Understanding Understanding
I picked up von Foerster’s Understanding Understanding: Essays on Cybernetics and Cognition from the University of Utah library. Parts of the book are way too mathematical for the average reader (and myself) to understand but he does have some amazing one-liners and great thoughts about learning. One passage to which I am drawn is from Chapter 2, “Computation in Neural Nets.” He writes:
Ten neurons can be interconnected in precisely 1,267,650,500,228,229,401,703,205,376 different ways. This count excludes the various ways in which each particular neuron may react to its afferent stimuli. Considering this fact, it will be appreciated that today we do not yet posses a general theory of neural nets of even modest complexity.
It is clear that any progress in our understanding of functional and structural properties of nerve nets must be based on the introduction of constraints into potentially hyper-astrononomical variations of connecting pathways (Von Foerster, 2003, p. 21).
Von Foerster is mainly speaking to the idea of creating mathematical models of the functioning of the human nervous systems. However, to me the passage about the complexity of neuronal connections (of just 10 neurons no less) brings to mind the utter foolishness (if not outright stupidity) of most personal growth methods. The human nervous system is capable of an inconceivable number of possible states and configurations. What in your life do you do that could evoke changes in such a complex system? In terms of somatic methods (yoga, pilates, massage, physical education etc.), most of what is worked with is strengthening, stretching and relaxing. Do such methods actually improve functioning in the brain? Do they engender new neuronal connections, new learnings, new states of organization? The answer is most assuredly no, although you may disagree.
As I see it, the task in developing humans is not only to discover new abilities and functions, but also to discover new abilities and functions that the person is not aware need discovered. Doing so requires novel experience. It cannot be done by the mindless repitition of acts. A developing child does not necessarily know what the final outcome of his explorations will be. How could he? He has never experienced them before. But, he can learn and try on new behaviors, new organizations, discarding those that do not interest him and moving exploring more deeply those that seem useful or pleasurable. This type of exploratory learning is what is needed for adult self-development – to learn in the same manner that child does. It is however, not what most people do. They learn bizarre concepts like “no pain, no gain,” they learn that they “need” to be bigger, stronger, faster and they spend their time on those functions, not realizing that the larger base of their potential goes untapped.
