There seems to be much talk about verbal levels of abstracting.

It seems to me that nigh all forget that to go from one verbal level to the next nearly always involves going through the object level again, going through new semantic reactions, and much more.

Consciousness of Abstraction lists some of those neglected levels.

Define "composition", please.

As far as I can remember, general semantics literature focuses on abstraction to the exclusion of "all" other cognitive processes. I have not even see any substantive references to the fact that we associate the meaning of marks on paper to the "word" they represent. One possible reason for this is that that association is a form of "identification", and general semantics is strongly biased against "identification" in any form. I have argued in the past that, for example, being able to read well requires identification of letters and words with their (idiosyncratic) meaning to the reader. Kids have to learn this. But most, in my experience, general semantists have a strong negative "signal reaction" to the slightest suggestion that there can be any kind of "good" identification.

The term elementalism is applied to language and is specifically defined as verbally splitting what cannot be empirically split. It's not about composing, combining, assembling, etc.; it's about not using words that abstract two or more distinct characeristic from something non-verbal which cannot be "disassembled" into somethings that each of the abstract characteristic terms would refer to. We use space-time and body-mind as paradigm case examples. Consequently "non-elementalism" is not about "construction" or assembly.

One aspect of creativity is to put two disparate experiences together in a way that results in something new. From ecology the term "hybrid" has already been used metaphorically in many other areas.

This requires that a person abstracts different experiences from memory and combine them, and recognize that some new experience is possible as a result.

About the only thing that general semantics talks about that could support this is time-binding. Unfortunately, the emphasis on time-binding is sharring of information, particularly through external symbols over generations. No principle of general semantics emphasizes abstrating and combining at the individual level. The notion of correlating and combining is absent from general semantics principles. The focus is on learn to use what is passed on. Moreover, abstracting too deeply is inhibited by the command to be extensional. Moreover, abstractions are "suspect" in that they can become "elementalisms".

I might put it this way: When Koryzbski wrote the manefesto for how to be sane through science, he left out the analysis of data part of science.

General semantics: (*)
Become aware of the abstraction process.
Learn to identify assumptions.
Test our assumptions.
Discard ones that cannot be tested.
Hold all beliefs conditionally.

Nowhere does it say analyze our abstractions, combine with memory and the time-binding record, and create new "assumptions".

One the first things a novice general semantics initiate starts to do is to adjudge assumptions of others as "bad". "Ah ha! You made an assumption!" I've seen this time and time again at general semantics seminars.

I would suggest that the creative process that comes from abstracting to high levels and making educated guess - formulating hypothesises about what is going on or how to handle something is actually inhibited in general semantics circles by the built in bias that says "be extensional", get down to objective levels. Do not make elementalisms. Concentrate on abstracting, consciousness of abstracting, and get down to the extensional.

So, general semantics might be "how to be sane with current science methods (circa 1933), and don't change them."

The "problem", as I see it, is that "elementalism" has an extremely strong negative connotation in general semantics. And non-elementalism refers only to the "put-back-together" of elementalisms. Decomposition and composition, on the other hand, seem much more general and without the negative connotation. I would think that decomposition and composition would be a general analytical perspective - take things apart and put things together - not necessarily the same things, whereas "elementalism" is something we are NOT supposed to do, and non-elementalism is only correcting for elementalism. It would seem that all the positive potential benefit from decomposition and composition would be denied or inhibited by the notion of elementalism. "Build something new with decomposition and composition, but don't you dare commit an elementalism, and if you find yourself doing so, correct it with a non-elementalism as quickly as possible." So I do not see decomposition and composition - as general analytical techniques - encompased in general semantics at all. I think you're projecting much more than what is (not) allowed by elementalism and (required by) non-elementalism.

In my view we could not have ever developed our current model of the universers if we had not abstracted the notions of space and time (and mass) as separate dimensions, and applied all the multi-dimensional math to them that results in theoretical physics. "Space" is an abstraction from the mass-space-time continnum, as are "time" and "mass". We cannot have "mass" "existing" without a space-time coordinate, and we have no way of measuring any space-time event without mass(mass/energy) either. The choice to call 'space' and 'time' "elementalisms" without bothering to worry about 'mass' shows a naive understanding of our current model of physics.

What Korzybski labeled as elementalisms are nothing more than abstractions, and most of them are highly useful and necessary for understanding the world around us. As far as "body-mind" is concerned, these abstractions are also commonly useful. It seems to me that neither of the notions of both relativity and psyschosomatic illnesses were in the awarenes of the common person in Korzybski's time. Now both are common knowledge, even if the ability to explain them leaves a lot to be desired.

In philosophy there is a notion in which a more abstract level is understood in terms of a less abstract model. It is call "reductionism" and has been been around and argued for centuries. It's the idea that something is "nothing but" something else, and one particular reduction common around Korzybski's time was the dictum from then science that Man was "nothing but" an animal. Social Darwinism was still in vogue, and "Science" was not yet sophisticated enough to leave religion alone, so people's beliefs were threatened.

General semantics with the three-way classification of life (relabeled as dimensions) promised to make Man something more than animals and suggest that we had a "scientifically based" ethic that distinguished us from animals. This, in effect, provided competition for other religions as well as lifted "science" above the purly reductionist view of man.

Unfortunately, the notion of "elementalism" is anti-abstraction as well as reductionistic. It it anti-abstraction because the mistique that has grown up around it is that we should not do it. It is reductionistic because it takes us from the level of abstraction where distinctions are made among parts or aspects of our perceptions back down to the level at which these distinguishing are inhibited. We go from the ability to talk about the body and its structure in anatomy, medicine, etc., and the ability to talk about cognitive processes, to being restricted to talking about whole persons. That is a form of reductionism, which, when coupled with the "don't be elementalistic" attitude is "anti-intellectual" (anti-academic) [- and we all know, or should know of Korzybski's hostility and resentment toward academia].

So, in the new "official" dictionary of general semantics, I would offer "elementalism" as a depreciated term for certain specific abstractions.

"Depreciated" means still in use, but no longer officially supported. Don't use it in new "official" documents.

Posted in two threads intentionaly. (*),

Religions cannot revise sacred terminology.
The Pope is infallabile.

Science, however, thrives on falibility.

Nora,

Your reply was primarily denial. It did not have any substantave rebuttal of my points beyond denial. You presented the Whorfian hypothisis as justification, and you defended Korzybski's original notion without substantial argument.

You claimed elementalism has nothing to do with decomposition, and you gave no justification for that claim.

Decompositition is abstracting different items from a lower level. Without abstracting "space" and also abstracting "time" from our space-time experiences, the so-called elementalisms are not possible. Elementalism depends on abstracting a decomposition and labeling the abstractions so identified. Consequently your claim that elementalism has nothing to do with decomposition is flat wrong. If you wish to argue in the scientific vein, you need to justify each step with a valid reason, just like proving a theorem in geometry.

Abstraction is required for decomposition.
Abstraction enables us to pick out a part from the whole. Decomposition is picking out parts from the whole until the whole is broken into several parts.

Decomposition is required for "elementailism".
Decomposition allows us to break a whole into parts, and elementalism is picking a part without regard for the whole or the other parts. We cannot do that without having first picked out the part, so without decomposition, we cannot have elementalism.

Consequently "elementalism" cannot, as you say, have nothing to do with decomposition.

A similar argument applies to compositition and non-elementalism. (The proof is left up to the reader.)

Since "picking out a part" is a species of abstracting, all the above depend on abstracting.

Through denial without substantive argument and defense of the original term, you exhibited an attitude that the terminology was "sacred" - cannot be changed - but without scientific justification for the denial of change.

Korzybski then becomes the "infallable" pope of the religion of general semantics.

Where are the examples of changes and updates that David asked about?

General semantics claims to be open, but I have not seen evidences of this, unless you consider some of my writings.

General semantics is largely a belief system - a belief system about how to behave (namely to use the methods of science in our daily lives) - and belief systems in general don't take kindly to internal change. It would not be a "belief" system if it could be easily changed.

Nora wrote, "YOU assert that elementalism requires decomposition."
I did not merely "assert" it; I showed the structural relations that go into it.
Abstraction permits decomposition by allowing the picking out of parts.
Without picking out the parts, picking only one part, such as "body" or "mind" is not possible.
X must be decomposed by multiple abstractions.
Then a part of X can be picked out.
This is a prerequisite for elementalism.
Without the picking out of a part, it's not elementalism.
Without the picking out of a part it's not decomposition.
Without decomposition it's not elementalism.
Elementalism is by its very structure a variety of decomposition, and both depend on abstraction.

Nora wrote :"Pick out a part" implies a part has some feature that can be identified, and some existence.

"Identification", yes - accomodation (Piaget) to an "existing" cognitive mapping structure.

No; abstraction does not have existential import. It has projective export.

"Being" or Existence (*)

The question of "being" permeated the early pre-Socratic philosophy. The convoluted arguments centered around what appeared then to be worse than an oxymoron -- the apparently contradictory act of asserting the existence of something in order to deny it. The act of speaking or even thinking something was viewed at the time to have had existential import.

when the goddess points out to her listener that he could neither know nor point out what-is-not (2.7-8), she is precluding reference in thought or speech to the non-existent.(8)

Time to post this again. It summarizes the time-binding history of abstraction as it relates to general semantics before seeking to present a more formalized notion. Abstraction

For those of you without the stomach for some precise language, abstraction, for general semantics purposes, is the transduction and transformation of information from a lower level to a higher level with loss of fidelity or loss of data.

The transduction may be from one medium to another, such as from light patterns to neurological patterns, or from neurological pattern to sound patterns, etc. The "loss" factor is significant. Abstract representations must be "simpler" in structure.

A list of 47 different triangles is abstracted to the set of properties common to all 47, the least of which is having three sides and three angles. There may be more if all 47 happen to have a right angle, or all 47 just happen to have the same area, etc.

In my technical paper I allow the injection of noise, but abstraction must always involves more loss than gain.

I think, now-a-days, I would be inclined to leave the injection of noise out in a revised formal paper and reserve that for another term or process.

Because the map is not the territory, the more abstract level is not simply a passing on of some while leaving out the rest. It also involves a transformation / transduction of that which does get through a particualar abstraction process.
Light to nerves is an example. Lots of information stimulates less information in another form.
From nerves to nerves, it is in the same form.
From nerves to sound; it is again a different form.

Do not confuse abstraction with semantic reaction. The semantic reaction to an abstraction can inject LOTS of information, such as when a single word heard stimulates reams of memory. That is NOT abstraction. But, the abstractor will certainly "abstract" from this newly injected reams of memory.

Examples:
Part/whole. Triangle/Pyramid.
Subclass/Class Chimp/Primate.
(I switched the later to provide parallelism.)

Part/whole. Vertex, line, face/ regular solid.
Parts are connected to make up the whole.
Subclass/Class. Chimp, man, gorilla / Primate.
Subclass includes individuals that are not connected to make up the class.

In a set of triangles, a subclass of the set of polygons, the "similarities" include having three sides, having three vertices, having three angles.

Abstraction in classes picks out similarities to "define" a subclass.

In the case of Part versus whole, abstraction is not necessarily picking out similarities. We can pickout the edges as similar in some way and different from other parts, vertices, angles. But that is actually a "class" of parts - the lines. A "part" in triangle abc might be edge ab. The characteristic of a part is that it is a singular entity within a larger singular entity. Classes and subclasses are composed of multiple entites with the degenerate exceptional case where there is ony one member of the class.

The class of people currently sitting in chairs has as a subclass the class of people sitting in my chair, which just happens to have only one person me, at the moment, but sometimes it can include me and my wife.

In principle classes and subclasses have multiple members (one or more), whereas parts and wholes are singular, although a house may have been built with many nails, each nail is a part whereas "nails" is a class of parts.

We can abstract a part by focusing our attenion on it. (This is basic figure/background distinguisting.) We can abstract a sub-class by focusing on similarities and ignoring differences.
That means using figure/background abstraction on each entity in the class, looking for a match with the memory of an abstracted part with the selected feature.

The nervous system, at the very minimum abstracts a distinction by focusing on a figure distinguished from a background. In this regard abstraction is fundamental and implicit in everything we can be aware of as well as at lower levels. "Generalizing" is the principle historical time-binding meaning of abstracting, and looking at what it involves - the reduction of detail in the data - the leaving out of particulars - is explainable in terms of the figure-background abstraction as the underlying process. Generalizing involves multiple examples or cases that are "reduced" to a class definition. This is done by each example being distinguished into parts or characetristics, and a subset of the characteristics figured while the remainder is ignored. That subset is then "found in" each of the other examples or cases.

In the wood, the nervous systems abstracts and focuses on regions which appear to form a figure. Each such figure appears to have a number of properties or characteristics. (Each property or characteristic is capable of being independently perceived as a figure also.) So a composite figure is perceived with multiple parts, each of which can be perceived as a figure in its own right. The nervous system however, stores these perceived figures, and new data perceived is assimilated to the existing set of perceived figures, occassionally accomodating data to add a new figure. In this way each "cell" perceived is "recognized" as a variation similar to a previously perceived "cell". Any two such cells may be compared by counting the number of features perceived and determining whether the previously perceived features are also perceived in this cell, resulting in individual sets of previously perceived features. By comparing any two such sets, the nervous system can abstract the intersection of the perceived features as a subset common to both. Repeat the process over many different cells, and there result is a set of features common to all of them, and our nervous system begins to record this combination as a "composite whole". This constitues a class abstraction. All the original members are organized as members of this class because they all have the class elements in common, but they each may have some other elements.
At each intersection of the prior result and the next cell, we are abstracting the commonality.

This illustrates a model for generalizing within the nervous system using abstraction of a simple figure distinguished from its background.

The way our senses work is that millions of individual cells all respond in an all or none fashion. This means that the "interface" to WIGO is in millions of individual "bits" of information. The nervous system is designed to respond to combinations of bits in both relative spacial organization as well as in time (sequential) organization.

let me give you an illustration of each.

Let the "o" represent a retina cell. In this simple example we have four such cells in a row.
Below them are four layers of neurons passing the information about that cell down the nerve. Each "t" represents when the signal gets to that level and is an amount of time later.
Let each "+" represent a connection to processing neuron "X". "X" is activated when all of the four "+" connections are active at the same time.
Each "+" is a connector neuron whose name is the missing letter in the sequence. In the first row it is "d"; in the second row it is "g"; in the third row it is "j"; is the fourth row 'm'.

1 2 3 4
o-o-o-o t0
a b c + t1
e f + h t2
i + k l t3
+ n o p t4
| | | | t5 X

If the sense cells are active one at a time in sequence, such as would be the case when a spot of light or an image is passing across the retina.

At time 0 cell 1 is activated
At time 1 cell 2 is activated
At time 2 cell 3 is activated
At time 3 cell 4 is activated

Now, let's look at the neurons being activated.

At time t1 neuron a is activated by 1.
At time t2 neuron b is activated by 2, and neuron e is activated by a.
At time t3 neuron c is activated by 3, neuron f is activated by neuron b, and neuron i is activated by neuron e.
At time t4, neuron d is activated by 4, neuron g is activated by neuron c, neuron j is activated by neuron f, and neuron m is activated by neuron i.


At this time all four neurons, d, g, j, & m are active. Nuron X is connected to all four, and neuron X requires all four to be active to activate, so at time t5 neuron X is activated in addition to the other 4 (unnamed) neurons in row 5.

In this case, neuron X has abstracted an object passing successively past retina cells 1 thru 4 in sequence. Moreover, the raw information is still available at time t5.

Suppose I connect another processing neuron, call it Y, to neurons b, f, j, & n. Neuron Y would then be active if cell 2 was active four times in sequence. It would abstract a spot remaining still in front of one retinal cell, cell 2.

These details are examples of how raw data can be "analyzed" at the celular bit level to discover both static and dynamic patterns in the first layer of sense cells. It is up to our brains to have cells that activate for many different types of patterns, and patterns of patterns, etc, to many levels of abstraction deep.

This is not decomposition, because the data is "already" fragmented into millions of bits when it touches our senses. It's also hard to call it "composition" when a cell is activated as a result of stimulation from lower cells separated in space or separated in time (or a combination thereof for more sophistocated cases). The higher level cell is "composing" the responses of lower level cells. All this and many, many, more combinations have been documented by the work of Karl Pribram and many other experimental neuroscientists. Summaries have been published in Scientific American.

Once we understand such a detailed and extensional model of what "actually" happens at the detailed level, such terms as "composition" and "decomposition" become too vague to apply, unless you say, "That what we mean by 'composition'."

In the description of some "recent" philosophy I use the word "representation" rather than "percept". Moreover, I described this breaking into pieces (fragmentation) and putting together (compositition), as well as alteration. I didn't date the piece, but I wrote it many years ago. The philosophy in question was current back when I was working on my dissertation in the '80's and '90's. See Genetic Epistemology.

This theory describes a perspective that applies to higher levels. A corollary is the "use it or lose it" phenenomenon. If we review Donal Hebb's early theory of synaptic facilitation we note that unused synapses lose their relative potency compared to those that become larger through more frequent activation. The more used brain circuits are more easily activated (use it or lose it). Also, as our brain circuits are multiply connected, any given circuit is part of or has an intersection with many other circuits. This means that a less used circuit can be altered by the changes in the connected circuity, and these alterations can include greater connection to another circuit (composition) as well as a partitioning of the circuit due to greater participation in two more separated circuits (fragmentation).

The metaphor used in genetic epistemology at the higher more cognitive level maps a brain circuit to a representation of some aspect of our physical, symbolic, or semantic environments. Although I have have not seen it so used, I decided to use 'representation' as the cognitive term that corresponds in genetics to 'gene'. Representations are like strands of DNA. They can be broken into smaller pieces and recombined to make new genes. They can be altered by mutation. They can be variably expressed. Recombinate DNA describes both fragmentation and composition. Just as the percept of a triangle can allow bigger and smaller sizes as well as varying angles, a gene can be expressed and altered in different ways. Break the triangle and add another side to get a quadralateral - modify the gene by breaking it into three pieces and duplicating one before re-combining them.

How difficult would it be to conceive of adding a fourth time-delay circuit to recognize the iteration of a circuit that recognizes a line segment four times compared to three times?

Suppose you happen to activate two circuits at once and this gives you a combined representation. Consider, for example, the circuit from high school geometry that says that the third side of a triangle is always shorted that the sum of the other two. Let this be activated at the same time as you have the percept of an intersection. Ah ha! It's shorter to "j-walk than to cross two streets in sequence. Ipso facto composition.

We have a theoretical mapping now that takes us from neurological circuit activation to "percepts" or to "representations" in a way that adds corroboration to the notions of genetic epistemology. And this mapping provides a low-level theoretical explanation that can "account for" composition and fragmentation. Both depend on neurological circuit structures - structures which perform abstractions and correlations. It's interesting to note that a neuron that requires two active inputs to activate implements the logical AND function, and synapse that inhibits another neuron implements the logical NOT function. And, through DeMorgan's theorem, a combination of these implements the logical OR function. Brain cells, however can have multiple connections, so a single cell can implement multiple ANDs or ORs, and through synaptic facilitation, can do so with "fuzzy logic" due to stronger and weaker connections.

Composition and decomposition, as well as alteration, is supported by a modern understanding of neurological networks with synaptic falcilation, and the metaphor of genenetics developed in philosophy - genetic epistemology - provides a ready handle. For the ambitious, this metaphor can readily be mapped to Media Ecology - a "spin-off" or advancement of general semantics with its heyday in the mid '70's. (See Neil Postman).

General semantics is supposed to be extensional, and it is supposed to be updated to keep up with evolving science. The material I'm presenting is the updated science that relates to and extensionally informs as well as supports the notions of general semantics. If you talk about abstractions without the abstractions being from extensional data, you do not have science. In day to day applications of teaching people to use the concepts, the up-to-date underlying science becomes "additional supportive information", and this forum is the ideal place to discuss that issue. Moreover, consciousness of abstracting "should" involve some awareness of the underlying processes, even if you don't need to use it to become aware of your assumptions every time. It all helps.

Pardon me while I bristle... Going back to Korzybski for what was important to him, circa 1933, adds to the perception of general semantics as a cult that insists on sticking to the proclamations of the master.

Note what I said and referred to as the originator of this topic. In addition, providing experimental evidence to explain and or update the explanations is not exactly giving "definitions". Abstracting, as applied in general semantic, is what nervous systems do. Understanding that is understanding how nervous systems, including neural nets that model them, work. Consciousness of that involves both the "third person" explanation of the process (updated for current science) as well as techniques for using it on one's self, such as extensional devices, organismic self-awareness, meditatio, listening to one's own words, etc..

David,
I think there would be benefits, especially if we monitor our own verbalizations. Asking ourselves, about what we just said, "What did I put together to get this?" and "What did I take apart to get this?" would be a consciousness of abstraction technique that just might help us discover more possibilities as well as allow us to evaluate an re-evaluate what we are saying.

For example, now-a-days I teach ballroom dancing. Frequestly a student says, "I can't do ...", upon which I say, "You haven't yet done ...". With regard to Salsa, for a long time I said that I can't master that extra tap or kick on the slow beat. After rudimentary training from an expert, I was able to do it. My "can't master" was a self-fufilling abstraction false to fact. I might have learned how more quickly had I applied the technique, at the time, to myself, saying I haven't yet mastered it. By using the notion than time N+1 is not the same as times 1, 2, 3, ..., N, one can "unblock", and one can catch oneself making an absolute statement, and revise one's own statement to a relative one. This is an example of "decomposing" an absolute and using it. We don't need to go into the underlying neural network structure that permits it, but knowing that we could if pressed gives support to the validity of the process.

By "extensional" I mean based in empirical and or checked out at lower levels of abstraction. Being empirical about what general semantics "predicts" would involve testing the prediction, in this case by collecting data and subjecting it to rigorous analysis and or by conducting some experiments. To date I know of no hard research on the effacy of using general semantics, but then I have not searched for such either.

Being extensional in the field of general semantics means, among other things, using the extensional devices as a tool to encourage consciousness of abstracting, using consciousness of abstraction to recall that our abstractions are maps and not the territory, being prepared to move to lower levels of abstraction whenever differences become apparent, providing examples to back up abstract statements, etc..

David,
The short answer is "yes".

The principle characteristic of abstracting in the same medium involves loss of detail. The contrasting, reverse, "opposite", etc., process is the addition of detail. In electronic circuits this is generally called "noise". Hilgartner's failed attempt to create a formal language representation used the word "particularize" as a contrasting notion to "generalize". I often use the phrase "supply an example". An example taken from the existing data would be a variety of abstracting - picking out one from many. But an example that is "made up" to satisfy the general case is the addition of "unreal" data and is an example of noise generation that just happens to match the general principle.

If we have a general principle, and we make up examples without regard for the data, then we just might have an example of the "reverse order of abstracting" that Korzybski may be interpreted as applying to the un-sane or even the insane. It happens when one makes a prediction and then refuses to believe it has not come true.

The term 'specifying' would certainly refer to the first case above - picking out one example from a set of data, whereas the term 'particularizing' would be more general and apply to both specifying as well as making up an example. I think, however, that 'specifying' is general enough to be a synonym, depending on the user, for 'particularizing'. I myself am partial to "deduction" and "induction", as deduction is strictly truth preserving, but induction is not (except mathematical induction, which is a special case of deduction). But for non-truth preserving, both 'generalizing' and 'particularizing' have nicely contrasting similarity.

Thomas wrote, Suppose I make a statement like "the tree has leaves" and you close your eyes and imagine a tree with leaves. Then when you look at the tree ...

When you say "the" tree, you are using an English construction which presumes that a particular tree has previously been identified or referenced (specified). It is already "specific" to a particular tree. If you wanted to be at a more general level of abstraction the word 'the' would have to be replaced with 'a' or 'some' or possibly even 'all'. When the person recalls from memory a generic tree with generic leaves, he or she will particularize that only if pressed to do so, and in which case, he or she will get down to visualizing something from his or her specific past.

The use of the word 'the' involves specified, and that involves specifying previously.
The recall of a specific past experience involves specifying.

When we emphasize similarities and ignore differences", we can visualize it like venn diagrams. The similarities are in the intersection area. Our nervous systems perform this kind of operation effortlessly because we believe there are correspononding neural networks structures interacting in just the way we visualize the venn diagrams. At some level of abstraction our seeing the intersection as a figure while the remainder is seen as part of the background just "is" (reductionist perspective) heightened activity in the shared neural network (the intersection or the commonalities). Higher level neurological networks "notice" the active area in the intersection.

Remember that the corpus callosum connect the two halves of the brain, allowing each half to monitor the activity in the other half.

The principle of comparison boils down, at the lowest level of abstraction with the simplest neurological structure as equivent to the logical not exclusive or, and I believe this can be implmented in a simple neural net with only six or seven cells using both forward stimulation and inihibition at the synapses. I recall seeing the diagram, but I can't find it just now. One cell handles the "a" input, one cell handles the "b" input, another cell supplies a constant "on" signal, and the remainder combine in such a way that one implements a or b another implements a and b, and another implements a matches b.

David, Yes.

What I meant by the lowest level of abstraction vis-a-vis neural nets was the smallest or minimal number of cells required to do the job. The circuit in question is an abstraction from studying the way the brain cells interconnect that reduces the data to a single case. There are many such cells with a great number of synapses connecting in many ways. Multiple synapses provide for redundancy and reliability. But to understand as a simple model or map what is going on requires us to represent all the multiple connections as if it were one.

Thomas,
From the point of view of general semantics abstracting, the lowest level would be the inputs of the two cells that abstractedly represent sensory data. The comparator circuits may be used and connected at many different levels of abstraction, so that we can compare high level abstractions as well as single bits of input data. These comparator circuits can be connected to the outputs of basic sensory input, the outputs of memory, as well as the outputs of abstract processing.

I used "lowest level of abstraction" when I could have used "essence", but "essence" does not play well in this theater. "Essence" would play well in philosophy. It is a reductionist perspective that reduces comparison in neural nets to the simplest possible minimal structure.

The structural differential uses the term 'characteristic'; however, "attribute" would be a good choice, since "attribute" implies that we attribute the characteristic or "property" to something.

Metaphysics: What is. : Property or characteristic.
Epistemology: How we know: Attribute.

Thomas wrote: Our cells respond to a certain frequencies, but not others so in a sense they are 'ignoring' some frequencies while 'emphasizing' others.

I would not use the word 'emphasize' in this context because 'emphasize' implies that something is highlighted so as to make it stand out from the context. In the case of cells responding to certain frequencies and not to others, there is no context for the response to stand out from. To illustrate, we have a visual blind spot in each eye, but we do not "see" a "hole" in our visual field. Click on Blind Spot and you should see a screen that will allow you to experience the phenomenon under conscious control. Certain frequencies (which we attribute to WIGO) activate chemical reactions in some sense cells. Other frequences are not detected. I would also not use the word "ignored" because that implies detected but not responded to.

Using instrumentation that responds with a broad range of frequencies we can compare the frequency response of certain sense cells and repeatably discover that the range over which the cells respond correspond to a narrow range of frequencies of those that the instrumentation responds with.

The choice of the word 'with' was carefully considered and is significant, as it draws attention to the output of the instrument as well as the measured output of the cell. 'With' was chosen specifically NOT to suggest that we know something about any putative "cause" of those inputs.

Thomas wrote "frequency of lightwaves", is part of a physical theory about the underlying structure of WIGO independent of our abstractions.

They are not independent of our abstractions. They represent concensus explanations to account for our abstractions.

A 'property' or 'characteristic' represents something presumed to cause a particular singular abstraction - and a fairly high level abstraction at that, because "properties" and "characteristics" are generally singular names for elementalistic high level abstractions.

See what NYU has for fourth grade on properties of matter.

An "attribute" is a "property" attributed by us to what is going on.

If we talk of 'properties' we are choosing a language that is used in philosophy and in the realist perspective. Users of this language style don't care much about the semantic relation between what is going on and them; they are interested in quickly "identifying" the semantic representation with the referent so as to deal with the referent. The same is true of characteristics, however, this term is more appropro of symbolic environments involving social and personal areas, but in the realist environment it seems synonymous with 'property'.

Attribute, however, has a built in awareness of the semantic relation between the symbolic environment and the supposed referent.

I think this distinction is important, and that use of 'attribute' more consistent with consciousness of abstracting.

A well known example: The neutrino was predicted by mathematical physicists long before it was finally detected by instrumentation.

Both the prediction and the data analysis that concluded it was detected are very high level abstractions. The former a projection and the latter a corroboration.

Marshall Mcluhan characterized media (and instrumentation) as extensions of our senses.

No. See these definitions. A scientific preduction about what one may find in the result of an experiment may assist in locating where and how to look, but it does not physically "cause" the result that was predicted.

This does not create the dual nature of energy. It's an example of how and where to look.

How something looks to us is often determined by the choice of viewing medium. It's like feeling the side of a drum compared to listening to it. We are using different senses. With light we are using different extensions of our senses, and this is comparable to using different senses.

Like the blind men and the elephant, we do not know what light "is like" that would allow us to experience each of the ways of "seeing" it (particle or wave) as a facet of some perceived whole (except possibly for some mathematical physics).

"Show" not "get".

Experiments produce data, and data may be interpreted as agreeing with the prediction or not agreeing with it; some times the data is ambiguous with respect to the predicted result.

I'm inclined to be very precise with my use of terms. Experiments don't "exhibit"; an experiment produces

The subject of the experiment would be that which "exhibits" a wave like property or a particle like property, and this depends on the structure of the experiment.

It would be more accurate to say, "Some experiments show 'wave-like' ...", because the more general 'show' does not suffer the same limitations as 'exhibit'.

An experiment is based on a prediction by a theory, and a prediction is of something that can be observed. The theory may have hypotheses, but hypotheses normally do not directly state what will be seen. The hypotheses are part of the standard model of physics from which the predictions are derived.

We have three levels of meaning discussed in multi-meaning in the context of general semantics. The first of these levels is the "dictionary definition", which anyone can look up. This is relatively fixed for an extended period of time, and it serves as the "jumping off" point for the standard. It is a standard, but one that varies with the culture, and it slowly evolves in time. Nevertheless, at a given point in time in a given culture / universe of discourse it is relatively fixed.

When we chose a term to symbolize one's internal meaning, one must take into consideration how that term is used in general by the general population, the target audience and the context.

In general semantics circles I see a lot of imprecise use of language sometimes supported by the argument that "meaning is only in people". Trying to communicate with such is like trying to build a sky-scraper out of rubber beams. In order to get much height, we have to have an extremely wide base. But make the beams out of rigid steel, and we can get quite high without having to have such a wide base. The more precise we are with our use of terms the more solid the structure we create.

I will continue to be very precise with my use of terms - precise in a couple of ways. I will continually check the web for definitions to validate my use is consistent with the general culture, but I will give priority to scientifically compatible and technical definitions. And I will continue to analyze the underlying structure within the general semantics and philosophical perspectives - time-binding - and scientific updates.

The term 'compose', for me, implies a putting together of pieces into a structure "made up of" parts with relations among the parts. Giving attention to inferring, based on the fomulation heard, what "structure" the speaker's use of the terms implies seems to be what we do all the time when we respond not to what the person says but to what we think they mean. When this is done consciously and delibertly, one tries to build a conscious model of, to put it in the venacular, "where the other person's head is at". This is what I do prior to supplying different ("correcting") formulations, but I do so when I seem to see an inferred structure with too few parts or parts interconnected in an inconsistent way, etc.

Examples:
Active verbs generally require animate subjects.
An experiment is not an animate subject; it is a procedure followed by experimenters.

"Show" is a very general special case active verb that is used as a shorthand that takes the observer out of the formulation.

Technically, "show" requires an animate subject, but the only animate subject is the observer that is missing from the formulation. A "shows" B (to X). means that "X can see B in A".

When X runs an experiment choosing a protocol, the process yields data A which the experimenter may interpret as entailing B. The choice of protocol determines what data may be abstracted, and the interpretation becomes how that data is assimilated into the model(s) the experimenter cognizes. I chose a protocol that tests for wave-like properties. I put on my rose colored magnifying glasses. I chose a protocol that tests for particle-like properties. I put on my green colored magnifying glasses. (We don't have a composite model showing wave and partical characteristics as special cases. If I don't have magnifying glasses on, I can not see any detail.)

De Broiglie shows how to calculate one from the other. This is a horizontal back and forth, but it does not show a composite structure of which each is a part. We simply do not have a coherent "concept" of mass=energy that lets us see a visualization of how it unfolds as waves or as particles. We have an X view and we have a Y view but we do not have a Z (=XY) view. Compare a watercolor picture with a pointilism picture. Beter yet, compare the pointilism picture with a holograph. Look at both close up under normal light. I neither can we see the scene. Step back from the pointilism picture and see the scene. Illuminate the holograph with coherent light and see the scene.

In the case of light or matter, we don't know what the scene is (is like), as we can only see the waves or the particles. Giving it a name, 'wavicle', does not give us any visual referent for the term.

My disseratation was on Atomism and Infinite Disability, tracing the arguments from the pre-Socratics of the seventh century BC to the present (1993), resolving the arguments in the light of modern science, mathematics, and general semantics perspectives. One thing that came out of my studies seems to be that seeing particles (atomism) and seeing waves (infinite divisibility) are independently consistent ways of seeing or conceiving, though they are incompatible directly with each other. Another pair of terms that align with these is counting wholes as opposed to measuring bulk. Yet another is analog versus digital. As one wag said, "there are two kinds of people in the world, those who divide the population into two kinds and those who do not." Our nervous system allows us to pick out wholes with cells that activate in response to a network of active cells. This is abstraction pure and simple. My conclusion, just like De Broiglie, showed that each can produce the other, but you cannot simultaneously hold both at once. Perhaps the search for that ability or perspective is the holy grail of cognition.

What? You ask that question after reading my dissertation? Cut to the chase, see Some Final Remarks.

The precision of mathematical physics gives us our ability to model the universe.

In ancient Greece there were four elements, earth, fire, water, and air. Now we have quarks within basic particles within atoms within molecules. In ancient Greece metaphysics was explained using natural languages, and the Pythagoreans saw numbers as mystical. Today we use mathematical physics to model our universe.

The syntax of modern mathematical physics is not open to questions of whether each may use the terms and formula differently. Time-binding passes on precise and consistent usage that each new generation must use "exactly" as specified. Add one and one and get two whether you write it as i+i=ii, 1+1=2, or 1+1=10. This did not change when Newton developed calculus (Leibniz published first). Neither addition nor calculus changed when non-Euclidean geometries were discovered/invented.

The golden gate bridge could never have been built if all the contractors used different size or shaped parts.

Drop a rubber ball and it bounces. Drop a ball of silly putty and it splats, because it has two soft a structure to preserve the energy in kinetic form.

Science is not the only human activity, but general semantics, which says that mathematics is the only language with structure similar to reality, advocates applying the methods of science in our daily lives with respect to abstracting and understanding, and that, it seems to me, means using the strength and power which derives from the precision of mathematics.

Use sloppy, imprecise, and rubbery or wishy-washy language in politics, in art, in psycho-babble, even in science fiction, for entertainment, etc., but do not use it for building our model (map) of what is going on, as that will impair our navigation. Language is our medium for understanding our world, and the more precise our language in this area the better we will be able to understand it.

The growth, however, of human knowledge structure has required the ability to look beyond the existing structures, always adding more detail and precision at each stage while simplifying the more abstract levels. But this does not permit using established terms with complete individual freedom. Time-binding depends on consistently repeated usage.

A very simple example. The "meaning" of the word "kill" has evolved since it was written into the ten commandments. In those days it meant "commit murder". Today the "meaning" of the commandment has changed with the evolution of the use of the word from commit murder to just plain take a life. Similarly "take the name of the lord in vain" meant to bear false witness whereas today it is interpreted as blasphemy. The original meaning of the message has been altered due to lack of precise consistency. Fortunately neither of these contexts is within the realm of science.

The current convention of language use does not prclude creativity, innovation, or associating existing structures. Nor does it preclude creating new metaphors. Moreover, not all our cognitive process depend on the use of language; we do have some visualization capabilities. See wisdom, particularly "creativity" therein.

It has been written, I won't bother to look up the reference this time, that group solutions tend to be conventional; it takes an individual working alone to come up with solutions that are significantly more "outside the box".

One needs to be precise about one's use of terms, even to one's self, in analysis and the search for creative solutions so as to even be able to recognize a distinction that can be advantageously used. Imprecise used of terms just allows a fuzzy encompassing of multiple possibilities, and the failure to distinguish possibilities obscures paths that could lead to innovation. Important also, is the ability to examine the structure implied by precise use of terms.

How does one look beyond the existing structures if they only use language in ways that are supported by current convention?

My focus was on using terms precisely in agreement with the time-binding record, but also to analyze these terms in connection with scientific and philosophical knowledge. The analysis, bringing out precise structure, allows finding anomolies, inconsistencies, and fallacies in reasoning, and these all contribute toward eliminating false reasoning pathes.

Using terms in ways that are both consistent with the time-binding record and with precisision - focusing on the technical and scientific definitions - is a variety of the use of language supported by current convention (in the precise technical use of terms). It does not preclude seeing beyond existing structures. On the contrary, if we see existing structures more clearly and more precisely, we will be more likely to be able to see beyond them, especially if we have a multiply connected knowledge base. See creativity again.

Agreed.
Precision in communications for the end of mutual understanding (not the same as agreement).
Precision in structure for the end of analysis of relations (not precision for the sake of precision).
Precisions in relations for the end of testing models (not the same as "accuracy").
Precision in models (maps) for the end of navigating (not just our physical environments, but our symbolic environments as well).

For me, our maps include maps of procedures for accomplishing end, and I include this under navigating. I use the word navigating as it naturally goes with the term map. I'm guessing that your use of 'function' is referring to procedures of the sort what something does so we can use it to do things. And I would include this under the general terms of navigating maps of our physical and symblolic environments using the metaphor of ends are destinations and procedures are maps. Recall that the terms 'map' and 'territory' under general semantics are extremely general. So I assume we are in agreement, unless you mean something else by function.

Yes, it's all talk.

Such a determination is a value judgement, and it would normally be made by the listener taking into consideration the listener's experience. After all, it is the listener who must assimilate the term into his or her own experience, which is likely different from the speaker. It is only through the process of sharing experiences, that we can build a picture that we agree about (or disagree about).

If I have experience that makes distinctions and builds a structure that you have not experienced, your use of a term would seem ambiguous to me, as it does not distinguish among the possibilities I see.
Conversely, if I lack experiences that make distinctions and builds a structure that I have not experienced, I am unable to bring experiences to your use of the term, and it would not make sense to me.

In the former case I try to provide you with the experiences so as to "pin down" the "meaning" to disambiguate among my experiences. In the later case I try to elicit information so as to build structures - give me the experiences - enabling me to see the different possibilities.

The speaker would rarely determine that his or her word choice would be "sloppy, imprecise, etc.," prior to such a, possibily extended, interchange.

If you think the judgement is the right/responibility of the speaker prior to such an interchange, then we do not agree.

The speaker has the choice of picking what level of abstraction to begin with, and he or she may choose to be intentionally ambiguous - as in the Oriental case of "leaving room to save face". But that, it would seem to me, would rarely, if ever, be appropriate for building models of how we know/learn/understand what is going on in our physical world and in our models of our abstraction process.

We talk until we can walk away satisfied or until one gives up, possibly leaving the other frustrated. This only applies to understanding; control is another issue.

We ask questions based on our needs, and that is not always to understand.

Yes, that paraphrase is part of the cycle of communication. Then the original speaker can, based on what he heard, infer what the original listener understood, assuming the original listener heard what the original speaker said, as he sought to encode what he meant, and compare that inference to his memory of what he originally intended as the desired response.

Speaker's meaning -> (E)ncoded -> speakers words spoken.
(T)ransmitted through (N)oisy medium.
Words (h)eard by listener - > (d)ecoded -> listener's (u)nderstanding, and (a)bstracted.
Listener's (m)eanings -> (e)ncoded -> Listener's words.
(t)ransmitted through (n)oisy medium.
Words (H)eard by speaker (R) -> Decoded -> speakers understanding.

Quite a complex process for just one cycle.
Speaker's understanding =D(H(n(t(e(a(u(d(h(N(T(E(speaker's meaning))))))))))))
And I did not include the effect of memory storage and recall.

And all this is complicated by social issues, needs, ego, purposes, etc.
But hopefully, when our goal is to apply the methods of science in our daily lives, we can get past most of that with repeated cycles of response and reply and a mutual desire to understand.

It ain't easy, folks.

General semantics does not specify what kind of social niceties should be adhered to in the application of the methods of science in our daily lives. Korzybski advocated that a "time-binding" ethic be based on the "natural law of human nature"; which he meant as the accumulation of knowledge and property and the sharing of such over generations with the concern for the welfare of all mankind (above any group or culture); he contrasted this with an animalistic "space-binding" ethic of competition for resources with regard for self only. (I just finished reviewing every instance of "ethic" in the collected works CD - which includes S&S & MoH.)

What is "compassion"; what is "common courtesy"; and what is "mutual respect" varies with culture to culture, society to society, family to family, individual to individual.

There is no scientific study that identifies any natural law of human nature as dictating any particular definition of any of theses. Even a cursory review of philosophy shows that all three are values, and that they vary. Typically 'values' have not been the province of science, although Korzybski advocated that the scientific study of man would produce a set of such values. I don't see that any such set of common valuse has even been evident. I have some, and I'd like to believe they might have some universal appeal, but I know of no scientific evidence to that effect.

Moreover, the notion that one can even accomplish such a task - to base an ethic or morality on observations - to say that we "should" behave the way we have been observed to behave - has been characterized as "the naturalistic fallacy" "to go from 'is' to 'ought'".

I had a much more extensive response written, but I lost it in a computer glitch, so you'll just have to make due with this much less verbose post.

David wrote "basic principles that govern enactment". "Enactment"? "Enactment", if that's what you meant, represents a small subset of human behavior based on a particular set of values (high level abstractions?) not universally held by mankind and not justifiable by any scientific method of observation. I spent twenty years defending the Declariation of Independence and the US Constitution, and I support them and the principles they represent; but I'm also aware that they are in no way "universal human values". We might like to think they are, but that's our own myopic view of value systems. Even Kohlberg's stages of moral development - based on Piaget's work observing kids deveoping - has no universal acceptance. The structure and functioning of the US Government is an implementation consistent with Kohlberg's stage 5. The vast majority of mankind adheres to one or another major religions with the varying dictates differentially interpreted by those in power in the various sects, and many would consider their (incompatible) approachs stage 6, and therefore above goverments.

Anything that can be said as the object of "should" represents a preference by an entity or group. There are only a few built into mobile life. Seek food, seek shelter, conserve energy, seek mates, avoid predators, and beat rivals. These are fundamental to survival of any mobile species. Any system of ethics for human behavior must support these "laws of nature of mobile life", any universal social value system for a society must provide for ways to provide food, shelter, freedom from predation, successful mating, and satisfactory competition for mates. Any value system that does not provide for these will be going against the basic nature of mobile life. Humans, being a special case of mobile life, have some means to do this, but so far, no such universal value system accepted by all has emerged. Competition for mates, and in the context of social interaction, competition for status (power), has no natural limits. Most species' fights end without injury, but a good percentage do, and quite a few end in death or murder, and the males of some species kill others's offspring, notibly Chimps (but not Bonobos) and domestic cats, just to name a couple.

While making breakfast, it just occured to me that when we think of values as somehow abstracted from lower orders of abstraction, we are possibly making a mistake. A value, it seems to me now, is better described as a reason or mechanism for deciding independently of the facts. If you value something you are predisposed to act in a certain way before any facts are in evidence. The incoming abstracted facts are used in conjuction with the value to effect behavior. When an appropriate context arrises, the value dictates the choice.

We can infer values from observing decisions. A decision made in the same way repeatedly reflects a value. I show the relation in my Think-Feel and Know-Act. We infer the value when we abstract a pattern, but our inference is a map of repeated decisions, and that is not the value which drives those descisions. Absracting and inferring a value is a bottom up process, but using a value to make a decision is a top-down process. That's when it hit me. A value is an example that borders on what we call in general semantics an "intensional orientation". Unfortunately, in general semantics "intensional orientation" has a bad rep. The connotations are very negative. We aren't supposed to have such, because we are supposed to be extensional. But it's values that make us human. Thanks to the impetus of this discussion, I can now see that yet another proclamation of general semantics that can be misinterpreted as an absolute principle. It is the interaction of extensional and intensional orientations that enables us to function. We are intensional about our values, and this guides our decisions for behavior when our extensional abstractions inform us of the opportunities to exercise our values. If we go overboard in either direction - have no vaues - or - ignore the abstracted facts - we are disfunctional.

So we can paraphrase the serenity prayer as: Great Korzybski, grant me the strength to hold to my intensional values, the fortitude to accept my extensional abstractions, and the wisdom to know the difference.

David's "actions that are governed or constrained by principles" first require that principles be abstracted, as no "principles" exist a-priori.

One cannot have "enactment" without "principles".
One cannot have "principles" without prior abstraction.
What are principles? See principles. Principles are statements of "oughts" based on human values, so one cannot have principles without first having values.

"Rights" are special cases of values.

A "right" is a claim on others based on a value and a presumtion that the others have acknowledged the claim as valid.

A "right" is granted by one entity to another.

The people who formed our government created an entity - the government - and granted it the right to administer values and delegated to it the power to grant specified rights to all citizens.

For every right granted one or more individuals held the corresponding value. Freedom is granted because the grantor values freedom and claims that others grant freedom in return. The structure is a quid-pro-quo of values. I value my freedom, and, so you won't restrict my freedom, I grant you the "right" to freedom on the condition that you grant me the right to freedom in return. In order for this to work we must also be self-limiting and pledge not to interfere with the other's freedom. This level opens the question of boundary between active freedom of the grantor and the passive right to freedom of the grantee. For decades I have continually said "My freedoms end where your rights begin." Kant resolved this with the appeal to reciprocity - which we might relate to the general theory of relativity. That the laws of physics must look the same to all observers becomes that the rules of etical behavior must look the same to all participants. And the earliest simplest expression of this is don't do to others what you don't want done to yourself, so you make an agreement to that effect with others implicitly through cultural history or explicitly through negotiation.

"Rights" are a complex social issue based on values in the context of multiple interacting entities. When you talk about rights, you are, in fact, implicitly talking about the values from which the right are generated. Without the underlying values, there would be no question of rights.

It is Korzybski's principle claim that there are natural laws of human nature, and that understanding the time-binding character of these natural laws will, throught the application of science, generate the appropriate "time-binding" ethic, and therefore, sufficient for sanity. I see that you disagree with this percept of general semantics. I'm inclined to agree with your disagreement as well, but I suspect our reasoning differs significantly.

define:rights. I see where we part company. You hold that "inherent" is a valid notion; "inherent" is an Aristotelian essences notion. For me anything that smacks of "essence" is an abstraction that we form, the map and not the territory. If there is anything that is "inherent" in anything else, we cannot know it because that is strictly a metaphysical idea, and general semantics is modern open applied epistemology.

We have to abstract descriptions.
Then we abstract relations.
Among the descriptions we abstract are examples of repeated decisions.
From this we infer values.
We abstract relations among persons.
We abstract that some relations include coercion ad dominance.
We abstract an ability (through mirror cells) to project ourselves in others situations.
We have, over the centuries, abstracted the notion of the "golden rule" to protect ourselves and our values as projected into the situation of others.
We have, over the centuries, abstracted the notion of cooperating with others.

We abstract an agreement, as the limeric says, as to who is allowed to ho what and where to whom (and when), as well as who is not allowed to do what to whom (in order to secure our values). We call the subject of that agreement, as to what is not allowed to be done a "right" of the recipient.

For me, within the context of epistemology - how we know - all "rights" are the subject implicitly or explicitly of agreements, and the agreements are made in the interest of protecting actions and property valued by the participants.

Now, I personally subscribe to the notion of Kant that, based on my understanding of the above, I shall agree with myself to limit my "freedom" [freedom to] in order to preserve my values [freedom from] ("rights") projected onto myself as the generic other my mirror cells enable me to empathize with.

This is an expression of Kant's categorical imperative. Act as if my behavior would be a universal law.

If you believe in inherent rights or absolute rights not so made by humans, well, then, that is the basis for a lot of disagreement in many areas.

From premises conclusions follow, and with different premises, different conclusions follow.
It's only logical, and the diagrams on many General semantics bulletins.

Well, we could extract two sub-topics - one on rights and values, and one on ethics, but I think that the perspectives exhibited that some have taken what some might think as a digression are relevant to consciousness of abstracting.

I see the percept that rights, essences, or anything else, are "inherent" as a "lack of experience" in consciousness of abstraction due to a lack of appreciation for all the steps involve in the abstraction process, especially since "essences" are deemed by general semantics as a strictly Aristotelian viewpoint.

Moreover, the abstraction of evidence of values that infers (more abstraction) the operation of a value also shows a similar lack of experience with awareness of the plethora of steps in the abstraction process that leads to such high level abstractions.

In both cases, however, I am not excluding the possiblity that the expereince is there, but the rejection is possibly due to a commitment to essences.

I have built a structure starting with observations that rises through level of abstraction to a notion of "rights" that is not only based in human behavior, it does not suffer from the eschewed notion of essences.

The "rejection" I'm getting sounds to me a bit like:
Me: "There aren't any essences." followed by Others: "There are too, So there!".

I've tried to show my experiential path, but I'm still hearing a "denial" or "rejection" that does not seem to address the abstraction process I've delineated.

A belief in intrinsic properties, values, rights, etc., are all projection or attributions of our obstractions onto what is going on. The language of intrinsic anything is from realism that presumes that these structures and characteristics exist independently of any observation. That point of view is not consistent with general semantics. We have to have an abstraction path of evidence for anything we know.

As long as anyone holds to the belief that "things" have intrinsic characteristics, including such characteristics as "entitlements" "simpliciter" he or she is holding onto the notion of Aristotelian essences.

Our Declaration of Independence is not without such phraseology, but I can "translate" that into structures which rest in multiple levels of abstraction based on the human context as we currently model it.

I do appreciate the fact that this interchange has given me the stimulus to more precisely differntiate the abstraction of apparent value (repeated evidence of deciding in a particular way) from the inference to an established predisposition to decide in that way (the value), and that these represent an interaction between intensional (plans, goals, values) and extensional (abstract, react, respond).

Davide wrote: Functionally, isn't that the same as saying, "I will respect the inherent rights of other human beings"?

Not at all, because your formulation presumes "inherent" whereas mine does not. You are abstracting my words using Piaget's assimilation into your cognitive structures, and comparing your abstraction to your cognitive structure.

Functionally, the behavior and the language will be different at lower levels of abstraction.

To say that something is "inherent" is to say that it "just is" and that it cannot be further analyzed.

You claim rights are inherent:

Look at definitions of rights on the web.

Pick this one, for example:

Powers or privileges granted by an agreement or law.
www.library.yale.edu/~llicense/definiti.shtml

Laws are legislated agreements among people, consequently both disjuncts go back to agreements, and agreements must be further analyzed as to why they are made. I alluded to the quid-pro-quo of value exchange as a basic reason for agreements, so (legal) "rights" trace back to values, and a value is indicated by a person deciding in a certain way. Further, I trace those to the basic "needs" for survival of the species.

Analysis of all the definitions show a trace back to authority based in agreement in general or in specific contexts.

Just as an added thought, in order to navigate the physical, symbolic, and social environments, we use our cognitive model, assimilating (Piaget) abstractions, until such time as "significant" failures in predicting necessitate accomodating (again Piaget) abstractions to form a revised cognitive model. The "goodness of fit" of our cognitive model can be measure by how infrequently we need to revise it. Consciousness of abstraction allows us to monitor the process more effectively.

David,
Drop down a level of abstraction and specify which right you have in mind.

The lower level of abstraction consists of a number of specific rights. "Rights" in general must be abstracted from many particulars.

I cited the web search which listed many of them. In each case they indicate an authority either assumed and deferred to or agreed to.

A hermit living alone with no possibility of interaction with other humans has no "rights", "responsibilities", or "priveledges". He interacts with his environment as he sees fit without any inteference. The concept of "rights" has no application in such a situation.

That you do not know of or cannot name an entity or a process by which rights are granted does not mean that others can not name or describe such a process. There is a logical fallacy operating in such a claim. "I lack knowledge of X therefore X cannot exist." This is confusing epistemology with metaphysics, and it is not valid reasoning.

See my Sentient Sovereignty. "Rights" are granted by the perspective expresesd beginning with Reciprocity. When I commit not to act in certain ways towards others, that creates the corresponding "right" of the others - they may claim that I keep my word and behave accordingly. When we band together in groups, and we establish customs of such behavior, then the "right" inheres in the expectation that no one will behave in the prohibited way. In such groups further agreements appoint individuals to see to it that individuls who would not voluntarily agree to the restriction are forced to conform. (Manjority rule).

Today, I have a "right" to freedom of expression, because it is written into the First Ammendment to the Constitution, which by the way, was created by agreement among delegates, and the ammendment was created by the process specified in the original agreement. This "right" only "exists" as part of the background culture because it is part of time-binding and goes back to agreements between people, as to how to protect what they valued at the time, and what we value now.

By the way, notice all the legal activity that continually goes on in an effort to both restrict as well as maintain these "rights". The rights do not have any absolute inherent existence. They must be created my agreement and then they must be maintained by a constant struggle - competition for power, the ability to obtain and hoard that which is valued.

Every chain of abstraction goes back to basic desire.

In the bill of rights, the words 'ability" or "ability to have" may be substituted for the word 'right' and not substantially change the meaning or the implementation. We call a "right" the ability not to have something done to us or the ability to do something. This is not "ability" in the sense of "can"; it is ability in the sense of "may", because the context, in all cases, governs the actions of other peo