Section 8
Feldman’s Levels and Pereslegin’s Quarcionic Quirks
(A lyrical digression on Ya. Feldman’s theory of levels and the astonishing adventures of Pereslegin’s ideas)
I have raised a monument to myself… [Pushkin, “Exegi monumentum” — trans.]
When you pick up this handsomely published book, you fill with hope that, having read it, you will learn something very important — something that will help you understand the human being better, for the subject is nothing less than a model of man. Let us see what Feldman writes about himself in the preface and further on in the book. Ya. Feldman wrote and published the book Theory of Levels and a Model of Man.
“I, Feldman Yakov Adolfovich, was born in Odessa (Ukraine, USSR) in 1957. According to eyewitnesses, I learned to read at three and a half. By my own recollection, I wrote my first poem at six. At the same age I drew up the first (and last) perpetual-motion-machine scheme of my life. Since then I have periodically lapsed into either poetic or philosophical creativity. I studied the violin, but in the senior grades transferred to a mathematics school. In 1973 I entered Moscow University (the Faculty of Computational Mathematics and Cybernetics) and graduated in 1978. I stayed in Moscow and worked as a programmer. Having convinced myself that the practical work of a programmer does not load the brain, I set about studying everything in sight. I wrote my first philosophical articles and showed up with them at the philosophy department of Moscow State University, where I was shown the door. At that time I found myself a philosophy tutor (A. V. Surin) and studied with him until (after about two years) I began writing articles again. Having convinced myself that the content of the articles contradicted ‘the line of the Party and the government,’ and not wishing to enter into direct conflict with ‘the Party and the government,’ I gave up philosophy — for good, it seemed. At the same time I again began writing poems and sending them to journals, receiving standard rejections.”
Commentary: Of course, we do not now hold it against Feldman that the content of his articles contradicted “the line of the Party and the government” — though one might see something rebellious and anarchic in this — but, alas, it is hard to judge the actual content of the works written back then. Only one thing is clear: the author liked them. Let us proceed on the assumption that those articles were no worse than the book the author has offered us. The author’s brief self-characterization creates the image of a person who is not only talented but many-sided. Moreover, the biographical data given in the introduction point to a high level of inventiveness and enterprise, which allows one to suppose the author’s TIM is LIE — though I still think it is ILE. If so, the author’s self-assurance about his fundamental rightness in any matter where he considers himself competent becomes understandable. But then, such are people.
Here are the author’s reflections on the theme of model and law.
Feldman: The school physics course contains a section on “the theory of gases.” It begins with the story of how the laws of Boyle–Mariotte, Charles, and Gay-Lussac were discovered. All these laws established the dependence of certain observable quantities on other observable quantities under certain observable conditions. These laws show how some phenomena are connected with other phenomena; they are called phenomenological.
Commentary: It is commendable, of course, that the author remembers the school physics course and draws methodological conclusions from that knowledge. A wholly insignificant stylistic defect, which only a meticulous editor would notice, is the third repetition of the adjective “observable,” here applied to the conditions. The point is that in such contexts one usually speaks of conditions as given, since a law is formulated with respect to specified conditions.
Feldman: For modern science, however, this is not enough. For every bouquet of phenomenological laws, modern science tries to build a model within which those phenomenological laws can be obtained as theoretical laws — that is, derived by logical reasoning from the simple principles (axioms, postulates, first principles) on which the model is built.
Commentary: The axiomatic approach to constructing a theory is not an invention of modern science; historically it was reliably used by Euclid to prove geometrical theorems. As for “bouquets of phenomenological laws,” this is a rather strange expression, since the concept of a law carries a seme of fundamentality, and it is hard to imagine that any modern science contains bouquets of fundamental laws. If the author means empirical regularities, then of course that is what he should write, so as not to mislead the inexperienced reader and not to provoke the experienced one.
Feldman: Science (Engl.) is the study of all phenomena and processes in which human participation is not essential (though not excluded in principle) — for example, geology or biology.
Humanity (Engl.) is the study of all phenomena and processes where human participation is an essential factor (for example, archaeology or the history of science).
Commentary: Here, on the one hand, it is completely unclear why the terms long used in Russian — “natural sciences and the humanities” — need to be replaced with Anglicisms. The answer apparently comes down to the author having studied the subject in America, so the Russian terms are simply unknown to him. From this one may suppose that other concepts used in Russian scientific methodology, as well as in the history and philosophy of science, are also unknown to the author.
Feldman: Recognition-naming, then differentiation-demarcation — that is, the first and second levels. Before that there was also the zeroth level — falling into the inarticulate stream.
Commentary: Such is the stylistic improvisation — many beautiful and portentous words, each evoking a mass of associations, but where these words come from and what they mean the author apparently considers self-evident.
Feldman: To trace one line requires the third level; to trace two lines in parallel, the fourth. But that is at the moment of perception. At the moment of writing, one had to trace, from without, from an external observation point, the existence of one system, and then of two systems in parallel — the seventh and eighth levels respectively.
Commentary: Reader, you understand everything here — while the author, it seems, understands everything too, yet cannot manage to explain it to the reader. Well, perhaps he will succeed later.
Feldman: I will never agree with the neo-Kantians that science is built according to one set of laws and humanity according to another, “for such is the nature of these things.” On the contrary, I have always held and still hold that science differs from humanity as a pie differs from raw dough — only in the degree of maturity of the cognitive process, the degree of our advancement along the path of knowledge, while the path itself is the same in either case. Moreover, to “bake the pie through,” to bring humanity up to the level of science, is what I have set as my life’s task.
Commentary: To put it simply: regarding the neo-Kantians I agree with the author, and I too believe that opposing the natural sciences and the humanities at the level of methodological requirements means capitulating before the difficulties of cognition. But the author’s style of argumentation is of so intuitive-metaphorical a character that one cannot even be sure he will be able to bring his proofs up to the level normative for science.
Feldman: If the work of the individual branches of humanity is not perceived merely as applied research for solving concrete problems (the sociologist helps a political party, the psychologist advises on career choice, the historian of science fits out a museum-apartment), but one imagines instead that all these particular studies are gathering facts describing the existence of one single object of knowledge — MAN — then everything falls into place. The facts turn out to be so numerous that astronomy and geology can only envy.
Commentary: Very optimistic — but where is the main idea?
Feldman: To collate the data of such distant branches as the history of science, the history of literature, the history of art, political history, political science, psychology, sociology, philosophy, logic, and pedagogy, one needs a general model of the central subject of these sciences — a model of MAN. And it must be such that the data of any of these sciences can be interpreted on this model, for only such data will be of use.
Commentary: So the author, drawing on the concepts of scientific methodology, wants to build a model of man.
Feldman: But here one more historical digression is necessary.
I studied at university in 1973–1978, under Brezhnev, in the USSR. In those years every institution of higher education compulsorily taught and examined “the social sciences,” a.k.a. “Marxism-Leninism”: the history of the CPSU, dialectical and historical materialism, political economy, scientific communism. Properly speaking, this whole set was supposed to create in the student the illusion that humanity was no less advanced than science. But why was this illusion needed? “Children, don’t go walking in Africa.” If research in a certain direction is advancing successfully and its results are superb, then other directions are unnecessary, and the results can be neither improved nor called into question. Thus the illusion “this direction is successful” and the illusion “these results are true” propped each other up for quite a long time.
Feldman: Life refuted Marxism in practice — it collapsed together with the Berlin Wall (November 9, 1989).
Commentary: What was refuted was not Marxism but its perversion. Marxism was not one bit worse than the Western humanities, and science in Russia fully met industrial needs; but Russia’s semi-literate rulers thought everything was fine with them and did not understand that the West was making enormous efforts to harm Russia, employing the full might of its science to that end.
Feldman: Is science a thing beyond the power of a single person, as Marx thought? And not even one science, but exactly half of all the sciences — humanity? To demolish someone else’s ready-made worldview, one person is enough, provided he thinks systematically (6) and paradoxically (7).
Commentary: So we are offered a recipe for demolishing worldviews. Feldman thinks systematically and paradoxically; consequently, he is about to demolish some worldview.
Feldman: I managed to supplement my abilities with the abilities of my wife. The result is before you.
Commentary: If what Feldman writes is what he considers a result, it is hard even to imagine what a lamentable state he was in before meeting his wife.
Feldman: …the space of problems is inhomogeneous; it does not resemble a boundless plain. There exist within it, like oases in a desert or mountain peaks, special points, “points of condensation.” The study of the problem space itself, detached from momentary practice, and especially the study of the “points of condensation” of this space (I shall speak of “points of aesthetic condensation,” for their study satisfies my aesthetic sense above all) — this is the only way to leap beyond the proverb “generals are always preparing for the last war.”
Commentary: Feldman speaks like a sage — mostly in parables. Presumably so that people will understand. But so far I simply cannot grasp what he is trying to say.
Feldman: A model of man. TO. Three subsystems.
Our many years of observation indicate that a model of man must include, first of all, the following groups of parameters (subsystems): 1) Warm-up 2) Coding 3) Levels
Commentary: Well, at last. Understood: first there will be a warm-up. As simple folk say, for warming up… Then we’ll be coded, and brought up to level.
Feldman: We shall devote most of the book to the levels, but without the first two subsystems the system will not work. Important to remember: warm-up acts over a short stretch of time; coding increases or decreases response time; levels manifest themselves over temporal (substantive) intervals longer than one action, one problem, one situation.
Commentary: Aha — everything will become clear at the very end…
Feldman: While acknowledging the physiological nature of temperament and considering it very important for building a model of man, we believe this concept needs refining.
Commentary: Generally speaking, to refine something, one must first define it.
Feldman: Whatever a person is engaged in, his activity at any moment of time has a definite intensity.
Commentary: No — he never did say what temperament is, but switched the conversation to intensity. That is probably how he coded temperament. In sum, as I understand it, for Feldman temperament is both intensity and warm-up. Somewhat unscientific, perhaps, but possibly very effective.
Feldman: Intensity can be measured in various ways (by operations per second, if the operations are of one kind; by the number of errors, if errors are possible; by the speed and accuracy of movements; by the electrical resistance of the skin; by the adrenaline level in the blood, etc.).
Commentary: Translated into ordinary language, this means that temperament, a.k.a. warm-up, can be measured by all the methods listed in parentheses. Psychology, as it happens, says nothing of the sort — but perhaps a discovery awaits us here.
Feldman: However, whatever we measure this quantity with, if we plot it along the time axis (“the warm-up curve”), the following simple regularities will emerge:
1) the warm-up curve has a periodic character over the working day. If we discard from the time scale the intervals of sleep and deep rest, the curve becomes periodic. As befits the definition, all periods have the same shape;
Commentary: Psychology says nothing of the kind about temperament… In any case, it is highly doubtful that temperament would change periodically over the course of a day. I have never heard such a thing.
Feldman: 2) the shape of the period changes little over a person’s lifetime (excluding periods of ill health);
Commentary:
Feldman: 3) if we examine the curves of different people, they fall into four groups (with random variations within each group). The average curve of each group corresponds to one temperament.
Commentary: If what is shown in the figure really is the graphs of temperaments-warm-ups, then either this is a discovery or some sort of misunderstanding. But it looks very much like the intuitive images of temperament in the author’s imagination. Well then — a rich imagination…
(Figure: “Working capacity” vs. “Time”; curves labeled 1. Choleric, 2. Sanguine, 3. Phlegmatic, 4. Melancholic)
Feldman: Unlike temperament (which is never “pure”), the warm-up curve can precisely convey the characteristics of a given person. There are only four temperaments, but infinitely many curves!
Note that the choleric and the melancholic ideally complement ((no!)) each other if they work sequentially (but not in parallel).
Commentary: So it turns out I was mistaken: the picture shows not temperaments but warm-up curves — but then why are temperaments written on it? I am forced to state that the author’s thinking is somehow blurry and poorly organized…
Feldman: Different people perceive, store, process, and output information differently.
The opinion that this was first noticed by the school of Neuro-Linguistic Programming is inaccurate. According to Alfred Binet, the division of people by types of memory (auditory, visual, motor) was known already to his teacher J.-M. Charcot. Binet himself discovered “thinking in schemas” and “imageless thought” (he also knew the term “warming up”).
Commentary: But what is the author’s own opinion?
Feldman: The “visuals – audials – kinesthetics” of NLP form the first triad of codings.
There are five triads in all, and they often mask one another:
Triads Channels of perception: Ear Eye Hand Mode of storage and processing: Text Picture Schema Mode of existence in culture: Book Film Computer Stage of thinking: Images Meanings Scenarios Kind of activity: Communication Reflection Action
Commentary: The author has called his chosen triads “codings.” Somewhat unclear. Codings of what? He is a programmer by profession — evidently the word is dear to him, and he is capable of investing it with various meanings. It seems the author is sharing everything he knows. And he knows quite a lot. He is, as it were, building his own private science. Still, it would be worth doing this on the basis of scientific methodology. The author has his own private methodology. Well then, let us see…
Feldman: The final result of thinking is precisely action.
Commentary: This is plausible as an empirical fact — but after all, one thought can beget another, and so on. As with philosophers or writers. Indeed, the result of the author’s thinking turns out to be thoughts, which he writes down in a book.
Feldman: Action is the realization of a scenario. A scenario can be invented oneself (text–picture–schema) on the basis of perceptual data (ear–eye–hand), or it can be borrowed from “social consciousness” (book–film–computer). When a scenario runs, checking of conditions is inevitable within it. To check a condition, one must single out an object for checking (an image) and compute some function on that object (a meaning). The same images and meanings can be used in different scenarios; that is, they are relatively independent. Communication is the joint construction of scenarios-images-meanings. Reflection is their independent construction, seen from outside.
Images – meanings – scenarios are discussed in [2.28].
Individual preferences and proportions for a given person exist in each triad. Knowing these preferences, one can say a great deal about a person. But the very knowledge of the triads as a system of concepts can itself explain many phenomena of our life.
The striving, well known in American literature, to go beyond a single triad (multiple intelligences) is, in our conviction, merely one step on the way to a system of many triads.
Feldman: There exist 10 levels in all, numbered 0 through 9 [2.2]. In practical life, however, we will almost never encounter levels 0 and 9. So if you hear that there are 8 levels, numbered 1,…,8, do not be surprised.
Commentary: Just like that — without definitions, without justification, without ceremony.
Feldman: Levels exist objectively. Why — we shall learn later. “Why” is a level-6 question, and in our exposition we are so far working through levels 1, 2, 3.
Commentary: How interesting and mysterious…
Feldman: Here are some “earmarks” of the levels, so as to recognize and distinguish them (i.e., to work at levels 1–2). Lining them up, we will reach (in our understanding) level 3.
Commentary: We do not yet know — do not even suspect — what levels are. The author possibly knows what they are but keeps up the intrigue. And he is not yet ready to give a strict definition — because the reader has not yet warmed up, and can only be told certain earmarks of the levels. The full answer the author promises at the end. Though possibly he himself will find it out at the end, or nearer to it.
Feldman: Inarticulate stream of events. Recognition-naming, one object, a thing. Differentiation-demarcation, many objects, space. Ordering, passage to the limit, one process, time, striving toward a goal. Series, many processes, a role system, an ensemble, narration. Table-classifier, one map, free will, risk. Model-theory, many maps, causality, proof, truth. Contradiction-paradox, one system, an idea. Harmony, many systems, accounting for distant consequences. Optimal instantaneous action.
Lengthening the lists of features takes us to the fourth level (series). Naturally, this list of features is not complete; the complete list will be accessible only at the 5th level of understanding (table-classifier).
Commentary: It seems the reader has already passed the level called “Inarticulate stream of events” and is beginning “Recognition-naming” — “one object, a thing” — more than that we cannot yet manage, but the wait won’t be long. So, reader, brace yourself — surprises may well lie ahead. But an experienced captain is leading you, and with him you will soon conquer “Differentiation-demarcation, many objects, space.”
Feldman: We proceed to level 4.
Commentary: Reader, prepare yourself!
Feldman: Imagine a meeting of two sides (two processes, two styles of behavior). For simplicity, suppose each side has fixed (for the duration of the meeting) its level. What will their interaction (conflict) lead to? It turns out the consequences can be foreseen.
Commentary: Here it is! Now you will learn to foresee — well, not everything, of course. You still have to grow into that.
| # | Relation | Formula | Type | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Levels equal | M = N | Competition | Mutual pressure, unstable equilibrium |
| 2 | Levels adjacent | |M−N| = 1 | Cooperation | The senior manages, the junior helps; cooperation voluntary and natural |
| 3 | Levels distant | |M−N| > 1 | War | Aggression of the lower against the higher. The higher perishes, or flees, or changes level |
Feldman: This table is not only explanatory and prognostic but of entirely practical character. However, for the theory to become practice, one must learn to see the opponent’s level — and in response tune oneself to the level optimal in the given situation. To what extent is such self-tuning possible in principle? And of course it is hard to agree that the table exhausts all variants of human interaction — where, for instance, is collaboration? So we are being misled.
Commentary: Reader, remember this. Explanatory and prognostic is not yet practical, because you have not yet learned to see your own level. Patience — a little more, and you will be able to use the explanations and forecasts in practice.
Feldman: Every person has his own genotype, which means his own particular structure of the cellular-hormonal system and his own particular brain proportions. This means that however you train yourself, one activity (A) will always come out better for you than another activity (B). What, then, can be done?
Commentary: You see, reader? You didn’t know you had “your own particular brain proportions,” and that is why certain things will always come out better for you. Well, do you understand why? It’s all a matter of brain proportions. Remember that.
Feldman: One can ensure that any activity comes out no worse than a certain minimally acceptable level.
Commentary: A well-known truth, but delivered with such aplomb that it inspires hope. And the main thing is, all this can be done without changing one’s brain proportions.
Feldman: One can ensure that you are able to pass freely from activity A to activity B when you yourself want to or deem it necessary — not as the activity “wants.” That is, to “become the master of your own actions.” A nontrivial task — recall gamblers, smokers, etc.
Commentary: Well — he recalled gamblers and smokers, and so what?
Feldman: One can discover that certain levels have been blocked in you by upbringing, while to certain others upbringing has assigned absolute value. Both push you toward suboptimal decisions and therefore require conscious correction.
Commentary: All perfectly clear — and no worse than the Delphic oracle.
Feldman: He who is not acquainted with the theory of levels will not even be able to pose these tasks for himself. He who manages to pose them and begins solving them will improve himself and improve the world.
Commentary: But it is understood that nobody is acquainted with the theory of levels, since we are present at its birth. No, no… it has not yet been born, but it is already moving down the birth canal, and soon it will happen… And you will learn it, and everything will start working out for you.
Feldman: Must be remembered: In every subject area all levels are represented and have a right to exist. However, in each area there are levels which (as of today) enter into the concept of “a professional in the given area.” For example, in mathematics a professional must display level 6 (no mathematical fact without proof).
Commentary: Whereas in Feldman’s theory of levels, one may state facts without proofs — because he not only knows the theory of levels but is its creator.
Feldman: Every level has civilized forms of manifestation in society and a subject area in which its manifestation is especially advantageous both to the person and to society. For example, team sports require level 4, individual sports level 3.
Commentary: Oh, this too must be remembered…
Feldman: My observations show that every person has by nature three favorite levels at which he prefers to act. Until July 2003 we (Ya.F. and E.) held that these three levels are equal in the personality profile. But on August 3, 2003 we published the article “Shakespeare’s Tragedies and the Levels of His Characters,” where we formulated a new rule: One of the three levels is auxiliary — it chooses means; the other two are principal — they choose the goal (alternately and in equal measure).
Commentary: You see: before July 2003 there was no such thing, and now there is — although the author conceals from the reader what a level actually is.
Feldman: A pseudo-conflict in our model is the meeting of two sides differing in warm-up and/or coding. If these sides try to work synchronously on the same material, a moment comes when the impossibility of such synchronous work becomes obvious. Subjectively this is experienced as a conflict — sometimes quite an acute one. Yet such a conflict is easily avoided: it suffices to cancel the requirement of synchrony.
Commentary: Correct. For example, if some work by day, others can work by night. All the more so since many buildings go unused at night. This applies especially to administrative buildings: by day officials work there, and by night the same premises could be used as hotels, or for dry-cleaning. Or for who knows what else…
Feldman: Why do some people make discoveries and others not? A (theoretical) discovery is a nontrivial mental step. Not everyone can take such steps. It is a step forward from a certain volume of initial data. Not everyone has that volume of data.
I am convinced that many of my readers could take the step. It is simply that each life has turned out its own way, and the volume of initial data that appeared on my path did not appear on theirs (or they attached no importance to it). But this can be remedied. I will show the data I relied on as I went toward my discovery.
Commentary: Now the author will share the secret of how to make discoveries like the ones he made. And immediately afterward each of us will be able to make some discovery or other and write just such a book — maybe even a better one.
Feldman: Cybernetics, as you of course know, studies control and communication in various systems — including the system “man,” the system “computer,” the system “state,” etc.
Cybernetics forces us (its students) to look anew at things simple and, it would seem, long and absolutely understood. Here, for example, are two systems: a doorbell and a machine selling carbonated water with syrup (there were such in the era of my childhood).
Commentary: No — he did not share it. He told us about a doorbell and about the carbonated water of his childhood. Later he will tell us about beads — how they can be scattered, about their topology, about dots on a screen…
Feldman: Imagine that the number of random dots on the screen is increasing. Imagine that a string of beads is depicted on the screen. Starting from a certain (large) number of random dots, we will see on the screen that the string has broken (though the real string is still intact). Let us now formulate two general rules:
For loss of complexity not to occur in a mapping, a certain minimal intrinsic internal complexity of the mapping system is necessary. The complexity of the mapping system is measured by the maximal complexity of the pre-image that is not yet lost in the mapping. It remains to define the grades of complexity of the pre-image (the levels).
Commentary: Well, here we come to the definition. It is not very sharp, but still — something at least. So: levels are grades of complexity of the pre-image. Note — not of the object itself, but of its pre-image. Not even of the image. But the highlighted part of the text deserves closer analysis. Here a genuinely important concept of complexity is introduced — important for defining level. Yet the author gives no definition of it, reporting instead that “the complexity of the mapping system is measured by the maximal complexity of the pre-image that is not yet lost in the mapping.” Note that what is at issue is not the complexity of the object but the complexity of the mapping system. It turns out that what matters to the author is not the complexity of the real object but the complexity of, say, the camera or computer that will display the object. Of course, we could guess on the author’s behalf what he must mean — after all, we already know what levels of complexity are, because we were taught it and it is written about in other books.
Feldman: A string of beads is more complex than scattered beads. But how many beads are scattered (10, 15, or 20) does not affect the complexity. However, if the beads are removed one by one, a moment will come when one bead remains. If there was one bead on the string, the beads cannot be scattered; if more than one — they can. This means that (for us, here and now) the number one differs qualitatively from the numbers two, three, etc., while the remaining numbers (2, 3, 4, …) are qualitatively identical.
Commentary: With the bead example the author wants to introduce some concept important to him — but it seems he cannot cope even with the beads. He handles concepts so casually because he knows what he means; us he does not tell, yet assumes we can guess. But I, for one, do not understand why the number of scattered beads does not affect complexity. I was taught, for instance, that complexity is connected with quantity. Nor do I agree that a single bead cannot be scattered — have you never dropped some small object and then had to search for it? That is the minimal case of “scattering,” but it does exist, and there is no sense in neglecting it. To scatter one bead means it slipped off the string. But the author gives no definitions and can therefore mean anything whatsoever. This example shows that the author gets muddled even with a single bead — which means he cannot be trusted.
It turns out that this whole manipulation with beads was needed by the author to convince us of the qualitative difference of the number 1 from all the rest.
Feldman: Here we come into contradiction with Hegel’s famous formula “the transition of quantity into quality”: in our opinion, a new quality arises in the transition from 1 to 2, but does not arise with further increase of quantity. The new quality is brought in from outside as an order relation that did not exist before!
Commentary: So now the author fancies he has refuted Hegel. Reader, do not believe the author — he has not refuted the great dialectician; he is simply muddling something again. He gives no definition of quality, so the reader must guess for himself what quality arises in the transition from 1 to 2. Had quality been suitably defined, the author would have seen that all numbers have a quality, each its own — but the author has not yet made that discovery.
Perhaps I simply do not understand the author. Perhaps I am unfair to him, too much of a nitpicker. Perhaps readers will be found who will read his book with pleasure. Therefore I refer those who wish to the author’s own text — let them appraise it themselves. It is quite possible someone will enjoy how the author, relying on his discovery, analyzes the characters of plays, or the stages of personality formation according to E. Erikson, or the child’s mental development according to Piaget, or poems, English ones included, or chess — it is entertaining, and the reader can pass the time quite pleasantly. At the end of the book the author tells of his poetic work. And although this has no direct bearing on the FLs (Feldman Levels), it does vividly illuminate his talent as a poet. His poems, his translations in particular, are simply good, and his analysis of poetic works is not inferior to the best examples of that genre.
I do not wish to weary the reader further — my conclusion is clear. The author is by no means a stupid man; he knows a great deal, though superficially. There is much he wants to share with the reader, but he offers too many banalities — and outright disinformation besides. Tell me, how is one to understand the first line of the table “Layers of Being”? The zeroth layer is called “Non-being,” yet its values are being, with the value criterion life? And the table “Elements” shows that the layer of being called “Non-being” is filled with the primal element “Ether,” and the state of matter there is called “Void.” So ether is non-being? Has science proved that? I understand, of course, that the author undertakes to explain everything in his book — but what about common sense? Reader, do you know what a “chronotope” is? The meaning of the word is determined by the meaning of its parts: “chronos” = time + “topos” = place; that is, it can be understood as “a place in time,” or “a stretch of time.” The author calls chronotopes, for example, “the development of world literature.” Well, in some metaphorical sense, sure, why not… His list of such chronotopes includes: the Individual Researcher, Science, Logic, Man, Humanity. With this term he equates concepts of entirely different scale and content. And here is what the author says about Hegel: “Hegel asserts that the following chronotopes are similar. Objective spirit = nature up to and including man.” Yet Hegel simply could not have asserted anything of the kind — for the simple reason that he never used such a word at all. The author’s text resembles a kaleidoscope: you are entertained with motley pictures, and this goes on for a long time. Yet all the while they are trying to convey to you one single, long-familiar thought: that everything in the world develops, growing more complex, passing through definite stages. A pity it is done so chaotically.
Conclusion [on Feldman]
Reading this book, one is left with the impression that it was written by a person who knows a great deal, but whose knowledge is somehow loose — a little about everything, banal and effortless. The text of this book can in no way be called scientific — methodologically it falls short. It is closest to something philosophico-scientistic, popular-worldview-ish, science-domestic; one could even assign it to an original genre: a light retelling of literature once read, with elements of pattern-seeking. Something like “A Popular Introduction to Pre-programming” — that is, a mention of items of information that might raise a programmer’s competence. Feldman is trying to give shape to the idea of levels, which he apparently senses intuitively at the empirical level but cannot articulate, remaining at the level of a vague image. He writes as though before him no one had ever spoken of or known anything about levels — whereas this is one of the most widespread themes in science and philosophy. References to predecessors — anything like a literature review — are absent. Instead there is a multitude of textual illustrations from philosophy, sociology, political economy, and other branches of knowledge, where it is said outright that these are levels. Nevertheless, the text stirs the imagination with hints of something significant and important — but this effect is connected not with real content but with a special linkage of words, well studied in NLP. The book lacks the key definition: what are the levels the author has in mind? He gives a large number of examples from various subject areas, from which one may conclude that in every subject area there are less complex and more complex objects — which, of course, is no secret to specialists in any sphere of science, technology, or economics.
Thus K. Marx speaks of a hierarchy of socio-economic formations: the primitive-communal system, to which corresponds a natural economy; the slaveholding system — an economy based on slave labor; the feudal system — an economy based on the labor of serfs; capitalism — an economy based on the labor of hired workers; socialism — an economy based on the labor of free workers receiving just pay for their work; communism — an economy based on the free realization of every citizen’s abilities, when material provision covers all his cultural needs. Here, of course, we are dealing with qualitative levels of the development of human society. The hierarchy of chemical elements fixed in the periodic table, where each atom represents a definite level of the development of matter, formed under definite conditions. The evolution of the animal and plant world consists through and through of levels of the origin of species. Plato writes of the changing character of power in the state. The state is created by sages, and they are respected for their wisdom. But a time comes when the state must be defended, and heroes and generals come to the fore. And when the state is defended, it begins to grow rich, and the richest become the most influential. But wealth is distributed unevenly, and gradually a marked division of people along the wealth–poverty index takes place. The poor folk — the demos — begin to hate the plutocrats leading their unrighteous life, and begin to smash them. Democracy is enthroned — an unjust order in which the victorious majority rules for its own benefit rather than that of the whole society. In this description we see levels of social change. But in a settled society, sooner or later, a social pyramid takes shape. Those at the very bottom in Ancient India were called vaishyas, with whom it was improper to associate. Above them stood the merchant-shudras. Higher still the kshatriya-warriors, headed by the chief commander. But everywhere there was also the class of learned bookmen — brahmins — standing as it were above all and mediating between the Higher Powers and all the people in society. These, of course, are level structures.
Even household things have their evolution with fixed levels. A multitude of books have been written on these themes, so no signs of novelty can be detected in Feldman’s “discovery.” Yet for analyzing various situations he uses the concept of level with virtuosity, creating an effect of explanation. Marx, explaining the succession of social formations, pointed to the cause behind it — the change of productive forces, which take shape as material means of production. The explanation Feldman offers is phenomenological: one ideal process is explained by means of another. Something like: people feud because they have different levels — as if people of the same level could not feud. But they feud not because of level, but in connection with concrete material causes. Yet since the levels are designated by digits, the cause of conflict reduces to an opposition of numbers. Pythagoras can take a rest. He held, for example, that the harmony present in the world is determined by the fact that the sum of the first four numbers equals ten: 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10. In the case of FLT (Feldman’s Level Theory), any effects in this world are explained by relations of digits (not numbers!) from 0 to 9. It is not real processes taking place in the material world that determine the phenomenology; rather, an abstract phenomenology of digits explains the concrete phenomenology of events. Approximately the same approach is used in numerology, where any combinations of digits are interpreted substantively as protocols of events. For example, in digit-divinations like the Pythagorean square, individualized combinations of digits from 0 to 9 are extracted from the date of birth and considered the cause of biographical circumstances. About 85% of people treat such explanations “with understanding” and pay money for them. Of course, as an explanation of real phenomena, manipulations with digits can create only an illusion of causal connection, which must in fact be sought in the concatenation of material and energetic processes.
As for the model of man, here one can speak only of preliminary considerations and approximate categories. Whoever knows socionics has an idea of a model of the human psyche based on highly generalized psychic functions. Next to Model A, Feldman’s very raw considerations do not look promising at all. The level of the book, in Feldman’s own sense, is very low — intuitive searching and the gathering of preliminary data. Here one can speak only of the appearance of a vague conception. It is somewhere between 0 and 1. Yet it seems that as a mnemonic scheme FLT may well justify itself. In that case it would be desirable to refine the name to “Feldman’s Level Theory of Transcendent Adequacy” (in Russian: TUFTA — a slang word meaning “baloney” — trans.), since the adequacy between phenomena and combinations of digits is of a transcendent character.
Attempts to find a system of representation adequate to the phenomenological stream have been undertaken by humanity since the most ancient times. This is precisely what divinatory systems amount to. Perhaps the most developed of them is astrology in all its variants. For example, the well-known astrologer Kvasha uses Chinese astrology to describe historical phenomenology, and he does it simply splendidly. One of his hits is the twelve-year cycle in Russia. 1905 — the first revolution; 1917 — the communist coup; 1929 — the “Great Break”: the communal order of the Russian peasantry is broken; 1941 — the fateful forties; 1953 — the death of the great tyrant; 1965 — the exit into space; 1977–1989 — the beginning of the perestroika tragedy; 2001 — light at the end of the tunnel: Putin. And this series makes sense in the reverse direction too — see Kvasha’s books on structural astrology.
But look how beautifully the book’s blurb is written: “This theory sets the world of science from its head onto its feet, uniting and structuring all humanitarian knowledge; the world of social life, canceling the fruitless debates of economists, sociologists, political scientists, psychologists, culturologists; the system of education; and, finally, the very everyday life of the attentive reader. It overturns our conception of man and society just as quantum mechanics overturned our conception of inanimate nature.”
Unfortunately, this very flattering assessment does not correspond to the real content of the book by Feldman — an unquestionably talented, intelligent, energetic, and enterprising scholar, but one insufficiently demanding of himself. The laudatory blurb was written by T. N. Prokofieva — unquestionably also an intelligent scholar and organizer of science. Perhaps Feldman possesses exceptional personal charm, and T. N. fell under the influence of his charisma? That might somehow explain her dithyrambs over Feldman’s quite mediocre book. Incidentally, he soon published a new large-format book, A Philosopher on the Beach, where he demonstrates his ability to turn into text any fleeting impressions of life or of books once read, simply retelling the little that remains in memory. Something like memoirs built on surnames and book titles that happened to become known to him. Of course, freedom of speech makes it possible to write and publish almost anything whatsoever. Still, I do not consider Feldman a graphomaniac: there is in his books a certain sincerity, a childlike readiness to tell of something important to him, to share — clumsily and awkwardly — his vision of the world, his personal discoveries, what he arrived at with his own mind. So what if everyone already knows it — the author didn’t know, and reached it by himself. There is such a level of creativity too. So his personal level can be rated somewhere at 7–8, his poems are remarkable (7), and he is full of ideas — but the text he has written is 0–1.
Well then, I too shall avail myself of freedom of speech and write what I think about such books — under Soviet power this would have been impossible.
Pereslegin’s Quarcionic Quirks
An example of the blurring of knowledge, its formalistic derealization — and, under certain conditions, its destruction.
As for Pereslegin, I will say very little about him — whoever gets interested can go straight to the primary source. He is, perhaps, the most intelligent person of all who have worked on theoretical socionics — at any rate, his IQ is off the charts, above 170. The spitting image of me in my childhood. He, for example, invented the technology of the information-creative “knowledge reactor,” thanks to which he could synthesize any ideas whatsoever. Actually, this is nothing more than souped-up brainstorming, but a witty organization of the work of a large group turned this instrument of collective idea-synthesis into an attractive and prestigious occupation; besides, it is modern, on-brand, and can be sold to foreigners. Still, what impressed me most was his quarcionics — simply because I had thought my way to the same idea myself but chose not to be distracted by developing it. So Pereslegin saved me time, and I am grateful to him for that. In principle, anyone acquainted with the basics of invention and rationalization can arrive at this idea without much difficulty — but one must also want to, and only passionaries are capable of that, of whom very few remain among Russians, since their extermination proceeded systematically. Clearly, they were very much in someone’s way. The selection of creative swindlers and rogues, as well as of bureaucratic scum, went on actively, and of those we have a surplus. But for democracy they too, of course, are needed — otherwise human rights will be trampled and the Americans will bring their fleet into the Black Sea.
To put it very simply, quarcionics — from quark + socionics, of course! — comes down to dressing socionics in a polar-trichotomic framework instead of a polar-dichotomic one. To do this one must find two pairs of triples of orthogonal entities of the requisite generality and carry out their combinatorial development. Naturally, one could also invent tetronics, pentonics, sextonics, septonics, etc. True, pentonics and septonics have long existed under other brands — but I will not dwell on that for now.
As poles for quarcionics, Pereslegin chose STATICS–DYNAMICS–SPONTANEITY and multiplied them by THINKING–COMMUNICATION–ACTIVITY. The result is a remarkable semantic matrix (fig. Pe.01).
1. Information can be represented as a vector in a certain functional space — the space of aspects.
Commentary: Unproductive formalism, since the author has given no definitions.
2. Informational resistance (the change of information in a communicative act) is complex-valued in character: the real part of informational resistance characterizes the decrease of the overall length of the information vector (loss of information in the process of communication); the imaginary part — the rotation of the information vector in aspect space (change in the aspect composition of the information). The complex character of informational resistance opens the possibility of informational generation in pairs and small groups.
Commentary: A negative image — resistance — is used instead of, say, the positive image of evolution; characteristic of an ILI.
3. The imaginary part of informational resistance is fully determined by the TIM.
Commentary: The term “imaginary part” introduces a semantic distortion with a negative tinge.
4. The TIM, determining the given personality’s mode of information processing, can be constructed from notions of the structuredness of the human psyche. The behavioral particulars of the various structural elements of the personality’s psyche in interaction with information are called socionic functions. The dimensionality of the space of functions and the space of aspects coincides, and the TIM is simply a distribution of informational aspects over socionic functions.
5. In socionic communication, like-named aspects interact, which in the general case are located in different functions.
Commentary: This is accepted as an axiom, but here it is both unnecessary and introduces a cognitive distortion.
6. There exist special communicative configurations in which informational resistance is minimized — the small socionic groups. Such groups include rings of supervision, rings of order [benefit], quadras, clubs.
Commentary: An unhappily chosen term has begun to impose its own semantics — analogy is used in place of proof.
7. There exist observable combinations of informational aspects — traits. The socionic TIM can be determined by analyzing a combination of traits.
8. Every trait is distributed in a personality in a certain proportion conventionally recognized as “normal” (in most models 30%–70%, sometimes 1/3–2/3). Deviations from this “normal” distribution are called a trait complex. One distinguishes accentuation of a trait, balancing of a trait, inversion of a trait.
Commentary: This is not proved but decreed.
2. The space of aspects is eight-dimensional. An aspect is constructed as a combination of three binary relations: internal–external, statics–dynamics, body–field.
Commentary: It has been proved that this is an incorrect set of binaries!
The space of functions is likewise eight-aspected. A function is constructed as a combination of three binary relations: strong–weak, donor–acceptor, conscious–unconscious.
Commentary: There are not three such relations but seven — the selection was made arbitrarily.
3. The structure of the TIM looks as follows:
4. Rules for constructing the TIM (selection rules):
Commentary: Not deduction but dogma. It is unknown where these rules came from.
a) All eight aspects are present in the TIM.
b) Statics and dynamics do not mix within one ring: the “conscious” functions are either all dynamic or all static. If the “conscious” ring is dynamic, the “unconscious” one is static, and vice versa.
c) In the unconscious ring, the same functions stand in the same places as in the conscious ring, but repainted. For example, if the second function is white logic, then the minus-second function is black logic.
In general: repainting an aspect is its conditional multiplication by minus one.
Commentary: The introduction of private jargon…
The type itself can be represented as a vector multiplied by the identity matrix.
Commentary: Such are these relativistic formalisms…
3. Quark-socionics (quarcionics)
Quark-socionics belongs to the socionics-like structural models of personality, uses the same ontology, and belongs to the same level of research. However, quark-socionics is not dichotomic but trialistic, which leads to substantial changes in the structure of aspects, functions, and TIMs.
Commentary: What we have is a mechanical transfer of adapted semantics into an arbitrary matrix — a typical example of the childhood disease of hasty identification.
The model of quark-socionics rests on G. P. Shchedrovitsky’s three-layer scheme of thought-activity and on the trialectical notion of three forms of motion (and, consequently, three forms of time).
Commentary: Where is the proof that Shch.’s scheme is adequate to the system of psychic qualities? Pereslegin’s methodology, as presented in this entertaining contrivance, rests on arbitrary assumptions, any of which is deemed semantically warranted — which is characteristic of science fiction. The use of mathematical metaphors creates an illusion of correctness; but in mathematics it is customary to prove theorems, whereas the author plays a pretty game, multiplying mathematical images by socionic categories and filling the resulting conglomerates by means of the dimensionlessness of ILI intuition. As a result we have a variety of symbolic art whose material is semantic smalto.
Let us call “color” the states of the operator of motion. Let green denote the statics of the generalized object (field), blue its dynamics, red — spontaneous changes. The direct sum of all colors gives white. Clearly, in this model the number of colors cannot in principle increase. By black we shall denote any color.
Let us call “flavor” or “sign” the state of the operator of thought-activity… ETC.
Apparently the author believes that any set of symbols can be filled with arbitrary semantics, and one can then merrily rejoice at the kaleidoscopic happening.
Let us give a few more examples of the types of quarcionic metabolism synthesized by the author, so the reader can savor to the full the play of ILI intuition. Note that his lists are preceded by the warning: THE TABLE IS COMPOSED FROM THE AUTHOR’S MOMENTARY PREFERENCES AND CLAIMS NEITHER COMPLETENESS NOR ACCURACY. That, perhaps, says it all.
Identicals; Quasi-identicals, or opposites; Meta-identicals, or spontaneers; Kindreds; Quasi-kindreds, or mirage types; Meta-kindreds; Mirrors; Quasi-mirrors; Meta-mirrors; Conflictors; Quasi-conflictors, or complements; Meta-conflictors; Supervision+; Supervision−; Command+; Command−; Order+; Order−.
Let us consider in more detail the rings of supervision, which in quark-socionics are distinguished exactly as in ordinary socionics.
Relations of supervision: there are six rings of supervision in quark-socionics. Static rings: Warriors; Adventurers. Dynamic rings: Masters; Managers. Spontaneous rings: Prophets; Judges. Relations of command; relations of order.
Large groups: intuitives (thinkers, theoreticians), ethicists (communicators, negotiators), logicians (doers, pragmatists), statics, dynamics, spontaneers.
Since in a book edition it is expensive to preserve the color and shape of the symbols, I will translate them into verbal form: gr = green, bl = blue, rd = red; ci = circle, sq = square, tri = triangle, ht = heart. Thus “bl-ht” is a blue heart, “gr-tri” a green triangle, “rd-ci” a red circle… I think the advanced reader will have no trouble sorting out this quarcionic alchemy.
TIQuIMs (types of quarcionic information metabolism):
- gr-tri gr-sq: Miss Marple (detective fiction), Corwin (R. Zelazny, SF), Genrikh Altshuller (TRIZ). TIM name — PIONEER-DISCOVERER
- bl-tri bl-sq: Hercule Poirot (detective fiction), Oberon (R. Zelazny), Aral Vorkosigan (L. Bujold, SF), Chancellor Palpatine (Star Wars), Steinitz (chess). TIM name — SEER
- gr-tri rd-sq: Miles Vorkosigan (L. Bujold), Dworkin (R. Zelazny), I. Yamamoto (admiral), Che Guevara (Cuban revolutionary), Merlin (wizard, Celtic cycle). TIM name — REVOLUTIONARY
- gr-tri gr-sq: Luke Raynard (R. Zelazny), M. Robespierre (French Revolution), J. Kennedy. TIM name — PRESIDENT
- bl-sq bl-tri: Jack London. TIM name — CAPTAIN
- rd-sq rd-tri: Perry Mason (detective fiction), Mandor (R. Zelazny), Dr. House (contemporary American series), the Stalker (hero of Tarkovsky’s film after the Strugatskys). TIM name — ALCHEMIST
- gr-tri gr-ci: Dr. Watson (detective fiction), Huxley (scientist), Dr. Wilson (contemporary American series). TIM name — ADVOCATE
- tri ci: Bleys (R. Zelazny), Llewella (R. Zelazny), Dr. Cameron (contemporary American series). TIM name — HELPER
- rd-tri rd-ci: Fiona (R. Zelazny), Coral (R. Zelazny), Chicot (jester to Henry of Navarre). TIM name — JESTER (Joker)
- gr-ci gr-tri: Benedict (R. Zelazny), Merlin (R. Zelazny), Dostoevsky. TIM name — HERO
- bl-ci bl-tri: Flora (R. Zelazny), Dr. Foreman (contemporary American series), A. Dumas père. TIM name — WRITER
- rd-ci rd-tri: Nayda (R. Zelazny), Yeshua, Moses. TIM name — PROPHET
- gr-sq gr-ci: Caine (R. Zelazny), Jasra (R. Zelazny). TIM name — CONSPIRATOR
- bl-sq bl-ci: Sherlock Holmes (detective fiction), Stierlitz (film), Master Yoda (Star Wars). TIM name — ANALYST
- rd-sq rd-ci: Darth Vader (Star Wars), Brand (R. Zelazny), Hamlet, Muhammad, J. Stalin, L. Beria, M. Gandhi. TIM name — APOSTLE
- gr-ci gr-sq: Ivan (L. Bujold), G. Zhukov (commander), Orlan (S. Snegov, SF), Tywin Lannister (G. Martin). TIM name — CHIEFTAIN
- bl-ci bl-sq: Gabin (actor), Alisa Freindlich (actress), I. Chmielewska (detective fiction). TIM name — WORKER
- rd-ci rd-sq: Eric (R. Zelazny), B. Obama, Napoleon, E. Pugachev; N. Makhno, P. Kropotkin (Russian rev.), M. Bakunin (Russian rev.). TIM name — ANARCHIST
[6] Most divergences in the socionic typing of people are connected with the fact that different schools calibrate the aspects differently and usually do not realize that the aspects are calibrated at all.
On substance. When Shchedrovitsky, in his methodological triple Thinking/Communication/Activity, threw Perception out of consideration, he was within his rights, since he was building merely a special instrument for certain particular people and certain special tasks. But in a universal typology of personality, throwing sensing out of consideration strikes me as somewhat not-quite-kosher. Sherlock Holmes and Otto von Stierlitz are simply not donor communicators — not one drop. A bottle over the head — that’s the whole of their donor communication.
On form. Using the color of the symbols as a meaningful parameter contradicts the conventions in use in our culture, so the text is perceived with very high informational resistance.
Commentary: I will not comment on anything here — it is simply an illustration of the rich fantasy of the Balzac author.
Roman, 08.01.2009, 19:51. There are only four symmetric relations — Identity, Kindred, Mirror, and Conflict. Any permutations of the colors give asymmetric relations. But what about the concept of duality? Which relations between two types are the most comfortable? As I understand it, there are none. It turns out the philosophy of this model is oriented from the outset toward group values — no gathering in groups of fewer than three :)
Roman, 09.01.2009, 13:50. In my view, it is sometimes very useful to revise so radically the meaning of seemingly familiar concepts. After all, what is “Perception”? In reality Thinking, Communication, and Activity can each be carried out both in Perception mode and in Influence mode. It is merely a matter of terminology.
I, on the contrary, am always delighted by theories that completely reformat the very foundations of our concept of the world. Another question is — what for? What philosophy and aim are embedded in quark-socionics? How will such a picture of the world change people’s motivations? Surely the authors were not merely exercising in algebra, but wanted to create a useful instrument, to launch a certain creative process in society. This is indicated both by the introduction of a very interesting concept — Spontaneity — and, as I noted above, by the demolition of the frame of Duality, of Dualization as the comfortable coexistence of two individualistic pictures of the world, and the reorientation toward group values.
Commentary: The authors were quite specifically having a laugh — and elsewhere they did not conceal it.
Vadim Rumyantsev, 10.01.2009, 3:28. I propose we not confuse the productive (donor) and acceptor functions with Perception — things are tangled enough here as it is.
Commentary: They’ve worn the poor zoo elephant out, the rascals…
When I am engaged in smelling the fresh taiga air at the Krasnoyarsk Stolby and admiring the blooming globeflowers, is that Thinking, Communication, or Activity?
Commentary: The comrade doesn’t get it…
Roman, 10.01.2009, 17:41. Careful study of the TIM examples leads to the thought that the Ethics and Sensing of traditional socionics have been merged, with equal rights, into a single Communication. Accordingly, “smelling the taiga air” is Communication-Dynamics. Paired with Thinking, Communication is Ethics; paired with Activity, it is Sensing. For 12 TIMs of traditional socionics there is a correspondence, while four ethical-sensing TIMs have passed into the category of Spontaneers. All this is of course quite conditional, since exact correspondence should not, in principle, exist. Let us wait for the respected authors of the concept to give a fuller description of all nine aspects and generally of everything modestly called “pragmatics” and placed at the very end.
Commentary: So some were found who got taken in after all… — but beautifully.
Vadim Rumyantsev, 10.01.2009, 22:49. Formally I arrived at the same answer from the table of tri-aspects. But then one must at the very least begin by defining Communication. Because in Shchedrovitsky, to whom the reference goes, Communication, as far as I know, is defined entirely differently — as the joint thought-activity of several subjects. Communication with the air, per Shchedrovitsky, is impossible.
And this is doubly less simple than it seems at first glance, since, generalizing the concept of information-energy exchange, we will at best arrive at the concept of relation (i.e., any white socionic aspect), while generalizing black ethics, white ethics, black sensing, and white sensing among themselves, we will arrive at nothing at all (which is in fact what Pereslegin writes, saying that the tri-aspects are irreducible to ordinary aspects).
Commentary: Lads, don’t sweat it. By means of spontaneous-communicative thought-activity anything is possible — especially for a Balzac.
In short, in his socionic syntagmatics Pereslegin quotes Sedykh’s definitions of the aspects, and with those everything is clear and systematic. But in tri-socionic syntagmatics there are no systematic definitions of the aspects — and so, without definitions, there is as it were nothing further to discuss.
Commentary: Well yes, nothing — but that’s in reality; in the virtual realm, as much as you like.
Papa-San, 11.01.2009, 14:34. Shchedrovitsky mentioned that the goal of Communication is always Agreement. Unlike simple conversation, where agreement may not even be sought…
Commentary: Shch. may have mentioned anything whatsoever — but he is needed here as a stash…
Roman, 11.01.2009, 20:12. One of Igor Kalinauskas’s books mentions a personal-growth method called “The Fire Flower,” built on a classification of the organism’s energetic states — from 1A to 4D. As one of the two “coordinate axes” three energy centres are chosen: the first located, let’s say, at the lower end of the spine, the second in the region of the heart, and the third in the head. It is asserted that concentrating energy (attention, control) in the first center promotes physical activity; in the second, psycho-emotional; in the third, intellectual. Perhaps precisely such an understanding of Activity/Communication/Thinking would be the most adequate. Activity is, after all, almost Sensing; Communication almost Ethics; Thinking almost Logic. If any one of the four socionic functions can be removed from the general series, it is precisely Intuition. Intuition can be regarded as a universal algorithm for optimizing the processing and transmission of information, a metalanguage whose words are integral images of heterogeneous (multimedia, one might say) content, and which a logician, an ethicist, and a sensor can command equally. Possibly the mechanism of intuition can even be considered the prototype of a third signal system.
Commentary: Surely not a Balzac? These people can connect anything with anything and fill any abracadabra with content — after all, their introverted intuition sits in the IVF position (imperative-temporal function).
Quietus, 12.01.2009, 4:43. Hurrah! I’ve understood something!
Commentary: So such people exist too…
Alexey, 15.01.2009, 16:22. The development of the theory seems to me to be in the right direction. It reflects reality more accurately than classical socionics. The following defects of the classics are absent:
1) the scheme is genuinely more comprehensible than Augustinavichiute’s (that one I still haven’t understood). 2) absence of binarity (people, after all, are not digits). 3) the relations of complement are not extolled. Absolute complementarity, in my opinion, does not exist — at least, in relation to myself I have seen no such people :). It is interesting what Pereslegin calls the relations of complement: Quasi-conflict. In my opinion this is very exact.
Now the criticism. 1) overloaded with terms. Quasi-, meta-, ontology, syntagmatics, etc. For many of these words an ordinary person has to reach for a dictionary :). It seems to me one could after all have tried to set it out in plain Russian. 2) it suffers badly from the possibility of double interpretation of many of the words used in unfolding the content (like thinking, development, statics, etc.). Almost all the previous critical remarks here stem from this defect. For example, that Sherlock Holmes is not a donor communicator — maybe the authors simply understand the words donor, communicator, and their combination differently. It seems to me it would have been better not to try to pin down key words but to clarify each concept with a brief example. 3) the TIM examples presuppose the reader’s wide acquaintance with science fiction and TV series. Couldn’t people known to everyone (actors, politicians) have been given as examples?
All the same, many thanks to the author for his labor. In my opinion, people need it :). I hope for the development of this direction.
Commentary: The bogatyrs of thought-activity have not yet died out in Rus…
Alexey, 15.01.2009, 16:57. What remains vexingly unclear to me: Why precisely the division into statics, dynamics, and spontaneity? Why is spontaneity separated from dynamics? Statics and dynamics are the opposition of motion and rest. How can something third be inscribed into an opposition? Maybe something else is meant?
Commentary: Alexey, you’ve been taken for a ride on concepts — feel that state through, and you will acquire new experience; step outside the frame of banal conceptual schemes. Incidentally, this is a remarkable psychotechnique for limbering up the intuition: filling the meaningless with meaning and de-meaning the meaningful. For Balzacs this is paradise and nirvana.
Evgeny, 16.01.2009, 18:06. Straight away a question: what if I up and changed my TIM? I.e., I can consciously pass from one type of perception to another, juggling them as it were. Am I lying, then?! Explain, please.
Commentary: That is your personal affair — if you choose to consider that you are lying, then you are lying; but thanks to quarcionics one can always choose the terms in such a way that you will simply be incapable of saying anything but the truth. Well, as in court.
Orlov, 18.01.2009, 1:26. I read the article with enormous pleasure. Dear Sergei, could you give an example of matrix operations with TIMs and their relations? For example, what matrix records Dumas with Gabin, and what is the matrix of their relations? This is completely unclear from the article. Thank you.
Commentary: Now that’s a passionary! With people like this, no Western intelligence services can frighten us.
Alexey, 20.01.2009, 14:35. I keep thinking about this article :). The following analogy came to mind. This model, in relation to Augustinavichiute’s model, is something like introducing a new coordinate system into the old space (that is how I understood the article’s mathematics). For example, like Cartesian coordinates and polar ones. But then attempts to reduce the new functions to the old ones are incorrect ((this is true, and it is good that you understand it)). For example, how would the phrase “the abscissa X in the Cartesian system is roughly the same as the radius R in the polar one” sound? Amusing.
Commentary: A good counterexample — but you won’t embarrass the Balzacs with it. They are capable of equating anything whatsoever to anything else, then proving the legitimacy of that act, and then proving the opposite — but the main thing is that there will be deep meaning in it. And what more do people need?
Likewise, “Logic” cannot by itself be matched either with “Thinking” or with “Activity” — in my view these are different things in principle.
Commentary: In principle — yes; but in quarcionics — no.
Vadim Rumyantsev, 21.01.2009, 1:32. Alexey, all that is clear — only, a definition of white logic exists, and a definition of black logic also exists, and both are even quoted here; whereas the definition of communication suitable for this article (and likewise of thinking and activity) remains a mystery to the reader.
Commentary: But not to a Balzac…
Vadim Rumyantsev, 27.01.2009, 12:37. ( (WS, BE, BL, WI) * ((1 0 0 0) (0 0 1 0) (0 1 0 0) (0 0 0 1)) )^T = (WS, BL, BE, WI)
Commentary: A beautiful inscription — it could adorn even a gravestone.
Vadim Rumyantsev, 27.01.2009, 12:58. Properly speaking, of course, one ought in this article to have written out the eight-dimensional vector, as Ru rightly noted, because for four-dimensional vectors in the matrix-tensor formalism the author, in order to avoid dealing with sums, has to introduce the artificial rule “the product of a black aspect and a white one equals zero,” which, in my view, follows from nothing at all. It is completely unclear why precisely the pairs of black and white aspects are singled out in this way from among all pairs of aspects complementary in two traits.
Commentary: Well, if this were also comprehensible, it would be beyond price. Understanding here is of a strictly virtual character: some understand one thing, others another, and their fields never intersect. Moreover, if out of the blue you suddenly understand something different, you will at once cease to understand what you understood before. And that is one of the virtual truths of quarcionics.
Alexey, 30.01.2009, 12:22. I am very glad of the opportunity, in such an engaged company, to declare that socionics is not a science but a field of activity (like scientific communism). From a few words of Jung socionics was born (in roughly the same way as “developed socialism” was born in the 1970s from the words of Lenin). I assert that these theories have identical value. Arguments:
1. The old theories of human types (astrological types, Galen’s theory) treat the people under study more cautiously (per Galen, a person may be, say, a sanguine — but may also have a balanced character, which in socionics is impossible in principle). Either an intuitive or a sensor — and this rigidity prevents its practical application. Have you noticed how many theoretical works on socionics there are, while foundational practical ones simply do not exist?
Commentary: Tell me your TIM and I will tell you how you understand socionics.
2. What I call foundational practical works: before beginning profound constructions, one should find a firm base — do all researchers understand the words “intuitive,” “logician,” and all the rest identically? Is a situation possible in which one socionist types a person one way and another differently? To what extent can one speak of replicability of results in socionics? I have seen no such works — please point me to some. I doubt that different socionists would identically determine the TIM of real people — I think the percentage of agreement would not exceed 30–40. The indeterminacy of the basic concepts (in many ways a plus) — some observant person spotted a real human type (possibly existing only in Russia) and, having “determined” its TIM, now combs everyone vaguely similar with that same comb (while another socionist’s original observation may be different). In practical usefulness your occupation approaches financial management, yielding to astrology (pure socionic types are few in real life — well, in books, yes… book characters neither change nor resist…).
Commentary: Everyone passes through this.
3. Has no one considered that the basic coordinate system in socionics may be non-orthogonal? In that case most nontrivial assertions would have to be hedged with so many reservations that they would be extremely hard to read… On this topic too there are no works… I am not saying your basic coordinate system is non-orthogonal; I am saying you have many coordinate systems — as many as there are people doing socionics (and among them there are non-orthogonal ones).
Commentary: In algebra I understand what orthogonality is; but as regards concepts, strict definitions are needed — without them there is nothing even to discuss.
4. Everything said in pts. 2–3 applies also to the new concepts introduced in the article — the author divides Ego and Superego lengthwise, and I divide them crosswise, and no one will prove me wrong: the etalon is absent (as are unambiguously understood rules for determining said etalon). And replicability of results and their unambiguous understanding are too good a pair of scientific qualities to simply up and renounce (if we want to do science, that is).
Commentary: It is entirely unproductive to begin a discussion from the middle — only by beginning from the beginning can one gain a chance of reaching agreement.
But everyone is carried away by theory, and such trifles are beneath attention…
Commentary: Clearly, such a thing could be said only by the bearer of a TIM whose introverted thinking sits in the CCF (conservative-critical function) or the MMF (motivational-mobilizational function).
Reader: But all the authors — of socionics, of characterology, and of all other similar systems — fail to answer one crucial question: who decided (or proved), and when, that a person’s type of perception never changes? On what grounds have you so constrained us all? Observing small children, one may notice that sometimes something like an additional intense attention switches on in a child (if something happening nearby interests him) — then what was seen/experienced is thought over, and the child’s behavior afterward changes noticeably. The same can happen with an adult (only more rarely) — and it does happen. Incidentally, from what age is the TIM fixed? What — after that moment a person’s development is impossible?
Awaiting answers.
Commentary: The man is standing at the wellsprings of the scientific approach — but wants to get everything at once, right now.
Reader: Gentlemen socionists, have you really not yet grasped that the method and the theory must be selected to fit the TIM?
Vadim Rumyantsev, 31.01.2009, 14:15. Statistics on convergence here: http://www.famo.ru//etalon.php
As for the immutability of type — that is simply an experimentally observed fact. Nothing in the socionic model requires immutability of type.
Commentary: This is a mistake due to lack of information…
On orthogonality, see this very article. Why Aushra used socionics is a question for Aushra.
Alexey, 06.02.2009, 19:06. I answer:
1. That is not statistics: what is studied is a list of “well-known people about whose types there are no serious disagreements, i.e., the majority of well-known socionists assign them to one socionic type…” If you aim to create a universal method of TIM determination, then the disagreements of the “well-known socionists” are the first thing to study! And if you pre-clean the sample and then discard part of the results (or introduce weights), you can prove anything whatsoever. Conclusion: for 8% of the list, the “well-known socionists” determine the TIM without large deviations. Isn’t that a bit little? Refute me (perhaps I have not entirely understood the method), give another link, or admit that a unified coordinate system in socionics does not exist.
Commentary: One should read more!
Vadim Rumyantsev, 08.02.2009, 22:27. I, in my ignorance, learned of Gabin only from socionics. Not to mention that as personalities I picture many of the prototypes very poorly — and it doesn’t matter, because they might not even have had the socionic types named in their honor. Remove the pseudonyms and nothing changes.
Commentary: People are trying to figure things out…
The socionic model is based on fundamental properties of the semantics of information (or our notions of such). Semantics is calibrated by three contradictions — that is, it is three-dimensional. Therefore it is entirely unimportant whether the person being typed is from Pakistan, Guinea, Alpha Centauri, or a computer program. If some system performs semantic processing of information, then at every moment of time it has a socionic type of information metabolism. Possibly an inhabitant of Alpha Centauri, brought up in a different system of philosophical notions, would divide information into a different 8 aspects and, accordingly, divide reasoning beings into a different 16 types (and Pereslegin here has tried to go even further). But this in no way prevents us from typing that alien researcher within our socionic model.
The proposal to improve socionics with careful formulations I wholly support.
Commentary: These are people one can take one’s bearings from.
Reader: I think the same can be said of psychiatry, psychology, and in general all fields of knowledge that study the human brain. It is too complex a thing to be written out with mathematical rigor. Interpretations, subjectivism, associations, etc. will remain in any case.
That socionics as a field of activity or a science (as you like) suffers from this — that is true. But in my view it is unavoidable, given the specifics of the subject.
However, this does not mean it cannot be used in practice. How? The main benefit of socionics is that it helps one make peace with reality — not to fight what one cannot defeat. That is no small thing. Strange as it may seem, wealthy people not infrequently pay a psychotherapist decent money precisely for this.
It’s not quarks you all should be busying yourselves with, but thinking about why the theory diverges from practice at its foundation.
Considering the number of exalted specimens of both sexes grazing on this meadow (nothing personal — I just browsed around the socionics sites), the situation is hopeless: easier to shoot the patient (IMHO).
Alexey Podchufarov, 12.02.2009, 21:32. The socionic model is based on the fundamental assumption that your simplification reflects the nature of the psyche well. As experience shows, this simplification is unfortunate and stalls all too often (sometimes it works). A living refutation of socionics is G. Kasparov (I am not an admirer of his). His logic is strong, and the emotional side of his personality is no less strong. By your theory, it is either the one or the other; in practice, the one does not exclude the other — i.e., the two properties cannot be plotted on a single coordinate axis (at least, not always).
Commentary: The socionic model is not a simplification — it reflects a fundamental regularity of the psyche’s design and is a fundamental discovery, which the not-very-educated, and sometimes the very educated, fail to understand while thinking it all very simple.
It seems I understand socionics correctly…
Commentary: That is not known…
Vik, 27.02.2009, 14:43. 1. A valuable article. Above all, it allows one to view socionics “from a bird’s flight.”
2. It has always seemed to me (and factor analysis of experiments confirmed it) that the fourth function is superfluous — it arose purely for balance. Greater connectedness is given to the model by the division people : things : ideas.
3. In particular, an example: the question is asked, “But where is the relation of duality?” The answer following from this article: “The relation of duality is a property not of reality but of the binary model of classical socionics. In the case of the three-dimensional model, elementary groups should be assembled from three, not two.”
4. This enriches the standard series of relations, allowing elementary cycles to be included in it (in socionics, cycles are second-order relations and not as natural).
5. In terms of distinguishing situations this is also a merit. Recall the Kelly grid and the methods of working with it, which from the outset included precisely triadic relations of similarity-difference. This allowed people to generate properties in the simplest way.
Commentary: An example of hasty identification.
6. I also consider valuable the concrete way of accounting for the aspect characteristics of the environment. In general, the influence of the environment on intertype relations is catastrophically underestimated in socionics. IMHO, the choice of communicative function is to a considerable degree determined by the environment; i.e., any use of a weak function as the main one is compelled by the environment and by nothing else. Pereslegin brilliantly shows how to account for this in formulas rather than as mere vibrations of air.
Commentary: Look how many opinions quarcionics has provoked — for that alone it was worth inventing.
Conclusion [on Pereslegin]
Of course, Pereslegin’s quarcionics is a theoretical joke. By the large account, it does not withstand methodological scrutiny. But the very idea of playing with three poles is interesting and deserves attention. Can three-pole systems exist in reality? Well, there is such a thing as three-phase current… But that is merely a technical refinement, and current itself has only two poles. As for Shchedrovitsky’s triad, it is an empirical construct, made for the occasion. There exists no proof that the three categories of this construct form a complete set. And in the set Statics, Dynamics, Spontanics, the last category has been artificially attached — which means one could go on attaching further items. For example, some sort of Relaxonics, providing a smooth transition between statics and dynamics. Or, say, Virtuonics, transferring the other categories onto an unreal plane where they can trade places and completely change their essence — when, for example, statics becomes dynamics and dynamics statics. Of course, there are people for whom this is hard to imagine; but there are also those for whom it is elementary.
What matters is that the three-pole system be real, not invented — for everything built on the invented will itself be invented.
Well, all right — but what about the Trinity? Alas, that is a truncated set: it lacks a fourth element. It is there, but masked for special reasons. It is the Mother of God. In short, if you come up with a real three-pole system, come to me — we’ll discuss it.
On the whole, though, one must give Pereslegin his due — his creative potential proved to be at its height. But fantasy still needs to be controlled by reality. So that, you know, the result may be real. But I respect Balzacs all the same…
Literature
- Feldman Ya., Theory of Levels, Moscow, “Chornaya Belka,” 2005.
- Pereslegin S., Quarcionics, Internet resource.
Translator’s notes: TIM = type of information metabolism; ILI = “Balzac,” LIE = “Jack London,” ILE = “Don Quixote” in socionics nickname convention. “TUFTA” (ТУФТА) is a Russian slang word for “baloney/rubbish” — the author’s mock acronym is a pun. “Некузяво” (“not-quite-kosher”) is a nonce word from Lyudmila Petrushevskaya’s nonsense tale “Puski byatye.” The function labels IVF/CCF/MMF are the commentator’s own jargon, glossed as given in the original.