[MD] Levels or branches?

[david buchanan]

In the "Quantum computing" thread, Case said
...We are not really talking about "levels" at all. We are talking about 
"branches." "Level" is simply the wrong metaphor. It implies discreteness 
and independence where they clearly do not exist. "Branches" implies 
separation and continuation at the same time.  ...One might even stretch 
this branching of patterns into the idea of holons where each thing is 
composed of smaller things and collects with like things to make bigger 
things.

dmb says:
Last night I was reading about structuralism in Piaget's developmental 
psychology, or rather Ken Wilber's examination of it, and it occurred to me 
that Wilber's holons and Pirsig's patterns are both versions of 
structuralism. Apparently, Piaget was among the first to discover that 
mental development was not simply gradual or accumulative but was marked by 
discrete cognitive stages, each with its own gestalt. And its interesting to 
note that each successive stage builds upon the previous stages, which are 
either taken for granted or even become unconscious. As the new stage 
unfolds it is refined and all the previous experience is reinterpreted in 
its terms. At some point this stage will reach some kind of old age, when 
its limits become visible and when it becomes inadequate to the point that 
it becomes a problem or incapable of dealing with problems, a new structure 
will emerge to overcome those limits or solve those problems.

These cognitive stages are what we'd think of as internal structures but the 
same thing applies to more apparent structures in the natual world. The way 
bacteria retain their form and function despite the fact that its 
constituent parts are replaced entirely during its life. The molecules that 
are used for its very existence and structure are distinct from the bacteria 
themselves. Their structure does not exist at the level of molecules and yet 
totally depends on them to achieve bacterianess. There is coherent structure 
that keeps itself together even as molecules come and go. This is not just 
an analogy for structualism, it is structuarlism on the biological level. 
And it can be extended downward so that the molecules are seen as something 
over and above the atoms, the atoms include but transcend the particles in 
the same way. We can extend this upward from single cells, to organs, 
organisms, etc..

This, I think, reveals the similarities between Pirsig's patterns and 
Wilber's holons. And the levels are similar too in that both of them 
basically define their levels as a class or category of patterns or holons. 
We draw lines where those whole new gestalts kick in. In that sense, these 
are not just metaphors. I mean, these metaphors are ways of describing what 
is observed, of making distinctions about what is observed. Piaget, as I 
imagine you already know, derived his ideas from working with small kids and 
seeing a pattern to their so-called errors. Pirsig's levels aren't so 
different. They simply recognize that the forces that hold a society 
together are different from the forces that hold an atom together, by 
noticing that the forces that perpetuate life are the same forces that 
threaten society, etc.. That's why the lines between levels and the borders 
between patterns aren't necessarily the same sort of distinction. The levels 
represent distinct sets of patterns operate according to the same general 
laws; physical laws, the law of the jungle, the rules of society, the rules 
of logic each govern a range of patterns or structures, has a limited 
jurisdiction. And of course the heirarchical arrangement speaks to the 
developmental relationship wherein the early stages are prerequisites for 
the later stages. In both the case of collective evolution and individual 
development, we add rather than replace. I think the idea here is that 
development isn't just an upward movement so much as an increasingly deeper 
and broader perspective and wider range of freedom.

The Freudian notion of repression seems like a good example here. If the 
Victorians were too sexually repressed and the hippy free love types weren't 
repressed enough, we can say they both failed to properly incorporate the 
lower levels. The Victorians forgot to include sex and the hippies forgot to 
transcend it. Somewhere in the middle there is a fully integrated human 
being. I try to stike that balance by crusing the music festivals for dirty 
hippy chicks and then take them home, clean them up and put them in tight 
corset. JUST a tight corset.

dmb

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