Remembering Stuff - III

(Previous Posts [1],[2],[2.5])

The previous post was a digression so as to prepare the background for this post.
The evolution of civilization, although faster than that of genes is still a slow process compared to the life span of humans and as such the scope of evolution is beyond endeavor of single man. Further the instincts may be the driver, it is the participating individual who is the agent.

However there is no blueprint or road map of the evolution available to the him. Combine the two conditions and it turns out that evolution is incremental process, present building on the accomplishments of the past, a bequeathing to the future.

But the problem in this is two fold, one the instincts as such remain in fragile equilibrium, which may not holdup, the other is as already pointed out the evolution of civilization is not reversible, specifically its tendency to decline is much stronger than its tendency to evolve to next stage (it can be called as entropy of civilization). I think, there is a convincing case to prevent backslide of civilization.

Question then arises how can we prevent that, the modern answer would be, "by creating appropriate institutions " or "by democracy" or "by enacting laws" or "by writing a nice constitution".

They are all correct, but only partially. Because the simple truth, that advocates of these measures do not realize, that institutions are just nice building, constitution is just a big fat book, passive, inactive, inert.
Of course these do "moderate" the effect of opposing forces and instincts, but in themselves they can not prevent the backslide of civilization, and while they do facilitate enlightenment, in themselves they can not drive evolution to next phase, finally, in themselves they are superficial.

What gives life to institutions and to constitutions, is the "conscience" of civilization, which is just another word for value system (as explained in previous post). So a more accurate answer is to create value system.
But this is back to square. It turns out that in order to have a value system, we need a value system! What an absurdity !

As it is science rescues us. To continue with analogy that I have alluded to in more than one place, civilization is a dynamic system, and our aim is its optimization, this optimization is possible only for certain specific configurations of its participant forces, these configurations change with time depending on the optimization level.
These configurations are fragile, our aim is to decrease probability (it is impossible to eliminate it) of chaos (or entropy) that this system can fall into.
Now this system manifests adaptability, this system is also capable of learning and biggest of all this system has feedback going for it.

This means the output arising from specific configurations can act as feedback (both positive and negative) to the system, control being the collective conscience.

Here another problem arises, unlike electronic circuits where feedback is almost instantaneous and can be directly used in control , civilization has slower response hence it means that feedback can not be directly routed to control.

Instead the feedback has to be stored as an impression to account for time delay factory, which acts as proxy between control and feedback.

I call this impression as "memory of civilization".

Remembering stuff - II (and I/II)

(Previous posts [1],[2])

The evolution of memory doesn't come to halt at the level of individual humans*, I believe that societies and civilizations have a "collective memory".

By this I do not restrict to technological knowledge, rather collective memory of civilization is an all encompassing collection of the philosophy, religion, rites, ethos, morality and art, the most accurate word being Weltanschauung . The question arises why the need for something like collective memory.

Nowadays one tends to assume that civilization is aggregate of individual members, sum of parts.In assuming that however, one commits a mistake, civilization is a fairly intricate system driven by interaction of forces (or influences) varying with time, and hence set of its defining attributes is in state of dynamic adjustment.

For that one must examine the cause which creates, maintains and destroys civilizations.

The civilization comes into being because, organization offers more"value" to participants than acting individually. Hence the purpose or vital sign of a vigorous and enterprising civilization is the "value" it creates. "Value" is used purposely,as it is distinct from merely material wealth*.

I believe the complete definition of value of civilization includes "approximately" material wealth, safety,security,freedom,absence of tyranny, creation of long lasting social and political institutions,ethics,arts, philosophy and religion, in that order.

In this respect the values of civilization are similar to Maslow's hierarchy of needs. However there is a crucial difference between how values of civilization and Maslow's hierarchy are realized.

I think it is reasonable to claim that values of civilization represents the goals of human instincts in various stages of social evolution. With the development of civilization, the productivity increases, which ultimately results in increase in surplus produce (or labour)**. Availability of surplus marks the transformation of society from one from phase to another, this transformation is also the trigger which raise the desirable "value" up the chian of values, I listed, for the next phase.

The pinnacle of this evolution is civilization.At this stage all the values, all the human instincts exist in state of interdependency. This interdependency means that the unlike simple hierarchy the evolution is not reversible (somewhat analogous to thermodynamics). Deficit or absence in one value can very well result in imbalance of civilization's forces, resulting in instability and decline (or even sudden unravelling) of civilization.

Now, for a civilization to evolve and prosper, it is imperative that underlying instincts are in harmony which means the desirable values be defined appropriately.
This is essentially a feedback kind of situation, as the values which are taken as goals of the civilization, are also the impulse which drives the civilization on its chosen path.

Jeez this sucks.......

* The biggest mistake, in my opinion, that Ayn Rand made was to make material progress as be all of the civilization. Market as altar, capital as God. But to be fair to her, she was a neophyte and did what what all neophytes do.

** Surplus depend upon the distribution also. There is a nice dilemma here. Civilization can not evolve unless there is surplus, and any equitable distribution will reduce the available surplus.

Remembering stuff - II

(Previous post)

So far, the ability to store and retrieve information for future requirement evolves from genes to memory, the later being much more complicated than former.

Memory finds its most evolved, and needless to say profound, expression in humans. It is not exactly clear how memory works, but the overall flow is clear. Storing, retaining and retrieving information. One assumes that there are specialized interfaces, regions and organs to execute the specific sub-tasks which constitute memory.

There are two important aspects to memory one is learning, other is forgetting.
We learn as well as forget all the time. While learning helps in acquisition of information, forgetting helps in getting rid of irrelevant information. Without this, faculty of memory will be impaired by information overload.

Now there are some special situations where memory may not function as desired.
First, it is possible that due to shocks (for example physical accident), some of the memory, or access to it, may be lost, in worse case it is also possible that even the capability to remember things is lost. While I am not sure, this must involve some drastic disruptions in the region(s) of brain which store, retain and retrieve information.

Then there is active suppression of memory, this is not forgetting, because the memory can be accessed but there is a block against it, as a result of trauma (physical or psychological).
Now it is my assumption that this block (or state of being in denial), has two forms.
One in which the signs of trauma (responsible for denial) are explicitly visible, this may be in immediate aftermath of a shock. The other form, is when the signs are not explicit, but nevertheless trauma has adversely affected the stability and robustness of psyche.

I guess the first may be at more conscious level and the second at subconscious.

But what is the point ..... ?

Remembering stuff - I

Once again we start from genes, genes are some ridiculously complicated chemicals (complicated thanks to promiscuity of carbon), which synthesize a range of chemicals vital for life, for example protein. Anyway the point is genes are in essence information encoded in form of molecules.

This information is passed from one generation to another, along the lines there is mutation and exchange. Nature selects the genes which are better suited and the rest perish.
Now there is a thing. The genes are blueprints of traits and structures which aid in survival*. But the evolution of gene is a very slow process, it follows then that genes are bound to reflect only the factors which affect them in a “significant” way for a “significant” duration.

This is not a very efficient way of ensuring survival, because what this essentially boils down to, is the fact that while the anatomy and instincts of organism as hard coded in genes are indeed suitable for coping with macroscopic environmental factors, they are not equipped to deal with short term variations (which have only local presence), which predominate at the level of individual organism.

The next stage of evolution that follows from this is the organism (now more complex than ever) gets the ability to think, that is process the input and act on it, this means development of nervous system from its primitive forms to brain.
Brain acts on the input and patterns (possibly in form of synapses) decide the output, now these patterns may be formed due to genetic inheritance, but complex brains have this capability whereby they can store information (input and output) in form of complicated networks comprising of neurons and their connections, and retrieve it for further use.

This is memory and and as we move up the hierarchy in animal kingdom, evolution of the memory (along with brains) is most noticeable.

Where I am leading with this ....

* Survival of what is the question? Of genes, of individual or of species. I think that depends on context.

Story of my life

Once a lallu,always a lallu.

Evolution, Faith, Reason & Existence - II

(Previous post)

In beginning faith was a psychological shield, however as faith was organized into religion (for fashionable "organized religion", which is redundant, but fashion thrives on redundancy), morality was incorporated in it.In a way it is logical, for if there is a purpose to the life then life must be lived to fulfill that purpose, and if life has a "conscious" origin then of course that is also the origin of morality.

Now the point is, by its very definition, "first cause" is beyond the realm of deduction. Our domain of reason goes only so far, but fails if trained on its origin. This limitation is indication how framework based upon reason is not absolute*. This inability to "reason", the origin is the basis behind existentialism, "Existence precedes essence". Where this idea falters however is, existence as such is not the issue, cows and buffaloes exist without the need of essence, or faith, or logic, for that matter. The issue is instinct of inquiry unique to mankind**, which at one level creates system of logic, and at other level faith. Hence faith and reason can not replace each other. This implies that faith can not be replaced with a set of logical statements, and since human inquiry operates through reason, it can not be sub-ordinated to faith.

The other point morality is a function of different instinct, instinct of survival. Again it is futile to reduce morality as a function of faith or reason, or a combination thereof. Since instincts never operate separate from influence of each other, the faith, the reason and the morality are bound to influence.

Then the practical aspect of philosophy can be stated as to reconcile these three forces in a single framework. Since they are valid and irreducible to each other, the framework should have something which we in software industry call loose coupling.

I believe that Hinduism with the concept of Brahman, Jnaana and Dharma is the right framework.

* However it is possible to be consistent within itself.

** Perhaps closest is the socratic idea of wisdom as highest virtue.

Of intellect.....

First rule of thumb, people are ignorant, when I say this I do not mean "aam aadmi", but as a term encompassing humanity, this is avidya. Second rule of thumb, every one considers him to be smart and others to be ignorant, this is garv.

This is not a calamity as it seems, machinations of life are for major part guided by vagaries of genetic make up and any importance of role of reason is mostly overstated and probably human delusion, opiate of our times.

Then intellect has actually less to do with knowledge than a drive irrational from point of individual (but makes sense from point of genes), people think beyond what is absolutely necessary for daily wants of life because they are compelled by their genes and triggered by pressure of social environment.

The interesting thing is not what this thinking achieve, which again is a matter decided by the prevalent contours of society, but how this thinking arises.

A thinker is deviant, if one presumes man is guided by reason, he is not, for he is just a tool for genes, just as reason is tool for Man. It is a fallacy to think man is a creation of this reason, yet people make this, which gives rise to paradox where there should be none.