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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Byrgenwulf (talk | contribs) at 08:33, 12 July 2006 (→Criticism: response). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

NPOV policy

Does this conform to the NPOV policy? ... I don't think so! =P --Cosmic girl 17:59, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

To the best of my knowledge, what's there is factually accurate. Notice that qualifiers like "Langan argues" and "holds Langan" appear every few sentences to indicate that we are describing the theory, rather than asserting it as truth. I admit, though, that the article could use a "Reception" section covering reactions to the theory and the nature of any criticism. I may write such a section eventually, but anyone who knows the subject is welcome to beat me to it! Tim Smith 19:10, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

It does smack of an advert, given the obscurity of the theory and the salesman-like way it's promoted by the initiating author. I made a few edits needed to differentiate Langan's claims about or related to his theory from any widely accepted view about or related to his theory. CaveBat

I think that this whole thing should be entirely rewritten. The CTMU is not a real scientific theory, and it is misleading to the reader who may not be clued up on these things to intimate that it might be. I have added a small "criticism" section, and links to pseudoscience and crackpot as an attempt to balance the scales a bit.--Byrgenwulf 13:36, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Unverified Claims

Tim, first, there are no wikipedia pages on "axiomatizable" or "formalizable", so the links you provide go nowhere. That's why I changed them to relevant pages that do exist, axiom and formal.

Second, you need to consider the difference between talk about advanced mathematics and advanced mathematics. Nothing in Langan's postings or his paper constitute anything more than talk about abstract concepts, with a few symbolic expressions thrown in here and there. It is not even clear that the CTMU constitutes a valid theory under the mathematico-linguistic domain in which it purports to reside wherein a theory is defined as a set of statements that are closed under logical consequence. And were the CTMU that (and thereby axiomatizable and formalizable), it would be more widely published than only in the ISCID journal. CaveBat 18:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages convention allows—even encourages—red links to viable articles-to-be; it's a way to signal that those articles are missing and need to be created. "Axiomatizable" and "formalizable" are not just affixed derivatives of "axiom" and "formal"; they are important concepts in their own right, and not adequately covered in those articles. Better candidates would be axiomatization and formal system, but until they at least mention the terms in question, I'm hesitant to pipe or redirect. Similarly for dual-aspect monism: delinking is sweeping the problem under the rug.

As I noted above, qualifiers appear every few sentences to indicate that we are describing, not asserting, the theory. For example, instead of saying "reality takes the form of an SCSPL", we say "in the CTMU, reality takes the form of an SCSPL", thereby localizing the claim to the theory. Further qualification is unnecessary; we don't need to say "according to Langan, in the CTMU reality takes the form of an SCSPL". The extra qualifier is redundant.

If Langan has argued a point, "argues Langan" is more precise than "according to Langan". That cognition is a form of information processing is a standard view (our own article calls cognition "a facility for the intelligent processing of information"), and the "generalized cognitive" nature of reality is not a bald assertion, but a point he has argued, for example on page 19 of "A New Kind of Reality Theory".

On mathematics in the CTMU, Langan has said that "ctually, it’s all mathematics, mainly advanced logic including a lot of model theory and algebra", and that he "can reduce that entire 56 page paper to variables and functional, operational and relational symbols". His public work is meant to be relatively accessible: "Rather than encumber you and others with strings of math symbols that you might not be able to decipher, I have chosen to convert these strings to verbal explanations in more or less plain language." We already acknowledge that Langan's public writings are relatively informal, but I see little reason to doubt the mathematical nature of the CTMU. (Whether the math is correct and proves what he says it does is, of course, another question.)

The CTMU has been published not only in PCID, but in the anthology Uncommon Dissent and in the journals of various high-IQ societies. It has also received extensive media coverage, including a description in Popular Science. That it has not appeared more widely in academic journals does not mean it is invalid. Academics tend to ignore outsiders with grandiose theories, dismissing them, often rightly, as cranks. Unfortunately, this blanket judgment puts more weight on incredulity that a nightclub bouncer could have proved the existence of God than on the need for a responsible assessment of his theory's validity. Tim Smith 18:52, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Process physics

Can anyone confirm if it related to process physics?

The CTMU was created in the mid-1980s and published in 1989/1990; it therefore predates process physics, which grew from a 1996 paper by Reginald Cahill and Christopher Klinger. There are similarities: both theories view time as an iterative process rather than as an ordinary linear dimension; both seek to model reality without assuming pre-existing objects or laws; both employ concepts of self-organization; both distribute over reality a form of self-awareness.

A major difference, though, is that whereas the CTMU reduces reality to infocognition and ultimately to telesis, process physics is not a reductionistic theory at all. Cahill writes, regarding the basic iterator by which his bootstrap model evolves:

It is important to note that process physics is a non-reductionist modelling of reality; the basic iterator (2) is premised on the general assumption that reality is sufficiently complex that self-referencing occurs, and that this has limitations.

So the basic iterator—which New Scientist in a 2000 article called "largely the child of educated guesswork"—relies on what Cahill admits is a foundational assumption. At this level, process physics leaves reality unexplained, simply taking for granted that it possesses the complexity needed for self-reference. If it turns out that such complexity does not come for free, but rather imposes constraints on the structure of reality, then those constraints will govern process physics.

The CTMU says that self-referential complexity does impose a constraint: that reality take the form of an algebraic structure Langan calls a Self-Configuring Self-Processing Language (SCSPL). Unlike process physics, the CTMU contains, according to Langan, no assumptions:

Because the CTMU is based on logic, i.e. logical tautologies, plus a small set of metalogical tautologies, it has been described as a "supertautology". No assumptions are necessary, only laws of mathematics.

So if Cahill's and Langan's models are to be reconciled, process physics must be embedded in, and must conform to, the deeper reality of SCSPL. The CTMU is therefore the more fundamental of the two theories.

By the way, you can sign your posts. Tim Smith 16:12, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

conspansion.com

The author of conspansion.com writes: "The Conspansion paradigm has haunted me since 1991." His version of conspansion is therefore predated by the CTMU, which was created in the mid-1980s and published in 1989/1990. It is also substantially less notable than the CTMU; nearly all Internet references to conspansion are to Langan's version. Because by the author's own admission, his interpretation of the concept differs from Langan's, links to conspansion.com are in my opinion of little use to readers of this article seeking to understand the CTMU. For more information about conspansion in the CTMU, see "A New Kind of Reality Theory", particularly pages 27–30. Tim Smith 16:13, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

(1) "...substantially less notable" is as objective an observation as "tastes a lot better." This is a meaningless justification for the edit.

(2) Primacy is irrelevant. That two strangers developed/envisioned the paradigm independently is remarkable, and should be embraced by the originator(s) of this article.

(3) The link to conspansion.com was an unobstrusive (read: few bits) reference to more information. Without positing an ulterior motive, I cannot for the life of me speculate as to why anyone would want to remove such an unobtrusive reference to further, relevant information.

The subject of this article is the CTMU. conspansion.com does not explain conspansion in the CTMU; rather, it describes the author's own version of the concept, which differs from Langan's. It is therefore, as I said, of little use to readers of this article seeking to understand the CTMU. Since "conspansion" in this article refers specifically to Langan's version, it is clearer to say "a process Langan calls conspansion" than "a process called conspansion".

At Misplaced Pages, notability is not a mere matter of taste, but a developed set of criteria used as an aid to deciding what belongs in the encyclopedia. The CTMU, having appeared in Popular Science, on 20/20, and elsewhere in the mainstream media, is clearly notable. conspansion.com is not.

So for lack of relevance to the CTMU and lack of notability in its own right, conspansion.com was removed from the body of this article. By the way, you can sign your posts. Tim Smith 05:49, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Criticism

By its nature, the Internet is an endless source of complaint and criticism. Some of the criticism is well-reasoned and cogent; considerably more of it is not. Four of the most reliable indicators that a given critique is worthless: it is vague, it is accompanied by contempt or denigration (e.g. "pseudoscience" and "crank"), it displays incomprehension regarding its target, and nobody is sufficiently confident of it to attach his or her real name to it and thus stake his or her personal and professional reputation on it.

Virtually all of the criticism thus far directed at the CTMU and its author has displayed at least three of these indicators, and most of it has displayed all four. In general, the existence of such criticism is uninteresting to all but the critics themselves, and therefore does not belong in an encyclopedia (even when accompanied by important-sounding terms like "rigor" and "the scientific method", which tend to be invoked at least as frequently by those who do not understand them as by those who do).

Recent changes to this article, particularly those by someone calling himself "Byrgenwulf", have been a case in point. Although Mr. Byrgenwulf (?) claims that he is trying to restore a NPOV, the tone and content of his edits tells another story entirely. It would be appreciated if Mr. Byrgenwulf, instead of using this encyclopedia to grind whatever philosophical axe he is evidently bent on grinding, would confine his attention to topics regarding which he is himself capable of maintaining neutrality.

OK, here's how I see things. I have studied the CTMU; I've read all of the papers and other matter pertaining to it that I could find on the Internet, and it seems that its originator, this Langan chap, follows the commendable policy of making his work freely available. So, in other words, it isn't as though there are volumes and volumes published about it which I am missing. What is more, I happen to work in the field of philosophy of physics, professionally, and I do know a thing or two about this subject.

Now, I agree that an encyclopaedia should maintain a neutral point of view. I also think that ideas like the CTMU have a right to be represented. However, despite the preachy, biased nature of the article on it, it is not an orthodox scientific theory. In fact, it is not scientific, it is metaphysical, by definition (and by Langan's admission). I feel that a reader of the encyclopaedia who looks up this article has the right to know this, and we who know a thing or two about the field have the duty to keep the reader informed.

I certainly understand the CTMU, such as it is something that can be understood. It is not mathematically or logically correct. For one thing, G\"odel's incompleteness theorem completely rips it to shreds...Langan's use of set theory is not, shall we say, rigorous. Moreover, it does not make use of the scientific method. It doesn't. It's that simple. No-one can claim that it does: where are the experiments to back it up? I don't have the time or the inclination to write a fifty page debunking of this idea at the moment, and besides, I do not believe that to be appropriate: the CTMU should be allowed to state its case in the article, with the criticism section kept to the minimum reasonable for the encyclopaedia to do its duty.

As for the "pseudonym" thing, this is normal for the Internet. It is a username I came up with to try to overcome the even more anonymous nature of an IP address. Does it say "Asmodeus" on your birth certificate, then? What a ridiculous and puerile assertion, that using a username on the Internet (like everyone else) renders what one says meaningless. And hypocritical to boot!

Now, why is it that the CTMU and its proponents are so terrified of criticism? Where are the peer-reviewed commentaries? I know that it was published in intelligent design journals, but if you read the entry for intelligent design, specifically under the heading for "peer-review", all the same comments that apply to that field also apply to CTMU. Why is it that these criticisms cannot be mentioned here?

In order to try to deal with this constructively, and prevent stupid "revert wars", why not talk over a reasoned set of modifications to the article here, including a small criticism section, and then we can post a final copy?