[Xmca-l] Re: Unit of Analysis
Andy Blunden
ablunden@mira.net
Thu Sep 7 21:02:01 PDT 2017
"if something explains everything, it in fact explains
nothing" ?
To say that there is always something in between any two
things you want to mention is not "explaining everything."
"If the body is mediating, then between what and what?"
Basically between mind and body. Initially there is no such
distinction, for a new-born, for example. But this
distinction arises through practical interactions with the
infant's socio-cultural environment, the same way a child
gets to know that that there is *my hand* and that there is
*not me*, etc. Repeating medieval aphorisms about "no
distinctions between mind and body" and denouncing this as a
"Western construct" - things one hears from time to time -
is a waste of breath. We are not born with such a
distinction, but we make one, and after a certain age,
almost everything we do is mediated by consciousness, even
if that consciousness is delusional.
Also, we now know that the characteristically human
adaptations - our upright gait, our speech-enabled larynx
and our hands are *cultural inheritances*, just like the
landscape, crops, domesticated animals and tools we use, not
to mention our languages, art, religions, etc. All
*artefacts* mediating our activity. You can say that these
things explain nothing if you like, but I am not convinced.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research
On 8/09/2017 1:44 PM, Wolff-Michael Roth wrote:
> Andy,
> if everything is mediated, what is the point of doing more research to say
> that something is mediated by something? Like the adage goes, if something
> explains everything, it in fact explains nothing.
>
> If the body is mediating, then between what and what?
>
> Concerning the "meaning" of mediation in CHAT----this is perhaps an
> Anglo-Saxon CHAT that you are referring to?
>
> There are scholars saying that Vygotsky's work is not of much use because
> of his instrumentalism, mediation seems to me part of that instrumentalism.
> (That's why those people say that Bakhtin has a better approach to the way
> language works.) The later Vygotsky did not seem to go the route of
> mediation, or so say those more familiar with some of the notes that have
> become available from the family archive.
>
> Michael
>
>
> Wolff-Michael Roth, Lansdowne Professor
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Applied Cognitive Science
> MacLaurin Building A567
> University of Victoria
> Victoria, BC, V8P 5C2
> http://web.uvic.ca/~mroth <http://education2.uvic.ca/faculty/mroth/>
>
> New book: *The Mathematics of Mathematics
> <https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/new-directions-in-mathematics-and-science-education/the-mathematics-of-mathematics/>*
>
> On Thu, Sep 7, 2017 at 8:32 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>
>> Sure, not everyone agrees. I think understanding what we come to know as
>> parts of our body as artefacts makes a lot of things comprehensible. Eating
>> and having sex, for example, are cultural practices and through
>> participation in these cultural practices people learn to name and identify
>> the various parts of our body and the appropriate ways of using them. As
>> David said, we are not born with this ability, but only natural functions.
>> We are born without self-consciousness of any kind or any distinction
>> between mind and body. These are culturally acquired distinctions and the
>> use of our bodies is the cultural means of acquiring these capacities,
>> which ultimately come to be embodied in external objects. I arrived at this
>> conclusion (the body is an artefact) because it was necessary to make sense
>> of the narrative of cultural psychology. But as you say, Michael, not
>> everyone agrees. I don't know anyone in this whole story that I entirely
>> agree with.
>>
>> Note however that "mediated" has taken on a very specific meaning in the
>> CHAT tradition, it implies artefact-use for CHAT people and in the same
>> tradition bodies are not "artefacts." So there is tons of room for talking
>> at cross purposes here. But mediation is something utterly ubiquitous.
>>
>> Andy
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> Andy Blunden
>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>> https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research
>> On 8/09/2017 1:19 PM, Wolff-Michael Roth wrote:
>>
>>> Not everyone agrees:
>>>
>>> (Mikhailov 2001, p. 20) "Hence, the external corporeal existence of other
>>> people, their real-objective behavior, their activity with things, their
>>> voices and gestures and, consequently, the object-related nature
>>> of all the conditions of their lives (all that is other), *is not
>>> mediated*
>>> for individuals to become aware of them by the pure meanings
>>> and senses of so many physically external words,26 but are
>>> themselves the reality of affect and sense for each of us."
>>>
>>> AND
>>>
>>> (Mikhailov 2001, p. 27) Everything
>>> to which the child begins to relate in himself—close adults,
>>> their speech, and consequently the “language” of household objects
>>> addressed to him, the “language” of the whole of nature around
>>> him, in a word, everything that his organs of perception assimilate
>>> together with the subjectivity of adults—all these things are given
>>> to the child *not as an ensemble of mediators* between the child and
>>> nature, but, in fact, as subjectively his own; for all of these things
>>> are subjectively “everyone’s.”
>>>
>>> Mediationism has become something like a religion---Alfredo and I have a
>>> piece in Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, suggesting why
>>> we do not need the concept,
>>>
>>> Michael
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Wolff-Michael Roth, Lansdowne Professor
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> --------------------
>>> Applied Cognitive Science
>>> MacLaurin Building A567
>>> University of Victoria
>>> Victoria, BC, V8P 5C2
>>> http://web.uvic.ca/~mroth <http://education2.uvic.ca/faculty/mroth/>
>>>
>>> New book: *The Mathematics of Mathematics
>>> <https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/new-dir
>>> ections-in-mathematics-and-science-education/the-mathematics
>>> -of-mathematics/>*
>>>
>>> On Thu, Sep 7, 2017 at 7:55 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>>>
>>> David, the germ cell of artefact-use is the use of our own body. Our
>>>> various body parts are essentially artefacts.
>>>>
>>>> Andy
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> Andy Blunden
>>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>>>> https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research
>>>> On 8/09/2017 12:45 PM, David Kellogg wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Andy:
>>>>> We're currently translating Chapter Three of pedology of the adolescent
>>>>> into Korean. You know that Vygotsky likes to begin at the beginning. So
>>>>> Vygotsky is discussing the way in which the first year of life both is
>>>>> and
>>>>> is not the same as intra-uterine development. He points out that there
>>>>> are
>>>>> three "activities" (and that is the term that he uses) that are similar.
>>>>>
>>>>> a) Feeding. Although the child now uses animal functions perfectly well
>>>>> (that is, the child responds to hunger and even actively seeks milk) the
>>>>> nature of the child's food does not depend on these animal functions:
>>>>> it is
>>>>> still, as it was during gestation, a product of the mother's body.
>>>>>
>>>>> b) Sleep. Although the child has periods of wakefulness and activity,
>>>>> the
>>>>> main (as opposed to the leading) "activity" is inactive sleep, and the
>>>>> child does not keep a twenty-four hour cycle any more than she or he
>>>>> did in
>>>>> the womb. Even the use of the twenty-four hour cycle is an adaptation to
>>>>> the circadian rhythm of the mother as much as the establishment of the
>>>>> child's own circadian rhythm.
>>>>>
>>>>> c) Locomotion. Although the child now has space to move arms and legs,
>>>>> the human child doesn't use them for locomotion for many months after
>>>>> birth
>>>>> and instead depends on mother, just as a marsupial that has a
>>>>> morphological
>>>>> adaptation for this purpose would.
>>>>>
>>>>> Vygotsky's point is that these activities are not yet mediated; if they
>>>>> were, then the child's discovery of her or his own ability to act upon
>>>>> objects ("tools") and the child's discovery of her or his ability to
>>>>> mean
>>>>> ("signs") would not have the significance that they do. Ergo,
>>>>> historically,
>>>>> genetically, developmentally there must necessarily exist activity
>>>>> which is
>>>>> not made up of mediated actions.
>>>>>
>>>>> David Kellogg
>>>>>
>>>>> On Fri, Sep 8, 2017 at 10:51 AM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
>>>>> <mailto:
>>>>> ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> "Andy added the notion that experts need basically to
>>>>> be able to agree reliably on examples of the unit" ?
>>>>> Researchers need to be clear about the unit of
>>>>> analysis each of them are using and of course,
>>>>> collaboration is much easier if you are all using the
>>>>> same unit of analysis. Exemplars are a way of
>>>>> substantiating a concept while a concept remains
>>>>> unclear or diverse, just like lists of attributes and
>>>>> definitions - all of which still fall short of a
>>>>> concept. To grasp the concept of something, like "unit
>>>>> of analysis," you have to know the narrative in which
>>>>> the concept is situated. Narrative knowledge and
>>>>> conceptual knowledge are mutually interdependent. The
>>>>> first three chapters of the story of "unit of
>>>>> analysis" as I see it are in my paper "Goethe, Hegel &
>>>>> Marx" to be published in "Science & Society" next
>>>>> year:
>>>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/pdfs/Goethe-Hegel-
>>>>> Marx_public.pdf
>>>>> <http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/pdfs/Goethe-Hegel-
>>>>> Marx_public.pdf>
>>>>> - Vygotsky is the 4th chapter.
>>>>>
>>>>> "What makes water not an element, but a compound, are
>>>>> the relations between the subunits" ?
>>>>> The idea of a water molecule pre-dates he discovery of
>>>>> its composition as H2O and all the chemical properties
>>>>> related to that. As David suggested, it is the much
>>>>> more ancient knowledge of the "water cycle" - rain,
>>>>> snow, hail and fog ... run-off, streams, rivers, lakes
>>>>> ... seas, oceans ... vapour, steam ... - which is
>>>>> expressed in the idea of a "water molecule" - a tiny
>>>>> particle which all these things are made of, but which
>>>>> combines in different forms of movement to give us the
>>>>> various physical forms of what is all water. It is an
>>>>> unfortunate choice for a archetypal example, because
>>>>> it appears to contradict my claim that the concept of
>>>>> the unit must be visceral. The water molecule is so
>>>>> small it can be held in the hand, tossed around and
>>>>> stacked together only in the imagination. Nonetheless,
>>>>> like with metaphors, it is our visceral knowledge of
>>>>> particles (stones, pieces of bread, household objects,
>>>>> etc) which makes the concept of a "water molecule"
>>>>> something real to us, whose manifold physical
>>>>> properties arising from its V-shape, and its
>>>>> electrical stickiness, are meaningful. This contrasts
>>>>> with the 18th/19th century idea of "forces" and
>>>>> "fields" which are intangibles (though of course we
>>>>> find ways of grasping them viscerally nonetheless).
>>>>>
>>>>> Different phenomena are grasped by the way one and the
>>>>> same units aggregate. The unit relates to the range of
>>>>> phenomena it unifies. Different insights are provided
>>>>> by different units, *not necessarily in a hierarchy*.
>>>>> But a hierarchy of units and in particular the
>>>>> micro/macro pair are a theme which runs right through
>>>>> this narrative, the micro in some way "explaining" the
>>>>> macro which in turn explains the main phenomena:
>>>>> cell/organism, atom/molecule, commodity/capital, word
>>>>> meaning/utterance, artefact-mediated action/activity,
>>>>> etc. I am interested in this micro/macro relation but
>>>>> personally (despite my interest in Hegel) I am not a
>>>>> fan of trying to systematise the world with a
>>>>> "complete set" of units. Just one unit gives us an
>>>>> entire science. Let's not get too carried away. :)
>>>>>
>>>>> I hold the view, with A N Leontyev, that *Activities
>>>>> are composed of artefact-mediated actions and nothing
>>>>> else*. Any move away from this destroys the
>>>>> ontological foundation and takes us into metaphysics.
>>>>> If it is not an artefact-mediated action or aggregate
>>>>> of such actions, what the hell is it???
>>>>>
>>>>> Andy
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>> Andy Blunden
>>>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>>>>> <http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>
>>>>> https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research
>>>>> <https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research>
>>>>> On 8/09/2017 3:41 AM, David Dirlam wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> The issues that have arisen in this discussion
>>>>> clarify the conception of what sort of entity a
>>>>> "unit" is. Both and Andy and Martin stress the
>>>>> importance of the observer. Anyone with some
>>>>> experience should have some sense of it (Martin's
>>>>> point). But Andy added the notion that experts
>>>>> need basically to be able to agree reliably on
>>>>> examples of the unit (worded like the
>>>>> psychological researcher I am, but I'm sure Andy
>>>>> will correct me if I missed his meaning).
>>>>>
>>>>> We also need to address two other aspects of
>>>>> units--their classifiability and the types of
>>>>> relations between them. What makes water not an
>>>>> element, but a compound, are the relations between
>>>>> the subunits (the chemical bonds between the
>>>>> elements) as well as those with other molecules of
>>>>> water (how fast they travel relative to each
>>>>> other), which was David Kellogg's point. So the
>>>>> analogy to activity is that it is like the
>>>>> molecule, while actions are like the elements.
>>>>> What is new to this discussion is that the
>>>>> activity must contain not only actions, but also
>>>>> relationships between them. If we move up to the
>>>>> biological realm, we find a great increase in the
>>>>> complexity of the analogy. Bodies are made up of
>>>>> more than cells, and I'm not just referring to
>>>>> entities like extracellular fluid. The
>>>>> identifiability, classification, and
>>>>> interrelations between cells and their
>>>>> constituents all help to make the unit so
>>>>> interesting to science. Likewise, the constituents
>>>>> of activities are more than actions. Yrjo's
>>>>> triangles illustrate that. Also, we need to be
>>>>> able to identify an activity, classify activities,
>>>>> and discern the interrelations between them and
>>>>> their constituents.
>>>>>
>>>>> I think that is getting us close to David
>>>>> Kellogg's aim of characterizing the meaning of
>>>>> unit. But glad, like him, to read corrections.
>>>>>
>>>>> David
>>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, Sep 6, 2017 at 10:08 PM, Andy Blunden
>>>>> <ablunden@mira.net <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
>>>>> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net
>>>>>
>>>>> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Yes, but I think, Martin, that the unit of
>>>>> analysis we
>>>>> need to aspire to is *visceral* and sensuous.
>>>>> There
>>>>> are "everyday" concepts which are utterly
>>>>> abstract and
>>>>> saturated with ideology and received
>>>>> knowledge. For
>>>>> example, Marx's concept of capital is
>>>>> buying-in-order-to-sell, which is not the
>>>>> "everyday"
>>>>> concept of capital at all, of course.
>>>>>
>>>>> Andy
>>>>>
>>>>> -----------------------------
>>>>> -------------------------------
>>>>> Andy Blunden
>>>>> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>>>>> <http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>
>>>>> <http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>>>>> <http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm>>
>>>>> https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research
>>>>> <https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research>
>>>>> <https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research
>>>>> <https://andyblunden.academia.edu/research>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On 7/09/2017 8:48 AM, Martin John Packer wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Isn’t a unit of analysis (a germ cell) a
>>>>> preliminary concept, one might say an everyday
>>>>> concept, that permits one to grasp the
>>>>> phenomenon
>>>>> that is to be studied in such a way that
>>>>> it can be
>>>>> elaborated, in the course of
>>>>> investigation, into
>>>>> an articulated and explicit scientific
>>>>> concept?
>>>>>
>>>>> just wondering
>>>>>
>>>>> Martin
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Sep 6, 2017, at 5:15 PM, Greg Thompson
>>>>> <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com
>>>>> <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
>>>>> <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com
>>>>>
>>>>> <mailto:greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Not sure if others might feel this is an
>>>>> oversimplification of unit of
>>>>> analysis, but I just came across this in
>>>>> Wortham and Kim's Introduction to
>>>>> the volume Discourse and Education and
>>>>> found
>>>>> it useful. The short of it is
>>>>> that the unit of analysis is the unit that
>>>>> "preserves the
>>>>> essential features of the whole".
>>>>>
>>>>> Here is their longer explanation:
>>>>>
>>>>> "Marx (1867/1986) and Vygotsky (1934/1987)
>>>>> apply the concept "unit of
>>>>> analysis" to social scientific
>>>>> problems. In
>>>>> their account, an adequate
>>>>> approach to any phenomenon must find
>>>>> the right
>>>>> unit of analysis - one that
>>>>> preserves the essential features of
>>>>> the whole.
>>>>> In order to study water, a
>>>>> scientist must not break the substance
>>>>> down
>>>>> below the level of an
>>>>> individual H20 molecule. Water is made
>>>>> up of
>>>>> nothing but hydrogen and
>>>>> oxygen, but studying hydrogen and oxygen
>>>>> separately will not illuminate the
>>>>> essential properties of water. Similarly,
>>>>> meaningful language use requires
>>>>> a unit of analysis that includes aspects
>>>>> beyond phonology,
>>>>> grammar, semantics, and mental
>>>>> representations. All of these
>>>>> linguistic and
>>>>> psychological factors play a role in
>>>>> linguistic communication, but natural
>>>>> language use also involves social
>>>>> action in a
>>>>> context that includes other
>>>>> actors and socially significant
>>>>> regularities."
>>>>>
>>>>> (entire chapter can be found on
>>>>> Research Gate at:
>>>>> https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319322253_Introduct
>>>>> ion_to_Discourse_and_Education
>>>>> <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319322253_Introduc
>>>>> tion_to_Discourse_and_Education>
>>>>> <https://www.researchgate.
>>>>> net/publication/319322253_Introduction_to_Discourse_and_Education
>>>>> <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319322253_Introduc
>>>>> tion_to_Discourse_and_Education>>
>>>>> )
>>>>>
>>>>> I thought that the water/H20 metaphor
>>>>> was a
>>>>> useful one for thinking about
>>>>> unit of analysis.
>>>>>
>>>>> -greg
>>>>>
>>>>> -- Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
>>>>> Assistant Professor
>>>>> Department of Anthropology
>>>>> 880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
>>>>> Brigham Young University
>>>>> Provo, UT 84602
>>>>> WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
>>>>> <http://greg.a.thompson.byu.edu>
>>>>> <http://greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
>>>>> <http://greg.a.thompson.byu.edu>>
>>>>> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
>>>>> <http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson>
>>>>> <http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
>>>>> <http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>
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