Mechanisms of Mental Relativity?
E/E <-> E*E
The above equation represents the distillation of our efforts in the past 13 years to solve the meaning of story and the function of the mind. It is the equation of Mental Relativity and is the essence of self-awareness.
All the variables are labeled "E" to express the holistic, homogenous nature of our perceived universe as a whole. Yet, each stands for a different word: a different kind of variable.
The initial E refers to Existence. The second E is Emptiness. The third E stands for Entropy. The fourth E is Extropy.
The equation reads: Existence divided by Emptiness is the equilibrium of Entropy times Extropy. Conceptually, this means that what defines the edges between existence and nothingness is the balance between the opposing forces of building down toward stability and building up toward complexity.
Jumping ahead, we can see that what we see as a process toward destruction or toward growth is actually the placement of the equilibrium point along a sliding scale between creation and destruction. Examples would be the tendency of a board to rot when the equilibrium point is closer to Entropy than Extropy. Yet a tree that grows has its equilibrium point closer to Extropy than Entropy.
Because of the fractal nature of the relationship of these variables, an item may be growing in one fractal dimension, even while it is disbanding in another. The human body is a point in case. We grow older and older and our bodies become more complex. Yet a point is reached in which that complexity becomes top heavy and can no longer be supported. The infrastructure crumbles and the body dies, succumbing to entropy which had been working in another fractal dimension. The line dividing life from death is drawn by the equilibrium between growing into complexity and falling apart.
We tend to see objects as either there or not there. We tend to see time as approaching some limit line that defines one state on one side and another on the other. In fact, objects are only perceived by taking a frame of reference and setting the limit at which the resolution of our perception discerns an edge. Binary states are only perceived by limiting the number of fractal dimensions so that the homogeneous nature of existence appears divided into moments.
In fact, we see an object degrade over time, or grow, but so slowly to our senses that we discount the temporal fractal as if it were not involved at all. We therefore see a desk or a tree and imagine that it has an existence outside ourselves.
In fact, there was a time when the desk did not yet exist and when the tree had not grown, and there will again. By ignoring the analog nature of existence, we form edges that truly are not, yet serve in a practical sense within the limits of our life span.
When we perceive a human as alive at one moment and dead the next, we mask over the degree of life that they existed in which varied over the years and see them as wholly alive on one side and wholly dead on the other. But when we take into account waking and sleeping, being groggy from medication or unconscious from an accident, the line between life and death becomes blurred or analog.
Is this to say then, that there are no true dividing lines, no edges, no stability? Well, of course, that depends on the frame of reference. When one selects a fractal dimension as the measuring stick, there quickly comes a point at which our mental perception fails to resolve the difference between one dimension and the next. This is our edge, and it is very real indeed.
It seems that we are hobbled by the limited complexity of our own minds into seeing roughly the same edges as our comrade human beings. Some see a bit more, some a bit less, but all that one sees is real to them, from where they stand.
This subjective reality is all that any of us can hope to be aware of. It is that great mystery of creation that there should be any separation at all, rather than a homogenous flux with currents and eddies that defines both processes and states, both mental and physical.
Newton once said that science was the greatest of all endeavors because it might someday answer why there is something rather than nothing. I suggest that this question will never be answered, and in fact is actually the wrong question. The real issue is: why is there something divided from nothing? I imagine this question is also unanswerable, but at least we now know that we will never answer the right question.
June 11, 1993
When we divide our appreciation of all that we perceive into the binary nature of E/E and the process nature of E*E, we actually create another binary pair between the two. Yet the influence they have on each other (causality in both directions) creates another analog pair. In this case, we might see the process of Entropy at work in our very perception of the equation. We take four items and group them into two. But Extropy is also functioning, since we then see another analog pair that did not exist in our original perception and this describes the process of creation.
Of course, grouping the two variables on each side of the equation into a single unit on each side is only one direction as well. We might just as well describe the relationship between E which is divided by E, creating a new process that then shifts the binary appreciation onto the two variables themselves. The similar effect could be employed on the right side of the equation.
Altogether, the point is, that when ever we see a pair, we project a relationship between them that determines a causality. And although one direction for that causality seems most comfortable, in truth, both directions work. So that the function of the human mind is to take pairs and make them fours by Extropy and to take fours and make them twos by Entropy.
From this point of view, binary pairs are what we are looking at, and analog pairs are where we are looking from. Of course, the opposite appreciation is just as true, yet the human mind seems biased to most comfortably employ the former. Problems arise when we try to use the same kind of appreciation for both sides of the equation (both pairs of variables). Suddenly we see objects in the universe and states of mind, but nothing gives or evolves. Or, we see an endlessly flexing universe in conjunction with a constantly altering mind set. These are the perspectives of chaos, and define the nature of awareness. However, it is the capacity to see one pair as objects and the other as interacting processes that defines self-awareness.
Obviously, the capacity to merge variables in one direction and to impose relationships in the other create an open ended vector of reorganization, which is the nature of the workings of the mind. Yet, a closed nature exists in tandem, for once one has either reduced or produced far enough, all the elements of consideration assume the same arrangement as their original position. In other words, the condition of the mind returns full circle to the beginning of a cycle imposed by the number of dimensions we can perceive. The cycle continuously repeats, always touching base with the intrinsic infrastructure of its order, yet endlessly spiraling through one fractal dimension to the next. It is the differential between the values assigned to the variables in one fractal dimension compared to the values assigned in the next that is perceived as chaos since it has no apparent source nor explanation, being intrinsic to the foundation of perception itself. One cannot look at the point they are standing on at the same time they are standing on it.
Backword
Well, there you have it: the bulk of my musings about the meaning of life and the universe. There are still a few more tapes floating around that need to be transcribed, and a few more articles that need to be dropped in, but most of it is here, except for the math and structural models. I'll probably dabble in this area in the future as well, for it seems to keep invading my thoughts. At this time, however, I've more or less answered all the philosophical questions I was pondering to my personal satisfaction. So now, perhaps, like Chris, I can put this awful business behind me and get on with life.
The above equation represents the distillation of our efforts in the past 13 years to solve the meaning of story and the function of the mind. It is the equation of Mental Relativity and is the essence of self-awareness.
All the variables are labeled "E" to express the holistic, homogenous nature of our perceived universe as a whole. Yet, each stands for a different word: a different kind of variable.
The initial E refers to Existence. The second E is Emptiness. The third E stands for Entropy. The fourth E is Extropy.
The equation reads: Existence divided by Emptiness is the equilibrium of Entropy times Extropy. Conceptually, this means that what defines the edges between existence and nothingness is the balance between the opposing forces of building down toward stability and building up toward complexity.
Jumping ahead, we can see that what we see as a process toward destruction or toward growth is actually the placement of the equilibrium point along a sliding scale between creation and destruction. Examples would be the tendency of a board to rot when the equilibrium point is closer to Entropy than Extropy. Yet a tree that grows has its equilibrium point closer to Extropy than Entropy.
Because of the fractal nature of the relationship of these variables, an item may be growing in one fractal dimension, even while it is disbanding in another. The human body is a point in case. We grow older and older and our bodies become more complex. Yet a point is reached in which that complexity becomes top heavy and can no longer be supported. The infrastructure crumbles and the body dies, succumbing to entropy which had been working in another fractal dimension. The line dividing life from death is drawn by the equilibrium between growing into complexity and falling apart.
We tend to see objects as either there or not there. We tend to see time as approaching some limit line that defines one state on one side and another on the other. In fact, objects are only perceived by taking a frame of reference and setting the limit at which the resolution of our perception discerns an edge. Binary states are only perceived by limiting the number of fractal dimensions so that the homogeneous nature of existence appears divided into moments.
In fact, we see an object degrade over time, or grow, but so slowly to our senses that we discount the temporal fractal as if it were not involved at all. We therefore see a desk or a tree and imagine that it has an existence outside ourselves.
In fact, there was a time when the desk did not yet exist and when the tree had not grown, and there will again. By ignoring the analog nature of existence, we form edges that truly are not, yet serve in a practical sense within the limits of our life span.
When we perceive a human as alive at one moment and dead the next, we mask over the degree of life that they existed in which varied over the years and see them as wholly alive on one side and wholly dead on the other. But when we take into account waking and sleeping, being groggy from medication or unconscious from an accident, the line between life and death becomes blurred or analog.
Is this to say then, that there are no true dividing lines, no edges, no stability? Well, of course, that depends on the frame of reference. When one selects a fractal dimension as the measuring stick, there quickly comes a point at which our mental perception fails to resolve the difference between one dimension and the next. This is our edge, and it is very real indeed.
It seems that we are hobbled by the limited complexity of our own minds into seeing roughly the same edges as our comrade human beings. Some see a bit more, some a bit less, but all that one sees is real to them, from where they stand.
This subjective reality is all that any of us can hope to be aware of. It is that great mystery of creation that there should be any separation at all, rather than a homogenous flux with currents and eddies that defines both processes and states, both mental and physical.
Newton once said that science was the greatest of all endeavors because it might someday answer why there is something rather than nothing. I suggest that this question will never be answered, and in fact is actually the wrong question. The real issue is: why is there something divided from nothing? I imagine this question is also unanswerable, but at least we now know that we will never answer the right question.
June 11, 1993
When we divide our appreciation of all that we perceive into the binary nature of E/E and the process nature of E*E, we actually create another binary pair between the two. Yet the influence they have on each other (causality in both directions) creates another analog pair. In this case, we might see the process of Entropy at work in our very perception of the equation. We take four items and group them into two. But Extropy is also functioning, since we then see another analog pair that did not exist in our original perception and this describes the process of creation.
Of course, grouping the two variables on each side of the equation into a single unit on each side is only one direction as well. We might just as well describe the relationship between E which is divided by E, creating a new process that then shifts the binary appreciation onto the two variables themselves. The similar effect could be employed on the right side of the equation.
Altogether, the point is, that when ever we see a pair, we project a relationship between them that determines a causality. And although one direction for that causality seems most comfortable, in truth, both directions work. So that the function of the human mind is to take pairs and make them fours by Extropy and to take fours and make them twos by Entropy.
From this point of view, binary pairs are what we are looking at, and analog pairs are where we are looking from. Of course, the opposite appreciation is just as true, yet the human mind seems biased to most comfortably employ the former. Problems arise when we try to use the same kind of appreciation for both sides of the equation (both pairs of variables). Suddenly we see objects in the universe and states of mind, but nothing gives or evolves. Or, we see an endlessly flexing universe in conjunction with a constantly altering mind set. These are the perspectives of chaos, and define the nature of awareness. However, it is the capacity to see one pair as objects and the other as interacting processes that defines self-awareness.
Obviously, the capacity to merge variables in one direction and to impose relationships in the other create an open ended vector of reorganization, which is the nature of the workings of the mind. Yet, a closed nature exists in tandem, for once one has either reduced or produced far enough, all the elements of consideration assume the same arrangement as their original position. In other words, the condition of the mind returns full circle to the beginning of a cycle imposed by the number of dimensions we can perceive. The cycle continuously repeats, always touching base with the intrinsic infrastructure of its order, yet endlessly spiraling through one fractal dimension to the next. It is the differential between the values assigned to the variables in one fractal dimension compared to the values assigned in the next that is perceived as chaos since it has no apparent source nor explanation, being intrinsic to the foundation of perception itself. One cannot look at the point they are standing on at the same time they are standing on it.
Backword
Well, there you have it: the bulk of my musings about the meaning of life and the universe. There are still a few more tapes floating around that need to be transcribed, and a few more articles that need to be dropped in, but most of it is here, except for the math and structural models. I'll probably dabble in this area in the future as well, for it seems to keep invading my thoughts. At this time, however, I've more or less answered all the philosophical questions I was pondering to my personal satisfaction. So now, perhaps, like Chris, I can put this awful business behind me and get on with life.
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