If you are relying on what I have to say about Cahill, I'm afraid your reliance is misplaced. My background in physics was a high school course in 1967, supplemented by independent study over the past fifteen years. To take what I say about Cahill or Whitehead as truly representative of what either has to say is a mistake. I struggle through both, and am seeking the similarities between the two models rather than trying to pit one against the other.

I understand what you're saying about Stapp, although I am much less familiar with his work. My point in the previous posts is that Cahill does NOT make use of Whiteheadian concepts, in fact, he seems to have little familiarity with Whitehead at all, classifying him along with Pierce, James, Bergson, etc. as another philosopher of process. He takes no terms whatever from Whitehead, and makes no attempt whatever to work Whitehead's concepts into his model.

At any rate, my point in this post is to rely on your own reading of Cahill as the basis for any comparison between Cahill and Whitehead. Don't depend on mine.

However, that is not to say that there is not a very interesting and correct idea implied by Cahill's approach. It is that, while the present moment of the flow of phenomenal time would be instantiated on the classical (or classically functioning) brain (although it does not need to be), the full subject system of the completed concrescence would indeed by instantiated on a neural network of the quantum brain (although it does not need to be). The decisive point is still the independence of the actual entities from the necessity of being instantiated on macro structures, but of course they can be, or else there would be no explanation of human experience.

I mean no offense, Dr. Mutnick, but until you read past the first sentence of Cahill's abstract, there is little point in making the argument you have. There is not one word in the above two replies that has even the slightest bit to do with Cahill's theory. It is not a theory of consciousness, brains, humans, neurons, or anything else you suggested above.

If you wish to discuss this further, at least extend the professional courtesy (to Professor Cahill, not to me) of actually reading the work we are discussing.

Now that we have some interest generated here on the relevancy of process to science, I'd love to hear what any of you think about Cahill's approach.
Especially Scotty, since you have a physics background, and may be able to read the math with far greater understanding than I.
For the most part, I think anyone can understand the basic principles he begins with, but there are many areas where I don't understand exactly what he means by certain terms, such as, "sticky with respect to the iterator" and I'd like to understand better how the fundamental tree graphs are generated.
Anyone with any thoughts on this, I welcome your comments.
Tom

I agree, Tom,
Cahills approach seems very interesting, but the description of the mathematical operations is much too concentrated for my understanding. But I suppose there must be a way to "open it up" for the layman, as I think Feynman has done with his Quantum Electro Dynamics. I would be very interested to hear more about how Cahills Process Physics may relate to Whitehead's Philosophy of Organism.
Bo

Me too, Bo, that's why I started this thread. I'm well aware how opaque the math is, but the overall approach he uses is a fundamentally process approach and I can see similarities despite the difference of language that I would like to explore further, but I'm stuck with a limited mathematical background, and unable to do anything close to a "peer review" of the work which I think is needed before any attempts at synchronization or synthesis with Whitehead.
Nevertheless, if one actually takes the time to read the work entirely, the main points are quite clear and precisely stated enough for even an amateur like me to get his overall concept.
Tom[/b]

IDEALDABBLER

Tom,

Glad to find someone who has read Cahill?s collection of papers (26 at last count), and that interest is still alive. Training here is mechanical engineering, but retired now with a lifelong interest in the sciences. I also do not understand Cahill?s ?sticky with respect to the iterator? reference but I?ve been working on your previous 3/26 to Ross where you characterized SRN as perhaps the driving energy of the process. I would like to offer a different interpretation and ask if it makes sense (to anyone but me The adoption of the process perspective as more fundamental than non-process seems to imply much more than meets the eye, and Cahill?s SRN has more to tell us than even he imagines. Sorry this is so long, but I got carried away. I was going to polish it some more, but it threatened to vanish if I touched it again. Any discussion most welcome.

Introduction

Classical physics contemplates the evolution of processes in defined systems in which causes are deterministic and proximate. Quantum physics broadens to this limited view by exploring as well the role of chance and probability and the resulting insight that in some way, at least in the quantum realm, the subjectivity of choice has a certain valid causality. This seems to remain for decades an enigma, a contradiction with the non-process assumption that time is merely a geometric dimension, the ?block-universe? its metaphor; its formalisms offering no description of the ?present moment effect? into which choice might intrude between an historical past and an uncertain future. Process physics seems the inevitable third incarnation of our most basic science, one that is forced to recognize the larger structure of ?natural order? representing the evolution of an open system that cannot be defined, a most fundamental natural order in which both chance and choice are integral and creative elements. Indeed, ?natural order? meets objective tests of subjectivity, of which Cahill?s pre-geometric formalism of SRN, while an apparent contradiction, is perhaps the best possible metaphor to deconstruct to illustrate the truly profound inclusiveness of process theory and the required paradigm change. It is especially relevant that his field theory formalism is modeled in the structure of a simple neural network.

Objectivity and Subjectivity

A salient feature of Cahill?s process physics is that it asserts the classic world has its origin in a pre-geometric sub-stratum, a realm in which the vehicle of process is the evolution of internal self-referential self-organizing semantic information. Of course the objective processes of the classic world are described by formalisms that attempt to mimic the emergent habits of natural order at each level of complexity. The question then becomes how the evolution of internal information relates in any way to the way we observe it from the outside. G?del?s theorem suggests that our mathematics and so the formalisms based on them cannot embrace every truth. Presumably, certain qualities of the internal semantic information are lost to our objective descriptions. It is all the more reason to explore why Cahill?s formalism treats the evolution of internal information as ?noise.? While the result presumes to explain ?in the most general way? how the classic world emerges, noise has implications that are not necessarily correct. Particularly arguable is Cahill?s view that while there is one indefinable source, there are many big bangs. He says that the noise term as used in his formalism implies that the process that brought about our universe ?is not reproducible?; the inference being a chaotic creative process which is found to be illogical. For one thing, it leaves unexplained the origin and qualities of the forces of nature.

To confirm the validity of the process perspective, generally, it is certainly necessary, as Cahill admits, to show how it not only confirms existing knowledge but answers questions that non-process theory cannot. He seems to be well along in the process of doing just this. Cahill?s formalism gains credibility in that it highlights the inadequacy of ?g?, as it fails to describe gravitation in non-symmetrical systems where the fine structure constant becomes relevant as well (PP18). But he does not appear to derive either the strong or the electro-weak forces from his own formalism, but rather uses the formalisms of QM. So, addressing the entire pre-geometric phase of the creation process, Cahill cites only the one basic process, the evolution of internal semantic information, interprets it as noise, but has nothing to say about why we have the forces of nature as they are, or how they arise, as they must, as expressions of the larger process imperative of natural order.

But this should not be surprising, as the application of a formalism to the pre-geometric realm defined by internal semantic information is something of a leap, but not unwarranted. The deficiency of assuming SRN is overcome by assuming that its product in our particular evolution of that SRN, is our existing world. The deficiency he finds in ?g? suggests that his process formalism is the more fundamental. In other words, it must be said that Cahill?s formalism in which the evolving information is assumed to be ?noise? produces a result that is true, but only in the most general sense ? which is all, and exactly, what he claims for it.

However, Cahill?s formalism is an adaptation of a classic non-process formalism to a ?process realm? that only makes sense as a process of ?iterations? to simulate a continuous flow of process in time. This would seem to imply that there must exist a complementary ?natural order? of the larger, more fundamental cosmic process that can be shown to include the classic (and quantum) perspective with considerably less ambiguity. In other words, over a century ago when the conservation of mass was found to fail with the discovery of radioactivity, the world of classical physics was faced with a similar enigma. Today, quantum physics looks back upon classical ideas in an inclusive and coherent way. It is expected that the same must prove true for process theory. For this reason I pursue the idea that the evolution of internal semantic self-organizing self-referential information is the more fundamental reality than the formalisms of objective science that, being nothing but objective observations of the resulting geometric manifestations, tend to be incomplete descriptions of that internal information, in that what can be physically observed is a mere shadow of the evolution of internal information. In other words any aspect of natural order that has no geometric manifestation is invisible to ?objective? science.

Coherence of Natural Order vs. Natural Law

I suggest that the evolution of information that Cahill describes as SRN is actually the evolution of the specific qualities of, and constraints upon, the several forces of nature that, of themselves, are the principal architects giving both impulse and direction to all creativity. Further, the several forces, being expressions of a unitary cosmic imperative evolving as internal self-referential self-organizing semantic information are necessarily totally coherent, a degree of coherence that formalisms based on external observation apparently cannot achieve (G?del?s theorem?). In other words even ten million years after the big bang, only a thin fog permeated space, a vapor of the lightest elements. Some fourteen billion years later, complexities such as this page of text are still emerging along with an entire world of ever-increasing novelty, an endless pageant of creativity carried forward by nothing more than 1) initial properties, 2) scale of investment, 3) probability, 4) chance, and, more recently, 5) choice. Entirely missing is any deterministic mechanism linking the overall evolution of system complexity; i.e. both cosmic and human creativity.

Whatever the cosmic imperative directing this process may be, the objective means it requires for its realization appears to be the indefinite evolution of system complexity. Given the recently evolved agency of creative mind, it is clear that the evolution of system complexity has no definable limit, given that our very survival depends upon our sustaining the creative process (technology and social organization). Not only is process sustained indefinitely, no mean feat in itself, but the process generates systems that not only self-replicate, but, having done so, generate indefinitely more complex systems. Again, this self-organizing capability reflects not ?noise? but evolution of the most profound coherence one can imagine.

The design of such total coherence seems possible only through the implicit unity and coherence of the evolution of internal self-referential semantic information. Non-process physics (and so technology) can never approach this level of coherence because its formalisms can never confirm the identity of the ?final elemental particle? because the particle accelerators necessary to approach the relevant energies are larger than the solar system and can never be built. In other words, a case can be made that the current pursuit of a TOE through discovery of more fundamental particles and their gauge fields requiring ever-larger-to-impossibly-sized ?particle accelerators? to confirm ? is doomed to ?infinite regress,? a likely sign of a failed assumption; in this case the assumption that geometric time and particles are fundamental. However, the geometric time metarule is a utility that will describe any process within any energy level we are able to create ? but nothing more. While objective science can tell us all we need to know about proximate cause, it cannot, in principle, tell us anything about ?first cause.? It cannot write a TOE.

Cosmic Process: Imperative, Direction, and Means

Cahill defines the origin of SRN as infinitely remote in time, generating an indefinite number of universes. Given the self-referential feature of internal information, it is constantly morphing its expression in a ?fractal? way such that the most fundamental truth is inaccessible in any objective sense. This seems to have the meaning that absolute Truth and Reality are beyond objective definition. Indeed, process theory implies the larger all-inclusive order of cosmic process as an indefinite whole, a boundlessly creative ?natural order,? an imperative that includes but transcends the local habits of ?natural law? in the same way that quantum physics includes but transcends classical physics. Indeed, process physics seems literally a third incarnation of physics. Again, described earlier, Cahill?s SRN represents, instead, the evolving (ever-more-complex) expression of an implicit cosmic imperative (natural order) that has three properties: 1) The cosmic imperative has no objective definition; 2) No finite set of processes can give it full expression (endless evolution of complexity), and 3) The creative mind is its essential and integral agency in that the mind?s survival depends upon sustaining the indefinite evolution of system complexity through its own creativity. In the same way that we cannot look in upon the subjective human mind to see it as it truly is, apart from conclusions drawn from theories about observed behavior, language, etc., so is the cosmic process imperative ?subjective? in that we cannot look in upon it to see it as it truly is, apart from theories about its observed behavior (objective means). The ?objective? view reveals only the evolution of SRN.

That absolutes are inaccessible in principle seems a message relevant to any intellectual pursuit. Its meaning here is that, with absolutes inaccessible, we are left to search for survival in a world of metaphor. In this case the relevant metaphor is ?process,? meaning all process whatsoever, which is not without subjective overtones. But all is not lost. Process, any process, has three attributes that constitute an essential and coherent relational order. These are: 1) imperative, 2) direction, and 3) means. In other words, with no imperative, nothing happens. If anything does happen, it has subjective direction implicit in the subjective imperative, together with an objective component. Further, if there is imperative and direction, then it will proceed by some objective observable means. Given objective observables, and the fact that all three attributes must be taken as a mutually coherent unity, we can raise (and endlessly refine) both objective and subjective theories about direction, and even, by inference, about the imperative. The reason this is possible, and necessary, is that the imperative is assumed unitary and infinitely coherent so that attributes of any one of the three must imply, be coherent with, the other two. In other words, process theory implies a more inclusive level of order, here called natural order, which is inclusive of both objective and subjective experience, i.e. both chance and choice serving the means and direction of the same creative imperative. While classic science denied outright the efficacy of subjectivity (choice) as epiphenomenal, quantum theory asserts, if grudgingly, the efficacy of subjective choice, as in the collapse of the wave function. The third or Process incarnation of physics takes the final step of asserting that the fundamental imperative of cosmic process as a whole, and its ?natural order,? meets the objective definition of subjectivity.

Of course subjectivity in common usage has distracting and confusing philosophical connotations, and classic science will become absolutely indignant at any suggestion that at the most fundamental level natural order is subjective, in spite of the evidence manifest in quantum theory that the observer and the observed must be considered part of the same system. Perhaps we can now look at process science from the larger view of natural order; the fundamental reality is the subjective imperative. The objective world can only arise by reason of contrived differences and the limits that give them definition, and it is contrived only as a means to the realization of the subjective imperative. Furthermore, any agency (such as creative mind) must be similarly limited to perceive the differences, but must be open to some level of direction by subjective qualities of the imperative.

Indeed the ?reason? for the primordial emergence of classicality (geometry) from Cahill?s pre-geometric substratum has two very specific, very elemental interpretations; one objective; one subjective. The objective interpretation offered by non-process science is that the initial state (whatever it was) was ?inherently unstable.? A subjective interpretation that we can draw from a most primitive perspective is that ?creation is flight from eternal sameness into eternal novelty.? But this is by no means a definitive statement. We will never be able to raise a fully definitive statement as the cosmic imperative is beyond any objective definition. What we can say is that eternal novelty requires the indefinite evolution of system complexity ? just what we observe throughout cosmic history, from creation to the present. In other words, subjectivity is not merely an epiphenomenon, a meaningless biological accident in a deterministic cosmic machine. It is the primary quality of the cosmic imperative that gives both means and direction to its realization.

Abstraction and Analysis

Given the status of the creative mind as the integral and essential agency of the cosmic imperative, and that objective science can provide nothing more than objective utility to serve our creative endeavors, exactly what is our situation, and what are our creative resources?

The first bit of good fortune we can point to is that the human brain, being the most creative, is the rarest system on the planet if not in the cosmos. This means that virtually all the sustaining resources we could ever need are at hand. Fortunately, we did not arrive until the garden of planet Earth was in full bloom. Since our arrival, even the remote resources of the inner solar system have come within reach of our creative technology. Process physics (Cahill, PP26) is exploring even now the possibility of vastly extending that reach.

Our second bit of good fortune was a world of great novelty, a garden of differences and limits and the inevitable challenge of conflict and competition for survival. While not always fun, this would have the fortuitous result of the evolution of our mental faculties that have given us dominion over all other creatures. In particular, at the most elemental level that we apparently share to some degree with lower animals is the instinctive subconscious operation ongoing in our right cerebral hemisphere (RCH) continually alert to likenesses among our different experiences, and differences among the likenesses (R. Sperry). In lower animals the criteria for comparison, i.e. the features to ?abstract? as significant were related to visceral utilitarian urges like hunger or fear. In modern humans the same subconscious abstraction process continues, and recognition of the similarity or difference is delivered (sometimes as quite a shock!) from the RCH to the left cerebral hemisphere which has a more conscious life filled with symbols and a more active sense of presence in a much more elaborate world of relationships, memory, and sense of causality. The remarkable faculty peculiar to the human brain, so facile with symbolic representations, is that in the left hemisphere the same process of abstraction takes place but this time pursued with conscious deliberation as a high energy process using symbols and learned mental tools, a process that we call ?analysis.? In other words an instinctive subconscious faculty for abstraction is leveraged, in humans, into a deliberate, energetic, and vastly more productive analytic faculty, and with the most profound effect.

The point made here is that Abstraction Theory actually describes the process structuring of natural order in both its subjective and objective expression, where every particular is a more or less refined expression of the implicit cosmic imperative, from both causal (cosmic) and utility (human) perspectives. The utility perspective of abstracting is what children and animals learn to do; passively relating levels of various kinds of experiences to visceral/emotional wants and needs. The deliberate process of abstraction, or analysis, exploits knowledge gained to deliberately search out (proximate) causal relationships to be written as formalisms and exploited in creative design to meet needs, wants, etc., thereby enhancing survival. Humans appear to be alone in the analytic process of abstraction because we are so strong in symbolic thought and expression compared with what is known of other species.

Most significant of all, we dominate all other creatures in this respect because relational levels of abstraction actually parallel the structuring of more or less refined expressed particulars of the cosmic imperative. The coherence of physics, chemistry, biology, etc., attests to this fact in terms of causality of experience in defined systems. Human creativity depends on similar relational (abstract) structuring of qualities of utility in existing resources that we will assemble creatively into still more complex systems for survival utility. A tentative list of axioms of abstraction theory include:

1. Analysis is the mental process of identifying the abstract (objective principle or subjective quality) of which the particular is an expression.
2. Expression is the creative process between the abstract imperative (direction) and the particular (choice).
3. Every subjective particular is an expression of an implicit abstract imperative relating to process/ends.
4. Every objective particular is an expression of an implicit abstract imperative relating to process/ends, as well as an expression of an explicit abstract imperative relating to means.
5. Every finite (definable) abstract is a particular of a higher abstract.
6. Each higher level of abstraction is more inclusive of particulars.
7. There is an ineffable, all-inclusive indefinitely high abstract imperative of which every particular, both objective and subjective, is a more or less refined expression.
8. An abstract imperative, imposing direction, can be realized creatively through any of a class of innumerable particulars. This seems to be why apparently random local and cosmic processes can creatively advance the overall direction of the whole through initial properties, scale, probability, and chance, e.g., where ?sustaining the process? is the imperative, there are usually many alternate creative choices that will serve. Again, all this would be implicit in the coherence of every aspect of the imperative.

In other words, the fact that Cahill?s model of evolving internal information is based upon a simple neural network suggests that it succeeds because the structure and processing of experience in the human brain is a faculty that evolved, was naturally selected for, for the simple reason that it most successfully ?models? the actual ladder-like relational structure between emergent particulars, i.e. ever-more refined particulars of the unitary implicit imperative. As Cahill says, ?A pure semantic information system must be formed by a subtle bootstrap process. The mathematical model for this has the form of a stochastic neural network (SNN) for the simple reason that neural networks are well known for their pattern or nonsymbolic information processing abilities.?(Process Studies Supplement 2003 Issue 5, p. 13). Indeed!

Where Cahill?s SRN formalism seems the ?missing link? between the fundamental subjective reality of the self-organizing internal semantic information and its objective expression in the classical world, abstraction theory offers a structure or scaffold by which to relate not only levels of complexity in process but also the diversity at every level of expression of the implicit imperative. Small wonder that Cahill?s field theory formalism describing the pre-geometric substratum succeeds as well as it does, modeled as it is on a neural network. Thus, while conflict and competition brought about evolution of neural faculties for abstraction and its contribution to our analytical skills, giving us great material power and adaptability, it has also brought us to the brink of mutually assured destruction (MAD), i.e. into contradiction with the cosmic imperative and possible interruption of the process on planet Earth. Did we miss something along the way? Well, yes and no.

Conflict

The search is not so difficult because the relevant human problem reflects the most fundamental problem of all, manifest literally at the moment of creation: the emergence of differences and limits, and so the possibility of interference and conflict. The problem of course is the plurality of conflicted perspectives; the sense of every ?subject? that he or she is the center of the universe, as it were. While the resulting conflict and competition was immensely creative in bringing about the evolution of our analytic faculties that literally model the structure of natural order, it now threatens our existence. In more recent times, the same subjective problem of conflicted perspectives emerged in physical theory itself. It was called the ?relativity? problem. The question was how to reconcile the relative motion of many observers moving in different reference frames. The answer, that ?all laws must look the same from every perspective,? was called the ?symmetry solution.? What a surprise to find that our more durable civil orders are based upon a foundation of ?equality under the law,? satisfying the first requirement of any durable society to restrain conflict while at the same time sustaining an appealing sense of justice. But there is much more to symmetry.

?Symmetry is ubiquitous. Symmetry has myriad incarnations in the innumerable patterns designed by nature. It is a key element, often the central or defining theme, in art, music, dance, poetry, or architecture. Symmetry permeates all of science, occupying a prominent place in chemistry, biology, physiology, and astronomy. Symmetry pervades the inner world of the structure of matter, the outer world of the cosmos, and the abstract world of mathematics, itself. The basic laws of physics, the most fundamental statements we can make about nature, are founded upon symmetry.? (1)

Again, this suggests the underlying constraint that gives the cosmic process imperative its total internal coherence essential to its endless creativity. Given that symmetry considerations are at the foundation of the basic laws of physics, then abstraction theory (axiom 5, above) suggests that symmetry must be considered a particular of still higher abstracts which would appear to include aesthetics generally. This draws our attention of course to the way our sensibilities and emotions such as love have evolved to respond constructively to such higher qualities in our experience, and from this we can perhaps explain the emergence of the several religions that seem to rise in response to the growing obsolescence of conflict, suggesting that the evolution of the neural faculties essential to our role as creative agency is virtually complete.

Religious Insight

However we wish to regard the origin of the various religious traditions, the heritage of conflict that selected for our creative analytic faculties would eventually require that some sort of major monument be raised in human consciousness generally to transcend conflict once and for all so that resources might be focused instead on optimizing human creativity to more effectively address the inevitable major threats of a capricious nature. At the same time that conflict and competition brought about the evolution of our analytic faculties, our emotions including our aesthetic sensibilities were also evolving through the same experience. While the lower emotions of fear and anger were useful in the jungle, such feelings were only the lower parts of a spectrum of evolving sensitivities of which the higher, more aesthetic prompted recognition of the fact that we benefited from the creativity of others, and that the more creativity that could be cultivated and turned to meet the common needs, rather than toward conflict, the more likely our survival. If we look back upon the evolved mental faculties of both analysis and emotion, we see that it is our emotion that is the subjective imperative that ultimately gives direction to all of our creativity, while it is our analytic faculty that gives us the objective means. The fact that we have recently turned away from MAD draws our attention to the sources of our more constructive values. Of course there are a number of historic monuments to such values: the several religions. Aside from all the cultural baggage of each that has also been the basis of wars at one time or another is the single theme shared by nearly all; love thy neighbor as thyself, and do unto others as you would be done by: the Golden Rule.

Clearly, this rule is an expression of the pervasive symmetry constraint essential to the coherence of the cosmic imperative. We remember how our subconscious is constantly at work comparing experiences for similarities and differences with respect to our innate sensibilities, memories, knowledge, questioning, etc., and how these bits of insight intrude into our conscious awareness. For the most part, these bits arrive unremarkably, assumed merely the results of our normal thought processes for which ?we? gladly take credit. It is only under rather unusual circumstances that we realize that these insights are certainly not the result of our conscious initiative. We understand this when truly striking insights arrive unbidden, ?out of the blue? as it were, the ?Eureka? experience. Considerably less common, but no less real, are the truly magnum events of insight; metaphors of experience that may discern the deeper similarities and differences between life experiences and lessons learned. Such experiences seem to be the basis of religious traditions of revealed knowledge. In the classic culture of non-process science, the religious view invokes dualism; that the insight is a message from an intervening God. The process view would reject dualism. The same ?religious? insights would be assumed to arise metaphoric from the subconscious processing of the lessons of experience, yielding ever-deeper insights into the symmetries and their aesthetics essential to the creative role of the agent. A process empiricism (or religion) might arise in which ?Reality is experience that informs choices that are Truly survivable in the long term.?

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Note:
(1) L. M. Lederman & C. T. Hill, (2004) ?Symmetry,? Prometheus, NY

Joe
J. S. Johnson

An amazing piece of work here. I saw it when you first posted it, but it's taken me this long to get through a first reading. I see many similarities in our thinking, and some startling differences.
I'd like to thank you first of all for reading Cahill before critiquing his work.
I see by ressurecting this topic I've added ten new papers to my reading list. Last time I looked at Cahill's site, he was at HPS17, and had been since his publication in Process Studies in later '03. Needless to say, I was thrilled to find the updated site, and amazed at the volume of work that has been done since the last update.
The more I read Cahill, the more sense his cosmology (for that is what it is) seems to make. My goal here is to raise some interest in examining the "symmetry" or "complementarity" between Whitehead and Cahill.


I found this statement of particular interest, as this was precisely the feature of his system that convinced me that he was right at this very fundamental level. One can not explain the evolution of the human mind, and its neural network without the potential for it to evolve at some level beneath our macroscopic experience of the evolution of species. Nothing in the classical world of physics, which underlies Darwinism and neo-Darwinism, can shed any light on the emergence of conciousness.

I hope to do a more competent reading of your article above, and may have some questions for you; particularly on what you refer to as "Abstraction Theory," as this is not something I am familiar with.
Anyway, thanks for your comments, and I hope we continue this discussion.
Tom

Tom,


Re: Abstraction Theory


Thanks much for your response. As in talking about ?consciousness,? it is very difficult to analyze abstraction as a discussion item, as virtually nothing takes place in mind that is not itself an abstractive or synthetic process. For example, simple conversation reflects a very high rate of such events ?abstracting? aspects of memories, feelings, body-language of the listener, all contributing to an ongoing synthesis of symbolic expression. Hopefully the following will help.


Classic non-process physics, while addressing deterministic processes within closed/defined systems, essentially ignored the larger process of cosmos as a whole. While the philosophy of science held the ideal that the order of nature was unitary and coherent, so much of it appeared random that there was never a coherent model of the whole, suggesting that the order of the whole was more or less arbitrary, a good excuse for not pursuing it as a priority. With the shocking failure of the conservation of mass over a century ago came the second incarnation of physics, the evolution of quantum theory that nonetheless carried forward the classic concept of the objective defined system, and the particle. But so deep is puzzle of the whole that it was even imagined more recently that perhaps the laws of physics were not coherent after all; that they might be different here and there, now or then.


However, since the rise of quantum physics two major surprises have intruded, indicating that somewhere in the body of physics was a less than fundamental assumption. First was the finding that subjective human choice is indeed efficacious in the collapse of the wave function; not epiphenomenal. In other words, the subject and object must be considered integral to the same system. The second defect appears to be the particle metaphor. With over 400 sub-atomic particles already identified, the current argument is that we need to confirm maybe just one more, except that our particle accelerators aren?t quite powerful enough to confirm its existence. For just a few more of your tax dollars we can build this huge machine that will . . . or maybe not, confirm the ?fundamental particle.? Or, more likely, this particle, if found, will raise questions indicating still more fundamental particles at still higher energies, and for a few dollars more . . . etc. What seems to be going on in particle theory is ?infinite regress,? a sure sign that there is something less than fundamental with the particle metaphor. As Cahill points out, the failed assumption appears to be geometric time taken as fundamental.


A third incarnation of physics must somehow encompass subjectivity and at the same time confront the natural order of an open system; cosmos ? not as a ?whole? in the sense of an object (because it cannot be defined in the same way we can define a closed system), but in the sense of a coherent open process. It would seem that process physics is the answer. As Cahill points out, it is internal semantic self-referential self-organizing information that that is more fundamental than geometry. He models it as self-referential noise (SRN) evolving in the relational structure of a stochastic neural network (SNN). The success of the SRN formalism indicates that an objective definition of cosmos as a closed system is not possible, and the inference is that absolutes, Truth and Reality, are beyond any objective definition, leaving us with a natural order that seems to meet ?an objective definition of subjectivity.? This would seem to leave only the common attributes of process (imperative, direction, and means) as metaphors of experience that must be found in some way mutually coherent. The imperative appears to be subjective, direction has both subjective and objective components, and means are the objective observables. (In theory: ?Means? is the indefinite evolution of system complexity.)


This returns us to the early assumption of science that natural order is unitary and coherent in spite of the apparent roles of chance (and now choice). Now that we have become aware of the extraordinary constraint of symmetry pervading every aspect of nature, including the most fundamental statements we can make about nature, the argument that natural order (even if subjective) is in any way arbitrary fails utterly. That the evolution of system complexity promises to continue indefinitely is in fact a statement implying the most extraordinary unity and coherence, even though its expression is indefinitely creative. The bottom line of this entire thread is the absolute unity and coherence of the larger cosmic process structure of ?natural order? taken in every sense as the ?expression? of the implicit imperative across time.


Therefore,


Synthesis:

1. Every particular (whether by chance or by choice) is a more or less refined expression of the implicit cosmic imperative.

2. Every particular is potentially the abstract of a more complex particular.

3. The more complex the particular, the fewer in number


Analysis:

1. Every definable abstract is a particular of a higher, more inclusive abstract.

2. The higher the abstract, the more inclusive of particulars

3. The highest abstract (the implicit imperative) is inclusive of all particulars


The above listings for synthesis and analysis relate the relational structure of cosmic creativity (synthesis) to the neural process of analysis, showing one essentially the mirror image of the other. In other words, our neural faculty is dominant over all others in that, with experience and learning, it literally mirrors the structuring of the expressive process of natural order.


Also, the implicit imperative is never explicit in cosmic creativity, so when the evolution of system complexity is reflected in the emergence of properties described by physics, then chemistry, then biology, etc., which are said to be successively more refined expressions of natural order, we ask, ?exactly what is this imperative that is common to all levels of complexity?? The answer is that it is nowhere explicit in that the imperative is beyond objective definition. Human creativity is similar, with but one major difference. Say, on the topic of transportation, expression evolves from bicycles to cars to airplanes to moon-rockets. The difference is that we always know the imperative behind our manufacture: ?transportation.? The relation of transportation (and all other human creative imperatives) to the cosmic process imperative is that they (transportation, etc.) are essential for the long term survival of the cosmic imperative through the agency of creative mind. Indeed, civil order itself is a deep and broad set of such particulars and their abstracts from the preamble to the constitution down to the apple we eat, all structured to enhance the survival and creativity of all; a structure where symmetries and conservation laws are deeply embedded in the forms. Creative mind preserves itself, gains material power through the lessons it learns about proximate causes of defined systems, the ?habits? of natural order peculiar to specific levels of system complexity. But more recently we have faced MAD as a consequence of this great material power.


Only by recognizing the total coherence of natural order as represented by abstraction theory, and realizing that this total coherence is literally mirrored in the structure of neural process, both analytic and synthetic, do we realize that abstraction theory actually points in a quite meaningful way to the very real and absolutely essential subjective qualities of the cosmic imperative, i.e. to symmetry and its abstracts that give such beneficial impulse to our more creative choices. As noted previously, the symmetry solution to the relativity problem of conflicted perspectives, that ?the laws must look the same from every perspective,? is virtually the same as ?equality under the law,? in order to secure liberty, justice and promote domestic tranquility. So dependent is the cosmic imperative upon the observance of symmetry and its abstracts in all creativity that gross disregard of these qualities in our creative choices will surely lead to very negative consequences. The achievement of our doomsday power proves that our analytic faculties have reached the essential end-point of useful development, and conflict becomes counter-productive because it has nowhere constructive to take us. In conclusion, the more fundamental process theory brings subjectivity directly into the realm of what we might call ?survival science,? the aesthetics of survivable social organization, guided by the reality of experience that informs truly survivable choice.

Joe

Hi, Joe, I was with you on this up to here. I'm unclear here on your use of the term "abstract" as it seems to be used in the same sense that "universals" is used in other writings. Is this a correct understanding?

Here I'm confused again. What exactly is "the abstract of a ... particular"? Is this similar to Whitehead's "superject"? In other words, every satisfied actual occasion is a superject that is potentially an object for prehension by every future actual occasion (including a more complex occasion or society of occasions).



Your use of the word "higher" would seem to indicate a heirarchical structure in which the "higher" would be more complex, thus less inclusive of particulars. I guess I think of it in terms of "fundamental" and "emergent" and what you call the "implicit imperative" would be the most fundamental expression with more and more complex expressions emerging from the unity of a multiplicty of the fundamental expression.

Looking forward to a continued discussion, and I'm sure we'll get back to Cahill eventually, but I think there may be something to explore here.
Tom

Hi Tom,

Sorry for the confusion and I much appreciate your questions as they do help me very much to clarify my own thinking.

Let?s assume a re-read of my last post to just short of the two lists of three points each, where I conclude with: ?The bottom line of this entire thread is the absolute unity and coherence of the larger cosmic process structure of ?natural order? taken in every sense as the ?expression? of the implicit imperative across time.?

The instinctive process of abstraction is the essentially continuous subconscious sensitivity to likenesses among differences, differences among likenesses, etc. that relate experience to survival utilities, threats, etc. In humans whose consciousness is essentially engaged in a world rich in symbolic content, the abstractive process is generally unconscious, but the results come to conscious mind often as ?ideas,? seemingly out of nowhere, that suggest causal relations between like experiences. The mind may then deliberately set out to confirm such relationships in the manner of analysis, including experiments, to abstract (v.) the principle that is causal of a certain result in a given system. The ?abstract? (n.) is the causal principle of which ?the result? is an expression.

The above relationships are the same whether we are talking about the principle that defines the velocity of a falling object, or about the principle that defines the evolution of cosmos.

Abstraction theory certainly does imply hierarchy, and the convention I use is that the cosmic process imperative that is beyond objective definition (the abstract principle of which every particular is a more or less refined expression) is ?up there, in the top of my head? Its most inclusive objective expressions are the earliest (at creation) simplest sub-atomic particles described by the most elemental formalisms of physics which, together with the constraints imposed by the existing forces, hold (implicit) within them the principles that will ultimately emerge as novel properties (and more complex principles) of all lower (more complex) particulars. In this sense, physics principles are the higher (all-inclusive) abstracts that will ultimately sustain all chemical processes which in turn will ultimately sustain all biological processes, i.e. all more complex particulars (lower down, underfoot, so to speak).

When I wrote that ?Every particular is potentially the abstract of a more complex particular,? I should have written: ?The principles defining any particular state of cosmos are potentially the abstracts of principles defining all more complex states.? The objective implication of this hierarchy is that the cosmic process subjective imperative (whatever it may be) requires for its realization the (objective means of) indefinite evolution of system complexity. Given the limitations of initial properties, scale, probability, and chance in the evolution of novelty (a profusion of star/planet systems and elements is about as novel as it gets), a point would be reached when the main agency of the process would have to be biological systems and ?choice.? Only then would the process be able to anticipate and overcome increasingly serious threats of a capricious nature and so (potentially) sustain the process indefinitely in any given locale.

As to your statement that ?. . . the ?implicit imperative? would be the most fundamental expression with more and more complex expressions emerging from the unity of a multiplicity of the fundamental expression.? No, the implicit imperative is not an expression. Nor is it a store of novelty such as a video tape, ready to run. Novelty does not then exist. The future opportunity for novelty to emerge is the whole creative point. The implicit imperative is pre-expression. Cahill?s evolution of internal information, SRN, seems to have as its finished product the forces and their inherent constraints such as symmetry that direct them. This, in turn, gives rise to expression, taking the form of geometric differences and limits in a way that is infinitely creative of novel systems, each with emergent properties that had no prior existence. This would seem the very definition of creativity. Not surprisingly, it is not brought about by mechanistic deterministic process, but by properties, scale, probability, chance, and now by choice.

Endless novelty emerges for two complementary reasons: Viewed objectively, eternal sameness is an unstable state. From the subjective view, creation is flight from eternal sameness into eternal novelty, where objective experience is a contrived means for creating and sustaining an illusion of differences enabled by the imposition of limits on perception.

Where the most primitive principle driving human creativity would be flight from eternal sameness (death), small wonder that the dominant neural faculty to evolve would be one to ?leverage? the instinctive faculty for abstraction into a conscious and deliberate process using elaborate symbolic formalisms; what we call analysis. The result is that we are able to ?abstract? all formalisms (principles) relevant to the exploitation of any level of energy that we can achieve, greatly enhancing the prospect of our physical survival as a species.

If creative mind is thus the integral agency of the cosmic imperative, and if the hierarchal structure of natural order is actually described by abstraction theory, then the extraordinary importance of symmetry at the deepest levels of natural order can be taken as an explicit subjective particular of the implicit cosmic imperative. Not only is the symmetry solution to the subjective problem of conflicting perspectives relevant to the same human problem of social organization, but the abstracts of symmetry reflect directly upon the evolution of more constructive emotions as well as aesthetic sensitivities that give impulse and direction to our most constructive creativity. More generally, process theory, together with abstraction theory, identify the creative mind as nothing less than the integral and essential creative agency of the cosmic process imperative. And this is only an objective analysis of what is not without complementary subjective meaning already much in evidence in traditional values.

Sock it to me, anyone.

Joe

Using a bit of humour here, let me see if I understand the difference between that which is 'abstract' and that which is concrete'--subjective and objective:

My wife is thinking about baking a cake. At this point, this is an abstract concept. However, my wife actually bakes a cake. Now, this is concrete! Pardon me: I mean a concrete concept, an object, which we can examine with the senses.

Hi Rev,

Thanks for the question. I expect that giving a full and complete answer will prove to be the most difficult task I ever attempted. But I am determined because I believe that abstraction theory is ?the missing link? between, 1) Natural Order that is fundamentally subjective, 2) its objective expression codified in terms of Natural Laws of the several sciences, and 3) the creative mind as the integral agent of the cosmic imperative, realizing its direction and improvising its means.

There is nothing in conscious awareness that is not an abstraction, a set of impressions drawn from an environment including our bodies with its messages of pain, joy, etc., that tend to give impulse and direction to our choices. A conversation, for example, is a literal storm of metaphors about subjective and objective relationships in memory and experience. Our role in existence appears to be ?as cosmic subject having the opportunity to enter the contrived realm of differences and limits with our own perceptions so limited, but with the ability to gain self-knowledge through the lessons of experience and give it expression through our own creative choice.? So remote is this notion from common understanding that it is not possible to explain detail without first establishing the larger context in which the detail is embedded.

The major difference is between the classic or non-process view, (geometric time, the block universe, determinism, etc.) and time as process. The non-process formalisms were/are useful for defining habits of natural order within defined, isolated systems in which chance and choice are presumed not to intrude. Of course quantum theory brought consternation to science when ?chance? could not be avoided at the quantum level, where even the subjectivity of human choice made its very real efficacy known.

Cahill?s new Process Physics (1) introduces literally the third incarnation of our most fundamental science. Not only does it include and describe quantum theory in detail that ?geometric time? cannot, but it deals with process of cosmos as an open undefined system. The formalism he has raised even addresses ?first-cause,? essentially declaring that it has no possibility of objective definition. This, together with our observation of cosmic history, especially given the capacity of creative mind for indefinite innovation of complexity, that there can be no finite set of objective processes that can give ?first-cause? full expression. These two conditions appear to comprise an objective definition of subjectivity. . .

Lest someone argue that subjective systems are basically irrational, incoherent, attention is drawn to the virtual impossibility of designing a system with sufficient internal coherence to sustain the indefinite increase in system complexity, yet this is exactly what cosmos seems to do, through means no more deterministic than initial properties, scale, probability, chance, and choice.

An interesting feature of Cahill?s formalism is that it requires a formative stage at a pre-geometric level, i.e. prior to any emergent geometric effect. The formative stage addresses what cannot be described otherwise than the indefinitely remote ?first-cause.? That is not the term he uses, but he gives no other account of the specification of the emergent energy and forces that give impulse and direction, respectively, to all creativity. What he does specify is the evolution of internal self-referential semantic information, i.e. the internal meaningful information that self-directs the process the result of which our scientific ?formalisms? attempt to mimic in terms of the emergent geometry of the classic world. Of course, in the pre-geometric substratum as Cahill calls it there is no geometry, and the application of his quantum field theory formalism cannot discern internal information, so Cahill assigns to the product of this pre-geometric evolution the meaning of ?noise? (SRN).

But this ?works? for his theory because it produces the most general possible result, which is exactly what he needs in order to integrate it with the equal generalities of quantum field theory. That it works as well as it does seems to be because the particular field theory that he employs is a formalism that best describes the evolution of non-symbolic information in a stochastic neural net. Yes, neural net, as in brains.

Now, since the origin of cosmic process is beyond objective definition, this implies that absolute Truth and Reality are inaccessible in any objective sense; a message here for virtually any intellectual pursuit. So what is left but the subjective attributes of any process: imperative, direction, and means.

Here we drag out the axioms of abstraction theory. We know that despite the fact that the imperative driving cosmic process is subjective, that it is infinitely coherent internally, as it would have to be to sustain the indefinite evolution of system complexity. We also know that all cosmic creativity is a consequence of internal constraints upon all the energy that gives impulse, and all the forces that give it direction. The point is the implicit coherence that tells us that every emergent particular is a more or less refined expression of the implicit imperative. The connectivity is by no means deterministic, mechanical, nor is the imperative explicit in any objective way. Instead, novelty emerges with emergent properties that cause process to seek out strange attractors and new regimes of stability. In particular, you are reading this page because of the initial properties of the forces, the scale of the investment of time, space and energy at creation, the consequent probabilities, chance, and a great deal of choice. Indeed, any finite system that is deterministic in the classic sense cannot be creative any more than your car is creative.

So the connectivity between the process imperative and this page of words is definitely not a reductionist path of deterministic process, but there is still an implicit path of internal coherence giving rise to the chance and probabilities of the emergent properties essential to the imperative. In the most general sense, principles of physics sustain all physical systems but cannot predict emergent properties of chemical or biological systems. Likewise, chemical systems sustain biological systems but cannot predict emergent properties of biological systems.

We might think of such randomness as a really sloppy go-nowhere process. Indeed the classic view is that cosmos is a meaningless machine. But cosmic properties, scale, chance, and probabilities have brought forth the most improbable emergent property of all ? choice. It is this internal unity and coherence that abstraction theory addresses in its relational structure.

The creative path from first-cause is the example given above. A second example would be from our internal sense of utility; what is necessary or desirable from the perspective of our survival, i.e. we as sustainers of the cosmic imperative. We, instead of creating resources, mainly explore existing resources and define them, catalogue them in terms of abstract concepts; likenesses in novel situations that show some similarities with desirable situations already experienced. This is the instinctive process of abstraction we practice since infancy. It is essentially unconscious, and is generally the difference we mean between ?mama? and the nice lady who feeds us when we are hungry.

But assigning ?mama? to that nice object is the beginning of a process of abstraction that becomes quite conscious and even very intense. Essentially, from what I recall of Sperry?s work, the unconscious part takes place in the right cerebral hemisphere which is constantly active in seeking and abstracting likenesses from among differences in our experience. Of course, the likeness it seeks is entirely biased by its current concerns. Occasionally it will deliver a greater or lesser impulse of ?discovery? to the more conscious left cerebral hemisphere, out of the blue, as it were. The LCH, having immense faculty for symbolic thought, will likely transform the imagery into more communicable metaphor and begin a much more deliberate abstractive process of related experience. This is the process we call analysis, but it is essentially the same faculty pursued in a more conscious and deliberate way. In the simplest form it will recognize bananas and apples as ?food.? Animals recognize that the water in the pond is just as good as the water in the puddle, but lack any elaborate faculty for symbolic communication so the inferences we might draw, and communicate, cannot grow in depth in the animal mind. In the more intense form of analysis, the human faculty recognized the equivalence of mass and energy, and wrote all of our natural laws. The difference is largely the capacity for symbolic representation identifying a structure of relationships in great depth and breadth beyond both the immediate and the local that greatly leverages the basic faculty. Again, from the cosmic perspective the vertical structure relates to causality (mimicked by the coherent formalisms of the several sciences) while from the agent perspective the vertical structure relates to utility (survival of the agent, i.e. sustaining the cosmic imperative).

The punch line here is the ?coincidence? that the ever-increasing depth and diversity of cosmic creativity (manifest in every particular of the classic world as implicit expression of the cosmic process imperative), not only arises from Cahill?s pre-geometric formalism of a ?stochastic neural network,? but that the neural network of the human brain is able to literally mirror the emergent structure all the way back to the fact that natural order is itself subjective, and that what we call ?mind? can be nothing less than cosmos becoming increasingly self-aware.

Again, the problem is not to try to ?track? objective and subjective, abstract and concrete, as in a conversation, as a means of proving anything ?objective? about abstraction from the inside, out. One could go quite mad in the attempt, getting absolutely nowhere. One needs to begin with a theory from the outside; in this case, process theory.

The problem is to show (by advancing a ?theory of means?) how the evolved neural process actually describes the natural structure of all coherent and directed emergence in nature, and that, to do this, we consciously and deliberately analyze (abstract and relate) experience from the two perspectives of 1) causality and 2) utility. The chief product of the former is the evolution of science, with physics now in its third and final incarnation. The chief products of the latter process are the many levels of social organization, each of which is an attempt ?to create a more perfect union? of human creative potential essential to long-term survival of the agency that sustains the cosmic imperative.

While understanding causality is itself a utility (giving the freedom of creative choice), both are particulars of the abstract, ?means? (as in imperative, direction and ?means?). So, what gives impulse and direction to human choice? We know that the cosmic imperative is subjective and without objective definition, and that cosmic direction has both subjective and objective components. The imperative that gives impulse to all human choice is emotion. The direction of that creativity depends upon our aesthetic sensibilities. The former is evolved, the latter is largely learned. But what do either have to do with natural order?

Here, abstraction theory intrudes to connect the classic objective world of geometry to the more fundamental subjective reality of the evolution of internal self-referential, self-organizing, semantic information; Cahill?s pre-geometric sub-stratum evolving in a way that is modeled as a stochastic neural network. We find that ?the basic laws of physics, the most fundamental statements we can make about nature, are founded upon symmetry?(2). It appears that creation of differences and limits is a contrived departure from an underlying quality of symmetry. I say contrived because symmetry constraints dictate the existence of every known force, and for every continuous symmetry there is a conservation law. It is expected that the symmetry constraint upon every force is the subjective quality that gives the absolute internal coherence essential as a design feature to support the indefinite evolution of system complexity.

The axioms of abstraction theory tell us that any abstract that we can define (such as symmetry) must also be a particular of higher, more inclusive abstracts. The reader is invited to speculate as to the abstracts of symmetry. What comes to this mind is ?aesthetics.? Along the way are also the harmonies of ?justice,? etc. Not to be overlooked are our emotional responses to such qualities or lack thereof, in our experience, suggesting a most fertile field for further ?analysis.? Consider also the historic subjective problem of conflicted perspectives in the contrived world of differences and limits. It was most recently manifest in Physics ? the ?relativity? problem ? solved by the ?symmetry solution? expressed as the necessity that ?all laws should look the same from every perspective.? Of course, this sounds much like equality under the law that addresses much the same problem. Another ?coincidence? of course, but we take it seriously because abstraction theory tells us to expect such coincidences, given that the creative mind is integral to and the agency of the cosmic imperative.

The physics ?relativity? metaphor is limited, however, to objective concerns and while the more durable civil orders restrain conflict by insisting on equality under the law, we are at the same time reminded that the Golden Rule seems relevant as well as a higher subjective abstract of the particulars of symmetry, especially in relation to our evolved emotional responses to justice, kindness, and other manifestations of love. Yet another ?coincidence? emerges; the single theme found common to most religions of the world is the Golden Rule, the one quality essential to both personal and civil orders as individual and collective agencies ?sustaining? the cosmic process imperative.

With the emergence of subjective conscious mind (3), seeming to mark the achievement of neural faculties essential to the cosmic agency, the ancient gods no longer spoke directly to man. The rise of the monotheistic religions seem part of this same epoch, and from these we have what we call traditional human values emphasizing the intrinsic value of human life and liberty, values which have recently defeated aggression by the more materialistic worldviews arising in some respects from the classic materialism of the emerging sciences.

Where traditional values are once again under determined attack by the baseless introspection of the liberal humanistic anti-science perspective, it is suggested that process theory, as the third incarnation of physics, at long last overcomes the unacceptable classic materialism, finds in abstraction theory the larger structure of natural order that is fundamentally subjective, and identifies the creative mind as nothing less than the essential and integral creative agency of the cosmic process imperative. Not bad for a start, and it surely beats being a cog in a meaningless cosmic machine.

Notes:

(1) R. T. Cahill, Process Physics, at: www.mountainman.com.au/process_physics

(2) Lederman L., Hill C. (2004) ?Symmetry and the Beautiful Universe,? Prometheus Books, NY (Highly recommended)

(3) Jaynes, Julian, (1977) ?The Origin of Consciousness and the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind,? Houghton Mifflin, Boston

Disclaimer: Any errors found here in representations of process physics are my own and not attributable to Cahill.

Comments always welcome.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Joe

Joe:
Personally speaking, I would like to see a glossary--that is, a list of special, technical or difficult words with explanations and comments--set up.

For example, what is an 'implicit imperative'? What is the difference between it an a 'cosmic imperative'? What is an 'abstract imperative'? Give an example that a ten year old would understand.

When you write: "7. There is an ineffable, all-inclusive indefinitely high abstract imperative of which every particular, both objective and subjective, is a more or less refined expression." are you referring to God?

Hi Joe,
Sorry for the long absence here--Family issues and events, blah, blah, blah.
Clearly you've put much thought into your abstraction theory, and clearly you see how it relates to Cahill's Process Physics. However, is there a link between your Abstraction Theory and Whitehead's metaphysics?

You mention "noise" (SRN) several times in your discussions here and the other thread, and I gather from some things you say, that you find Cahill's depiction of SRN is deficient. Can you explain what you mean by this, or am I not understanding what you said?
I also have some difficulty in understanding what Cahill means by SRN. Clearly it cannot be vibrations of air molecules. Does he mean some sort of energy?

Also, I haven't seen where he accounts for the bosonic particles (specifically photons, as his theory of gravity eliminates the need for a graviton) as his system emerges from the "foam" of space directly into the "topological defects" of quantum matter (i.e., Fermionic particles).

I'm wholly with you on the concept of the neural net as fundamental, and that it is repeated over and over at each successive energent level, and I believe Whitehead understood this as well and is the basis for his labelling of emergent societies as actual entities on the same level as the most trivial puff of existence in far-off empty space. Elsewhere he states that life exists in the interstices of space which can certainly find some resonance with Cahill.

In reference to LGK's last post, I do think a more formal presentation of Abstraction Theory would be very helpful,you seem to have the raw material for it right here in these two threads, and although I wouldn't expect it be at the level of a ten-year-old, a systematic discussion of your terms would be helpful as well.

Thanks for your continued interest in this, and I hope to hear from you soon.
Tom