II
OF MAPS
AND GAPS IN THE MINDS OF MAN
The first issue is information: its storage,
interpretation, use, change, increase and its
absence. This section will primarily deal with the
culture-level aspects of this discussion. Another
section devoted to individual level aspects in a
problem-solving theory framework will follow.
The concept of an information system as introduced
above implies information storage. This storage
process is fundamental in that it defines the
amount of modification possible in the system and
the mechanisms involved in such modification.
Margalef describes the information forwarded by
life as being divided into three channels: the
genetic, the ecological and the cultural (1968:
98-99). The genetic channel is based on
"replicable individual structures". The ecological
channel is based on interaction between (or
within) species. The cultural channel "transmits
what has been learned by individual activity or
experience and is transmitted to future
generations outside the genetic channel". The
interface between the genetic and cultural
channels is of particular interest in
characterizing the human information system. Two
types of genetically determined responses have
been described in ethology. Stereotyped response
is a totally determined reaction hard-programmed
into the organism. Open response is an
environmentally interactive, soft-programmed
reaction which can be modified to particular
circumstances rather than simply triggered by
them. It provides the basis of learning and,
ultimately, culture. However, what these responses
amount to in practice are information-carrying
impulses of varying strength and plasticity what
are expressed in various ways including
emotionally in environmental responses. The
environmental channel is defined as all
experienced non-cognitive information. This
information may or may not exist in association
with a cognitive interpretation. The capacity to
learn, to interpret emotion through cognition,
makes the interpretation of the emotional channel
problematical. Having these two channels (i.e.,
emotion and cognition), while increasing the
amount of information coming into the individual,
allows errors in labeling because the
interpretation may be incomplete or wrong.
An example of this sort of error is often
encountered in cases of mononucleosis. Many times
the disease goes undetected because the individual
mislabels and explains the disease in other ways.
Experimental examples of this phenomenon will be
given in the section to follow. However, the
potential confoundability of emotion and cognition
points to another characteristic of the
relationship between the two. Experience stored
for use in interpreting the present situation and
the reaction one makes to it comprises a set of
potentially reflexive responses. As B.F. Skinner
(1953) demonstrates, to a large extent we all
control our responses--our emotional and cognitive
contexts--by modifying our situation. Thus, we use
behavior to control the future situation. For
example, if one wishes to stop smoking, one might
remove all smoking materials from the house so
that they will not be around to trigger the
desire.
Cognition can cope with predicted variation in
emotion by controlling a part of the situational
input through behavior. The behavioral origin and
application of this information defines the
relationship of this information to the reality it
maps. However, there is no reason to suppose
(considering subsystem limitations) that every
reaction potential to human experience is mapped
and indexed with an effective response. It is
useful to consider the frequency of experiencing
and mapping as complementary. The more times one
faces a situation, the more chances one has to
figure out what it means, how to respond and what
the consequences of the response will be. Which is
to say that an information system will be most
developed where it is most used and that it is
most used where it is most developed.
This relationship is tied to the connection
between behavior and information and their
functional interdependence in the system.
Information both informs and is informed by
behavior such that, in a sense, behavior is
information. Behavior tests the reliability of and
provides the basis for the modification of
information.
However, this identification points out a
significant potential for confusion in the
operation of such a system. The stochastic
predictions encoded in the cognitive channel
impose artificial boundaries on both the
individual and the group using the information
system. In essence, the greater the control
afforded by the information, the greater the
potential for not appreciating its limitations
(confusing the map with the territory). Such
a phenomenon might be seen as operating in the
individual in the concept of self or identity. The
self can be seen as a relationship of predictive
control operating on some subset of experience. As
long as the boundaries of such a reflexive
subsystem are not exceeded, as long as it remains
within the thickly mapped region of experience,
the information can support a concept of
subsystemic control in that the knowledge of
behavioral options and consequences implies
control of behavioral exigencies through control
of the situation (cf. Skinner's (1953) discussion
of "self control" cited above which gives
many other examples of this as well).
The same appreciation can be made concerning the
operation of an information system within a group.
The non-identity relationship between information
and reality feeds back into the system in the form
of unpredicted perturbations defining unpredicted
situations with unknown implications. Some
perturbations are less severe than others allowing
them to be ignored at least temporarily and thus
not affecting boundaries. Others of a more extreme
nature seemingly demand attention. One example of
this type of boundary penetration can be seen in
the Azwan High Dam wherein a technological
"miracle" turns out to be an ecological disaster.
A connected but broader example of the penetration
of perturbation into the information system itself
is perhaps reflected in the dramatic rise in
ecological concern in contemporary political and
economic thought. However, a more instructive case
highlighting some of the issues and implications
of such perturbations can be seen in what A.D.
White calls "the warfare of science with theology
in Christendom".
Medieval theology constituted a notably
intransigent information system. However, the
self-consciousness of the church apologists makes
the reaction of this system to perturbation: the
procrustean efforts to make the map fit the
territory, much more illuminating than a simple
case of conservatism. It also highlights the
observation that one does not necessarily respond
to perturbation. The theologians consciously
appreciated the importance of fundamental,
axiomatic assumptions in defining and delimiting
the cognitive, emotional and behavioral
superstructure they underpin. An axiom delimits
the territory of its application. To understand
the reaction of the theologians, it is necessary
to appreciate, as they did, that by assigning
organizational characteristics to reality, one
imputes a tone defining the way things work, one
with one another. It was argued against Newton
that he "took from God that direct action on his
works so constantly ascribed to him in Scripture
and transferred it to material mechanism" (White
1960, I: 16). Pope Pious IX commented on Darwin's
work in declaring that:
The theologians
were quick to see that the basic assumptions of
'science' not only contradicted the basic
assumptions of Christian theology but implied an
incompatible system of rules for interpreting
experience that would effectively undermine
Christianity by making the reality of Christianity
look like the emperor's new clothes.1
In the individual, such disarticulation reflects
the presence of a situationally activated by
unmapped area of experience. This experience might
be expressed as an unmapped source of concern or
unintended behavioral impulse which the
disarticulation caused, or perhaps better put, is
in the first place. The individual has little
choice about attempting to solve the problem
because in an experiential sense, he is the
problem. However, from the group perspective, it
makes little sense to consider a gap in the
information system simply as an individual
concern. Given that each individual in a group
acts on more or less the same information as drawn
from a common information pool, one expects to
find that common gaps and perturbations generate
common vagaries and miseries, common stereotyped
expressions, and common techniques or strategies
for attempting to solve these common problems.
Schizophrenia will considered as one such response
and the characteristics distinguishing this
response from others will be discussed.
Like all behavior, schizophrenia is a response to
and an attempt to deal with a situation.
Schizophrenia is behavior. It is also information.
However, if normal behavior is what happens when
one responds to mapped experience in the
experiential universe, schizophrenia is what may
happen when one responds to the prolonged
experience of some type of unmapped perturbation.
In essence, schizophrenia can be considered a
problem-solving mechanism applied to a prolonged
and "unusual" problem in experience.
This approach is attractive in that it can explain
a number of the faces of schizophrenia which often
cause problems in its theoretical treatment as
noted above (cf. Bateson and Lidz). First, the
schizophrenic syndrome, as an isomorphic response,
can theoretically be generated by anything which
defines the conditions requisite to trigger the
response (drugs, diseases, double binds, etc.).
Second, in intragroup expression, one encounters a
tremendous amount of minute stereotypy as the same
limited information is applied to the same gaps
(e.g., the particular words encountered in
auditory illusions are predictable). Third, one
finds a great deal of intergroup variation as a
result of different groups having different maps
and different gaps.2 Fourth, one finds
intragroup variation over time as problems are
solved and new perturbations expose new gaps.
Silvano Arieti remarks that:
An extreme incidence of intragroup variation over time is apparent in cases of culture contact and adoption. Tooth observes that:
In a rather metaphoric vein, man's existence is a massive collective problem-solving enterprise, a wave surmounting the obstacles that stand before it until the energy and the information available mount and fall short and man finds his boundary in time. The "minds of Man" are those units which perceive these problems in a particular frame. As we have seen in the example of Christendom, the frames too come and go with their applied utility, their ability to solve the problems that arise. Schizophrenia fits into this scenario in that not only is the map associated with specific problems that become apparent, that are meaningful in the contemporary milieu, but also, in large measure, with the paths and pitfalls that come out of attempts to solve these problems. Another area wherein this is expressed is in the fits and fashions of art and music: Right now, as you stumble about on the Web seeking solice, instruction, escape and diversion, finding the various curiosities that have arisen here, you are participating in an awesome, albeit neonatal, influence on our collective perception of what is and what it all means, on our understanding of who, what and where we all really are. |
NOTES
1. The depiction given by the church was found to err on many points. Though some perturbation would probably have been tolerable in the information system, unfortunately for the church, the deficiencies which came to light were both important and, in time, obvious. However, the hydra-like foe of Capella, de Cusa, Bruno, Copernicus, Galileo et al. leads to another observation. Discounting variable access, nearly the same information is available to all members drawing on an information system [cf. L.A. White's simultaneous invention material (1949: 170)]. The lengthy expression of such perturbations both obliges and enables the information system to find out what they are about in order to deal with the disarticulation they manifest. Seemingly, the many individuals who expressed heterodox views reflect a general, system-wide condition.
2. Opler's (1967) comparison of manifest symptomatology in Irish and Italian schizophrenics shows significant differences between groups within European culture. Referring to this finding, Opler argues that:
J.C. Carothers comments concerning African psychopathology that, while some patients show patterns of reaction, "similar to those included in neurotic categories in Europe, the diagnostic criteria applicable in Europe cannot be stretched to include many other patients" (Opler 1967: 115) who exhibit specifically African disorders. Opler reports that: