If an Impact Destroyed Earth, would 'God' Care?

On Mar 7, 12:02*pm, "Jonathan" wrote:
"tension_on_the_wire" wrote in message

...
On Mar 4, 7:40 pm, "Jonathan" wrote:

To the very core, it's randomness that is the source of all Creation.

After all, a totally disordered or random system has as it's future
only one possible direction, towards more order. As is shown in the
study of random boolean networks.
I'm afraid your basic premise is incorrect. *The system to which you
are assigning a random state is one made of atoms.

From a reductionist frame of reference that would be correct, all of what
you say is correct. But as I said at the start, I was talking about a system
perspective. Where order and disorder are defined relative the....output
of the system, it's global behavior. Not from the part or component
properties. So from a system perspective order and chaos, or simple
vs complex has an entirely different meaning.

You're still using a linear perspective where order vs complexity
is measured, say, on a sliding scale from zero to infinity
A non-linear frame would call complex the place where simple
and chaotic behavior transitions from one to the other. Such
as the very narrow temp range where water is transitioning
to vapor. That is the highest level of complexity, at that transition
point. Either opposite possibility, water /or/ vapor, is considered
simple by comparison to the behavior /at/ the point the system
changes state. *This is because at the transition point the behavior
is a combination of the two states of matter, requiring both
fields of science at once to describe the whole. Once on either
side of the transition, only one field is needed so to speak.
So simplicity is found in either the static or chaotic realms, and
complexity is found when the system is equally dominated
by both types of behavior....at...the transition point from
simple to chaotic.

It's at this very narrow transition point where spontaneous order emerges..
Requiring a system pushed far from equilibrium, just far enough to persistently
reside near this delicate phase transition. And pushed usually by random
interactions from outside systems. This narrow transition point is commonly
called the Edge of Chaos.

Perturbation and Transients - The Edge of Chaoshttp://www.calresco.org/perturb.htm
Attractors everywhere - Order from Chaoshttp://www.calresco.org/attract.htm

linear frame of reference (part perspective)

order(simple) * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *chaotic(complex)

* * * * * 0 ---------------- * * ------------ Infinity

in a non-linear frame of reference (system perspective) becomes

* * * * * * 0---------- * * * * infinity * * * * * * * ------- * 0
* * * * * *simple------ * * * *complex * * * * * *---------simple
* * * * * *static ------- * * * *dynamic * * * * * *--------chaotic
* * * * * *solid ------- * * * * liquid * * * * * * * *--------- gas
* * * classical motion * *thermodynamics * * *quantum motion

So in this view the highest level of complexity is at the point where the
system is a combination of both behaviors or states. And also at it's
lowest ability to quantify. At the edge. where both classical and quantum
like behaviors are entangled.

*When it comes to
order and chaos, atoms tend to follow the laws of thermodynamics, not
the behavior of random boolean networks.

Well, again you're right, but boolean networks describe the behavior of
the ...output... of complex adaptive systems, of which thermodynamics
is but the simplest example.

"A Boolean network has 2N possible states. Sooner or later it will reach
a previously visited state, and thus, since the dynamics are deterministic, fall
into an attractor."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boolean_network

An attractor, meaning cyclic behavior, spontaneously emerges.
Cyclic behavior is a greater level of order than totally random.

*And the laws of
thermodynamics are pretty clear about the fact that order begets chaos
in closed systems, and it is irrelevant whether you are examining very
small molecular systems or those of great big astronomical bodies.
The concept of absolute zero, in heat measurement, describes exactly
what happens in a closed system which is allowed to run down to total
chaos and zero order. *Those systems do not reassemble themselves
spontaneously into ordered systems.

But your closed system with zero order is my static attractor.
Which could be described like spinning a ball inside a bowl.
Sooner or later it comes to rest at the bottom, this is also
called subcritical behavior. As opposed to supercritical behavior
like a gas dissipating. Or as in gravity vs cosmic expansion.

Show me at least one example
where this is not the case and I'll be happy to retract.

How many examples do you want?
When a static system finds itself in an unstable equilibrium (complex)
relationship with its chaotic attractor. Then often a third type
of behavior spontaneously emerges, called dynamic.

As in... * * solid * * * * * * * * * * * *liquid * * * * * * * * gas
* * * * * * * * static * * * * * * * * * *dynamic * * * * * * * chaotic
* * * * * * *particle motion * * thermodynamics * * quantum motion
* * * * * * * *rule of law * * * * * *democracy * * * * *freedom
* * * * * * * * *genetics * * * * * * natural selection * * *mutation
* * * * * * * *knowledge * * * * * * genius * * * * * * * * imagination
* * * * * * * * producer * * * * * * * market * * * * * * * consumer
* * * * * * * * *science * * * * * * * * *art * * * * * * * * * *
religion
* * * * * * * * *matter * * * * * * * * * *light * * * * * * * * *energy

* * * * * * pre-invasion Iraq * * democratic Iraq * * *post-invasion Iraq

When a system is dominated by /either/ the static or chaotic attractor, it's
behavior is short lived and tragic. But, as boolean networks show, and as
any good intuition knows, these opposites tend to attract each other
..they cross paths.. sooner or later. Then life has it's chance.
The middle or complex dynamic realms are all emergent. They
are all spontaneous creations of the combination of static and
chaotic system behavior. *Or edge states.

You see, a non linear frame of reference provides the essential ability
to describe.....every discipline...within a single mathematics.

Even the disciplines or art and religion are now under the gun of modern
mathematics. Once you learn the universal frame of reference of
complexity science.

And you know what, suddenly the commonalties among all the
countless disciplines become easy to see. There is a simplicity
to our reality that can't be seen from a reductionist or from the
input side of reality. You have to inverse the initial frame
of our scientific method, and /start with the output/ of the whole.


I've read your last two posts carefully, and you are making some
useful if obvious observations. However, would it not also follow by
your reasoning that the most fertile ground for further progress lies
at the interface between the reductionist and holistic paradigms,
rather than in one or the other?

Just trying to follow your teachings.....:-)

-tg





For instance, the behavior or output of life tends to follow power law
relationships, which in essence is really just another inverse-square law..
It's not a coincidence that fitness peak look a lot like gravity wells.

Life is no more a fluke than a black hole.

Dynamics of Complex Systems
Full online texthttp://necsi.org/publications/dcs/

--tension