On particulars and Universals

In the moment, what time scale are we in?

Is this even a reasonable question? For reasons that appear hidden, the nature of the particular and its composition from elements of the universal has been a subject of inquiry in all civilizations and in all times. The current time is not an exception.

The consequences of the investigation, in our times, results in almost every type of belief system and in every form of our science, in what ever system of science one inspects. In all cases, we find incompleteness and often inconsistencies. In some cases, the science is merely incorrect. The Resilience Project asserts that computer science has regarded itself as dealing with absolute universals, and as a consequence from this assertion is absent an ability to solve data-non-interoperability issues. Many other concerns are addressed very well. Many of those concerns that are addressed well have huge economic and cultural value.

Iterative measurement of social reality even on a day-to-day basis is not easy accommodated either by the current information technology or the business processes that are developed on top of the adopted system by business processes of computer science. Response to novelty in real time is virtually excluded by the bureaucratization of natural processes involved in healthy decision-making.

As in string theory, there may be more than one conceptual system that accounts well for the phenomenon that manifest in the various scales of physical, biological and social activities. Non-translatability separates any one of these “systems” from each other. One can have the position that non-translatability has something to do with a failure to find the set of universals that apply to everything. On the other hand, one may take the position that human knowledge always has an illusionary nature, and then very timidly suggest that non-translatability between human conceptual systems has a non-removable truth. The paradox in this timid statement escapes no one’s attention.

In the language of systems theory, we may say that the expression of ontology in time is or appears to be fractal in nature. What this means in pure mathematics is precise in works on scholars like Mandelbrot. [1] What it means to me is that the particular is attempting to expression in the patterns that have formed at slow time scales, and is being required to make that expression with patterns expressed in the fast times scales. The particular is sandwiched between universals at two different scales of expression.

Lines of affordance form and create an event horizon with the present moment appearing to be in the center.

The Way of the Shaman is lived by a few. The Shaman most often live in a way that isolates him or her self from the large social complexes, for reason that have to do with the nature of our current social world.

Toltec, Maya, Navaho and Hopi are all deeply influenced by a way of being that focuses on the present moment and often only allows the social complexity a controlled presence in awareness. The Shaman must push the current social complexity away, as it is far to foreign to the natural ways of the old culture.

In the current social reality it is perhaps useful to talk about the singular coherence as being the system that produces advertising, television programming, and the educational curriculum. This singular coherence appears to have a type of immune system that pushes the Shaman out even further into a separation and into isolation.

The separation of the Shaman from the singular coherence can provide an clear perception of the nature of the modern world; the effects of advertising and the patterns of consumption of the natural world.

Note sent January 29^th à [382]

January 30^th reply from NSF à [383]

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[1] Mandelbrot, B. B. Fractals: Form, Chance, & Dimension. San Francisco, CA: W. H. Freeman, 1977.

Mandelbrot, B. B. The Fractal Geometry of Nature. New York: W. H. Freeman, 1983.