Re: [Cogitata] Digest for cogitata@googlegroups.com - 2 updates in 1 topic

[Jerry LR Chandler]

List, Jerome:

A couple of comments are in order, one for clarification of my comments yesterday and the other about the roles of logic in the conceptualization of the triple helix.  These two comments are tightly linked to one another.

So, my comment about Newton (as a scholar) was ill-advised for this group.  My reference was to the Aristotelian - Newtonian conceptualization of predications and predicaments.  Newton followed the Aristotelian method of “analysis and synthesis” in the development of correspondence truths of materializations of number symbols and other mathematical notations. This aspect of Newtonianism should not be conflated with the much-wider spread of physicalism as Newtonianisms as a philosophy of science.  Bob U. Recognized the distinction.      

The critical issue is when and how are mathematical symbols relevant to social systems.  In other words, for example, what is the meaning of the word “triple” in the phrase “the triple helix”.  Is it geometric? Analogy? Homology? Metaphor? Numerical?

The second issue is closely related to Jerome’s comments. 

Logics, both informal within disciplines and formal logics related to mathematical operations (such as category theory, or set theory or information theory,) are readily mis-interpreted.  These various forms of communication are often termed “silos” when approaching the meanings in descriptive mathematics.  

In the case of Loet’s term, "triple helix”, it has confused me for decades because Loet’s background suggests a context of a DNA sort of intertwining with information theory/anticipatory systems.  From these discussions, it suggests that many readers / analysts use the term as some sort of professional metaphors within the humanities/economics/education/etc.

Cheers

Jerry

On Apr 21, 2022, at 8:25 AM, cogi...@googlegroups.com wrote:

cogi...@googlegroups.com

Google Groups

Topic digest
View all topics

• Digest for cogi...@googlegroups.com - 1 update in 1 topic - 2 Updates

Digest for cogi...@googlegroups.com - 1 update in 1 topic

Jerry LR Chandler <jerrylr...@gmail.com>: Apr 20 12:13PM -0500 Lots of Fun!!!   Cheers Jerry

Jerome Warren <gregor...@riseup.net>: Apr 21 05:44AM -0700 Dear Jerry and Co.,   I agree, it was a fascinating discussion. Just some reflections on my part: I think what is interesting about the TH approach is its injection of the relational view into the foreground. The fact that different logics (each with different goal functions and means of arriving at those goals: whether optimization [maximization under constraint], redistribution [reallocation of resources according to some rule], reciprocity [e.g., Kant's categorical imperative], randomization, etc.) can simultaneously operate on each other, on the agents and institutions employing them, and on the world, adds something new to both the notion of evolution and the notion of social behavior than a purely static or mechanismic understanding, with its reductionist perspective.   My main draw from reading Chapter 6 and comparing its conclusions with my own research was that the recognition of the above is significant. With regards to innovation policy, this means incorporating the historical development of both the goals of innovation policy (is it GDP growth, mitigating of climate catastrophe, reducing inequality, etc.?), what Loet refers to as a regime, as well as the context in which it occurs (this also includes the historical development of political and geographic boundaries).   Within that framework, I think the powerful message of the TH framework is the ability to marshal such knowledge for the purposes of crafting intelligent, mission-oriented policy. Where this links up to my own research is in my attempt to foreground cooperation as a necessary condition for economic behavior and for economic development. As Klaus empahsized yesterday, communication is important, not merely as an artifact, but as a motor of change. Engendering new values (including those of "emulation" that Veblen spends so much time on) can motivate the shift to new macrocultures that are, in turn, able to reorient entire systems, like society, on a new footing. And, in accordance with Loet's framework, I think this process works best when one iteratively shifts back and forth from the evolutionary logics that operate on historical events and actors and the tendency of those events to incur again on the logics. Here, the place for notions like ascendancy. Just as governments were essential in creating the conditions for the rise of the present industrial system based on wage labor by lending such relations legitimacy via the legal and jurisprudential logic, via regulations and via building infrastructure like roads, bridges and canals, such institutions can facilitate a shift towards a qualitative shift towards more explicit cooperation in industry and knowledge production. Such a shift may ultimately work to de-emphasize the operation of other logics, e.g., the profit-miximizing logic may become less of a constraint as we enter a post-scarcity economy (it is already less relevant in the information and knowledge economy, which, as we all know, relies largely on volunteer labor within the FOSS community).   To what extent information theory is necessary or useful for such an analysis: the point, I think, relates to uniqueness: information theory, as I understand it, tries to break data down to their most elementary units. As I think one can never reduce human agents in their complexity and indeterminacy to "bits", one can only capture regularly occurring interactions in this way. I think, for instance, a theory of money based on information theory might be a useful endeavor. Loet mentions the application of his approach to money at one point in the book (money as "medium"). Its use in reducing linguistic acts to data seems to me limited, as these are often times irreducible. This might get to what Jerry was getting at with his "semiosis" reference..   Not sure if this adds anything... Jerome

Back to top

You received this digest because you're subscribed to updates for this group. You can change your settings on the group membership page. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it send an email to cogitata+u...@googlegroups.com.

[Jerome Warren]

Dear Jerry,  Dear group,

I think both of your questions are highly relevant. With regards to the former ("when and how are mathematical symbols relevant to social systems"), this points to the contribution being made by Pearl and others, going back to Sewell Wright's notions of path analysis, of developing a framework for dealing with causal relations. Much of the modern architecture of causal analysis, including Pearl's methods of causal inference, make use of directed graphs, which have been interpreted as mathematical  language (a parallel strand uses Structural Equations). In particular, "This mathematical language is not simply a heuristic mnemonic device for displaying algebraic relationships, as in the writings of Blalock (1962) and Duncan (1975). Rather, graphs provide a fundamental notational system for concepts and relationships that are not easily expressed in the standard mathematical languages of algebraic equations and probability calculus. Moreover, graphical methods now provide a powerful symbolic machinery for deriving the consequences of causal assumptions when such assumptions are combined with statistical data."  (Pearl, 2001/2009, 5.1.3, p. 138)

I am a big fan of the causal inference and do-calculus that has been developed alongside it. I feel that it offers legitimate philosophical grounds for debating just the question Jerry asks above. It is also intuitive in that graphical representations are accessible to those without a rigorous mathematical background. Of course, they can be extended and/or expressed with use of that more formal language and are in many cases isomorphic, if used correctly. I'm open to reading Pearl's latest book, The Book of Why, together within this group after we finish Loet's, if there is interest.

Thus, with respect to the analogous question of "what is the meaning of the word “triple” in the phrase “the triple helix”"? I think it is both numerical and at the same time communicates something qualitative. It is numerical in the sense that when we deal with a "Triple Helix" phenomenon, we are dealing with three distinct logics in interaction with another, featuring feedback, synergies and specializations. At the same time, it has a symbolic quality in that the concept attempts to qualitatively shift away from paradigms like political science, which Loet interprets as dealing with a binary interaction between the political and the economic spheres, which he (and here one can ask if this entails an over-simplification) reduces respectively to the regulatory and profit-maximizing logics. Adding novelty-generation as a third logic, and then simultaneously focusing on the dynamic interactions between these three logics, entails a qualitative shift in analysis, both epistemic ("what can we know?") and methodological ("what are the tools that aid us in this endeavor?"). Thus, the qualitative shift from binary interaction of logics to triple interactions is likely not as great as that between triple, quad-, quint, n-tuple interactions. This is what I mean by the communication of something qualitative.

The graphic Loet has just posted in his last post, from p. 76. of the book, is an excellent representation of this thinking. As a result of this qualitative shift, Loet is trying to reframe the analysis towards an anticipatory framework, looking at and emphasizing the interactions between the logics (and here is where the role of communication becomes so essential) and how these, phenomenologically, themselves objects of study. As I understand it, bibliometric analyses are just one application of the approach. As I have tried to show (I am not sure if my attempt was successful), one can apply the same thinking to interpreting the effect of cooperation -- as a logic -- on notions like novelty-generation, or even on education. A question to be asked in general, related to what you, Jerry ask, is what the analogs to many of the conceptual terms are, e.g., when attempting to apply Shannon's formula to social systems. Thus, Bob Ulanowicz writes on p. 102 of A Third Window that "The usual convention is that K defines the units of information. For example, if the base of the logarithm is 2, a single unit of K is referred to as 1 “bit” [. . . ]. Should natural logarithms be used, K = 1 then represents one “nat” of information; when the logarithmic base is 10, K is measured in “hartleys.” Early in most introductions to information theory, the base of the logarithms is specified; K is set equal to 1, and thereafter it disappears from discussion. However, Tribus and McIrvine (1971) suggest that the purpose of K is to impart physical dimensions to the index it scales. As the total systems throughput has already been cited as characterizing the size (or scale) of a network, it is appropriate to equate K with T." (T in his book refers to the size of an ecosystem).

In my example, financial flows, not citations, serve as the conduit mediating these interactions and I use a similar approach to Loet's notion of synergy and information, however not measured in bits or hartleys, but with reference to Ulanowicz's notion of "total system throughput", so replacing the -K in the Boltzmann equation (Shannon's equation for information) with the scale of total monetary flows (in this case, Legacoop's total profits, as calculated for 2018). The result I get I showed on p. 8 of my slides ("Applying the CNH"):

Just to show my work:

Thus, A (ascendancy) refers to the mutual information measure (in Loet's language, synergy), whereas O (overhead) refers to the conditional entropy (in Loet's language, redundancy, or "unrealized options"). The two together account for the capacity, C, which is a measure reflecting both the size and degree of organization of the system. My main point was to show that, by using this formula, one can move beyond measuring units of information, but that the relations can be used very broadly in differing contexts. Bob has applied these lessons to ecology and is my attempt to introduce such notions into economic analysis. The example was designed to show that Legacoop can frame its need for growth within the TH framework (extended to a "cooperative n-tuple helix) according to multiple logics: that its members may benefit not just from higher levels of profit (certainly, by increasing the size of system throughput, having more profit, more money would be available for improving the quality of life of its members), but also by the manner in which existing profits are utilized: by either increasing the share of profits (from the present-day 3%), or by allocating relatively more of the existing level to education, research and analysis, that qualitatively more would potentially go to novelty-generation, increasing education of cooperative values (which themselves serve to increase the efficacy of the resp. organizations, etc. Each of these (presently unrealized) options would then feedback into increasing the level of profit.

There are lots more aspects of this conceptual framework I find highly useful to my own work, in particular the notion of anticipatory system I find very useful to integrate into firm cost-accounting. For instance (and these thoughts are still at an early, conceptual stage), one can introduce relationships into firms' cost accounting to take into consideration the relational rents, in the language of Josef Wieland, these entail. Thus, I have two very rudimentary sets of T-tables in my dissertation:

The first represents the standard relationship between firms and their creditors, e.g., banks. For instance, Bank gives a loan, Firm receives cash and then can use that for productive investments, etc. In the second table, instead of taking the standard approach of object relations, I (quoting from the dissertation): "In the second set of T-tables, we adopt a relational view of capital, as entailed by the third cooperative principle. Here, we see instead of cash being the firm’s asset, the continuing relationship instead takes its place, with a respective liability booking in the creditor’s T-table. Thus, the relational creditor-debtor relationship develops a distinct language for integrating the sustained relationship into both parties’ cost- accounting. Thus, “[t]he loan issued includes a deadline, and therefore a fixed end date for the financing of the debt and an interest rate. Thanks to this clear dividing line between negotiation and a fixed date for repaying the debt, the cooperation is separated into distinct processes and becomes quantifiable, even if doing so always represents an artificial intervention in the underlying societal processes.” [Biggiero, 2022, p. 292] In practice, one can see such relational approaches applied in, e.g., the investment strategies of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV) or in the activities of charitable foundations, cooperative development funds and increasingly in multilateral organizations like the UN." (pp. 522-3)

This linguistic act, or recognition of the communications level within the intra-firm cost accounting, adds a layer by means of which future relations can incur on present-day ones. This is another conceptual case where the Triple Helix framework can serve as a useful framing for relational contracting. This is something I would have discussed had I had more time.

Jerry, this also gets into your last point about "silos", because focusing explicitly on the communications level allows one to reflect on the mutual influences of the various logics, such as those I described. Thus, I see the TH framework as one potential (surely, there are others) attempt to frame what Herbert Gintis has called for in his book The Bounds of Reason, in which he calls for a "unification of the behavioral sciences". Again, quoting from (the literature review of) my dissertation: "[Gintis, 2014, p. 194] remarks that

The behavioral sciences include economics, anthropology, sociology, psychology, and political science, as well as biology insofar as it deals with animal and human behavior. These disciplines have distinct research foci, but they include four conflicting models of decision making and strategic interaction, as determined by what is taught in the graduate curriculum and what is accepted in journal articles without reviewer objection. The four are the psychological, the sociological, the biological, and the economic.

These four models are, according to Gintis, “not only different, which is to be expected given their distinct explanatory aims, but are also incompatible.” While “all four are flawed”, they “can be modified to produce a unified framework for modeling choice and strategic interaction for all of the behavioral sciences.” As Gintis asserts, such a model can then be modified to suit particular research questions.

Much progress has been made towards achieving such a multi-disciplinary synthesis, argues Gintis:

In recent years [. . . ] the value of trans-disciplinary research in addressing questions of social theory has become clear, and sociobiology has become a major arena of scientific research. Moreover, contemporary social policy involves issues that fall squarely in the interstices of the behavioral disciplines, including substance abuse, crime, corruption, tax compliance, social inequality, poverty, discrimination, and the cultural foundations of market economies. Incoherence is now an impediment to progress.

The five components of Gintis’ theory are “(a) gene-culture co-evolution; (b) the sociopsychological theory of norms; (c) game theory, (d) the rational actor model; and (e) complexity theory.” (Id., p. 195) These domains all offer useful contributions to a coherent theory of human social behavior and any synthesis, Gintis argues, “[i]mplies change only in areas of overlap”. [Gintis, 2014, p. 196]"

(pp. 103-4)

So, again, I see the utility of Loet's approach on two levels: on a rudimentary, conceptual level, of emphasizing the interaction among differing (sometimes complementary, sometimes oppositional) logics, and, more specifically, in attempting to fill in this conceptual framework with some concrete analytical measures. I think all -- or most -- of us are in agreement with Loet on the former front. The main distinctions I've heard, to date, from Klaus and others, appear to refer more to the actual analytical framework Loet has developed, and whether what Jerry calls its “analysis and synthesis" is in fact the best approach, whether it needs to be amended or whether it is a cul-de-sac.

At this point, I'd personally be very curious to hear what Inga Ivanova has to say on the potential for supplementing the TH framework to quad-, quint, etc. domains and what that does to formalization. I'd also be curious what Helen and Richard have to say to these comments and to Jerry's. (I was unfortunately still nervously editing my presentation and so missed much of Helen's initial contribution, so will have to re-watch the video!)

Greetings,

Jerome

[Jerome Warren]

Sorry, I meant to write " Thus, the qualitative shift from binary interaction of logics to triple interactions is likely greater than that between triple, quad-, quint, n-tuple interactions."
-J

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Jerome,

Thank you for your responses. 

Is your dissertation available online? What should I read? 

Best, 

Loet

_______________

Loet Leydesdorff

"The Evolutionary Dynamics of Discusive Knowledge"(Open Access)

Professor emeritus, University of Amsterdam 

Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR)

lo...@leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/

http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ych9gNYAAAAJ&hl=en

ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7835-3098;    

--
Visit group at https://groups.google.com/g/cogitata?hl=en
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Evolutionary Dynamics of Discursive Knowledge" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to cogitata+u...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cogitata/80bd4dae-0512-4131-94ac-885c1fdd8893n%40googlegroups.com.

[Jerome Warren]

Dear Loet,

Whatever you found was not my dissertation, as I wrote it in English. I attach two documents here, one is the entire dissertation, which is quite extensive (782 pages). I also attach Chapter 8 separately, which covers the issues I discussed in my presentation and is influenced by your work, as well as that of Bob Ulanowicz. It also builds somewhat on the discussion of Chapter 7, which may also interest you. That may be a good start. At the end of Chapter 1, there is an overview of the entire manuscript, which you may review if interested.

Thanks for your interest!
Jerome

[Loet Leydesdorff]

Dear Jerome, 

It is almost unbelievable! I am impressed; I have hundreds of pages to read. 

Thank you for this.

Best. Loet

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cogitata/74e176e5-0077-46e9-8bbf-91f39c996281n%40googlegroups.com.