Surrogates of "conjection" as an unrecognized cognitive process?

Envisaging NATO Otherwise -- in 3D and 4D? (Part #3)

Rather than focus on any complementary term to projection. it can be readily assumed that some such process is recognized through other terms, techniques and metaphors. These could include:

Mapping the intangible as variously distinguished:
- Cognitive map (sometimes called a mental map or mental model) is a type of mental representation enabling the acquisition, coding, storing, recalling and decoding information about the relative locations and attributes of phenomena in everyday or metaphorical spatial environment. They can be mental representations of physical locations. There is an extensive literature on mental mapping, notably associated with geography. The methodology can be successfully applied to cognate areas, as noted by Sorin A Matei (Mental Maps: making the invisible visible, 2007)
- Topic map recognized as a standard for the representation and interchange of knowledge, with an emphasis on the findability of information.
- Concept map or conceptual diagram is used to depict suggested relationships between concepts. : Concept maps are rather similar to topic maps in that both allow to concepts or topics via graphs.
- Mind map understood as a diagram used to visually organize information, however this is to be contrasted with a cognitive mapping. Both concept maps and topic maps can be contrasted with mind mapping, which is often restricted to radial hierarchies and tree structures.
- Semantic map as used in a method of teaching reading using graphical representations of concepts and the relationships between them
Interpretation of symbols has given rise to a very extensive literature on a variety of theories and practices, recently summarized by Vasil Rainov (Interpretation of Symbols, Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), 2004). That summary notes the different "illusions" associated with the various approaches -- reminiscent of the "distortions" in cartography. Semiotics is the study of signs, symbols, and signification as communicative behavior. Noteworthy with respect to the argument below is the extent to which symbols take geometric forms with particular symmetries. By contrast the interpretation of symbols is far from succinct, tending to be unfortunately verbose in various senses of the term. Is an interpretation to be recognized as a "conject"? The implication of "conjection" could be usefully explored otherwise in terms of the far more frequent use of "contention" -- which any interpretation of a symbol (and its "content") could be held to be.
"Optics" has recently developed as a metaphor in the political arena as a description of perception -- political appearance -- otherwise associated with public relations and image making (Ben Zimmer, Optics, The New York Times, 4 March 2010; Wendy L. Patrick, The Optics of Politics: appearances are not always reality, Psychology Today, 1 November 2014)
Interdisciplinarity as the use of a variety of disciplines to elicit a coherent understanding of a complex of phenomena. Various approaches to interdisciplinarity have been identified and distinguished from transdisciplinarity and multidisciplinarity (Robert Frodeman, et al, The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity, 2012; Joe Moran, Interdisciplinarity: the new critical idiom, 2010; Harvey Graff, Undisciplining Knowledge: interdisciplinarity in the Twentieth Century, 2015; Felicity Callard and Des Fitzgerald, Rethinking Interdisciplinarity across the Social Sciences and Neurosciences, 2015; Alasdair Gleed and David Marchant, Interdisciplinarity: survey report for the Global Research Council, 2016; Susan A. Nancarrow et al., Ten principles of good interdisciplinary team work, Human Resources for Health, 2013). With each discipline as a metaphorical "eye" or "lens", and the particular understanding of projection in optics, especially valuable in this respect is the need for a "polyocular" mode of understanding to focus effectively on complex subtlety, as argued by Magoroh Maruyama (Polyocular vision or subunderstanding? Organization Studies, 25, 2004).

In a post-truth era, conventional modes of "explanation" are clearly no longer "fit for purpose" -- as remarkably demonstrated by explanations of climate change and other emerging crises. This calls into question the adequacy of the responses to the Edge Foundation Question of 2012: What is yours favorite deep, elegant, or beautiful exaplantion? In a compilation of 150 selected responses, the editor notes that:

The common thread is that a simple and nonobvious idea is proposed as the explanation for a diverse and complicated set of phenomena. (John Brockman, This Explains Everything, 2013).

It is curiously assumed that any "simple and nonobvious idea" is readily and widely comprehensible. There is however no reference to "comprehension" in the extensive index or to how it is enabled -- other than through the significance attributed to "deep, elegant, or beautiful".

"Conjection" as an unrecognized cognitive process? With the emphasis on mapping, much of the literature conflates projection with explanation. This reinforces any assumption that if it can be mapped then this constitutes an explanation. Arguably this conflation can be recognized in the recently emergent possibilities of visualization. Visualization as explanation?

The implications of 9/11 destruction of the Twin Towers, together with the attack at the time of writing on London Bridge, suggest that it is symbols that empower, not explanation. The issue has become especially evident in disregarded explanations regarding climate change, or the psychic numbing evoked by starvation imagery (Starvation Imagery as Humanitarian Trump Card? Counterproductive emotional blackmail engendering worldwide indifference, 2016). Clearly there are concerns with whether, and how, any map can be understood.

Given the extensive mathematical literature on "projection" of a global reality onto a flat surface, it is appropriate to ask whether there is an inverse or reverse process (not to be confused with "back projection"). This might be described as taking one map projection (or more) and deducing from the configuration in 2D the form in 3D from which the map was derived -- most obviously in the case of a globe. This process may be variously implied in the preoccupation with projection in mathematical cartography. This is not immediately relevant from the literature, and may well be considered of little interest -- except in the sense of stereographic projection. Metaphorically it could also be explored in terms of decryption, with the map understood as a form of encryption -- two or more maps being of value to the decoding process.

The challenge to comprehension of "conjection" has been remarkably clarified using the mathematics of q-analysis as developed by Ron Atkin (Multidimensional Man; can man live in 3-dimensional space?, 1981), as separately summarized (Comprehension: Social organization determined by incommunicability of insights). Atkin illustrates the challenge of comprehension in relation to experience "within" the geometry of a triangle.

Comprehension through transcending the plane
(as indicated by the q-analysis of Ron Atkin)

Conjection as recognizing "white"

Relative orders of comprehension

0-dimension:
Red, Green or Blue

1-dimension:
Yellow (=Red/Green)
Purple (=Red/Blue); or
Turquoise (=Blue/Green)

2-dimension:
White (=Red/Green/Blue)

Beyond the "plane" of explanation? The geographical challenge of reducing the sphere to a plane as a means of explanation highlights the continuing challenge of a "flat earth" understanding of global reality, however absurd (The Flat Earth Theory has seen a resurgence, with people trying to prove our planet is not a sphere, News.com.au, 1 June 2017). This has been famously emphasized by Thomas Friedman (The World is Flat, 2005) and the focus for criticism (Irresponsible Dependence on a Flat Earth Mentality -- in response to global governance challenges, 2008).

The inadequacy of the quest to reduce complexity through projection onto a plane is only too evident in the extension of the metaphor into "planning", namely the conception of strategic "plans" in response to "global" challenges. This tendency is curiously exemplified in the interpretation of the religious agendas by which governance may be especially informed (Adhering to God's Plan in a Global Society, 2014).

Conventional explanation may therefore be characterized as the projection onto a plane -- supposedly offering a perspective from "elsewhere", as indicated by "ex". Some form of "extraction" from the plane is then implied as a key to comprehension. Greater coherence regarding the disparate elements forming the explanation -- in the plane -- might then be more significantly related to a process of "conjection" from the plane. This is variously confused and conflated with surrogates, most notably those associated with interpretation and inference.

With respect to maps, it has been famously stressed by Alfred Korzybski that "the map is not the territory", The available maps are clearly inadequate for a civilization characterized by a combination of high degrees of uncertainty and high degrees of certainty -- itself questionable. Many offer guidance (E. F. Schumacher, A Guide for the Perplexed, 1977; Maimonides, The Guide for the Perplexed). Clarifying "conjection" in relation to mapping may then offer a more fruitful means of engaging with the "territory" (The Territory Construed as the Map: in search of radical design innovations in the representation of human activities and their relationships, 1979). Missing is a process which is the reverse of "zooming down" and "drilling down" -- as originally argued by Joel de Rosnay (The Macroscope, 1979). Geometry suggests the possibility of "zooming up" to the high orders of symmetry which render symbols so meaningful -- to whatever degree they are comprehensible.

How indeed can invisible coherence be rendered comprehensible? How might the process of projection be reversed in the light of mathematical insights -- starting with a 2D representation and extending it into 3D, with the possibility of 4D animation? Is "conjection" the key to empowerment in a period of crisis, as can be otherwise argued (Polyhedral Empowerment of Networks through Symmetry: psycho-social implications for organization and global governance, 2008).

Rather than offering commentary and explanation, the focus here is on the use of such imagery to evoke interest in the possibility and its potential. The exercise relies on use of the possibilities of morphing the basic 3D analogue to the 2D NATO symbol through the geometrical transformations enabled by Stella Polyhedron Navigator.