[MD] Quantum computing

[Magnus Berg]

Hi

> [Case]
> Without trying to start a big to do about them the problem with the levels
> occurs at the edges. They tend to be arbitrary abstractions. Organic
> chemistry is relegated to the inorganic level. Social structures among other
> species are confined to the biological level. The social and intellectual
> levels are confused in ways that cause nothing but headaches. And for what? 

In my view, the levels don't have "edges". They are orthogonal. Pirsig doesn't 
use that word in Lila, but an orthogonal arrangement of the levels doesn't 
contradict anything he says either. Higher levels are dependent on lower levels, 
  but they are not an extension of it, they are not continuous, they are discreet.

My interpretation of this is that they are orthogonal. Think of the inorganic 
level as an X-axis extending to the right. When it's complex (long) enough, the 
biological level can extend upwards on the Y-axis forming a 2D plane. The social 
level extends the 2D plane into a 3D cube and the intellectual turns it into a 
4D hypercube. Such an arrangement makes the levels absolutely dependent on each 
other and makes each type of value very easy to spot. There's no fuzzy borders 
between the levels, they just go off in completely different directions.

And to be honest, I frankly don't see why most people tend to treat the levels 
as just one long one-dimensional line (along some sort of complexity axis). 
Because, as you say, it just turns the levels into arbitrary abstractions. In a 
one-dimensional view of the levels, each *thing* can only belong to one level. 
But that's the reason it becomes so fuzzy and causes headaches. In a 
multi-dimensional view, each *thing* have a 4-tuple coordinate placing it in 1, 
2, 3 or 4 levels at once.

> [Case]
> I have mentioned several times that Pirsig's use of the term Quality for
> "Tao" draws attention away from the Taoist vision of The Way. But you also
> raise a perennial problem I have with static and dynamic. You seem to be
> using the terms in a sensible way, that is stasis and change. Am I
> misreading you? Evolution is all about stability and change. Complexity is
> about the quality and quantity of change.

I don't think you're misreading me. Stability and change sounds like the static 
and dynamic I use.

Not sure what you mean by "Complexity is about the quality and quantity of 
change" though. Complexity, to me, is more about the number of possible 
combinations in a system.

	Magnus