Xaq Pitkow
<no home page yet...>
231 Perkins Hall
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138
AFFILIATIONS
Program in Biophysics at Harvard University
Alumnus of Princeton University in the department of Physics
HOW I FOUND YOU
I searched the Web for "superorganism" and the Global Brain group
appeared.
INTEREST:
Ever since reading Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke, I've been
captivated by the idea of Gaia or the global being. Of course, initially
it was a rather fanciful idea; vaguely plausible but more like science
fiction than science fact.
Now, however, I think that the superorganism is not merely hypothesis but
reality. When I drop my old notions about how Gaia might behave and I
start looking at the global system, letting it tell ME its properties
rather than vice versa, I see complex systems that must inevitably be
described as emergent, unified entities. Much of the perceived "softness"
of the concept I think might be a result of the language difficulties
ascribing intentionality to the superorganism, and the huge time scales
involved in any superorganismic activities. Really, though, we have the
same difficulties ascribing intentionality to our fellow humans, and it's
merely through repetition and convention and pragmatism that we accept
other people as having minds and intentions: we have no direct knowledge.
Looking for a mind in a superbeing is just like looking for a mind in a
conventional being, and just as reductionist materialism seems to fail in
explaining our own brains, a reductionist ecologicalism seems to fail in
explaining the global brain.
My field of study is Biophysics, which I chose because of the breadth of
topics of investigation. I'm intrigued by so many levels that no single
discipline satisfied me. I'm trying to choose between topics ranging from
the evolutionary genetic archives in our unexpressed DNA, to the signal
paths of a cell like E.coli as it blindly tumbles and swims towards food,
to the information processing of the brain in the spirit of William
Bialek. Logically extending this series of complexities towards
larger scales, I naturally end up considering the systems of the global
organism(s). The techniques involved in understanding any one of these
complexity scales have great potential if applied to the others.
I am very happy to see that a group of scholars and scientists have
established a serious forum to discuss these ideas, and I would love to
experience or be a (prudently contributing) part of the emerging
understanding.
<It feels disconcerting to be aware of being unaware of being a "cell"...>
I hope to have a fruitful dialogue with your group. Thanks for your
consideration.
-xaq pitkow
--BLR25150.906618528/mail.binghamton.edu--