Biological systematists that are called "cladists" believe that there is a true "tree of life" to be found, and spend their time and our money searching for it. Now, if there really is such a true "tree of life" to be found, how can cladists then know when they have found it?
If this true "tree", as cladists themselves claim, is the "tree" that requires the fewest number of explanations on the origin of traits among organisms, then there isn't any such tree at all, since classification is ultimately paradoxically contradictory, which we can figure out ourselves but which Bertrand Russell also demonstrated already in 1901 (that is, before the origin of cladistics), because it means that there are at least two such "trees". If so, then cladists will thus search forever for their true "tree of life", because there simply isn't any single such thing to be found.
So, can there possibly be another true "tree of life" (ie, one that doesn't minimize the number of explanations on the origin of traits among organisms) to be found? If so, then there will also be a mirror image of this "tree" actually representing the other side of the same real "tree" (ie, the true "tree" seen from the other side). How can cladists then distinguish which of these two true "trees" that represent the true "tree" (when both actually do)?
The existence of such a true "tree of life" does thus appear to be a practical impossibility. Instead, the belief in it appears to be a conflation of representation with the represented (ie, class with object). It gives rise to the questions: how can we pay cladists for a search for a practically impossible belief? Doesn't cladistics actually represent science (in this case biological systematics) going nuts into its own classification?
söndag 12 maj 2013
lördag 11 maj 2013
When science turns into belief: cladistics and Higg's particle-ism
Cladistics and Higg's particle-ism do actually represent scientific breakdowns into belief. When the irrationality of reality frustrates scientists enough, they find ways to escape this frustration, and these ways do, unfortunately, always lead them into the belief they tried to escape in the first place, and are, also unfortunately, just as paradoxically contradictory as the beliefs they tried to escape are. These ways do thus just lead them from the ashes into the fire. Neither clades nor Higg's particle are consistent, but are actually paradoxes.
Scientists can't understand how their rational search for the truth led them to this frustration, which forced them to take the step to belief, but I can explain that it is because the explanation of this is simpler than their explanation of reality is. They simply can't see the forest because they look to close on the trees.
The fundamental problem is that reality has two aspects: pattern and process, and that this fact prevents us from finding a single truth, just as it prevents reality from finding a stable state. This fundamental fact is not something we can overcome, but something we have to accept. Unfortunately, it means that particle physicists will not find a smallest particle and that cladists will not find the tree of life. Both of them are convinced over the boundary between science and belief that their respective ideas are to be found, but, unfortunately, they're wrong. Neither of them is to be found. This I can claim with security, since if they could be found, then time would not be relative to space. My claim thus hangs on the fact that time is relative to space.
(However, independently of this fundamental rectifier, only my reasoning is totally consistent. Please, correct me if I'm wrong).
Scientists can't understand how their rational search for the truth led them to this frustration, which forced them to take the step to belief, but I can explain that it is because the explanation of this is simpler than their explanation of reality is. They simply can't see the forest because they look to close on the trees.
The fundamental problem is that reality has two aspects: pattern and process, and that this fact prevents us from finding a single truth, just as it prevents reality from finding a stable state. This fundamental fact is not something we can overcome, but something we have to accept. Unfortunately, it means that particle physicists will not find a smallest particle and that cladists will not find the tree of life. Both of them are convinced over the boundary between science and belief that their respective ideas are to be found, but, unfortunately, they're wrong. Neither of them is to be found. This I can claim with security, since if they could be found, then time would not be relative to space. My claim thus hangs on the fact that time is relative to space.
(However, independently of this fundamental rectifier, only my reasoning is totally consistent. Please, correct me if I'm wrong).
onsdag 8 maj 2013
No, extraterrestrial civilizations do not exist
No, extraterrestrial civilizations do not exist. No matter how high the probability for such civilizations is, they do not exist as pure probabilities, but only as facts. If probabilities exist (as facts), then God can also be a fact by pure probability. And, furthermore, if probabilities exist, then realities, like you and me, do not exist.
We have to choose: do realities (like you and me) or probabilities (like extraterrestrial civilizations) exist. If the latter, then not the former, and vice versa.
We have to choose: do realities (like you and me) or probabilities (like extraterrestrial civilizations) exist. If the latter, then not the former, and vice versa.
lördag 4 maj 2013
On the dream of cladistics
An orthogonality is a diametrical opposition. It may be between classes, as that between 'hairy-hairless' and 'hair color', or between dimensions, as that between 'X' and 'Y'. The typical property of an orthogonality is that it lacks a common middle. There is, for example, no hair color that can be assigned to both a hairy and a hairless object. Orthogonalities emerge in the moment we conceptualize reality. Indeed, reality itself protrudes as an orthogonality between what we call 'pattern' and 'process'.
Orthogonalities are difficult to interpret in an existential sense, since both of the opposites have to "exist" as being interdependent, although not both of them thus can exist at the same time as being contradictory. An orthogonal relation do we sometimes express as that one "thing" is BOTH one and its opposite, as in that a photon is BOTH a particle and a wave. However, if this statement is correct, then it logically means that a wave also is BOTH a photon and a particle, which, obviously, isn't correct. The problem is that concepts have different extensions (ie, are of different inclusiveness among objects), and that this difference is impossible to express for certain relations. We can, for example, say that SOME waves (ie, photons) also are particles, since 'wave' is intermediate in extension between 'photon' and 'particle', but we can't incorporate this distinction in a statement about photons, since the extension of 'photon' is smaller than that of both 'wave' and 'particle'. The extension of the concept we explain must be intermediate between the concepts we use to explain it. Instead, the correct expression is that a photon is NEITHER a particle nor a wave, since it does not have any erroneous connotations, but leaving the photon unexplained.
The correct statement about reality is thus that it is neither pattern nor process, thus leaving reality unexplained. This statement excludes the existence of something like Higg's particle, although it would have explained reality if it indeed had been a particle, which it can't be because it would have meant that a particle is a wave. There is thus no Higg's particle, although Higg's particle-ists claim to almost having found it.Never will we cross the boundary between knowledge and belief.
Orthogonalities are difficult to interpret in an existential sense, since both of the opposites have to "exist" as being interdependent, although not both of them thus can exist at the same time as being contradictory. An orthogonal relation do we sometimes express as that one "thing" is BOTH one and its opposite, as in that a photon is BOTH a particle and a wave. However, if this statement is correct, then it logically means that a wave also is BOTH a photon and a particle, which, obviously, isn't correct. The problem is that concepts have different extensions (ie, are of different inclusiveness among objects), and that this difference is impossible to express for certain relations. We can, for example, say that SOME waves (ie, photons) also are particles, since 'wave' is intermediate in extension between 'photon' and 'particle', but we can't incorporate this distinction in a statement about photons, since the extension of 'photon' is smaller than that of both 'wave' and 'particle'. The extension of the concept we explain must be intermediate between the concepts we use to explain it. Instead, the correct expression is that a photon is NEITHER a particle nor a wave, since it does not have any erroneous connotations, but leaving the photon unexplained.
The correct statement about reality is thus that it is neither pattern nor process, thus leaving reality unexplained. This statement excludes the existence of something like Higg's particle, although it would have explained reality if it indeed had been a particle, which it can't be because it would have meant that a particle is a wave. There is thus no Higg's particle, although Higg's particle-ists claim to almost having found it.Never will we cross the boundary between knowledge and belief.
måndag 25 mars 2013
Cladistics (Willi Hennig) got off the problem for biological systematics on the wrong foot
Cladistics (Willi Hennig) got off the problem for biological systematics on the wrong foot. The problem isn't which dichotomously branching illustration of the origin of life that is "true", but that there can't be a single "true" dichotomously branching illustration of the origin of life.
This problem is due to that classification is orthogonal and thus ultimately paradoxically contradictory, which also Bertrand Russell demonstrated in 1901, and is actually the reason for Linné's invention of his orthogonal classification, which avoids the paradox. Cladistics' (actually Hennig's) belief there is a single "true" dichotomously branching illustration of the origin of life does not change the fact that there isn't. Belief can overcome many problems, but not change facts.
This problem is due to that classification is orthogonal and thus ultimately paradoxically contradictory, which also Bertrand Russell demonstrated in 1901, and is actually the reason for Linné's invention of his orthogonal classification, which avoids the paradox. Cladistics' (actually Hennig's) belief there is a single "true" dichotomously branching illustration of the origin of life does not change the fact that there isn't. Belief can overcome many problems, but not change facts.
lördag 9 februari 2013
Explanation of what a "species" is
Biological systematists (and others) have long wondered what a "species" is. Well, I can tell them that a "species" is the opposite to an "object" (or "entity"). I can also tell them that the problem to find out what a "species" is, is that whereas an "object" has two different aspects: pattern and process, these two different aspects are in a species instead orthogonal properties. It means that a "species" is different from itself by having orthogonal properties (per definition).
This property of a "species" (ie, being different from itself by having orthogonal properties ) is difficult to understand, but Bertrand Russell (1901) gave the explanation by the paradox that became known as Russell's paradox. The explanation is simply that classification is inherently paradoxically contradictory by being orthogonal, and that species is the paradox itself.
A "species" is thus the opposite to an "object" (or "entity"), that is, a paradox. It is the paradox that emerges in the moment we distinguish "objects" of different "species". One of "objects" and "species" has to be a paradox, we can just choose which. (Whereof the approach for typologists, cladistics, chooses "objects". To a cladist the problem is thus not what a "species" is, but what an "object" is. A representative for a species, like the cladist Steve Farris for Homo sapiens, is not a representative for the species Homo sapiens, but the species Homo sapiens. As an object, he is a paradox, And, although this may be true for Steve Farris, it is not true for all representatives for all species).
This property of a "species" (ie, being different from itself by having orthogonal properties ) is difficult to understand, but Bertrand Russell (1901) gave the explanation by the paradox that became known as Russell's paradox. The explanation is simply that classification is inherently paradoxically contradictory by being orthogonal, and that species is the paradox itself.
A "species" is thus the opposite to an "object" (or "entity"), that is, a paradox. It is the paradox that emerges in the moment we distinguish "objects" of different "species". One of "objects" and "species" has to be a paradox, we can just choose which. (Whereof the approach for typologists, cladistics, chooses "objects". To a cladist the problem is thus not what a "species" is, but what an "object" is. A representative for a species, like the cladist Steve Farris for Homo sapiens, is not a representative for the species Homo sapiens, but the species Homo sapiens. As an object, he is a paradox, And, although this may be true for Steve Farris, it is not true for all representatives for all species).
tisdag 29 januari 2013
Förklaring av kladistik
Den inriktning i biologisk systematik som kallas "kladistik" är egentligen en sammanblandning av sak och sort som vänder upp och ner på dem, dvs fokuserar på sort istället för sak. Genom detta förvandlar den Darwins illuistration av evolution från att vara en fundamentalt inkonsekvent illustration i termer av sorter till att vara en till synes självklar illustration av Livets Träd. Det stora problemet med denna förvandling är att sammanblandningen av sak och sort leder in i Russell's paradox, dvs är paradoxalt självmotsägande, därför att det betyder att detta till synes självklara Livets Träd för sorter inte har en enda konsekvent lösning, dvs att alla möjliga lösningar av det är självmotsägande.
(Grundproblemet är att sorter inte uppkommer genom dikotom splittring, utan genom förändring av enskilda saker över tid, därför att det betyder att interna linjer i varje möjligt Livets träd kommer att inkludera egenskaper som i verkligheten har funnits vid olika, dvs på varandra följande, tidpunkter, så kallade "felande länkar". Orsaken till sådana "felande länkar" är alltså att en dikotomt förgrenande modell av evolution är fundamentalt inkonsekvent i att blanda ihop sak och sort. Sådana "felande länkar" är alltså ett tankefel, inte något som verkligen har funnits, dvs, inte något att leta efter, lika lite som någor enskilt sant Livets träd. Nej, evolution måste beskrivas orthogonalt, som i den Linneanska systematiken, därför att den sker över verklighetens alla fyra dimensioner).
Problemet med kladistik är att det är mycket lättare att luras in i den än att förstå vad problemet med den är, och att när man väl har lurats in i den, så kan man i värsta fall inleda ett praktiskt sökande efter något som inte står att finna (om man nu inte sysslar med något helt annat, vilket kladisterna tenderar att göra efter ett tag).
(Grundproblemet är att sorter inte uppkommer genom dikotom splittring, utan genom förändring av enskilda saker över tid, därför att det betyder att interna linjer i varje möjligt Livets träd kommer att inkludera egenskaper som i verkligheten har funnits vid olika, dvs på varandra följande, tidpunkter, så kallade "felande länkar". Orsaken till sådana "felande länkar" är alltså att en dikotomt förgrenande modell av evolution är fundamentalt inkonsekvent i att blanda ihop sak och sort. Sådana "felande länkar" är alltså ett tankefel, inte något som verkligen har funnits, dvs, inte något att leta efter, lika lite som någor enskilt sant Livets träd. Nej, evolution måste beskrivas orthogonalt, som i den Linneanska systematiken, därför att den sker över verklighetens alla fyra dimensioner).
Problemet med kladistik är att det är mycket lättare att luras in i den än att förstå vad problemet med den är, och att när man väl har lurats in i den, så kan man i värsta fall inleda ett praktiskt sökande efter något som inte står att finna (om man nu inte sysslar med något helt annat, vilket kladisterna tenderar att göra efter ett tag).
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