By Herb Wiggins, M.D.; Clinical Neurosciences; Discoverer/Creator of the Comparison Process/CP Theory/Model; 14 Mar. 2014
“The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible.”
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“The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility.” –Albert Einstein “Physics and Reality” 1936
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“Found your house upon the rock. For the winds and storms may come but it will endure.” –Traditional wisdom
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The “Three Little Pigs” story, about the houses built of straw, sticks of wood, versus the brick house. —Traditional wisdom
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Part and parcel of complex systems are stabilities which those generate among their complexities. These are repeating events in our local and even, in the case of stars and emission lines and gravitational forces, can be universal. Our brains can “cut the Gordian Knot” of complexities and see more of what’s actually going on in the system. It’s this human characteristic, shared in simpler ways by the other animals and even some plants, which can note stable events in their environments, such as trees, rocks, streams, and the branching of the trees where in their nests lie, and can put these into their long term memories (LTM), and then constantly refer to them and recognize them to ID and thus use those for navigation around their territories. Indeed, territoriality must needs, by necessarily strongly imply recognition of landmarks by ANY species which is observably territorial. Thus LTM and comparison processes (CP) go hand in hand, regardless of which animals or species, or even plants demonstrate such interactions with environments.
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Using the same, or analogous systems of recognition they learn to recognize same species, their mates, food, dangers such as predators, sudden heavy rain storms, and so forth. Plants know their own pollens, and can often identify, as in the special case of fireweed, the best times to grow. In springtime plants know by recognition of temps, rains, and related patterns when to germinate seeds, or grow out leaves, and set flowers. In this way, they make use of their environment, because stabilities naturally occur by repeated reinforcements into their LTM’s of whatever kinds being used.
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Einstein asked a very serious and critical question when he asked how does the capacity to understand the universe come about? IOW, how is it that we can comprehend events in the universe? This article gives insights into the neural, higher level mechanisms of how this comes about. It’s the very repetitiveness of the day/night cycles, the tides, the moon rising and setting. the full moon versus the other moon phases, & the seasons,which impress themselves upon the day to day and year to year physiology and behaviors of plants and animals, of all sorts.
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He also described the relationships of events as to their connections to other events. This is a sort of relativity in and of itself as well. It’s the foundation of this article that relativity arises as a form of the comparison process, which comparison process allows us to ID, and repetitively recognize events in existence, which are stable, largely. The more often repeating events are detected, the more likely those will pass by process of reinforcements into the nervous systems and similarly physiological systems of plants. The self evident facts that there ARE such stable events all around us, are the events which make the universe comprehensible. If “all was change”, from moment to moment there would be no constancy of events, and these are what makes the universe comprehensible. It’s the observable, provable organization of the universe which makes it comprehensible. Order creates comprehension/understanding.
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Further, we note the major differences between scientific evidence and proofs versus those of historical, genealogical and legal events. The latter three are rarely repeating, except in general forms, such as humans, which have huge variability and rarely if ever are repeated themselves exactly. IN contrast the sciences concern themselves with provable, repeating, exactly specified events, such as atoms, elements, isotopes, molecules, organic and biological structures, which are often repeating in their general forms, although few are exactly alike.
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Take the proton for instance. It exists theoretically as the same proton within an atom, or molecule, or nucleus, or as a free ion such as acid solutions. Yet none of them are EXACTLY, or absolutely the same, but exist in a multiplicity of forms, most all arising from a proton which is nearly the same. Still, NO proton, for the reason of the Fermion rule, can occupy the same space at the same time. Thus, the positions of protons are all and must be different. Their relationships to nuclei, atoms, molecules, and such are definitely different, yet we believe that, essentially, the proton is of the same type, regardless of where it’s found. Though it has many manifestations and types, as described above.
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Now compare this with a single human. He/she is unique, and even ID twins are not the same, for the simple fermion rule. Thus there is NO true identity in terms of position, although of structures they are assumed to be similar even in nuclear and molecular and ionic compositions. Thus although it’s assumed and likely true that protons in a nucleus are all the same, they do differ by position. And further, the nuclei of those atoms below Fe56 can lose energy by fusions, whereas those above, cannot, and require more energy to create them. Thus the U-235 atom has been coaxed by specific neutrons to fission and release energy, but only to a certain point. This finding of neutron emission by fissile U-235 is what created the nuclear chain reaction, which is a repeating, stable finding wherever the conditions are right.
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Now contrast this with a single human being, who is very likely unique, but note the vast variations possibly in the trillions of those beings which can be considered “humans”.
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Now, let us look at our logic, and how that works.
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All humans are mortal.
Socrates is human.
Therefore, Socrates is mortal.
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This is a logical, deductive syllogism, and necessarily true, though is it? As long as the categories are fixed, relatively and stable, we can perform acts of logical deduction with them. But what of the conundrum, which came first, the chicken or the egg?
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This paradox arises because of categorical confusions and inexactitudes, as most paradoxes show. & their solutions arise when we deny the absolute “identity” of members of the class, category, or word meaning. The point here means something very clearly. If all chickens are the same, it’s true. If all eggs are the same, it’s true paradox. BUT,& this is the veriest point, they are NOT all the same. Evolutionary model shows us that at one time there were not chickens, which became chickens. So clearly, if we define the genetics of a chicken rather precisely, there were at one time, “not quite” chickens, which mated, and the egg had the first full complement of genetics and phenotypic characteristics of what we’d call, ID, recognize, understand and categorize as a “:chicken.” Thus, the egg came first. QED. This shows the problems with categories which are rather fuzzy in many cases, and the semantic problems which can arise due to this fuzziness, or false assumption of complete identity, which in the case of “ALL mortals”, does not exist.
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The problem with logic is the assumption of identities of the events, which they do not have. Thus most all logic is not quite true, because the assumption is that all grass is, when healthy, green, is not necessarily the case. The categories, are shown thusly to be “fuzzy” and not well defined. Within those tight definitions of “humans” the logics are said to be very solid. But in fact, it’s not. The universe of events contrasts, contradicts and often gives us paradox when we try to impose this utter absolute and fixedness upon events. The idealisms of the mind, do not thus correspond completely to events in existence.
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And if we try to detail and tighten down all of these categories, not only do they lose much of their value, but we end with the problems of legalisms, which do not and cannot totally comprehend and deal with all complexities even using most all known ideas & their words meanings. Also. we begin to run up that exponential barrier of increasing costs and times, and lose to the rules of diminishing returns. We cannot afford such a system. It’s too complicated to be, in the long run, useful. It violates least energy rules.
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Thus logic of itself breaks down in the face of fixity of events and definitions. When we try to fix virtually ALL of the conditions which make electrons quantum tunnel to make transistors work which clearly DO work highly reliably in our computers, then we have that same repeatability again. That same repetitiveness which give us reliable technology. But as soon as the conditions change, it gets too hot (why most computers have fans and must operate in cool conditions), the transistor becomes too small & quantum leakages occur (which marks the end of the silicon revolution and Moore’s Law, BTW). The system breaks down.
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The light and ignitions switches almost always work, but even those break down. Conditions are no longer fulfilled, & the machine or cell, or living system breaks down. The fixedness of events in existence is that which reinforces themselves in our minds and allows recognitions to take place, which then create comprehensibility, understanding, knowledge and the categories and hierarchies of our understanding. But take away this fixedness by altering conditions & at once, the repetitive events are gone.
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Thus it’s the breakdown of the models, which causes loss of comprehension, much of what Einstein showed as he introduced the quantum, and relativity. IN the same way, the comparison process, as a fuzzy logic, an uber logic, used in brains in most animals, and also in many plants which can detect up from down, that is center of gravity by some unknown means, and grow relative to that.
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But in history, how can we prove that Julius Caesar in a repeatedly observable way, ever existed? When such persons are living, we can very often show that truth. But after they die and information decays due to normal entropic events? We can see the same constellations (tho they change slowly enough we can ignore it in our lifetimes), the seasons, and rising of the sun and setting, too. Around us are all of the stabilities, which repeat themselves. But in that case we also see the panta rhei, the flux, the change which makes us realize this stability is largely not immutable. & there exists a range of great stabilities to the lesser, and at last the few at all.
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IN the article, “:Depths within Depths” we see the deepest, most essential and basic, established stabilities, those of the emission lines of the atoms, which are observably stable over 15 gigaLY and 15 gigayears. & all distances and times in between the present and this immense past/distance. We see the same gravitational forces and even the Einstein crosses showing the verifiable reliability and great age of the universe, where even across the solar system we can detect photons bending paths in a high gravity field. And we see that the stars of the most distant galaxies also shine by hydrogen fusion processes, just as they do in our sun, and so, too, the rules of nuclear processes & the Second Law are observably stable, and long lasting.
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It’s the lack of repeatability of history which makes it hard for our understanding, because, verifiably, it’s NOT the same from year to year. These countless recombinations are generally ongoing and without end. The same is true of legal truths based upon accounts of events, which are not only necessarily not repeatable, but which cannot be shown to be repeating, unlike many physical processes, which do. Further, eye witness testimony of itself, as even the law knows by demanding physical evidence of proof of a verbal claim, means that human observations are very, very fallible. And this has been confirmed many, many times.
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These stabilities of many events make these repetitions possible. Stabilities arise generally because of least energy effects. When our neocortex recognizes these stabilities, it does so meaningfully and with assumed force that those will be seen again and again. This is a result of experience.
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Thus this shows the differences by comparison between the duplicable results, confirmabilities of the sciences (penicillin always works in not resistant bacteria and other organisms) versus the development of bacterial resistances which make PCN relatively useless, like some other drugs, with respect to bactericidal effects.
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The point is that complex systems are exactly of this kind. There are aspects of them which are observably stable and repeating, tho much of it is not. The combinatorial complexity of those complex systems of huge numbers of interacting factors are virtually incomprehensible, BUT, & this is the point (the Fermi/Ulam findings), stabilities CAN and often do arise in complex systems, such as the solar system, such as stable societies, and beliefs, such as market stabilities, for a while. Even in weather and the seasons show these. Tornadoes, hurricanes and whirlwinds have these repeating, complex system features. And our brains can comprehend those as long as it can recognize repeating classes, more or less, of events. Thus, if very very clearly, those can be considered stable and the rules never change, as in transistors, within the limits of the conditions. Water at STP of 1 CC always weighs most exactly, 1 gram. 1/100th of the difference between the STP boiling and melting point of water is 1 deg. C. The same is true for most all relatively stable, fixed measuring systems. But those are NOT absolute, as relativity has shown us and this conclusion has been scientifically, and repeatedly and confirmed to be likely highly correct.
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Confirmability of the sciences is found when events in existence largely repeat themselves. Lacking that, events become “chaotic” or turbulent flow, or more correctly & universally, complex systems. Thus the usage of the complex system model allows us to better comprehend more about systems which for us, are so complex we cannot understand, literally all of it. Our understanding considering our extreme limits is and likely most always will be limited. But the findings of stabilities in such complex interacting systems, create predictability, and thus control. we can see tornadoes forming under a range of conditions, can detect the rotating winds with Doppler radar, and thus by comparing positions of this event, can predict where it will go, and give warning. This is how the sciences work, in fact. This is how our brains detect, recognize, & form pattern recognitions which lead in many cases, to predictive control. Thus the CP is the parents of knowledge & predictive control.
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This is essentially how the Rhizobacter fix nitrogen at soil temps, while humans must use 100’s of atmospheres of pressure and over 1000 C to fix H2O and N2 into NH4+, the basis of protein chemistries, as well.
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It’s the repeatability of events in existence which give us scientific confirmation. Under very similar circumstances and conditions, we DO find these stabilities. Simple linear stability can be seen, but in complex systems, which are most all of event, the recognition of repeating events, such as in the plate tectonic model, again render a complex system comprehensible. We see the patterns, the repeated stability of volcanoes arising from subducting plates; fault lines where plates move laterally more or less against each other, creating earthquakes great and small. Similarly hot spots arise as the surface of the plates moves over underlying upwellings of basaltic lavas. Then the mountain ranges come about with this faulting, or with collision of plates, such as which created the Karakorums and the Himalayas, including the remnants of the Appalachians which arose from a similarly repeated but not exactly the same events, 100’s of megayears ago. Or the Alps, too.
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Therefore, how do we determine what is confirmable and what is not likely to be, for us at this time? This bears heavily on the P and NP question as well. because if a solution can be confirmed, then we can know it’s a truth. If not, it cannot be known, largely. It’s then clear from the events of history NOT being confirmable, due to entropic factors as well as complexity, that historical truths of the past are largely NOT confirmable, esp. the further they are into the past, as information tends to decay in time.
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Thus we are left with thermodynamic considerations once again. P and NP problems are of this same type. IN order to confirm something as true, it must be a considerable, repeating stability. If not, it cannot be confirmed, scientifically, and this means that the sciences do NOT necessarily apply to it, as the problems with histories of all sorts show. It might be in some cases, but there is no clear order to this problem. Archeology is necessarily an incomplete science due to this fact. & in order to solve the P and NP problems posed, apparently we must be able to solve it or not. So historical problems CANNOT be P = NP in a vast range of events.
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Further, what are the classifications of events in existence which CAN be confirmed, that is, what are their fine structures, or details? We do not know in most cases. We cannot order complexity very well. Some, such as living systems and so forth we can to some extent, but not completely. And we know thermodynamics plays an important part in this.
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Universally, observable processes such as TD, relativity and QM we CAN in some consistent sense, confirm, again and again. But those we cannot confirm, which are substantially rare and unlikely to recur again, such as a famous persons in history, & thus we cannot solve that problem. & with time passing inexorably it becomes increasingly clear we cannot. Using DNA methods we can sometimes establish ancestry, but this again runs up that exponential barrier in terms of cost. & DNA itself degrades so much even over many centuries, that we cannot duplicate dinosaurs and so far, even woolly mammoths and other species, either. Winding in & out of this are the Thermodynamic rules of entropy, once more. We can begin to classify those events which we CAN confirm, but must generally state the rarest of the combinatorial complexity problems we cannot. These are, once again, the limits of our knowledge.
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CF: https://jochesh00.wordpress.com/2014/09/03/beyond-the-absolute-limits-to-knowledge/
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Thus the stability of events in existence and our ability to perceive these relatively stable events, are what give us comprehensions & lie at the roots of scientific confirmability. But the law, history and genealogy do NOT have this to rely upon in many, many cases and use similar means to make sense, that is understand, what’s going on. Realizing the limits of the sciences with respect to history and the laws with respect to scientific events is very important to do.
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And in order to understand these better, we must classify as best we can those events and processes which repeat themselves for us, and those which do not. IN that fine structure of careful observations and classification using CP, we will find more answers. But as usual it’s NOT a logical, mathematical method which will work, but simply testing, checking in an empirical sense which will give us answers. This once again may come to rest upon experimental maths which can model such events, which are often and usually presaged by verbal recognized patterns, which can then be mathematized, in many, but not all cases. This is how relativity was mathematized by Minkowski and Einstein AFTER the fact, when the essential details of special & general relativity were created. These are limits to maths, as well.
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It’s the vast range of combinatorial complexity and repetitiveness which creates the problem, too. And when we with our brains find “breakthroughs” which we deem creativity, which allow us to see more “pattern recognition” then we make progress. Understanding & detecting most all of this is the comparison process (CP), which does most of the work in recognition via LTM, pattern recognition which creates the hierarchies of out understanding, & so forth.
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When we concern ourselves with current problem of confirmability in the science articles published even in our best journals, we find the same problem. Those cannot upwards of 2/3-3/4 of the time be confirmed. This is esp. irksome in pharmacology, where journal articles were shown not to be the case, and those had to be weeded out and the facts of the matter found by confirming them repeatedly. It’s not accidental, that the accountants’ final figures are repeatably shown to be the case, but that’s still a matter of higher reliability than normal. Because if the bean counters get the same sums each time, it’s more democratic, than absolute, as well.
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So how we know what we know, that is our epistemology, depends basically upon what we can confirm by repeating events in existence. Einstein showed these methods are NOT absolute, and therefore cannot be proven mathematically, but best by confirmations. If the math applies by comparing and closely modeling those confirmations it has a use. If not, then it’s discarded. Thus our maths, as per the Dictum of Gauss must have a practical use, and if not, they are useless to us. Inevitably then most math must very likely be experimentally validated, and if not, cannot be entertained. Otherwise we waste time upon fantasies, and sadly, this eliminates most math as being absolute, either.
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Take geometry for instance. We do NOT see Euclidean geometries very often. Those are very rare. The universe is not Euclidean, and uses a geometry not very related to our own. Indeed, we can compare and ID human constructs versus natural phenomena by this very Euclidean nature of our constructs, whereas events in existence, such as waves, clouds, mountain ranges and so forth are simply NOT Euclidean, thus not of human origins. By comparison, of course.
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Yet another way, more useful and widely applicable, to confirm scientific findings rests upon this very repeating of stable events in existence, in many of their forms. This very repetition makes technologies possible, from hand axes and arrows to spears to the modern computers and MRI scans, for instance, of today. In most cases true events are also confirmed by the technologies they spawn. Irascible and falsely claimed events, such as Russo’s E-cat have NEVER and cannot result in and create technologies, simply because thy are not the case, and not confirmable. This fact, that real events in existence can often be used to create tools, devices, and technologies, due to this universal repeating characteristic, is yet another way to confirm scientific articles.
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The Garden of Eden model here shows this point ever so much more clearly, as does the “Depths within Depths” show this immense stability of the observable universe, as well. Adam and Eve were the first humans is the religious dictum, but the story can be seen in yet another more convincing way, too. They knew sin. They knew of good as well, because they could compare events which resulting from good acts, versus the bad outcomes from evil actions. This point has been forgotten and the not Biblical ideal of “original sin” was created to help clarify the problem. But the outcomes of sins are evil and death while that of good is life and survival in the here and the hereafters.
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At what point did prehumans become aware of this comparison of good and evil? At what time, were they able to understand what was right and what was wrong? What was moral and lawful, & what was not? & the Garden of Eden story applies this parable to answer the question. it was the outcomes of those acts which when carefully, and repeatedly compared gave them knowledge & the knowledge of what was good and what evil. The tree of knowledge lies within our cortex, and from that origin we became not animals and thus acquired the veriest essence of our humanity.
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IN the same way as the chicken & the egg, there was a time where genetically, biologically and culturally, pre-humans could not reliably detect and recognize what was right or wrong. This problem still exists today among children, and the morally incapable. They lived in a state like the animals who do NOT have much morality, nor clear cut values. Nature is red in tooth & claw, and stealing, damage others, and such is mostly the case in the animal worlds. They can be trained, but do not usually act morally, and will often hurt themselves & others by being unable to make these distinctions which are the veriest essences of humanity. Our ancestors knew this & saw, recognized and saw the patterns repeatedly. Thus We humans are breed apart from animals, and plants.
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So not Only was it the expulsion from Eden, but the story of the Garden ALSO tells of the time, when humans could first, reliably, tell the difference between good and evil, & this is what started our human race, as well. These are the eggs which became the first humans, as well. That ability to do pattern recognitions, reliably and well. The comparison between moral laws and our behaviors & those of others which drives the recognitions of morality, even physical laws. THAT mental ability was what changed & made is recognizably human, and set up the entire flow of human progress and social organization for the last 10K’s of years. & incidently creates the civil and scientific laws, as well.
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So the answer as to what the Garden of Eden story also portends, is that this is when pre-humans became humans in a large breeding population. They knew sin, but they also knew the good, & by comparing the outcomes, the fruits of their various behaviors, we know those outcomes as good or evil.
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&in the same ways by comparing the observed events, organized by the same comparison process which drives morality we know the lawfulness of the universe, and we know, most interestingly, HOW we understand, and how the comprehensibility of the universe comes about, in the same way. This union of moral laws & physical laws, coming about from the same, repeating comparison process thinking, recognitions and LTM is what marks us as uniquely human, although we share many of those simpler traits with most all the higher animals, and even many plants. Because implicitly within the recognitions of the outcomes of good and evil, are the outcomes of the sciences which create our skills, devices, methods, and technologies. All from the same neocortex of our ancestors.
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This is the universality of comparison process, La Chanson Sans Fin, which has been found, and which applications can create an understanding of the wellsprings of creativity & the limitless improvements in how to understand, perform and educate. The comparison process, least energy (which arises from comparing outcomes of energy and related costs), complex systems and structure/function relationships give us a good understanding of these matters. Einstein article showed he was very interested in, how comprehension & understanding came about by the interactions between events in existence and our nervous systems. This article is very likely a good answer to his very basic, deep question.
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And it was found by extending Einstein’s relativity epistemology and applying it to neocortical functions, too. We see further because we stand on the shoulders of giants.
La Chanson Sans Fin 