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A STUDY OF LOGICAL CONTOURS AS AN ORIGIN OF REASON (Causes of "Information") Marcus Abundis' INTRODUCTION This essay explores the evolutionary dynamics of active agents (Life) as influenced by natural selection, and therein, a likely ab initio unfolding of an agent's reasoning, logic, or informational wherewithal — that is, basic consciousness or intelligence. Earth's entropic unfolding (environs) affords a stage upon which all Life arises. As such, Earthly entropy must be mapped before a notion of agency or living informatics can be posited. Earthly dynamics, vis-à-vis active agents, are shown below. Figure A depicts Selection Vectors around an existential niche (agency) separated by a Bounded Affordance line. That three-fold constraint presents imagined right-ward, left-ward, and down-ward selection forces on active agents. Any combination and/or amount of those forces can impinge upon the afforded agency, at any time. Evolutionary biology calls the result of this existential constraint-affordance putting, divisive, and directional selection (Figure B). Hence, selection presents three innate or observed "logical contours" to which agents must conform, or become extinct. Figure A: Three Selection Vectors and three agent responses, as a constrained-contested space. Selection Vectors fight freeze * (niche/agency flight Figure B: Classic effects between selection forces and agent responses, equally labeled stabilizing, disruptive, and directional selection. Each result depicts a distinct "logical contour," affording defacto styles of agent behavior, and thus "agent logic," to support related behaviors. But to claim that such logic may exist requires the presence of agent memories "to be reasoned with." With no extant memory or "content," reason or logic is, a priori, not possible. If those three vectors captured the full range of dynamic possibilities for all agents, and if agents behaved passively vis-à-vis those vectors, our map would be complete. But agents exhibit a span of passive and active behaviors. This passive-active "entropic role" must also be mapped, via three "contesting" dynamics, for a complete map. Those classic behaviors are called fight,flight, Organizational Behavior (GFTP), Graduate School of Business, Stanford University (March 2011). 20 April 2015, M. Abundis ( 1): Logical Contours. EFTA01206813 and freeze, but could be equally named adapt, escape, and succumb (Figure A). This constrained- contested schema thus presents a "bounded-yet-ambiguous" solution space for all agents, as a range of entropic demands and opportunities — defined via divisive, purifying, and directional selection contra fight„flight, and freeze actions — or, collectively speaking: evolutionary dynamics. This constrained-contested space exhausts all environment-agent interactions (omitting genetic factors) and conveys an initial behavioral map, but without useful details. MODEL DEVELOPMENT To provide the missing details we start with an agent's three-fold entropic response (fight, flight, or freeze) to Earthly entropy, and argue that agent "logical profiles" co-incidentally or reflexively emerge as part of three-fold selection — forced contour fit-ness. This empiric relationship then suggests a "reason-able continuum" of adjacent (action-able) possibilities (Kaufmann, 2000) for agents exhibiting resilient behaviors — or what one might call a basic intelligence. This reason- able continuum is developed herein as a "first order -, fifth order" unfolding of active agency. To initiate this continuum, first order reason (1D narcissism) must be exhibited by all agents that do not simply succumb (requiring fight or flight), where failure (freeze) often points to extinction (Figure C). But these "monadic sensate roles" afford a range of passive-active possibilities. For example, given a crushing surge of selection forces, if an agent stands frozen (relatively inactive), it may succumb to events and be made extinct. But if an agent is passive (relatively pliant), it may "wash" into a protected niche, arriving bruised but not crushed — as a co-incident or passive flight response. Alternatively, an activeflight instinct would drive agents to "single- mindedly" escape Earthly entropy by fleeing hostile environs for a co-incident niche. Agents with a weak flight response remain vulnerable. Figure C: Model of agent freeze and flight responses to directional selection. preserved space (inactive) ................ freeze co-incident niche expansion waning space flight (passive or active) In both cases, passive and active flight, primal (empiric effective) differentiation is initiated as co-incident ID niche formation/expansion — or, a minimal survival opportunity. Later, as Earth's entropic environs diversify,flight agency also differentiates via Earth's more numerous niches. Growing niche opportunities thus afford a further exaptive role (adaptive latency) for agents. The passive-active-latent parsing (ID logic, flight) of Earthly environs marks selected a priori traits, for a continuum of 1D action-able possibilities for agents. Further, while freeze (inactivity) may imply extinction for agents within a waning space, freeze may also linger unmolested within a preserved space; alternatively, inactivity may indicate non-agent (not-alive) status. 1D logic thus identifies vital "monadic sensate roles" related to core genetic (minimal) homeostatic function, reflex, and instinct behaviors, which define "active agents" — while not perforce exhibiting an ab initio "reason-able behavior." 20 April 2015. M. Abundis Logical Contours. EFTA01206814 As a fight response (Figure D), 1D reason can yield second order reason (2D polemic logic) by inciting and/or affording ever-more complex actions. "Fighting" against growing Earthly entropy (Figure A) marks a type of entropic mimicry in agents striving to adapt — specific agent counter- actions. As a counter-action, simple empiric/entropic oppositions afford an opportunistic parsing of Earthly environs via object-subject (0-S) modeling or material ideation. Agents that fail this "diametric sensate task" are bound to 1D niches and co-incident flight behaviors. But agents that form effective (entropically counter-active) object-subject "images" — minimal effective actions joined with related diametric sensations (memories) — can be said to show reason-able behavior. Figure D: Model of an agent'sfight response to directional selection forces. opportunistic ..... niche expansion ..... fight The entropic mimicry (parsing) afforded by diametric material ideation: 1) fortifies an agent's role within a niche, likely displacing ID agents, and 2) allows agents to willfully (ideal-ly) move into adjacent spaces, when and where selection forces are weak. Further, impotent ideation has no immediate benefit, but if that ideation is benign it affords later exaptation (2D latency). As such, 2D opportunistic minimal ideation (0-S behavior, diametric roles) would grow over time. O-S modeling affords a minimal "generative informatics" or incipient creativity, as agents are now willful or ideal narcissists, versus co-incident narcissists. This willfulness affords agents a helpful 2D pro-active role in formulating behaviors. What starts as 1D flight or fight (uninformed empiric roles or counter-actions) can refine and entrain via selection, as an informed pro-activity. Willfulness thus sharpens ID flight: instead of fleeing (base instinct)from a threat, agents now flee (ideal intention) toward a protected 2D space. Further, a strong flight instincUdirection may resemble a weak fight intent, implying contiguous rather than discrete adaptive roles. Lastly, as niche diversity grows (ID latency), the afforded O-S/2D agency also co-incidentally expands. 2D parsing/mimicry of Earthly environs enlarges to a point to where agents exhibit predator-prey roles or behavioral ideation. This incites an evolutionary arms race between agents — Van Valen's (1973) Red Queen's Race, "where it takes all the running you can do, just to keep in the same place." That arms race further expands the action-able demands and opportunities for all agents. Effective diametric ideation of materials and behaviors is key to reason-able sensations. Also, as ideation requires a sensate split, a divisive role is named — a Sacred Wound or core angst — where agents see nature (Mother) targeting their demise, oddly counter-acted by endless re-creative deeds or Eden-like abundance. Hence, re-creative counter-actions are central in modeling Earthly and agent (entropic) roles. This informed creativity is often excluded in modem science, where "innately creative" uncontrolled variables are the bane of scientific experiment. Finally, labeling "material entropy contra behavioral entropy" as a Sacred Wound gives an archetypal base (core psychology) to an essential homeostatic task of material self-regulation. This now 20 April 2015, M. Abundis Logical Contours. EFTA01206815 meanbigfitl psychological-empiric face allows the later development of cultural roles, while still retaining a core Shannonesque (1948) entropic, or signal-based, sensibility. Advances past ID and 2D logic are often derisively labeled New Age (non-scientific), as each shift offers new demands and opportunities, seemingly from "thin air." The retort to this non- scientific derogation is that science is oddly non-self-reflective — that is, it cannot explain the presence of science — it holds no creative narrative. Inversely, a "cognitively creative" 3D dialectic logic begins as naive 2D oppositions (thesis and anti-thesis). Here, some agents may notice that the output (synthesis) is vital. This "vital noticing" marks the arrival of meta-perspectives, a 2D 3D "intelligent" shift, via effective conceptual ideation. Here an "output" is imagined conceptually, as it is not materially evident until its actual emergence (proof). Conceptual ideation thus seeks to enhance the "willful advance" of material and behavioral ideation. Further, and as before, impotent benign (un- proven) imagined outputs may contribute to later exaptation (3D latency), to augment 1D and 2D latency — all of which sets a stage for "trial-and-error conduct," later called "formal science." Thus, from co-incident-ally creative ID and 2D behaviors, a willfully creative 3D role emerges to afford more opportunistic expansion. Conceptual ideation entails "reason-able outputs," a re- combinant role — a vital re-creative counter-action. This "imagined output" can then refine and entrain, again, via selection, to yield an archetypal idealized imagination — Psyche. In humans this imaginal shift (psychological informatics) is called the Upper Paleolithic Revolution or the Great Leap Forward, where humans plainly start to exhibit cultural behaviors in the form of ceremonial death rituals, self-adornment, cave painting, etc. This dialectic (Hegelian) opposition (thesis + anti-thesis = synthesis) begins to reflect an agent's ab initio three-fold entropic core, affording self-reflective roles or informational self-awareness. 3D logic offers a parsed scale beyond what is possible with 2D reason, lessening the polemics needed to frame new demands and opportunities. This benevolent shift affords more meta- perspectives and generative archetypal elements — in other words, universal informational roles start to unfold. Rigid 1D and 2D riddles now seem solvable (e.g., type theory, Chalmers's Hard Problem, a Symbol Grounding Problem, etc.). A psychological task of "making conscious what is unconscious/latent" via self-realization is named by Janet, Freud, Jung and others. Also, 3D logic shows in Peirce's abductive reason and triadic logic, and in nature's fractal forms. Since 3D logic start as 2D polemics, it marks an augmentedfight behavior rather than a new role — again, implying contiguous rather than discrete adaptive behaviors. In later states of 3D reason, diverse outputs are seen as arising from 2D roles (un-intended consequences, added 3D latency), instead of simple "targeted outputs." Sociability in some agents allows a leap into 4D relational roles. Logically, a fourth node inflates prior triadic vistas to tetrahedrons, jointly enlarging and fortifying 3D roles. This four-fold punctuated leap in entropic parsing contrasts to more gradual 1D -3 2D -3 3D shifts. This multi- faceted relational logic then infers ideas of interiority-exteriority, distributed memory, networks, and systemic complexity. 4D ideation re-creates 3D and 2D roles with more depth and subtlety. 20 April 2015. M. Abundis Logical Contours. EFTA01206816  Logic or Reasoning Modality Memory/Cognitive Traits 1D Freeze strong material roles (specialist, rigid) 1D Passive Flight broad material roles (generalist, flexible) 1D Active Flight (also weak 2D fight) strong behavioral roles (instinctual, rigid) 1D Fight (directional variation/exploration) broad counter-actions (adversarial ideation) 2D Fight (polemic logic, also strong JD flight) broad materiaVbehavioral ideation (flexible) 3D "Fight" (dialectic logic) generative conceptual ideation (creative) 4D Relational Logic generative complexity as relational ideation 5D Fully Sensate Logic maximal flexibility, complexity, and ambiguity Table I: Logic and memory reason-able-ness needed to support agent behavior(s): a reasonable continuum. High- order 5D logic accommodates (mimics) more Earthly entropy, but at a greater energy cost than low-order material roles. Inversely, specialist roles like I Dfreeze have low energy costs, but with a smaller adaptive/entropic span. This inter-subjective realm expands the psychological task by calling for "richer language" that then seeds notions of compassion, empathy, partnership, reciprocity, new sensuality, and the like. This "touchy-feely" 4D role does not erase the call for ID, 2D, or 3D logic, but extends an agent's reach. Still, emergent 4D roles lessen the need for lower orders. As such, the entropic cost of "fighting" may abate via abstract reason — innately external material/behavioral strife is augmented/preempted by internal psychological-social strife (cognitive creativity). As such, the "unprecedented" caloric and biological expense of maintaining a cognitive brain might now be re-evaluated in terms of "material entropy contra cognitive entropy." But competition between logical orders also arises. Beneath this "new strife" lie two factors: 1) some agents fail the psychological challenge of 3D and 4D logic and dismiss that failure by emphasizing more fundamental views; and 2) other agents question if the energetic cost of 3D and 4D entropic mimicry is needed. Relational strife (2D redux) thus cultivates external self- regulation by social-ably matching (within agent groups) logical processes to ever-more diverse demands and opportunities — cultural collectives now arise for agents. Amidst this growing strife, richer meta-perspectives are called for to support ever more abstract and complex study and debate. As such, prior ID, 2D, and 3D latency is now willfully drawn upon to explore growing relational roles. Later states of relational logic point to the human potential movement of the 1960s, exemplified by Maslow's (1943) hierarchy of needs, Gestalt therapy, and so on. From conceptual strife in 3D and 4D logic, SD filly sensate reason emerges for some agents. SD logic gives no priority to one role, but sees all strategies as useful. Fully sensate logic focuses on specific demands and opportunities, considering what is effective and efficient. This "studied context" affords relational meta-perspectives (meta-meta), aesthetic sensibility, and effective ambiguous ideation. The psychological task is now to fluidly grasp various patterns and roles (e.g., group theory) and to re-create or "play" those patterns and roles in novel ways — in effect, seeking to exploit any available universal facets. Re-creative counter-actions of 5D logic afford many new demands and opportunities, and cannot be fully named here. Still, as a maximal 20 April 2015, M. Abundis Logical Contours. EFTA01206817 process, 5D logic infers an evolutionary-empiric terminus for agents — where no greater entropic parsing/mimicry/granularity seems likely. As a minimal role, 5D logic affords internal self-regulation: complex homeostasis of material, behavioral, and psychological roles. The "psychological autonomy" that conscious homeostasis affords was first noted as a naive Sacred Wound (2D material self-regulation), but now shows as a Necessary Unity of richly differentiated and integrated roles (Bateson, 1979). This multi- dimensional "thinking like nature" (sensate logic) has a willful dispassion toward specific roles, which then affords a dispassionate play and infers a "natural information science." Furthermore, the acute environmental sensitivity of 5D logic is shared by Taoist, shamanic, and other "sub- conscious habits." Sensate logic may thus carry a quality of intuitive/mystical/emotive "think- feeling?' or cognitive ambiguity, apart from the more discrete and lucid (or divisive) cognition of earlier roles. This cognitive ambiguity, most notable as curiosity, is well placed to maximally/ creatively exploit the exaptive latency of earlier "less-conscious" orders. In more mature, well-integrated states, 5D logic drives a sense of "being in the zone" known to top athletes, artists, and the like — where agents are wholly given over to the "becoming-ness" immediately before them. Such highly-refined homeostatic roles are often celebrated. High- performance players are idealized and enlarged, as with a mythic Ulysses, Jesus, "founding fathers?' Rockefeller, Einstein, Michael Jordan, etc. This sharply re-creative process presents an impossible challenge for some agents, while others are merely "haunted" by its subconscious effects, and yet others work arduously at focused sub-conscious access ... but some agents shift fluidly, "animal-like?' between conscious and sub-conscious realms. This distinctly "altered state" of play is beyond-but-joined-with prior orders. As such, prior logic may iteratively cycle, for novel advances — a spectrum of complex, unfolding, re-creative roles. Early mythology names this endless recombination an Uroboros — a serpent-dragon eating its own tail (van Dijk, 2014). In Eastern philosophy, recreative destruction is called Yin-Yang and Shiva Nataraja. Creative destruction even appears in capitalism, with many informational cycles needed to create new market niches and product concepts, then prompting many needed product manufacturing and distribution (informational) cycles (Reinert and Reinert, 2006). CONCLUSION In the foregoing ID 4 5D analysis, I assert that Earth's entropic unfolding affords, and thus demands, more entropic processes and processing. Agents then have the chance to "entropically match" that unfolding, or fail at the project. The diversity afforded by this scenario does not argue for one role being superior to another. Rather, it argues that agents that fluidly embrace diverse roles (513) can benefit in dynamic environs. Inversely, stable environs call for greater specialization (1D). Diverse ID .4 513 agency thus points to a variable empiric notion of "free will" for agents performing within a "bounded-yet-ambiguous" solution space. Ironically, humanity's Anthropocene Epoch largely affords "stabilized environs?' where human advances now come via "broad specialization" — a rather oxymoronic role, compared to prior "specialist versus generalist" norms. While this atypical twist enhances human survival, it also clouds our informational role. Further, this oxymoronic twist underlies a current "human ecology versus natural ecology" conundrum, and points to known hazards in our era. The forefront of this 20 April 2015, M. Abundis ( 1).: Logical Contours. EFTA01206818 challenge is typified by growing calls for cross-disciplinary perspectives, or more naturally integrated (5D) human logic/reasoning — a skill we have yet to amply demonstrate. Still, in looking back, we can say little about the actual origins of a reason-able continuum. All ancestral environs and populations are long-gone, preventing a useful comparative study. A few material shards of uncertain heritage are all that remain to us for studying early psychological and behavioral roles and shifts. Thus, this topic will forever remain a speculative matter. At best, we consider our currently-observed behaviors and circumstances, and then attempt to fashion some plausible "backward-looking" narrative. If this analysis answers some questions, it only hints at other onerous topics. It notes Chalmers's Hard Problem and a Symbol Grounding Problem, and then "flirts" with notions of meaning and free will. Also, an inactive-passive-active-latent continuum framed simply as "material entropy contra behavioral entropy" lacks precision. Next, the essay's psychological tone may bother some readers. Philosopher Collin McGinn (2012) points to that "psychological challenge" as an obdurate issue for humanity. Further to humanity's psychological hurdles, our current (likely) cyclic phase, that of shifting between 2D and 3D roles, seems especially difficult — managing our growing modern dilemmas. I address some of these issues in a separate technical essay: Psyche as an Informational Strategy — General Information Theory (Abundis, 2015). REFERENCES 1. Abundis, M. (2015). Psyche as an Informational Strategy — General Information Theory. [online] Available at: < > [Accessed 1 February 2015]. 2. Bateson, G. (1979). Mind and nature: A necessary unity. New York, NY: Dutton. 3. van Dijk, S. (2014). Ouroboros —After Effects Preset. Sandervandijk.tv [online] Available at: <http://www.sandervandijk.tv/blog/ouroboros> [Accessed 1 March 2015]. 4. Kauffman, S. A. (2000). Investigations. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. 5. Maslow, A.H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review 50(4), 370-396. [online] Available at: <http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Maslow/motivation.htrn> [Accessed 1 April 2015]. 6. McGinn, C. (2012). "All machine and no ghost?," New Statesman. 20 February 2012. [online] Available at: brain> [Accessed 1 October 2014]. 7. Reinert, H., & Reinert, E. S. (2006). "Creative Destruction in Economics: Nietzsche, Sombart, Schumpeter," in Backhaus, J., & Drechsler, W. (editors): Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900): Economy and Society. Series The European Heritage in Economics and the Social Sciences, Volume 3,2006, pp. 55-85. Boston, MA: Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.: [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative destruction> [Accessed 1 April 2015]. 20 April 2015, M. Abundis Logical Contours. EFTA01206819 8. Shannon, C. (1948). "A mathematical theory of communication," Bell System Technical Journal, 27, pp. 379-423 & 623-656, July & October, 1948. 9. Van Valen, L. (1973). "A new evolutionary law." Evolutionary Theory 1: 1-30, Dept. of Ecology & Evolution, University of Chicago. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago, etc. 20 April 2015. M. Abundis Logical Contours. EFTA01206820