Measurement-Omission

[jackcousins]

Is it fair to say that all one has to do in order to gain conceptual knowledge is constantly omit the measurement of entities? If one simply omits the measurement of everything does one gain a conceptual knowledge of "everything"? How can one actively omit measurement of every physical or mental entity that comes into one's awareness? What is this process? How does one omit-measurement? I think that this is the key to becoming the type of hero that Rand portrays in her novel. The principle of measurement omission is possibly the idea with the greatest potential to expand humanity and lead it into a future of exponential growth yet so little work is done on this idea and the only work that has been done on it is a chapter a some lines in OPAR and ItOE. I know this seems very primacy of conciousness and Platonic, but I would greatly appreciate any thoughts on the subject and I believe that a greater understanding of this single principle could efficiently increase our knowledge of objectivism, practicality, the universe, or any subject we see fit, and could benefit our live in a very real way. Please respond with any criticism of this post. Any personal experieces and first hand knowledge of/with the measurement-omission principle would be perfect, and any insight of thought provoking questions or comments would be great. I pledge my active participation.

 

Cheers, Jack

[Brant Gaede]

Is it fair to say that all one has to do in order to gain conceptual knowledge is constantly omit the measurement of entities? If one simply omits the measurement of everything does one gain a conceptual knowledge of "everything"? How can one actively omit measurement of every physical or mental entity that comes into one's awareness? What is this process? How does one omit-measurement? I think that this is the key to becoming the type of hero that Rand portrays in her novel. The principle of measurement omission is possibly the idea with the greatest potential to expand humanity and lead it into a future of exponential growth yet so little work is done on this idea and the only work that has been done on it is a chapter a some lines in OPAR and ItOE. I know this seems very primacy of conciousness and Platonic, but I would greatly appreciate any thoughts on the subject and I believe that a greater understanding of this single principle could efficiently increase our knowledge of objectivism, practicality, the universe, or any subject we see fit, and could benefit our live in a very real way. Please respond with any criticism of this post. Any personal experieces and first hand knowledge of/with the measurement-omission principle would be perfect, and any insight of thought provoking questions or comments would be great. I pledge my active participation.

Cheers, Jack

You don't omit measurement in science; if you do it's only philosophy. You cannot become a Randian hero as in the totality of what is depicted; no one can. If you understood those heroes a little better you wouldn't want to. But live a life of integrity and the rest that will follow will dress you out nicely. Being and living rational is a part of that. Mix in the necessary courage.

--Brant

hey, those heroes had a hell of a lot going for them!

[Guyau]

Hello, Jack Cousins and welcome to OL. I read your Profile. You are quite a reader. I wish you the best in philosophical learning, career, and love.

Concerning Rand’s measurement-omission theory of concepts, I have contributed some development, which is reprinted here. That work originally appeared here. There is great potential for further development of this theory within the grand program underway known as the computational theory of mind. I agree that Rand’s theory is important: a, b, c, d, e.

—Stephen

[merjet]

Any personal experieces and first hand knowledge of/with the measurement-omission principle would be perfect, and any insight of thought provoking questions or comments would be great.

Here is another JARS article on the topic. Welcome to OL.

[Xray]

Is it fair to say that all one has to do in order to gain conceptual knowledge is constantly omit the measurement of entities?

I don't think so. For one has to mentally retain the characteristics of entities too in order to establish categories.

Imo Rand's whole theory of concepts is about something very basic actually: it is about forming lexical classes and subclasses, or, in linguistic terminology, about the relation of hypernyms to hyponyms. 'Furniture" for example is the hypernym of the hyponym 'table'.

All human beings not mentally/ language-impaired are effortlessly able to achieve this stage of "conceptual awareness" in the course of their cognitive development.

If one simply omits the measurement of everything does one gain a conceptual knowledge of "everything"?

How can one actively omit measurement of every physical or mental entity that comes into one's awareness?

If, for example, you stand in front of a mountain (and already know what the essential characteristics of a mountain are), you don't have to measure its exact height in order to come ot the concusion that 'mountain' is the adequate linguistic label for the object.

What is this process? How does one omit-measurement? I think that this is the key to becoming the type of hero that Rand portrays in her novel.

I can't see any connection between measurement-omission and becoming a Randian type of hero. It would interest me why you think this is the key.

[BaalChatzaf]

How does one do measurement omission on the class of non-metric topological spaces?

ba'al Chatzaf

[merjet]

How does one do measurement omission on the class of non-metric topological spaces?

That's easy to answer. If you have a cup of unsweetened coffee, you omit sugar.

[Guyau]

How does one do measurement omission on the class of non-metric topological spaces?

. . .

Bob, the conjecture I endorse, a conjecture implicitly presupposed in Rand’s stronger conjecture, is that one can classify all concretes into one-dimensional or multidimensional concept classes having at least the structure of a uniform topological lattice. Though every dimension will afford at least ordinal scaling, it need not afford metric structure.

Merlin would not want to count ordinal scales as measurement scales. Similarly, on his view, ordered geometry and affine geometry should not pass muster as multidimensional measurement systems. I do count ordinal and other scales on up to ratio scale as measurement scales, I count ordered geometry and affine geometry as measurement systems, and in all of that I’m in league with the principal measurement theorists of the last few decades.* Even if one did not think of ordinal ranking as measurement, it would remain that it takes the set structures the theorists have found for it, going beyond the structure for counting (absolute scaling). This makes Rand’s conjecture (her analysis conjecture presupposed by her formation conjecture) and mine (weaker than hers) an addition to the simple substitution-unit standing of instances under a concept that is common to pretty much all theories of concepts or universals.

. . .

I remarked previously, taking issue with Rand, as follows:


. . .


There are indeed some indispensable concepts we should not expect to be susceptible to being cast under a measurement-omission form of concepts. Among these would be the logical constants such as negation, conjunction, or disjunction. The different occasions of these concepts are substitution units under them, but the occasions under these concepts are not with any measure values along dimensions, not with any measure values on any measure scale having the structure of ordinal scale or above. Similarly, it would seem that logical concepts on which the fundamental concepts of set theory and mathematical category theory rely have substitution units, but not measure-value units at ordinal or above. The membership concept, back of substitution units and sets, hence back of concepts, is also a concept whose units are only substitution units. Indeed, all of the logical concepts required as presupposition of arithmetic and measurement have only substitution units. Still, to claim that all concretes can be subsumed under some concept(s) other than those, said concept(s) having not only substitution units, but measure values at ordinal or above, is a very substantial claim about all concrete particulars. 
. . .

(See also here.)



I said earlier in this addendum that in Rand’s philosophy objective meaningfulness requires the setting of identity by definition. I say further: Some logical and set-theoretic concepts—not, or, and, all, some, set—are defined by implicit definitions, a specification of their roles supporting meaning and truth of propositions, displayed most essentially in the propositions of logic and mathematics themselves. To be sure, these concepts are rooted in structures of action and situation learned in child development. (Notice also that some functions of these concepts can be implemented in machines.) Later they are rarified for use in language and abstract thought. (On action origins, see a, b. On Piaget’s perspective, see the contributions of Smith, Boom, and Campbell here. On acquisition of logical notions in language acquisition, see a, b, c, c´.)



The concept collection is not the very same as the concept set as the latter is used in logic or mathematics. Then too, logical class membership, which is used in Rand’s explication of conceptual class, is not the very same as natural-species membership such as Silver’s belonging to the horse species. Validity of the concept natural-species membership is not the full warrant for the concept class membership.



Perfecting the meaning and warrant of the concept class membership will not rely on a measure-value omission. Substitution units are not to be analyzed in terms of measure-value units. The concepts from logic and mathematics that are required for an analysis of measurement, thence measurement omission, are not to be analyzed in terms of the latter. That is why I have held, contrary to Rand, that certain logical and set-theoretic concepts are not to be analyzed in terms of measure-value omission, which is the explanatory structure distinctive of Rand’s analysis of concepts. It remains that the proposal to analyze all other concepts in terms of measurement omission (at least to the level of ordinal measurement) is a substantial, definite, meaningful, and meaning-giving proposal.





[Brant Gaede]

How does one do measurement omission on the class of non-metric topological spaces?

That's easy to answer. If you have a cup of unsweetened coffee, you omit sugar.

And the Andromeda Galaxy.

--Brant