The Plural of Self

The plural of self is selves, and if elf, elves; a shelf grows into shelves. And yet, here we are, not really knowing which is self and what is selves.

The fact is that there is no such thing as self; self is an image in the real that is ideal in the way it exists — no evidence can proof or prove the self, but yet it is hard not to think of self. Self, it turns out, emerges from the cocoon of reality and takes flight, and metamorphosis ensures it never remains the same.

Some people think of self as identity, or of self as being. It is possible to see the two things as the two sides of self, bearing in mind that you cannot be immutable being if you are to have identity.

Why? Because identity is defined in terms of what you are not; if thing X and thing Y are distinct, then X cannot be Y. But if things that are not X are always changing, how is X defined in terms of things that are not X? X must change too, and so it is never an identity in the ideal sense. It is a shifting panorama, a landscape, a kaleidoscope of identities, conflated as self.

And so, I am selves. I am many. If I, Christian, am in the image of God, remember too that God can be many, for in Genesis he is not only God (singular) but Elohim (plural).

Responses 003 (Nov 2012)

The short list for the year ahead has this as Question 3: "Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand." — Albert Einstein. Do you agree?

I think this question is one of those trivial ones which can be made important by deliberately introducing extra material. So let's dispense with the trivial approach first.

Knowledge does not exist without information, and information does not exist without data. At each stage, the questions of validity, reliability, utility, generalisability, transferability (etc., etc.) intervene in an attempt to prove or disprove the various claims that arise (whether actual or potential). Hence the only way to claim knowledge is to subject it to tests of some kind of reality — something that contrasts or is contrasted with imagination. Without imagination, i.e. the capacity to create images/imagery or otherwise imagine, we cannot test knowledge. Knowledge therefore has no importance without imagination.

In fact, etymologically and historially, the image or imago is the ideal or fully-developed concept of something. The real is merely the sub-standard shadow in Plato's cave. We see this usage in the relationship between (for example) real and ideal gases.

At this point, we can concede completely that Einstein was right. However, as always, a case can be made for negotiating on the basis of 'important'. What does 'important' mean?

'Important', from Latin importare, is used to indicate something 'brought in', 'brought into the discussion'. This explains why 'import' can mean 'significance' as well as 'something shipped in'. When we say something is 'of import' or 'important', we are saying that it is a point to be noted, or that we should pay attention to it.

And that is why knowledge might be thought of as more important than imagination — knowledge is reality as far as we can confirm it, and is thus the basis of our action in this world. It introduces the key points to be considered in what we do, as opposed to imagination, which is what we might aspire to (or have realised that we can never attain).

The argument then, it seems to me, is whether the real is of greater value (practical or otherwise) than the ideal. It's a good debate to have. While the idea of an ideal gas allows us to conceptualise many things, no such gas exists — we have to solve problems in reality based on real gases.

Real and Ideal

Well, here we are again. After several rounds of explaining to people that both 'ideal' and 'real' don't mean what they thought, I am moved to etymologise once more.

'Ideal', from Greek eidos = 'form' and then idea = 'archetype', refers to things that are not real. An ideal gas does not exist, and ideal option doesn't either. If you say something is 'Platonic', then it is archetypal, and hence ideal and not real.

Which brings us to 'real', from Latin res = 'thing' and then realis = 'actual'. This refers to things done or objects to which you can do things. A real gas is something you can trap and manipulate, a real option is something you can see and exercise.

You can think of 'ideal' as describing something that ought to be. As 'archetype' or 'first among forms', it is the desired shape of things. You can think of 'real' as that which is.

True contentment comes when you accept the real as something as close to ideal as you can get, or feel empowered to make it so.

The Overimportance of Objectivity

Friar Tuck reminded me that we are subject to curious fits of self-doubt, by which I mean that we can always set up thought experiments to doubt that the self exists. But the fact is that while there are many ways to distract you from yourself, there is much more that persuades you that you exist.

No matter what science tells you about the molecular, atomic, or subatomic composition of your too-mortal frame, the fact is that you wake up in the morning, you feel the hangover. You feel the aches and pains, the sensations of being. No matter how unearthly the scientist, how objective his intellectual sensibilities, if he has heartburn or a headache, it is hard to remain purely objective. The disinterested observer of self does not exist.

To me, science and mathematics are games. Neither of them impacts my sense of self. I can intellectually believe that I am soup, or as Asimov (I think) once put it, water with impurities. But no matter how much empathy I muster, how much sensitivity I have that makes me tear up during certain movie moments, I am centred around me. It is my pain that I feel in my aching feet, it is my heartache I feel when I am sad. Even when I am sad for someone else, I am sad in me.

But what then of religion, of faith and my own quirk (at least that's how my non-religious friends see it) of Christianity? Well, since subjectivity is all, I am sure God will forgive me for having the purely subjective belief in Him. Do I care if I am wrong about Christ? No. Does it then devalue Christianity to not care if I am wrong? No. All such reasoning is hypothetical. I believe, I believe 'in my heart', and that's it for me. Not that I can't defend my belief if that's the game to be played, of course.

Objectivity is the Great Lie. There is no such thing. One would have thought that Einstein's ideas on relativity, and Newton's ideas before that, and the entire chain of ideas (for those who claim objective belief or beliefs can exist) would dissuade people from believing in that which they cannot directly engage.

Which brings us to the last frontier. Do we directly engage what we think is the self? I have no idea. All I know is that my feet hurt, I like coffee, I do things that seem to me to be good things, and I enjoy the company of certain people — who appear to have a real existence to me that I cannot penetrate. I have dislikes, I have tastes, I have the desire to use what functions as a language. But it's all me, and no matter how you can discredit solipsism by intellectual reasoning (yes, I know how it's done), that's all a game.

As that famous sage once said, "How are we to know if our reason has anything to do with reality at all?" I don't know, but if the game comes round, I'll play it.

Memory Foam

I had an interesting dream last night. I dreamt that our universe was like memory foam. It has a shape, it has substance and information and form and everything — but it only retains that shape because of what the random entities in it impress upon it. Particularly intense entities leave deeper impression in their field or domain of intensity.

And that is why everything exists, why limited free will and perception exists, why the whole thing is one piece and yet not. Occasionally, our interactions within the foam spawn other entities, or other perturbations in the foam. Larger perturbations are obvious to more of us, smaller ones may go unnoticed forever.

I woke up lying on my back, feeling strangely comfortable. My first conscious thought was, "What a movie that might make!"

My enthusiasm lasted for just enough seconds until I realised that this movie would obviously have to be called 'The Mattress'.

Oh Neo.

Science vs Reality

Recently, I had the opportunity to engage in a fascinating discussion with two ironically-named gentlemen (who I will leave unnamed here in case irony overcomes my readers). Both are eminently reasonable, but Gentleman #1 took issue with my definition of 'reasonable' and Gentlemen #2 took issue with my view of science.

According to Gentleman #1, it is better to define 'reasonable' as 'just; fair; agreeable to reason' than to use the 'argument of popularity'. Actually, in the context of what a reasonable belief is, it is perfectly normal to define 'reasonable' as 'something a majority of the population are in agreement with'. This is of course a legalistic position, akin to the idea of 'the man in the street' or 'the reasonable man'. But the problem with Gentleman #1's stand is that we as humans define 'just' as 'that which fits the common sensibility', 'fair' as 'that which seems balanced to the common sensibility', and 'agreeable' as 'that which most people agree with'.

According to Gentleman #2, reality is a the objective test of science. The problem is that this is a circular argument. In scientific circles, it is common to find the argument that reality is that which is verified by some form of the scientific method (as borrowed by Francis Bacon from the Islamic world). If this is true, that reality is verified by science, then how can reality be the objective test of science? The fact is that we can only trust our reason and our perception to the extent that it keeps producing exactly the same answer. This, of course, means that the inductive fallacy lies in wait.

My point is that a properly scientific skeptic would indeed be only provisionally certain, and even then only in the pragmatic sense, about any scientific claim to knowledge. If computers work because of applied science, that's great. Whether this is true or real, that's for the philosophers.

It is utterly possible to (as the humorist Terry Pratchett has done) postulate a science that works by little psychic beings of immaterial (and hence non-space limited) 'substance'. This would have the advantage of making the entities we call 'subatomic particles' and 'atoms' (and base much of our science on) explainable in terms of inherent intelligence; it would also explain action at a distance.

Unfortunately, it would also be unsatisfactory to scientists because the next question would be, "How do we understand the minds of these little psychic beings?" In fact, scientists dig until they hit 'fundament', and then they call what they've found 'fundamental' until they get better shovels. The problem is the 'better shovels' part.

What if you reach the point at which no better shovel is possible? This is apparently the case with the Planck constant, which describes the level of quantization of energy. Other physical constants (for example, the rest mass of the electron, Avogadro's number) depend on it to some extent; the fine-structure constant is interdependent with it in establishing the nature of our universe.

Well, having reaching that kind of fundament, I suppose the next question would be, "Why it is that value and not another value?" A true scientist would never accept the 'because it is, and that's all' explanation. But to me (and logically, anyone else), it is the explanation which must eventually suffice, and it would be unreasonable to think otherwise, simply because of the gap in orders of magnitude between our perceptions (and their proxies) and what lies beneath Planck's constant.

That would lead to the conclusion that true scientists are unreasonable, which must be irksome to them — if there were any such people at all. However, there is hope. As GBS once said (in Man and Superman, 1903), "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

Perhaps that progress will (as it often has) redefine our concept of what is reasonable. It is now reasonable to believe in flying steel machines, as it might not have been five centuries ago. But flying steel machines operate at the same level of perceptual reality as we do, while quantum electrodynamics (and other such theories) don't.

Gravity and Sorcery

For all that science is, it still has problems dealing with reality. As a teacher of science and of the epistemology that comes with it, I've found that teaching people the difference between reality and representations of reality is very tough.

Take for example the idea of an atom. With things like X-ray crystallography and electron microscopy we can vicariously perceive things that purport to be atoms, or at least, the positions, the wraiths, the ghosts of atoms. Limited by time and space, we still cannot know atoms except at one remove, or more. But the evidence is clear that something is there, and we know its properties well.

The same thing occurs with gravity. We know how it seems to work; we are pretty good at estimating its effects and predicting its behaviour. But how does it work the way it works? Here is where we slip into hand-waving and analogies. Gravitons? Just a name for the supernatural entities that we hang our dreams of gravity on.

The list goes on. Dark matter, dark energy, string theory... our knowledge of the universe has become increasingly tenuous. By what criteria do we call it knowledge now? By the fact that we have found a connect-the-dots theory to account for everything we think we see? By the fact that we can use the theory to predict other things? But how does it work?

That's where we enter the realm of the sorcerer's construct. A sorcerer who knows nothing of science, given a modern gadget (say, a laptop computer with a solar-cell recharger), will eventually come up with an hypothesis of its workings that will account for its behaviour and, because the machine's logic is internally consistent, also account for future behaviours. But does he know how it works?

Think about it. He learns to launch a word-processor by clicking on its icon. He learns that when he presses the 'A' key, an 'A' appears on the screen. This behaviour is reliable, and it will hold true for all the keys — whatever is on the key is what appears on the screen. The simplest hypothesis is that there is a sympathetic link between the symbol on the key and the graphic on the screen. The nature of that link is so complicated that if this were a scientific experiment, scientists would throw out the real explanation by using Occam's razor. It would be far simpler to hypothesize that it works like a typewriter: mechanical action on keyboard impresses the screen with images.

We're in that position. We attempt to name ourselves the lords of creation, writing out our account of how the universe works. But we'll never get into the workings. Even with our analogies, our metaphors, our formulae, the universe is still a black box. We put stuff in, we see stuff, we figure out what stuff produces what stuff. But why does it produce stuff? All we have is the idea that the universe is consistent. And worse, we assume the simplest explanation is probably true.

And now, not even that. The more we know, the more we begin to suspect that the consistencies we find in the laws of physics are merely a local aberration. It's like when you first see a colour change during a titration, before you swirl the mixture. The local concentration has spiked, and the indicator has changed colour, but that situation is not true for the rest of the solution.

We're all sorcerers, just as Isaac Newton was proud to be. We have no idea of what is real, we advance no hypothesis that is worthy of the name; we only report what we see, predict what we think we will see, and are happy if it turns out right. That is what science is about; it is the predictable toy in the bag of jokes.

The World

It's a fragile thing, this thing the Greeks called 'Cosmos'. It is all we have, it is all we think we make of it and all we see. But it is tissue thin, and dissolves for us at the moment of our passing.

The World is not the only real; it is the thin shell of reality, much as we tend to view the Sea as only its surface and perhaps the next five metres down. But the Sea is a thin skin over a progressively hot and molten ball of iron, a furnace made for powers like Hephaestus and the myth of the phoenix. So too is this Cosmos, this World that we see.

Not Teaching?

I was in this fog of fatigue last night. At the same time, some sort of text conversation occurred on my phone.

Wolfberry: HAPPY TEACHERS' DAY!

Me: Hello dear... Thanks. It kinda feels like that was a very long time ago.

W: No it wasn't. Don't feel sad. You don't have to be in a school to be a teacher you know (:

Me: Heh. I feel oddly reassured. You might just have made my night.

W: That's great! But all I did was point out a fact. (It always helps to have someone on the outside to do these things.) It's true okay. Be happy (:

And yes, I am a lot happier now. And I am still a teacher, even in the cold light of the morning.

=====

Note: How on earth do wolfberries figure out when someone is sad? Was it that obvious?

Truth (Sir Wolff's Version)

They have convened again. Sir Wolff has been placed in the dungeons for a week, with only the water on the walls for drink. Then they have washed him, and clothed him, and allowed him the bare honours of his rank. So he is too weak to wear his armour, but they have mounted it upon him; he is too weak to bear the sword of his fathers. So they have given it to him. That is a mistake.

Kneel, recreant. What do you say is truth? Quid est veritas?

What you call truth is what you have invented. It is a cloth you have woven upon the sticks of reality.

See, murmurs one to another, the black hoods rustling amongst the Magistratum, he continues to defame.

You say we invent the truth? That we weave what is not true?

No, I say that what you weave is what you call the truth. You summon it to you, you bind it, you name it 'truth'.

And do you think, sieur, that it is not?

How could I think that it is not when it bears that name? The Magistratum publishes it, and hence it is truth.

Do you mock us?

I am too weak to mock you. See how I am faint as unto death beneath the heavy burden of my armour? I have had nothing but God's dew to drink in all these seven days.

They laugh among themselves. One says, perhaps he thinks he is Elijah come again.

Why do you still bear a sword in the presence of the Magistratum?

I am too weak to bear a sword. It has the might of my fathers in it unto the third and fourth generation. My hands quiver as if palsied, for I am unworthy in my strength.

But it glows, and he raises it up, says a grey voice.

Aha, but I did not say the sword was too weak to bear me! And its name is Perdurias, for it is that which lasts long after all else has fallen to dust.

Alarm. Consternation. And through it all, the serene visage of one who knows his Master, and has long learnt not to fear the end.

'Est vir qui adest' was the answer Pilate failed to see, says Sir Wolff to himself, quietly.

=====

"God is my Master," the Patriarch said. "It makes for simplicity. I commend it. For that is your trouble, isn't it?"
– Dorothy Dunnett, Caprice & Rondo

Cold Logic

Well, at some point one has to give up on concepts like 'holism' and fall back on nostalgia, which always seems like a good idea. Hence my dredging up of this song, which always reminds me of one of my students. Heh. Bonus points if anyone guesses whom. Not so many points if that person guesses it...

This is the Supertramp hit from Breakfast in America (c. 1979, I think): The Logical Song.

=====

The Logical Song

When I was young
It seemed that life was so wonderful,
A miracle, oh it was beautiful, magical...
And all the birds in the trees
Well they'd be singing so happily,
Oh joyfully, oh playfully watching me.
But then they sent me away
To teach me how to be sensible
Logical, oh responsible, practical –
And they showed me a world
Where I could be so dependable,
Oh clinical, intellectu-al, cynical...

There are times when all the world's asleep,
The questions run too deep
For such a simple man.
Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned
I know it sounds absurd
But please tell me who I am...

Now watch what you say
Or they'll be calling you a radical
A liberal, oh fanatical, criminal
Oh won't you sign up your name
We'd like to feel you're acceptable,
Respectable, oh presentable, a vegetable!

At night when all the world's asleep,
The questions run too deep
For such a simple man.
Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned
I know it sounds absurd
But please tell me who I am, who I am , who I am...

Looking Back (Part 2)

Hey, look: the old folder, and here is a second scrap...

=====

The little islands are dark, slightly tarnished - ambergris, blue vitriol, rust, deep slumbersome black-brown hues in a night-lake of midnight blue. The Wanderer sits alone on the cliff, warming old hands over a dancing yellow fire and his food. He has placed his weapons by the fire, and the fire’s light dances over them as well.

It is comfortable here in the Archipelago, he muses. There’s no stress. Back to nature, except that you can have modern conveniences whenever you want. He pulls the spit from the flames, lays it swiftly on a clean, flat stone, sucks his fingers. This is a good life. He looks with Dreamtime-seeing eyes out over the twilight sea, waits for the chicken wings to cool. This is a good life, he repeats, with much satisfaction. He tenderly caresses his flesh, feeling the invisible dents where flesh has rejected bullet and healed. A good life for a Wanderer, this is.

In the distance there is uneasiness. The centre is not at peace. The Wanderer looks back and down, and in the distance sees another with his inner eye. This other wears the billowing cape and dirt-coloured leggings of a Walker. Wanderer smiles.

Toilsome, toilsome step by step, the Walker wends his way Wanderer-ward. The Wanderer thinks of slain Hunters, many of them in a catacomb of the mind, all buried, all neatly entombed therein. He smiles again, and knows that for Walkers, he needs no weapons.

The Walker halts in the narrow defile at the foot of the slope and looks up. “Wanderer!” he calls. “Wanderer, come home!”

The Wanderer waits. He can afford to wait. The Walker is Maradaine Chase. Maradaine was always too good, too humane for his job. The Wanderer’s smile is feral.

=====

That's how the third section goes. What on earth was I thinking of? The question remains unanswered. But still... what was all this about?

Interlude 5: Research

For ten years now, I've been accumulating data about the place in which I work. I have watched and counted and drawn inferences and listened to people and watched the fabric of history unravel and the palimpsest rewritten. I have seen facts interpreted and misinterpreted, recorded so that they become more artifact than fact. And in the end, who is to say what the truth is, or what it ought to be?

The fact of human existence is that it is malleable. Eternity is something we apprehend but cannot comprehend, and that ruins us for the big picture. So for those who cannot stand to look out into the infinite unknown - and yet know what infinity is about - there is nothing but the small (and ever-decreasing) circles of perception and detail.

We know now that the brain creates its own pictures of reality. The simplest case which can carry this image is this: the human eye does not see anything if it is moving. But we seem to see seamlessly. This is because the brain sees a start picture and an end picture, and interpolates everything else. The brain, we now know, is selective in what it records, and it ceaselessly re-edits memories. The more we emphasize or reiterate or dwell on memories, the more true they become, the more reality we build into them - even if they were never true.

This is the problem of human research. It is based on consensus, and where it is based on fiat, it must fail.