From: tobis@meteor.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: The Criterion for Ecocentrism
Date: 8 Nov 92 23:51:18 GMT
Organization: University of Wisconsin, Meteorology and Space Science

In article <1992Nov3.151028.6445@vexcel.com> dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:
>In article <-1365345967snx@Gilsys.DIALix.oz.au> gil@Gilsys.DIALix.oz.au (Gil Hardwick) writes:
>>
>>I would very much like to know how any of it pertains to the actual
>>dynamics of human impact on their environment. The model being pursued
>>in this thread is not holding any water whatever at this end, yet it does
>>remain an extremely important issue. If I were to get some handle on it
>>I might then proceed with some elaboration of my own references to
>>Catastrophe Theory and Systems Management without some damn fool BS
>>Detector setting off an over-excited round of abuse from someone else
>>lurking on the group I never heard of before.
>>
>>Gentlemen, can we possibly get back to the matter at hand?
>
>I am not familiar with Catastrophe Theory.  What does it
>contribute to this discussion?

Catastrophe Theory is one among a venerable serquence of perfectly
interesting results in theory of continuous dynamic systems that
for some reason has been blown out of all proportion by people who have
limited understanding of it. The most notable of these have been
cybernetics, general systems theory, catastrophe theory, and chaos theory.
A good diagnostic tool for determining whther the person mentioning the
results actually understands them is whether they use capital letters,
e.g., Catastrophe Theory, as if a few interesting theorems promised to
solve all remaining scientific, and perhaps even moral problems. The history
of these overblown popularizations has been an interest of mine for some time.
Another diagnostic of misuse of the theory is a constant mentioning of
the field, with very limited mention of its actual results.

Historically, the trend started with the fascinating eccentric Norbert
Wiener, a brilliant mathematician and statistician who may be regarded
as the founder of the most mathematically sophisticated branch of
electrical engineering, i.e., statistical communication theory, a field
which has turned out to have wide application in a surprising diversity
of other areas. Even so, in his popular works, Wiener actually overstated
its applicability! This spawned a whole industry of innumerate blather 
on applications of "cybernetics" to fields where it did not actually
apply. The result was that in the english-speaking world, "cybernetics"
quickly fell out of fashion as a description of a legitimate science,
even though the word continued to be used in other countries, usually
associated with computation rather than control and communication as 
originally intended.

The next outbreak of this sort of hyperenthusiasm was General Systems Theory,
popularized by a certain Ludwig von Bertallanfy, who, apparently jealous
of Weiner's popularity, decided to reinvent the whole process. As he was
soing so deliberately, he was spared the embarassment of actually having
any science embedded in his enthusiasm. His work consisted mostly of
stating the broadest possible category of continuous multivariable
differential equation in his first chapter, and being enormously enthusiastic
(in ways that could hardly be contradicted, but said a great deal less than
they purported to) about the potential of this angle of attack for another
dozen chapters or so. This approach apparently generated enough funding
that it spawned a number of imitators, and they even had what passed
for academic conferences for a few years in the 50s and 60s, though what
they actually discussed is quite beyond me.

Catastrophe Theory, like Chaos Theory, actually are similar cases of
spectacular exagerration of the applicability of certain results, of
impact somewhat less than Weiner's work but vastly greater than Bertallanfy's.
Thom's catastrophe theory is about the sitation when a simple continuous
function of a simple continuous set of variables is defined in such a
way that no continuous output trajectory corresponds to a continuous input
trajectory. Physical systems described by such a relationship show
interesting behavior, though in practice it is the case that an assumption
involved in setting up the model is invalid in the region of the catastrophe.
That's about all I know about it.

People really interested in chaos, rather than in repeating Gleick's
breathless and inexcuseable hype, are referred to _Does God Play Dice?_,
by Ian Stewart, a book written in a fine didactic style by someone who
actually understands the material. Many tenured professors in sociology
and other pseudosciences have taken to footnoting Gleick's blather as if
it actually had some obvjective content.

In case anyone is wondering, my BS detector is in red alert. 

mt
Newsgroups: sci.environment