Emergent
Patterns
Yet we mistake other dynamic communication systems for
objects all the time. We think of atoms and molecules and bacteria and cells and beings
like you and I as objects, and not dynamic communications systems.
In a broad sense, communications are an exchange of
information, a relationship, an interaction between systems. Communications between
systems are always directional (to or from or between the systems) and always generate
change.
When systems intercommunicate new patterns emerge. The
new patterns are more complex, than the patterns of intercommunications creating
them. Moiré patterns are a good example of how new patterns emerge. Click on the
Moiré pattern to see more.
Intercommunications
Intercommunicate implies the freedom for information to
move in either direction or even between many points. Thus a house might have three
intercommunicating rooms. Energy intercommunicates between the sky and the sea in a
waterspout.
Non-living objects communicate with forces, like
electromagnetism, gravity, or direct impact. The resulting changes between non-living
systems are limited to a specific set of forms and conditions. On the cosmic scale we see
similar shapes - spheres and vortexes repeated billions upon billions of times. The
up/down quarks and electron/electron neutrino leptons intercommunicate using bosons,
photons and gluons (under natural conditions) in 96 different combinations (elements).
Each element can intercommunicate with itself to become one of 32 crystal forms.
Atoms intercommunicate with
different elements to form hundreds of thousands of different kinds of molecules. Yet
these too are divided into specific sets by the limitations of how they can communicate
with each other. Their arrangements for building larger networks of communications are
limited to Plato's five regular convex solids (tetrahedron, cube, octahedron,
dodecahedron, and icosahedron) controlled by four kinds of pattern-shapes that generate
all of the natural universe.
Living creatures communicate with an even greater range
of interchanges; thousands of different chemical messengers, an infinite range of
electrical impulses, microwaves, sounds, tactile stimuli, and visual signals. Some of
these are accidental emissions detected by other organisms, others are deliberate signals.
Communications construct the form and control the behavior of living beings.
Communications emitted by one being will regulate the
behavior of other beings capable of detecting them. Communications are events between beings.
The Interplay of Open and
Closed Communication Webs
There is
a critical difference between language
and content. Language is a semi-closed
pattern of organization between beings.
Content flows through the language system;
an open flow extending between all concerned
parties and their internal and external
environments. Language moderates content
to create an emergent
higher layer of being, a new concept.
Bacteria have a large vocabulary,
big enough to create some pretty amazing organizations (fish, trees, human beings and all
the rest of the living creatures of our planet).
Cells also communicate. Their
vocabulary is much more sophisticated than that of bacteria, but shares many similarities
because cells are communication networks of bacteria and thus use many of the same
communications.
How do living
creatures appear in the vortex of the elements moving through them?
|
