Category Archives: Book Review

12/15/23

Looking at Daniel Dennett’s Book (2017) “From Bacteria To Bach and Back” (Part 8 of 20)

0067 The year, 1935 AD, stands in the interim between the “First World War” and the “Second World War”.

Remember, these terms are modern labels for two brief historical periods.

Jacques Maritain publishes his book in the interim.  He lives in France, where Christendom faces an apparently mortal enemy: Modernity.

0068 Modernity has modern science in its arsenal.  Christendom has… um… a newly revived Thomism, apparently ill-suited for the intellectual fashions coming from allegedly “scientific” movements, such as Darwinism, Marxism, Saussure’s linguistics, Husserl’s phenomenology, quantum physics, and so on.  Catholic intellectuals in Paris, a former epicenter of medieval scholasticism, ask, “What is the nature of science?”

Maritain’s answer may be diagrammed according to the triadic structure of judgment.  A judgment contains three interlocking elements: relation, what is and what ought to be.  A judgment is a relation between what is and what ought to be.  When each element is assigned one of Peirce’s categories, then the judgment becomes actionable.  Actionable judgments unfold into category-based nested forms.

0069 Here is a picture of the Positivist’s judgment.

0070 A positivist intellect (relation) brings a noumenon […and…] its phenomena (what is) into relation with an empirio-schematic judgment (what ought to be).

0071 Note that two judgments are entangled.  The empirio-schematic judgment is embedded within the Positivist’s judgment.  The empirio-schematic judgment is what ought to be.  It is also imbued with the category of secondness, the realm of actuality.  To the scientist, a model is more real than its supporting observations and measurements.  How so?  One may make predictions about future observations and measurements based on the model.

0072 Also note that what is has a hylomorphic structure, even though it belongs to the category of firstness, the realm of possibility.  Aristotle presents an exemplary hylomorphe: matter [substantiates] form.  This hylomorphe fits Peirce’s category of secondness.  Secondness consists in two real contiguous elements.  For Aristotle’s hylomorphe, the real elements are matter and form.  The contiguity is labeled “substance”.  For clear nomenclature, I place the contiguity in brackets.

In the above figure, the substance labeled “…and…” is far more complicated than it appears.  The full hylomorphe is a noumenon [cannot be objectified as] its phenomena.  […And…] is short for […cannot be objectified as…].

Perhaps, it will be no surprise that the noumenon associates to Dennett’s term, “manifest image”.

0073 Dennett’s scientific image is located in what ought to be for the Positivist’s judgment.  Here is a picture of the empirio-schematic judgment.

0074 How do diagrams of the Positivist’s and empirio-schematic judgment illuminate Dennett’s subliminal… or is it sublime?… defense of the Positivist’s judgment?

To start, I wonder, “What elements associate to the manifest image and to the scientific image?”

Well, obviously, the manifest image and the noumenon go together.

The scientific image matches mathematical and mechanical models.

0075 Here is a result of the substitutions.

0076 Ah, the manifest image is already proscribed by the rule of the positivist intellect.  The manifest image is not the thing itself.  It is a sensation2a, a phantasm2b or a judgment2c concerning the thing itself.  The manifest image calls to mind the actualities within the scholastic interscope about what is going on in an individual’s mind.

Plus, the scientific image is constructed from observations of phenomena that cannot fully objectify the manifest image… er… our mind’s response to a noumenon, a thing itself.

0077 Here is a comparison of what is for the standard version and for the adjusted version of the Positivist’s judgment.

0078 What does this imply?

Dennett’s defense of the Positivist’s judgment is neither subliminal nor sublime.  It is subtle, in precisely the way that philosophers employ subtlety.  The fact that the phenomena of neural synapses and (I will get to this later) cultural memessupport the manifest image as a multifaceted evolutionary adaptation (that may be modeled using neuronal and cultural Darwinian paradigms) implies that the manifest image may be dispensed with, because it is an user-illusion of the scientific image.

Does this tell me that the noumenon, the thing itself, is what humans are conscious of?

Or is the noumenon what humans adapt to according to neuronal and cultural Darwinian paradigms?

0079 My user-illusion is an adaptation, as substantial as a dog’s fierce jaws and a cat’s sharp claws.  It cannot be dispensed with, lest I die.

In the face of subtle distinctions between the noumenon and the manifest image and between the manifest image and the scientific image, the betting man would place his money on the manifest image, as that which will endure… er… survive, rather than the scientific image.  Dennett argues against this bet, but he cannot speak directly, because his scientific discussion supports the betting man’s conclusion.

0080 If our consciousness of species impressa2a and species expressa2b is an adaptation, then how is the proposed scientific accounting of our impressions2a and perceptions2b supposed to make them more adaptive?  And if Dennett’s argument succeeds, and a scientific image based on Darwin’s paradigm overlays our feelings2a and phantasms2b, then what about what humans think?

0081 The long-debated scholastic picture of the way humans think cannot be lightly discarded.

Only a subtle argument will suffice. 

12/14/23

What Is A Meme? (A of G, Part 9 of 20)

0082 So far, the structural coincidence between Darwin’s paradigm and the specifying sign covers Part I of Dennett’s book and a couple of chapters in Part II.  The title of Part I is “Turning Our World Upside Down”.  The title of Part II is “From Evolution to Intelligent Design”.  The chapters covered in Part II include seven (“Darwinian Spaces: An Interlude”) and eight (“Brains Made of Brains”).

From this coincidence (or is it from Dennett’s argument?), I learn that a lot of what goes on in my neocortex supports a user-end illusion, which I label “my mind”.  The method behind this neuromechanical marvel employs a Darwinian paradigm, where neurons act like selective breeders and their synapses are the creatures that they breed.  This method strikes me as a little weird, since short-lived synapses are extensions of long-lived neurons.

Maybe it is not as weird as me walking Daisy around on a leash.

0083 I also learn that scholastic inquiry into human knowing provides a nested picture of the actualities that participate in manifest images held by individual human minds.  A three-level interscope contains three virtually nested actualities.  The three-level interscope is delineated in A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction, by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

Here is a picture, highlighting the three actualities2 of the manifest image, and downplaying their respective normal contexts3 and potentials1.

0084 The content-level actuality, species impressa2a, goes with the terms “sensation”, “impression”, “feeling” and “qualia”.  In terms of ontology, this actuality2a may be portrayed as active body [substantiates] sensate soul.

The situation-level actuality, species expressa2b, goes with perceptions2b, phantasms2b, emotions2b, trained responses2b, along with other expressions.  In terms of ontology, this actuality2b may be portrayed as perceptive soul [informs] reactive body.

The perspective-level actuality, species intelligibilis2c, goes with judgments2c, explicitly, and convictions2c, implicitly.  A conviction is a judgment where the relational elements are not labeled.  So, the triadic structure operates holistically.  In terms of ontology, a judgment is a triadic structure consisting of three elements: relation, what is and what ought to be.  When we associate each of the elements with one of Peirce’s categories, the judgment becomes actionable.

0085 These three actualities are discussed in Razie Mah’s blogs for October 2023, titled Looking at John Deely’s Book (2010) Semiotic Animal.  Of course, in order to understand these three actualities, I must divine their normal contexts and potentials.  This divination will proceed as I examine the sign-relations that are embedded in the scholastic manifest image.

0086 Let me start with the basics.

We (humans) encounter actuality2.

We understand that encounter when we have elucidated the appropriate normal context3 and potential1.

The elucidation may proceed using Aristotle’s four causes.

0087 But, what if two of Aristotle’s causes are outlawed by the positivist intellect?

Well, the positivist intellect cannot achieve understanding.

Instead, the positivist intellect (which is the relation in the Positivist’s judgment) uses disciplinary language to construct mathematical and mechanical models of observations and measurements of psychological and social phenomena (what ought to be in the Positivist’s judgment).

Then the Positivist sells these models under the label, “scientific conclusions”.

0088 Typically, when a clinical psychologist mentions the term, “manifest image”, the referent is a species expressa2b. Why?  People tend to seek the services of a clinical psychologist when they cannot control their emotions.  An emotion may be portrayed by the hylomorphe, perceptive soul [informs] reactive body.  Perceptions [trigger] emotions.

The client suffers the actuality of a phantasm2b.

The clinician suspects that the client will understand that actuality2b when a virtual normal context2c and potential2a are elucidated.

0089 The following figure portrays the virtual nested form in the realm of actuality for the scholastic’s manifest image.

0090 This nested form is virtual because it runs down a column in a three level interscope.  The qualifier, “virtual”, means “in virtue”, in regards to the mind, and “in simulation”, in regards to the brain.

The perspective-level normal context of judgment2c virtually brings the situation-level actuality of a perception2b into relation with the content-level potential of sensations2a, impressions2a and feelings2a.  Each of these actualities conveys its own sense of realness.  But, the phantasm2b seems to be the most real because it occupies the slot for secondness in both the situation-level nested form and the virtual nested for in the interscope. 

0091 Often, the species intelligibilis2c and the species impressa2a do not register.

Even less apparent are the normal contexts and the potentials for all three actualities.

No wonder the catholic schoolmen spend centuries debating the causalities involved in how humans think.

12/13/23

What Is A Meme? (B of G, Part 10 of 20)

0092 According to Dennett, a meme is a unit of information worth having.  If a meme is worth having, then it is worth paying attention to.  A meme is a unit of cultural information.  “A meme” rhymes with “gene”, a unit of information coded by DNA.

Of course, I can also say that a “meme” sounds like “mean” and “gene” sounds like “jean”.

0093 That raises the question, “What is information?”

Well, “semantic information” is encoded and specifies its own interpretation. 

0094 Surely, that sounds like the work of the specifying sign.

So, a meme behaves as if it contains semantic information because it activates (what the scholastics call) specificative extrinsic formal causality, otherwise known as a specifying sign.  The specifying sign connects the content and situation levels of the scholastic manifest image.

0095  In terms of semiotics, an impression2a (SVs) stands for a perception (SOs) in regards to the question, “What does it mean to me?”3b contextualizing the possibility of situating content1b (SIs).

Dennett calls the coupling of a content-level sign-vehicle (SVs) to a situation-level sign-object (SOs), “semantic information”, because, often enough, the species impressa2a merely decodes spoken words and grammar.  The qualifier, “semantics”, associates to spoken language.  Semantic information offers designs worth getting, differences that makes a difference, and opportunities that go with Gibson’s term, “affordance”.

0096 So, right at the start, I know that the species expressa2b (SOs) virtually situates content2a in such a manner that the species impressa2a (SVs) is meaningful to me3b (SIs).  But, that is not all.  Species impressa2a (SVs) also offers clues to presence (who speaks to me?) and message (why speak to me?) (SIs).

0097 To Daisy, the cat (er… the species impressa2a of the neighbor’s cat2a (SVs) stands for a species expressa2b, a little monster… or maybe, an animated morsel… equipped with paws with claws2b (SOs).

To me, the fact that Daisy’s tail tucks between her hind legs2a (SVs)) stands for her fear and loathing of the neighbor’s cat2b (SOs) in regards to our morning walk3b (SIs).

Neither Daisy nor the cat know why this drama plays out with regularity.  The lady next door throws out her trash just before I take Daisy on her routine walk.  Her open door serves as an opportunity for the neighbor’s obnoxious cat to scamper out of its indoor enclave.

0098 I cultivated an additional incentive.  I planted catnip among the neighbor’s untrimmed verge, which the cat finds attractive.  Now, as soon as the neighbor lady opens her door, the cat scampers out and beelines to this destination, a garden of intoxication, where she is always surprised by Daisy and puts up a wonderful display of threats and hissing.

Daisy is so perplexed by this stoned feline that she either wants to protect me or expects me to protect her.  The leash pulls tight either forward or backward, depending on the suddenness of the realization of this dramatic species impressa2a(SVs).

0099 Clearly, the cat2a is a meme.

Plus, it2a is more than a meme.

Daisy’s tail going between her hind legs2a is a meme.

Plus, it2a is more than a meme.

0100 As the encounter achieves greater regularity (thanks to the catnip taking root, plus the morning routines), Daisy is slowly coming to a consistent species expressa2a (SIs).

Nevertheless, she is regularly confounded.

12/12/23

What Is A Meme? (C of G, Part 11 of 20)

0101 With a single chomp of her mighty mouth, along with some head thrashing, Daisy can put an end to the neighbor’s cat.  I suppose that I restrain her from what her species expressa2b calls her to do, because I have her on a leash.  The leash puts Daisy’s species expressa2b into perspective.

0102 Does this imply that there is another sign?  Does this sign connect the situation and perspective levels?

Daisy’s fear and loathing of the cat2b (SVe) stands for her being restrained by the leash and thereby confounded2c (SOe) in regards to the question, “Does this makes sense?”3c, contextualizing the possibility of putting the situation into perspective1c (SIe).

The subscript, “e”, stands for “exemplar”.

Here is a picture.

0103 The exemplar sign-vehicle (SVe) coincides with the specifying sign-object (SOs).

Correspondingly, the exemplar sign-object (SOe) puts the specifying sign-object (SOs) into perspective.  This perspective includes both Daisy and myself, along with the catnip, the cat and my trash-toting neighbor.

0104 Plus, there is a question about nomenclature.

For scholastics, the specifying sign starts with subjective content and ends with objective situation.  The exemplar signstarts with an intersubjective situation and ends with a suprasubjective perspective.  So, the situation-level actuality is “objective” (SOs) for the former and “intersubjective” (SVe) for the latter.

For moderns, only two terms are employed, “subjective” and “objective””.  Scholastic terms shift when stepping from the specifying sign to the exemplar sign.  For moderns, “subjective” opinions often address the question, “What does it mean to me?”3b, while “objective” facts raise the question, “Does this make sense?”3c.

This terminological shift is discussed in Razie Mah’s blog for October 2023, Looking at John Deely’s Book (2010) “Semiotic Animal”.

0105 The exemplar sign object2c (SOe) makes sense3b because it may be true, or believable, or commonly accepted, or logical with respect to an affordance.  What is that affordance?  May I call it, “intelligibility”?  Oh, that could bring a smile to the face of a philosopher and a grimace to the face of a scientist.

0106 Let me return to the scholastic manifest image for the example of Daisy, my dog, who I knowingly place into proximity to the neighbor’s miserable feline, soon after the neighbor lady takes out her trash.  Is there a problem with planting catnip in the verge near where we regularly stroll?  Surely, the neighbor’s husband, who is rarely at home to tend the verge, does not mind.  Plus, the cat clearly loves the mint.

Here is a picture.

0107 The exemplar sign-object (SOe) contains a judgment.

Recall, a judgment is a relation between what is and what ought to be.

0108 In order to arrive at my judgment2c, I first look at the virtual nested form in the realm of actuality.

To me, Daisy’s confoundedness2c serves as a virtual normal context that brings the actuality of unnerved Daisy2b into relation with the possibilities inherent in her tail tucked between her legs2a.

I next transfer the virtual nested form into the triadic structure of judgment.

Daisy’s confoundedness (relation, thirdness) brings her tucked tail as an universal being (what is, secondness) into relation to Daisy’s fear and loathing as an intelligible being (what is, firstness).

0109 Yes, whatever is going on in Daisy’s mind2c contributes to my judgment2c, even though it (whatever “it” is) cannot be articulated.

0110 For Daisy, a relation that I am not privy to2c virtually brings fear and loathing2b into relation with that catnip-addled feline2a.

0111 The triadic structure of judgment fits neatly into the sign-object of the exemplar sign as well as the perspective-level actuality2c of the scholastic’s three-level interscope.

12/11/23

What Is A Meme? (D of G, Part 12 of 20)

0112 Here is a scholastic picture of the way humans think.

0113 What is the nature of the Latin term, “species intelligibilis“?

Typically, this actuality2c attempts to bring the ‘what is’ of a species impressa2a into relation with the ‘what ought to be’ of a species expressa2b.

There is another way to describe the perspective-level judgment.  A relation2c brings together the universal aspects of the species impressa2a (what is) and the intelligible aspects of the species expressa2b (what ought to be).  As such, the elements belonging to the perspective-level actuality2c are not exactly the same as the situationb and contenta level actualities2.  They must be qualified as elements of judgment.  The scholastics accomplish this task by adding the word, “intelligibilis”.

Here is a picture.

0114 Daisy cannot ask the question, “Does this makes sense?”3b.

Consequently, Daisy cannot contextualize the potential1c of her species expressa2b by formulating a species expressa intelligibilis2c.

Or, maybe she can.

I guess one does not have to speak the question3c in order to ask it.

0115 What is her conviction2c?

Is her phantasm2b effectively true, believable, commonly accepted, and logical with respect to an affordance1b?

What is that affordance1b?

I can only guess.

And then, there is the issue of the leash2c.

0116 Since I am able to put my species expressa2b into perspective2c, I can imagine what Daisy’s judgment might be2c.   I may not be correct.  But, I know that Daisy is fully capable of dispatching that cat, because, by my reckoning, she has already performed such duty on at least one other cat, a half-dozen squirrels, and a dozen rats.

On top of that, if Daisy suddenly throttles that indoor cat, whose only excursions into the wild lead directly to the catnip patch, then the cat’s owner would have to deal with me, her neighbor, whom she has studiously ignored for long enough.

0117 Hmmm.  I guess I should not have said that.

There is something about my species intelligibilis2c best be left unspoken.

How so?

My little addendum enters the reader’s slot for species impressa2a and, in the process, provides a clue to what is happening3a, as well as the potential of ‘something happening’1a.

0118 I know what you are thinking.

What sort of freak would create a situation where his dog kills the neighbor’s cat in order to gain her attention?

12/5/23

Looking at Daniel Dennett’s Book (2017) “From Bacteria To Bach and Back” (Part 18 of 20)

0183 If human culture is to be modeled as the replicative success of memes, then what would empirio-schematic researchentail?

Well, if the term, “meme”, labels a cultural adaptation2b, in the normal context of cultural selection3b operating on various affordances1b, then the actuality independent of the adapting species2a must relate to the scholastic interscope of how humans think2a.

Indeed, I may highlight one particular element in the scholastic interscope2a, the species impressa2a, as the premier feature of the actuality independent of the adapting species2a.

0184 But, didn’t I offer the above content-level actuality2a as a technical definition for the term, “meme”?

So, how can the term, “meme”, also stand for a situationb-level actuality2 in the normal context of cultural selection3b?

If that is not confusing enough, consider that the content-level actuality2a also belongs to the manifest image (which is described by all three actualities of the scholastic interscope).

Plus, we are conscious of a manifest image, not its scientific image.

0185 Consciousness is the user-illusion of competition among neurons for active synapses3b.  Synaptic networks form and are maintained in response to memes.  The qualia that we feel are most likely memes, sign-objects of interventional signs substantiating sign-vehicles of specifying signs.

Consequently, another term for [substance] is [implicit abstraction].  The sign-objects of interventional signs (SOi) are like matter.  The sign-vehicles of specifying signs (SVs) are like form.

So, a meme may be denoted as SOi [implicit abstraction] SVs.

0186 Another word for [substance] might be, “projection”.

In projection, the situation-level potential1b projects continuity into the content-level contiguity.

For example, there is no motion in cinema.  There is only a rapid sequence of images cast upon a screen.  The user illusion projects (or implicitly abstracts) smooth motion in time.  This is only possible if the situation allows it.

Similarly, there is no sweetness to the fact that the neighbor’s cat is dead.  There is only a corpse in the refrigerator and Daisy’s querying gaze, asking, “When are you going to give the dead cat back to me?”

So, the term, “meme”, also labels a neural network2b, in the normal context of neural selection3b operating on the potential of creating and destroying synapses1b, in the process of situating a species impressa2a.

But, once again, didn’t I offer the above content-level actuality2a as a technical definition for the term, “meme”?

Yes, but neural networks are clearly implicated, since they constitute the adaptation2b, and the adaptation is um… what?… a meme?

0187 If that is not enough, the designs of the most intelligent human designer cannot be compared to the adaptivity that arises from a variation of Darwinian natural selection operating on units of culture, in all their varieties.  Why?  There is always a cultural… er… cognitive space that even the most neurotic and attentive-to-detail engineer cannot plan for.  

Consequently, cultural selection3b yields memes that survive and flourish on their own and some of these memes are so strange and resilient that they appear miraculous, even to the positivist intellect.  Therefore, they must be ruled out as “not scientific”.

0188 Here is one confounded empirio-schematic judgment characterizing this discussion.

Here is another.

12/4/23

Looking at Daniel Dennett’s Book (2017) “From Bacteria To Bach and Back” (Part 20 of 20)

0196 Razie Mah offers three masterworks on human evolution.

The Human Niche concerns the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

An Archaeology of the Fall dramatizes the first singularity, the transition from the Lebenswelt that we evolved in to our current Lebenswelt.

How To Define The Word “Religion” concerns our current Lebenswelt.

These works sustain this examination of Dennett’s book.

0197 In these blogs, the term, “meme”, is technically defined using the scholastic interscope for how humans think.  This interscope is also in play in Razie Mah’s blog for October 2023, Looking at John Deely’s Book (2010) “Semiotic Animal”.  A “meme” corresponds to a species impressa2a with a hylomorphic structure whereby the sign-object of an interventional sign substantiates a sign-vehicle for a specificative sign.

0198 According to Dennett, a spoken word is a good example of a meme.

Notably, our current Lebenswelt must face the question, asking, “What is the nature of spoken words?”

Why?

Spoken words facilitate explicit abstraction, while hand-talk words allow only implicit abstraction.  We innately expect that spoken words image and point to their referents.  But, they do not.  Symbols are natural signs whose sign-objects are defined by convention, habit, law, tradition and so on.  Yet, no hand-talk language has words that can picture or indicate these terms.  “Convention”, “habit”, “law” and “tradition” label explicit abstractions that cannot be articulated using hand talk.  They may exist, but cannot be named, while using hand talk.

0199 Recall that actualities2 are encountered.

Such actualities2 are understood by ascertaining an appropriate normal context3 and potential1.

0200 How To Define The Word “Religion” applies these lessons to a familiar and contentious term.  This examination of Dennett’s book applies these lessons to the word, “meme”.

Here is a picture.

0201 The message?  The meme exemplifies cultural evolution.

The presence?  The meme embodies neural selection.

The meaning?  A scientific image of the word, “meme”, should overlay what is going on in my mind, that is, the manifest image.  My consciousness is an user-end illusion produced by the message and the presence of cultural and neural selection.

0202 My thanks to the author.  This well-documented work conveys that impression that inquiry into memes may account for the evolution of the human mind.  Whether this impression is productive or unproductive depends on how one defines the word, “meme”.