A note on Derek Cabrera’s Theory of (absolutely) everything.
His video on Big Theory of Everything describes a relational holon, DSRP. http://www.cabreraresearch.org/tabs/videos However his labels are different from R-theory and Aristotle’s causes, but they are archetypically the same. The association is easy to see:
D – Distinctions: This is material cause, which is about measurable properties in a local ‘space’ context. The context does not have to be physics, it could be a cultural contexts that establishes coordinates to measure distinctions between people in the culture, etc.
S – Systems: Well, bad word because ‘systems’ can describe everything including DSRP, unless you use specialized language to distinguish that from meta-systems. But it is basically efficient cause. It is the laws of how distinctions behave and interact. In the physical world these are the natural laws. In a cultural context of distinctions it would be what those distinctions do, how they interact and develop as a set of distinctions over time.
R – Relations: This is formal cause. Relations in R-theory are defined differently, more specifically in the category theory as functors, but in this case relations are how the first two DW are constrained by context, which not only establishes the coordinates for making distinctions, it establishes the parameters for laws. It is the ‘shape’ or ‘form’ of the DS distinction-system. DS forms a category because it has two things that are sets (D) and morphisms (S).
P – Perspectives: This is final cause. Perspective establishes an observer, without which there is no perspective. An observer has an identity and purpose, or goal. That perspective did not simply arrive, it had to develop with the observer. Thus it has prior examples or exemplars. These constitute prior ‘ends’ of the system that establish information about possible ends of a future system. Perspective leads to vision, creative emergence, etc.
Now the thing is these four, taken most generally as Aristotle tried to do, are a hierarchical cycle. They are not a linear hierarchy as Aristotle unfortunately promoted and all followed. The creative cycle (deductive or decoding from model to realization), using Cabrera’s labels, is P-R-S-D-repeat The inductive cycle (encoding from specific properties to models) is the other way, D-S-R-P-repeat. The ‘forward’ creative cycle says what models and realizations do. The ‘reverse’ inductive cycle says where models and realizations came from. The answer in both cases is ‘models and realizations’, but the direction is different. One is about behavior, the other is about origin; the two things that make a system complex.
These are relational holons. The ‘natural’ holon is the creative cycle. It can be shown mathematically that the reverse, inductive cycle, can be accomplished in nature only by a living system, which is a fifth-order holon (matching Rosen’s diagram of life). In that kind of holon, each of the four quadrants can be performed by forward, natural sub-holons, which reverse the direction of the main holon, thus explaining induction by deduction.
Images from the ancient Vedic-Harappan civilization around 2800BC strongly correlate with these diagrams, as do rather precise descriptions in the Rig Veda and Upanishads. It is likely that the ancients understood the basic structure and function of reality in these terms.
The creative cycle looks like this (also showing corresponding Vedic/Harappan diagrams, 2800BC):
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The reverse, inductive reasoning cycle looks like this (again showing corresponding Vedic/Harappan diagrams, 2800BC):
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