Arguing revisited.

[Mole]

On this forum we don't exist alone. We exist when we interact with one another. Or as I am prone to say, the meaning of any post is its response. For if there is no response we are like the tree that falls in the forest, unseen.

However interactions expose us to risk. The risk of being misunderstood. The risk of being opposed. And the risk of being insulted.

And so we are driven by two mutually inhibitary impuses, quite like our heartbeat. The first impulse here is to be seen and the second is to hide.

And like everyday, garden variety geniuses we accomodate both impulses in arguing.

For arguing allows us to be in contact but at the same time arguing allows us to protect ourselves.

Normally such an activity driven by two conflicting impulses at the same time is called neurotic. And so arguing is simply a group neurosis.

And of course a neurosis is simply a reaching for integrity and wholeness.

So together we are reaching for integrity and wholeness that is just beyond our grasp.

 

[Octarine]

An interesting perspective. You could also suggest parallels with other aspects such as learning something new vs finding out what we thought was true, might not be true. Or on a more basic level, the risk of danger in acquiring food vs the risk of starvation.

But this is just our intellectual ruminations about it. Reality itself is not so dualistic, so I'm not sure if I agree with the implication of neurosis.

 

[Arclight]

A lack of response does not mean a lack of communication or interaction.
Seems my blog is read by quite few people who never actually post in it, is one example.

The rest of what you are saying, Vic.. Is quite interesting and not without some substance.

 

[Mole]

Reality itself is not so dualistic

If we perceive by making distinctions, then our very perceptions are dualistic.

Indeed the very medium we are using is based on the distinction between 0 and 1 and so is dualistic.

Also our genome is digital, just like this medium, and so is also dualistic.

So our perception of the world, the medium with which we grasp the world and the very substance of our bodies are all dualistic.

 

[Octarine]

Our perception only becomes dualistic, only when our brain starts to carve it up. It only does this because the complexity of the brain cannot mirror the complexity outside and thus must compress/reduce this complexity. But if you deny the boundary between the mind and the universe itself, then there is no duality.

 

[Mole]

Our perception only becomes dualistic, only when our brain starts to carve it up. It only does this because the complexity of the brain cannot mirror the complexity outside and thus must compress/reduce this complexity. But if you deny the boundary between the mind and the universe itself, then there is no duality.

I know it is fashionable to deny dualism but quantum mechanics has made it clear that things proceed in distinct steps. This is simply dualistic as we are on one step or the other.

On top of quantum mechanics epistemology teaches us that we perceive by making distinctions and without dualism there are no distinctions.

And biology teaches us that our very genome proceeds in distinct digital steps. So every cell of our bodies is read off dualistically.

And I hardly need point out that the medium we are using now is based on the distinction between 0 and !. Our computer knows it is either 0 or 1 by simply making a dualistic distinction.

However the Romantic New Age tells us we don't live in a dualistic world but everything is misty and in soft focus, all the better to fool us.

 

[Octarine]

I know it is fashionable to deny dualism but quantum mechanics has made it clear that things proceed in distinct steps. This is simply dualistic as we are on one step or the other.

It is fashionable to misunderstand quantum mechanics.
There is not merely a dual series of states. Quantum mechanics suggests that before an interaction, there are an infinite number of solutions to the eigenvalue problem and these exist in a superposition of states. And even during the moment of an interaction, its state is limited by Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. Afterwards an observation, you have no idea whether it is still in that state or not.

In terms of genetics, you know that there are multiple genetic possibilities in forming the same functional enzymes right? Given an arbitrary polypeptide of reasonable length, the chance of predicting the underlying genetic code is very low. Protein folding itself is not a trivial process and sometimes difficult to predict from the genetic code.

Communication itself is dualistic owing to limitations in expressing reality. But the loop is closed once this communication is interpreted. The dualism of a computer only arises once we think those binary states actually mean something. Otherwise, the behaviour of the semiconductors is just a natural physical phenomenon.