Tom on "Quantum Enlightenment"

[Balder]

For anyone interested --

Tom, a former member of IPS, has posted an interesting -- and lengthy! -- blog on Integral Life.

 

Quantum Enlightenment 

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

http://vimeo.com/20105257

Hi Joel,

Great, I am posting both the paper that describes the mathematics and reasoning behind Cracked Orlando's libretto here, plus the link to the opera highlights. The opera premiered at Columbia University's Italian Academy. Attending was the thrill of my life. By the third night, the opera received a standing ovation. The idea behind it was to formulate a kind of opera more contemporary and accessible to everyone. The opera only runs a little over an hour, and as you'll see, the dancers are continually taking off and putting on clothing. We are looking for other venues around the world, if anyone has any ideas...  

Joel Morrison said:

...Oh, and I'm definitely interested in the opera and ballet, paper and video.  I'd love to see it!  :)

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

I don't think zero is like other numbers either. Zero is a place-holder. I think that must be what you mean by "tacit." By holding the column place in the number system for 10's, 100's, 1000's, etc., our number system became liberated from the need for new symbols within sequential numbering. By using only 10 digits that fold back on themselves over and over, the number system itself became recursive and so fractally organized. Though, of course, this is a trivial example of a fractal, partly through its being completely linear and predictable. Infinity became implied by the invention of zero as a placeholder, because numbers could then shoot into an indefinite future, since there was never a need for a new symbol.  

 
Thomas said:

I hear what Shinzen is saying about zero and nothingness.  I read a book on zero---I think it was one of Barrow's---and independently confirmed to my satisfaction that zero traces back to the dual emergence of zero and infinity in mathematical and philosophical thinking, not coincidentally, in my view, to the axial age of Buddha.  I disagree with Shinzen that zero is like other numbers 1, 2, 3, etc., though I do agree that zero is implied by polar opposites.  Zero is tacit, as infinity is.  Regular numbers appear as number-plays in that tacit backdrop---a parenthesized backdrop, if you will, a zero and infinity non-bracketing.

 

Jumping out of the negationist understanding, zero is wholeness: circle.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

I just read through Shinzen's piece. The idea of zero balancing polarities is quite interesting in terms of the virbrating void. But I personally think the idea of zero as a place-holder is also profound, from a consciousness point of view. By using the void to hold space in columns of increasing value, we wind up needing zero to go someplace, including towards infinity. In fact, as mentioned in an earlier posting, zero as a place-holder in the columns was what made possible the mathematical invention of infinity as a new symbol in and of itself.   

Balder said:

This floated by on my Facebook feed today:  Algorithm and Emptiness.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

Thanks Thomas! I'm so glad this stuff resonates with you. As a clinical psychologist, I personally just love the notion of paradox built into the very fabric of things, especially things psychological and deeply emotional. Then we can stop fighting these opposites as if they contradict or annihilate one another. Instead, we can see them as the stuff of rich variability.

Thomas said:

Oh, and Terry, I have also recently shifted to a qualitative view of numbers that follows closely what you say above about their archetypal significance.  I've read quite a lot of Jungian literature, so I get what you mean by that reference.

 

Yes, 1 is wholeness, 2 duality, 3 process and 4 resolution back into wholeness.  Wonderful stuff.

 

And one other rambling comment.  I like what you say in your reentry paper, particularly your chapter titled "Contradiction Built Into the Fabric."  I have been stressing that in most of my numerous posts in many threads, and particularly this one, over the last several weeks here.  I resonate with how you conclude that chapter:

 

Whether in organic or inorganic forms, autonomous systems appear supported by inherently contradictory underpinnings.

 

I also appreciate the Bohr quote with which you begin that chapter:

 

A great truth is a truth whose opposite is also a great truth.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

One of the very cool things about fractal dimensionality is that unlike previous systems, the number system itself now includes both a quantitative and a qualitative aspect. Take for example, the fractal number 1.24538. This is a fractal that exists between ordinary dimensions of one and two. So, the 1 before the decimal point refers to the quantitative aspect, which is its topological dimension. The series of numbers after the decimal point refers to the qualitative aspect, i.e., its complexity, or how much of the next dimension this fractal occupies. Since the next number is 2, this is not a very complex fractal shape. It would look like a squiggly line that hardly meanders off the straight and narrow. If, instead, it was 1.94538, than it would have a very different qualitative feel. The squiggle would be like a child's scrawl that madly fills up a 2-dimensional surface. By inventing a number system that includes both a quantitative and qualitative aspect, fractals embody infinity in a whole new way. Kind of like bringing heaven a little closer to earth...   

Thomas said:

Nicole, I've gained deepening over time appreciation for particularly that section of Eliot's poem, like an important dream where in going back to it after some time or further experience I see new angles, more highly resolved and differentiated, more subtle and more powerful.

 

You can see this development in what I wrote about QM in 2009, which Bruce posted in the Bitbol thread.  I got the basic frame for QM back then, but I've dropped to a deeper understanding now.

 

This process---a fractalling into deeper or higher resolution---looks apparent to me in what you say above, Terry, about dropping into a new, qualitative understanding of numbers.  I underwent that shift not so long ago myself, which I take to be a shift to a greater reliance on intuitional understanding.  I personally understand what you mean by channeling---it's as if new understandings simply emerge whole and here and now.  Who knows where that comes from.

 

Speaking of channeling, I had an archetypal dream about a year ago.  I was clearing a channel---a concrete channel of water that drained into the unknown earth deep below.  There was garbage and some sort of square cloths in the channel---the veils of square, you could say.  As I was clearing this channel, a boa snake emerged from the hole leading into the earth ... only his head.  He glanced at me and transfixed me.  I then ran to gather better implements to clear the channel and in doing so told my mother what I was doing, I was working to free the snake.  She reacted hysterically, which I noted, and disregarded so far as concerned clearing the channel, to which I immediately returned.  I then awoke.

 

This dream prefigured new understandings that emerged in me soon after.  The channel was now working.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

This Eliot poem is lovely indeed! The image of getting to the end only to find ourselves back in the beginning is indeed the image of the uroboros, the snake that eats its own tail, symbol of eternal recursion and renewal through feeding-back. What a perfect dream symbol for clearing out the channels! And there is even an Oedipal aspect in needing to go beyond the protesting mother, who would hold you to her bosom until the death of you both...

Thomas said:

Nicole, I've gained deepening over time appreciation for particularly that section of Eliot's poem, like an important dream where in going back to it after some time or further experience I see new angles, more highly resolved and differentiated, more subtle and more powerful.

 

You can see this development in what I wrote about QM in 2009, which Bruce posted in the Bitbol thread.  I got the basic frame for QM back then, but I've dropped to a deeper understanding now.

 

This process---a fractalling into deeper or higher resolution---looks apparent to me in what you say above, Terry, about dropping into a new, qualitative understanding of numbers.  I underwent that shift not so long ago myself, which I take to be a shift to a greater reliance on intuitional understanding.  I personally understand what you mean by channeling---it's as if new understandings simply emerge whole and here and now.  Who knows where that comes from.

 

Speaking of channeling, I had an archetypal dream about a year ago.  I was clearing a channel---a concrete channel of water that drained into the unknown earth deep below.  There was garbage and some sort of square cloths in the channel---the veils of square, you could say.  As I was clearing this channel, a boa snake emerged from the hole leading into the earth ... only his head.  He glanced at me and transfixed me.  I then ran to gather better implements to clear the channel and in doing so told my mother what I was doing, I was working to free the snake.  She reacted hysterically, which I noted, and disregarded so far as concerned clearing the channel, to which I immediately returned.  I then awoke.

 

This dream prefigured new understandings that emerged in me soon after.  The channel was now working.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

Let me say a bit more about using numbers in a quantitative versus qualitative sense. When we use numbers quantitatively, their meaning is quite precise. 7 is 7 period. It either is 7 or it is not. There is a polarity to this use of number, as in an equation is either true or false, but not both at once. This quantitative use of number clearly has been very useful in the history of modern invention. But this kind of polar thinking also does some damage psychologically. People argue from the perspective of right and wrong, as if everything has one and only one of these truth tags to it. Well, number can also be used to represent qualitative aspects, when it is based on something other than a bi-valent logic system. So, for example, rather than simple true-false, yes-no, zero-one (bit) systems, there are any number of multi-valent logic systems. Fuzzy logic is a good example. Here 0 and 1 only represent the extreme ends, and there exists all degrees of truth inbetween these extremes. So fuzzy logic can be used to model qualitative descriptors like, "He's quite tall" or "She's not very pretty." In my book, Psyche's Veil, http://www.amazon.com/Psyches-Veil-Psychotherapy-Fractals-Complexit... , which applies chaos and complexity science and fractal geometry to the psyche, I have drawn a fuzzy logic cube (interestingly, 0,0,0, is the emptiness in the center). Perhaps because of its imprecise, ambiguous qualities, fuzzy logic has not caught on in the Western world as much as in Japan and other places more comfortable with multivalent systems of logic. Appliances that are able to automatically adjust to things like how many clothes you load in and how dirty they are, use fuzzy logic algorithms at their base, rather than having to program in these features by hand. Ironically, the addition of fuzzy logic, with all of its imprece algorithms folded in, allows greater precision in the end.

valli said:

 

Hi terry

 

It's just that I've never written anything mathematical before, and I wasn't sure where it came from. One aspect is quite different. Whereas we usually think about mathematics as purely quantitative, this piece was inspired by a Jungian understanding, which looks at numbers from a qualitative point of view

So you are accessing channels that are kind of non local ! If I may ask how did you acquire that ability. Iam not sure where that came from -That’s vision logic right? At least  after it comes . Seeing the equation instead of a step by step process - same movement of seeing numbers as archetypes, Or is Vision logic less representational than archetypes. Theres also where it comes from. Can I say a two step dimensional entry not in terms of plural dimensions but singular ones? I have to process what numbers to archetypes mean, I’ll read the paper and see if that comes together. But since I’ve been thinking….

 

I was tongue and cheek about the channeling of the mathematics

I realized first thing this morning , what you meant by channeling and when I posted that it was late last night and maybe why I was seeing séances and silky crystals . I should restrain myself :) but it wasn’t me it was my mind  that made the association, haha. Made me think neither realization or association is performative, that’s sort of similar. But association has a context  and realization doesn’t seem to . Going back to the discussion with joel I wonder if (transrational or rational) recursions  occur as either association or realization into equations ( which are performative.  and quantitative as you say). when the equation is a realization, it might rewire associations. To close the gap between the qualitative and the quantitative – Iam trying to process what this means – as  a symbitioc feature of technology and what it means for the organism (I had a question on this when you pointed me to semiotic seams) – and to archetypes. Ie when an equation is a realization but since its based on an associations inherently, does it then validate it beyond its essential reductivity.

if qualitative extends  to the fallout, ie  distance themselves  from associations,  or  the associations  are recursively redefined (reinvented? ) the dynamics of re-entry here – suggests tampering with the archetypes.

would love to check out the music and poetry. I used to be into them too in a dissidents way!

[Balder]

I'll post more soon, but just a quick testimonial:  Terry's book is quite good.  I definitely recommend it.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

Gee, thanks so much for the kind words about Psyche's Veil. I so suffered over its writing. It took me 12 years and 3 complete drafts written and discarded to write. I spent a long time thinking I was crazy to see and say what I saw. I couldn't find my voice. One draft surrounded a very funny, self-referential story, which was way too trivial to carry the deeper messages (e.g., the final chapter is all about synchronicity and interpenetration at all levels). I was trying to hard make the ideas compelling and accessible. But then, finally, I hit my stride. All the case examples fell into place. I had a blast doing the science boxes and filling the book with my own drawings. I believed I had discovered a whole new paradigm for psychology--one much truer to how nature works, with the capacity to capture the complexity of people's actual lives. I'm still waiting for my colleagues to catch on to this stuff. But one thing I have realized that makes me more patient is that the artists often get cutting edge stuff before the scientists. I was deeply gratified to hear from the Julliard composer, JonathanDawe, and to receive his invitation to collaborate on a fractal opera. And much to my delight, unlike the book, the libretto poured out whole in only 2 1/2 days...

Balder said:

I'll post more soon, but just a quick testimonial:  Terry's book is quite good.  I definitely recommend it.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

Ah, Rumi so often has just the right poem for the insight of the moment. Just last week, I cited a Rumi poem to a patient: Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I'll meet you there. Much to my delight, he came back the next week with yet another poem about tearing down the structure of the house to get at the treasure buried underneath the ground. We spent the entire session talking about the meaning of this for him. I love this image of the door opening from the inside. Yes, that's it exactly! I hope that your experience lives up to your expectations of this book. I have gotten so little feedback on it that whatever strikes you I will enjoy hearing about. I was recently gratified when I attended a conference and a woman came up to me and said the book was being used as a textbook in her home country of Denmark. This was my vision for it--that it was packed enough to provide enough rich clinical and theoretical material for an entire course. But it doesn't include any "how to" stuff. So it makes sense that the Europeans are more attracted to the material than Americans have been so far... 

Thomas said:

That's a lovely story of your writing, Terry.

 

I spent a long time thinking I was crazy to see and say what I saw.

 

Innovators are often branded as crazy.  I take it as a good sign if I others think I'm teetering on the lip of craziness.  Check out what Rumi said about such:

 

I have lived on the lip
of insanity, wanting to know reasons,
knocking on a door. It opens.
I've been knocking from the inside.

 

Knock and knock, and the door opens, from the inside!  Isn't that what you experienced, Terry?  I can tell you that from even the little you've shared here that I will thoroughly enjoy your book, and I expect to go, ahh, she nailed it.

 

I believed I had discovered a whole new paradigm for psychology--one much truer to how nature works, with the capacity to capture the complexity of people's actual lives.

 

I bet you have.  Congratulations.  Your kind of thinking is to me the way of the future.

[Terry Marks-Tarlow, Ph.D.]

Thanks! It's up to you if you whether you want to send your reactions through a personal message or not. If you feel the content could be of benefit to others in some way, please feel free to post the message more publically.

Thomas said:

I'll send you my feedback after I read it, through a personal message on this site, Terry.  : )

[Tely]

Hello, all.  I don't have anything to say, but I just wanted to "say" something so that I would get notified when people respond to this discussion.  Thanks!