Category Archives: fourfolds

architectonics, fourfolds, Philosophy, sixteenfolds

The Archic Matrix

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Now that I am presenting sixteen-folds, let me briefly return to a subject I’ve mentioned previously. The Archic Matrix of Walter Watson and David Dilworth is a four-by-four matrix representing different aspects of the “personalities” of philosophers, determined by their writings. It is adapted from the Philosophical Semantics of philosopher Richard McKeon.

The four aspects of the Archic Matrix (also called Archic Variables) in this diagram are Perspective (upper left), Reality (lower left), Method (upper right), and Principle (lower right). The archic variable Perspective can have values Personal, Agonistic, Existential, and Creative, and similarly for the other three variables.

Each of the values of each of the variables is conditioned by one of the variables. For example, Personal is only conditioned by the Archic Variable Perspective, even though it is already a value of that variable. The value Agonistic is conditioned by the Archic Variable Method, Existential by Reality, and Creative by Principle.

Whereas the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is a two-by-four matrix giving sixteen different combinations for its four personality “variables”, each having two values, the four-by-four Archic Matrix has four values for each of four variables and so gives 256 different combinations. It would be interesting if someone mapped the larger scheme into the smaller.

Further Reading:

Walter Watson and David Dilworth’s Archic Matrix

Archic Matrix: Perspectives

Archic Matrix: Realities

Archic Matrix: Methods

Archic Matrix: Principles

Richard McKeon’s Aspects of Knowing

http://www.ottobwiersma.nl/philosophy/archic_matrix.php

http://wwwhistoricalthreads.blogspot.com/2010/07/walter-watson-architectonics-of-meaning.html

http://www.philosophicalprofile.org/test/index.php

Notes:

The only work that seems to mention both the Archic Matrix and Myers-Briggs is as follows:

Mondo Secter / The Architectonics of Culture: A Critique, Modification, and Extension of Hofstede’s Study of Societal Culture with a Chinese-Based Typology, Ph.D. Dissertation, Simon Fraser University, August 2003

Click to access b31853754.pdf

Secter is elsewhere mentioned to be completing an adaption of this dissertation (albeit long ago), called “The Architectonics of Culture and Personality: Six Core Dimensions of Who We Are”. It would useful to know anything else about this work. Updates, anyone?

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fourfolds, Physics, sixteenfolds

The Standard Model of Particle Physics

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Until a few years ago, the Standard Model of particle physics had sixteen particles verified. Recently, the Higgs Boson was added, so just imagine another triangle hanging off somewhere. Or, alternately, one may combine the Z and W Bosons when adding the Higgs, so a sixteen-fold scheme is maintained.

Also, the Standard Model is much more than a list of these seventeen particles and their attributes. Not shown are a plethora of equations that describe the properties of these entities and their interactions.

I admit that this diagram is not very useful for scientific knowledge, but the reader may contemplate it as they please.

Further Reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Model

https://home.cern/about/physics/standard-model

https://physics.info/standard/

Also:

Can We Understand the Standard Model?

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fourfolds, sixteenfolds

The Diurnal Cycle and Chinese Hours

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Long ago in a distant land, I, Aku… wait… let me start over.

Long ago in China, the diurnal cycle of day, dusk, night, and dawn was divided into twelve two-hour hours and each hour was named after an animal in the Chinese Zodiac. The Hour of the Rat was from 11 P.M. to 1 A.M., and so on. These animals were also assigned directions: Rat being North, Ox being NNE, etc. Many are familiar with the animals having “years”, so if you were born in a certain animal’s year, you might have certain attributes. These twelve animals are certainly multi-purpose!

Further Reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diurnal_cycle

https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Zodiac

https://www.thoughtco.com/chinese-zodiac-in-mandarin-2278416

The Diurnal Cycle

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Esoteric, fourfolds, sixteenfolds, Space and Time, twelvefolds

The Seasons and the Zodiac

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This isn’t a bad little diagram of the four seasons along with the twelve zodiac names and symbols. However, it might be oriented wrong by convention or going clockwise instead of counter-clockwise.  Interestingly, old horoscope charts that show what was in the sky (the positions of the zodiac stars and the eight or nine planets in regards to the twelve “astrological houses”) at the time of a person’s birth were shown using the outside ring of twelve triangles instead of the more familiar circle that is used today. The inner square might be for notes or some nice drawing.

Further Reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zodiac

https://www.completehoroscope.org/envelope-diagram-horoscope.htm

The Four Seasons

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fourfolds, Science, sixteenfolds

Ohm’s Law

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Unfortunately it has finally come to this: enter the sixteenfolds!

  • Voltage = V = P/I = sqrt(P·R) = I·R
  • Resistance = R = V^2/P = V/I = P/I^2
  • Current = I = V/R = sqrt(P/R) = P/V
  • Power = P = I^2·R = V·I = V^2/R

Further Reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohm%27s_law

Ohm’s Law

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fourfolds

Free Four

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One, two, free, four!

— Pink Floyd

There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.

— Origin unknown

In the United States of America we celebrated freedom on July 4th. Here are four free or not so free things.

It is useful to consider Richard McKeon’s words on freedom from his Philosophic Semantics and Philosophic Inquiry:

The question, What is freedom? is one of the recurrent ambiguous questions of philosophy which has opened up new dimensions in contemporary thought and action. It is a significant question because the initial interpretation, “freedom is the absence of external impediments to action,” focuses attention on the need to remove the ambiguities of “absence”, “external”, “impediments”, and “actions” and the growing host of ambiguities in each clarifying statement. The semantic scheme constructed from the modes of thought sets forth, thus far (see chart p.253), three sets of determinations of the question, What is freedom? What is freedom in fact or interpretation, What things are free?; What is freedom in thought or method, What property do free things share?; What is freedom in being or principle, What are the grounds of the possibility or the actuality of freedom? The question takes on a vast scope of meanings under these distinctions; and since a complete interpretation of the question makes use of all four semantic headings, the number is increased by the number of possible combinations of the four. The indefinitely large number of possible meanings is the source of the richness of philosophic inquiry, for each interpretation may be used as the hypothesis for further investigation.

Further Reading:

Click to access McK-PhilosophicSemantics&Inquiry.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freethought

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_market

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_lunch

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_ain%27t_no_such_thing_as_a_free_lunch

Also:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_wants_to_be_free

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_the_press

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Bird

Four Freedoms

The Four Freedoms

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fourfolds, Politics

The Eisenhower Matrix

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What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.

— Dwight Eisenhower, 34th President of the USA.

For your self improvement, here is a simple two by two matrix that can help you decide how to prioritize your “To Do” list. Sort everything into four groups, depending on whether it is important or not, and whether it is urgent or not:

  • Important & Urgent : Do First
  • Not Important & Urgent : Delegate
  • Important & Not Urgent : Do Later
  • Not Important & Not Urgent : Eliminate

Further Reading:

https://blog.trello.com/eisenhower-matrix-productivity-tool-trello-board?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=paid-content&utm_content=trello-blog-4&utm_campaign=trello_pocket_sponsor-content-h218

Other images of the Eisenhower Matrix:

https://www.google.com/search?q=eisenhower+matrix&tbm=isch

[*10.120]

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fourfolds, Mathematics, Science, technology

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics

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STEM: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. We often hear that these areas of education and expertise are critical for the development of our modern society. To attract students to these fields, banners and logos are full of bright colors and crisp graphics. In comparison, above is my rather dull diagram. Not very enticing, is it?

Some are now adding Arts to the four, giving STEAM. I think the Arts are important of course, but fives don’t go with my oeuvre.

In addition, I give you a diagram with Chinese substituted for English (科學 技術 工程 數學).

Further Reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science,_technology,_engineering,_and_mathematics

https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=science+technology+engineering+mathematics

[*10.110]

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fourfolds

Wan Shou Wu Jiang

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While eating out the other day I noticed a melamine plate with an interesting fourfold arrangement of Chinese characters on it. After asking the waitress what they meant and she didn’t know, I decided to figure them out using “the internet”. I first tried to use a photo of one of the characters with Google translate, but that didn’t seem to work. Next I tried several “draw the character” websites like Mobilefish, but those are tricky and require you to draw the strokes of the character in the correct sequence. Finally, with some success I was able to determine that the characters “Wan Shou Wu Jiang” (wàn shòu wú jiāng or 萬壽無疆) mean “infinite long life”, and are on many Chinese tableware, both antique and everyday.

I have to say I think representing fourfolds with such tidy logograms is quite beautiful and I would enjoy seeing my diagrams translated into them.

Further Reading:

Some notes on Wan Shou Wu Jiang (万寿无疆) Porcelains since the Late Qing period

http://gotheborg.com/glossary/wanshouwujiang.shtml

https://www.mobilefish.com/services/chinese_handwriting_recognition/chinese_handwriting_recognition.php

https://www.google.com/search?q=萬壽無疆&tbm=isch

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fourfolds

A General Theory of Value, Part 2

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What is value?

In his unpublished book “A General Theory of Value”, architect Michael Benedikt argues for a information-theoretic account of value, defining value as follows:

The theory of value offered in this book revolves around three propositions: first, that positive value is attributed to that which preserves or creates more life; second, that “lifefulness” is characterized by a particular quantity and combination of complexity and organization; and third, that in the case of human societies and minds, achieving this optimal quantity and combination of complexity and organization depends on the quality and flow of information among people, and between people and their less-animate environment—plants, animals, buildings, places, things.

It is fascinating that the things that are alive and the products of these lives obtain the highest calculated value of “complexity and organization”.

In order to begin to quantify value, a measurement of the complexity and a measurement of the organization of an entity or system is required. It is worth noting that “not organized” does not mean “complex”, nor does “not complex” mean “organized”. Thus complexity and organization are independent of one another.

Above I have schematized Benedikt’s “Ω Plane”, which consists of two axes, organization and complexity, ranging from disorganized (chaotic) to organized, and simple to complex. “Δ Ω” is simply the measure of the increase in both complexity and organization, and points the way to “value”.

Generously, Benedikt has made his unpublished book available on his web site for all to read.

Further Reading:

Michael Benedikt / A General Theory of Value (unpublished)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Benedikt_(urbanist)

http://www.mbenedikt.com/b-o-o-k-s.html

A good resource for reading about information:

http://www.informationphilosopher.com/

Also see Cesar Hidalgo’s excellent “Why Information Grows”.

Cesar Hidalgo / Why Information Grows: The Evolution of Order, from Atoms to Economies

https://paulromer.net/why-information-grows/

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