistication about information storage, retrieval, and processing
is a breathtaking benchmark of what the true changes in this century have been
about.
Still within the recreational playground the seeming infinity of programming
available on cable TV and the insatiable appetite for news programs of every
sort speak to another aspect of this information revolution. As does the linking
up of more and more homes to fiber optic pathways capable of delivering
mind-numbering data rates. The "construction" of the information equivalent of
the interstate highway system, an ultra-high capacity fiber optic network
throughout the whole country for data transmission rapidly became an inevitable
necessity.
When “Grand Theft Auto” becomes the favorite past time of Homo Ludens, and
ever-growing computer firepower and programmer brainpower is directed at
accelerating the complexity, sophistication, and verisimilitude of this "game",
we have entered a "new age." And some of these "games" such as the game of
"Life" serve as direct entryways to frontier thinking using such cellular
automata in fields as diverse as cosmology and molecular biology. A similar
direct connection between play and cutting edge research exists in the area of
personal computing. But even in their more mundane applications such as word
processing, budgeting, and record keeping, home computers represent an immersion
in information which was largely regarded as highly improbable thirty years ago.
I well remember arguing that what is now obvious was then inevitable, and being
greeted with skepticism at best and more often scorn.
A final facet of the "recreational" aspects of this ocean of information
suggests what an infinity that sea may represent The present state of
"Artificial Reality" where computer controlled visual, audio, and tactile input
create convincing artificial worlds only can hint at what may be ahead of
us—particularly when that is somehow cast as a collective experience.
Turning to the arena of commerce the impact of the science of information is all
pervasive. Computing has rapidly exponentiated into supercomputers on the high
end with hypercomputers in development. In a truly exponential, and possibly
super-exponential, process computers are designing computers from microcircuitry
to overall architectures in a rocketing process of capability enhancement which
is positive feedback at its wildest. At the same time the power available on a
desktop dwarfs the common mainframes of two decades ago and far surpasses the
power of early Cray supercomputers. We have arrived at the point where computers
are expanding off into so many directions in a super-nova-like burst that the
term "computer" itself has passed into a kind of quaint generic obsolescence,
much as has occurred with the term "vehicle."
For now radically different types of "computers" have appeared. Noteworthy are
"neural nets" which rather than being digital processors, actually mimic the
structure and function of the human mind. These devices can truly be said to
learn how to associate selected input patterns with desired output patterns.
Many curiosities and mysteries of human thinking are mirrored in these devices,
such as the phenomena of "confusion" which occurs when more than about 10% of
the theoretical capacity of the memory is used. Also reminiscent of human
behavior is the fact that certain "pedagogies" are far more effective than
others, and in all of them repetition is the key to learning. This is no longer
the stuff of science fiction, it is current technology. One which 19th century
chemistry, physics, and mathematics is an ineffective and irrelevant way of
approaching. It is already being used in financial analysis and airport bomb
detection to mention but two very "real world" applications.
"Computers" using "fuzzy logic" realistically representing the world of grays,
rather than black and white (or the binary choice of only on and off), are now
in ascendancy, especially in Japan. Once again, information and its
representation, is taking a giant quantum leap forward.
So much so that the world of "traditional" artificial intelligence seems
pedestrian and ancient in contrast. But this is not to downplay the large and
growing role of such expert systems in fields such as airline route planning and
seat pricing, or academic semester scheduling.
Computation and communication have more and more coalesced into one integral
package highlighting the underlying essence of information that is involved.
“Voice Over Internet Protocol” (VoIP) says it all. Voice mail, PBX switchboards,
and fax machines speak to the incessant demand for more communication at higher
speeds. In a non-electronic sense the explosive growth of Federal Express speaks
to the same phenomenon, the same craving, and the same need for the
aforementioned information equivalent of the interstate highway system. At the
same time much of what a computer does is focused on the transfer of data from
one point to another within the same machine, an esoteric but critical
communication problem. For it is the speed of light, the data transfer limit,
which establishes the ceiling computers are currently constrained by. All wiring
in computers is kept as short as possible, for data can only move a foot a
nanosecond, and for a computer a nanosecond can be a frustrating wait.
A variant approach to supercomputing, connected computers (in the same building
or over the internet) linking together tens of thousands of independent
processors, leads to hypercomputing. And the key to this next step is the
hyperspace manner in which a communication network is established between these
processors, and the fashion in which data flow between them is managed Again a
communication problem at the core of "computation."
In the daily life of commerce, computer networking in a more traditional sense
has leapt to the forefront, linking together minicomputers and desktops in a way
that has doomed most mainframes to the fate of the dinosaurs. At the same time
it has cut down the time needed to access information required by managers or
employees from days to seconds in many cases.
Twenty years ago 300 baud was the standard. Now on DSL and cable modems hundreds
of megabits per second enter the home.
Which is just in time. Because the tidal wave of information which the average
computer user, never mind executive, lawyer, or researcher must swim through
daily has given rise to the need to store electronic images of all the documents
such an individual must constantly have at his fingertips, including the
graphics which may be enclosed in those documents. At this point the storage,
data retrieval, and data transmission requirements become astronomical. Much
current software development is addressing these issues. Intense effort is
directed towards data retrieval and data association, whether it be through
hypertexts or some far more sophisticated inferential technique. The necessity
for such search capability in this sea of information has made Google a
household name., both a noun and a verb
The highly advanced data compression methods used in making maximum use of
satellite capacity, or in transmitting images from the far reaches of the solar
system where absolute baud rates are limited by electric power constraints, have
played an essential role in making the possibility of intelligently capturing
thousands of documents at all feasible. Such data compression techniques delve
deeply into the essence of information, squeezing out all redundancy and
repetition, leaving an irreducible core to which the original message can be
compressed. This is an incredibly conscious way of relating to information. At
the same time it is commonly used in the information infrastructure of the
current world. One application is to use it to maximize the utility of a
personal computer's hard disk by automatically scrunching down everything that
is ever stored on it, and automatically re-expanding that information whenever
it is accessed. This intimate involvement with information is common knowledge
among the technically literate, and incomprehensible to those outside. And is
representative of the kind of current reality education, in its revised form,
absolutely has to address.
All of this imaging of documents implies an ever growing capability in computer
graphics. Here every two years signals the advent of a new graphics standard
boasting higher resolution, more colors, and faster screen drawing speeds.
Computer aided design/computer aided manufacturer (CAD/CAM) with its associated
computational/graphical "workstations" have pushed the edge of the envelope in
this area. But the standard issue desktop computer has been quick to follow.
As great a burst of technological progress as all of this represents it is still
only the first step across the threshold. Word processing, now ubiquitous, is
the first hint of how well information processing can meet a long standing need,
how well it can address the way that people would really like to do something,
and how radical a change in how things are done all of this can add up to.
Word processing is a tremendous technological tool which easily accommodates the
non¬linear collage style of writing which for many people is the most
comfortable and productive way to proceed. It reduces the threshold of pain for
subsequent revisions to near zero, thereby producing far more coherent and
polished final drafts. But it is only the first step.
Armies of writers who for many reasons prefer to put down their thoughts with
pen or pencil on paper await automatic hand-written text readers which could
quickly, accurately and cheaply convert hand-written drafts into a computer
file.
And those who favor dictation still await the advent of a reliable and
economical voice-recognition system with a wide vocabulary and the ability to
decipher natural speech spoken at a normal rate. Scansoft Dragon Naturally
Speaking and IBM Via Voice are big steps in the right direction, but much more
needs to be done
These first two items are high on the want lists of many professionals. Moving a
bit further down the list and out in time would be systems which could monitor
news lines or journals as they are published and effectively respond to one or
both of the following requests: Read this article and only tell me what is new
in it, not the background information I already know; or Read this article and
tell me what, if anything, it contains that I need to know. Either
request presumes a challenging grasp of what the requester knows already, or
needs to know.
This knowledge base would certainly not be simple to construct, but the payoff
would be enormous. In the face of endless information inundation, such as
approach will be absolutely necessary. In fact it already is.
This raises the key point that up to now the information/computer age has
principally emphasized the ever increasing capability to generate overwhelming
amounts of information. Future capability will have to be focused on the task of
intelligently filtering through this monumental mound of data and text.
Initially this can take the form of database queries in search of specific
information.
This type of service is already currently provided in many forms. At a
rudimentary level search engines such as Google permit the user to search vast
the full extent of the internet using several keywords linked together with
"and/or" constructs from Boolean logic. Such an approach is powerful in its
scope and ability to focus on a sub-subtopic. It has the drawback that sometimes
the really right reference would be in a graduate level text beyond the reach of
Google at present (but Google is rapidly expanding its reach to all the world’s
literature and video sources).. A second problem is that sometimes a subtle
misphrasing of a keyword or phrase will misdirect the search process to
unfertile areas.
The ideal answer here would be access to a skilled pilot adept at sorting out
such subtleties and able to expertly traverse the terrain of large databases. As
an indication of how far along this evolution of the science and commerce of
"Information" has proceeded, such services already exist in various specialized
areas such as the law, engineering and medicine. And they take the logical next
step, backing up the skilled database pilots with large networks of human
experts on call to address queries not easily answered from a database. These
human experts are able to point out the reference text worth looking into, or
the engineer in the field who has the needed information at his fingertips. A
whole second set of information pilots stand ready to put the caller in touch
with the right expert using a specialized database which has been constructed to
sort out which expert is appropriate or a given query. Technical services of
this type have between 4000 and 5000 experts on tap. It reflects how far, how
fast, the market for this filtering role has grown. But as valuable as such
current services are, only the future will provide an effective way of
automatically extracting the needed new information from the intimidating stack
of incoming memos and articles, not to mention the ever-growing queue of
electronic mail, that greets all professionals and most home computer users each
morning.
In light of all these aspects of the current information universe which
surrounds us, it seems remarkable that no systematic restructuring of a
scientific curriculum has been initiated to adapt to this shift away from the
billiard ball and test tube world of Newton and Lavoisier. For it is in science
that the threads of this new information reality are omnipresent, and seem to
naturally suggest a new integrating perspective that ought to lie at the core of
all that is taught. It would be instructive to look at three areas of
traditional science from this new integrating perspective: molecular biology,
self-referential systems, and physics/chemistry.
It is in the burgeoning field of molecular biology that the singular importance
of the new science of information be most deeply felt.
For out of molecular biology comes the realization that life itself, in the
scientific sense of the word, is in fact a process of information transmission,
variation, elaboration and replication. A dance of pattern that is much less
chemistry and much more code. But a code that takes on the form of an elaborate
living architecture-capable of duplicating itself. From the sub-microscopic
viewpoint used in the stunning IMAX film "We Are Born of Stars" genes as
structures combine the towering power of our tallest skyscrapers with the
dazzling intricacy of the most detailed Islamic architectural designs. All of it
meaning something. In a situation where we are both the messenger and the
message. Momentary carriers of a communication that races forward in time
becoming ever more complicated along the way. In fact becoming complex enough so
that the message becomes aware of itself and how it is coded and transmitted.
Complex enough to start actively modifying itself towards ever increasing
complexity. Perhaps eventually to a point of complexity capable of answering "To
what end"—"From what beginning." For now the complexity is advanced enough to
recognize other similar processes occurring in the universe. And to even set a
few of its own in motion whether they be computers playing the game of "Life" as
software, or software designing software, or computers designing subsequent
generations of computers.
Looking into a new perception/understanding of the process of life itself ought
to call attention to the revolution in science which has characterized the late
20th century. And although this directly involves biology and chemistry in its
material aspects, what is actually going on is an exercise in bare information.
Information operating on itself. Non-linear information. This is a radically new
twist in the history of science, and of thought. The curve of evolution has been
bent Sharply. And all of this has occurred in a remarkably short amount of time.
Many of the key early players such as James Watson of Watson and Crick fame are
still very much alive and active in the field. And yet some forty odd years
later the advances have been staggering. With the human genome project we
constructed a transcription of the complete book of life from chemical to
computer notation. Translation has followed. Already key sentences, paragraphs,
and chapters have been deciphered. Even with the relative rudimentary
information and manipulative techniques we have in hand, genetic engineering has
made significant advances.
A sense of the processes at work here has filtered down into part of the common
language where we speak of computer viruses, understanding to some extent their
role as informational interlopers fouling up messages. And recognizing that some
parallel process occurs within our very cells each time we get a common cold,
known to be virus caused. Where these not quite living snippets of genetic
information like crafty pirates infiltrate our defenses, finding a home for
themselves where they propagate, often taxing the whole system in the process.
The eerie synchronicity of the overnight growth in our understanding of the
subtle informational games that viruses play and the near simultaneous advent of
the AIDS virus as a threat to man is a disquieting coincidence. Deadly disease
is disturbing enough. But one that has the feel of espionage where messages are
altered slightly to lethal effect is disorienting. It would be like opening the
New Testament and finding each occurrence of the name "Jesus" replaced by that
of "Satan." Only a proportionally miniscule number of words would have to be
changed. The results would be monstrous. An assault by bacteria or parasites,
even though fatal, feels far less horrifying than the internal revolution
triggered by AIDS, or its terrifying cousin in genetic mayhem, cancer.
But stepping back from those dark valleys we've come to understand but not
control, it's extremely noteworthy that we live in a time where an informational
process so intimately involved in life and death issues is seen to have
computational analogs, the much-publicized computer viruses. This speaks to a
truly advanced involvement in and appreciation of the universe of information.
One which should be captured in a curriculum.
Turning to self-referential systems in mathematics and physics the same deep
involvement can be seen. And the same lack of a coherent curriculum. There has
been an enormous amount of public press concerning non-linear dynamics, fractals
and chaos, including a best selling book by James Gleick. Each of these topics
involves self-referential or self-interacting systems in a reflexive universe.
Once things can start interacting with themselves, feeding back into themselves,
the process changes, immensely. The linear world of Newton is a well-behaved
dream. Once the possibility of non-linear self-interaction or non-linear
interaction with other entities (where the sum is more (or less) than the sum of
the independent parts) is introduced a computational nightmare can easily erupt.
It was not sheer stupidity that prompted early physicists and mathematicians to
adopt linear tunnel vision by putting on blinders. Without computers problems
could become mathematically intractable almost instantly. Each solution to a
non-linear problem would be unrelated to others starting with near identical
initial conditions. Once computers became ubiquitous it was inevitable that the
blinders would eventually come off. There are two things to note here. The first
is chaos theory itself. And the role that these offspring of our intelligence,
computers, played in rocketing the sophistication of our view of the universe
ahead. Intelligence acting on intelligence, providing it with the tools it needs
for a major bootstrapping upwards. Information acting on information. And it's
important to remember that we're only a decade or two into a new era where the
acceleration of this kind of strong positive feedback can be felt. In comparison
all previous science was conducted linearly. Built on previous information to be
sure, and to that extent mildly non-linear. But what we're now experiencing is
wildly non-linear. And there is a critical need not only to educate students in
the individual tools of the accelerating domain, but to provide an overview of
the process itself. What is happening here? Where is it going? And how fast is
it getting there?
There are myriad aspects of chaos theory that could be highlighted at length
here. For example how a mathematical understanding of the way in which a subtle
change in one part of a system can produce a major effect on other part at a
later time (the “Butterfly Effect”). And how this reshapes our view of the
interconnectedness of the world, and perhaps universe, in a much more
quantitative and substantial way. Not undercutting the tenets of mysticism, but
instead speaking to the same insights in an entirely different language, and
thereby reinforcing them.
Our attention could be directed to the role of sequential or iterative behavior
in chaos theory in which wildly intricate patterns can be generated, not random,
yet never exactly repeating. This stands in stark contrast to the geometrical
simplicity and "purity" of nature as described by Pythagoras, Newton, Kepler or
even Einstein. This is an essential point here concerning a qualitatively
different role of time in natural systems that Gregory Bateson regarded as
critical in attempting to understand mind and nature.
Rather than continuing with a lengthy litany of such implications of chaos
theory, a few final examples should drive home the relation of all of this to
the key issues of pattern information, intelligence, and consciousness.
One of the key philosophical, artistic, and scientific questions that traces its
origins back to Pythagoras and beyond, is that of the role of order versus chaos
in the universe. Chance vs. necessity. Randomness vs. predestination. And
whether we can even tell the difference. Coincidence, especially those eerily
impossible and meaningful coincidences that are elevated to the status of
“synchronicities”, whisper or scream in our mind that "life is more than it
seems" on the surface, or according to science. As Jung so aptly and precisely
described it—"an acausal connecting principle" clearly exists in our universe
operating at variance with the "rules" of ordinary science. This presents a
direct challenge to our power to discriminate between the random and the
ordered.
This point is dramatically driven home by an example that is far from
"synchronistic" or mystical. If presented with the number series 3.14159... most
individuals with a high school education would immediately recognize this as the
leading digits of pi. But if instead the number series
...74215630982736046129...were given, the natural response would be to say that
the numbers look entirely random. This assumption would gain credibility if it
were pointed out that for the next 1000 entries in the series each of the ten
digits 0 through 9 appeared equally often. It really appears to be thoroughly
random. And there is not a test that could be applied to show otherwise. But it
isn't. It's the 100 to 120 digits in the full expansion of pi. And it's entirely
deterministic. A simple rule can be given for calculating the digits. But it
can't be deduced from examining the digits themselves. If the digits presented
had been ...33333333333333333333... many people would correctly guess that it
was part of the decimal expansion of the fraction 1/3. Those sequences such as
that for 1/3 which we can easily recognize are but a tiny fraction of the
infinity of absolutely deterministic decimal expansions. Most look absolutely
random. Unless you know they are not. Randomness and Order. How do you tell the
difference? You don't. You can't. Unless at a meta-level you "know what is going
on."
This "knowing what is going on" is the essential core of the curriculum for the
21st century. It encompasses an interlocking hierarchy of pattern, information,
intelligence, consciousness. There is a causative flow in both directions. Once
that flow is understood the key role of pattern interacting with pattern becomes
clear, as does the primacy of relationships rather than objects as the basic
entities in terms of which this universe can be perceived and understood.
Consider the number 314159. To make clear the necessary context that information
provides for pattern, intelligence for information, and consciousness for
intelligence, express the number in binary form. This is done simply to avoid
the confusion which could ensue about the numbers if written as arabic numerals,
which many might argue are inherently patterns. On retrospect it would be seen
as unnecessary. But probably only in retrospect. In binary thus 314159 becomes
1001100101100101111. This could be envisioned as the on and off flickering of a
light bulk where "1" would be on for one second or "0" off for one second. This
would appear pretty random. As it would if it occurred as static bursts of sound
on the radio. The point may be clearer if this is written as - -- - -- - ----.
It literally doesn't look like much. Yet we know there is a pattern there
because (and this is critical)-because we know that it is information. Pi: There
is a fixed relationship between the elements. That makes it a pattern. In this
case there is a hidden context that makes each position a marker for a different
value, all of which are then added together. This may seem a highly stylized and
intricate context But all perception imposes a context, even if it is as simple
as vertical versus horizontal.
"Pi" was the context of information which converted a phenomenon which at first
seemed random into a pattern. But without the context of intelligence there is
no information. All of the "calculations" within a computer are only patterns of
electronic activity interacting with other patterns of electronic activity in a
wondrously choreographed dance. There is no information if there is no
intelligence to interpret the pattern as information, as a representation of
something else.
Information is the representation of one phenomenon in terms of something else.
Information is a relationship. When we take the temperature we convert a
phenomenon into a number on a device, the position of a needle on a dial, or the
length of a tube of mercury or alcohol. Pi as a number is a representation of
the ratio of the circumference of a circle to the diameter. It is neither. As a
representation it is in a relationship. In this particular example it describes
the relationship between two things. A relationship that was deemed important
enough to make the number associated with it quite famous.
Stepping back for a moment and zooming in on the computer example it turns out
that from another perspective there is perhaps a sub-hierarchy of five or six
levels of information at play here, only the highest one of which we could
ordinarily relate to as "information" as has just been discussed. The other sub
levels warrant mention.
The data a computer program may be processing is a special type of pattern where
"information" as we usually use the term has been encoded as a series of on and
off electronic, magnetic, or optical states in such a way as it can be acted on,
processed, or serve to direct the flow of processing. At the next higher level
there is the computer program, encoded in the same way, but serving a markedly
different role, one that is far more "active." These patterns describe the
intended flow of action. And the very description is encoded in such a way as to
execute those actions when placed in the right electronic context. Lending new
meaning to the concept of Logos, "and the word was made flesh." The third level
in this hierarchy are the operating system instructions which at a meta level
maintain the flow of the environment and when called upon, cede partial control
to individual programs. Maintaining the "void" as it were. At the fourth level
of information there is the architecture of the circuitry itself, the Byzantine
geometry of very large scale integration where races of three dimensional space
against time are conducted, choreographed to a fraction of a billionth of a
second in exquisite precision. In an almost entirely different universe of
"information", at the fifth level there is the applied voltage driving all of
this. A simple matter of on or off. Used everywhere. Brute strength. But its own
kind of information. A difference that makes a difference. One very important
definition of information due to Gregory Bateson. Another difference that makes
a difference is the "here and not there" of the conductors and insulators.
All of this could be calculating the digits of Pi beyond measure through
eternity. And
yet if there were no intelligence that knew of the existence of Pi, no
intelligence that knew that this was what the computer was producing as output,
these five levels of "information" beneath the sixth level with its context of
intelligence somehow seem "mindless" and hollow. And yet human life is such a
"mindless" information processing system that somehow, miraculously, developed
to the point of providing its own sixth level (and may be on the verge of a
seventh).
As critical as intelligence is for the complete actualization or very existence
of information in the full sense of the word, intelligence alone is not enough.
Although intelligence provides context for, and in doing so provides meaning to,
information, it does not provide direction. It does not provide motivation.
Information is what is seen. Pattern is how it is represented. Intelligence
provides illumination to what is seen like a spotlight But it is consciousness
that directs the play of the spotlight. The endless interplay of one piece of
information after another and with another. Provides the context for and gives
meaning to intelligence.
The four stages in this hierarchy of pattern, information, intelligence and
consciousness, and the way each provides context for and meaning to the level
immediately below, evocatively suggests levels higher still which we can
occasionally glimpse glimmerings of, and perhaps with directed practice can
perceive more directly.
As long as science fixates on number, objectivity, and control rather than
turning its attention to pattern, context and relationship, this four-fold
hierarchy will remain largely hidden, and we will lack the very vocabulary and
elementary concepts to perceive and explore the other half of the universe we
have been ignoring. We won't even have an adequate grasp of the science and
mathematics we do use. Much of science and mathematics is taught and understood
in a state that closely approximates sleepwalking. It totally and understandably
confuses and alienates those not inclined towards science and math. More
devastatingly, those who do have a taste for these subjects often end up with no
grasp whatsoever on what they are doing and why they are doing it. This can
apply to truly understanding techniques or operations in mathematics. Or in
comprehending how a description of the essence of the structure of a physical
system implicitly leads directly to the behavior it will exhibit and the
equations that will describe it. To many students and professionals physics is
either a subset of magic, or a trip through a conceptual jungle armed only with
a pen knife and a faulty flashlight. The essential patterns and relationships do
not become clear. Nor the fact that a very human trial and error iterative
mathematical approach can serve far more effectively in many cases than pure
error-free deductive reasoning.
A second key concept arising from non-linear dynamics and chaos theory, is that
when the possibility opens up that the sum is more or less than the sum of the
parts, a revolutionary figure and ground reversal occurs, the interaction
between the parts may have a large impact on the net behavior of the parts, and
in fact may be the most noteworthy feature of the system. The parts as absolute
independent objects becomes more and more a secondary description of system
properties, and instead the primary description has to be in terms of
interactions between parts. The parts end up being described almost entirely in
terms of their relationships with the other parts. Interdependent relationships
that connect, participants who are almost entirely defined by those
relationships, rather than independent properties of isolated objects is really
a far more perceptive way to relate to much of reality. Almost everything is a
primarily phenomenon of dependent arising, a dance between two or more players
where the dance is all. Our identity and personality (or more accurately the
multiple identities and personalities we all possess) make far more sense from
this from this perspective. Lending new meaning to Sandra Bernhard's phrase of
"Without me, you're nothing". Everything exists in coexistence. Coexistence is
everything. The same applies to the hydrogen atom, or the proton. Going looking
for indivisible "atoms" is a futile exercise in the "object" world. Finding
choreographed dances of subatomic particles that never appear onstage alone is
an evocative discovery in the "relationship" world. This figure-ground reversal
takes some getting used to, but it is incredibly illuminating in areas as
diverse as physics and family therapy.
A third and final model of how reality can behave is also provided by non-linear
systems. The phenomenon of systems exhibiting gain and what occurs when that
gain rises to a point where it can overcome dissipative losses. Nuclear energy
gave language the phrase "critical mass". Electronics and lasers have
popularized the concepts of gain and feedback to a lesser extent Both speak to
the same point. A condition where a small input, or even internal fluctuation,
can be amplified to monumental proportions. There are usually some losses
inherent in any system. And if the gain is not able to overcome those losses no
dramatic change occurs. On the other hand if stored energy is available to be
converted to output at a rate that exceeds internal losses, amplification can
occur. If that amplified input signal is than fed back into the gain region (by
light bouncing back and forth between mirrors surrounding the gain region in a
laser, or loudspeakers feeding back into a microphone on stage and thus back
into the "gain region" of the amplifier) a tremendous final output can occur
limited only by the electrical energy being fed to the laser or public address
amplifiers. Sometimes the mirrors or loudspeakers blow out before this happens.
This basic behavior can be seen in the population explosion, in the spread of
epidemics such as AIDS, or more positively in the information explosion we are
experiencing. When ever more powerful computers design ever more powerful
computers a rapidly accelerating rate of growth in our thinking tools results.
Opening up the possibility of an intimately symbiotic relationship between
"mind" and "machine." As the AI of artificial intelligence becomes the IA of
intelligence augmentation or perhaps more evocatively in terms of feedback and
power, intelligence amplification, the sky and beyond becomes the limit. We may
be on the verge of inventing futures for ourselves beyond the imaginings of all
but a very few science fiction visionaries such as William Gibson. Space may not
be our next frontier. We may take a sharp right turn into unimagined frontiers
of our own making.
In a laser, or on a stage with a PA system, it takes a few round trips for the
signal to build up to the point where you first discover that a tremendous burst
of feedback is about to drown out everything else that is going on. In the
fifties computers were very isolated rarities. In the sixties they were about as
common as fire stations, and about as expensive. In the seventies they began to
proliferate and seriously undertake the process of self-design. Between 1980 and
1990, only ten years, we went from rudimentary Apple computers marginally
capable of word-processing to ubiquitous Macintoshes and IBM clones capable of
professional level desktop publishing and near-supercomputer number crunching
power. The graphics approached the ability to replicate reality in real time. It
is only in those ten years that we've started to get above threshold and the
phenomenon has attracted widespread attention. That is only the initial audible
whistle, the penetrating roar of full-throated feedback has yet to be heard. It
will be the roar of planet earth blasting off into cyberspace. We've gone
non-linear. Totally. Our planet, our lives, our minds will be radically
transformed. In the twinkling of an eye when measured from the perspective of
history. New meaning will be given to the phrase "Change Your Mind". More than
we can guess.
As has been discussed, deep familiarity with the four fold flow of pattern,
information, intelligence and consciousness can radically and revealingly
reorient our view of science, substituting an emphasis on pattern, context and
relationship for a fixation on number, objectivity and control.
There is a powerful perspective from which many of the assertions of physics and
chemistry can simply and comprehensibly be seen as symmetry statements. These
statements about symmetry can take the form of descriptions of behavior such as
"opposite charges attract" or "similar magnetic poles repel." Alternatively the
statements about symmetry can describe the geometrical arrangement of components
in a system, such as "an electron occupying the space surrounding a proton
serving as the nucleus of hydrogen atom." The mathematics of physics and
chemistry are simply the language used to describe in detail the implications of
the symmetry at the heart of the system description. Pattern has implications
for behavior. Physics explores the relationship between system pattern and
system behavior. It is a rich and precise language in one, two, three or many
dimensions.
Its simpler systems such as the hydrogen atom are perfectly symmetrical. The
patterns describing the probable position of the electron are cloud like
structures centered about the proton nucleus displaying varying degrees of
complexity, but all highly symmetric.
Sometimes the symmetric nature of the forces involved can become apparent to the
eye, as in the case of crystals. Here visible structure reflects the stable
balance of forces that are possible in symmetric patterns such as the triangle,
square, hexagon, cube, tetrahedron, etc. Pythagoras' regular solids find
expression at the atomic level. Dynamic symmetries become apparent in the
vibrating strings of a guitar, especially when the guitarist carefully
suppresses all motion at the center of a vibrating string causing the frequency
to double in pitch as the harmonic rings out
It is really critical, and rare, to understand how all this behavior directly
flows from the symmetry implicit in the description of a system, whether it is a
hydrogen atom or the solar system. The mathematics involved only serve to derive
explicit expressions describing this implicate order. It doesn't add anything on
that isn't already there. The kernel of implicit behavior folded into the very
geometry of position and the way the forces act (usually in a straight line
between bodies in a system - so-called "central forces") is unfolded into
equations which permit the system to be read as a text, and numerical quantities
related to the systems static or dynamic character to be calculated. It is
crucial to be able to read equations as a musical score - not an end in
themselves - black squiggles on white paper - but rather as a springboard to
being able to "hear" the "music" of the systems inherent pattern. And in that,
to be able to perceive the similarity between systems that at first glance seem
totally unrelated, but which in terms of their basic "music" reveal the same
essential pattern of interplay. As in the connection between light amplification
in a laser and screeching feedback from a loudspeaker onstage.
This shift in perspective to a pattern-based outlook can free us from the
tyranny of viewing science, and nature, in terms of number, objectivity,
experiment and control. That can be replaced by a perception of science and
nature in terms of pattern, relationship, interaction and participation.
This will not only lead to a clearer and deeper understanding of physics and
chemistry but also to a richer and fuller experience of nature and life.
Because physics, when limited to number and control and excluding pattern and
relationship, blocks us from having the eyes to see, the vocabulary to describe,
and the concepts to think about "the other half of the universe." The half that
includes experiences of coincidences, effective prayer, precognition, myth, deep
connectedness. It is no surprise that we see "... through a glass darkly" those
phenomena that we have no systematic way of thinking or talking about.
Blinded and tongue-tied defenders of this other half of the universe are at a
severe disadvantage. Especially when confronted by the dogmatic high priests of
the church of scientism, ever ready to conduct an inquisition laced with
ridicule and scorn. Not to mention the occasional fire-bombed career. Scientism
has become viciously paranoid with a defensive line of attack dogs ready to
destroy any threat to a thought system that has become ever more rigidly closed.
To give defenders of the Church of Science their due, there is a very necessary
filtering function which must be performed to weed out hare-brained concepts and
fraudulent schemes. The "dumbing" of America and its willingness to pay serious
attention to utter bunk can give rise to an understandable upwelling of contempt
among scientists concerned with validity. But a few showmen have turned
vigilante-like defense of the faith into a lucrative profession. James Randi,
Martin Gardner, and Carl Sagan come immediately to mind. Closed minds result
from saganism, which is an arrogant ignorance arising from a limited experience
of reality. The pompous sneer is its trademark. The brain police have become the
secret police. As AA points out "Condemnation without investigation is the worst
form of ignorance." And its cost to both science and life has become
intolerable.
But rather than leaping feet first into the realms of the paranormal, mysticism,
and the occult I would suggest an evolutionary approach. For I have an equal
lack of respect for much of the mystical outpourings that have flooded the
bookstores since the 1960's. Especially those which in a neo-reductionist
approach invoke quantum mechanics or chaos theory as an explanation for "action
at a distance" in some sort of justification for mystical phenomena. This really
feels like another attempt to explain the greater in terms of the lesser. As was
discussed in terms of the hierarchy of pattern, information, intelligence, and
consciousness, this may be a case of trying to explain the enabling context in
terms of the level below which it informs and gives meaning to. A real reversal
of causal flow. Beyond that, mysticism has an unhappy history of repeatedly
reaching for the most recently understood physical phenomenon as "The
Explanation". It began with "vibrations" in the early days of mechanics,
followed by "magnetism", "light", "electricity", "Bell's Theorem and
non-locality" or more recently chaos and string theory. There is something both
trendy and mindless in such attempts to acquire the substance of validity and a
futuristic flavor by appropriating the latest "hot" concept in science.
Attaching a Mercedes Benz "star" to the hood of a Kia yields a joke, not a
Mercedes Benz.
A more productive path would be to allow a way of perceiving and explaining
paranormal phenomena to evolve gradually out of a deeper and clearer
understanding of the patterns of normal phenomena and how they interact with
each other. In this way a more natural bridge can be constructed between the two
worlds we live in, rather than one hastily thrown together in a post hoc attempt
to provide justification for what we are already cloudily convinced exists.
This natural flow from physics to meta-physics would occur because the
metaphysical basis of ordinary science is elevated from the hidden status of
unconscious assumption. The central hierarchy of pattern, information,
intelligence, and consciousness directly raises the three central issues of
metaphysics: ontology (the science of being what is?); cosmology (the science of
the fundamental causes and processes in things - how did it get here and what is
it doing?); and epistemology (the science of the method and grounds of knowledge
especially with reference to its limits and validity - what do we know and how
do we know it? - how do we know what is?). It has been aptly noted that
asserting that one does not have a philosophical basis or metaphysical
perspective does not mean that one does not in fact have one, only that it is
most likely a poor one.
It is entirely possible (but not guaranteed) that a careful examination of the
four fold flow of pattern, information, intelligence and consciousness would
shed coherent light on several areas of strong current interest. This would
include parapsychology, especially in light of our now closer ties to the former
soviet republics where such phenomena have been researched extensively.
Many of the most commonly experienced phenomena have far more to do with pattern
and information than the falling apples of Sir Isaac Newton. Information "leaks"
in unexpected ways. Or in that mode where the universe is more like a pun than a
definition, bits of information, meaningless in themselves, take on startling
significance when spatially or temporally juxtaposed with each other. As if a
grand game of "catch" were going on in the universe with balls of information
and meaning being tossed back and forth, through space and time, with some
unseen acausal connecting principle synchronizing the flow of events.
Coincidences, precognition, clairvoyance, telepathy, archetypes all speak this
language. It is time we learned it. Thoroughly.
Reaching further out to a fuller appreciation of the role of time in dynamic
casual systems (as explored by Bateson), perhaps questions can be profitably
posed and answered concerning whether time itself has a varying character, and
as such can leave a fingerprint on processes begun at a certain instant. And can
that character of a moment of time be seen in the planetary patterns of the
night sky? From one perspective this seems absolutely ridiculous. But until the
role of consciousness in the universe is more systematically and solidly
understood, structures such as astrology have to remain open questions. For the
planetary display is a natural interface linking the here and now with the
infinite and the eternal. We have come to learn the myriad ways the rapid lunar
and solar clocks influence our affairs, often with surprisingly important
effects but through invisibly subtle pathways.
As outlandish as such a suggestion might seem, it is important to remember that
we are dealing with a universe that in us managed to achieve consciousness and
self-consciousness. We may be able to replicate that in our computational
clones, and even may be able to develop systems sophisticated enough so that
consciousness spontaneously arises rather than being explicitly programmed in.
But the amazing fact that "mere meat" was able to do this should not be
forgotten. It should stand as a reminder of the astounding surprises this
universe is capable of. The wonder of it all is actually difficult to grasp
experientially. But it is a realization worth cultivating and regularly
revisiting. The study of the four fold flow of pattern, information,
intelligence, and consciousness is a direct way of strengthening this useful
self-realization.
That same four fold study is a particularly apt way to approach the holographic
storage of information, whether it be in photographic plates, our minds, neural
nets, or the universe as a whole. The field of neural nets has much to teach us
concerning information representation, storage and interplay - especially that
of pattern with pattern. In neural nets a piece of information is stored in a
distributed way rather than being contained in one spot. Beyond that, it is
stored as the connection between related entities, rather than as the contents
of those isolated entities, which would have been another way of achieving
"distribution". A new paradigm of information reaches out to us here for greater
appreciation.
And we need all the insights we can gather into information as a central
phenomenon of human experience. We are in the process of being inundated in a
tidal wave of timely and relevant information. Richard Wurman's study on
"Information Anxiety" surveys the scope and growth of the inundation. We have a
desperate need to achieve some control of this flood. For information, like
technology before it, is taking on the characteristics of a living system (as
James Hougan terms if a "chreod") in some ways more Frankenstein than friend in
the stresses it imposes on our minds and time.
A better structural understanding of the phenomenon of information and its
relationship to intelligence and consciousness is clearly called for in this
regard. Otherwise our "solutions" will be ad hoc and insufficient. Perhaps in
opening up this new area of study some new inspired insights might come our way,
along with a better understanding of the process of inspired insights.
To raise the issue of "information management" is to indirectly touch on the
most critical "information management" problem of all in our time, education. If
we delivered milk to convenience stores the way we deliver information, concepts
and experience in education, the streets would be filled with dog carts pulling
five gallons apiece hither and yon with predictable results. A lot of sour milk.
Curricula need to be radically reshaped, not only to cover essential topics in a
comprehensive, exciting, interesting manner, but also to strip away the
tyrannical tendency of many departments to insist on teaching material in a
style that is true to the purist core of the discipline involved. Whether that
is impossibly rigorous, incomprehensibly abstract, or overwhelmingly
all-inclusive, the end result is the same. A job poorly done at exorbitant cost.
A cost we can no longer afford, whatever the motivation for this behavior.
Education has so far fended off the kind of revolutionary redefinition that has
occurred in many other retail service and sales industries, whether it is
television broadcasting, food delivery, gas stations or even medical care,
another bastion of conservatism and profit-margin maintenance. Education is the
last holdout. Understandably so because it depends on its clients performing a
stupendous act of sleepwalking. With 4-year education costs easily reaching the
$200,000 - $400,000 range, families are purchasing the equivalent of several
luxury cars or a fair fraction of a home with none of the "Consumers Reports"
information and meaningful comparison shopping that they lavish on buying a
camcorder. In part because they have little meaningful choice. The academy can
destroy any threat to its hegemony and monopoly with the lethal weapon of
withheld accreditation. Like a motel chain there are beds to be filled and
salaries to be paid.
The situation is way out of equilibrium. It will not hold. New technologies of
information delivery (cable, DVD’s, computer aided instruction, virtual reality
classrooms) will of necessity entirely reshape the process of education.
Teacher-student, and student-student interaction will still be essential. Rather
than being diminished, its role will be enhanced by giving to machines the
things machines can do in terms of education tasks. The traditional approach has
many virtues which some will still be willing to pay for as an extreme
luxury. But for many others for whom college education is becoming a cost-driven
impossibility, technology may come to the rescue.
The colleges and universities may along the way discover that they have grossly
underestimated the potential demand for low-cost access to DVD’s of lecture
series. These are now available, but at a premium price. In a time when
information and concepts largely define the world in which we exist, many adults
over 35 would welcome the chance to experience lecture series on topics of
interest for the sake of pure learning, not necessarily for credit. For many
adults now realize that not only youth, but also education is wasted on the
young—themselves when they were young. If commuting hassles could be avoided,
time flexibility achieved, and low viewing costs maintained through development
of a relatively mass market, tremendous benefits could result for everyone
involved, and for society as a whole.
© 2005 by George Hart, The MERLIN Project® Co-Founder All Rights Reserved
Research Resources
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Reference: A Curriculum for the 21st Century - Dr. George Hart (PDF) {An Interactive Exploration of the Other Half of the Universe through Pattern, Information, Intelligence and Consciousness - V1.1 Copyright 2005} |
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