Back to Stage 1

-- Guide to the Water Trail

Stage 2: The Hairy Hypothesis

There's something wild loose in here!

If I cried out, who would hear me up there among the orders of
Angels? And suppose one were to take me
Suddenly to heart -- I would
Shrivel before such a stronger existence. For beauty is nothing
But the first edge of terror we can only just bear;
And it astonishes, while it coolly disdains
To dismiss us. Every single angel is terrible!
So, I hold myself in and swallow the
Dark sob of desire. Is there anyone
We can turn to? Not Angels, not men;
And even the cunning beasts exploit our discomfort
In this interpreted world.
--Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies (author trans.)

THE WILDERNESS

"Hair" refers to the wild part of nature, both within us and outside.

Hair includes:

matters we do not understand
happenstance and unintended consequences
things that cannot be made to work
irreconciliable conflicts
unrealizable longings

Myths and stories have spoken of:

a wild god
a wild "wolfish" spirit in our hearts
a continuing battle between our wild and domestic natures

These pages hypothesize that the wild part of nature is

real: an important influence in our lives
pervasive: it's everywhere and always possible, and often actually present
uncontrollable: wherever and however we try to tame it, it breaks out

THE HAIRY HYPOTHESIS

Formulations of the hairy hypothesis:

from direct exerience

There is something inherent in reality that generates conflicts, errors, opposition, blockages, lack of essentials, unsuitability and other difficulties that are universally and constantly encountered in all activities.

psychological

We aren't smart enough to figure things out. We aren't smart enough to figure ourselves out, either.

analytic

It is always possible to discover discrepancies between events and circumstances and any mental representation of them we construct. It is never possible for two persons to agree entirely on any matter to any substantial depth and diversity of detail.

metaphysical

Reality is not only queerer than we imagine, but queerer than we can possibly imagine (paraphrased from J.B.S. Haldane's epigram about the Universe).

as part of reality

Reality does not possess coherent unity.

as part of experience

Experiences come with structures inside:

The structures often only approximate reality.
Structures are plastic and can be adjusted to create apparent conformances to reality under many circumstances; structures are often powerful and we use them to change reality for our purposes.
We increasingly live in environments governed by invented structures that grow increasingly complex.
The complexities grow wild because the structures fit reality poorly.

The "smooth hypothesis" opposes the hairy hypothesis and declares:

experience and reality are in accordance
experience and reality have a common basis, such as "the brain"
structures of experience correspond to structures in reality
reality can be explained in terms of structures

The smooth hypothesis leads to a "smooth reality" with laws that are:

permanent: enduring unchanged
complete: behind each and every experience
general: a few elements out of which all arise
universal: the same for everyone
coherent: without contradiction or internal inconsistency

Comparing the two hypotheses:

each accounts directly for some matters but is unsatisfactory as to others
the hairy hypothesis supports this approach to freedom; but many who follow the smooth hypothesis envision a comprehensive system of mechanisms and/or probabillities that excludes freedom
scientific thinking accords directly with the smooth hypothesis, but, under some views, does not exclude the possibility of hairy matters (Popper, Logic of Scientific Discovery, sec. 78; E. W. Hobson, Domain of Natural Science).

ARGUMENTS FOR THE HAIRY HYPOTHESIS

Arguments based on immediate experience

surprise, novelty, happenstance and unintended consequences
power of illusions and fantasies to affect reality
labor involved in getting things to work
attempts to fix things can make them worse (e.g., juridical law)
we sometimes feel we are strangers in the world

Arguments based on view that experience is like a system found in engineering or science that:

deals with only limited matters
introduces distortions and artifacts into the product
was adapted from previous systems by way of extension or correction of error
is itself subject to improvements

Arguments based on intellectual history

some hit jackpots, nobody breaks the bank: attempts to establish scientific relationships between structure and reality have been only partially successful
scientific revolutions and evolutions: new paradigms sometimes sweep the field and all theories undergo continual change
systems of ideas do not merge, but only breed: the nature of a theory is specific to its discipline and each discipline has a unique style; no discipline has an inherent governance of any other (ask a chemist about physics, a physicist about mathematics).

HYPOTHESIZING REALITY

It is a fact of life (perhaps the first fact) that there is something outside my experience that I call "reality" (sometimes "actual reality").
Piaget teaches that, during the second year of life, a child constructs an image of itself (with body parts, sensations, acts) and also an external universe of other objects. "This organization of reality occurs to the extent that the self is freed from itself by finding itself and so assigns itself a place as a thing among things, an event among events." Piaget, Introduction to The Construction of Reality in the Child.

Reality is found in:

material objects (e.g. baseballs), their nature and motion
other peoples' experience
the past
the future
whatever inside my skin generates my experience

Adherence to the hairy hypothesis implies rejection of smooth reality. Stage 3 supports the view that the purported characteristics of smooth reality are not real, but only often erroneous images projected from processes that generate experience [e.g., that the ideal characteristic of permanence derives from our preference for states (where conditions endure unchanged)]

I am myself generating errors and these pages are infected with them.
I am probably ignorant of most of them. I am compelled to see things in a context of smooth reality most of the time, in these pages and in daily life.
The ways of the hairy hypothesis help find a way around the difficulty (bugs beget features).

The ways of the hairy hypothesis differ from those appropriate for smooth reality.

The ways appropriate for smooth reality are studied in such disciplines as philosophy, physical science, psychology. These disciplines focus on matters where actual reality most closely resembles smooth reality. Their successes do not mean that all actual reality is smooth reality. Indeed, examination of these disciplines and their "foundations" supports a strong form of the hairy hypothesis that declares no part of reality is entirely smooth.

THE WAYS OF THE HAIRY HYPOTHESIS

The Way of Error

Errors are inherent in experience and systems of ideas
Error does not in and of itself disqualify, otherwise nothing can be done
Some errors can be corrected and others minimized; the consequences of many errors can be guarded against or overcome

The Way of Development

To start with a single simple germ idea
To watch for opportunities to grow
To maintain focus on defined problems and a structured program of goals (although particulars are subject to change)
To be ready to sustain tension and error at every stage of development if that is necessary
To proceed as if correcting or adjusting for tensions and errors will lead to further development

The Way of Multiplicity

We encounter reality many times and in many ways and the encounters generate many images
The images may or may not cohere
We look both for coherence and for incoherence
Images must be selected and organized, as best as we are able, but incoherence is not of itself grounds for exclusion

The Way of Example

- Every general statement should be grounded in an example
- Examples should cluster (e.g. examples drawn from juridical law) and the clustering should be susceptible of analysis
- Progress is made through working on actual problems
- Simplification must be made, but a problem must also involve human needs and vicissitudes
- The principal problem explored in this website is the website itself
- Major structures in the website include:
  - Water Trail, Ridge Route, Kwik Tour, High Path, Base Camp
  - Three forms of notation (event notation, dot-arrow notation, matrix notation)
  - Psychological processes
  - A series of related devices
  - Material drawn from different disciplines, including psychology, engineering, law, philosophy and science
- A style appears on every scale that resembles musical counterpoint: logically simultaineous presentation of multiple themes with points of congruence and incongruence (resembling consonance and dissonance)

AN ENGINE FOR DEVELOPMENT

Development, like walking, is never in balance. We cannot use the customary scientific model with a single overarching system of definitions into which everything is presumed to fit. Instead there are several interacting parts that sometimes fit together easily and sometimes not.

Development employs an artificial psychology:

Elements of the artificial psychology are borrowed from human psychology;
The artificial psychology supports invented structural systems;
The invented structural systems interpret experience (especially the experience of structure);
The invented structural systems are expressed through notation and embodied on devices.

A cycle of development:

An invented structural system appears to interpret structures of experience;
Interpretations employ multiple forms of notation, including graphical forms;
We use forms of notation to build new constructs;
Comparison of the constructs with experience reveals shortcomings in the interpretations;
In psychological terms, we try to project a structure of experience onto the notational form; and the projected image exceeds the capacity of the invented structural system;
The shortcomings in the invented structural system point the way to further development.

Example: the co-ordinated changes that make possible the introduction of relations in stage_3 of Water Trail:

the development of device_1 into device_2 in Ridge Route
the progression to process 6 (reflection) in stage_3 of Water Trail
notational re-definition of location

Forward to Stage Three.