How the Unified Theory of Knowledge Can Close The Enlightenment Gap
Uniting science and philosophy with this new theory...
How the Unified Theory of Knowledge Can Close The Enlightenment Gap
Gregg Henriques thinks he has developed a theory which can allow us to pursue the function of sensemaking without allowing the increasing complexity of higher layers of reality to confuse the core principles of the lower ones.
He calls it the Unified Theory of Knowledge. He has written a book and several resources on this theory - I don’t hope to explain the entire thing today. But I do want to highlight one basic part of it which might be useful to resolving the problems. Taken from Gregg Henriques’ Psychology Today Article: “A Periodic Table of Human Behavior”
There is no general framework for understanding the concepts and categories under investigation. Consider physics. Prior to Newton, physics was a “pre-paradigmatic mess”, meaning that the concepts and categories that physicists were using were highly inconsistent. One of the great achievements of Newtonian science was the emergence of a shared definitional system that could be examined empirically. Notice the first part of this sentence. A shared definitional system. That is a key aspect of cumulative science. And it is something physics, chemistry, and biology largely have achieved, at least at the core of the discipline. That is, scientists from these disciplines know generally what matter, energy, electrons, neutrons, genes, cells, evolution and so forth "mean". And this shared, clear definitional system is one of the decisive factors that makes them worthy of the name "science". Psychology completely lacks a shared definitional system. There is NO agreement on terms like behavior, mind, cognition, self, consciousness, and the like.
A lack of a general framework for psychology is a problem. There will also need to be meta-frameworks to account for the changes that arise in the mass-awareness of psychological frameworks (see Freud example above).
The most useful first resource within the Unified Theory of Knowledge is the Tree of Knowledge, pictured here
The Tree of Knowledge shows a timeline of the universe and the general progression of complexity through time.
There is a field of study called “Big History” which also attempts to chronicle the development of layers of complexity through time.
First there was the big bang, then a development of several layers of physics and chemistry. In fact, the first new layer of complexity was the creation of new chemicals - we didn’t start out with a full periodic table.
Other layers of complexity include the formation of stars, the development of carbon-based life forms, and the development of “mind” (in the sense a dog or cat has consciousness).
Though it may be a tad pretentious of us, we would describe the human race as another layer of complexity due to our self-awareness and the creation of technologies like the internet.
The Unified Theory of Knowledge posits that we are building a “layer cake” of science.
The “simplest” level of science is physics. It’s certainly a difficult and complex field - but at the core there are a set number of laws which govern physics. These laws remain true when applied to chemistry, the next layer. But chemistry adds it’s own laws and properties. Chemistry’s laws do not retro-actively change Physics - but they do apply forward to Biology. Biology does not change the laws of Physics or Chemistry, but it sure informs Psychology.
Each layer adds more laws which apply to itself and subsequent layers - thus making each layer more complex to understand.
Psychology has several laws which apply to the animal kingdom and to human beings - but there is yet another field of science, the social sciences, which have even more complex laws. It appears that this final layer is een more complex because it has the additional property of self-change.
Human’s fundamental biology and psychology is likely not changing for another few hundreds of thousands of years, or more. But our social configurations are changing at an increasingly breakneck speed. The agricultural revolution lasted ten thousand years, but the industrial age gave way to the information age in only a few hundred. Entire political ideologies, artistic movements, and lifestyles are born and die online in a few years time.
Gregg Henriques is doing exceptionally important work to identify a meta-framework which might apply to this process - similar to how Newton created a framework for Physics to fit into.
It’s a lofty challenge because this layer ALSO adds another layer of complexity - ethics. Humans will be unsatisfied with living in a framework they regard as unethical. If science has any hope of co-operating with philosophy to discover “objective ethics” (something I’m skeptical of, but could be possible) and closing the Enlightenment Gap, it will be because of a meta-framework developed to contextualize the social sciences.
I will have more discussions with Gregg Henriques to see if we might continue working on understanding such an interesting function!
To watch this week’s discussion with Gregg Henriques click here: www.bradleywerrell.com/podcast-library/did-psychology-change-human-thinking-dr-gregg-henriques
Until next time!
Dr Bradley Werrell