What is Evolutionary Epistemology
Immortalist
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epistemology/
Evolutionary Epistemology is a naturalistic approach to epistemology,
which emphasizes the importance of natural selection in two primary
roles. In the first role, selection is the generator and maintainer of
the reliability of our senses and cognitive mechanisms, as well as the
"fit" between those mechanisms and the world. In the second role,
trial and error learning and the evolution of scientific theories are
construed as selection processes.
...Human beings, as the products of evolutionary development, are
natural beings. Their capacities for knowledge and belief are also the
products of a natural evolutionary development. As such, there is some
reason to suspect that knowing, as a natural activity, could and
should be treated and analyzed along lines compatible with its status,
i. e., by the methods of natural science.
..Evolutionary epistemology involves, in part, deploying models and
metaphors drawn from evolutionary biology in the attempt to
characterize and resolve issues arising in epistemology and conceptual
change. As disciplines co-evolve, models are traded back and forth.
Thus, evolutionary epistemology also involves attempts to understand
how biological evolution proceeds by interpreting it through models
drawn from our understanding of conceptual change and the development
of theories.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epistemology-evolutionary/
Evolutionary epistemologists argue that units of knowledge themselves,
particularly scientific theories, evolve according to selection. In
this case, a theory—like the germ theory of disease—becomes more or
less credible according to changes in the body of knowledge
surrounding it.
One of the hallmarks of evolutionary epistemology is the notion that
empirical testing does not justify the truth of scientific theories,
but rather that social and methodological processes select those
theories with the closest "fit" to a given problem. The mere fact that
a theory has survived the most rigorous empirical tests available does
not, in the calculus of probability, predict its ability to survive
future testing. Karl Popper used Newtonian physics as an example of a
body of theories so thoroughly confirmed by testing as to be
considered unassailable, but which were nevertheless overturned by
Einstein's bold insights into the nature of space-time. For the
evolutionary epistemologist, all theories are true only provisionally,
regardless of the degree of empirical testing they have survived.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_epistemology
Like evolutionary psychology, this is really split into two parts. One
is the notion that ordinary, organic evolution is important to
epistemology, in that it's shaped our senses and our cognitive
processes. The other is the contention that knowledge, or at any rate
opinion, somehow evolves.
...Optimists, like Quine, say that animals which are consistently
wrong about the world have a "pathetic but praiseworthy" tendency to
die out, so there's no cause for alarm. Pessimists get very worked up
about the possibility of adaptive errors; Nietzsche has some classic
statements along these lines, though as usual the argumentation behind
them is tissue-thin.
http://www.cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/notebooks/evol-epistem.html
Zerkon
> ...Human beings, as the products of evolutionary development, are
> natural beings. Their capacities for knowledge and belief are also the
> products of a natural evolutionary development. As such, there is some
> reason to suspect that knowing, as a natural activity, could and should
> be treated and analyzed along lines compatible with its status, i. e.,
> by the methods of natural science.
A sharper point could be made if "being" were replaced with "becoming".
A "Human Becoming" certainly sounds awkward because it is incomplete but
then this is the entire point, isn't it?
OTOH, "Human becomings, as the products of evolutionary development..."
would be nearly a redundancy.
Uncle Al
[snip]
> Like evolutionary psychology, this is really split into two parts. One
> is the notion that ordinary, organic evolution is important to
> epistemology, in that it's shaped our senses and our cognitive
> processes. The other is the contention that knowledge, or at any rate
> opinion, somehow evolves.
[snip rest]
You can call a turd a sausage and eat it with relish, but it's still a
turd. Tommy Aquinas prove god, Baruch (Benedictus!) Spinoza disproved
god; scientifc socialism is inevitable, Whip Inflation Now.
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/crap.htm
Shut up and calculate.
--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
(Toxic URL! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/qz4.htm
tadchem
wrote:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistemology-http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epistemology/
>
> Evolutionary Epistemology is a naturalistic approach to epistemology,
Epistemology, and indeed all "philosophy" is inextricably bound into
the vocabulary, grammar, and general semantics that it uses to express
each and every proposition, argument and conclusion. As such it
cannot be divorced from language, and it cannot exist independently of
any particular language. German epistemologists do things very
differently from the English or the French, because they all express
and conceptuaize their ideas very differently.
A "naturalistic approach" presumably would abandon all dependence upon
human artifacts such as language, and thus could not be processed
using propositional logic.
Without propositional logic, philosophical pondering is reduced to
phenomenological observation. This is why there are no Zen
empistemologists.
IOW, "a naturalistic approach to epistemology" is bullshit at best and
self-delusion at worst.
Tom Davidson
Richmond, VA
M Purcell
> On Dec 31 2009, 9:09 pm, Immortalist <reanimater_2...@yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
>
> > Evolutionary Epistemology is a naturalistic approach to epistemology,
>
> Epistemology, and indeed all "philosophy" is inextricably bound into
> the vocabulary, grammar, and general semantics that it uses to express
> each and every proposition, argument and conclusion. As such it
> cannot be divorced from language, and it cannot exist independently of
> any particular language. German epistemologists do things very
> differently from the English or the French, because they all express
> and conceptuaize their ideas very differently.
The discussion of any subject does require a common language however
the purpose of language is to express ideas so other people can
conceptualize them. And scientific, mathematical, and many other types
of knowledge are independent of nationality.
> A "naturalistic approach" presumably would abandon all dependence upon
> human artifacts such as language, and thus could not be processed
> using propositional logic.
I fail to see how that can be presumed, quite the contrary.
> Without propositional logic, philosophical pondering is reduced to
> phenomenological observation. This is why there are no Zen
> empistemologists.
However premises must be verified by observation.
> IOW, "a naturalistic approach to epistemology" is bullshit at best and
> self-delusion at worst.
It seems more of a social approach, but we are the products of
evolution and language has evolved.
Day Brown
reveal hominids are born with moral values- more or less. Lots of these
ideas are somewhat innate, and somewhat more or less common in various
gene pools.
Hominid brains are born with ROM, and the bios varies, both among
individuals, and statistically across various gene pools. Some kids are
innately more logical, and will resist immediate gratification of a
small reward for a much larger pay off later. Some kids wont. Some wont
grow up to giva fuck about this thread.
Languages express epistemology differently in part because of this DNA
diff in the gene pools in which they evolve. Its why we like German cars
but French art. And of course, there are also those born liberals who
will maintain that all mankind are alike despite any evidence. They want
to think well of people. Capitalists are grateful for the supply of suckers.