Philosophical musings on Quanta & Qualia;  Materialism & Spiritualism; Science & Religion; Pragmatism & Idealism, etc.

  Post 120.  November 29, 2021

  Holism and FreeWill

  Versus Reductionism and Fatalism

 When a forum poster accused me of being a woo-mongering New Age nut-case, I began to realize that a significant difference in our worldviews might be characterized as Reductionism vs Holism. You may not be aware that the man who wrote the book on the modern concept of Holism was in no sense a New Ager. Instead, he was a South African general, statesman, naturalist, and philosopher. His 1926 book, Holism and Evolution, was a treatise on the philosophy of Western Science, which he saw had veered so far toward a reductive perspective that it couldn't see the forest for the trees. Likewise, my worldview is not New Ageism, but it is a form of scientific Holism or Systems Theory. It may be confused with Eastern paradigms of Reality, because of its emphasis on the Philosophical science of Metaphysics, which I like to spell as Meta-Physics1 to distinguish it from physical science. It studies our ideas about Reality.

Holism and Evolution :
“The holistic approach to life has had such a far-reaching impact in the world that most people assume it grew out of some Far Eastern practice.”
___review of book by Jan Smuts
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00VISSWR6/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

Another divergence in our philosophy is between Determinism, narrowly defined, and FreeWill, as the ability to choose based on rational evidence rather than on fatalistic necessity. But Determinism is a belief and a premise, not an objective fact. And Determinists typically assume a linear chain of physical causes only. Yet they ignore the influence of feed-back loops in the human mind, which become the non-physical Causes we call "beliefs"2. The behavior of lower animals might result from external influences only. But the human mind is able to interrupt the flow of physical causation with feedback loops that insert new learning links in the chain (creative ideas). When those new links are perceived as different from our beliefs and preconceptions, the mind begins to look for a way to get back on course. Which is known as "Reasoning".

Feedback Loops :
The human brain is a negative feedback loop system. This means that whenever there is a difference between what a person experiences in reality that is different from the ideal set point established by this person’s brain, an urge to behave to correct the situation is created by the brain. https://www.funderstanding.com/brain/brain-biology-a-negative-feedback-loop-system/    [my bold]

Every Effect has a Cause, but not all causes come from the environment. When faced with an incongruency, humans are able to "leap" to a conclusion that seems reasonable, in light of our prior beliefs of what ought to be true. So, what seems reasonable is not just pure Logic, but can also be determined by any prejudices, premises, and presumptions in our belief system. Those inner beliefs are not in any sense physical objects. Instead, they are meta-physical causes of our mental behavior. You might say that beliefs are indirect motives of behavior, because they result from feedback loops in the chain of incoming information. Those information loops add to the complexity of a simple linear cause & effect system. But out of the apparent chaos comes the novel (butterfly) effect that we call "Free Will".

                          Blog Post 119 continued . . .

1. Meta-Physics :
Physics is the science of material Reality. Meta-Physics is the science of human Ideality. It looks inward toward the subjective Mind, not outward to objective things in the environment.

2. Beliefs :
Our beliefs are imaginary pictures of Reality that we use to govern our behavior. In the Feedback Loop quote, it is labeled our “ideal set point”. That’s what we think ought to be Real, but is what I call Ideality.

        METAPHYSICS

“The central problem of Metaphysics is the existential status of ideas.”
___Bob Doyle,
the Information Philosopher

“Metaphysics is a difficult branch of Philosophy, but is rather easy to define: It is the study of the most fundamental concepts and beliefs about them. Examples of metaphysical concepts are Being, Existence, Purpose, Universals, Property, Relation, Causality, Space, Time, Event, and many others. They are fundamental, because all other concepts and beliefs rest on them. All Knowledge and Value is based upon the definitions of these concepts.”
http://getwiki.net/-Metaphysics

    What is Metaphysics? • What is Real? • Metaphysics, inquires, presupposes some theory of what is real, and of what exists? • Metaphysics is closely related to Epistemology; in the same way that Epistemology asks, What is Knowledge and how does it differ from opinion/belief? Metaphysics asks, What is Reality and how it differs from mere appearance? • What is Reality and what are the standards or criteria for what count as REAL? • Both Eastern and Western Traditions have similar definitions of REALITY, that is what is PERMANENT, UNCHANGING, and UNCAUSED can be real.
https://www.slideserve.com/layne/what-is-metaphysics

The

Philosophy

Forum

“I don't believe your understanding that all mental phenomena are considered metaphysical is consistent with any generally accepted definition of the word”.

 — T Clark

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/12096/what-is-metaphysics-yet-again/p1

Holism vs Reductionism

Synthesis
vs
Analysis

ENFORMATIONISM

Feedback Loop Learning

Chaotic Progress
 positive & negative feedback loops
reinforce & weaken the chain of causation

X

X

Set Point

New Point