It was noted earlier that phenomena appearing to be constrained in some ways and unconstrained in others are compounds of purely connective and purely architective interactions, which have no features in common. The examples of serial meaning demonstrate that purely connective and architective interactions also have no serial meanings in common. Just as a phenomenon can be analyzed into component interactions that are either purely connective or purely architective, so too its serial meanings can be analyzed into those that are either purely connective or purely architective.

Different interactions of the same mode may share serial meanings, and an interaction of one mode may display several serial meanings of that mode, since these are often interdependent, as for example, the serial meaning of precise enumeration is dependent on the serial meanings of identity and separation. But interactions of different modes share no serial meanings.

In a compound phenomenon, one that is a mixture of connective and architective interactions, serial meanings may continue across adjoining interactions when they are of the same mode, but when the interactions are of different modes there can be no continuity of serial meaning because the different modes have no serial meanings in common. A birdbath's bowl at the top of its post continues the post's serial meaning of stasis but that serial meaning does not extend to any (liquid) water filling the bath. In a compound phenomenon, serial meanings are necessarily interrupted at junctions between interactions of different modes even though the interactions may be contiguous.

There is a significant consequence to this. Since the connective and architective modes have no serial meanings in common, serial meanings in one mode are meaningless in the context of the other, indeed not even recognizable as having meaning. To a (connective) wave or flood of water, for example, the (architective) distinction between a chair and a table that it sweeps along is lost. For a compound phenomenon, the serial meanings in components of one mode are meaningless in components of the other.

Even though serial meanings in one mode are meaningless in the context of the other, interactions in one mode can have consequences for interactions in the other, especially within a compound phenomenon. For example, a table swept along in a flood may well get hooked (architectively) to objects protruding from the riverbank and thereby alter the (connective) flow of the water, while why or how the table got hooked would be meaningless from the point of view of the water (since water can never get hooked).

Narratives of Serial Meaning

When a serial meaning continues across adjoining interactions of a compound phenomenon, as can happen when the interactions are of the same mode, I call it a serial narrative.

Though a serial narrative is interrupted when the adjoining interactions are of different modes, it may well pick up from where it left off when a previously interrupted mode is resumed. Narratives can continue across interruptions - and do so apparently seamlessly - since in the context of their own mode nothing meaningful happened during their interruption. Of course a disjunctive interaction may occur during an interruption to prevent the narrative's resumption, in which case the narrative terminates.

A narrative runs in its own mode only, but a compound phenomenon may have a narrative running in each mode and skip between them as it skips between modes, with the narrative in each mode appearing seamless in its own mode while being meaningless - not even recognizable as being a narrative - in the other.

When a disjunct occurs during an interruption that diverts the course of a narrative or prevents its resumption, the disjunct would appear inexplicable in the narrative's own context because whatever occurred during its interruption would be meaningless to it. In the narrative's mode the disjunctive interaction would appear to have arisen randomly, without reason. When a disjunct occurs in a narrative's own mode it would not be so mystifying.

Fields of Serial Meaning

The serial meanings and narratives at different levels of an architecture can be very different. Objects emerging at higher levels of aggregation have properties of their own, some of which are different to those of their constituent objects, and may interact using these novel properties in completely novel ways, displaying serial meanings completely different to those of their lower levels.

The serial meanings at an emerging level need not even be of the same mode as those of their lower levels, for as an object in its own right, the emerging object may engage in either mode of interaction depending on the environment it finds itself in. A carbon dioxide molecule, for example, may behave connectively in a gas with other carbon dioxide molecules even though it is an architective bond of carbon and oxygen atoms; or it could bond with the other carbon dioxide molecules into crystals of dry ice if the temperature was low enough.

Thus with each new level in an architecture, new fields of serial meaning may emerge, in which the emerging objects engage in novel interactions with novel serial meanings. These emergent objects can be sequenced and arranged in novel ways, in which completely novel patterns can arise - both connective and architective - and in which novel games can be played.

New fields of serial meaning can emerge in connective interactions as well, for example when waves interfere to display novel patterns that none of the contributing waves display, or when incidental factors generate yet more novel patterns, or when high frequency waves carry low frequency modulations. We can see this in Moire fringes, when light generates extraneous patterns on water waves and in the transmission of radio and television programs. But the novel serial meanings emerging from connective contexts are as ephemeral as their visages, while the novel serial meanings emerging from architective aggregations can endure for as long as the emerging objects (with their novel properties) endure.

It is significant that the serial meanings in a higher level of an architecture do not emerge from the serial meanings in the level below but from the novel capacities and interactions of the objects in the higher level. In connective contexts, serial meanings in higher levels often do emerge from serial meanings in the levels below or even from extraneous incidents.

Fields of serial meaning emerge in an architecture in the same fixed, hierarchical levels as its levels of aggregation. The fields of serial meaning emerging in connective contexts can also have levels, but since these serial meanings are ephemeral, their levels too may be ephemeral.

As atoms emerge from nuclear aggregations, so the field of chemistry becomes available to them, which was not available to their component nucleons. Atoms can aggregate chemically in different ways to form different kinds of molecules, while the atoms' component nucleons - their protons, neutrons and electrons - had only the sub-atomic (non chemical) field of serial meanings to play in. Biology with its many fields of meaning emerge in turn from the aggregations of different kinds of molecules, the interferences of molecular vibrations and the emergence of inter-molecular electrical circuits. 3D vision and its fields emerge from the biology of eyes and brains, while art and its playful fields emerge from vision, and so on. Interactions at the level of art have different fields of meaning to those at the level of vision, while interactions at the level of vision have different fields of meaning to interactions at the level of biology, and so on.

The accumulation of fields of serial meaning may follow different paths in the development of different phenomena as new and diverse fields emerge. Nowhere is this more evident than in the diversity of biological life-forms, with each living organism having acquired different fields as it developed from a different genomic starting point. However, not all the fields of serial meaning an organism acquires are accessible to all its levels: As a conscious human I will be ignorant of many of the fields my own blood cells play in - and vice versa.

The Organization of Architective Serial Meaning

Though the fields of meaning in art emerge from 3D vision and the fields of meaning in vision emerge from the biology of eyes, it is the art that directs the eye to the picture.

The higher level serial meanings in connectives may be derived from their lower level serial meanings so if the lower level serial meanings disappear then the higher level serial meanings would disappear too. The higher level serial meanings in an architecture are not derived from their lower level serial meanings but from the novel capacities and interactions of the objects in the higher level. The higher level serial meanings in an architecture are thus existentially independent of the serial meanings in their lower levels (but not of the objects in the lower levels). As long as the interactions between the lower level objects in an architecture persist, its higher level serial meanings can persist even if lower level serial meanings disappear.

So should a conflict arise between serial meanings at different levels of an architecture, a serial meaning at a higher level can govern those in its lower levels so as to maintain the integrity of the serial meaning in the higher level even at the cost of lower level serial meanings. Lower level serial meanings could not govern those in their higher levels even though lower level serial meanings are also existentially independent of higher level meanings, since there could be conflicting serial meanings amid the many lower levels and expressing all of these would result in chaos at the top; while the single serial meaning at the top governing all those below results in order throughout the architecture.

In this way higher level serial meanings in an architecture can be said to enjoy a semantic priority over those in their lower levels, even though the higher level objects have emerged from the lower level objects. In connective contexts higher level serial meanings may well be derived from their lower level serial meanings so no level of serial meaning necessarily has priority.^#18

For example, societies emerge from the aggregations of people but the serial meanings at a social level can govern the serial meanings at a personal level. As long as a society persists, what happens at the social level governs the behaviour of people at the personal level so as to avoid contradicting the social level behaviour, even if it means that some personal level serial meanings are forfeited. This does not mean that all personal behaviour is socially dictated, only that lower level serial meanings may not transgress what is acceptable at the social level.

I say that serial meanings at higher levels in an architecture organize the serial meanings in their lower levels (and that serial narratives in the higher levels of an architecture organize the narratives in their lower levels) so as to maintain the integrity of the serial meanings and narratives at the higher levels, even though the higher level objects have emerged from the lower level objects.

Serial meaning in an architecture is thus layered in levels of organization in the same way that its objects are layered in levels of control. Both control and organization in an architecture occur in a top down direction. The lower levels may have created the higher levels but they neither control them nor organize their serial meaning. Like control, organization occurs between levels of an architecture.

We should also note that it is only the architective serial meanings in an architecture that are organized by the serial meaning in its higher levels; connective serial meanings at lower levels of an architecture are only organized to the extent that they are contained by elements of the architecture.

Organization differs from control in an architecture in that the termination of a narrative at a lower level need not affect a narrative at a higher level, while disruption of objects in a lower level will disrupt objects above them. A dynasty can continue after the death of a particular ruler, for example. Contrarily, termination of a higher level narrative would very likely affect lower level narratives, while disruption of a higher level object does not necessitate disruptions in the levels below.

Higher levels of serial meaning in connective contexts do not organize the serial meaning in their lower levels. When new connective serial meanings arise they overlay each other without organizing each other. Two radio programs broadcast at the same frequency will likely be garbled. It could be argued that the modulation of one wave by another of a different frequency so as to carry a signal is a connective organization of serial meaning. However, such a modulated wave carries the serial meanings of all its contributing waves rather than having one serial meaning eliminate any other. Each contributing serial meaning could subsequently be extracted from the modulated wave by using suitable filters, whereas once a serial meaning has been organized by higher levels of an architecture some of its original lower level serial meanings may not be recovered. The organization of serial meaning is a feature of architectures only.

In conjunction with their ability to code, store and copy information with fidelity, this capacity of an architecture to create higher levels having novel serial meanings which then organize their lower level meanings facilitates them developing into self-sustaining, self-organizing functional structures. Novel fields of both connective and architective serial meanings spontaneously emerging in such self-sustaining, self-organizing functional structures could have allowed life to emerge from matter, not simply as a development of complexity, but as a consequence of the emergence of novel serial meanings and the ability of architectures to organize them.

Michael Polanyi's "Life's Irreducible Structure" ^#5 offers vivid examples of the hierarchical organization of meaning.

Processional Narratives

It may happen, in fact is very likely, that as architectures step through a procession, the architectures at succeeding steps will be similar to the ones they have just replaced, allowing some narratives to continue in successive architectures while the architectures themselves do not. That is, at each step in a procession, some narratives of the resulting architecture continue narratives that were present in the preceding architecture despite the preceding architecture having been replaced. An architecture and its identity may be disrupted but some of its narratives may continue in the architecture that replaces it. In a dynasty, for example, narratives of the ruling family continue even though individual rulers have passed on.

I term architective narratives that continue through a processing of architectures processional narratives. We can consider processional narratives as emergent phenomena with the continuing narratives comprising the processional narrative's own narrative themes, and these may evolve, step by step, as the underlying architectures are replaced. As emergent phenomena in their own right, processional narratives can then be seen to organize the narratives of their processing architectures to their themes in a top down fashion, even though they emerge from their underlying architectures. Indeed, processional narratives would organize all the levels of architective serial meaning in every one of their contributing architectures to their themes, albeit slightly differently in each contributing architecture as the procession evolves.

A processional narrative is not itself an object or an architecture even though it arises through architective procession. Not being an object, it has no lasting identity (as I have defined it), but rather a collection of continuing architective fields of meaning and narrative themes. Not being an object, it cannot engage in interaction (as I have defined it) nor aggregate or exercise control, but it can organize the serial meanings and narratives of its contributing architectures to its themes. Not being an object, it cannot be disrupted but being a narrative it can be terminated. (An object, such as a name or an icon, may be associated with a processional narrative, and that object can have an identity.)

When processional narratives are present in a functional organism I say that the organism is a processional organism. Our bodily organs are such processional organisms since they maintain their functional architecture and processes even though the cells of which they are constituted die and are replenished.

Though the topmost level of each architecture in a procession is at the apex of control in its own architecture it is not at the apex of that architecture's organization, for its architective serial meanings may yet be organized by a processional narrative. Conversely, though a processional narrative may be at the apex of organization of all its contributing architectures, it does not control any of them.

For a processional narrative to persist, it would probably require that the architectures making up the steps in its procession have similar if not the same properties and fields of meaning - that their differences are minor - but if the procession involves many steps the final architecture may be very different to the original. An old man holds little resemblance to the baby he once was.

Processional narratives may also have a lateral dimension, in that the processing architectures may branch multilaterally at each step. For example, a person may have many children continuing their themes. Each child may then have many children. As the child architectures proliferate, the themes extend in multiple directions, each evolving slightly differently but each instantiation continuing the parent's theme in some way.

It could be argued that a spore traveling through space and seeding on another planet (as proposed in ideas such as panspermia) would continue an architective narrative well beyond the architective limits of its originating planet, but this again only pushes the boundary of architective isolation further out without eliminating it, since there would ultimately be a limit to how far an object could travel (given the Einstein speed limitation) and the time a spore can remain viable.

Interactions and Serial Meanings

Interactions and serial meanings are quite different.

Architective interactions have features like the creation and disruptions of objects, emergence of new and different objects, changes in discrete steps, and hierarchical control; while connective interactions have features like susceptibility to change, integration, emergence of visages, smooth movement, the hosting of waves and vibration, and superposition.

Serial meanings on the other hand, whether connective or architective, have features like narratives and fields of meaning, which in architectures can be organized and themed across processing architectures.

Importantly, while interactions of different modes can affect each other, the serial meanings of different modes are totally meaningless in terms of the other.

Sentience necessarily involves a comprehension of serial meaning. The incomprehensibility of serial meanings in different modes means that a different kind of sentience is required to comprehend the serial meanings of each mode.

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