[FRIAM] Mysticism: still effing the ineffable?

[Frank Wimberly]

Do you people use acronyms to appear more esoteric?  Stop it!
---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Fri, Jun 27, 2025, 10:06 AM steve smith <sasmyth at swcp.com> wrote:

> FWIW I composed one of my arbitrarily long (and convoluted) observations
> (maybe just mansplaining) about the multiple uses of the term *Reality*
> and how I apprehend them and how I (think) they relate to the business of
> "chatting with LLMs" and the implications for the discussion at-hand.
> Maybe there will (co)arise a white paper elsewhere.
>
> However, to (try to) be concise I trimmed it a bit.   I think I hear us
> talking (effing) all the way around the question of whether there is an
> ineffable and is it just "mysticism" by another name?
>
> I hear DaveW holding Qualia as the only truly grounded Reality and EricS
> alluding to the way the Intersubjective dribbles over into Placeholder (a
> handwaving name for something we all think we know, but can't seem to pin
> down or agree on).  Most of us trained and operating in Sci/Eng/Tech *want*
> there to be a simple Objective which the formalisms of math/science help us
> converge upon but defer to Operational/Pragmatic most of the time?
>
> My suspicion of mystical rhetoric is that it is a most *obscurational*
> form of Placeholder Reality... while also being *aspriational* ("but what
> IF there IS an objective reality which *only I* can access through
> unspecified occult means?").  That said, I DO agree with DaveWs suggestion
> that there are things which can be perceived, even apprehended which cannot
> be expressed ("effed").  thus they are "ineffable".  The arts of the Arcane
> and Occult attempt to "eff" them, though gesturally, pointing vaguely
> toward an interstice?   Alexander's QWAN, etc.
>
> My working definitions of "Reality" to be found at the bottom of the post.
>
> I acknowledge Qualia as fundamental to *my* existence..  but recognize
> the  Pragmatic as a common mode of my expression and even apprehension, all
> the while aspiring to Objective but deferring heavily to Intersubjective to
> interpret all of the others.     EAC is most interesting to me whether it
> is the autopoesis of M&V or the vedic/buddhist dependent co-arising, or
> wheeler/beyond quantum realities.   But maybe because it is more exotic?
> EricS wrote:
>
>
> On Jun 27, 2025, at 7:31, Marcus Daniels <marcus at snoutfarm.com>
> <marcus at snoutfarm.com> wrote:
>
> Dave writes:
>
> < My 'mysticism', like my hallucinogenic experience, is nothing more than
> a source of what I consider to be "real" data and a supply of fascinating
> questions—never answers. >
>
> Not clear why something that supposedly cannot be captured by mere
> language keeps getting pitched as a real and intersubjective thing via
> language.
>
>
> I am much less bothered by this _in principle_, since I generally hold the
> two premises:
>
> 1. Language is a collection of signals _within_ a system,
>
> ...
>
>
> 2. The term “reality” is a problem in general.
> I do like the idea that this is just a version of the normal confusion,
> for things not understood very well (like, quite badly), and that one could
> find ways to do better.
>
>
> Without belaboring (but including for completeness) I offer my working
> definitions of various uses of the term *Reality*:
>
> 1) Operational Pragmatic Reality:
>
> *That which affords coherent behavior—the reliable background against
> which action can occur.  As from ecological psychology (*Gibson*’s
> affordances), predictive processing (*Friston*), and some aspects of (our
> beloved) *Peircean* pragmatism?*
>
> 2) Intersubjective Reality:
>
> *That which is constructed, maintained, and enacted through language and
> shared narratives.  As from *Luckman, Lacan, Foucault*?*
>
> 3) Formal (Scientific) Reality:
>
> *That which can be modeled with precision, prediction, and repeatability.
> As from Mathematics, physics, systems theory?*
>
> 4) Experiential Reality:
>
> The immediately given, lived experience—the “suchness” before concept.  *As
> from *Husserl, Merleau-Ponty, Varela?  Whence *Qualia*.
>
> 5) Placeholder Reality:
>
> *The term “reality” as a placeholder or dummy variable—used rhetorically
> to defer deeper ontological commitments.  As from *all of us* all the
> time?*
>
> 6) Participatory Reality:
>
> *Reality as not wholly determinate *until observed or enacted*—that is,
> it co-arises with participation.*
>
> 7) Linguistic Manifold Reality:
>
> *LLMs inhabit and approximate intersubjective reality.  Each language
> model represents a “manifold” within a semantic plenum. “Reality” is the
> high-dimensional attractor surface that forms when enough participants
> (biological or artificial) converge on something shareable, predictive, and
> compressible.*
>
> Enactivism / Autopoiesis / Dependent Co-Arising (EAC) is not a single
> category in this typology—it is a *meta-theory of reality-generation*,
> operating across:
>
>    -
>
>    *Operational* → it explains the *conditions for affordances*
>    -
>
>    *Intersubjective* → it explains *how we co-construct the shared*
>    -
>
>    *Experiential* → it explains *how we inhabit the lived*
>    -
>
>    *Participatory* → it explains *why observation creates reality*
>
> And it gently critiques:
>
>    -
>
>    *Formal* → by showing its limits
>    -
>
>    *Placeholder* → by showing its necessity
>    -
>
>    *LLM-based* → by asking what is missing for full participation
>
>
> .- .-.. .-.. / ..-. --- --- - . .-. ... / .- .-. . / .-- .-. --- -. --. /
> ... --- -- . / .- .-. . / ..- ... . ..-. ..- .-..
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