3
In the Prologue to this book I stressed the fact that our present situation is without precedent in history. To say it once more: in all previous generations man had to come to terms with the prospect of his death as an individual; the present generation is the first to face the prospect of the death of our species. Homo sapiens arrived on the scene about a hundred thousand years ago, which is but the blinking of an eye on the evolutionary time-scale. If he were to vanish now, his rise and fall would have been a brief episode, unsung and unlamented by other inhabitants of our galaxy. We know by now that other planets in the vastness of space are humming with life; that brief episode would probably never have come to their notice.
Only a few decades ago it was generally thought that the emergence of life out of inanimate chemical compounds must have been an extremely improbable, and therefore extremely rare event, which may have occurred only once, on this privileged planet of ours, and nowhere else. It was further thought that the formation of solar systems, such as ours, was also a rare event, and that planets capable of supporting life must be even rarer. But these assumptions, flavoured by 'earth-chauvinism', have been refuted by the rapid advances of astrophysics. It is now generally accepted by astronomers that the formation of planetary systems, including inhabitable planets, is 'a common event' *; and that organic compounds, potentially capable of giving rise to life, are present both in our immediate neighbourhood, on Mars, and in the interstellar dust-clouds of distant nebulae. Moreover, a certain class of meteorites was found to contain organic materials whose spectra are the same as those of pollen-like spores in pre-Cambrian sediments. [11] Sir Fred Hoyle and his Indian colleague, Professor Chandra Wickranashinghe, proposed (in 1977) a theory, which regards 'pre-stellar molecular clouds such as are present in the Orion nebula, as the most natural "cradles" of life. Processes occurring in such clouds lead to the commencement and dispersal of biological activity in the Galaxy . . . It would now seem most likely that the transformation of inorganic matter into primitive biological systems is occurring more or less continually in the space between the stars.' [12]
* Professor Carl Sagan (Centre for Radiophysics and Space Research,
Cornell University), at the CETI Congress. 1971. CETI (Communication
with Extra-terrestrial Intelligence) was sponsored by the US National
Academy of Sciences and the Soviet Academy of Sciences and attended
by leading scientists from both countries. Its proceedings (published
by the MIT Press, 1973) represent a landmark in the study of the
problems of extraterrestrial life, and of the possible methods of
establishing contact with alien life-forms.
As for the pollen-like structures in meteorites, the authors hold it to be possible that they 'represent primitive, interstellar "proto-cells" in a state of suspended animation'. [13] At present 'some hundred tons of meteoritic material enter the earth's atmosphere every day; but in earlier geological epochs the accumulation rate may have been much higher'. Part of this material may have originated in the 'cradles of life' -- the dust-clouds pre-dating the formation of stars.
Thus the doctrines of 'terran chauvinism' have become untenable, like so many other cherished beliefs of nineteenth-century science. We are not alone in the universe -- not the only spectators in the theatre, surrounded by empty seats. On the contrary, the universe around us is teeming with life, from primitive 'proto-cells', floating in interstellar space, to millions of advanced civilizations far ahead of us -- where 'far' might mean the distance we have travelled from our reptilian or amoebic ancestry. I find this perspective comforting and exhilarating. In the first place, it is nice to know that we are not alone, that we have company out there among the stars -- so that if we vanish, it does not matter too much, and the cosmic drama will not be played out before an empty house. The thought that we are the only conscious beings in this immensity, and that if we vanish, consciousness would vanish from it, is unbearable. Vice versa, the knowledge that there are billions of beings in our galaxy, and in other galaxies, infinitely more enlightened than our poor sick selves, may lead to that humility and self-transcendence which is the source of all religious experience.
This brings me to a perhaps naive, but I think plausible consideration regarding the nature of extraterrestrial intelligences and civilizations. Terrestrial civilization (from the start of agriculture, written language, etc.) is, at a generous estimate, around 10,000 years old. To make guesses about the nature of extra-terrestrial civilizations a few million years older than ours is of course totally unrealistic. On the other hand, it is entirely reasonable to assume that sooner or later -- within, say, its first 10,000 years -- each of these civilizations would have discovered thermonuclear reactions -- i.e., met the anno zero of its own calendar. From this point onward natural selection -- or rather, the 'selective weed-killer' as I have called it -- takes over on a cosmic scale. The sick civilizations engendered by biological misfits will sooner or later act as their own executioners and vanish from their polluted planet. Those civilizations which survive this and other tests of sanity will grow, or have already grown, into a cosmic elite of demi-gods. More soberly speaking, it is a comforting thought that owing to the action of the cosmic weed-killer, only the 'goodies' among these civilizations will survive, whereas the 'baddies' will annihilate themselves. It is nice to know that the universe is a place reserved for goodies and that we are surrounded by them. The established religions take a less charitable view of the cosmic administration.*
* The oft-raised question why these advanced civilizations do not
communicate with us lies outside the scope of this book; the
reader will find a few remarks and bibliographical references on
the subject in Appendix IV.
4
I shall conclude this book with a kind of credo, the origin of which dates some forty years back, to the Spanish Civil War. In 1937 I spent several months in the Nationalists' prison in Seville, as a suspected spy, threatened with execution. [14] During that period, in solitary confinement, I had some experiences which seemed to me close to the mystics' 'oceanic feeling' and which I subsequently tried to describe in an autobiographical account.* I called those experiences 'the hours by the window'. The extract which follows, though rather loosely formulated, reflects what one may call 'an agnostic's credo':
The 'hours by the window' had filled me with a direct certainty that a
higher order of reality existed, and that it alone invested existence
with meaning. I came to call it later on 'the reality of the third
order'. The narrow world of sensory perception constituted the first
order; this perceptual world was enveloped by the conceptual world
which contained phenomena not directly perceivable, such as atoms,
electromagnetic fields or curved space. This second order of reality
filled in the gaps and gave meaning to the absurd patchiness of the
sensory world.
In the same manner, the third order of reality enveloped,
interpenetrated, and gave meaning to the second. It contained 'occult'
phenomena which could not be apprehended or explained either on the
sensory or on the conceptual level, and yet occasionally invaded them
like spiritual meteors piercing the primitive's vaulted sky. Just as
the conceptual order showed up the illusions and distortions of the
senses, so the 'third order' revealed that time, space and causality,
that the isolation, separateness and spatio-temporal limitations of
the self were merely optical illusions on the next higher level. If
illusions of the first type were taken at face value, then the sun
was drowning every night in the sea, and a mote in the eye was larger
than the moon; and if the conceptual world was mistaken for ultimate
reality,
the world became an equally absurd tale, told by an idiot
or by idiot-electrons which caused little children to be run over
by motor cars, and little Andalusian peasants to be shot through
heart, mouth and eyes, without rhyme or reason. Just as one could
not feel the pull of a magnet with one's skin, so one could not hope
to grasp in cognate terms the nature of ultimate reality. It was
a text written in invisible ink; and though one could not read it,
the knowledge that it existed was sufficient to alter the texture
of one's existence, and make one's actions conform to the text.
I liked to spin out this metaphor. The captain of a ship sets out
with a sealed order in his pocket which he is only permitted to open
on the high seas. He looks forward to that moment which will end all
uncertainty; but when the moment arrives and he tears the envelope
open, he finds only an invisible text which defies all attempts at
chemical treatment. Now and then a word becomes visible, or a figure
denoting a meridian; then it fades again. He will never know the exact
wording of the order; nor whether he has complied with it or failed
in his mission. But his awareness of the order in his pocket, even
though it cannot be deciphered, makes him think and act differently
from the captain of a pleasure-cruiser or of a pirate ship.
I also liked to think that the founders of religions, prophets,
saints and seers had at moments been able to read a fragment of the
invisible text; after which they had so much padded, dramatized and
ornamented it, that they themselves could no longer tell what parts
of it were authentic.
* The Invisible Writing (written in 1953).
APPENDICES
APPENDIX I
BEYOND ATOMISM AND HOLISM -- THE CONCEPT OF THE HOLON *
* This edited version of a paper read at the Beyond Reductionism
Symposium at Alpbach, 1968 [3], is intended as a summary of Part
One, 'Outline of a System' (Chapters I-V). Unavoidably some passages
are repetitive, others rather technical. The general reader can
safely skip Appendices I - III.
This is going to be an exercise in General Systems Theory -- which seems to be all the more appropriate as Ludwig von Bertalanffy, its founding father, sits next to me. It seems equally appropriate that I should take as my text a sentence from Ludwig's Problems of Life [1]; it reads: 'Hierarchical organization on the one hand, and the characteristics of open systems on the other, are fundamental principles of living nature.'
If we combine these two fundamental principles, and add a dash of cybernetics to them, we get a system-theoretical model of Self-regulating Open Hierarchic Order, or SOHO for short. I intend to discuss some of the properties of this SOHO model as an alternative to the S-R model of linear causation, derived from classical mechanics, which we seem to be unanimous in rejecting. I can only give here a sketchy outline of the idea, but I have tried to tabulate the axioms and propositions relating to it in a more systematic way in an appendix to my last book, [2] which I have also appended to this paper, as a sort of Tractatus Logico Hierarchicus. Some of these propositions may appear trivial, others rest on incomplete evidence, still others will need correcting or qualifying. But they may provide a basis for discussion.
HIERARCHIES AND OLD HATS
When one talks about hierarchic organization as a fundamental principle of life, one often encounters a strong emotional resistance. For one thing, hierarchy is an ugly word, loaded with ecclesiastic and military associations, and conveys to some people a wrong impression of a rigid or authoritarian structure. (Perhaps the assonance with 'hieratic', which is a quite different matter, plays a part in this confusion.) Apart from this, the term is often wrongly used to refer simply to order of rank on a linear scale or ladder (e.g. Clark Hull's 'habit-family hierarchies'). But that is not at all what the term is meant to signify. Its correct symbol is not a rigid ladder but a living tree -- a multi-levelled, stratified, out-branching pattern of organization, a system branching into sub-systems, which branch into sub-systems of a lower order, and so on; a structure encapsulating sub-structures and so on; a process activating sub-processes and so on. As Paul Weiss said yesterday: 'The phenomenon of hierarchic structure is a real one, presented to us by the biological object, and not the fiction of a speculative mind.' It is at the same time a conceptual tool, a way of thinking, an alternative to the linear chaining of events torn from their multidimensionally stratified contexts.
All complex structures and processes of a relatively stable character display hierarchic organization, and this applies regardless whether we are considering inanimate systems, living organisms, social organizations, or patterns of behaviour. The linguist who thinks primarily in terms of Chomsky's [4] hierarchic model experiences a déjà vu reaction -- as McNeill expressed it -- towards the physiologist's intracellular hierarchy; and this may equally apply to Bruner's presentation of the hierarchic structure of voluntary action. In this essential respect -- and in others that I shall mention -- these processes in widely different fields are indeed isomorphic. The hierarchic tree diagram may serve equally well to represent the branching out of the evolution of species -- the tree of life and its projection in taxonomy; it serves to represent the step-wise differentiation of tissues in embryonic development; it may serve as a structural diagram of the parts-within-parts architecture of organisms or galaxies, or as a functional schema for the analysis of instinctive behaviour by the ethologist; [5] or of the phrase-generating machinery by the psycholinguist. It may represent the locomotor hierarchy of limbs, joints, individual muscles, and so down to fibres, fibrils and filaments; [6] or, in reverse direction, the filtering and processing of the sensory input in its ascent from periphery to centre. It could also be regarded as a model for the subject-index of the Library of Congress, and for the organization of knowledge in our memory-stores; as an organizational chart for government administrations, military and business organizations; and so on.
This almost universal applicability of the hierarchic model may arouse the suspicion that it is logically empty; and this may be a further factor in the resistance against it. It usually takes the form of what one may call the 'so what' reaction: 'all this is old hat, it is self-evident' -- followed by the non sequitur 'and anyway, where is your evidence?' Well, hierarchy may be old hat, but I would suggest that if you handle it with some affection, it can produce quite a few lively rabbits.
EVOLUTION AND HIERARCHIC ORDER
One of my favourite examples to illustrate the merits of hierarchic order is an amusing parable invented by Herbert Simon -- whose absence we all regret. I have quoted it on other occasions, but I shall briefly quote it again. The parable concerns two watchmakers, Hora and Tempus. Both make watches consisting of a thousand parts each. Hora assembles his watches bit by bit; so when he pauses or drops a watch before it is finished, it falls to pieces and he has to start from scratch. Tempus, on the other hand, puts together sub-assemblies of ten parts each; ten of these sub-assemblies he makes into a larger sub-assembly of a hundred units; and ten of these make the whole watch. If there is a disturbance, Tempus has to repeat at worst nine assembling operations, and at best none at all. If you have a ratio of one disturbance in a hundred operations, then Hora will take four thousand times longer to assemble a watch -- instead of one day, he will take eleven years. And if, for mechanical bits, we substitute amino-acids, protein molecules, organelles, and so on, the ratio between the time-scales becomes astronomical.
This is one basic advantage of employing the hierarchic method. The second is, of course, the incomparably greater stability and resilience to shock of the Tempus type of watch, and its amenability to repair and improvement. Simon concludes:
Complex systems will evolve from simple systems much more rapidly
if there are stable intermediate forms than if there are not. The
resulting complex forms in the former case will be hierarchic. We have
only to turn the argument round to explain the observed predominance
of hierarchies among the complex systems Nature presents to us. Among
possible complex forms, hierarchies are the ones that had the time
to evolve. [7]
If there is life on other planets, we may safely assume that, whatever its form, it must be hierarchically organized.
Motor manufacturers discovered long ago that it does not pay to design a new model from scratch by starting on the level of elementary components; they make use of already existing sub-assemblies -- engines, brakes, etc. -- each of which has developed from long previous experience, and then proceed by relatively small modifications of some of these. Evolution follows the same strategy. Once it has taken out a patent it sticks to it tenaciously -- Thorpe remarked yesterday on its fixed conservative ways. The patented structure, organ or device acquires a kind of autonomous existence as a sub-assembly. The same make of organelles functions in the cells of mice and men; the same make of contractile protein serves the streaming motion of amoeba and the finger muscles of the piano-player; the same homologous design is maintained in the vertebrate forelimb of man, dog, bird and whale. Geoffroy de St Hilaire's loi du balancement, and d'Arcy Thompson's [8] transformation of a baboon's skull into a human skull by harmonious deformations of a Cartesian coordinate lattice, further illustrate the hierarchic constraints imposed on evolutionary design.
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