[MD] Levels in electronic computers

[Andy Skelton]

Howdy, list. Please excuse any fox paws in this, my first MD post. I
am re-reading both of Pirsig's books after years away, so some of the
bases for my thoughts are fresh while others are still quite dusty.

> dmb to Magnus:
>
> Biological patterns INSIDE the computer? Seriously? It seems you have a fairly bizarre position. I mean, as far as I know there is no such thing as a computer that operates with social or biological patterns inside it.

This thread about computers "supporting" MoQ levels above inorganic
has yanked me out of newbie lurk mode. My thoughts take two orthogonal
tracks. First, the "organic" level is not necessarily limited to or
defined by what we have found and classified as "life" in the
universe. Second, the reality of any given thing under Quality cannot
be considered to exist without a second referent to provide point of
view.

To follow the first track, first review what constitutes biology or
life. Pooping is not a defining characteristic. An organism that
accumulates all of its waste until death or outsources its energy
production is still an organism. I say that a biological pattern it is
any pattern that tends toward self-perpetuation despite adversity.
Atoms and most molecules do not qualify but DNA is such a pattern. In
a favorable environment, DNA perpetuates its pattern by building
defenses and making copies of itself. These activities are the result
of molecule-manipulating programs embedded in the DNA. We are capable
of manipulating DNA and thus capable of rudimentary hacking of
biological programs. (Please correct me if I need correction on the
biological level.)

This definition of the biological level does not necessarily exclude
patterns invented or circulated by man. We have already seen man-made
self-perpetuating patterns in the wild: computer viruses. These
patterns are self-replicating in that they can spawn viable copies of
themselves in favorable environments. To varying degrees, they exploit
their environment despite adversity. To varying degrees, they take
part in communication of information about their environments, so they
can be said to have a social level. To varying degrees, they have been
programmed to mutate to gain advantage against other patterns in their
environment. The fact that one can easily defeat the pattern by
pulling the plug is no proof against its being biological as the same
effect could be applied to you by suffocation.

So you could say that a computer "supports" biological patterns in
that a computer "is a suitable medium for" biological patterns. This
is no different from saying that the ocean supports life, if you can
suspend whatever social or theological precepts prevent you from
attributing to man the ability to breathe life into matter, at least
outside of polite company.

I am too fuzzy on the second novel to embark on any proof that we have
created self-supporting intellectual patterns in electronic computers.
That will be in my mind as I study.

The second track is more firmly grounded in the first novel, with
which I am currently becoming reacquainted. Consider an unpowered
computer lying in a dark closet with nobody around to see it. Does it
exist? At what levels? If it is online and connected to the internet
and communicating with other computers, yet nobody is aware of it at
this specific moment, does it exist? At what levels? Let me make it
more concrete.

At the present moment in your time frame, you are reading these words
from a screen (or hearing them from an assistive device) and
suspending your knowledge that the symbols ride on signals composed of
electronically controlled pixels (or vibrations of speaker membranes)
that convey symbols from me to you across thoroughly inorganic air.
The medium of communication need not have the capabilities of the
participants.

That we have interposed electronic computers in our communication loop
is no more significant than had we had this discussion via paper or
smoke signals or mind melding. Smoke is no more capable than a
computer is of "being" intellectual, yet both are capable of conveying
patterns between intellectual beings.

Notwithstanding the first track above, the computer that sits before
you does not support anything so complex as an intellectual pattern as
you understand it. The existence of an intellectual pattern in a being
presupposes an environment of physical, biological, and social
patterns upon which to exist, plus all of the "a priori" stuff
necessary to make it intelligible.

Ultimately, the maximum level perceivable in a given being by any
other being is a dependent variable rather than an absolute. There can
be no canon about it. Once you admit that your evaluations are only
your own and understand that any universality is illusory, you can get
down to the business of using the system for something practical other
than confusing your friends.

Andy