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Organisation of the process

First example: process organization. At home, on Obruchev Street, I constantly observe the same picture, which can be called a war between architects and the district administration and the city residents. There is a shopping centre near my place. Naturally, all residents of the house leave the entrance and go straight to the store. But for some reason there must be a lawn on their way.

The asphalt path is a detour, and you cannot go straight. Residents trample a path across the lawn, it is regularly dug up, wire is installed by order of the administration, etc. It is interesting how the process is organized. When we lay asphalt, we organize processes in a certain way, channelize them, and direct people through them.

The Brits do the following: they plant lawns in parks, people walk, trample the paths, then after a while the trampled path is asphalted. What’s going on here? I would describe it is this way: first Brits give the opportunity to process the material, natural paths are then formed, after which they are organised with laying asphalt. In our country, space is first organised based on the ideas of symmetry and some other abstract principles, and then the struggle of such organization with a natural and convenient process begins.

Ontological representation of knowledge content

The most important result of the previous analysis is the proposition that the application of comparison actions to objects creates new content: we can depict it with the symbols XΔ1Δ2... This content is fixed, expressed in the sign form (A) (B) and methods of operating with them - λ1λ2. By applying other operations of comparison to the signs (A) (B), we obtain some new content (a subject), which we express in the signs (D) (E) (F) and very often relate directly to the object X.

For example, when we measure sequentially corresponding values ​​of pressure and volume of a certain mass of gas (the first layer of the subject), obtain series of values ​​p1, p2, p3 ..., V1, V2, V3 ... (forming the second layer of the subject), then compare them as p1V1<->p2V2<->p3V3<->... and find the mathematical form of their dependence pV = const (which should be placed already on the third layer of the subject). We consider the content of this form as a “law” to which the gas obeys, and, therefore, we attribute it directly to our object.
But often such direct attribution cannot be made, since the content revealed indirectly from activity with signs does not correspond to the empirically observed or identified properties of the object. Then a special iconic image is built, which “stands” in ‘between’ the iconic form of knowledge and empirically observed objects.

This happens due to the fact that we cannot attribute the results obtained from operating in the fourth layer of knowledge directly to the original object X. To eliminate this gap, a special function , a relationship is introduced , which should represent the object “as such” in a certain way.

Based on this specific function, such representation can be described as ontological representations of knowledge contents. This accurately expresses the specific cognitive role of such sign constructions: they must represent the object in such a way as to ensure its connection with newly acquired knowledge. It is in this way that the so-called “ideal objects” appear - a heavy point, an ideal lever, an absolutely elastic body, a mathematical pendulum.

The difference between an object and a subject of knowledge II

The subject itself does not contain any object. But it can be isolated as special content through practical actions with an object. This content can be recorded in signs/characters. And as soon as this happens, a subject arises and appears in an objectified form in addition to those objects from which it is abstracted. It is objectified representation creates illusions - as if they are dealing with the object itself. This illusory understanding of the essence of the matter, having already arisen in relatively simple situations (for example, with quantity), penetrates into the highest levels of science and completely confuses everything.

The only one way to understand the nature of an object - this is to clarify the mechanisms of formation and structure - means sequential analysis of substitution layers successively built one on top of another.

Thus, we can say that a “subject” is a hierarchical system of substitutions of an object with signs included in certain operating systems, in which these substitutions actually exist as subjects of a special kind, they are objectified in the form of scientific literature or the production activities of society in the creation and use of sign systems. As an example on can consider constant transition of programming languages from ‘lower’ to ‘higher’ levels of programming abstraction.

The distinction between the object and the subject of knowledge allows us to introduce another important concept of methodology - ontological representation of knowledge.

The difference between an object and a subject of knowledge

The object exists independently of knowledge; it existed before its appearance. The subject of knowledge, on the contrary, is formed by knowledge itself. When we start to study or simply “involve” any object in our activities, we consider the object from one or several sides. These different points of ‘views’ or ‘projections’ become a replacement or a “surrogate” of the entire multilateral entity; they are recorded in the symbolic form of knowledge. Since this is knowledge about what objectively exists, it is always objectified by us and, as such, forms a “subject.”
One must always remember that the subject of knowledge is not identical to the object: it is a product of human cognitive activity and, as a special creation of mankind, is subjected to special laws that do not coincide with the laws of the object itself.

Several different subjects can correspond to the same object. This is explained by the fact that the nature of a subject of knowledge depends not only on what object it reflects, but also on why this object was formed, to solve what problems.

Lets consider a simple example to clarify these general abstract definitions. Let’s assume that we have two groups of sheep in two settlements. These are undoubtedly objects. People deal with them, use them in different ways, and at some point they are faced with the task of counting them. First, one group is calculated, let’s say - 1, 2, 3, 4, then the second - 1, 2, 3, 4, and finally both numbers are added: 4 + 4 = 8.

And already in this simple fact there are a number of very complex and at the same time very interesting points. Objects, rams, have a various representations and when we start counting them, we highlight one side of each group - the number of rams. We express this quantity in symbols, in the number 4 once, then in the number 4 a second time, and then we perform some strange action - we add the numbers. If we did not have two groups, but, say, five, and each of them had 4 rams, then we would not add, but simply multiply the numbers: 4 x 5 = 20, i.e. would have produced another, even stranger action.

Why do I always call the actions strange? Let’s ask ourselves, can the action of addition be applied to rams as such? Or, say, the action of multiplication? Or - let’s continue this line of reasoning - the actions of division, root extraction, exponentiation? Definitely not.

But there is another, no less important point here. We can ask ourselves: do these operations—addition, multiplication, exponentiation—apply to “squiggles” expressing signs, or to numbers? When we add, we do not add numbers, but signs. And there is a big difference between a number and a sign, because a sign is just an icon, a trace of ink, paint, chalk, but a number is a representation of objects, it is an icon in which a certain aspect of objects is expressed. And we do not add numbers because they are symbols, just as we do not multiply them because they are signs; we add and multiply because these icons because they express a strictly defined feature of objects, namely quantity.

In them, the object receives independent existence, separate from objects, and in accordance with this, when we talk about numbers as a special formation, different from rams as such and from the number of rams, we don’t mean an object and the characteristics of this object, but a special, a separate “subject” created by mankind.
Tbc…