Memorable Configurations of Numbers of Cognitive and Strategic Relevance

TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 28 Apr 2025

Anthony Judge | Laetus in Praesens – TRANSCEND Media Service

Implications of Clarification Elicited through Exchange with AI

Introduction

Corresponding to the long-recognized crisis of illiteracy and current aversion to reading, there is an increasing degree of recognition of innumeracy and the aversion to “mathematics”. With respect to innumeracy, current concerns are framed in terms of mathematical anxiety and the contested efficacy of mathematics education. The deeper concern may lie in a broader incapacity for configurative comprehension — the ability to recognize and internalize meaningful patterns in structured spaces, especially in maps, models, and 3D geometries. Although such comprehension may be superficially appreciated through popular interest in “sacred geometry“, little is known about why these forms are experienced as meaningful or memorable — despite their embodiment in architecture and ritual design.

This concern becomes particularly acute in an era dominated by evidence-based policy-making, in which strategic options are increasingly framed and legitimized through the use of numbers. But how well are policy-makers — or the publics they serve — cognitively equipped to evaluate such configurations? The challenge is compounded by a widening cognitive gap, hinted at in early reflections by Harold Lasswell:

Why do we put so much emphasis on audio-visual means of portraying goal, trend, condition, projection, and alternative? Partly because so many valuable participants in decision-making have dramatizing imaginations…They are not enamoured of numbers or of analytic abstractions. They are at their best in deliberations that encourage contextuality by a varied repertory of means, and where an immediate sense of time, space, and figure is retained. (The transition toward more sophisticated procedures, Computers and the Policy-making Community; applications to international relations, 1968)

Whilst population numbers continue inexorably to increase unchallenged — and resources and species diminsh in sympathy — little attention is paid to the possibility that the key to any elusive “peace” may lie in configuration and multipolarity (Middle East Peace Potential through Dynamics in Spherical Geometry, 2012). This contrasts with simplistic appeals for unity, solidarity and harmony (The Consensus Delusion, 2011). With the primary focus on binary dynamics, even the potential of triangulation is ignored (Destabilizing Multipolar Society through Binary Decision-making, 2016; Triangulation of Incommensurable Concepts for Global Configuration, 2011; Eliciting Patterns of Global Consensus via Tensional Integrity, 2023).

The current human condition is further stressed by reports of a global decline in IQ, accompanied by a noted deterioration in focus, reasoning, and critical thinking — particularly among younger generations (Arezki Amiri, Human Intelligence is Sharply Declining, Daily Galaxy, 23 April 2025). In this context, the tendency to “dumb down” complex issues is not merely a pedagogical issue, but a profound systemic risk.

Ironically, mathematics itself — the discipline most directly concerned with number — offers little insight into what constitutes “comprehension.” It remains largely indifferent to the psychosocial dynamics of understanding, often defaulting to a stance of implicit deprecation toward those less mathematically fluent. The field rarely accounts for the emotional and cultural weight of “ignorance” — or for its own cognitive blind spots. Ironically this is nuanced by the fact that some aspects of mathematics are recognized as a major challenge to many mathematicians — if not most — exemplified by discovery of the monster symmetry group (Mark Ronan, Symmetry and the Monster: one of the greatest quests of mathematics, 2006; Potential Psychosocial Significance of Monstrous Moonshine, 2007; Dynamics of Symmetry Group Theorizing, 2008)comprehension of psycho-social implication Again however, the discipline of mathematics is variously challenged by the concept of “ignorance” — although reframed in some cases as “uncertainty”.

A striking example of the current conceptual constraint is the remarkable compilation of 370,000 sequences of numbers by the On-Line Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences (OEIS). There is seemingly no implication that these could be evaluated in terms of their meaningfulness in practice or their comprehensibilty. A related question can be highlighted by the sets of numbers variously considered meaningful for conceptual and strategic articulation, as previously argued (Representation, Comprehension and Communication of Sets: the role of number, 1978).

This broader aversion to mathematics — and to structurally nuanced reasoning — is made increasingly problematic by the accelerating capabilities of artificial intelligence. Not only has AI already surpassed humans in games of high abstraction like chess, go, and poker, it is increasingly deployed to solve mathematically-framed problems that long resisted human insight. A growing concern is not whether AI will offer meaningful solutions, but whether humans will be cognitively equipped to understand them — especially when such solutions pertain to governance of polycrises and interwoven planetary challenges (Brandon Boesch, (More-than-human Science, Aeon, 24 April 2025). It remains intriguing as to whether AI will be able to meaningfully address problems formulated otherwise (Superquestions for Supercomputers, 2010). There may then be the question as to whether humans can comprehend any solutions which then emerge — especially when they have implications for governance of polycrises.

Debate regarding increasing reliance on AI for modelling policy options is appropriately biased by reference to the tendency of AI to make errors — a phenomenon now widely described kin terms of “hallucination“. Such debate typically avoids any reference to the remarkable tendency of humans with the seemingly highest qualifications to make “errors” — as is becoming increasingly evident in analysis of the policy response to the COVID pandemic.

The following exercise is a response to the question of how configurations are comprehended — as might be relevant to the articulation, comprehension, and communication of strategies. It could be understood as a challenge to the universal reliance on “multiplication tables” or manipulation of devices like the abacus or calculator. One aspect of that response, beyond appreciation of AI as a “super-calculator”, is the degree to which AI merits consideration as “super-configurator” — whatever that may become to mean. This recalls contrasting renderings of “computer” in other languages, such as French, where the term is derived from the Latin ordinare (“to put in order, organize”) — reflecting a conceptual focus on the ordering, organizing, or systematizing function of a computer.

In its extensive use of AI, the following exercise helps to reframe the potential role of AI in relation to humans — as a “cognitive prosthetic” — especially given relative incompetence in framing questions deemed to be of relevance. As an appreciative inquiry, the exercise clarifies aspects of that interaction in contrast to the automatic condemnation of AI and its use — now a major fearful characteristic of discussion of its future implications. Curiously such debate, in its uncritical appreciation of human intelligence and creativity, fails to note the manner in which such intelligence is clearly constrained by various factors, as noted separately (Knowledge Processes Neglected by Science, 2012, Modelling silo thinking and resistance to integrative perspectives, 2024). Their consequences are most obvious with respect to obvious failures of international dialogue, interfaith dialogue, interdisciplinary dialogue, and the like.

The responses from AI in this exploration have been framed as grayed areas. Given the length of the document to which the exchanges gave rise, the form of presentation has itself been treated as an experiment — in anticipation of the future implication of AI into research documents. Only the “questions” to AI are rendered immediately visible — with the response by AI hidden unless specifically requested by the reader (a facility not operational in PDF variants of the page, in contrast with the original). The responses are indicative of progressive convergence on preliminary presentation of results in tabular form. The progression took the form of multiple iterations of that presentation (many excluded) of which only the final form is included as of primary interest. Whilst optionally accessible, the iterative progression to that end may be of interest to some — but is best recognized as of secondary relevance to the argument made by that final table and the illustrations.

Reservations and commentary on the process of interaction with AI to that end have been discussed separately (Methodological comment on experimental use of AI, 2024). Those reservations have been supplemented with commentary from Deep Seek on AI’s tendency toward formulaic flattery or semantic inflation — seemingly analogous to that questionably appreciated in many social situations. Such exaggerated responses in what follows have been left for the reader to navigate — recognizing that they may be reframed by settings. Readers are of course free to amend the questions asked, or to frame other related questions — whether with the same AI, with others, or with those that become available in the future. In endeavouring to elicit insight from the world’s resources via AI, the process calls for critical comment in contrast with more traditional methods for doing so.

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