Scientific Thinking LO21907

Winfried Dressler (winfried.dressler@voith.de)
Mon, 14 Jun 1999 18:21:16 +0100

Replying to LO21889 --

At de Lange wrote:

>(1) To give something a name is one of the innumerous ways of making a
>measurement. It corresponds to Alonso Church's thesis in logic that
>making logical statements is to give names. In other words, logic is
>nothing else than a certain kind of measurement.
>(2) When we name the elements of a set and we become ware of "the
>rapid rather than a one-by-one reduction of choices", is it not an
>indication if a "well-formed set", i.e. a set with the correct number
>of elements -- not too few elements or not too many elements? What has
>the "reduction by explication of the wave packet" to do with "eidetic
>reduction" of phenomenology to obtain essentials

Dear At,

So Alonso Church's thesis in logic refers to what I called RTL - relation
of terms logic. Giving a name is an explicate statement on how this name
relates to others. The implicate possibilities have been reduced to one
actual name and meaning.

Scientific thinking thrives for a "well formed set" of terms discribing
all kinds of observations. All observations are communicated in language,
which is already an act of speculation. The scientific approach is, not to
allow any other set (for instance "dogma") to jugde the value of such
speculation but only observation itself by means of attempts to falsify.
Thus scientific thinking creates the form sureness out of the content of
the observations. The form is created by means of speculation and
falsification.

What about the content of observation? Isn't the observed the same as its
content? Reviewing the seven essentialities as form, I tend to believe
that all observed is primarily observed form, not content. Where does the
content of scientific observation come from? I guess it also is created by
speculation and falsification. These two provide for something (can I call
it "expectation"?), which introduces an element of entropic force leading
to the process of observation as entropic flux.

Is it too far fetched to think of the process of scientific thinking as
the process of coevolution of content and form as it ought to be? We only
need to keep in mind that 1.) form consists not only of sureness (the
emphasis of this mail) but the other six essentialities as well and 2.)
scientific thinking in this sense is not restricted to humans, thus
opening up to deep scientific thinking. If you don't like the second, I
offer an alternative to the first sentence in this paragraph: The process
of scientific thinking is the manifestation of the process of coevolution
of content and form in the human world of mind as it ought to be.

If as such, scientific thinking is at the heart of learning organizations,
I wonder what inhibits scientific thinking. The three mental detectors are
good to recognise the symptoms of such inhibition: At which stage, how and
when. The detectors are a defensive alarm system. But: Is good protection
the constraint in achieving more qualified scientific thinking?

>I intend to investigate in some future contribution the role of
>technology to sustain and imbetter each of these three mental
>detectors essential to the scientific method. I wish somebody creative
>would jump me to the gun so that I can sit back and enjoy what is
>inevitable!

Let's assume we have all technology we can wish for and thus the best
detectors, we can think of. I very much doubt that this will help to
improve a balanced, healthy and sustainable coevolutionary process. We DO
already have the best detectors since ever. In the course of the last five
hundred years they lead us to the discovery of energy including LEC and
entropy including LEP which were fundamental to the transformation of
alchemie to chemistry and the construction of thermodynamic machines.
Timely the earths resouces on coal and oil became accessible and that's
where we are today.

What is the constraint? In all our dialogue and discussions here, I am
more and more convinced, that the form into which the content of the
creative course of time emerge has cracks. Thus impaired essentialities,
and at its roots the essentiality wholeness as I guess, build the
constraint.

What prevents us to detect wholeness as a gem? What makes us to love us
more than our neighbour? What makes it more important that I have
something to eat, a nice house, a big car whatever than anybody else? What
keeps us in the illusion of being distinct, fragmented individuals? Why is
a candy for my son so much sweeter when his sister has none? Human
nature?? Hopefully not. I am not going to accept impaired wholeness as a
general part of human nature.

Liebe Gruesse,

Winfried

-- 

"Winfried Dressler" <winfried.dressler@voith.de>

Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>