Background, Agency, Emergence
Ilexa Yardley 28 November 2009
Background, agency and emergence are three ideas which can be used to compare physics and biology.
If we use complementarity to integrate them, we may find a theory of everything, as well as proof for a higher intelligence (of some sort) present within them.
First, to define terms, as they are used here: background is the complement for foreground, agency is the complement for non-agency, and emergence is the complement for non-emergence.
Complement is a term used to join, and separate, two into one (one into two) by reversing, alternating, inverting, switching, or forcing a relationship on something (turning an X into an X and Y).
The complement joins, and separates, background and foreground, agency and non-agency, emergence and non-emergence.
If we use complementarity to join and separate background, agency and emergence, we can determine the (a) strategy (paradigm, paradox), that can be used to analyze any aspect of reality present in either physics or biology, as well as the aspect of reality which joins, and, therefore separates, physics and biology.
Further, if we apply complementarity to itself, complementarity and non-complementarity emerge as background-foreground, agency-non-agency, emergence-non-emergence.
So it is clear, using this strategy, complementarity, and its complement, are key.
If we substitute the word observation for complementarity we can solve the paradox these words produce, as well as the basis for the reality we wish to understand.
That is, observation (complementarity) separates (and joins) background from foreground, agency from non-agency, and emergence from non-emergence.
Further, observation, or complementarity, whichever term is used, if it joins and separates any two ideas (entity or process) is, in essence, the background, agent, and emergence present in both physics and biology, and reality (specifically and in general).
Necessarily, there is something between any X and Y, which can be termed, labeled, named and-or assigned to (as-for-because-of) either and-or both X and-or Y.
That is, there is no background without foreground, agency without non-agency, emergence without non-emergence, or, in other words, movement without stillness, observation without observer, non-complement without complement.
The question here is how are all of these words related?
There is a mandatory circle and line, or, one-way and-or two-way relationship, between any idea and its complement, producing ideas and their corresponding realities (and the corresponding symbols we use to represent these).
We can call this one or two-way relationship complementarity. However, we can also call it background, agency, and-or emergence. (Or, as previously mentioned, observation.)
The circle and line between any X and Y produce background, agency, and-or emergence, in either one or two directions, as either one or two, where all of these terms are articulating the same thing (reality).
Further, we can notice the one or two-way relationship is necessary to articulate an idea as background, agency, or emergence. We can term this necessary relationship complementarity or we can term it observation. We can also term this relationship circular and-or linear. And we can (must) notice the terms are slippery (we can substitute one of the terms for the other(s)).
What we cannot do is insist one of these terms is background, agent, or emergence for, or from, the others. However, because of complementarity, what we can do is insist one of these terms is background, agent, or emergence for, or from, the others.
Or, if we want to be more efficient (and more accurate), we can eliminate all of the words and ideas and skip right to the source, or basis, or relationship between, and among any two words (ideas, realities).
Because there is a mandatory circle and line between and among any X and Y, it is the circle and the line that become (are) the X and Y.
This removes (creates) the problem of time (future from past and vice versa) and space (here from there and vice versa). It also removes (creates) the problem of background, emergence, and agency (which came first, chicken or egg) which are attempts to address the problem of time and-or space.
Circle and line between and among any X and Y, produce (destroy) time (future and past) and space (here and there). Circle and line produce, and solve, then, the problem of background, emergence, and agency (which came first, egg or chicken).
Circle and line form the basis for complementarity (and thus any relationship, no matter what it is named or termed, or how it is articulated) because a complement is X and Y and a circle and-or line connect X to Y.
Therefore, circle and line is reality (biology and physics and also chemistry). (Also philosophy, psychology, economics.)
We can substitute any complementary ideas or symbols within any discipline because any two is one, and any one is two, because circle is line (circumference is diameter.)
Circle and line produce background-foreground, emergence-non-emergence, agency-non-agency. So, therefore, circle and line are background-foreground, emergence-non-emergence, agency-non-agency.
Or, put another way, circle and line cause us to notice background-foreground, emergence-non-emergence, and agency-non-agency, since these are all ways to study, or analyze, time and-or space.
The question that is really being posed here is this: is time and space circular or linear (closed or open)? Are these separate ideas (non-complements) or the same idea (complements)?
The answer that is really being posed here is this: time and space are circular and linear (closed and open). Time and space are separate ideas (non-complements) and the same idea (complements), at the same (different) time (and space).
The complementarity of time and space is circular and linear, created and (destroyed) via circle (line).
The theory-of-everything (nothing), and a higher(lower)-intelligence, producing time and space, then, is circle and its mandatory line (or vice versa), which may also be articulated as background, emergence, and agency (observation, complementarity). This originates (destines) as (at) circumference diameter pi.
That is, a circle is background, or foreground, for a line. A circle is agent, or non-agent, for a line. And a circle is emergent, or non-emergent, from (for) a line. And, complementarily, vice versa, for all of these.
Background, emergence, and agency are alternate words for (one and-or two) circle(s) (line(s)), where one must be, eventually, two (and vice versa).
We must be in a circle to observe circle. We cannot have line without circle. If we count circles (or lines) (one, then two, then three etc.) we have produced background, agency, emergence.
If we collapse more than one circle (background, agency, emergence) into one circle we have produced reality.