[FRIAM] better simulating actual FriAM

Mon Jul 20 16:05:08 EDT 2020

Thanks, frank, for that affirmation.  

I am sitting here, on this hot day, looking at the tree across the street, and saying to myself (The Behaviorist) am I REALLY going to get away with telling Glen he cannot say, “That tree is causing the yard to be shaded.”  Something not right about that.    Modulo obsessive thinking. 

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

 <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com

 <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Monday, July 20, 2020 1:59 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] better simulating actual FriAM

Nick, you are correct in saying that causation is a relation between events.  The most useful definition of causation that we found in our statistical causal reasoning research (viz Spirtes, Glymour, and Scheines) was event A is a cause of event B if the occurrence of A is followed by a change in the probability density over the possible values of B.  Modulo obsessional tweaking.

Frank

---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz, 
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Mon, Jul 20, 2020, 1:39 PM <thompnickson2 at gmail.com <mailto:thompnickson2 at gmail.com> > wrote:

Nick (to Jon)
Re Gen Phen: That's the Whole Point, here.  There are two different
distinctions, here, one apparently arising form computation (?) and one
arising from biology.  Glen originally mentioned a GENerator/ PHENomenon
distinction which seems to be the broader of the two and does not forbid
downward causation.  More recently we have been talking about the
GENotype/PHENotype distinction which is narrower and does -
historically-forbid downward causation.  So, I think we need to spell the
words out completely from now on, so we know which game we are playing. 

Your reference to language games raises the question of what sort of "game"
are we playing when we talk about causation.  One rule of that game, I
think, which I may have violated myself in this discussion, is that things
cannot cause things.  Only events can cause events.   The reason is that the
notion of cause involves temporal order and things (as opposed to the
arrival of things or the placement of things or the removal things) cannot
be in a temporal order.  I am wondering if adherence to this discipline
might make the whole problem of downward causation disappear?  So, the
addition of the 5th stick (an event) to previous four sticks CAUSES the
other 4 sticks not to rotate (an event) and CAUSES the structure to be
strong (another event).  Notice that this formulation appears to forbid us
to say that the constraints on the rotation of the other four sticks
provided by the fifth stick CAUSES the strengthening of the structure
because those two events are temporally inextricable.  What IS the relation
between those two facts if not a causal one?  I think I would argue that
it's a constitutive relation; ie, the rotational constraints constitute the
greater strength of the square with the fifth stick.  

Nick
ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> 
https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

Jon to Nick 

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com <mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com> > On Behalf Of Jon Zingale
Sent: Monday, July 20, 2020 11:07 AM
To: friam at redfish.com <mailto:friam at redfish.com> 
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] better simulating actual FriAM

Maybe I am misremembering (which clearly happens), but didn't the discussion
of gen-phen-like maps arise in the context of goal-function distinctions? In
this latter class, we included the thermostat system where constraining
systems to Weismann's doctrine would not be meaningful. Clearly, in the
goal-function system, an individual that changes the thermostat dial because
they prefer the house to be at 60 degrees rather than 80 degrees (a
variation on function) performs downwardly to affect the tolerance of the
piece of metal or mercury switch (a variation on goal). Are we breaking the
semantic game by now demanding that our admissable gen-phen-like maps
preserve Weismann's doctrine? I understood Glen's evocation to not be so
constrained.

--
Sent from: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/

- .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. .
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam>  un/subscribe
http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ 

- .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. .
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam> 
un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200720/dc507a12/attachment.html>