Monday, August 31, 2009

Kantian Space and Time

One of Kant's notable achievements was to de-mystify Space and Time without trivializing them. Time, i. e. Chronos, was an ancient diety, and Space, i. e. Place, had Metaphysical significance for Aristotle. Newton's physical universe is a contraption built by God, in which Space and Time are the ultimate conditions. In contrast, Leibniz' universe is as much God's creation, but it is pluralistic, meaning that experience in it is perspectival, entailing that there are multiple Spaces and Times, but no single absolute Space and Time of which they are all versions. If Leibnizian Space and Time are perspectival, but still objective, Hume subjectivizes them. For him, Space and Time are not objects of immediate experience, but are merely abstract mental comparisons. In his attempt to hit upon a middle ground between Objective Perspectivism and Subjectivism, Kant transcended both by revolutionizing the very conception of Experience. In contrast with the long tradition of treating Experience as an undergoing of a pre-given objective world by a passive subject, Kant anthropomorphizes the world by construing it as the product of one's active construction. In other words, what we immediately experience, we have constructed. That is not to say that it is a piece of fiction--sense information is raw material from the objective world, but it is shaped by subjective structures, so what we actually experience immediately is structured raw material. Now, two of those basic experiential structures are Space and Time. For Kant, Space is the 'Form of Outer Sense', and Time is the 'Form of Inner Sense'. Hence, the problems with his notions of 'Outer' and 'Inner' that I have previously addressed are entailed by his notions of Space and Time.

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Formaterial Mind-Body

The Formal Principle, Becoming-the-Same, begins with Diversity and ends with Sameness. The Material Principle, Becoming-Diverse, begins with Sameness and ends with Diversity. Traditional Philosophical categories such as Identity and Difference are thus abstractions from the Principles. Likewise, the Formal Principle of the Individual, Propriation, begins with corporeal motions and ends with a thought. And, the Material Principle of the Individual, Exposition, begins with a thought, and ends with corporeal motions. Even casual attention can reveal these processes to be ingredients in one's everyday experience. Traditional Philosophical categories such as Mind and Body are thus abstractions from the Principles. In many Systems, Mind and Body serve as the fundamental Principles. But where their separation serves an ulterior notion, e. g. that Body is ontologically inferior to Mind, that there is incorporeal life after corporeal death, or that physical existence is a curse or contamination, then they are not fundamental Principles. A Mind and Body split that does not serve such a purpose, or is not an unexamined habit, is as difficult to find in any tradition as is their clear separation in everyday experience.

Saturday, August 29, 2009

Externalization and Internalization

Kant's problems with his attempt to distinguish 'Outer' and 'Inner' begin with his apparent indecision as to whether or not the former is relative or absolute. On the one hand, it is natural to interpret 'outer' as meaning 'outside one's body'. But such an interpretation is difficult to sustain given that since any part of the body can be seen or touched, even the sense organs, the body itself would seem to be 'outside' as well, thereby committing Kant to a Cartesian position that the entire physical world is 'outside'. In contrast, his treatment of 'Inner' receives greater attention, and is thus more clearly developed. 'Inner' means 'inside Me', wherein experiences of all kinds are arranged successively. However, the unclarities pertaining to this 'Me' are amplified by his overlooking that while referring e. g. a sense-event to oneself entails its being placed subsequent to a previous e. g. sense-event, the process of referral is always subsequent to what gets referred. In other words, he misses that the very process of referral is itself a reference to 'Me', entailing relations that his account does not cover. The analysis of Propriation, previously presented here, shows how the 'I' is constructed, and how Interiority is created. But even given the emergence of an I, a fundamental problem with Kant's entire System restricts him from using that as a point of reference for Outerness. That problem is that it treats Outerness as pertaining fundamentally to sense activity, whereas, he might have more fruitfully assigned it to his theory of action, i. e. to treat it in his Critique of Practical Reason. For, 'Outer' can only be a product of a process like Exposition, in which the 'I' produced by Reflection is externalized. Otherwise, from the Inside, there is no cognitive ground for even positing the existence of an Outside, as his very denial of the knowability of a 'thing-in-itself' articulates. 'Outer' is fundamentally the relation of a motion to the 'I' in the intention that motivates it. That an object is given in Outer Sense only means that it is encounterable in a process of Exposition, e. g. the ball to which the 'red' datum is referred is something that I may kick, or trip over, or walk around.

Friday, August 28, 2009

Intention

An 'intention' is an image, usually visual or linguistic, that precedes some movement. A long tradition has often interpreted an intention as a prevision of the completion of the movement that follows it, as if that completion already existed in the future, and it were drawing one towards it. Dewey offers an important challenge to such an interpretation, distinguishing between an 'end-in-view', and an 'end'. While the latter is the actual termination of the movement, the former is at best a piece of imagination, the function of which is it to initiate and guide immediate action. But Dewey's analysis applies to only unreflective contexts, and, hence, is incomplete. In a Reflective context, an end-in-view is not merely an isolated given, but an imaginative modifciation of the activities presented by Reflection. Unreflectively, for example, an end-in-view for taking a walk might be 'to visit a friend'. Reflectively, the end-in-view 'visiting a friend' is a modification of what one has just been doing, e. g. sitting home reading, a variation of what one has been doing that conjures up, e. g. images of past visits to the friend, images of the friend, etc., that is an accommodation of some impulse.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Outer and Inner

Kant draws a distinction between 'Outer Sense' and 'Inner Sense'. By 'Outer Sense', he seems to mean the processes of sight, hearing, taste, touch, and smell. By 'Inner Sense' he seems to mean any reproduction of outer sensings, pleasure and pain, memories, thoughts, etc. Because one's own foot is an object that one can see and touch, it is an object of Outer Sense, whereas the pain of a sore ankle is in Inner Sense. In an example that he does not entertain, he seems committed to classifying one's stomach as an object of Outer Sense, perhaps because it is as visually accessible to a surgeon as it is to oneself, while a stomach ache is in Inner Sense, because no one else can feel it. Now, Kant treats Outer and Inner as realms that are ready-made, but unclarities in his analyses suggest that they are more than merely given as is. For example, is the sense-datum 'red' Outer or Inner? It would seem that it could be either, depending on whether it is referred to an outer object, or to the perceiver. And, the same ambiguity seems to hold of any datum of the 'five senses'. That the answer depends on the nature of the 'reference' involved, suggests that the entire distinction between Outer and Inner depends on it as well. In other words, 'Outer' and 'Inner' are the products of processes that can be called 'Externalization' and 'Internalization', respectively, and, hence, are thereby distinguished from one another.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Impulse

Impulse is often described as 'blind'. Such a judgment is not surprising where the criterion for 'vision' is the certainty of the contemplation, sedentary or incorporeal, of eternal truths. From such a perspective, if impulse is not ignored completely, belittlement or vilification of it are not surprising. On the other hand, such a perspective might itself be incapable of noticing boredom, inertia, indecision, or loneliness, all breeding gounds of Impulse. Impulse is always variation with respect to a preceding condition, a manifestation of the Material Principle, so it 'sees' Diversification, even if ideologies that accord priority to Unity cannot.

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Prescription and Reflective Behavior

While description is subsequent to, and brings closure to, what it describes, prescription, conversely, precedes and gives rise to what it prescribes. Since the most common usage of 'prescription' pertains to pharmaceuticals, and the most typical Philosophical one entails features that are irrelevant to current purposes, a familiar example of prescription, recipe, will be more helpful here. A recipe entails two primary elements--it is a directive to both proceed, and to how to proceed. One's understanding of a recipe is not, as some theories have it, of its 'sense' or of its 'reference', but of to proceed, and of how to proceed. Usually, a recipe presents several stages--fill kettle with water, place kettle on heating element, place tea bag in cup, pour boiling water into cup, in that order. Knowing how to proceed means, at minimum, being familiar with the constituent stages. The recipe guides the proceeding--e. g. one awaits the whistling of the kettle, one checks the instructions, and then one pours the water into the cup. In other words, there is a cycle of interaction between the awareness of what has been transpiring and the next movement. With enough practice, this interaction becomes so fluent that the movement and the awareness can seem to be running parallel to one another, as Spinoza perhaps observed. The enactment of a recipe is an example of reflective behavior, in which the activity is a product of the Formal and Material Principles. Previous discussions focused on examples which would help clarify how each in itself functions, but those analyses were not meant to be taken as exclusive instances--the two Principles can combine in an infinite variety of ways. One is autobiographical retrospection, another is the guidance of movement by some conscious image or expression. Autobiographical writing is one type of reflective behavior, and skilled action is another.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Thought Thinking Itself

The theory of Reflection being presented here is an example of 'thought thinking itself', as Aristotle put it. But for Aristotle, such pure intellectual activity is the essence of Philosophy, and the highest achievement of any rational being. In contrast, the presentation of a theory of Reflection is quite definitely not the ultimate purpose of the project here. Instead, that theory helps to illustrate the Formal Prinicple in human Individuals, which, taken in combination with a Material Principle, constitutes a theory of Conduct, that is itself crucial to the Ethical theory that will eventually be discussed. It is because Aristotle had no analogous Material Principle that his Formal Principle also qualifies as his highest Ethical principle. Perhaps the epochal achievement of the Critique of Pure Reason is to counter Aristotle's valorization of Pure Reason, by demonstrating its limits, in the course of explaining how the proper sphere of Reason is Practice. Marxism and Pragmatism are continuations of this anti-Aristotelianism, whereas Analytic Philosophy, insofar as its aim is to clear up intellectual confusion, is reactionary Aristotelianism. A currently popular hybrid of Analytic Philosophy, e. g. Russell, and Pragmatism, e. g. Dewey, with the later Wittgenstein as its paradigm, defines Philosophy as a 'therapeutic' discipline. Now, 'therapy' presupposes a concept of 'health', so lacking an explicit discussion of that concept, as seems to be the case with this hybrid, it is more Russell than Dewey. Anyway, a pure Aristotelian might argue that the Formaterial theory of Reflection here has fallen short of the highest level of pure Intellectual Reflection. To be sure, there has been no discussion of intellectual operations such as Logic, Mathematics, etc. But the position here is that they are all fundamentally combinations of Unity and Multiplicity, and, hence, are derivative Form-Matter combinations. Also, some thinkers seem to have insisted that there is a further level of Consciousness to be achieved--a Reflection on Reflection, that, for example, produces 'an idea of an idea', a sphere of incorporeality. Now, there is no denying that Reflection is a representation of its object, nor that further representation occurs. But the latter is not a more rarefied level of Reflection, but, rather, is Retention, as part of Memory processes. Confusing Reflection and Memory has not only bred much Philosophical mischief over the centuries, but is likely at the root of the 'Narcissistic' tendencies that are the focus of contemporary Psychology.

Sunday, August 23, 2009

Autobiography and Propriation

An autobiography introduces structure into its topic. Narrative connects incidents that may not have been originally experienced as such. "I was reading, and then I went for a walk" links what might have originally been two discrete events, by characterizing the I that commenced reading, and what it became in the process of reading, as constitutive of the I that commenced going for a walk. Some theories maintain that the the two I's are identical, others that they are different. But both theories are inaccurate--the first is I becomes part of the second. Now, narration, like any description, must be subsequent to it. Hence, it must treat what it describes as completed, and, so, introduces closure into it. Furthermore, as can be seen when someone writes an autobiography, or even keeps a diary, in order to 'make sense of their life, and who they are', the narration organically emerges from the experiences that are themselves to be described. As such, closure is an immanent product, not imposed from without. Finally, the most recent autobiographical event is the one that can never explicitly appear in the autobiographical narrative, but is always implicitly present--the narrative itself. In autobiographical narrative, Subject and Object thus converge. Now, Reflection is internal autobiography. In it, one gathers and retains oneself, one makes oneself one's own. It is an example of Propriation, in which which various movements Become-the-Same. Reflection is an example of Propriation, the Formal Principle of the Individual.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Variation and Exposition

The effect of a visual object on our eyes varies them. Contact with the ground on our feet when we walk varies them. To be discussed at greater length later, social interaction varies our behavior. In general, any activity entails our being varied. So, in deliberate activity, one voluntarily allows oneself to be varied, that is, one willingly exposes oneself to the forces that vary one. What distinguishes Exposition as a type of Becoming-Diverse of an Individual is that it is a putting-forth that entails exposure to what varies one. In other words, Exposition is the Material Principle of the Individual.

Friday, August 21, 2009

Reflection and Idionomy

Theories that portray 'Consciousness' as disembodied still characterize it as as much a response to a stimulus as embodied responses are often taken to be. As such, its process is likewise heteronomous, i. e. subject to a law that is external, natural, or otherwise. Consciousness of color is determined by optic laws, and, even where removed from the natural world, e. g. in Berkeley's theory, it is determined by the God who communicates it to the perceiving mind. Other theories, which attempt to evade the problem by designating sense-data as simply 'given', are still heteronomic, because the 'given' is still subject to some law of 'giving' or another. As previously argued, these theories are not outright wrong, just limited in scope--they are best suited to unreflective processes. In contrast, outer perception, like behavior in general, is transformed in the context of Reflection. Reflective behavior does not preclude the awareness of a color, but it takes it as having transpired following the opening of the eyes, and the opening of the eyes follow a decision to look for something, etc. So, rather than the awareness of color being characterizable as an instance of optic laws, it is an autobiographical event, characterizable as an instance of whatever theme one has chosen. As such, it is part of an idionomic process.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Experiment

The trying of something new is often called 'experimenting'. Frequently, we experiment in order to attain knowledge that can be put to some further use. But sometimes we simply attempt something just to 'see what will happen'. Involved is a basic movement-awareness structure, the movement producing the 'happening', and the 'seeing' of it being achieved in the awareness. Often, such experiences are merely whimsical, but even without the awareness gained being put to some further use, experimenting can be serious and urgent. Any movement whatsoever can be the subject of deliberate experiment, the potential seriousness of which can be seen in physical rehabilitation processes, in which the very attempt to move a limb may be fraught with uncertainty. In fact, every movement, at every instant, is uncertain at the outset, even if that uncertainty is obscured by the comforts of routine--the outcome may be highly probable, but absolute certainty is impossible. What is often underappreciated in Hume's scepticism regarding Causality is that the fundamental uncertainty of causal connections lies not between 'cause' and 'effect', but between previous sequences of events and future possible outcomes, because any propensity to link 'cause' and 'effect' is grounded upon the assumption that the future will repeat the past. The word 'experiment', like 'experience', comes from 'peril'; and, insofar as every movement is uncertain, all behavior is experimental.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Stimulus-Response and Reflection

The main problem with the Stimulus-Response model of behavior is not that it never applies, but rather that it does not always apply. There are undeniably cases, e. g. when the arrival of rain is responded to by the seeking of protection, when it holds. However, e. g. when rain arrives in the course of a walk that one has been taking, the question is not what to do about the rain, but about the walk. Now, the latter still seems to easily lend itself to S-R interpretation, but not if the entire situation is fully reflective. If one has reflectively gone out for a walk, and it starts to rain, what occurs is not a stimulus, but a variation of, in the form of an addition to, what one had been doing, i. e. I have been out walking, and now I am feeling the rain as well. What occurs next will be any one of a number of possible variations--stopping the walk completely, e. g. running to shelter, stopping the feeling of rain, e. g. putting up an umbrella, or continuing on, e. g. walking in the rain. Again, it might still be argued that these are only possible reponses to the rain. But what eliminates the rain/stimulus entirely from the structure of the situation is that those three possibilities--stopping completely, continuing with variation, or simple continuation, are available at any instant of any activity, regardless of whether or not some new stimulus enters the situation. So, the S-R model is inadequate specifically to reflective behavior. Or, to put it another way, Individual behavior is not of an S-R structure.

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Self-Consciousness and Self-Appearance

Since there is awareness of every new corporeal movement, the latter can also be said to 'appear'. Such appearance is so fundamental to the functioning of the organism that it remains hidden, especially insofar as consciousness tends to be directed to outer stimuli. But once awareness internalizes the perspective of others in general, it becomes explicitly aware of its motions objectively, and Self-Consciousness, i. e. Reflection, is attained. In Reflection, one is both subject and object, appeared-to and appearing, but, contrary to the long tradition that treats them as otherwise, subject and object therein are not identical. In one's Consciousness that, for example, 'I am walking', what actually appears is 'I began walking', in which what is more precisely entailed is a new movement, walking, that is a variation on the previous condition, 'I'. So, in 'I am conscious that I am walking', the two 'I's are not identical. Rather, the conscious I emerges in the process of Consciousness, as what the appearing I has become through the variation of walking, the grasp of which is impossible insofar as 'consciousness' is construed as an instantaneous passive information-gathering. Thus, in Reflection, a new I is formed, which itself becomes the point of departure for subsequent variation. In other words, every new I is the culmination of what a previous I initiated, in which case, it is the culmination of not only the most recent activity, but of one's entire history.

Monday, August 17, 2009

Exertion

There are occasions on which when, in the middle of some activity, we realize that we are merely 'going through the motions'. At that point, one might resolve to exert oneself. For example, one might be casually ambling along, anddecide to 'pick up the pace', following which there is an acceleration of the walking. More precisely, first, there is the awareness of what one has been doing. Second, there is a decision to exert oneself. Third, there is the feeling of the beginning of an impulse. Finally, we find ourselves walking faster. This is a common example of Variation for Variation's sake. Furthermore, it demonstrates Motility originating as an internal impulse, and eventually externalizing itself. More precisely, one's awareness is of the impulse quickly radiating from a point to the extremities, and then generating more motion in them. As, 'Epiphenomenalists' maintain, it is not the awareness that generates the motion. On the other hand, contrary to what some of them seem to further insist, it does not follow that self-motivation is indemonstrable.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Awareness of Variation

An explanation of how Awareness of Variation is achieved is a classic Philosophical problem, often presented under the rubrics 'Perception of Change', 'Consciousness of Motion', etc. Zeno's 'Paradox' attempts to dismiss the question, by concluding from the difficulties entailed in trying to solve it, that Motion, Change, Variation, etc. are all illusory to begin with. Hume argues that we never directly experience Variation. For, for example, we might hear an A note, and then a B, but that the latter is a variation on the former requires a side-by-side comparison, impossible after the A has been replaced by the B, and possible only in abstract analysis. Kant replies that the A is reproduced and retained upon the arrival of the B, and that some C that persists through the transition is a necessary point of reference for B to be cognized as different from A. Kant's discussion is unclear as to whether he means that the comparison occurs only in abstraction from the live experience of the notes, or that all these elements are integrated into one live experience. But even if the latter, it still stands susceptible to an challenge from Santayana, that when the B arrives, the A is no longer actually there, in which case, variation is still not an immediate object of awareness. On the other hand, Santayana's scepticism regarding Change does not seem to address Bergson's objection that Consciousness is not, as all these others positions seem to presume, instantaneous. Rather, it is in flux, with the, for example, distinction between A and B itself the product of an arbitrary abstraction. Instead, we possess Intuition, which directly perceives Motion. Now, while this objection to the instantaneity of awareness is sound, his notion of Intuition seems to overshoot the mark. For, while it explains how we directly perceive the transition from A to B, it seems to lack an account of how we perceive A or B themselves. Furthermore, if Intuition is itself in flux, then the Intuition of Motion cannot distinguish between the flux of Intuition and the flux of the intuited Motion. One thing shared by all these theories of Awareness is that it is fundamentally receptive information-processing. On the hand, if it is fundamentally homeostatic, then it is easier to grasp that it functions fundamentally as a complement to new bodily movement, which it is fundamentally structured to accommodate. In other words, it structures its object as a new movement, which means that that its object is a variation on a previous condition is intrinsic to the awareness. For example, my current awareness that I am writing these words entails that my writing of these words is a variation on my previously not having been writing these words. Even if my awareness is of my STILL writing these words, entailed is that I am doing more of what I had been doing, which is another type of variation on the latter. So, rather than the immediate Awareness of Variation being either impossible to experience or difficult to explain, it is, quite to the contrary, tautological, because the object of awareness is always a variation.

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Varieties of Variation

When considering a sequence of movements, e. g. putting on a nicotine patch and chewing some gum, to be behavior-modifying, there can be the tendency to casually analyze it as a variation with respect to the sequence that it thwarted, e. g. smoking a cigarette, namely, with respect to what could have occurred, but did not. Such an analysis, favored by some contemporary Philosophical schools, misplaces the object of comparison. The new sequence is first and foremost a variation with respect to habitual sequences that have already occurred, not to some non-occurring counterfactuality. But variation is not restricted to transpiring with respect to some previous general theme. Taking a walk after having been reading is a variation with respect to the latter. Furthermore, variation is not necessarily a relation between sequences of movements. An improvising musician might, only upon hearing the previous note, play the next one, and if the artistry involved is accomplished enough, the seamlessness of the transition can absorb that the new note is a variation on the preceding note or notes. In other words, continuation entails variation, even if the new note is a repetition of the previous one. As Deleuze has profoundly noted, the chronic tendency to understand Repetition as a mode of Identity has obscured that it entails Differentiation--the simple addition of the same type of item is a variation in quantity. Even Nietzsche seems to have missed that Recurrence is a mode of Differentiation. In other words, more of the same actually varies 'the same'.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Variation for Variation's Sake.

According to the Stimulus-Response model, all behavioral modification is for an ulterior purpose, namely, modification is a response to a stimulus that aims to resolve the problem presented by the stimulus. For example, when a habitual smoker reaches for chewing gum instead of a cigarette, it is for the purpose of, for example, easing the stress that has hitherto habitually led to smoking a cigarette. But not all variation in habit has an ulterior motive. Most of us are familiar with personal situations in which we 'just want a change of pace, or a change of scenery'. So, to put on a hamburger, one might, just for the sake of change, try mustard instead of the usual ketchup. An example like this might be dismissed as trivial, but a much more significant one is musical composition, in which Theme-and-Variation is the essential structure of the activity. Variation in musical composition is always fundamentally for its own sake. Kant's characterization of artistic products as 'purposeless, but as if they had a purpose', stands as a refutation of the S-R model of behavior, which, if he had not been at an advanced age, he might have explored more thoroughly. For, perhaps the most the deeply ingrained human habit is to behave for some ulterior purpose, a habit which can be broken.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Behavior Modification

At bottom, the stimulus-response model of behavior is a dissatisfaction-satisfaction circuit. That is, what initially stimulates a response is something problematic, and the response is a means to resolving the problem. For example, in an infant, hunger is a stimulus to which a response of crying leads to feeding. Behavioral patterns can thus be taught or modified via punishment and reward techniques. But such an educational technique is suited to children. Adolescents begin to self-modify their behavior rebelliously, with responses contrary to what they have been taught. In an adult, a new dimension must emerge if one is to break one's conditioning. First, one must become aware of one's behavioral patterns, and second, one must constrain oneself from falling into them. An example of how to achieve such self-constraint is offered in one of the greatly under-appreciated facets of Kant's 'Categorical Imperative'. His formula refers to 'maxims', a 'maxim' being an articulation of a behavioral pattern one is considering acting upon. Usually going unnoticed in studies of Kant is that the very awareness of one's habitual responses is itself the beginning of detaching from them, to be followed by active constraint, e. g. Kant's 'universalization' procedure. So, self-constraint is a necessary condition of self-modification, and for Stoicism, it seems to be regarded as a sufficient one as well. However, someone who is seeking to quit smoking often needs to not only not grab cigarette, but to furthermore put on a nicotine patch and chew some gum. In other words, mere suppression of a habit does not suffice to rid one of the dissatisfaction that first generates it. As Nietzsche and Freud have famously argued, unless constructively redirected, that dissatisfaction can breed responses that are much more harmful than that which has been suppressed. Thus, adult behavior self-modification must both understandingly constrain the original pattern, and vary it.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Stimulus, Response, and Intellect

According to one standard model, behavior has a 'stimulus-response' ('SR') structure, namely, that, at bottom, all behavior is a response to some stimulus. At its most basic, response follows directly upon stimulus, as if they composed one continuous circuit. In SR theories in general, Intellect is regarded as intervening in the circuit, introducing calculation into it, pertaining to the possibility of a variety of responses to a stimulus. The capacity of Intellect is thus the grounds of the distinction between 'lower' and 'higher' creatures, with many gradations in between. But the distinction is not necessarily inter-species; rather, it can be discerned within a matter of inches on one and the same human organism. A blow to a certain spot just below the knee will immediately be followed by a small kick of the leg, while one to a spot just a few inches below that might also be followed by a kick, but it also might be followed by linguistic comment, a punch, or a flight away. In the latter case, some calculation has preceded the ultimate response. One important criticism of the scope of SR is that it oversimplifies the lower-higher distinction, especially insofar as it ignores a crucial factor in the response phase, namely Habit. The criticism acknowledges that a habitual response is as automatic as a reflex, but it maintains that habits can be changed. To which a defender of SR can argue that the changing of a habit simply entails a redirecting of response, via reward or punishment. However, as especially Stoicism has shown, given a stimulus, one option is not merely either a habitual or a novel response, but no response at all. The Stoic can thus argue that what the SR model most notably glosses over is that the Intellect is not merely calculative, but constraining, as well.

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Sense-Experience

The classic Empiricist theory of 'sense-experience' is 'Atomistic'. Namely, it holds that sense-data are the irreducible building blocks of the entire universe, which, by implication, can never mean more than an experiential universe. This Atomism has also been one of its most vulnerable features. Some have argued that any sense-datum is itself the product of a construction, just as contemporary Science recognizes the the existence of sub-atomic worlds. Others have argued that any sense-datum is only an arbitrarily derivative abstraction, e. g. that redness is not irreducibly given, but is only an abstraction from a perceived ball. These criticisms might be said to be insisting that Empiricism is wrong because there is more to a sense-datum than meets the eye. In contrast, the challenge here asserts that there is more to a sense-datum that meets the eye than what the Empiricist is reporting. For example, as one is walking along, one might notice a red ball in its path up ahead. What is most immediately visually noted in the situation is not redness or sphericality, but that something is in the way. In other words, the initial datum of that sensory experience is resistance, not merely potential resistance, insofar as that the ball may prevent the foot from touching the ground, but actual, insofar as vision itself cannot pass through it to see the path underneath the ball. So, the primary visual datum here is not redness or roundness, but opacity. And, since this datum pertains first and foremost to its impenetrability, it is more accurately classified as a motor-, not a sense-, datum. Generalization to touch is easy--the primary datum in feeling is resistance. But if generalization of this analysis to the other senses is less easy, it is only because of its unfamiliarity, not its inaccuracy. It might become more familiar with respect to 'hearing', if the latter is construed as 'listening to', and a sound interferes with what we are trying to listen to, e. g. the sound of a car engine drowning out the words of someone talking to us. Therein, the resistance aspect of a sound-datum is as obvious as that of visual opacity. A further familiar example demonstrates the general point more effectively. When a hand that has been exposed to cold weather is placed in lukewarm water, the sense-datum is 'hot'. To the Empiricist, this is proof that the 'hot' is not in the water but in the perceiver of the datum. But another interpretation can agree that the datum is not in the water, but can further argue that the 'hot' is not atomic, but is, rather, actually 'hotter than the initial coldness of the hand'. In other words, the datum is in the hand. And, what is happening in the hand is an increase in the velocity of its molecules. In other words, the 'sense'-datum is actually a 'motor'-datum--the product of a synkinetic process that is an awareness of the change in local corporeal motions. Generalization to the other 'sense'-organs yields the criticism of Empiricism: 'Sense-data' are all primarily 'motor-data'.

Monday, August 10, 2009

Consciousness and Behavior

According to the theory of 'Consciousness' being advocated here, all awareness is fundamentally self-awareness, meaning that it is fundamentally an intra-organic process. In more common jargon, the 'consciousness of outer objects' is mediated by the consciousness of local corporeal processes, i. e. the 'consciousness of redness and roundness' is actually the 'consciousness of looking at something red and round'. This inverts the classical Empiricist thesis that knowledge begins with impressions of the outer world. But the challenge to Empiricism is not merely 'Epistemological', as would seem to be the case from standard classifications in Academia. For example, that Locke's notion of 'Tabula Rasa' has significance to both Epistemology and Political Philosophy can hardly be grasped where those two subjects are taught in entirely different Departments, by those with different areas of expertise. More to the immediate point here, despite their being systematically presented in one and the same book, the connections between Hume's Empiricism and his theory of behavior seem rarely to receive attention in Academia. Those connections were hardly new with Hume. To the contrary, they are as traditional as Aristotle, who argues that motivation begins with some sensory stimulus. So, if a sensory stimulus is ultimately, directly or indirectly, from without, then behavior can only be a response to something external. Thus, an alternative theory of 'Consciousness' will entail a challenge to the Empiricist theory of Behavior.

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Learning How To

Being 'experienced' at something means knowing 'how to do' it. So, since how something is done unifies the various motions involved, it is the Form of the Experience. Now, this Form entails more than the simultaneous coordination of bodily motions, e. g. of the movement of the surgeon's hands and eyes as an incision is made. For, the incision must come subsequent to the anesthetizing of the patient, and prior to, e. g. the removal of the appendix. In other words, the Form of most activities is a sequential ordering as well. furthermore, knowing how to do something means having learned to do it, and it is most likely that the learning process entailed step-by-step movements through the stages of the activity. To learn how to walk, a baby must first learn to stand, and then to put one foot forward, and then the other. This natural analysis of the Form of an Experience helps demonstrate two main ways that observation and movement interact in it. First, the inner awareness of the localized bodily movements constrains and coordinates them; in this interaction, the awareness is subsequent to the movements. On the other hand, movement can be subsequent to awareness: the awareness that one is standing up, or that one has completed an incision, is the point of departure for the next phase of the activity, putting a foot forward, or removal of the appendix. Examples such as these suggest what is problematic in both Teleological theories of behavior, and Platonism. The former insist that behavior has a point or points of termination, whereas the Teleologist is hard-pressed to cite any example of a completed action that is not itself the point of departure for a new action. Plato thought that Contemplation of Form was just such a terminal point, but he leaves unexamined how such Contemplation might also be the starting point of another activity, e. g. how Contemplation moved he himself to write voluminously about it.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Experience

Corresponding to the two notions of Consciousness are two differing common usages of 'Experience'. One means to 'undergo' and to 'observe', and, so, is often classified as a 'passive' notion. But, when, for example, one is asked whether or not one is an 'experienced' surgeon, one is not being asked whether or not one has observed oneself performing surgery, but rather whether or not one has performed surgery. So, this notion can be classified as an 'active' one. But the value of this active sense of 'experience' is not as an alternative to one that is surely a prevalent connotation. Rather, it brings to light the unequivocal essence of Experience. The 'active' notion does not reject that Experience is observational, just that it is merely observational. A surgeon surely observes what (s)he is doing, but such observation is integrated with the moving of hands, fingers, eyes, etc. So, Experience, in at least the 'active' sense, would seem, paradoxically, to combine both 'activity' and 'passivity'. But the seeming paradox is a consequence of an inappropriate use of 'passive' to begin with. As Dewey has argued, even the observation that is the quintessential 'experience' in Platonism, the Contemplation of Beauty, is not merely 'passive'. For, as he analyzes, the contemplation of a painting entails not merely passive looking, but an active reconstruction of the work, perhaps even a reconstruction that accurately repeats the artist's initial construction itself. That such reconstruction takes place in the imagination does not undermine the point that it is no less 'active' than the movements of the surgeon's hands, just as the surgeon's observation of those movements is no less undergone than a observer's being affected by the colors on a canvas.

Friday, August 7, 2009

Conscience

From the preceding, it can be demonstrated how embodied, or otherwise, Consciousness is identical to Conscience. While the homeostatic functioning of Consciousness is similar to the typical experience of Conscience, that the latter involves a correction of personal behavior towards others, would seem contrary to the intrapersonal nature of the former. But, as Heidegger has argued, the essence of Conscience is its intrapersonal structure, a 'call' from within, not whatever value system the call happens to serve as a surrogate. Less obviously homeostatic is the concept of Consciousness as a disembodied observer. But Kant's demonstration of how Reason is implicity Practical analogously applies to Consciousness. For, as disembodied, Consciousness is also impersonal, and as an impersonal visitor to a personal Body, it, in itself, constrains corporeal behavior, that is, serves as its Conscience, which is brought out much more plainly when Consciousness and Soul are presented as identical. Even when Aristotle distinguished Practical Intellect from Theoretical, and subordinated it to the latter, he did not mean to distinguish Conscience from Consciousness. For, in his system, thought-thinking-itself is a higher Good than thought-influencing-conduct, and, hence, a more fundamental source of Conscience, not an intellectual process of a different type. Here is exposed Aristotle's allegiance to Plato's doctrine that Contemplation of the Form of the Good is a higher Good than conduct in accordance with the latter. What the Individualistic concept of Conscience primarily rejects in the Platonic tradition is that the 'recollection' of Form is more important than the original collection of localized corporeal movements that first constitute their Form.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

An Alternative Derivation of Self-Consciousness

One standard theory of human experience begins with the awareness of either an object, such as a ball, or a quality, such as roundness, proceeds to discuss the accumulation of the data of consciousness, and, often, somewhere along the way, examines the awareness of that original awareness. Wittingly or otherwise, it is difficult for such a methodology to avoid arriving at the thesis that Consciousness is essentially a disembodied information-processor. A different starting point is the awareness of walking along and noticing a ball close ahead, a basic experience that might be familiar to any young child. Furthermore, the combination in awareness of leg motions and of visual operations can lead to either walking around the ball, or to kicking it. So, this methodology very easily helps establish that Consciousness is essentially embodied and homeostatic. The example also demonstrates how 'information' about the outer world has an essentially homeostatic meaning. For, it is not the case that we first are aware of something, and then incorporate it into our movements. Rather, that awareness is itself the incorporation, an integration into experience that is itself homeostatic, is itself as much the organism's adjustment to a novel stimulus as is its attempt to regain balance after having tripped over a ball. That some information might be categorized as 'useless' only confirms the primacy of 'usefulness', just as for Heidegger, 'Ready-to-Hand' is more fundamental than 'Present-at-Hand'. So, Synkinesis is the feeling of bodily movements as a whole that any introspection can reveal. An explicit bodily 'image' is a further refinement of that feeling. And, as Mead has shown, a lot of what we internalize, from the earliest age, are our images of others, which quite plainly has a homeostatic influence on our behavior. Reflection, that is, explicit Self-Consciousness, is arrived at when one internalizes an image of how one appears to others in general, that is, one self-objectifies, or, as Sartre puts it, one 'assumes' one's 'Being-for-Others'. In the Evolvemental scheme, this is the achievement of the awareness of one's particularity qua particularity, namely the emergence of one's Individuality.

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

The Traditional Conception of Consciousness

If a homeostatic conception of Consciousness seems unfamiliar, it is due in part to its notable ancestor having been pre-empted by its author himself. In Aristotle's notion of Practical Wisdom, i. e. his theory of 'Moderation', the Intellect serves the homeostatic function of introducing balance into behavior. However, he goes on to propose that in this capacity, the Intellect is only imperfect, for, its ideal, the apex of human fulfillment, is Theoretical Wisdom, 'thought thinking itself', the self-sufficient Intellect. Thus, despite Aristotle's continued rejection of Plato's separation of Soul and Body, he himself arrives at a notion of an essentially incorporeal Intellect. So, Aristotle's legacy in this area is that the Intellect is essentially not the coordinator of physical behavior, but incorporeal, contemplative, and self-related. The main heir of this legacy is the standard Modern notion of the 'ghost in the machine' theory of Consciousness, which even when incarnated, is an observer, operating independently of its host body, of the outer world and of itself. Even Spinoza strays from his conviction that Mind and Body are correlates, when he proposes the existence of a reflective mental relation, the 'Idea of an Idea', without even mentioning the existence of any physical parallel, which is otherwise demanded by his system. The endurance of Aristotelianism even two millennia later is perhaps best summed up by the usual technical meaning of the expression 'self-consciousness'--'the consciousness of consciousness'--as if Selfhood, too, were essentially disembodied.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Synkinesis

I have previously been suggesting that Reflection is essentially kinaesthetic. A more accurate term is 'synkinetic', from my neologic 'synkinesis', meaning 'unity of motions'. That any human is naturally synkinetic is obvious from its equilibral system, e. g. of the inner ear, as well as from its native ability to coordinate its motions. As a human develops, so to does its synkinetic capacitites. So, for example, in a simple experience of avoiding a puddle while walking, visual processes are plainly coordinated with ambulatory ones. Thus, in general, perceptual processes are primarily components of synkinesis, a point which has traditionally eluded philosophers who have ignored 'looking at', 'listening to', and 'touching', in favor of 'seeing', 'hearing', and 'feeling', in classifying the 'senses' as merely receptive, and even incorporeal, functions. (If Kant had lived long enough, he might have overridden his 'Transcendental Unity of Apperception' with a 'Synthetic Unity of Kinesis', as the true character of 'a priori' corporeal experience.) Furthermore, our synkinetic processes have a palpable effect on physical activity, as for example, when we recover balance. Thus, synkinesis functions fundamentally as a homeostatic process, again, a point easily missed by theories that construe the senses as mere receivers of information. So, anyone having to pause to consider this assertion is thereby also exemplifying it. Accordingly, Reflection, and Propriation, in general, serves a homeostatic function in the Individual.

Monday, August 3, 2009

Motility and Reflection

The basic manifestations of Exposition and Propriation are Motility and Reflection, respectively. 'Motility' means 'self-moving', in contrast with mobility, which pertains to any kind of movement. Or, to put it another way, Motility is Idionomic mobility. Animals, in general, and particular humans, of course, are mobile, but such mobility is heteronomic. The two main types of heteronomic mobility are what are Aristotle would call the Final Cause and the Efficient Cause. More familiarly, any goal that is being pursued is a Final Cause, while any environmental stimulus is an Efficient Cause. A more subtle type of Efficient Cause is any Systemic law to which an entity is subject qua sub-System, e. g. a procreative urge. 'Reflection' means 'self-consciousness', and is, analogous to the relation between Motility and mobility, Idionomic awareness, (a distinction that Sartre draws between 'thetic' and 'non-thetic' consciousness). The most fundamental type of awareness, present in any animal, is kinaesthesia--the feeling of bodily movement. So, the Motility-Reflection combination is a development of the mobility-kinaesthesia combination.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Propriation

To more sharply distinguish the Formal Principle from the ordinary meaning of 'appropriation', I am modifying the latter to one of its obsolete ancestors, 'Propriation'. Likewise, the definition of 'Propriation' is the more precise 'making one's own'. The distinction that I want to draw can be observed in two examples of the process of internalization. In one, which qualifies as 'appropriation', some household items are moved inside a room. In contrast, an example of Propriation, a structure is built around the items. In both examples, internalization is achieved, but in Propriation the enclosing structure emerges at the end of the process, whereas in appropriation, it is generally taken to precede the process. (This former is also Whitehead's notion of Unity 'emerging' from Concrescence.) Also, the enclosing structure imposes organization on what had originally been a random aggregation of items. (In Kantian language, a Category is an expression of the Transcendental Unity of Apperception.) Furthermore, the room can be expanded to accommodate additional items, in which case, once again, Unity is produced by Propriation. Now, to begin to relate Propriation and Exposition, what Propriation internalizes are Expositions, e. g. goings outside to create new items. (While Propriation is analogous to his Concrescence, Whitehead's system is completely lacking in any process that corresponds to Exposition.)

Saturday, August 1, 2009

Appropriation

I am calling the Formal Principle, the Becoming-the-Same, of the Individual human, 'Appropriation'. Here 'Appropriation' means 'taking possession of', much as is with the common usage, but with some subtle but important differences. In its ordinary sense, it implies a process of internalization that relates two items that are distinct at the outset, and and are still distinct at the completion. e. g. any purchase of an use item. In contrast, in the technical notion, 'something becoming mine' is more accurately 'an indefinite something becoming me', as in fact can be appreciated even in ordinary cases, e. g. the tool that I use becomes no longer just that but an 'extension' of me. Furthermore, the 'me' that has become is a product of the process, as it is in Whitehead's 'Concrescence'. For example, the tree that results from the addition of a new ring did not, strictly speaking, exist prior to that addition, and the ring is part of the tree, not a distinct but related entity. In other words, both the 'subject' and the 'object' of Appropriation are internal phases of the process, which get distinguished as a matter of analytic interest or linguistic convenience. So, in contrast with Exposition, Appropriation is a transition from indeterminacy to determinacy.