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A Doublet Dialogue Twixt Bret and Doug

About Doug's
Ad
Lib review of William James Sidis'
Unconscious
Intelligence

A doublet of two emails, one from Bret to Doug, and Doug's response to Bret.



1 of 2 — Acronyms used in these emails.

Subject: Your review of [William James Sidis'] Unconscious Intelligence
Date: Fri, 1 Dec 2000 14:40:25 -0500
From: "Bret" <flameproof@ufl.edu>
To:

 


To contact Quantonics write to or call:

Doug Renselle
Quantonics, Inc.
1950 East Greyhound Pass, Suite 18, #368
Carmel, INdiana 46033-7730
USA
1-317-THOUGHT

[Site author made minor rev's to Bret's email: 'Band' to 'Bang;' delete a URL recommendation; break monolithic text into smaller paragraphs; italicize book titles; add plurals as apropos; bracketed remarks and alterations.]

Doug,

I was going over your review of Unconscious Intelligence, and I can't help but bring up some points of mine that conflict with yours.

First of all, I can understand that after reading in depth for years about Quantum sciences as you have, that you could develop some sort of intellectual tower that you look down from (not meant as an insult) and you could examine the apparent fallacies of systems of beliefs that do not follow your own. Almost everybody does this. But to assume that William Sidis wrote his paper on Unconscious Intelligence as a ruse because his adherence to Aristotelian [classicism] is just not fair.

To assume that he's speaking of reversibility as a joke is just wrong. If memory serves he wrote an entire book about reversibility, and I think you're in the middle of reviewing it now, The Animate and the Inanimate.

While a ruse is not impossible, it seems to me from the biographies I've read that Sidis wasn't big on humor or other psychological aspects that make normal people, well, people.

For instance the concept of beauty was foreign to him. I mean, we both know that Sidis was a brilliant man, but I have met other brilliant people that have very little common sense and come up with the most outlandish theories; I'm sure you've met some people like this too. I guess the contrasting psychological profile for a genius would be found in Einstein, who appreciated the social side of life and seemed to get along with normal people fine. Anyway, I'm kind of straying, my only real intent here was to voice my opinion that just because Sidis' written beliefs don't follow yours doesn't necessarily make them a ruse.

A couple side notes: I don't know if you're aware, but in the 1950s a lot of physicists did some research on reversibility through time and came to the conclusion that most physical laws were in fact NOT reversible in time, but then again that supersedes Sidis' writings. Also, I think in the area of astronomy, we could call Sidis and Hawking intellectual equals, perhaps one is a little more gifted than the other, but they're about the same, and I've read a lot of Hawking's work and he fervently defends the Big Bang (or, as Sidis would have it, Great Collision) and the second law of thermodynamics. I'm not sure who to side with, I mean, Sidis was certainly brilliant, but I doubt he could sit down and beat Bobby Fischer in a chess game or could defeat Napoleon on a battlefield, etc.

Thanks for your time,

- Bret

P.S. I've been reading lots of your reviews and most of the material on your site and encourage you to keep up the good work. I've found Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem[s] very interesting and confusing at the same time. [We recommend those interested in Kurt Gödel's work should search www for more. If you want to see our Gödel work in Quantonics do a search like this: "Gödel"+Quantonics]



2 of 2 — Acronyms used in these emails.

Subject: Re: Your review of [William James Sidis'] Unconscious Intelligence
Date: Sat, 02 Dec 2000 06:32:16 -0500
From:

 


To contact Quantonics write to or call:

Doug Renselle
Quantonics, Inc.
1950 East Greyhound Pass, Suite 18, #368
Carmel, INdiana 46033-7730
USA
1-317-THOUGHT
Organization: Quantonics
To: "Bret" <flameproof@ufl.edu>

[Site author made minor rev's to Doug's email: Addition of apropos links; indentation to distinguish Bret's dialogue from Doug's; singulars to plurals as apropos; single quotes as apropos; bracketed revisions and comments; some bold and color emphasis added.]

Hello Bret!

As always, it is good to hear from you.

As I told you in an earlier email, no one knows Sidis' comtext of thought. I am taking as much available data as I have access to, to attempt a reconstruction of how he thought and what he thought.

Your comtext differs from mine, so we might expect one another to share differences on how we view Sidis. Those differences are good and valuable. They are Value interrelationships when examined offer us opportunity to evolve our thoughts in better directions.

Our quantum stage minds are fascinating in their ranges of temporal evolution. We see change at microseconds, milliseconds, up to decades. And there are temporal affects shorter than those and longer than those which we do not sense directly, but they affect us too.

In quantum reality, in general, SOM's 'wall' is absent. It only exists in a small, contrived and conventional subset of reality ruled by Greek assumptions about truth over Value. You and I often refer those as "Aristotelian."

Those assumptions only work in SOM's box.

As soon as one steps out of SOM's box, those rules may work, may not work, or may produce mu outcomes.

My last sentence shows us that a larger reality, which subsumes SOM, uncloaks itself via SOM's assumptions when applied to that larger reality. Many call this uncloaking of larger reality, "quantum uncertainty."

Where SOM's dichons are dyads of certainty, quantons are omniads of quantum uncertainty. Examples of former are dichon(wrong, right), dichon(bad, good), dichon(up, down), dichon(left, right), dichon(black, white), dichon(false, true), etc.

SOM's wall produces dichotomies.

SOM's wall allows its practitioners to delude themselves that they may make those dichonic assessments of reality absolutely and have absolute confidence their results are 'true.'

Philosophical and scientific outcomes of that SOM delusion are manifest:

o assumption reality is closed
o assumption reality adheres mathematics' independence axiom
o assumption formal contradiction works
o assumption Popperian falsifiability works
o assumption modular induction works
o assumption mathematical negation is objective
o assumption concept 'one' exists
o assumption concept 'zero' exists
o assumption concept 'identity' exists
o assumption concept 'infinity' exists
o proofs that sophisms are 'false'
o and on and on and on and on...

When we step into a larger quantum reality we can see new light. We garner tools which allow us to question SOM's assumptions in very powerful ways. When we step out of SOM's box and commence asking those questions and answering them we discover a whole new realm, an omneity whose Values are profound. We may choose to use those Values to leverage our own growth and success — and simultaneously leverage a better future for all of us.

See my remarks embedded in your email below -

==

Bret Warren wrote:

Doug,

I was going over your review of [William James Sidis'] Unconscious Intelligence, and I can't help but bring up some points of mine that conflict with yours.

First of all, I can understand that after reading in depth for years about Quantum sciences as you have, that you could develop some sort of intellectual tower that you look down from (not meant as an insult) and you could examine the apparent fallacies of systems of beliefs that do not follow your own. Almost everybody does this. But to assume that William Sidis wrote his paper on Unconscious Intelligence as a ruse because his adherence to Aristotelian [classicism] is just not fair.

Bret,

I assumed that Sidis was not a SOMite, rather he manifested many notable sophist comtexts. One of those comtexts is Aristotelian SOM.

I assumed that Sidis, as a sophist, felt trapped in a Western culture most of whose constituents are SOMites. As a result he was fully capable of moving into a SOM context and playing by those rules. A sort of 'When in SOM, do as SOMites do.' Sam Rosenberg, in his 'Streetcar Named Paradise Lost,' agrees.

I assumed that Sidis' quantum stage was/is capable of almost unlimited quantum comtexts, and he could move among those at will. Evidence for this arises from Sam's conjectures regarding why Boris Sidis wrote so many [~four] text books on schizophrenia. Other evidence is Bill Sidis' ability to speak, write and reason among over 200 languages and dialects instantly. [Amy Wallace cites other examples which may be interpreted this way. And Bill Sidis himself speaks in his Unconscious Intelligence of his own abilities to recall patterns of Value which he was unaware he was gathering while he walked. This is a strong indication of his intrinsic sophism. For Doug's latest list of WJS' sophism examples see our 2001 News, Dec. 2000.]

A SOMite always views someone like Bill Sidis as suffering multiple personality 'disorder.' Why? Because Aristotle and his ilk denigrated a quantum fundamental: sophism.

Please see our comments on autism, schizophrenia, and narcolepsy.

Bret, please beware that our intellectual environment changed much since then, but most folk are still fundamentally SOMitic. As a math major, you experience that every day. We sophists are basically feared or laughed at, still.

So in fairness, my (quantum uncertain) claims about Sidis' Aristotelian role-playing are indeed fair when one is willing to enter a Quantonic comtext.

Doug.

To assume that he's speaking of reversibility as a joke is just wrong.

Bret,

I believe Sidis saw classical, unitemporal, positive entropy reversibility as a non-starter.

I believe Sidis saw a classical assumption of reality as only positive entropy a non-starter.

Doug.

If memory serves he wrote an entire book about reversibility, and I think you're in the middle of reviewing it now, The Animate and the Inanimate.

Bret,

You are correct.

But we think Sidis saw 'many reversibilities.' How can we say that? Your earlier email comments re: energy efficiencies below, equal to and above 100%. [I.e., respectively, posentropy, zeroentropy, and negentropy.]

And notice Sidis' book title: The Animate and the Inanimate.

SOM assumes not only that reality is closed but that it is also inanimate. How do we know that? SOM assumes reality is 'objective.' An example of an object is y=f(t). (See Irving Stein's remarkable insights regarding Newtonian objects 'inconsistencies and incoherencies.')

Just like Stein, Mae-wan Ho, Poincaré, and Henri Bergson declare classical Newtonian objects "nonstarters." There are many reasons why, but basically they all arise from an Aristotelian assumption that reality is an inanimate monolith whose 'objects' may be analysed (e.g., Newtonian and Leibnitzian differential calculus) and synthesized (e.g., Newtonian and Leibnitzian integral calculus). Thus, you see, classical mathematics' problems abound, mostly from those ill-founded Greek assumptions from about 2500 years ago.

To bottom-line this comment, let's just say that — from what we know now — quantum reality is both reversible and irreversible. Decoherent flux appears irreversible, but both coherent and isocoherent flux appear reversible. Saving grace is that we can learn how to quantum spin 'doctor' all patterns of flux. Examples here are: gravity, cooper-paired electrons in superconductors, atoms in Bose-Einstein Condensates, photons in laser beams, etc.

Think about how important tentative irreversibility [I.e., e.g., Pirsig's tentative latching of Static Patterns of Value.] is to reality's abilities to latch new, evolute patterns of Value. Think about how important irreversibility is to realty's patterns of Values' abilities to tentatively 'persist.' Note how this jibes with Maxwell's second law of thermodynamics. But also note how Maxwell's second law is, as Sidis [and Mae-wan Ho, et al.] suspected, non-general. We must move to a larger realm which we call quantum reality to commence an understanding of more general aspects of quantum thermodynamics. Maxwell's SOMitic monism blinded him to that larger realm. Evidence? His specific and now inadequate 'laws.' Sidis could see this. An implication: Sidis' sophism.

But Sidis, when he assumed a SOM context, found that it is unitemporally, posentropy irreversible. (Except in his Gedanken experiments, which he performed on his quantum stage where all is quantum. Esp. one where he reverses a movie film. Note that Bergson uses this theme for his whole book, Creative Evolution, to disprove much of SOM's Aristotelian foundations. See in particular Bergson's fascinating epiphany that classical negation is subjective in his Topic 39.)

[Readers note that classical temporal reversibility, which depends upon homogeneous time, may be expressed mathematically showing object y's Newtonian mechanical motion like this: positive motion - y = f(t), and negative motion - y = f(-t). In his Topic 39, Bergson is telling us that classical negation of an assumed homogeneous time is classically 'subjective.' Bergson calls Newton's mechanical motion and Newton's classical mechanics, "radical mechanism."]

A good, but more classical treatise on some of these issues is, Order Out of Chaos, by Ilya Prigogine and Isabelle Stengers. [Prigogine and Stengers, however, distinguish only two classes of entropy: production (e.g., emergent, biological) and dissipation (Maxwellian).]

Doug.

While a ruse is not impossible, it seems to me from the biographies I've read that Sidis wasn't big on humor or other psychological aspects that make normal people, well, people.

Bret,

Read Amy Wallace's The Prodigy. Though Sidis' humor was offbeat, he had ample laughs and always carried pocketsful of jokes and cartoons.

Sam Rosenberg discloses Sidis' use of burlesque in Boston's [1918] May Day riots.

Doug.

For instance the concept of beauty was foreign to him. I mean, we both know that Sidis was a brilliant man, but I have met other brilliant people that have very little common sense and come up with the most outlandish theories; I'm sure you've met some people like this too.

Bret,

Pioneers are always 'nut cases' until their ideas achieve fruition.

What is 'common sense?' Who decides? Is there just one? Is that what 'common' means?
(This is all SOM legacy Boole. J)

Doug.

I guess the contrasting psychological profile for a genius would be found in Einstein, who appreciated the social side of life and seemed to get along with normal people fine.

Bret,

Einstein was somewhat a recluse, somewhat similar Sidis. For some fascinating perspectives on Einstein read James Gleick's Genius. Also, search for 'Gerald Holton' here. Holton offers some new historical comment re: both Einstein and Heisenberg.

Also consider that Einstein thought gravity was acceleration, an objective, classical function of time. Rather, our Quantonic heuristic is that gravity is quantum partial coherence. How do we intuit that? Gravity is not a function of classical uni-time. Gravity is superluminal.

Einstein was a classicist. (Hawking is too, in spades.)

Doug.

Anyway, I'm kind of straying, my only real intent here was to voice my opinion that just because Sidis' written beliefs don't follow yours doesn't necessarily make them a ruse.

Bret,

I think you are missing my whole point and intention.

Indeed, I think Sidis and I share huge vistas of intellect, intuition, and instinct. I think Sidis was a closet quantum paralogist. I consider myself on a journey of attempting to reach that goal.

I seldom put Sidis down. And if/when I do, it is intended to be unambiguous.

I attempted to picture Sidis in a role play as a consummate SOMite pretender. Why? Because he felt trapped in a Western culture of nearly all SOMites. His Mom and Dad were worst of all. If you read Boris' Philistine and Genius, you see Boris' huge classical predilections. Bill Sidis had to live with that, so he pretended, and comically shoved it right back down their throats.

[Readers note that William James Sidis had wholly classical experiences with his Mom, too, and nearly all his work and casual acquaintances. Amy Wallace, et al., tell us how William became estranged from both his Mother and Father, then from classical work environs. We think William estranged himself because of their predominate adherence to Classical Thing-king Methods, e.g., Newtonian ontology (See WJS' contrary Theory of Origin of Life.), absolute truth, viability of 'scientific method,' 'laws,' 'either/or' SOM dichotomous assessments, homogeneous societal architecture, et al.]

An individual's sophism is difficult to detect in a single comtext. One must experience someone like Bill Sidis in a wide variety of comtexts to see how his 'rules' adjust.

One of my favorite examples of this occurs in a movie titled 'Devil's Advocate,' where an attorney defends an African's ritualistic slaughter of sheep in his basement in downtown New York City!

Most SOMites assume One Global Context, and thus assess others' comtext switches as [classically] either acceptable or unacceptable behavior within that single, monistic, classical context. (I see this fundamental SOM problematic as source of Achilles' wrath in Homer's Iliad. It is source, in our opinion, of Western culture's violence and warlike societal pragma.) Pirsig's gray matter was violently purged for his "abnormal" sophist behaviors. He called it "leaving the mythos."

Doug.

A couple side notes: I don't know if you're aware, but in the 1950s a lot of physicists did some research on reversibility through time and came to the conclusion that most physical laws were in fact NOT reversible in time, but then again that supersedes Sidis' writings.

Bret,

It appears that posentropy, decoherent flux is not (by itself) wholly classically reversible. (Just recently spin zero flux was found in nuclei of atoms. It appears that nature's latched flux commingles both decoherence and coherence. This fits our Quantonic conjecture that gravity is "partial coherence." It also fits how we graphically depict a quanton with both dotted blue and solid black commingling. See our Flash section, and search for "spin-zero states.")

See my earlier comments above in this post.

Reality offers many examples of what appears as 'classical reversibility,' however, from a quantum perspective this probably arises from partial coherence within a decoherent regime. Read Mae-wan Ho's the Rainbow and the Worm, and search on Net for 'Bénard Convection.'

Also search for Rolf Landauer, an (now deceased) IBM fellow who found a way to 'reverse' RAMemories without energy loss. That is why today's dense RAM systems do not melt!

Doug.

Also, I think in the area of astronomy, we could call Sidis and Hawking intellectual equals, perhaps one is a little more gifted than the other, but they're about the same, and I've read a lot of Hawking's work and he fervently defends the Big Bang (or, as Sidis would have it, Great Collision) and the second law of thermodynamics. I'm not sure who to side with, I mean, Sidis was certainly brilliant, but I doubt he could sit down and beat Bobby Fischer in a chess game or could defeat Napoleon on a battlefield, etc.

Thanks for your time,

- Bret

Bret,

We appreciate your patronage in Quantonics!

Please do not hesitate to keep us on our toes!

Mtty,

Doug.

 


To contact Quantonics write to or call:

Doug Renselle
Quantonics, Inc.
1950 East Greyhound Pass, Suite 18, #368
Carmel, INdiana 46033-7730
USA
1-317-THOUGHT

©Quantonics, Inc., 2000-2009 — Rev. 16Dec2007  PDR — Created 6Dec2000  PDR
(7Dec2000 rev - For consistency alter a double dash to an extended dash.)
(1Jan2001 rev - Add link to 2001News WJS sophism example list, extended.)
(16Jan2001 rev - Correct link date in ref to 2001 News.)
(26Mar2001 rev - Repair Einstein and Spin Zero Flash_2000 links. Add 'Problematic Einstein' link.)
(24Nov2001 rev - Minor text formatting corrections.)
(15Dec2001 rev - Add top of page frame-breaker.)
(11Nov2006 rev - Adjust colors. Slight reformat.)
(16Dec2007 rev - Reformat slightly.)

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