Re: The Eonic Effect and the problem of evidence

Interesting material here in these last few posts.  Let me sketch out a means to play-off of them a bit.  May I suggest the following:  the content, the discussion – all this relating to the Eonic Effect is suggestive of an elaborate geometry and mathematics to the model.  You’ve seen Paul Ziolo’s paper [Chaos, Catastrophe, and Psychohistory], that I sent you, where he talks about “dynamic topology”, “attractors”, etc. {For anyone on WSN who’d like to look, per PZ’s permission that I’d be able to do so , get in touch we me personally by email and I’ll send it onto you}  It could very well be that the Eonic Effect might be better understood if people could consider your (visual) metaphors in the book using such geometric figures.  The symbols and iconic representations are already there in the text; if you with the help of a graphic artist or math expert in topological geometry were to get together on this, & shell out something, I can pretty much guarantee the results would be very interesting -> both in terms of what it might further reveal about your model of the Eonic effect & other’s being able to better interact with it.  It is quite intriguing to me.  (Every time I look at the material it reminds me a lot of networks theory, fractals, and Fuller’s tetrahedronal geometries from Synergetics all rolled into one; it’s also indicative of the complex spiral sequence of DNA – the double helix..  Perhaps this isn’t in the text at all as far as you can see, but for some strange reason it always reminds me of such things when you describe your model)  Maybe even considering your material [visually (in terms of some corresponding diagrams or notational statements] in light of set theory, flowcharting, and/or symbolic-modal logic might shed light on its own unique descriptive expression via mathematic theory or geometrization.

The Eonic Effect may not be an “economic phenomenon.”  But the problem is when we arrive at the level of your model or “Big History” (ala David Christian) or even Andre Gunder Frank’s “5000 Yr Old World Wide World System” we’re vaulted into a domain really where the standard academic fare of sociology, political science, and economics doesn’t work very well to explain things nor can it identify all too well the nature of the macro-historical phenomena we’re looking at.  “Socioeconomy” at the level of World History is not just a sociologic phenomenon anymore, nor is it “just” an economic one.  It seems to be something more – something that drives the systematic functioning of both trade and communications networks around the world.  But it is not even a “civilizational” phenomenon as such (if we take the term to mean either higher aesthetic culture, ‘city’ culture as opposed to ‘barbarian’ culture, or the pinnacle of human social achievements in history).  What complicates the matter further – and I am saying that the Eonic effect and Big History must transcend even Socioeconomy as I ‘ve defined it here – is that the dynamics of socioeconomic trends themselves go a step above our normal discussions of macro/micro-economics, supply and demand, etc.  Socioeconomy as it translates into historic “cycles” goes two steps above our notions of economic analysis [ even when such analysis falls back on an understanding of business cycles and K-waves].  As an example, take a look at the standard fare of the Longwaves List at CSF (http://csf. colorado.edu/forums/longwaves/2002/ ).  (Even apart from the whole matter of Elliott waves and technical analysis that appear there regularly, such economic understandings, structures, and analytical frameworks are thoroughly entrenched in business, investment, and personal finance.  It never takes the leap beyond, really, to the “big picture” and only deals with history occasionally as history relates back to “practical” economics. But Socioeconomy does take this leap for some reason (as do Kontratieff cycles, as such have been applied in world systems history & larger scale analyses of WST extending further in the human past and greater frames of human social activity); the problem is where to draw the distinction between classic [pragmatically-based] economic study and the higher science of Socioeconomy where larger dynamics of global processes and human behavior occur.  It’s not easy to tell where the one ends and the other begins; and yet the evidence comes from the scope and analysis of world history itself.  “Economics” in world history (aka “Socioeconomy”) doesn’t exhibit the same exact drives as utilitarian economies of personal finance and investment stratagems.  Not only is the scope larger in the system but the very animus of the larger patterns work according to motives not reducible to a “casino” mentality in human affairs.  For all intensive purposes, Socioeconomy and its cycles -- [even if we wish to frame such in terms of  “business cycles” & view Kontratieffs, logistics, et al in that light -> even when such models are actually far richer in their own analytic substance than what we make them out to be] -- is not the economics of Bloomberg and CNBC.  It’s something far more theoretically intriguing than just that and no doubt more related to your “econo-sequence” principle.  In any event, that’s my view of the matter.  Feel free to agree or not agree with it as you like.  Any theoretical or otherwise problems with this understanding?  I’d like to hear what they are.

I’d like to hear some more about that sine curve from ancient to modern times that you were talking about in your post a few days ago.  Anything especially significant about it that we should know?

Regarding the matter of memetics as relating to the Eonic Effect (or “Big History” dynamics), I view a real world scenario this way.  The trade and communications of a long term Worldwide World System (be it 5000, 13000, or 200,000 years old) act as a midway point between “big picture” dynamics EE/BH and the ongoing attempt of the human psyche in a social-pscyhologic/psychohistorical way to make sense of the world and the human condition.  Memes as it were would act as the dynamic points of interaction where both fields meet and play off each other creating a new set of historical and socioeconomic outcomes, which are neither exclusively big picture macrohistorical or completely social psychological .  They’d constitute the attractors and interzonal-mechanisms of this in-between area of world systemic networks.  Memes as is would be “drivers.”  Their function would be to help maintain “circulation” as it were of ideas/information and materials throughout the system.  But they would also act in such a way as to insure social equilibrium and get people where they need to go in life (not only in terms of their physical movements but also in terms of their chosen ends and experiential/cultural/intellectual requirements for living)(for both minimum survival and maximum life’s successes) Not only would memes help maintain individual homeostasis in terms of personal and ‘me”-relational psychology [how someone makes sense of the world and one’s place in it]; but they would also maintain a basic fit between (the drives of the whole individual and his/her community with the dynamics of the more immediate physical/social environment) & (larger natural processes that play out in Big History, the greater cosmos itself, and more particularly the pattern of Eonic effect evolution).   In other words, memes would act as (polarizing/amplifying/regulatory) mechanisms of directionality in human affairs, controlled from above by macro-historic and large-scale environmental and ‘cosmic’ oriented forces (ala the Eonic Effect and “Big History” dynamics in our world), but also ‘balancing agents’ as it were for the impulses of the human psyche (mind & behavior) in world history.  Memes would maintain an equilibrium between the tugs of macro-historic forces acting on people in human affairs and subconscious-affective-psychic & physiologic drives of the human/mind or behavior in human events (as people try to make heads or tales of themselves & th/ place in such a setting).  In this way, people wouldn’t be over-tugged in either direction, neither by the drives of social-psychologic psychohist.or by the large-scale dynamics of their greater ecologic sphere in the universe.  Memes would also operate from a point of functionality, making sure people are not schizophrenically torn in two between the opposite pulls of bigger picture forces of their environment – physically or macrohistorically – or by the microsocial-psychical-physiologic pulls of the human mind and psychosomatic organism in history; they’d help keep the torrents of the human senses and emotions under wraps.

Well, at least that’s my own interpretation of the matter.  Perhaps it’s way off-base; but if it’s not – if it does contain a shred of truth to it either in terms of World Systems or the Eonic model - I’d love to here about such a point of consilience from your own interpretations.  Do you have any ideas about this?  Good points or too much of a Darwinian, organismic interpretation mixed in with psychoanalytic historicism here?  Has anyone here on the list thought of using a discussion of memes as part of their own research into world systems and world history?  I’m looking forward to your responses.

All the best!

Luke R.

 
p.s., “Problem of Evidence” à Seems to me the problem is not with evidence being non-existent in the Eonic model; the problem is, what kind of “evidence” are we talking about via Landon’s model and Mike Alexander’s ideas of what constitutes good evidence in world history/world systems theory and social science?  What manner of “evidence” will we accept or not accept?  Where lies the difference between the (empirical) “evidence” of an Aristotle’s Metaphysics and the “evidence” of a modern scientist or social scientist? Please note, pre-modern scholarly or non-scholarly understandings of the world were just as “empirical” as modern or early modern ones.  David Christian says as much in his Science in the Mirror of Big History.  The real difference comes down to testability and criteria of evidence.  So having said all this, where stands the Eonic Model in light of such understandings? …

p.s.s., A question about the Eonic Effect and its placement in terms of complexity and large scale natural phenomena has been brought to my attention.  How can the Eonic effect, which seems to operate by its own rules, function according to principles of chaos, complexity, et al?  How can it even relate to them?  These are good questions.  No doubt about it!  Let me suggest an answer of my own by asking another overall question.  Bucky Fuller (Synergetics) raises the point about “departments.”  As he says, there are no “departments” in nature for physics, biology, mathematics, literature, sociology, and/or “evolution.”  There’s one “department” of nature.  If that’s the case, then why not consider a notion of “maps inside maps” (ala David Christian’s very intriguing concept)?  Why not consider WST in terms of the Eonic Effect and the Eonic Effect in terms of Big History, Psychohistory, Complexity, Chaos, Whole Systems, Syngergetics, etc.?  Why not consider such models ((not only in terms of the social sciences)(but also) in terms of the humanities as well > incl. literary thought and philosophy (which I’m happy to see the Eonic model doing to a point)?  This is in large part the emphasis and motivation of my own work.  Fuller is right!  Nature doesn’t have separate “departments”; all these fields intertwine and form a systematic whole.  That is why I try to consider such fields in light of one another.  By not doing this as scholars, we really do miss out on all the intellectual fun and the really interesting part of what goes on in our world, our history, and our physical environment starting out with our more immediate surrounding and working up towards a cosmological context.  Specialization may indeed be important, especially to get at well defined evidence and ideas in the disciplines we study, but if it doesn’t lend itself – if we do not allow it to lend itself – to finding points of consilience in our work (where similar modes of evidence, concepts, and main ideas lead into parallel conclusion) then we’re missing the boat in terms of our interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary, interactive, research among ourselves?  That’s my point in what I do, that’s my point of departure.  It seems to me that anything less amount to a “preaching to the choir” -styled scenario.  What do you all think?  …

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