The Head-Up, Non-Specialist, Theoretical approach?

The Necessary Role of Philosophy in Science

On reading a collection of short articles under the general title of The Unknown Genome in New Scientist (2765), I realised that I had perhaps hit pay-dirt with regard to my own ideas on the possible policing of genetic materials within all organisms.

I found, in this series, substantial evidential support for some of the hypotheses I have been formulating about this area, particularly in the maintenance and policing of the genetic material (though, of course, my considerations were, perhaps surprisingly, almost wholly philosophical).

NOTE: A fuller discussion of the content of the above mentioned series in New Scientist will be addressed in a separate paper on completion of this one.

I am no professional biologist, and I must depend wholly on those who are, for the content that I must attempt to make sense of. So, I hadn’t arrived at my suggestions via personally-newly discovered concrete evidence, but, on the contrary, solely in response to my dissatisfaction with the usual consensus explanations of Mutation and Species Change, and involving possible alternative accounts of my own.

The usual explanations were much too hit and miss, and as is usually the case, often latched onto the ubiquitous use of Randomness to “explain” everything!

No, I was convinced that Life would immediately and vigorously react to mutation damage to its absolutely vital genetic materials, and hence, apart from Natural Selection of the adult phenotype, other processes would occur within the genotype to remove, alleviate, or “wrap-up” and store any genetic damage, which, by some set of criteria was labelled as wholly deleterious.

I must admit that while I am not a biologist, I have always been very interested in all aspects of the subject, and have followed developments closely. I have never been taught the subject at any level, and my experimental experience was, and still is, is precisely NIL.

But I am by no means un-informed. I have been reading extensively on this subject for over 40 years, not to mention on many other very wide-ranging areas, and was indeed extensively educated as a scientist and mathematician, prior to changing my specialisms several times, and even achieving a professorial appointment in one of these latter areas.

So, what is it that I must have been doing to now attempt to integrate such state of the art discoveries into my own propositions?

The resonance between what these real biologists were finding and my suggestions as to what I considered were necessary processes have been surprisingly close. The usual response to such a person as myself making any worthwhile contribution at all on such a specialist subject is universally agreed to be of minimal value.

But such a reaction is not always justified.

And this same situation has occurred several times for me in widely different disciplines. It has even occurred within my legitimate disciplines of Physics and Mathematics, because I was “making judgements well outside my specialist areas”. More expected similar responses have been coming my way in many other areas from Painting and Sculpture to even Dance at one extreme to Geology, Politics and Pedagogy on another. Yet, though such condemnations would usually be correct, they will not always be so. It will depend on how such a wide range of subjects are considered by the outside interloper.

It will most certainly depend on his ground! In other words it will be basically determined by how that person deals with knowledge and understanding from disparate areas: it will depend on his worldview.

Specialisation does indeed allow a remarkable focus to be achieved and discoveries to be made. It is, of course, essential for each and every serious area of study. But it is also invariably what I term a Head-Down approach. It limits the considerations of the expert to his/her own narrow area. And it must be contrasted with a Head-Up approach, which builds its worldview out of the widest possible Knowledge and Understanding.

It should really be the approach of the philosopher, but even there it is rarely the normal mode.

All problems, no matter what the specialism, will not be solved by concentrating only within that specialism. Indeed, along with the accumulated wisdom of that specialism, such a limitation will also justify and firmly embed in addition its current assumptions and errors. Many practitioners will never see the wood for the trees. And a generalist approach can, and sometimes does, reveal things invisible to the Head-Down expert.

A real philosopher MUST be multi-discipline, if he/she is to benefit from human gains across the board in understanding the World. All understanding is, of course, social, but it is also multi-discipline. Even the greatest specialist experts show almost unbelievable errors in their generalist thinking.

It is almost universally true that all specialists make rubbish philosophers. And they also cannot switch disciplines and produce as good work thereafter as they did in their own prior area.

To give an exemplar of this which may establish my own approach, I will relate the experience of my major diversion into Dance!

I have become the leading author of Multimedia Resources for the Teaching of Dance (along with an excellent Dance specialist colleague). And this situation was established some 21 years ago, and has remained the case ever since. In addition I also designed a teaching aid for Dance Teachers employing Rudolf Laban’s ideas in their area, and related to his famous Labanotation – the world-wide employed method for recording Dance. 

In that very different world, I became an expert in Computer Systems and Programming, not only producing that high point of systems design – a machine independent compiler, but finally achieved a post as Director of Information Technology in one of the colleges of the University of London. I had received zero instruction in computing also.

But, I was always a Head-Up philosopher, and every discipline was relevant to that! Recently I have been making significant contributions in the Theory of Emergences, as applied to the Origin of Life on Earth and to its subsequent Evolution.

Have I any right to tackle such problems? Many would tender an emphatic, “No!”, but they would also be mistaken.

In the last five years I have again changed course and spent all my time writing about Philosophy and now run an online Journal (SHAPE) concerned with Philosophy and it is full of new and legitimate ideas.

Now, at this point, the reader may well be yawning at “my efforts to show how clever I am”, but they would be mistaken if they are. I am, and purport to be no genius.

I got a lower second in Physics from Leeds University, and was throughout my education damned with the faint praise of “promising”. No, my descriptions of what I do are not to establish any sort of superiority, but, on the contrary, to reveal an approach that enables me to address such a very wide area of disciplines and to do something worthwhile in every one. It is because I am, and always have been, multi-discipline in my interests. NO! “Interests” is much too weak a word. I should have said “concerns”.

And though much of conventional education is to tell us HOW things happen, I always wanted to know WHY they happened the way that they did. 

AND I demanded (of myself) a philosophy that could face all ways, and cope with all expectations. After all, what is the use of a philosophy that is strictly limited to a specific discipline – as, for example, the current consensus in Sub-Atomic Physics – the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Theory and its various developments.

Not only should my philosophy be entirely general, but it should never be only an academic subject. 

As Robert Pirsig tried to insist in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Philosophy is for every day! It should illuminate your life and purposes, and it should never be second hand!

Though you may, and indeed frequently have to, take on what you learn from others, you must never be converted “hook, line and sinker” for most of what you “take on” as your position, you will not fully understand if you do.

But, if, on the other hand, what you learn from others must be integrate-able with what you already understand, it will be very different. It may be difficult to achieve such integration, but without it, you really have nothing new to take on.

What you have learnt cannot actually mean anything!

Of course, if your “core” is constant and immutable, you will also be in deep trouble! Integration is a two-way process, and its successful achievement changes the receiving “core”, and frequently the new material too. Indeed, the greatest understanding comes only from transcending what appears to be unbridgeable contradictions between what you already understand and what you are trying to integrate.

The reason for such an impasse is always that your usually-inviolate assumptions are incorrect, and the only way to traverse the seeming full-stop is by a radical change in those assumptions.

I have recently been fascinated by Evolution and have even written a paper entitled Truly Natural Selection, which generalised Darwin and Wallace’s Natural Selection to apply also to non-living, purely-chemical processes by means of a very different selection process.

My Theory of Emergences tackles the trajectory of Emergence Events such as the Origin of Life on Earth, NOT particularly, of course, but generally as a revolutionary interlude in the on-going Evolution of Reality. It concerns itself with the form or shape of the episode – its turnovers and consequent phases until there is some sort of resolution in the establishment of a wholly New Level.

What has therefore emerged is extremely surprising!

The assumption that minor constructive processes prior to such an Event actually precipitate a whole new Level determined by the direction of those prior processes is shown to be totally INCORRECT! The nature of the new Level does NOT emanate from changes in the prior Level at all. The only thing that within-Level processes can produce is a catastrophic collapse of the prior system, and that is very different indeed from the usual assumption. 

Indeed, it is ONLY the Second Law of Thermodynamics type sub-processes that bring about the demise of every Stable Level.

The first phase in an Emergence is the opposite of anything emerging: it is composed of a catastrophic collapse of the prior stability, which then seems to be hurling headlong down to total chaos.

But it doesn’t!

The dismantling of the stability-ensuring processes within the previous Level, plus its history and still-remaining, productive-process content, allows new things to occur, which within the stable Level were prohibited, and a brief period of remarkably diverse and numerous processes leads, by a selective process to the creation of entirely-new proto-systems. Nevertheless, these quickly generate their own Second Law curtailing, and this leads into a period of oscillations between creation and dissolution, which nevertheless gradually ascends to a point where a completely new and self-maintaining Level is established and PERSISTS!

It is no empty myth, when legend talks of the Phoenix arising from the flames of destruction.

That is the ONLY way that the wholly NEW can ever emerge!

The real myth is that which asserts that innovation can be achieved by small quantitative and incremental steps - it cannot.

Now, interestingly, my work on Emergences naturally progressed to seeing what their role must be in the actual Evolution of Life, and many questions immediately arose about our universally agreed assumptions of how new species emerged, and also how matter ascended from inert particles to produce Life, Humankind and indeed Consciousness. The incrementalist myth would just NOT suffice, for such a remarkable trajectory, and all our basic assumptions had to be thoroughly investigated.

My work in this area (remember I am NOT a biologist) has recently been confirmed by a whole series of unconnected discoveries by real experimental research biologists in the various academic Journals and Magazines.

The point of this paper is NOT self-congratulation, but instead to try to reveal why an ordinary man from a poor working-class background (my grandmother could neither read nor write) could be in a position to make such significant contributions.

It HAS to be important, and though it may dismay the elitists and the privileged, it should encourage all who really want to understand the World, rather than merely join-the-club, accept the consensus, and live comfortably.

But, the barriers to doing it are indeed considerable, I must admit! Such researches are MORE than a full time job and you have to earn your living.

I chose, and luckily it was the correct choice, to be a teacher, and have taught at every level of Education from lower schools to Universities. But to get anywhere I had to move fairly frequently. I had eight posts culminating in my Directorship at Goldsmiths’ College, and always tackling new things. 

At Goldsmiths’ I devised and commissioned the first Campus-wide Fibre-Optic Network in any of the Colleges of London University, while in Glasgow I had to turn myself into a systems expert to set up an appropriate teaching-orientated computer network and system for an educational institution at the highest level, and also to become an expert in Computers-in-Control to help many researchers with their chosen questions.

The thing is to tackle what needs doing, and learn as you go. Nevertheless, you do not have to have a goal from the start. It expands with each new job and the challenges they deliver. I seemed to arrive at a professorial level final post by a totally unplanned route. (Though I often spent very long periods in a given post, because the job demanded it).

But, what does happen is that as your achievements are your own, and never facilitated by contacts and influence, you gain in both reputation and confidence.

From an initially shy working class boy from West Gorton, Manchester, I am now a confident philosopher! How about YOU?

Thinking Randomly

The Inevitable Dead End of Pluralist Science

I am about to tackle a whole special issue of New Scientist (3012) on Random Chance (contributed by several different science writers). Now, I have, for some time, rejected purely formal investigations into physical phenomena, as being solely about Abstract Form, and, therefore, concentrating only upon description, rather than the actual physical causes of the natural happenings. Indeed, I have demonstrated that the seeming coherence of formal equations is more about the consistency in the parallel World of Pure Form alone (which I term Ideality) rather than being about the true nature of, and causes within, Reality itself.

Clearly, there are, indeed, some real situations in which physical reasons for a random-like outcome are also valid. But, both kinds came to be seen as the same – when they are most certainly NOT! Indeed the two get swapped around completely, as with The Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Theory, randomness is promoted from being a mere consequence of multiple opposing causes, to itself becoming the cause!

Thus, as the preparation for this may be a massive undertaking, I feel it necessary to prepare for all the usual tricks. And, as I have learned from similar situations in the past, I prepare by consciously laying out my current stance, so that I will be adequately prepared to register precisely where the two approaches begin to diverge significantly. In this preparation, we must, of course, start where the two approaches actually coincide – where physical reasons result in a situation best seen as completely random. And then, thereafter, trace out the diverging paths (and consequent assumptions) from that mutually agreed situation.

We must also, of course, make clear the differing assumptions and principles of the two approaches. They are categorised by the very different principles of Holism and Plurality, which turn out to be the grounds for the two alternative approaches.

Holism sees Reality as one composed of multiple, mutually-affecting factors; while Plurality sees such factors as separate and eternal Laws.

The distinctions turn out to cause the two alternatives to lead off in entirely different directions, because there is no doubt that such complex situations have contributions from all involved factors. All phenomena, in one way or another, are results of many different factors acting simultaneously.

The crux of the problem is whether that joint causality is merely a SUM of independent, unchanging factors, OR the result of all the acting factors being changed by presence of all the others, and delivering a result, which then cannot be explained in the same way at all.

For, the pluralist approach, where phenomena are mere complications of unchanging natural laws, assumes that explanations can be arrived at by extracting each of those involved, one-at-a-time, until all the laws involved have been identified.

Whereas, from the Holist stance, that conclusion is seen as a pragmatic method of deriving simplified and idealised “laws” via experiment, while, in contrast, Holism would have, somehow, to see how all the various factors involved are modified by their context – that is all the other factors, and the same will be true for each and every one of the rest.

Now, the pluralist view does approximate reality very well in carefully isolated, filtered and controlled situations, so, needless-to-say, that approach soon came to dominate our way of doing things. But it could never cope with certain results, the most significant being those occurring in qualitative developments, where wholly new features emerge, and most dramatically in what are termed Emergences (or in another parlance – Revolutions).

Plurality became the norm, for it could be made to be both predictable and very productive, as long as it occurred in stable situations (in both naturally stable situations, if available, or in purpose-built man-made stabilities).

Now, this coloured the whole level of discoveries arrived at with such a stance and method, and also unavoidably caused multiple areas of study to be separated out from one another, simply because causal connections between them were unavailable.

Reality-as-is was literally constantly being sub-divided into many specialisms, or even disciplines, which could not be made to cohere in any simple approach. And, as the required “missing-links” just proliferated, the gulfs between these separate, created areas of study grew ever larger – even though the belief was that, in time, these inexplicable gaps would finally be filled with explanations of the same type as within the known and explained areas, but not, as yet, discovered.

It amounted to cases of investigators “painting themselves into corners”, by following their primary principle – Plurality.

Now, such a trajectory was historically unavoidable, because the gains of such pluralistic science within their defined and maintained contexts were so successful and employable in effective use.
Naturally and pragmatically, Mankind moved as swiftly as possible, where they could, and the flowering of this effective, pluralistic stance was, of course, Technology. But, such approaches could never address the really big questions. And, of course, both understanding and development were replaced by increasing complexity and specialisation.

So, quite clearly, such a mechanistic conception could never cope with the emergence of the entirely new, which were always described as particularly involved complexities, yet never explained as such.

Now, to return to the supposed “common ground”, this was interpreted as a complex, multi-factor situation, in which opposing contributions tended to "cancel out”, and the result was a situation best described as one in which random chance predominated. And, of course, such could indeed be true, in certain situations – for example in an enclosed volume of mixed gases, you could derive both temperature and pressure by assuming a situation of random movements and collisions.

But, such required it to be a continuing and stable overall situation. If the gases were reacting with one another, and other substances were present, and reacting too, then the persistence of that stability might not reign very long.

As always, such an assumption was invariably a simplification and an idealisation of the given situation.

Now, such situations were frequently adhered to, as stabilities are the rule in most circumstances, so such ideas can be used with a measure of confidence, BUT, whenever any development began to occur, such a stance could never deliver any reasons why things behaved as they did.

In Sub Atomic Physics, for example, as investigations penetrated ever deeper into Reality, problems began to occur with increasing frequency. The discovery of the Quantum became the final straw! 

For, in that area, phenomena occurred which blew apart prior fundamental assumptions about the nature of Reality at that level, and, for example, what had always been considered to be fundamental particles, could seem to be acting like extended Waves. Yet, with the smallest of interventions these could immediately revert back to acting as particles again. These phenomena were deemed to be beyond explanation, and what was used instead of the usual explanations, was the mathematics of random chance, not merely about a given position, but significantly about the probabilities of it being in each of a comprehensive set of positions (presumably relating to a wave) when they reverted back to particles again.

The formalisms of waves were used in this very different and illegitimate context. At the same time, physical explanations were dumped completely. The only reliable means of predicting things was in the probability mathematics developed originally for Randomness.

Now, the question arises - what do the Copenhagenists think they are doing with this new position?

First, they have NO explanations as to why it happens the way that it does.

Second, they deal only in Forms – equations and relations! Do they consider these to be causes?

Well, maybe you have guessed their position. They have no adequate answers, and hide behind the known physically-existing random situations (as described earlier), and say that their equations have exactly the same validity as those. Not so! For, this researcher has managed to explain all the anomalies of the Double Slit Experiments merely by adding a universal substrate into the situation. You don’t (as the Copenhagenists insist) need their idealist “interpretation” at all.

But, nevertheless, a great deal more still remains to be done. If the real problem is the incorrect Principle of Plurality, and the only possible alternative is the Principle of Holism, then we are still a very long way from a comprehensive explanation of natural phenomena from this stance.

The whole edifice of current Science (and not just the current problems in Sub Atomic Physics) is undoubtedly based upon flawed assumptions - not only in how things are explained, but also in Method. It is exactly how we do all our experiments!

To change track will be an enormous undertaking, and a look at the current state of “a Holist Science”, reveals that almost nothing has yet been achieved. Honourable exceptions, such as work by Darwin, Wallace and Miller are simply not enough to fully re-establish Science upon a coherent, consistent and comprehensive basis, for that will be an enormous task. But, there is a way!

First, we carry on with the current pluralist methods, BUT no longer stick to the pluralist principle as correctly describing the nature of Reality. It becomes a pragmatic method only. We can use it both to reveal the contents of a situation and to actually organise productive use, BUT we must abandon the myth of eternal Natural Laws revealed by those methods. We must accept that what we can extract in pluralist experiments are NOT “Laws”, but actually approximations confined to the particular imposed conditions, in which such were extracted.

Second, we must begin to devise and implement a new paradigm for scientific experiments. Stanley Miller’s famous experiments into the early stages in the Origin of Life, and Yves Couder’s “Walkers” experiments, clearly show two valid routes.

But, most important of all, scientists must become competent Philosophers!

Pragmatism and positivist philosophical stances are just too damaging. A clear, consistent and developed Materialism must be returned to, but it can no longer be the old Mechanical version.

We must learn the lessons of Hegel, and actively seek the Dichotomous Pairs that indicate conclusively that we have gone astray, and thereafter, via his dialectical investigations into premises, recast our mistaken assumptions and principles to transcend our own limitations, at each and every guaranteed impasse.

The main problem in Holist Science is the fact of the many, mutually-affecting factors in literally all situations in Reality-as-is. Plurality validated the farming of experimental Domains to simplify such situations, and in doing so cut down the affecting contributions either to a single one, or to one that was evidently dominant. So, with repeated experiments with different target relations, such investigations delivered, NOT Reality-as-is, but a simplified and idealised set up, with a recognition of the factors involved, but with each one, in a particular Domain, presenting a version, which could also be replicated to allow effective use of the idealised form extracted. But, the whole series of different tailor-made Domains, each with one of the factors as target, also delivered a list of the factors involved.

Pragmatically, each could be used effectively to some required end, but the list, though each one was idealised, would as a full set, allow a theorist to attempt an explanation of what was seen in the unfettered and natural “Reality-as-is” Though achieved using pluralist methods, and hence distorting each factor, a Holist theoretician could use that list in a very different way.

It was, after all, what had been the situation in the past including BOTH views, that had been the usual way of doing things, before Wave/Particle Duality and the Copenhagen stance had brought that to an end.

Yet, of course, the new stance was not the same as before. For now, plurality was just a pragmatic trick, and the real Science was in Holist explanations.

The pluralist mistake of assuming eternal Natural Laws, which produced all phenomena merely by different summations, was no longer allowed. And the belief in Natural Laws was replaced by an acceptance that all extracted laws would not only be approximations for limited circumstances, but would also and inevitably at some point produce contradictory concepts, and that only by unearthing the premises that had produced these, and changing them for something better, would the produced impasse be transcended, and further theoretical development made

The Holist scientist did not deal in supposedly eternal Natural Laws, but factors that were indeed effectible by their contexts. So, this new breed made the investigation of how factors were indeed changed by their contexts, and were always prepared to directly address major impasses when they arose.

Now, there are different ways of doing this sort of Science. In this theorist’s re-design of Miller’s Experiment, he realised that the provision of inactive pathways within the apparatus would facilitate certain interactions and their sequencing. So, a series of versions of the experiment were devised with such appropriate inactive channels, which were also equipped with non-intrusive sensors, sampling on a time-based schedule. Then, on a particular run with a given internal channelling, data collected from the various phases, would be taken and could be analysed afterwards to attempt to discover certain contexts at different times. 

Something similar is currently done by Weather Forecasters in their simulation models linked to large numbers of sensors at weather stations, but the crucial difference in the New Miller’s Experiment was in the Control that was in the hands of the experimenters. That was never available to the weather Forecaster; he had to take what he was given, but the new holistic experiments allowed something greatly superior to their Thresholds, when one law was sidelined to bring in another. The Weather simulations with thresholds were a crude invention to attempt to deal with a real Holist situation, pluralistically.

In the described Miller-type experiments the investigation would be constantly re-designed, both in the inactive structures provided. And in the necessary kinds of sensors to maximise the information and allow progress to be made. Clearly such control is never available to weather forecasters.