Directory talk:Jon Awbrey/Papers/Inquiry Driven Systems : Part 1

Work Area

1.3.

1.3.5. Discussion of Formalization : Specific Objects

I recognize inquiry as beginning with a "surprising phenomenon" or
a "problematic situation", more briefly described as a "surprise"
or a "problem", respectively.  These are the types of moments that
try our souls, the instances of events that instigate inquiry as
an effort to achieve their own resolution.  Surprises and problems
are experienced as afflicted with an irritating uncertainty or a
compelling difficulty, one that calls for a response on the part
of the agent in question:

   1.  A "surprise" calls for an explanation to resolve the
       uncertainty that is present in it.  This uncertainty
       is associated with a difference between observations
       and expectations.

   2.  A "problem" calls for a plan of action to resolve the
       difficulty that is present in it.  This difficulty is
       associated with a difference between observations and
       intentions.

To express this diversity in a unified formula:  Both types of inquiry
begin with a "delta", a compact term that admits of expansion as a debt,
a difference, a difficulty, a discrepancy, a dispersion, a distribution,
a doubt, a duplicity, or a duty.

Expressed another way, inquiry begins with a doubt about one's object,
whether this means what is true of a case, an object, or a world, what
to do about reaching a goal, or whether the hoped-for goal is really
good for oneself -- with all that these questions lead to in essence,
in deed, or in fact.

Perhaps there is an inexhaustible reality that issues in these
apparent mysteries and recurrent crises, but, by the time I say
this much, I am already indulging in a finite image, a hypothesis
about what is going on.  If nothing else, then, one finds again the
familiar pattern, where the formative relation between the informal
and the formal merely serves to remind one anew of the relationship
between the infinite and the finite.