The Hard Problem — also Freud and Jung Semiotics

djhm March 6, 2011

Philosopher David Chalmers remarks that the confidence in the traditional scientific method “comes from the progress on the easy problems.” Over the past decade or so, Chalmers has argued that it is time to tackle what he famously calls the “Hard Problem”, notably to develop a rigorous, scientific theory of consciousness. Chalmers’ Hard Problem is Hard to tackle because its requirements are antithetical to the very essence of the scientific method. The objectivity of the scientific method demands that only the object data be under consideration. All reference and interactions with the knowing subject must be eliminated. Thus to turn the tables and make the knowing subject the object of scientific enquiry means that all data has disappeared. And thus the problem of knowing the subject, this entity without data, becomes indeed a very “Hard Problem”.

As we have sketched in the book, this kind of problem has a long history, going back to Aristotle who saw it as the problem of developing the First Science, which he called the First Philosophy. Kant raised the ante in his time, calling for a science that didn’t rely on any a priori experience. Kant called such a science, metaphysics. In modern times, we now see it presented as the challenge of understanding consciousness badged as the “Hard Problem”. Nothing has changed over the past few millennia; whether it is called metaphysics or the Hard Problem, the problem still remains distinctly difficult.

Chalmers’ Hard Problem nomenclature raises possible objections. The emphasis on consciousness, as the last man standing, implies that traditional science has victoriously swept all before it, conquering practically everything in its way and has finally come to the final and last frontier to be conquered. Charmers offers no critique of the scientific method except that when it comes to consciousness it doesn’t work. This ignores the many foundational present day crises that riddle present day traditional science. What is needed is not just a science of consciousness but the noble, unifying science that Aristotle and so many others since have called for.

Having said this, we have no fundamental disagreement with what Chalmers has been saying. He is just presenting the scenario in terms of the measured language of Analytic Philosophy. He has considered all of the armaments and munitions at our disposal, inspected the terrain and has reported back to base. Despite all the equipment we possess and may develop in the future, it appears starkly apparent that there is absolutely no way we can win the battle. Game over.

Chalmers’ message is clear. If you want to win the war, you will have to start from scratch. You need an entirely different scientific methodology.

This, of course, is precisely our message. In order to start getting traction we have illustrated our thinking by using the biological brain as a metaphor for the required epistemological framework to do the job, the epistemological brain. The traditional sciences are what we call the left side sciences and correspond to the left hemisphere of our epistemological brain: reductionist, analytic, abstract, and obsessed with raw data. To resolve the Hard Problem we need another kind of science, the unifying right side science, the one that mysteriously operates out of the right hemisphere of our conveniently confected epistemological brain. In employing this pseudo-biological terminology, we take the same convenient path as Chalmers and effectively rebadge the ancient metaphysics problem as an organisational problem of mind. One could be tempted to say that it is a brain problem but, other than sounding a bit crass, the epistemological brain we are constructing is more based on a metaphor than sticky grey matter.

Thus, to resolve Chalmers’ Hard Problem, we are faced with the challenge of developing the right side science. Using the biological brain as a metaphor, this requires understanding right side reasoning, a totally different kind of reasoning from left side reductionism.

We have a fair idea of how linear, reductionist left side reasoning works. The student can start off with elementary logic, truth tables, Venn diagrams and so on as an introduction to symbolic logic. The abstract exercise can be combined with practical applications, so that at least some semblance of contact with the real world is inferred. This is all part of the Easy Problem.

What is the corresponding right side way of reasoning? We have already provided a preliminary response to this question in previous sections. Right side reasoning works with oppositions. The only way to understand something is in opposition to something else. In left side reasoning, it suffices to give a label to something in order to get a conceptual handle on it. What’s more, as general linguist Ferdinand de Saussure pointed out, the label can be completely arbitrary. This is first order semantics in action; labelling technology. This does not work for right side reasoning. Arbitrary labelling is not allowed. Ferdinand de Saussure stayed clear of the Hard Problem and stayed at home on the left side, the easy side.

Unlike left side rationality, labels form an integral part of right side reasoning and do so in an incredible way. However, that most exciting and positively overwhelming part of the story must wait until the later part of this work.

For the moment, we must work in a label free world. Rather than say “Let A be such-and-such, consider A”, our first examples were based on oppositions of cardinality, the opposition between One and Many. This is not the most fundamental opposition. It is too simplistic. However, the One-Many opposition is useful for an introduction. We then introduced a second opposition, another version of the same One-Many opposition. The second opposition was opposed to the first. The first was assumed to apply spatially from left to right, the second from front to back, as shown in Figure 3.

Relativistic Relativity

Now here is the rub. Something has been cut into four with these left-right and front back cuts. However, what has been cut into four? Nothing is really being cut in this first application of the semiotic square. What is being established is simply a unique frame of reference from which to comprehend reality. We build this tennis court-like structure in the middle of the Cosmos and demand that the whole Cosmos gyrates around it. From this unique pedestal for viewing the world, we have a ready-made reference frame of what is left and right, as well as what is front and back. This is all set in the polarity convention shown in Figure 3. We have discovered the location and shape of the centre of the universe! In fact, it has the same shape as the centre of your universe.

Right side science must be simple and simplifying, whilst continuing to climb out of the trap of appearing simplistic. Granted, our square-shaped mind situated in the centre of the Cosmos might appear a little simplistic. However, the situation can be saved by this egotistical mind-sprite admitting that there might be other entities in the Cosmos that enjoy the same viewing rights as itself. In this less determined context, the centre of the Cosmos becomes not that entity but any entity whatsoever, the true centre of the universe. One might argue that maybe only one such entity has the necessary four-part brain to join in the fun. This would not be an impediment, provided the consciousness in question could imagine itself in the place of any one of the other mindless entities and would thus see that same thing as the mindless (that is, if it had a mind). However, even that requirement could be weakened because the single mind might lack the capability of imagining changing places with another. In that case, it would not matter, as long as the same result would have occurred if it had such a capability.

At this point, we pull the ripcord even though we have not finished the story. These little naïve adventures into right side reason can be like a voyage into insanity. The author thinks that such exercises may be beneficial for students as long as they do not rote learn anything. The benefit for the student is probably to wean them off a dependence on left side linear thinking and on to binomial thinking. It should be kept in mind that similar tortuous adventures can be entered into by, for example, simply explaining in words something like the clock paradox in the special theory of relativity. In applying the theory mathematically, the formal methodology works quite smoothly and effortlessly. Right side relativity, once endowed with its own formalism, a relativistic relativity rather than the classical, should also be smoother and effortless.

It is time to look at some more practical examples of semiotic wholes.

Semiotic Square of Freud

The intention here is to provide a gentle introduction to right side science via practical example of the semiotic square. The approach is informal and intuitive at this stage.The semiotic square is an informal way of understanding wholes. A whole is Totality looked at from a particular perspective. Any thinker contemplating reality in a fundamental, non-abstract way is lead to semiotic squares of some kind. We have already seen this with the case of Kiyosaki, the uneducated but “rich dad” who thought holistically about the rationale of generating cash-flow. Kiyosaki thus sneaked into the ranks of the great philosopher’s like Hegel. In fact, these ranks are full of anonymous autodidacts like Kiyosaki. Unlike Kiyosaki, Hegel was highly educated, but both these figures shared one thing: an aversion for abstract thought. Abstract thinking is left side thinking. Both Hegel and the entrepreneurial Kiyosaki emphasised right side thinking. They reasoned in terms of wholes. Wholes are not abstractions, as they include the subject. This is right side thinking. The abstract thinker gives way to the generic thinker, a much more powerful breed.

One can only think of the poor Bertrand Russel, one of the greatest analytic, left side thinkers trying to understand Hegel, a great right side thinker. Trying to understand the right side with left side thinking technology? The atomist trying to understand monism? That is really a Hard Problem, as Russell freely admitted.

With the exception of Kiyosaki’s quadrant, the semiotic square examples have so far been concerned with the rarefied environment of the highly non-qualified. Understanding entities, which are practically devoid of any qualifying specificity, presents quite a challenge. A practical path to understanding is via the theological interpretation. This has many advantages as the entities are often seen as divinities that naturally spring into life in one way or another. The figures may be adorned in myth and shrouded in icons, which can be confusing. At the same time, every myth, every icon is the product of various people’s deep intuitions and wisdom accumulated across the ages. The author believes that a desirable part of modern education should be to impart the skill of being able to read and interpret these icons, myths, legends and sacred texts. This is not to debunk them, but to revel in them. The necessary skills can come from even an elementary mastery of semiotic analysis of the kind presented here.

The whole examined in this section is more qualified than the theological variety. Instead of subject as the impersonal self, with all of its theological overtones, we are going to consider subject as personal self. We are going to consider the human mind from the perspective of psychology. What is the basic generic architecture of the psyche? Our response will be in the form of Freud’s semiotic square interpreted from a viewpoint somewhat like that of Freud’s student, Jung, Once again we will start from scratch.We start with the left right divide of reality as conceived by modern present day science. Modern science splits the Cosmos into two sides. On the left side can be found objects which are completely untainted by subjectivity of any kind. The Cosmos itself is sometimes referred to in hushed and hallowed tones as the Laboratory. In between the objectified objects on the left side and the other side of the laboratory is a glass wall. On the right side of the glass wall is the observing subject. This subject is not like any ordinary subject as he is the Supreme Scientist, beyond and above all other. The Scientist, sometimes represented iconically as being dressed in an impeccably white dustcoat, a sure sign of divine objectivity, is completely fair, dispassionate and unbiased in any way. This means that he is devoid of any determined viewpoint or favoured perspective. The Scientist is endowed with the unique ability of being able to see everything from literally nowhere. He has the God’s eye view. These characteristics form the essential ingredients for being the Supreme Scientist, Lord of the objective universe.

Ordinary, everyday, scientists that have to work for a living aspire to emulate the Supreme Scientist and obtain his God’s eye view. Frustratingly, they never quite achieve their objective. Some scientists are so impressed that they take on the Supreme Scientist as their personal god. Like George Berkeley, they believe that you cannot have a Spectacle without an omnipotent Spectator, and that even applies to the lonely tree on a hill spectacle. Other scientists are completely unaware or refuse to embrace the existence of any scientist more clever than themselves. These are the atheists who spend all their time on the Left Side and parasitically enjoy the fruits they find there.Once again, we have made a literary excursion into the realm of the great left right dichotomy. It paves the way to looking at the great left right cleavage of the biological brain used as a metaphor for understanding the personal Self.

The relationship between the personal Self and the impersonal Self has been a long discussed topic. Advaita Vedanta provides the most elaborate accounts where the impersonal Self (Brahman) and the personal self (Atman) are considered as non-dual. Advaita non-duality is a more subtle way of saying that they are indistinguishable but different whilst being identical and distinguishable. For our immediate needs, it suffices to say that they share the same structure with the personal Self simply being a more determined version of the impersonal Self. The extra determination comes about via introducing a second cut of reality with the personal Self occupying the front and the rest of reality, the personalised objects relative to the personal Self, taking up the rear as shown in Figure 5.

As can be seen, the semiotic square illustrates the human psyche, the Self, can be understood in terms of the triad of psychoanalytic terms, the Ego, Id (the “It), and the Super Ego.

Carl Jung, one of Freud’s students, claimed that the right hemisphere of the brain was the “religious” side, an observation that has already become tantalising more evident as we have been advancing. The Freudian semiotic square is essentially what Jung described as a One-plus-Three structure. He remarked that these structures underlie most religions. This is in agreement with the theological semiotic structures that we have examined in previous sections. We wish to push the envelope further and demonstrate how any structure, treated holistically will present in a One-plus-Three format. Thus, instead of explaining Freud’s’ Ego, Id and Super Ego in strictly psychoanalytic terms, we will take a more generic approach.

In the next section, we add in the semiotic square for a holistic system that is easy to understand, a political democracy.

Figure 5 Freud’s semiotic square of the personal Self in the form of the human Psychic Self.

Political Psychology and Psychological Politics

gure 6 Two semiotic squares with a generically common ground but different figures

The material in this section is probably better suited for discussion in a tutorial situation with a small group of students. It involves an exercise in lateral thinking across several semiotic squares. The importance here is to have some fun as well as perhaps getting a deeper understanding, without actually learning anything in particular. Our fascination is in the generic shape of knowledge and less in specific content.

Figure 6 shows two semiotic squares, the Freudian square and one for parliamentary democracy. To avoid any diplomatic incidents, the democratic square has been grounded in Australian democracy, hence the flag. Freud’s square has been grounded in the psyche of a person of undetermined nationality. We will now spend a few moments explaining the democratic square as a subterfuge for explaining Freud: the author knows only a little about Freudian psychology. Like most people, he knows more about democracy and particularly how it works in his home country.

Side note:

As the author started to fill in the details of the left side of the square, as reported below, he inexorably slid into a mode of thinking that he can only describe as Zinovievian (but without the talent!). The world starts to take on a Yawning Heights (Zinoviev, 1979) character. Despite having read most of Alexandr Zinoviev, he is not really an influence, but represents rather a syndrome. It is a kind of disease, except you don’t know who has got it.. Describing left side reality from a right side perspective seems to be the catalyst.

One way of explaining the democratic square is to exploit a few Buddhist insights. This turns our subterfuge into a double subterfuge, but it can shorten a long story. Besides, everyone likes Buddhism.

Take Parliament for instance. From a Buddhist perspective, Parliament can be thought of as the house of suffering. All suffering ends up here. The house is full of suffering because of the craving. Craving stems from the Cravers down below in the bottom left side slot. The role of Parliament is to try to appease the Cravers, which presents a perennially difficult problem; hence, the suffering and angst.

Parliamentarians publically refer to the Cravers as Voters, which gives the impression that somehow the Cravers control Parliament by voting for it. Nothing could be further from the truth. Voting is compulsory in Australia. The main reason people vote is to avoid a fine and so have more money to spend on their cravings. However, sometimes they will vote for a Parliamentarian who seems to identify with their particular craving. In private, Parliamentarians refer to the Cravers as the “It.” The word “It” might refer to the Electorate, but more commonly, the word is used generically. Those clever enough to translate the word into German and creatively back into English might end up referring to the Cravers as the Id.

The Id is a teeming mass of opposing desires. Down-river irrigationalists confront up-river cotton farmers. Talk back radio Shock Jocks inflame the airways, railing against the boat people arriving on shore. Indigenous people writhe in the consequences stemming from when the forbears of the Shock Jocks arrived in boats on what used to be their shores. Greenies battle against loggers. Every complex, every syndrome imaginable will be found here amongst the craving Id.

That completes this little section on the left side of the Freudian psyche, written in Zinovievian mode. Coming over to the right side of the Freud square, the desire to write in Zinovievian mode vanishes. Actually, it feels a little bleak on this side as all we have is the Self in the frontal lobe and a thing called the Super Ego equipped with some powerful jurisdictional and moralising capability. There also seems to be some law enforcement capability as well. Super Ego seems to be full of lawyers and law enforcement officers.

Although we could pursue this topic at length, that is not on the agenda. So far, we have developed some experience in semiotic analysis and hopefully had some fun. The author has used these informal semiotic forms of analysis over many years in his profession developing software systems and computer languages.

Key Phrases: Semiotic square, genetic code, generic code, DNA, start codon, left right hemispheres, the divided brain, epistemology, anti-mathematics, masculine, feminine, gender differentiation, Generic Science, Consciousness, the Hard Problem.

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Dialectics, Theology, and Opposition Based Reason

djhm March 3, 2011

Right Side Reasoning is based on Oppositions

Left side reasoning is what we associate with the traditional sciences, including mathematics. The reasoning flows sequentially from premise to conclusion via intermediary steps. Every step in the process involves a proposition of some kind, be it simple, modal, a predicate or whatever. The reasoning involves a flow of logical steps. A mathematical proof, for example, presents itself as such a flow.

In the West, we have becomes so accustomed to this way of thinking that we refuse to countenance the possibility of any other kind of formalism of reason. Our task is to demonstrate the contrary. Orthogonal to sequential reasoning of left side thinking is a non-sequential form of reasoning. We call it right side reason. Instead of thinking in terms of sequences of single units of rationality, right side reasoning takes the path of Heraclitus and expresses itself in terms of binary oppositions.

The atomism of left side logic can involve complex propositions being formed from the sequential concatenation of simple propositions. On the right side, the equivalent to the compound proposition is the compound opposition. There we find oppositions between oppositions. The simplest such compound structure is the semiotic square.

Non trivial aspects of left side reasoning can be taught at an elementary age. The student can be introduced to the propositional calculus including the concept of negation, disjunction and conjunction, for example. Venn diagrams can also be used as an aid to an intuitive understanding. Right side reasoning should also provide its own gentle introduction. The semiotic square is the first artifice along the road to understanding. Understanding this artifice requires many practical examples. At all times, it must be stressed that right side reasoning cannot be an abstraction. Abstractions always leave something out of the picture. In right side reasoning, the entity is investigated as a whole. The semiotic square, composed of two opposing oppositions encapsulates the whole. The whole can be thought of as Totality viewed from a particular perspective. The perspective forms an integral part of the resulting whole. The semiotic square and its dialectic is a simple tool for understanding these concepts.

The Dialectic of the One and the Many

The semiotic square can be used to analyse a particular kind of whole. In this case, the basic oppositions are deconstructed from the whole. Deconstruction is the right side equivalent of analysis. The approach can also be constructive, starting from a primary opposition; a generic whole can be constructed. This latter approach will be illustrated here. First, we look for a fundamental opposition to work with.

There are many fundamental oppositions. The most fundamental of all oppositions is the masculine-feminine gender principle of ancient pre-Socratic times. This will be considered in later chapters. Here we choose a rather more tangible opposition, that between the Many and the One. We remark, in passing, that this Many-One opposition can be thought of as a simplistic version of the masculine-feminine opposition, and so paves the way towards understanding the more advanced concept.The cardinality Many-One opposition can be considered as a dichotomy that divides reality into two. On the left side, there are the Many, on the right side there is the One. These two different realities can also be seen as the one and the same. The two realms are a consequence of the two possible takes on reality, the left side atomist take and the right side monist take. One sees an exploding multiplicity; the other sees an all-embracing unity.

This Many-One opposition provides the left-right cut for our semiotic square. The next cut is the split into the front and back. Cutting a long story short, this cut can be made by reapplying the same Many-One opposition to itself. The One side goes on the front and the Many takes up the rear. The reasoning here is that any One can be many, any Many one and there can be many Many. Last of all, there must be one One. Having exhausted all possibilities, we end up with the semiotic square in Figure 3. This is the semiotic square of the Cosmos as a whole when viewed from the perspective of its cardinalities.

The end result is that this semiotic square demonstrates not two different takes on reality, but four. There are four completely different ways to conceive reality. Such a mind-boggling vision has not gone unnoticed across the ages. Corralled by the emergence of the written word, formalised in canonised texts, different ethnic and geographical regions have coalesced around one or the other of these great doctrinal viewpoints. Each gave birth to its own world religion. There are four such world religions

Godhead Semiotics

Left side sciences rely on abstraction, the “view from nowhere”, the God’s eye view. It could be said that right side science takes the “godhead view.” It sees the world from four different vantage points. What interests us now is that each of the four different takes elaborated in the Many-One semiotic square spells out the central tenant of a world religion.

The fundamental question of theology can be asked. What is the relationship between the One and the Multiple? As can be seen from the semiotic square, there are four answers. Each is discussed below.

Figure 3 The Theological Brain. A semiotic square for the four takes on reality based on cardinality oppositions.

The One is Multiple (Judeo-Christianity)

The One is Multiple formula defines Providence, the giving, creator god. In the Judeo-Christianity, the individual roaming amongst the Multiple is showered on by the Benefactor on high. The loving god, the greatest giver, even sacrificed his own son for the redemption of the often egotistical individualists massing below. The One is Multiple doctrine emphasises free will and the temporality of the individual. Exercising free will is inexplicably concerned with temporality. The Judeo-Christian God is essentially temporal in nature. Christ is sometimes interpreted as the Lord of Universal History. The culture is very conscious of its history. God manifests through history. This is a temporal God.

Being a left side religion, the emphasis is on belief. The pious should believe in this god. It is possible, but not advisable, to disbelieve.

The Multiple is One (Islam)

In the Islamic take on reality, the tables are turned. God does not give to the masses; the masses must give to god. Islam is literally the doctrine of surrendering to god. The Judeo-Christian individual gives way to the collectivist convictions of the peoples of Islam. Gone are the historico-temporal preoccupations of the first paradigm. Enter spatiality. If Christ is the Lord of Universal History, Allah is the Emperor of Space. It is spatiality of Allah than unites the Multiple into Oneness. Allah is truly the Greatest because he is everywhere, with no exception. Mecca is the iconic centre of all spatiality dictating the spatial direction of the praying, emphasising the spatial unity of all and the spatial, all-embracing nature of Allah himself.

Islam is a right side religion and so is not based on a belief system. No Muslim believes in Allah. “There is no god”, declares the Koran. To believe in Allah would be to admit the possibility of not believing in him, a sacrilege. Situated on the right side of rationality, belief gives way to faith. Allah is the god that Muslims have faith in. “There is no god, except god,” states the Koran. Lose your faith and you lose your god. You cannot disbelieve something of which you do not have any inkling. The only way to have any inkling of Allah is to have faith in Allah. Allah walks the tautological line.

The Multiple is Multiple (Buddhism)

The Multiple is Multiple paradigm underlies Buddhism. The One has no place in this worldview soaked in Multiplicity. Each religion has its favourite icon. The iconic Buddha says many things. It radiates well-being, but what is so captivating is that famous ironic smile. The author’s strongest Buddhist image is of a lawn covered square in a Bangkok primary school. Each side of the square features a row of identical Buddhas, all looking across to the other side; multiple to multiple from left to right, multiple to multiple from front to back. Student desks were also arrayed under the awnings around the square. What an incredibly idyllic place to start school!

This Multiplicity doctrine is a left side religion, like the Judeo-Christian, and so is belief based. People believe in Buddhism. The problem is that, unlike its theist front side neighbour, there is not anything specific to believe in. All is multiplicity, there is no One. This is the belief. Working this into a tractable religion requires the work of someone of considerable intellectual agility. Hence, that ironic smile….

The One is One (Hinduism)

Advaita Vedanta is the core philosophical school of Hinduism and teaches the principle of non-duality. Ignoring the fine print, ultimately only the One is real. Apparent multiplicity is subjective and illusory. Advaita Vedanta articulates a non-compromising monism. The Western mind is reminded of Parmenides who took a similar monist position.

This Hindu doctrine is situated well and truly on the right side of the theological semiotic square and so, like Islam, is not belief based. According to Advaita Vedanta, the truth of the doctrine is obtainable via pure enlightenment. For Shankara, the founder of Advaita Vedanta, you do not believe in the oneness of the One. By enlightenment, you simply know.

The Theological Square of Squares

The theological semiotic square provides a way of understanding the four world religions and how they relate to each other. Every religion has its own semiotic square and so there are semiotic squares within the semiotic square. Take Hinduism for example. The One in the One-is-One doctrine is the Brahman, the impersonal god that cannot be worshipped directly. The Brahman can be comprehended in the form of a triad of personal gods consisting of Shiva, Vishnu, and Brahma. This leads to the semiotic square in Figure where Vishnu occupies the same front top slot as did the Christ god and Shiva occupying the same back left slot as Allah. Brahma, who is rarely worshiped takes up the Buddhist slot. Theologians warn that this is an error. The Christ god and Vishnu are quite different as are Shiva and Allah.

One way of formalising this difference is via a semiotic square of semiotic squares where each of the four squares is located in the respective slot of the first semiotic square. We will not pursue the details of such structure here. However, a good example of such structure can be found in the signs of the zodiac where there is interplay between figure and ground, the twelve signs and the twelve houses.

At this point the reader might be wondering what has become of the topic of conversation. Basically, we are exploring elementary cognitive or generic structures and their interplay with reality.

The theological semiotic square has provided a way of understanding a holistic view of reality and that are four fundamental “takes” on reality. These four worldview paradigms are mirrored in the four world religions

Key Phrases: Semiotic square, genetic code, generic code, DNA, start codon, left right hemispheres, the divided brain, epistemology, anti-mathematics, masculine, feminine, gender differentiation, Generic Science, Semiotic structure

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Mantra: Were the Stoics Right Hemisphere Dominant ?

djhm February 28, 2011

This is just a fragment posted to Stoics mailing list:
Mantra
A mantra usually refers to a verbal repetitive chant. This is particularly therapeutic for the left hemisphere of the brain. The left hemisphere is the side that characterises modern Western thinking and the sciences. This is where you find the angst. It specialises in abstract, symbolic, analytical thinking. The angst comes from the alienation of the abstract to anything substantial. The right hemisphere specialises in the creative, dominated by context, concerning itself with the whole.

Apparently, at any particular time, one hemisphere will be dominant. Empirical studies have shown that, in humans, the hemispheres switch from being dominant every ninety minutes. Repetitive reciting of a mantra is a good way to switch over to the right side. The left hemisphere is comforted by the mantra, gets bored, and falls asleep, leaving the right side, in a mild meditative state to contemplate the whole.

In Hellenistic times there was a dichotomy in philosophical outlook: The Epicureans on one side faced off against the Stoics on the other. The Epicureans were left side thinkers and precursors to the analytical, atomistic, amoral, dualism that characterises Western thought today. The Stoics were right brained thinkers, monist, rationalist moralist and holistic. They also sketched out the framework for a unique, unifying science. Over two thousand years later, it is up to us to complete their long neglected project.

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Mantra: The Stoics were Right Hemisphere Thinkers

djhm February 28, 2011

In Hellenistic times there was a dichotomy is philosophical outlook: The Epicureans on one side faced off against the Stoics on the other. The Epicureans were left side thinkers and precursors to the analytical, atomistic, amoral, dualism that characterises Western thought today. The Stoics were right brained thinkers, monist, rationalist moralist and holistic. They also sketched out the framework for a unique, unifying science. Over two thousand years later, it is up to us to complete their long neglected project.

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Semiotic Square and the Shape of Mind

djhm February 18, 2011

The farmyard hen’s left-brain is connected to its right eye, the right brain to the left. There is no partial sharing of retina connections across the hemispheres as in humans. When foraging for that allusive grain of wheat, the hen will use its left brained right eye to focus in and seek it out. For awareness of its environment, it relies on its right brained left eye. The hen will check out possible threats, menaces and escape routes with the right brained eye, even if this requires cocking the head right around to the other side. The opposite applies for finding the noodle in the haystack, in which case it will use its left brained right eye. The farmyard hen carries around two worldviews, one in each side of its cranium, two worlds and one hen reality. The two worldviews are interchangeable by just a cock of the head. Is this farmyard chook more epistemologically aware than present day science?

For the author, the subject matter towards the end of this section provokes a personal feeling of profound wonder. However, if we are not careful, this wonder can be lost in the technical detail. This can particularly be the case if the reader focuses in with left side analytic reasoning where so often, the finger points to the stars and the narrowed mind merely stares incredulously at the finger. The subject matter can only be fully understood from a right side perspective, the awareness side of consciousness. Without awareness, there can be no wonder and no deep comprehension, the sharpness of focus can be a distraction.

To bring this subject onto centre stage, as a full-blown science requires a certain kind of mathematics, this will be covered elsewhere. In the meantime, we can make do with some elementary apparatus accessible to any mind curious enough to go along with the flow. The kind of reasoning is not traditional reductionist, analytic reasoning of the ordinary sciences. Such reasoning is an “open loop” form of thinking that necessarily involves labels and meaningless symbols. Allocating arbitrary names and symbols to things is a shaky start in the search for the deeper truths.

We have been referring to this kind of thinking as left side. What interests us is right side thinking. Right side reasoning is closed loop thinking where concepts are expressed in the form of oppositions and oppositions between oppositions. Some call this dialectical reasoning but no one has yet succeeded in formalising such reasoning. This is one of our objectives. The basic ideal of such reasoning is that everything is determined and understood in reference to something else, something that it clearly and absolutely is not. The opposition, the dichotomy, express such references. The semantics of object is lost without a present subject and so this leads to the fundamental opposition between subject and object, each giving meaning to each other.

We paint the picture with broad brushstrokes. However, even before the brushstrokes there comes the canvas. The canvas has four corners and is sufficient for an artist to paint a whole picture. So far, we have looked at a number of wholes and found that, as a whole, they can be painted on a four-cornered canvas. In previous sections, we saw that the “rich dad” Kiyosaki painted his cashflow quadrant on his four-cornered canvas. We saw that Freud accomplishes the same thing for the architecture of the psyche. We discussed the functioning of Freud’s mechanism by talking about another semiotic canvas, parliamentary democracy; to demonstrate that by talking about one thing you can be really talking about another, a favourite pastime of artistic expression. As an attempt at some dangerous semiological acrobatics, we talked obliquely about the personal psyche in terms of the political psyche with a dose of Buddhist philosophical semiotics thrown in. It appears that we have stumbled on the universal language of the artist, a language that can talk across the board. Rather than just describe the scene, we can describe the canvas, the common ground for any painting. It also provides the elements for a common universal language that can operate across the board.

The canvas can be understood in the form of a semiotic square that encapsulates the two kinds of subject with the two corresponding worlds of objects. This semiotic structure is based on the opposition of two oppositions. The first opposition, termed the left right opposition, was seen as that between the impersonal subject on the right and the impersonalised objects on the left. Empirical scientists dreams of this dichotomy where a pure, dispassionate, non-entangled subject surveys a non-disturbed world of object-ve objects. Such a subject has the highly sought after “view from nowhere”, the God’s eye view, the holy grail of empirical science, the unachievable dream. This was the first understanding of what constitutes a whole, an amorphous mass of objects together with the necessary but totally undetermined impersonal subject.

In order not to be stranded in the domain of the unachievable dream, a second kind of subject must enter the scene, the real world, determined subject, the personal subject. This leads to a second opposition that we referred to as the second dichotomous cut across the canvas, the front back opposition. In the frontal lobes resides the epistemological domain of the personal subject. The rear is the epistemological domain of the other side of the whole, all that is not personal subject. This is the personalised object domain. The result is a canvas cut up into four regions. These regions are not spatial divisions. One could say that they represent epistemological regions describing the four aspects of a whole, any whole. This is ground zero. We have considered a number of examples already that share ground zero. The content has changed but the ground has been constant throughout.

A natural question is to ascertain where ground zero is located. It all depends on where the personal subject is located, and that can be literally anywhere. Everyone possesses his own ground zero. It is usually located somewhere in the region between the ears and behind the eyes. This is your own personal canvas for picturing the universe. Functioning correctly, it will be aligned with the impersonal version. It is split into left and right sides that in turn are split into front and back. This, in itself can be an immense source of wonder. However, we have not yet finished with the technicalities.

The generic ground for any entity taken as a whole can be understood in terms of the semiotic square. The square is generated from an opposition applied to itself. We have already interpreted this opposition in a number of ways. There was the opposition between subject and object. Another version was the opposition between the One and the Multiple. The most fundamental version of the opposition is that conveyed by ontological gender, the opposition between the masculine and the feminine. Gender will be revisited in more detail and precision later. Here we simply consider the masculine feminine opposition as involving a more generic opposition than the cardinality opposition between the determined One and undetermined Many. Gender is not limited to cardinality and goes right across the board from the quantitative to the qualitative. In all cases, the masculine appears as the determined singularity, that which is determined as singularity. The masculine is the only certainty in the equation. The feminine, on the other hand, is a totally unknown quantity. The best way to understand the feminine, albeit from the masculine viewpoint, is that it is a total wildcard. And this is the key. There is nothing wrong about knowing nothing about something as long as that is certitude. Here we find the Socratic confession of ignorance as the lynchpin of a whole algebra of the Cosmos! The ignorance is encapsulated in the feminine wildcard. The absolute certitude of knowledge that this wild card is a wild card is encapsulated in the masculine. The singularity of absolute certitude meets absolute uncertainty. This is the ultimate Principle of Uncertainty. What ‘s more, it provides the two letters capable of coding the whole Cosmos, any Cosmos.

We still have not come to the author’s object of wonder, but we are slowly moving in that direction.

The Four Letters of Antiquity

The above material will be revisited at a more leisurely pace in later sections. What we wish to retain here is the notion of a two-lettered generic alphabet. Intuitively we can say that these letters are M for masculine and F for feminine. These letters have semantic implications. The two letters have meaning as has been explained above. For example, the feminine F is the wildcard and is totally devoid of determined meaning, which, when you think about it, is really loaded in meaning. In a recent seminar given by the author, apparently a woman in the audience was taking notes and wrote down the letter F and then the word “wildcard” followed by a string of exclamation marks. So F seems to have meaning of some kind!!!

The physics of pre-Socratic times and later the physics of the Stoics were founded on the theory of the four elements, sometimes called the four letters. According to the Stoics, two of the four elements were masculine and two feminine. The Stoics were not innovators in this domain and seemed to have just adopted the older versions of the science from previous generations with little modification. In addition to the masculine feminine opposition, the Stoics also include a second opposition based on the Active and the Passive principles. The way we interpret it, the gender opposition is the primary impersonal opposition and fits the left-right polarity convention. The Active Passive opposition can be interpreted also as a gender opposition like the first. However, this time it involves the personal version, the one corresponding to the front-back polarity convention. The Active corresponds to the personal masculine (the personal singular subject) and the Passive to the personal feminine (the personal non-singular). The four ancient elements, similar to those mentioned in other cultures such as those on the Indian subcontinent, were water, earth, air and fire.

Figure 11 shows the four elements together with the Stoic qualia and the pure gender versions. Heraclitus associated Fire, the doubly singular MM element, with Zeus. Note that Earth, the doubly non-qualified element is a kind of “double wildcard.” As a substance, Earth would have to be interpreted as devoid of any specificity whatsoever. It is pure “stuff”. In this F and M algebra, the F can be replaced with a question mark. The other three elements do possess specificity, but only relative to subject. Water with the specificity FM has for its only specificity the singularity of the personal subject. Air with the specificity MF has for its only specificity the singularity of the impersonal subject. Fire, on the other hand, being MM enjoys both the specificity of both personal and impersonal subject.

In the light of the above, it does not take too much imagination to realise that this ancient way of reasoning about the substantiality of reality is non-trivial and, in fact, very profound. Keep in mind that this is not abstract thinking that is involved here; it is thinking of a different kind, what we call generic thinking. For several millennia, this brand of thinking made up the dominant scientific view. This generic kind of science has been totally eclipsed by the dominance of the abstract sciences of the last few centuries. The generic science perspective has fallen in such disarray that it has become a source of ridicule. “Four elements! Everyone knows nowadays that there are at least 96 elements.” The thinking of thousands of years of the greatest minds of the times has become an object of scorn and derision. It is time to reverse the tables.

Figure 11 Table showing the four ancient elements, the Stoic qualia for the elements and the pure generic gender algebra version.

The Generic Square

The physics of the ancient world was not based on empirical left side thinking but rather an intuitive version of an embryonic right side science. In later sections, we will endeavour to reconstruct the ancient science and move it to a more rigorous and potentially formal footing. Of fundamental importance is the concept of gender, the most fundamental of any ontological principle. At present, we are content with an intuitive understanding of the concept. Figure 12 shows how gender coding can be used to provide the elementary algebraic expression of the ancient four elements. The table includes an additional column that describes how the same gender coding codes the genetic code. It is a relatively simple exercise to actually determine the exact match between the genetic code and the gender coding. Suffice to say that there are so many constraints to the puzzle that only one combination stands out. We do not go into these details here.

Figure 12 The ancient four-letter code can be understood in terms of the gender code. So can the generic code.

The Genetic Code viewed Left and Right Side

The gender code mapping to the four bases C,A,U, and G of the genetic code as shown in Figure 12, is incomprehensible from a left side science perspective. Implicit in the gender coding is a right side science of language. Before going down that track, it is worthwhile considering the genetic code as seen in the optic of traditional left side science. The left side linguistic theory of the genetic code is quite elementary and predictable. Basically, the genetic code is seen as a simple transcription language. This is in accordance with standard left side concept of the binary relationship between the signified and the signifier. The sign and the signifier are assumed to be the one and the same. Language thus presents in the standard way outlined by Ferdinand de Saussure. First as a sequence of signifiers and secondly as a sequence of entities signified. The relationship between the signifier and the signified is considered as completely arbitrary. In human everyday languages, this means that the actual sounds, the phonemes, are devoid of any meaning. For example, the three phonemes making up the words C-A-T are considered arbitrary and have no meaning. It is only the morpheme CAT that signifies something. Three arbitrary markers, taken together have come to signify a cat.

The left side view of the genetic code is along the same lines. The signifiers in this case are the four bases A,U,G, and C. True to the left side paradigm, these bases are considered to have no meaning, they are just markers. The equivalent to a morpheme in the case of the genetic code is the codon. A codon is a triplet of any combination of the four bases, three signifiers per morpheme. The codon is considered to have meaning because it signifies something. As we know, in most cases it signifies one of the twenty basic amino acids that make up proteins. Three of them, the “stop” codons act as punctuation marks signifying the end of a genetic sequence. One of them, the AUG “start” codon, also acts as a punctuation mark, signifying the start of a genetic sequence. If situated in the middle of a genetic sequence, it signifies an amino acid, methionine in this case.

We pause for a moment and give left side science its due. To arrive at the present day understanding of the genetic code is an incredible achievement and well worthy of a Nobel Prize or two. However, after the dust has settled, there comes a time when deeper questions come to the surface. Some of these questions are quite simple. Why do all creatures, ranging from the smallest microbe, the smallest streak of slime, right up to humans, all use the very same code and the very same coding? Even very specifically, why do they all use the very same start codon? If all life were a product of evolution, then surely the genetic code would also be a product of evolution. However, the evidence points to it as never changing and never have being in a state of change. Right at the beginning of life, there was the Code. Why didn’t the genetic code evolve? Where is the survival of the fittest code? Where does the genetic code come from? Why this particular code and this particular coding? Does this code precede life?

Even more importantly, we ask the question as to whether the genetic code can be reverse engineered. This is the problem taken in this book: Determine how to reverse engineer the genetic code. Our approach will be to attempt the reverse engineer a generic code which is capable of coding, not just the visibly animate, but anything whatsoever in a rational reality.

Asking the above questions, posing them to the left side dominant scientific thinker, inevitably results in being confronted by incredulity or shear blankness. From the left side perspective, the situation is in hand. The genetic code has been “cracked.” How the genetic coding transcribes the building planks of life has been revealed. All of these ontological questions of where it came from and why it works the way it does, lies outside the scope of science. The role of science is to describe, not to explain.

The Full and the Half Paradigm

There are two takes on reality. One is a full take and the other a half take. Left side science is based on the half take. It appears that the biological brain is similarly inclined. Thus, before investigating the scientific ramifications and avoiding any abstract musings, we look at the personality traits and competencies of the human brain when operating on a single hemisphere. What is the difference between the take of the left brain operating alone from the take of the right brain acting alone?

When only the left hemisphere is effectively operational, the subject suffers from “hemi-neglect”, as McGilchrist explains.

Because the concern of the left hemisphere is with the right half of the world only, the left half of the body, and everything lying in the left part of the visual field, fails to materialise … So extreme can this phenomenon be that the sufferer may fail to acknowledge the existence of anyone standing to his left, the left half of the face of a clock, or the left page of a newspaper or book, and will even neglect to wash, shave or dress the left half of the body, sometimes going so far as to deny that it exists at all. This is despite the fact that there is nothing at all wrong with the primary visual system: the problem is not due to blindness as ordinarily understood. If one temporarily disables the left hemisphere of such an individual through transcranial magnetic stimulation, the neglect improves, suggesting that the problem following right-hemisphere stroke is due to release of the unopposed action of the left hemisphere. But you do not get the mirror-image of the neglect phenomenon after a left-hemisphere stroke, because in that case the still-functioning right hemisphere supplies a whole body, and a whole world, to the sufferer. (McGilchrist, 2009)

Hemi-neglect is a characteristic of left side thinking, whether it be the biological brain or the scientific mind. The left side is aware of only one half of reality, whereas the right side must be aware of its domain of specialisation and the other side as well. After all, its specialisation is in terms of whole wholes, not half wholes.

Hemi-neglect runs right across the left side sciences. It always manifests itself in a binary way of thinking. We have already seen this in logic where left side reasoning is based on the Law of the Excluded Middle. Something is either true or false. Analytic Philosophy is full of it. The Mind Body, the imaginary and the real dualities are pet pre-occupations. When it comes down to linguistics and semiotics there will usually be two versions. One will be the left side version and is always dualistic. For example, the left side perspective on the nature of the sign is expressed by Ferdinand de Saussure as a dyadic opposition between signifier and signified as illustrated in Figure 13. Right side thinking employs a second opposition leading to a semiotic square with one “real” component determined by a triad.

Figure 13 Left side semiotics is dyadic; right side (Peirce) is triadic.

The Tower of Babel

And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do; and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. (Genesis)

This is where we come to our point of wonder. The first wondrous aspect of the reality we live in is that it can be understood in terms of a single unique language formed from four letters. This was the dominant concept running through ancient civilisations, right into medieval times. The concept gains new impetus with the discovery of the genetic code. The concept will return to central stage with the development of our understanding of the generic code, the unique code underlying all reality, not just the animate. This four-lettered code, describes every cell in our bodies. Every cell has a copy of the same code.

The central theme of this book is that this genetic code, this generic code is the language of wholes. As such, it is the natural language of Mind, the mind conscious of itself as a whole.

However, it appears only one half of mind, the right side, is based on the thinking in wholes and the corresponding 4-letter generic code. Here we come to the second theme of the book. We assert that the left side is not based on this four-letter alphabet. Rather than four letters, it only uses two, the two letters on the left as illustrated in Figure 14.

The right side thinks in terms of wholes and needs the full four letters of the generic code. However, the letters C and G relate to the Singular and the Universal. They express the requirement that the One must be One and the Multiple must be One. These are regulatory requirements. Such a mechanism can be restrictive. Like the free market economist who abhors legislation and regulation of the marketplace, left side reasoning dispenses with such travesties against individual freedoms. It becomes open loop and tries to go it alone. It doesn’t need any Cosmic Reason to figure out what should be done. It just needs a notepad of rules and a belief in Providence. Totally unaware of the guiding hand of the right side, an incomprehensible entity at best, the left side thinks that it is master of the world.

Figure 14 The generic mind: The right side is conscious of the whole. The left side has dispensed with the regulating machinery of the right side and has become open loop, relying on learnt rules. It has dispensed with the generic code and speaks the local patois. Faster, agile, and focused, the left side is unaware (Genesis) that the right side even exists, sometimes to its own peril.

All Rights Reserved. @copyright Douglas J. H. Moore 2011 Phrases: Semiotic square, genetic code, generic code, DNA, start codon, left right hemispheres, the divided brain, epistemology, anti-mathematics, masculine, feminine, gender differentiation, Generic Science, Semiotic structure

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