18 November, 2022

A Revolutionary Understanding



Lenin was very critical of Positivism


The major Wrong Turning at the beginning of the 20th Century within Physics (and then the other Sciences), was undoubtedly that taken by the Positivists, who were troubled by the increasing number of solely Empirical Laws arising within Modern Physics, which seemingly had no evident Physical Causes naturally available - as had always been the case with the usually historically-sought Causal laws. The advantage with those Prior Laws, was that they could be related to the involved componentsí Natural Properties, that also clearly held sway all the way from the Atomic & Molecular Level, to their performances in Bulk at a higher Level of Reality. So, in addition to any purely Quantitative Relations extracted, there was also always this Qualitative Information: so, together, they married Quantity & Quality into two-sided, Meaningful Laws! 

But, those New sort of relations, also emerging, though they involved similar numerical relations between certain evident variables, clearly DID NOT & COULD NOT ever relate these to any Qualitative relations, to, together, deliver meaningful Explanations of Real phenomena.

Now, before we go any further, we simply must make absolutely clear that the now usually achieved Totally Separate Quantitative & Qualitative Equations as such delivered NO PERFECT standard to mutually relate to! And, this inadequacy became a far more general attitude to behaviours well outside The Sciences too!

Once accepted as legitimate, ALL LAWS covering much wider areas of Reality also were acceptable as mere Quantative Relations having NO Qualitative Explanations!

And this was highly dangerous, for what effects they produced were seemingly Unknowable!

And they were only finally possible as Mankind developed the means to largely Control Limited Areas of Reality, extremely effectively, and, thereafter maintain that situation throughout subsequent variations within the Main Components, that would have to be clearly associated with certain actually consequent changes: and if these were then extracted as Laws they could effectively be used - BUT ONLY in Artificial Tightly-Controlled Production Methods.

That became their primary motivation!

For more genereally evident Quantitative & Qualitatative Relations were NOT there simultaneously available! And so NO Explanations were possible

You would imagine that the growth of The Sciences would simultaneously greatly enable Mankind in Explaining their World: BUT the Pluralist limitations caused by those tightly restricted conditions made it so the relations that they were limited to DID NOT reflect Reality-as-is, and was linked to Numeric Values rather than Explanations! And, it, inexhorably, began to move Human Society from merely taking Reality, exactly AS IT IS, to instead having to be able to direct, small parts of it into very useful chosen (and more-and-more-often), Entirely New Directions. 

The age of advanced technology effectively killed Science.

It wasnít so much a Revelation of Reality-as-is, as it was a ìNew Extracted and Totally-Controllable More-Limited Versionî, capable of empowering the Manufacture (but NOT the Understanding) of useful, artificially extracted & Transformed Additions - both as clean & unadulterated, as were most of the wholly Natural & Different Productions, independent of Man, within Reality-as-is!

Indeed, the New approach embodied a Veritable Revolution in the Capabilities and the assumptions of Mankind in order to achieve ONLY that & no other. But, it also originally explained Absolutely Nothing! For, it was situated only within a Parallel Artificial Domain, which was initially, at best, much more useful than it was informative.

But, Mankind saw, at least, the possibility of it delivering a great deal more, if, and only if, it could be married to its evident Properties with roughly-appreciated from already-known (for many Natural Phenomena) and their inter-relationships. But the two were only separately known. 




Of course, these ideas emerged as such, ONLY within the Working People of Society: for NO progress could possibly be made by those who didnít actually DO any such work! So, the initial gains were always made by the Artisans and their descendent Engineers and Experimentalists - the most skilled pragmatic workers in Society - whose knowledge of making things was Wholly Pragmatic, rather than Explanatory.

Now, simultaneously with these crucial developments, a very different Social Class had politically taken control of their individual Localities, (often by Force), and, thereafter, convinced the Populations which they now controlled, that they alone were ALSO both Capable Defenders of their now-subsevient charges, and were also absolutely necessary to stop even-worse-others (from elsewhere) taking away all that was now being achieved, and doing it by viscious-looting Force, and even killing any who got in their way, when they thought it necessary.

Now, such consequent internal social divisions, were never conducive to the increasing requirement for a real Understanding of what was currently actually being both pursued & achieved, and, by which the overall Level of Understanding AND Achievement could be extended.

Somehow, the false paths, and even the consequent wrong conclusions imposed by all the participators within so far experienced History, just had to be somehow transcended, if the many usual prematurely-terminated outcomes were to be avoided.

But, it, unavoidably, had to eliminate the usual consequences of a very poorly understood, and consequently always deteriorating situation, especially as the Ruling Classes (and their many privileged hangers-on), constantly used their limited Control to actually prevent the Real-if-hidden Truth being both considered and then developed effectively!

How are we to convince ordinary people of the Real Truth of the situation, when as individuals it will always be impossible, within such a situation, where every usual means of informing them, of what is possible, has been well-and-truly tightly controlled for centuries, if not actually millennia, by the Ruling Classís generally agreed self-centered means of dealing with all such features, while ALWAYS maintaining their CONTROL!

The consequently-developed route unavoidably-achieved, came to be via Wholly New Political Parties, along with Jointly-agreed actions, based solely upon their Own Class! But, those benefitting mostly from the current situations, would, in any Generally-Precipitated Crisis Situation, always turn to the much wilder, more direct Forms of Repression, such as Fascism & even naked Military Control of Society.

So, the best hope surely now, has to be to equip the Real Class Forces of Change to take maximum advantage of the Coming Inevitable Terminal Crises, by knowlegibly revealing the predictable Result, if the Forces of Reaction within the battle for The Minds AND The Forces necessary to impose their preferred outcome. As always, a union of The Working class Youth and the latest Marxist Theory - as spelled out, for exanple, in this Major Series of Essays, can be the only salvation.

But beware of false Prophets!

It is also very clear that the Stance fought for in these papers is neither complete, nor does it have sufficient Forces to achieve the Necessary Objective of providing what will be needed, to direct that Assault! Alliances with currently existing and tolerated organisations clearly presently, does the Very Opposite, and ALWAYS also undermines the only valid means of understanding the current Headlong Deterioration!

It IS NEVER mere Organisation that will equip the Necessary Forces of Social Revolution, BUT ONLY a genuine UNDERSTANDING of what drives such situations.

Not Alliances, but Understanding! 




And, currently, absolutely NONE of the current Claimed-to-be Left Parties have added significantly to the contributions of Karl Marx - the unavoidable limitations of a philosophic stance initially derived almost 200 years ago, will NEVER be sufficient to address TODAY!

That is why this research was begun, some 16 years ago, following an active participation in literally ALL the Parties of the LEFT, but also an increasingly a commitment to the essential Development of Marxism via the Sole attempt at a Dialectical Critique of both Social Development, and its inevitable Turning Points within Social Revolution.

BUT, and it turns out to be a very big BUT: the necessity of Theory involved which can NEVER EVER be developed by a single individual! It is far too big a risk to be the work of only a single contribution, as was clearly proved by the example of Marx himself!

Though the gains I have been able to contribute, have at least been significant, they have been so in spite of over 60 years commitment, which has NEVER been sufficient! And, in spite of my most productive contributions being in the last 16 years, amounting to over 1,600 papers, it has only been in the last couple of years that the most significant contributions have been produced.

It isnít the job for a single individual (no matter how committed), for it is without doubt, an approach which not only transcends any single discipline: but, indeed, needs to be adequately developed, it requires them all - and not just produced by real interest, but also, necessarily, by the required methods to breakthrough all the many constraints, implemented to simplify analyses!

For example, it has been the inclusion of the major discoveries in Systems Theory, by Biologist Denis Noble and others, that has for the first time also addressed several limitations in the ways Marxism has regularly pursued ever since - and including, Marx himself!

Now, this project, along with a series of others, has put into serious question, NOT just these type of problems, though also upon a much wider scale, in which the Whole set of ways that problems can occur - both in Reality-at-large, AND in the whole range involving both natural and consequent engineered problems, concerned with Explaining all that we now also see, as well as the full range of situations both now possible and also as newly evident, achievable Objectives in delivering what they all can do. For, in the past, a set of assumptions about what makes things the way that they are, have MOST CERTAINLY greatly over-simplified our Understanding.

The perceived basic (and invariably inadequately described) situations, have, almost always been believed to be those possible States - that some Natural, or even Man-Made Action or Event can actually exist within!

Indeed, on-going-investigations are always revealing New Forms, which could-and-often-did actually persuade Artisans that their objectives were impossible: especially as ìprecisely-knowingî the current state turns out to be never a simple task, as so many interactions frequently produce results that ìlook unchangedî and are in fact actually significantly-different, in a way which is not immediately evident.

Remember that Artisans have long established required conditions for certain processes WITHOUT a full theoretical basis for them, & their Laws reflect curtailed & severely limited Equations only!

The usual solution was always to so-greatly-restrict both the Context and Controllable Content, as to always produce a single, easily reproducible State, that could validly be considered One of the Many Basic States possible, which would always be taken as a legitimate extraction from all of the others known to be possible in that Context! For such always was the Primary Objective, as a starting point, in all Manufacturing - as the dependable Basis for all Subsequent Productions.

But that doesnít help us Understand complex, dynamic, Natural Systems - including those of Society itself. 



The Odessa Steps


The separately arrived at properties in Reality-as-is DO NOT just ADD UP - they DO NOT deliver the Full Set of possibilities. They are a Strictly Limited Set, selected for by the particularly severe constraints that had been imposed in order to extract them in the first place.

For the objective was NOT, and, indeed, was never intended to enable an Explanation of the subsequent performance, BUT, instead, only those required for Future Production of a Chosen Result.

And these two sets of conditions produce Very Different Possibilities!

The ones always chosen are just those with ONLY a Future Production in mind! Indeed, that objective is the ONLY One usually fulfilled: the whole Approach is solely directed towards Production, and NEVER Explanation!

And the Conclusions from this are that our assumptions are certainly NOT sufficient! Reality-as-is contains many other cases we are unaware of, and, they also affect one another, which would greatly complicate the then required processes yet to be implemented.

So, they donít even try!

So-called Physics is NOT what it is claimed to be: it is a SYSTEM for controlling Reality, solely designed to aid Production. 





The Required Revolutionary New Stance

Clearly, we have been well-schooled, in this Wrong Turning, for a very long historical period, and for what always were Very Good Reasons indeed!

You would not criticise a child for not dancing before it could even walk - NOR understand what you were saying before they could even talk!

There have been profound and unavoidable Purely Natural Reasons for the necessary route we have taken, which, if we are Now (and Subsequently) to avoid at least some of the consequent pitfalls, in our future updates upon our methods.

For, the problem emerges entirely from our distorted - yet completely understandable, Early Misconceptions of the True Nature-of-Things!

For, we, ourselves, actually also developed from a Whole Series of Lesser Forms, and many earlier solutions, within our then Primitive Thinking, only had to be close enough to Reality-as-is, to deliver an improved, and hence worthwhile, benefit! This, anyway, has always been the situation for Mankind: for settling upon the ìSupposed Truthî, long before anybody even had the required means to do so absolutely, or even partially! So, it NEVER delivers the required complete-and-wholly-correct Truth as its evidently, arrived-at conclusions.

Let us attempt to address this problem better NOW!

We will still NOT yet arrive at the Complete Truth (for it doesnít yet even ìexistî), BUT, we can eliminate just a few obvious very long-standing ìsupposed truthsî as now completely evident as errors.

The daddy of them all is the belief that The Truth is FIXED!

It isnít.

Indeed, Absolutely Nothing is!

But, it can certainly appear so in stable Systems, for some considerable periods of time, because even with apparently constant random variation, Really Significant Changes will only emerge when that ìseemingly undirected variationî, somehow, finally arrives, surprisingly, and at a Much Better State - and, thereafter, vigorously proliferates the New Form fast!

BUT NO External Judgement of Quality was necessary in this crucial transformation: its own increasing relative success, alone confers that by itself.

This is something like Darwinís notion of Natural Selection, but extending that to all Levels of Reality - all Natural Systems.

So to us, at our Level, , most things either continue to appear Fixed, or in ìGetting-Nowhere Randomnessî seemingly permanently! But, that isnít actually The Full Truth.

Yet, appreciating this, still doesnít indicate, in advance, exactly what Laws are going to emerge. On the contrary, to ensure Current Success, you simply always have to be maximally aware of what Laws seem, ìfor nowî, to be Fixed! But, the scientists who do ONLY that, will unavoidably be caught into getting nowhere, when suddenly a New Law finally does emerge!

So, instead of ONLY Subject-Based-Research: there, surely, has to be also Constant Background Research probing-deeply into the very important Dynamic Development of Laws.

A Final Aspect of this whole Approach, when generally-applied, concerns how the various well-established Laws, being unavoidably radically challenged by this Current Stance, occupied by almost Everybody Else with the argument that it most closely reflects what has been continuing to significantly Change. Laws that were usually considered as Forever Fixed now are more correctly seen as involving Whole Mixtures of Laws, most usually swamped by one that had previously emerged as totally naturally dominant.

This is a rarely appreciated feature of Reality-as-is, which is usually simplified into that which is currently dominant, so when circumstances begin to greatly amplify another element, it seems to have come in from outside of the System, whereas it was always a built-in, though currently suppressed, aspect of Reality-as-is that was therefore always totally hidden and ineffective previously, but in non-conducive condutions. It is clearly an important philosophic feature that was naturally, if mistakenly, assumed as such in the past.

For with the Long Established view determined by both tailored and rigidly maintained Fixed Sets of Contents, along with unchanging Contexts - they are all separately dealt with - each in its own required Context and Content, the resulting Laws, are then coupled with sets of another, Absolutely NEVER arrived-at in a Commonly occurring Situation - and in a Production always applied as part of a sequential Series, with each step in its own ideally necessary and maintained different Context.

So, clearly, that will constitute a wholly Artificial Union, and will never suffice if they were all applied in a singular Common Context - which is, of course, certainly mainly the case in Reality-as-is!





In Conclusion

So, in finnaly assessing what has ultimately been achieved, we must draw some general conclusions, primarily about the most important areas tackled in these essays.

The key objectives were always to deliberately target the absolutely necessary Philosophical Developments, which are particularly difficult when no longer addressing Restricted Contents & Contexts, as we always do in Mathematics: but, instead, approach the Real World-as-is - much of which still remains not only yet to be revealed, but also Explained in any way!

And, that, Iím afraid, is much easier said than done: for an Extremely Important Ser of Reasons:

Reality-as-is is NOT already fixed!

Neither does it change within limits!

It is an Evolutionary System - forever developing to the Wholly New!

So, they were here addressed hopefully to transform the underlying assumptions unavoidably-associated with the usually involved important Ideas and Methods, upon which our current Theories are always based.

But, unlike most Explanations that only ever deliver within Constrained Rationalities (like Mathematics), what we have to deal with is absolutely NEVER finished: for it creates the Wholly New regularly (if infrequently) and requires, instead, an Open-Ended System, integrating the Totally New, BUT also never as an Anything Taken-up Collection. It also has to fit!

But, in doing so, it adds more to have to relate predictably with every new addition! So, it involves a Rationality, which grows, amd though preserving the old, it also adds-in, an affecting, yet mostly conforming, NEW!

How about that for a truly demanding Discipline!? 




This article is taken from Issue 79 of the SHAPE Journal, and is the last in the series of papers called The Systems Theory of Everything.



Issue 79 - The Systems Theory of Everything VI

Read Issue 79 of SHAPE Journal


The last in this series of papers on Jim Schofield's Systems Theory deals with how science needs to move on from a mechanistic understanding of systems and evolution, and finally embrace dialectics.

Contents:

Introducing Schofield’s Systems Theory

Natural Multi-Factor Interactions

Dialectical Materialist Evolution

Addendum: Emergence and Randomness; Order out of Chaos?

Systems Structures & Top-Down Causalities

A Revolutionary Understanding

The Need for a New Approach to Theory in General