Something Ain’t Right.
Somethin ain’t right! A furrow between the eyebrows should manifest if we contemplate the philosophical implications of Kurt Godel’s incompleteness theorem. Godel’s theorem states that all arithmetic systems are inherently incomplete, and arithmetic systems are the quintessential example of rational/logical systems. He proves this mathematically. In essence, logic will always fall short of comprehensively explaining reality regarding pure logic. For someone, such as myself, warmed by the light and heat of the western scientific enlightenment, this creates a disturbance. Is observation, reason, testing, evidence and evaluation a rational, logical process, correct? How can this be incomplete?
Well, scientists who do science will tell you that when it comes to advancing what one knows, it’s messy. Sure, one employs reason and logic when scientists sweat through researching and testing their hypotheses, but how this moves one from confusion to clarity can be almost mysterious at times. Sometimes, an answer rationally unveils, like the sun slowly rising over the horizon. Solving for x employing algebraic equations typifies this step-by-step opening towards a clear solution. Then, we have problems that cannot easily deduce the way forward.
Remember Archimedes? He was tasked to determine how much of the king’s gold crown was gold. Employing reason and logic, he became stuck on how to choose the solution to this problem. As legend states when he submerged in the tub and watched the water slowly rise, the clarity of the solution burst through his confusion like the sun peeking through the clouds. Eureka! Eureka! I got it! I got it!
Wait, what happens?!?! Well, many things, and it wasn’t just logic. When the external ingredients of his body, the tub, and the water met the internal components of the problem and his mind (perhaps in cognitive, emotional and psychosomatic dimensions), something emergent happened. This is what Godel calls intuition. The contemplator moves within and intuits the answer when the way forward cannot be readily deduced. A creative leap is made. However, it is incorrect to assume that this leap is a non-rational or, worse, irrational event. It is much more comprehensive. Like two hydrogen atoms colliding with enough force will release a hockey stick energy output curve of catastrophic consequences, something irreducible occurs when external factors and internal factors come together to open the door towards a new direction of understanding. Rather than an irrational event, I would say it is a comprehensive emergent event.
Following this train of thought does not cause too much disturbance until we begin to identify these factors. For example, Chepenik, Cornew, and Farah, who wrote a scientific article titled, “The influence of sad mood on cognition,” states that sad mood can affect emotionally-related cognitive tasks. (1) Don Norman, an American researcher, professor, author and director of The Design Lab at the University of California, San Diego, wishes to go further.
When it comes to interpreting one’s world, it is not just a cognitive process but an emotional one, Norman says. The rub lies in the interpretation. While conscious interpretation is primarily a mental operation, unconscious interpretation is mostly emotional. These emotional and irrational factors unknowingly influence how we see our world and may lie distastefully in the mouths of rationalists. While this may be unwelcome news, the noble prize winner in economics, Daniel Kaufman, implores us to accept the role of irrationality as a factor in human decision-making behavior.
Again, irrationality is one of many factors to consider. Skillful practices methodology (the Grand Method), as seen above, strives for a comprehensive practice that embraces the essential scientific endeavor. This is not to say that exclusive employment of observation, reason, results from the evaluation and peer review were ineffective when advancing knowledge scientifically. Just as Newtonian physics works just as well with slow-moving bodies as relativistic physics does, Newtonian physics fails to include moving objects that approach the speed of light. Likewise, traditional scientific practice fails to have intrapersonal and interpersonal dimensions, which the Grand Method addresses. Employing the method perspective, one may find on breaks, in science departments, scientists engaging in ecstatic dance for the sole purpose of heightening their positive moods so that they can come back to solving a challenging problem nugget with more mental resilience and creative robusticity.
Business leaders would employ qi-gong & meditation to become more “eureka-prone” when discerning a proper course to follow. I aspire to teach others several skillful practices to facilitate a workplace that engages interpersonal, intrapersonal, empirical and systemic dynamics together in a more synergistic way. Emergence, it seems, is just another word for interdependence. Descartes was incorrect. Mind and matter operate not separately but symbiotically. Together, they seem to converge at the emergence point where imagination springs.
1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18039049
