Octopod

The party's over, the teams return from whence they came, the 2010 World Cup is done. Hovering behind the games is the image of the octopus named Paul, who predicted the correct outcome of eight matches and ensured himself a place in history.

It is a somewhat Cthulhoid idea, that in the whorled snarls of the octopus's tentacles there is a mysterious apparatus which transcends human senses and can plot, prophesy, scry, or see as through a glass darkly, the results of World Cup football matches. But it is a compelling and evocative picture.

After all, the octopus is the smartest of all invertebrates, the only one of that enormous array of life-forms to use tools. If we count in binary through our twofold surface symmetry, an octopus can count in octal; if we count in denary through our ten digits (thus making our hands both digital as well as analogue, denary as well as binary), an octopus can count in the most useful factors of its 240 suckers per arm.

To make matters more complicated, an octopus has 2/3 of its brains in its limbs, which are really outgrowths of its neck. Each of those tentacles is much smarter than our own limbs. They are not mere feet, as the word 'octopod' might imply.

An octopod drummer would have eight intelligent limbs, each capable of autonomous action, a veritable orchestra of musicians linked to a single conducting node. Think of the complexity of sound, of aural texture, of colour and echo!

Think of what feats of computation are available to an intelligent creature who has so many more combinations and permutations of 'digits' than we have. Is it any wonder that an otherwise undistinguished member of that species can predict the outcomes of World Cup matches? Would we be able to predict the outcomes of octopus sports?

Word of the Day: Oneiromancy

The word 'oneiromancy' is just one of many related words ending with what would be -manteia in Greek. That particular suffix comes from the Greek mantis, which means prophet (and by extension, a holy man or hierophant). A 'manteia' of any kind is thus an oracle or form of divination.

So what is 'oneiromancy'? The first half of the word, oneiros, means 'dream'. Oneiromancy thus is the practice of divination through dreams, either directly (as in a prophetic dream in which events proceed as dreamt) or symbolically (as in a dream in which the images represent something else).

Oneiromancy, like all the other manteia, is subject to ethical and moral difficulties. In nekromanteia or 'necromancy', the form of divination requires interaction with the bodies or spirits of the dead. Most cultures find this, if not a little outré, rather vile or unnatural. The whole idea of divination does not sit well with humans, who would like to believe that free will is superior to predestination – although of course humans would love to know if nobody else did, being selfishly curious in general.

In oneiromantic history, several oracles have purportedly dreamt accurate dreams of events which came to pass. The question of utility rears its ugly head: if you should dream a 'useful' dream (e.g. that an identifiable terrorist is going to carry out an act of terrorism in a specific place at a specific time), should you tell anyone? There is no scientific justification in advance that you are right, and if you were correct about the prospective details, you'd be a suspect too.

And what if you dream the details of an examination paper or a bunch of examination results? Are you ethically bound to remain silent? Or can you share your dream under the defence of 'it was only a dream'?

Decisions, decisions...

Innards

For many years, whenever people used the phrase internal assessment, I would think of my brother-in-law the specialist in internal medicine. It was then a short step from internal assessment to haruspimancy. As they say, the quality of life depends on the liver.

This haphazard and peculiar divinatory practice was, of course, designed to produce useable knowledge. The main problems of knowledge are obvious - how it is obtained; how it is justified; of what use it is, what applications it has; what intrinsic properties, propensities and biases it contains and presumes upon; how it is sufficient for certain purposes and not for others; how well does it support other knowledge; what forms it takes and how resilient those forms are - and so on.

The trick in any argument involving knowledge is to narrow an issue down to which problem of knowledge best describes it, and what can be done to resolve the issue on that basis. For this, the proponent has to bring to bear an established set of analytical tools, with the results displayed to best effect. Begin with the difficulties of the issue, and why the problem chosen is a problem at all. Then examine the ways in which the problem can be resolved, and propose a method of resolution. If the argument can be sustained with each point justified, logically linked (i.e. with consistency and inevitability) and relevant to the case, then the argument is strong; if the argument shows insight, originality, precision and brevity, so much the better.

Yet, all arguments have logical consequents. If these are then summarised and dealt with in a way that is clear, rational, and easily understood when complete, the argument is likely to be successful on the appreciative (as opposed to purely cognitive) level of assessment. Regardless, if the argument remains hypothetical, it is unlikely to have utility value.

For an argument to develop utility value, it must be shown to be directly applicable to a contemporary and important issue. This applicability must be demonstrated to be direct as opposed to tangential, specific as opposed to general, and provide a good level of resolution. Most important, it must make abstract principles relevant to concrete reality in a way that leaves little scope for opponents to complain about vagueness and exceptions of various kinds.

Throughout, the proponent of the knowledge-based argument should remain calm, controlled, clear, coherent and consistent. At no point should circular or specious arguments be employed - be on guard against such! If you can pass this test of communication, then the argument is complete, the innards intact, and the assessment of such innards auspicious.

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And at the end of all that, I must say that this was not such an argument, nor was meant to be.