Holographic Thinking of Social Culture from the Perspective of Lost Book Compilation ^†

Abstract

Lost Book Compilation (Ji Yi Theory) depends on information collation and summary to recover lost books and culture. There have been some holographic phenomena in the process of natural evolution, but such holographic phenomena are also reflected in the process of cultural evolution in human society. The phenomenon of holographic insufficiency exists in both nature and social culture. The holographic phenomenon of social culture is reflected in the corresponding characterization and mapping between books and books, society, era. The holographic nature of social culture is reflected in both horizontal and vertical aspects, that is, contemporary thought and the inheritance and development of historical thought.

1. Introduction

Chinese Ji Yi Theory is a philological discipline, which is the next discipline of philology, appeared about the Song Dynast. Its appearance is inseparable from the seriousness of the death and loss of ancient documents. Its contribution is the restoration or partial restoration of lost books and documents through collecting and sorting out documents that have been lost but were preserved as citations in other existential documents. Many ancient books have been reproduced in these lost compilations. For example, according to Hanshu-Yiwenzhi records, Mozi originally had 71 articles, but only two versions have been survived: Dao Zang (contains only 53 articles), and the Si Ku Quan Shu (contains only 63 articles). The Si Ku Quan Shu Concise Catalogue was also mentioned that “The original book has seventy-one articles, but now eight have been lost.” At the end of the Qing Dynasty, Sun Zhirang gathered the sentences quoted from Mozi in the books of previous dynasties rather than the fragments contained in the biography, and formed the Mozi Yi Wen, attached to the Mozi Jian Fang. Therefore, many books and documents that seem lost have actually been preserved or partially preserved in other surviving documents.

From an information perspective, the literature data contain textual information, which can be preserved through various carriers, such as the earliest oracle bone inscriptions, stone inscriptions, and silk paper. Information can also be saved in either direct or indirect ways. For example, relevant discourse in articles and thoughts can be directly preserved in the text of the book, or could be preserved in other materials by indirect quotations, paraphrases, etc. The multi-carrier and multi-intermediary nature of the preservation of information dissemination records allows for information to be multi-layered and multi-dimensional, so that holography can also be reflected in the social culture.

A classic work or book also embodies and bears the spirit of that era, and its thoughts and discussions are branded with that era. Holography is reflected in the correspondence and mapping between books and books, society, and era, in which they were written. The facts show that some books and documents of a certain era will almost always quote and summarize the ideas and contents of other books and documents related to that era, and will also reflect the cultural ideas and cognitive methods of that era from certain, angles. Mencius’s Confucianism, for example, developed because of the ideas of Mo-tse and Yang Zhu. Therefore, the relevant thoughts of Mo-tse and Yang Zhu are bound to be introduced or reflected in Mencius’s relevant works. It is mentioned in Mencius: “Yang Zi advocated the idea of ‘self-interest’ and refused to do anything that would benefit the world. But Mo-tse advocated universal love, if it was beneficial to people all over the world, he would do it, even polishing his head and breaking his heels [1] (p. 271)”.

Any thought has an origin and inheritance. Although the ideas in the process of inheritance has develop and change, they will inevitably retain a lot of information about the thoughts of their predecessors. Therefore, when looking at human thought in both the vertical and horizontal directions, it deeply embodies a holographic characteristic.

2. The Characteristics of Information and the Emergence of the Ji Yi Theory

One of the characteristics of information is that it is condensed in the passage of time and can be lost and dissipated at any time. In the evolution of the universe, many links no longer exist. Additionally, in the evolution of the biological world, too many primitive biological species have become completely extinct, and now only a very small portion remains. Moreover, with the changes in the earth’s environment, the extinction phenomenon continues. The extinction of biological species can also be regarded as the extinction of some information in their biological genetic code, which is an information dissipation phenomenon in the biological world. Similarly, this phenomenon will also be reflected in the information in social literature.

Although geological change, species extinction, text loss and information loss are research problems in different disciplines and respectively belong to geology, biology, philology, and communication, the holography conforms to the performance of partial mapping whole, discontinuous mapping process and individual mapping class. The reason for this is that the research contents related to these disciplines are related to the change in the form of material existence and information dissipation. As an indirect existence, information is absolutely depends on direct existence. Matter is the carrier of information, and, as a direct existence, matter is always in the process of eternal movement and transformation; therefore, changes in the structural mode of the information carrier bring about change, fuzziness and dissipation in the information carried by the carrier. Therefore, the dissipation of information is eternal and inevitable, and exists indirectly [2] (pp. 65–67).

From the perspective of philology, the loss of ancient books is quite common. Zheng Qiao once said: “There are many books were lost in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, but even more the ancient books either. [3]” The New Tang Book: Preface to the History of Art and Literature written by Ouyang Xiu mentioned that: “The heyday of Kaiyuan is the most prosperous collection of books. There are 53,915 volumes of books included, and 28,469 volumes of books written by Tang scholars, which can be said that a great many......When I wrote this book today, five or six tenths of the books only heard their names but have been lost, what a pity! [4]”.

At that time, the tools used to preserve documents were very rough and easy to destroy, so it was more difficult to preserve books, but it was easy to kill books. In addition to human factors, the dissipation of information is an inevitable process. The external environment is a filter for information retention and dissipation. This is not only true for the the natural selection of species and the survival of the fittest, but also for the information in written books. Only a small portion of books can be preserved following external factors such as war, the government, and readers.

However, loss is only relative. After the loss of ancient civilizations, many traces and information on their existence can still remain, just like seemingly extinct natural information is partially preserved through other means—many extinct natural species and natural historical periods from long ago leave traces of their existence in the form of fossils and stratigraphic structures.

The reason that some information of natural and social can be retained because the information has a unique nature that different from material nature, sharing of information which determines the reproducible and disseminated characteristics of information. Matter is conserved, so there is no way to share information, and since the exchange and reaction of mass or energy are one-time, it is impossible for the giver and receiver to have the substance of the exchange or reaction at the same time. On the contrary, in the process of information reproduction or dissemination, the giver and the receiver have the same information at the same time (although there will be corresponding information loss, distortion and innovation in the information response process), the carrier of information can be replaced, and different material forms can carry the same information. These information characteristics create conditions for the preservation and dissemination of information at multiple levels and in multiple ways.

3. The Embodiment of Holographic Incompleteness in the Ji Yi Theory

Holographic insufficiency is ubiquitous. Holography is based on the interaction between things and the transformation of time and space. Historical information serves as a kind of “trace” to preserve the passing time. The spatial structure that disappeared in the evolution process was partially stored in the subsequent structure in the form of integration and reconstruction [5] (pp. 274–275). However, this preservation and storage is relative and partial. The reason that it is partial is that information is continuously being lost. With the passage of time, information dissipates and “traces” are blurred. As subsequent interactions occur, the transformation of time and space, passage and distortion are inevitable. The second law of thermodynamics shows that the trend of entropy increase in our world determines that the general direction of the flow of information is irreversible. Therefore, in this world, 100% preservation of information is impossible [6]. Obviously, the information-mining of lost books using the Ji Yi Theory is partial and relative. The Ji Yi Theory is not a panacea. It can be inferred from the incomplete holography that it is impossible to recover all lost cultural information, although the nature of information is used. The fact is that the Ji Yi Theory is not only has limited to restore cultural classics, but also has many mistakes and omissions. Therefore, the Ji Yi Theory “needs to verify the authenticity of the collected documents by distinguishing the false, and needs to review the similarities and differences, right and wrong gains and losses of the collected words and sentences through version and collation [7] (p. 251)”. There are many problems of Ji Yi achievements, just like occasions where the compilers deliberately fabricate false information, or instances where the source of the compilation of lost books is unreliable. Many achievements in the compilation of lost books were found to have problems in later generations. For example, there is a contradiction between the emergence of new ancient books and the narratives of other documents.

Cultural falsification has existed since ancient times. The ancients often relied on the Lost script of relevant books for counterfeiting. If relevant Lost script can be Ji Yi, it is easy to discover how the counterfeiters could improperly increase and reduce them, for example, this is what our predecessors did to distinguish the authenticity of “Gu Wen Shang Shu” [8] (p. 5). Therefore, in the compilation of lost books, both restoration and falsification can be distinguished. From the perspective of information activities, this kind of forgery can be regarded as man-made information noise. In nature, information noise is caused by the non-stop interaction between natural things, while, in human culture, it is caused by man-made distortion in meaning, or deliberately distort. This artificial information noise will more easily distort the original information and aggravate the degree of holographic incompleteness. However, some counterfeiting can be identified, which also reflects the holographic characteristics of social culture.

4. Social and Cultural Holography

The holographic phenomenon is the result of the condensation and accumulation of related information that may be achieved by the evolution of complex self-organization. All ordered structures formed in the process of evolution will inevitably present corresponding holographic phenomena. In addition, both self-similarity across different levels and chaotic order in aperiodic chaos are expressions of some holographic phenomena, the true meaning of fractal and chaotic phenomena can also be explained at the level of holographic phenomena [9]. In the theory of the complex information system, holography is from the perspective of natural evolution, and the evolution of human society and culture also contain holography. Taking the compilation of lost books as an entry point, we can see the holographic nature of human cultural products. Specifically, social cultural holography can be divided into two forms: horizontal holography and vertical holography.

Horizontal holography means that the cultural works of the same era will reflect the era’s spirit and brand. The social thoughts of any period are the embodiment of the spirit of that era, a display of ideological fusion, conflict, competition, and absorption. It can be said that the ideology of one period can explore the deficiencies in the other side’s ideology, and only by knowing both yourself and the enemy can a self-contained academic culture be proposed. Therefore, cultures from the same period all mirrored, represented, contrasted, competed, and blended with each other. There is holography not only in the thoughts of the same sect, but also in different or opposing thoughts, because the thoughts of the same era are contextualized, interrelated and inseparable. In addition, the holographic nature of social thought is also reflected in the blending of cultural thought and scientific and technological levels.

For example, the anarchism and postmodern thought that appeared in the late 20th century was also influenced by many other theories: the contingency of the micro-world and the uncertainty of non-determinism revealed by quantum mechanics; the emergence of the nature of things, the irreversibility of time and the fractal spatial structure revealed by the theory of complex information system; the bifurcation and chaos of the evolution direction, etc. Therefore, the mutual mapping, correlation and influences among culture, society, science and technology all reflect the holographic nature of a social culture.

Vertical holography means that all kinds of thoughts in history have a rheology and inheritance. It is precisely this diachronic nature that means that human thought can develop. As mentioned above, every era creates ideas that contain the brand of that era, but no matter how an idea is branded by the era, it has its own roots and veins, and the cultural and historical origin of these ideas can be found. For example, in the earliest pursuit of the origin of the world, there were many reveries or speculations about the origin of fire, water and soil in various ancient civilizations [10].

Democritus first put forward atomism, and modern physics has been pursuing the smallest particle that makes up the world: “the brick of the universe”. In fact, this vitality has been reflected since the establishment of various theories, and also indicates the future development of this kind of thinking. From this, it can also be seen that the vertical holography in human social culture is not only for history, but also for the future.