Entropy: def-n: 1) "a measure of the capacity of a system to undergo spontaneous change"
2) "a measure of the randomness, or disorder or chaos in a system" - American Heritage Dictionary

"Only entropy comes easy." - Anton Chekhov

"Shared pain is lessened; shared joy is increased, thus do we refute entropy." - Spider Robinson

"Just as the constant increase of entropy is the basic law of the universe, so it is the basic law of life to be ever more highly structured and to struggle against entropy." - Vaclav Havel

"Heretics are the only bitter remedy against the entropy of human thought." - Yevgeny Zamyatin

Heretic: def-n: "One who maintains unorthodox or controversial opinions on any subject." - Standard College Dictionary

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Before I begin the 'meat' of today's entry (or perhaps this is a part of it!), I want to point out two things.
First, a curious, and perhaps random, occurence. Just now, I was looking at the results of Statstracker for my blog yesterday, and between 11:34 Am and 12:04 noon (the space of half an hour) there were eight consecutive hits from readers who have never visited my site before. It is unusual for me to have more than 1 or 2 new readers in any given day, and often there are none. I visited each of the 8 sites, and they are as diverse as you could imagine, from a first-time blogger who had a single entry, to a site called "Blogger Buzz" that, with just a cursory look, seemed to be about various options and possibilities thst blogs can be used for. Curious? Or deterministic.

Secondly, there will be both spelling and grammar 'errors' (according to the rules of the set {ENGLISH}) included in this entry. They will remain 'uncorrected' for a reason.
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I wrote the following lines last night. "Before I started reading this evening, I had the thought 'I wonder what I'll read about this evening that I wrote about in the past day or two'."

It turns out...pretty much everything. As I continue to use Gleick's book on chaos theory as a source of triggers for my thoughts, I read last night about a group of young post-grad students in Santa Cruz California.

These are some example snippets of what I read.

"In 1977 chaos offered no mentors. There were no classes in chaos, no centers for nonlinear studies and complex systems research, no chaos textbooks, nor even a chaos journal."

"...'all you have to do is put your hands on these knobs, and suddenly you are exploring in this other world where you are one of the first travellers and you don't want to come up for air'..."

"All the important concepts --- the Lyapunov exponent, the fractal dimension --- would just naturally occur to you. You would see it and start exploring."

"A visitor could see members...arguing about consciousness or evolution, adjusting an oscilloscope display...its orbit flickering and seething like something alive."

" 'The same thing really drew all of us: the notion that you could have determinism, but not really.. The idea that all these classical deterministic systems we'd learned about could generate randomness was intriguing' ."

" 'Nonlinear was a word that you only encountered in the back of the book...The idea that an equation could bounce around in an apparently random way --- that was pretty exciting...It seemed like something for nothing, or something out of nothing...."

"They enchanted themselves and dismayed their professors with leaps to questions of determinism, the nature of intelligence, the direction of biological evolution.."

" '...but you take one little step away in parameter space, you end up with something to which all this huge body of analysis does not apply'. "

" 'On a philosophical level, it struck me as an operational way to define free will, in a way that allowed you to reconcile free will with determinism. The system is deterministic, but you can't say what it is going to do next...I'd always felt that the important problems out there in the world had to do with the creation of organization, in life or intelligence...here was one coin with two sides. Here was order with randomness emerging, and then one step further away was randomness with its own underlying order'. "

I continued to write: 'I read that and more, and felt what must have been the same feeling of anxious joy at knowing I was aware of something new, but not yet certain what it is. It definitely will end up being a connection between science and non-science (perhaps prescience...or pre-science!). For instance, they were intrigued by the fact that the same system could produce both order and randomness --- that was precisely what I wrote about today'

I wrote many notes last night, as I continued to read.

I wrote: 'I have climbed the mountain of curious endeavour and have experienced the thrill of realizing I am the source of something that no one else 'is'. I have found not only my place, but a way of describing and giving purpose to the place of each within all.'

I don't record this here to be a braggart...'is' does not make judgements. I just wish to make a record of my excitement, my wonderment, and the connections that are starting to arise from the mists of ambiguity, as if the continuing and evolving clarity of thought within my own mind is beginning to counterbalance the ambiguities that it is replacing. If that is the case, it would be an example of a closed system seeking its own state of equilibrium, and be consistent with the law that 'n can be neither created nor destroyed, but can only be converted from one form to another' where n is a variable, including the original example for which the law was written --- energy. In my illustration here, the variable would indicate 'clarity of thought', or perhaps simply 'thought'. I'll have to think about [that] some more. I'll have to think about some more.

I feel, and felt last night, a sense of learning and thought evolution in fast-forward mode. Two entries ago, I wrote of 'reverse-engineering' the process of thought evolution to arrive at original thought. Last night, I felt like I was re-positioning the read-write head back to the present moment. It strikes me now as part of the pattern of words I spoke of in earlier blogs [and will speak of much more again], that the word 'head' is not an arbitrary choice here, my 'head' being the physical vessel involved in the system; nor is the word 'back' arbitrary... in this case meaning 'forward'.

According to 'is', an entity can 'give birth to itself', and in the process of self-generation also creates its own opposite [ the {ANYTHING...NOT-ANYTHING} concept]. The word 'back' creates its own opposite, 'forward', which can legitimately be used as a meaningful substitution for itself in the proper context, as shown in this illustration.

There is an intertwining of several thoughtlines in what I just wrote. It becomes a fine line, I think, to balance the number of thoughts within the system of thought. I propose that the number of thoughtlines is related to the threshold of the thought system, and is therefore a measure of the chaos of the understanding component of the system.

One thought, expressed by itself is one thought. But it lacks context. Seversl thoughts (sentences, perhaps) recorded in sequence provide context, but require linear memory. An intertwining of multiple thoughtlines provides simultaneous context, but introduces the chaos of confusion, since a multiplicity of simultaneous connections could be made, each providing a different configuartion of the system. [Note the spelling of 'configuration' in the previous sentence, as an example of the same principle buried within a 'word' system instead of a sentence one...merely a microcosmic example of the same concept.]

I note with interest that yesterday on the news there was an item that the judge in the "da Vinci Code' plagarism case had included his own embedded code in his written judgement by italicizing selected letters, and now people all around the globe are attempting to crack it.

As I was researching the word 'entropy' this morning on the web, I came across page after page after page that serve to reinforce the preceptd that I have been expounding within my proposition of 'is' for nearly four months now. I have a filing drawer about three-quarters full of notes I have made over the past several yars as I have experimented with the language and syntax of 'is' that just now is slowly starting to emerge in a unique format, English-like, but NOT-ENGLISH.

Last night, I was reading about the evolution of information theory, something I am somewhat familiar with in respect to digital computers. It was within that context that i came across the word 'entropy'. In a language (take English, for instance, since my asumption is that you are somewhat familar wth it), the occurence of a letter is to sme degre determnid by the precding or suroundng lttrr or lttrs. Therefr, not each 'letter unit' carries the same amount of information as each other. It is this concept, for instance, as Gleick points out, that allows for compression of data files, or 'zipping'. If you've ever missplled a word when you're doing a Google search, you'll often get the message 'Did you mean _____". That's an example of the reverse of the process. Google's mechanisms are adding or correcting the ordered system of letters and/or words you provided it with.

English 'noise' does not necessarily imply sequence noise. In my blog, 'The Mind Is a Wonderful Thing to Taste', I included an example where only the first and last letter of each word was retained in place, and the order of the intermediate letters was shuffled randomly, but still present. So from the illustration above with either missing or substituted letters, and the example just cited, we can conclude that at least two qualities of letters are not 100% necessary, but they are still necessary to some degree. That difference is the entropy of the letter, but only for that specific occurence and context of the letter. Within a different word or sentence, it would most probably have a different value. It is the missing order which is unnecessary without impeding understanding. So where does that order go? Again. my contention 'is' that it is converted to the chaos within the threshold crossover zone of {UNDERSTAND ... NOT-UNDERSTAND}.

All of this begs questions like, "who cares?", "Can these entrpy quantities be measured?", "If so, what will their measurement lead to?" and so on.

Well, just for a change, let's consider the mirror image (another characteristic of 'is') of the entropy of a letter. Instead of thinking of it as a 'letter unit' not needing to have 100% capacity to convey its meaning, let's look at the letters in the 'letter space' surrounding the missing letter instead. Each letter unit in spce has added on the value of the missing letter unit (in this case, the letter 'a' in the word 'space'). So now we have four letter units s,p,c,and e (presumably of finite size and capacity) taking on a value greater than it's own in order to contain the value of the missing letter 'a'. These four letters, in this occurence, have become 'super-letters' in a sense. This would be the language equivalent of a super-conductive metal, for instance, except in the case of the metal, resistance to current flow approaches zero as temperature approaches a limit (absolute zero) beyond which it cannot go. In the case of the letter unit within a language, however, it appears there is no limit. In other words, a letter can contain 'more' information than the 'space' allocated for that letter to contain! An apparent paradox, which is where 'entropy' enters the picture.

In case the discussion at the 'letter unit' level is confusing, let's move back to the level of human knowledge (and intelligence?). I quote again from Gleick's book:

"Billions of years ago there were just blobs of protoplasm; now billions of years later here we are. So information has been created and stored in our structure. In the development of one person's mind from childhood, information clearly is not just acumulated but also generated --- created from connections that were not there before."

The pattern and establishment of these creations and connections, I propose as part of 'is', is a non-linear, exponential growth pattern at first random (or seemingly so), until a certain information threshold (in education, I propose a 'mastery' level) is reached, at which point it recognizes itself as being complete and understood. It becomes part of the established library of information (knowledge). The continuing 'energy' being generated by the microsystems of thought that developed the complete closed system (or universe) is now released to append onto other NOT-CLOSED and/or imperfect (NOT-MASTERED) systems, at first randomly and sporadically, but over time, and with an understanding of itself (UNDERSTANDING giving birth to itself) can then be directed through {FOCUS, MOTIVATION, NEED, INSIGHT....} to other partially-thought systems, thereby accelerating the {CLOSURE, MASTERY, DIFFICULTY...} in the system {KNOWN...NOT-KNOWN}. (Note: I'll be re-visiting these concepts in more detail and from seveal different angles in further writings).

My brain, and the concept of it being bipolar by nature 'is' the threshold concept that I needed to create the {closed system, complete, mastered...} thoughtline leading me, in conjunction with my selection of {subconscious, conscious, related...} reading inputs to the insight and evolution of 'is'. My ability to {express outwardly, write in English, make connections to other known systems....} is still limited and therefore forms an incomplete or open system of communication. I need to add 'is' to 'is' in order to explain it, and close the 'broken circle' of explanation. 'is' still needs to re-generate itself satisfactorily in order to become anything worthy of note by others. But that in no manner diminishes its need and place. As I pointed out earlier in this entry, it is my place (the 'value' of my letter space within the paragraph of humanity) that contains the value (or entropy) of 'is'. Like knowledge and information, entropy has the characteristic tht it continually increases.

Wheter or not there is a physical and/or chemical {brain, system container, ...} disordered component to my particular vessel as the result of the judgement 'bipolar' is a completely separate and separable side issue to the thought domain (even if potentially serious in the physical domain of my existence).

Do the three systems of human beings (body, mind, spirit) have a static wholenes that merely gets re-distributed or, like information, can there be creation from the inner energy levels (microsystems, entropy...} In other words, does the soul have entropy, and is that the source of creation? Is that, indeed, the essence of 'god'?

I found last night that i was writing as fast as I was physically able to record my thoughts, attempting to capture some clarity with which I was thinking them. This is exactly the behaviour I exhibited in the days prior to my three manic attacks, each of which ultimately ended in hospitalization for a few days until i was able to untangle my thoughtlines and return to a more linear pattern of daily living. Last night I felt those were sort of practice runs for establishing in my own mind my mental threshold of {depression, normalcy, hypomania, mania....}. I did not feel (nor do I feel now) even a bit of the physical or mental hypomanic state I felt during those three previous sessions. It's as if I have 'learned' the boundary to my mind, and I clearly know when I am approaching the chaotic state.

I am fully cognizant that someone else reading this who {has a pre-disposed opinion of my state of mind, doesn't understand what I have been attempting to write about, follows it but thinks it's sheer poppycock, follows with intrigue but not comprehension, comprehends more than I do....} will no doubt have a different set of thoughtlines being processed in their mind. I have no problem with that, again because 'is' is not judgemental. It records and identifies uniqueness, and that is what i have been doing.

So, even if those three earlier sessions of mine weren't practice, they were certainly preparation!

I close with a quote from another book I randomly (or perhaps not!) pulled off the shelf last night and opened at a page where a bookmark had been inserted long ago, for this was one of the books that has sat packed in a box in my crawl space for about eight years, until I unpacked it just a few weeks ago. The book is titled "The Mind's I", subtitled "Fantasies and Reflections on Self & Soul". It is a collection of writings by various authors, compiled by Douglas Hofstadter (author of Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid --- another excellent read BTW!) and Daniel Dennett. After each entry, they include a section called "reflections" wherein they record their own reactions and thoughts on each piece. This is a quote within a quote (which, ironically illustrates the point of the quote itself...) and is taken from their reaction section to a piece titled "Where Am I?".

"When Dr. Jekyll changes into Mr. Hyde, that is a strange and mysterious thing. Are they two people taking turns in one body? But here is something stranger: Dr. Juggle and Dr. Boggle too, take turns in one body. But they are as alike as identical twins! You balk: why then say that they have changed into one another? Well, why not: if Dr. Jekyll can change into a man as different as Hyde, surely it must be all the easier for Juggle to change into Boggle, who is exactly like him.
We need conflict or strong difference to shake our natural assumption that to one body there corrsponds at most one agent."
(quoted from -'Rational Homunculi')

I have pointed out in the past that I consider the view that bipolarity affords me to be a gift. It from time to time allows me the mental construct (or imagination) to simultaneously consider different and conflicting points of view (click on the linkage above to "Rational Homunculi" for an interesting coincidence). Yesterday I wondered if a person with a 'thin' consciousness even has the capacity of imagining that another person may have a 'rich' consciousness, without having the need of a single model for everyone. I wonder the same thing about bipolarity, or any mental thought process for that matter.

It is a question, by its own phrasing, I should be unable to answer. Can the imagination imagine itself? If 'is' is, then it can. And since it can, then 'is' is. At least, part of it is.

At the end of yesterday's post, I declared "we have discovered 'is' ".
Today, I propose that we have discovered a part of 'is'. The part that re-generates itself.

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I haven't included fractals for a couple days, so here you go. Click to enlarge.












" I've learned that the two happiest days of my life were the day I bought my boat and the day I sold my boat." - Age 42

Posted by Evydense on Friday, April 28, 2006 at 8:42 a.m. | Permalink