The Black and White Universe
(Context Theory, The Trick and Simolution)
Geoffrey Hamilton
Sept. 1 93 (Unfinished 1993)
Chapter 1: Suspect the author
This is a book of observations about the relativity of meaning and as such the
above chapter heading is meant as an observation more than a warning. You doubt
me. I must prove to you that I have something to say worthy of being listened
too. The only way I'm going to remove that doubt is by creating a document
worthy of the time you expend reading it. I'll try every trick in the book and
if your disposition is favorable I may remove that doubt and in the process become
above doubt. Something like the Beatles were to their screaming fans on the Ed
Sullivan Show. But even those fans conditioned their suspension of doubt,
conditioned their screams on something. They weren't constantly screaming and
suspending doubt. What that something is is the heart of both Context Theory
and the Theory of Simolution. That something is the weight of meaning, the value
given, the worthiness, when compared to some other something. Now for me to
succeed in removing that doubt about whether I have something worthy to say I
must equal the value you give to the portion of your time that you will need
to read it, (Time is one of many values and I arbitrarily chose it), then hope
that you have a disposition towards what I have to say, (Not everybody with
access to the media of the time was a screaming Beatles fan either.) More
importantly for such an exact exchange of values to occur 'your time' and 'removing
doubt in your mind' would need to be of some value to me, and they are not in the
least. I'd actually prefer to get money for this book not your time or your
fanaticism. Unless your time was in the form of a letter full of excellent
arguments, your time and how you spend it is completely your business. On your
side of the exchange of values, if I succeeded in removing doubt as to the sagacity
of my document here the world that I irrationally cherish will be sapped of one
less relative value system, you. Your life will be no more. You will have committed
suicide.
Then in one sense, even I must doubt my ideas - I haven't done it yet.
So why do I write this? A question you might want to keep in mind for the
rest of this essay.
Chapter 2: Efforts of Distinction
If you defined your values at every moment and asked why they are the way they
are that might save a lot of time. So do it and you can dispense with reading
this essay. But if you're lazy and not into examining why you fight to save the
whales, or why you build a car, or why think that green is green, or why you think
that right is right and wrong is wrong, or why even that you fight things that
get in your way, then The Black and White Universe has all the answers you need.
(Just a reminder, this is a book of observations not a guide to conduct.)
The Black and White Universe is the title of this work because for lazy people such
as yourselves, (now that all the people that think they're not lazy have stopped
reading I can tell you that in fact we are all the lazy people) you can't help
but make distinctions that are black and white. You see when you're present at
a sports game, for example, where two teams are totally foreign to you and you
have no stake in the outcome, if there is no escape for your mind, you begin to
make distinctions between the teams. You may like one team's sweaters and the
smile of the other team's captain but when one team starts to lose you may
decide to root for the underdog. Seemingly there could be nothing more flippant
than making such distinctions. But it will be my contention that all distinctions
are equally flippant due to what causes that something and I explain it within
Context Theory; the arbitrary creation of points of view, methods of investigation,
territory, history, societal structures, beliefs, goals, premises and of the forms
that life can take. And even the form of a life's demise. Nothing is above Context
Theory and no amount of intelligence can outwit it. The fundamental aspect of
Context is you. You see with your eyes, feel with your hands, die with your body.
And no one else does it for you. How far can you see? To the wall of a neighbor's
house? Maybe she's masturbating right now. Maybe not. If she was, would you
condemn her or be aroused? Why either? All this is to show how far you see in
general. Not very far. Well that's your Context too.
Wherever your senses and your body can get you is your Context. You cannot escape.
But where could you escape to? You'd get tired very quickly running away from
your Context. Your space fuel for your flying saucer would run out long before
you could find anything that could avoid a Context. Even if it were agreed that
the universe is infinite, no concept of infinite could survive long without a neat
and tidy Context to pidgin hole it in. Case in point, the symbol for infinity is
Contexted into a choo-choo train track.
So then what is the thing that the Context is arbitrarily highlighting at different
points? I suggested it in the last paragraph so if you agree from now on the universe
will be implied as the central, the only, figure in this whole discussion. Not the
absurd Big Bang Universe that started from nothing (can 0 = p), or the Pin Head
Universe that started from a vewy vewy vewy small point, or what has lately been
refered to by apologists for the Big Bang Theory as the 'known universe'. The
Universe that matters here is the whole thing, including the unknown universe.
The Universe is one thing. And this is one arbitrary statement I'm not going to
concede to be untrue. It is not the sum of its parts because all the parts are
temporary. Every single individualized part, from a quark to the edges of the
known universe, is a momentary construct. The perceptions of these constructs are
called Contexts and the process of construction is called Simolution. (…While to
spill the beans a bit I'll tell you now for the sake of clarity that the motive
of change is The Trick, the cause of the something I'd mentioned earlier.) The
Theory of Simolution has as its premise that Contexts change constantly by the
processes derived from cooperating to survive against competition, (or to put it
in more precise terms, from the accidental clumping and falling apart of things,)
but that they never change their value and that their value is always 0. The word
Simolution is a construct of simulate and evolution. It implies that evolution is
a 0 factor process. Simolution is what describes the entire process in the
infinite Universe,
while Context only accounts for how we see that Universe, and consequently why the
author sees it his way.
This essay has three tasks given it. 1 to introduce the ideas. 2 to explain generally
and abstractly those ideas in the fullest manor known to me. 3 to give examples in
specific ways of every possible instance of the two theories relevance.
With the introductions complete let's make our way to the dinning room
Chapter 3; Not Hungry Dear
What I'm going to say is about as tasty as a mouthful of sand and no matter how
perfect my arguments are, no matter how many examples and proofs I offer you you
won't believe me unless you've already come to these conclusions on your own. It's
not that your stupid or that I'm too smart, it's just that we have different bodies
and different experiences and we cling to our beliefs, abstractly speaking, no less
than we cling to our bodies. But in order to minimize the gulf in Context that exists
between us I'd like to offer a selection of definitions as a relative touch stone to
facilitate greater understanding of what I mean. You may skip it for now but come
back to it as you go further along.
Relativity begins with language
Definitions
Absolute; 1 the concept 0.
2 a fantasy of The Trick that allows pretensions of
non-relative worth.
Consciousness; 1 a structure of matter and energy that allows de facto perception
by a Context that it is itself a Context to be maintained. 2 an internal
logic made up during the creation of a context which happens to increase the
varieties of similar contexts - variations which happen to increase the
chance of survival of the context. 3 the source of the Trick.
Context;
a randomly created structure that comes and goes.
Death; non existence before
conception and after life. Coming and going.
Definition; a relative touch
stone from which people can be understood
Distinction; a process of separating
things.
Life; a perception of matter and energy that implies consciousness
Meaning; an arbitrarily created relative system of generalized values.
Money;
an arbitrarily created relative system to generalize value.
Perception; a
consciousness' various senses and assumptions, and their limitations.
Positionality; a limited Context Theory; a simple 'point of view' concept.
Simolution; The theory that things change but that their value is always 0.
Structure; a particularized something made by matter and energy of matter
and energy - always a temporary construct.
Trick; 1 the quality of Context that prevents anything outside the
Context from being seen or understood. Especially when it concerns
motives or reasons that supply the will to live and consciousness.
2 Matter and energy, the motive force in the universe. 3 de facto reasoning
and justification for existence.
Universal; pretentious reasoning that implies that a limited context
can be applied to everything. 2 this essay
Universe; Everything. Time, space, matter, socks. It is infinite.
Value; 1 a relative creation; 2 a fantasy that there is an absolute
worth in the Universe. 3
something .
As you can see, these definitions are similar to those you find in
a dictionary or any other method of determining meaning. Each word must
stand on the definitions of the words that define it. It's always a circle;
a perpetual motion machine in effect. Now if I gave you an argument that
was as circular as a dictionary you might notice that it was flawed, but
somehow the idea that there is an absolute way to spell, write, read, talk,
politic, insult discriminate or whatever is drilled into society. Somehow
we all fail to come to terms with this obvious problem. Why? There we come
back to something. Something makes us believe that
there is a right or wrong answer. Something causes people to
call up radio shows to complain that the host dangled a participle.
That something is what we value. None of us totally agree what
to value. But all of us value something. And we do it because
of the - I'll make up a name for it.
Chapter 4; The Trick
The Trick. As the heart of this document's construction it will figure prominently
if not problematically. The Trick made the Beatles fans scream. It makes you aroused.
It makes the marathon runner finish his race. It makes people whine that I didn't
say 'his/her' in the last sentence. But it also equally makes the cat play with the
ball, the ant turn right at the stream, the river bank fall into the water, the
water drop drip on your mouth and not in your ear or belly button. To understand
precisely in terms of Simolution Theory what the Trick implies; The Trick is the
leading edge of Simolution within the Universe, it determined why the ant turned
right, while in Context Theory it is what motivates us to see absolute distinctions
when only relative ones exist. It tells us that something called an ant turned in
a direction different from some other. It turned "right." A something
, a value. The reason The Trick is used in both ways is that it does the same thing.
The Trick tells us to make distinctions because we do, like the ant, turn "right"
sometimes, thus avoiding drowning in the stream. Therefore the Trick in Context
Theory is the same as the Trick in Simolution. The consciousness quality of the
Trick in Context Theory does not matter. It is the same thing as the Trick that
determines why the river bank falls in the water.
Chapter 7; Holy Water!
Water is the best analogy I can think of to illustrate The Trick.
In experiments to prove the tenants of Chaos Theory two glass panels were placed
face to face and water was run between them in systematic fashion. The intention
was to show how unknown factors caused the water to trickle down between the panels
differently every time. The pattern of the water being different every time. Stress
and precondition being the two important concepts that usually were the areas to be
concerned with in rationalizing this problem. Stress in this instance probably
deriving from an immeasurable difference in the rate of flow coming out of the
water dispenser while the precondition probably deriving from an immeasurable
change in the structure of the glass panels from experiment to experiment. I
have no problem with these ideas except that they imply the possibility of these
things being measurable given the right instruments. But they are not measurable
because they are random, random in a way that is hard to conceive of but is none
the less the only way that something can be random without the laws of physics
having some explanation for it. They are arbitrary. Arbitrary in the sense that
they are fought for by the individual Context whatever it may be from an atom ,to
an animal, to a solar system, to an institution, to a concept, to an idea or to a
word. Every context has its version of a will to live, a need for space, a
consciousness. And while this may seem like a contradiction to my tenant that
Contexts themselves don't exist and that they have been defined and created
arbitrarily, it is not. We define them but they define us equally arbitrarily.
All the Contexts have this arbitrarily acting consciousness that I mentioned but
they are temporary constructs and don't exist always, therefore by that criteria
they don't really exist.
Now I don't want you, the reader, to assume that
when I say that an atom has a consciousness that I mean it has one exactly like
the one you imagine that you have. One with all that spirituality, soul, lust and
supreme intelligence. I mean one that you don't usually imagine that you have.
One with a commonness, with foul ups, luck and death lurking. A consciousness
that does at all times 'survive'. Everything else is icing on the cake. Or even
more precisely, the ninety percent of the iceberg that is under the surface and
which keeps it close to the surface. An atom's logic is fighting against a
breakdown and its consciousness fights against the conflicting interests outside
its context. ( It is similar to a human that has problems with the conflicting
interests of an idea that take hold of his mind, while a germ takes hold of his
lungs or a cramp takes hold of a leg, etc..) It is as if all things are like the
conflict of two wined up toys. One may fall over a cliff while bumping into the
other and the other may just run out of pent up energy. Whether they were fighting
for a cause or a girl like humans do is immaterial. The facts are they were
fighting, or in another sense they are having a relationship, with their own
interests at stake and that is the consciousness of a context.
And its consciousness, its will to exist, its gravitational force, its inertia,
its interests, they are all motivated by the Trick.
Why? Why? Why?
Chapter 8; I Don't Have the Foggiest
I wish I knew why the Trick is functioning. If it didn't work, like I suggested
at the start of this I essay, I should have killed myself. And if it didn't work,
as I suggested on page one, I would have no reason to write this essay. As it is,
you still need to suspect the author, even now - especially now - that he - that I
have come to a point where there seems to be no ready answer. No pat solution to
such an important question. Sorry.
Chapter 9; Pat Guess #1
To make this guess at why the Trick works work I need to, in a sense, start from
the beginning.
You know the chicken/egg scenario? Which came first and all
that? And You remember that I said that the universe was infinite? Well they are
related things. I want to show that the answer to the chicken/egg thing is that
the universe is infinite. While this guess as to why it is that the Trick exists
is simply a function of that fact.
First I'm putting aside any rhetorical
tricks to get to the answer. For example by answering which word, chicken or egg,
first appeared in a dictionary. I'm answering which thing preceded the other. The
things we generally refer to as chickens or the things we generally refer to as
eggs.
If it is assumed that no two snowflakes are exactly the same or that lightning
never strikes the exact same spot twice or that every person is different. In other
words, individuality is a hall mark of a Context. Then the Context 'chickens' while
being itself individualistic is itself also a container of other individualistic
Contexts - a specific chicken for example named D.. Now if every component individual
is different and has been at all times, and D. has never existed before what says
it is a chicken. Something had feathers before there were chickens. Something lay
eggs before there were chickens. So what is the thing that defined a 'chicken'?
You see D. is very individual. She has two beaks and while it is unusual for a
chicken to have two beaks, it still is a chicken. But if every chicken had two
beaks it would not be chickens we were talking about, they would be from a different
concept then the one on discussion here. So does this mean that individuality
shared commonly. (Unfinished)
1992 version unfinished
If you want to know something, the way you find, out is that you
First establish a context. But there is only one context that matters,
only one context that does not deceive us by excluding alternatives,
only one context that does not pretend that there can be truths in
isolation, only one context that really does show the truth. That
context is the universe - not the universe that's been fenced off by
the Big Bang theorists - I mean the universe that the Big Bang universe
rose out of, the proto-universe. But 1'11 .just. ca11 it the universe.
But who am I to say this?
Now we come to the problem, who decides these things? Logically
fallacious means are often used to decide these matters. Means
derived from political, or military power often do this, also equally
fallacious means are derived from popular will or in the resorting
to the professional standing of the person making an argument. One
last logical fallacy I'd like the reader to be aware of before
of continuing, this is not just an opinion that follows, if there is
"going be disagreement with it, I'd 1ike to hear considered. arguments
not the old refrain, "It's only his opinion". I beg that
these five fallacious tactics be suspended.
I premised this essay by saying if you want to find out something
you must establish a context, or in other words a frame of reference,
then I said only one context shows the truth. So does this mean that
if I'm ignorant of something I can't know the truth, or in other words,
that unless I know absolutely everything about the universe I can never
know the truth. Yes that's exactly what I mean. But there is one other
kind of truth that can be achieved short of absolute
truth and it is a relative truth, and I'm assuming that the wider the premlse
is and the larger the context is, better this relative truth will
be.
So now you have two sides to consider for the remainder of this
essay. One is the truth, which is the universe. And two you have me
the writer, the observer who will attempt the broadest possible context
of truth in the broadest possible guise (as humankind) and in the process
strive for the unachievable goal of the full truth.
What should the process of the unfrozen universe be called? Time
never stops. Matter is always changing. So what should the universe's
process of never stopping be called? Let me take the long route to answer
this question. Outside of our direct knowledge of the universe we make
assumptions that there is more knowledge to learn from it and whenever
we do make this assumption, it is proved to be a correct assumption by
the evidence of the new knowledge that we are acquiring everyday. This
ignorance, or yet To Be Acquired Knowledge (BAK), is of unknown
quantity but it is there. The meaning that I imagine, but that I still
attach to this TBAK idea stems from the fact that it hasn't been judged
by anyone as to whether it is good or bad, helpful or harmful, in the
estimation of people like me. So BAK is useful when I say the universe
has no inherent value. But the only way I can show that is by discussing
previously acquired knowledge PAK) Together BAK and PAK make up the
rdpe show in this essay wlll justlfy my contentlon
that the unlverse only changes shape but never changes its value. Also
I want to show that I'm justified in calling for the replacement of the
misleading and limiting concept of evolution with the more accurate
concept of simolution.
The fiction that I can represent the knowledge of humanity, the
PAK, is a laughable joke under most circumstances but a necessity for
my purposes here. However it is far from a joke at times that we as
individuals within humanity can't even understand one another. In
other words we need to acquire our opponent's understanding of an issue in dispute.
We often try to imagine it but the attempt, while it may lead to a
reconciliation, will be totally misleading. We can't have our opponent's
personality, brain, history, body, experience with time, and especially
will never have their point of view.
This is the first and most
important of the releative truthes you must consider, the inescapable
context of the individual in percelvlng the truth. I am the individual
you are probably most concerned about in the perceiving this truth but
it is you the individual reader that is the first context, the first truth.
to be considered. If you, the reader, believe in values and I say here
there are no inherent values only made up values, chances are you will
not believe me. You only need to convince yourself something
is true and therefore it is true. Even if I offer proof, chances are you
won't believe me.
The reason is that I need to use values in order
to prove it to you. You might say 'Your argument is a fallacy because
you used values to make your case.' And these values, these relative
values are hard to distinguish from ultimate values, mainly they are
hard to distinguish because we don't have any ultimate values for them
to be compared to.
In other words to make a relative comparison to is a double
bind. Pick up a dictionary some time when you want to know what a word
means and try to find a word that exists without relative meanings.
A dictionary ignores each individual person's particular slant
and history with a word's usage. Occasionally individual slants become,
widely used and are grudgingly brought to a lexicographers rulings
on a word's legitimacy.
Case in point webster decided, all by himself,
that Americans needed their own spelling of words like colour. He
made up the spelling of color for Americans and now it is the standard
by which Americans are judged to be good spellers. Otherwise, allowing
the fiction that no other standard would be available, there would be
no way to tell if someone spelled colour wrong. Individuals may decide
what is relatively true but this does not preclude other individuals
and events from accidentally reshaping it.
Accidentally, because once
again only the individual can experience the point of view that is
used.
The first context is inescapable and impenetrable but we
can be given snipits of what it is. If someone declares themselves
for a political party you like, for example, your conception of
their declaration becomes part of your context. That act of theirs
may make you decide to join that political party or it may not.
There is no way for that to be predicted accurately without more
information, even with the maximum amount possible it will never be
known what the effect could be on you.
If you'll allow me the point that an individual's context is
unknowable and inescapable, depending whether your the possessor
or observer of a context, and that therefore truth is relative
to the individual, then I'll move on. .....
unfinished
