Changes

=====1.1.4.1.  Imagination=====

=====1.1.4.1.  Imagination=====

The intellectual factor or knowledge component of a system is usually expected to have a certain quality of mercy, that is, to involve actions which are Reversible, Assuredly, Immediately, Nearly.  Even though every action obeys physical and thermodynamic constraints, processes that suit themselves to being used for knowledge representation must exhibit a certain forgiveness.  It must be possible to move pointers around on a map without irretrievably committing forces on the plain of battle.  Actions carried out in the image space should not incur too great a pain or price in terms of the time and energy they dissipate.  In sum, a virtue of symbolic operations is that they be as nearly and assuredly reversible as possible.  This "virtual" construction, as usual, declares a positively oriented proportion:  operations are useful as symbolic transformations in proportion to their exact and certain reversibility.

The intellectual factor or knowledge component of a system is usually expected  

to have a certain quality of mercy, that is, to involve actions which are  

Reversible, Assuredly, Immediately, Nearly.  Even though every action obeys  

physical and thermodynamic constraints, processes that suit themselves to being  

used for knowledge representation must exhibit a certain forgiveness.  It must  

be possible to move pointers around on a map without irretrievably committing  

forces on the plain of battle.  Actions carried out in the image space should  

not incur too great a pain or price in terms of the time and energy they  

dissipate.  In sum, a virtue of symbolic operations is that they be as nearly  

and assuredly reversible as possible.  This "virtual" construction, as usual,  

declares a positively oriented proportion:  operations are useful as symbolic  

transformations in proportion to their exact and certain reversibility.

Imagination's development of elaborate and seemingly superabundant resources of  

Imagination's development of elaborate and seemingly superabundant resources of imagery is actually governed by strict obedience to the cybernetic law of requisite variety, which determines that only variety in the responses of a regulator can counter the flow of variety from disturbances to essential variables, the qualities the system must act to keep nearly constant in order to survive in its current and preferred form of being (Ashby, ch. 10 & 11).  Aristotle, thinking that the human brain was too flimsy and spongy a material to embody the human intellect, thought it might be useful as a kind of radiator to cool the blood.  This is actually a pretty good theory, I think, if it is recognized that the specialty of the brain is to regulate essential variables of human existence on a global scale through the discovery of natural laws.  To view the brain as a theorem-o-stat is then fairly close to the mark.

imagery is actually governed by strict obedience to the cybernetic law of  

requisite variety, which determines that only variety in the responses of a  

regulator can counter the flow of variety from disturbances to essential  

variables, the qualities the system must act to keep nearly constant in order to  

survive in its current and preferred form of being (Ashby, ch. 10 & 11).   

Aristotle, thinking that the human brain was too flimsy and spongy a material to  

embody the human intellect, thought it might be useful as a kind of radiator to  

cool the blood.  This is actually a pretty good theory, I think, if it is  

recognized that the specialty of the brain is to regulate essential variables of  

human existence on a global scale through the discovery of natural laws.  To  

view the brain as a theorem-o-stat is then fairly close to the mark.

=====1.1.4.2.  Remembrance=====

=====1.1.4.2.  Remembrance=====