Gouldists and Hawkinsists
Gah...@swns.net
I give up.
Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
Also, a "Hawkins-ist"?
Are there real differences?
How much of each "system" is jargon?
How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
Arne
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WirtAtmar
> I give up.
> Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
> Also, a "Hawkins-ist"?
> Are there real differences?
> How much of each "system" is jargon?
> How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
A "Hawkins-ist" is a person who believes that the universe began from an
amorphous, homogenous singularity of initially minute size that later condensed
into all of the various forms of matter-energy complexity that we see today in
the universe.
A "Gouldist" is someone who sees no "progressivity" in this pattern.
Wirt Atmar
hemida...@my-dejanews.com
Gah...@swns.net wrote:
> Dear NG:
> I give up.
> Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
>
"Gouldist" is probably best considered a term of denigration that someone
might use against a caricature of some of the stands Stephen J Gould has
taken on evolution. A "Gouldist" could be a person who champions punctuated
equilibrium, species level selection, developmental constraints, exaptation
and "contingency", has a penchant for ridiculing "neo-Darwinism", (I've
probably left a couple of other "Gouldian" concepts out... oh yeah, top down
evolution in the Cambrian also). In reality, someone could follow Gould's
arguments, agree here and disagree there, and not feel a major compulsion to
attack Gould as the devil incarnate. For instance, I now have reservations
about the arguments concerning human paedomorphosis that Gould makes in
_Ontogeny and Phylogeny_ yet still consider that book very important for its
history and references to biologists like Gavin de Beer and Walter Garstang
to name a few.
>
> Also, a "Hawkins-ist"?
>
You might mean "Dawkinsist" here (unless you're taking about the renouned
physicist). A "Dawkinist" would be a unflattering caricature that one might
assume worships the "selfish gene" idea and who takes Richard Dawkins'
microevolutionary gradualism to heart. In reality, someone could read a book
like _The Selfish Gene_ and find points of agreement and disagreement, yet
feel no need to attack Dawkins (although this could be fun). Seriously,
_Climbing Mount Improbable_ is an excellent book IMO, at least coming from a
beginner perspective like I am.
I admit that some of Gould's thought patterns mesh better with my own on
average. Does that qualify me as a card-carrying Gouldist? Let's not forget
other influences on my thought patterns like Wallace Arthur, Brian Hall,
Scott Gilbert, Ernst Mayr, Rudy Raff, and even Dawkins too.
In reading the book edited by Ridley _Evolution_ I have been formally exposed
to Motoo Kimura. I'm a lost cause now.
>
> Are there real differences?
>
Between Dawkins and Gould there are, which is a good thing. It would be a
boring world if people didn't disagree on specifics. Gould and Dawkins
probably do have some major points of overlap though. In the few things here
and there where I've read them being critical of each other I've sensed both
undercurrents of them enjoying the practice a little, yet also being a little
frustrated. I think it's the N.Y. Times Review of Books (?-IIRC) stuff where
Gould appears a little frustrated with Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins,
throwing names like "lapdog" around. I'm not fully familiar with the history
of the conflict, but it seems like this conflict alone would make for a good
book. Even Steven Pinker gets into the act from time to time.
Dawkins has dropped the latest bombshell in his newest book _Unweaving the
Rainbow_. Dawkins might have a good point about the top-down aspect of
Gould's rendition of the Cambrian explosion. I dunno. I haven't yet read
_Wonderful Life_ but feel as I already have (second hand) just from learning
about the Vendian/Cambrian from other sources like Brian Hall in
_Evolutionary Development Biology_ or in Wallace Arthur's _Origin of Animal
Body Plans_.
This could be the crux of the issue. I could be wrong, but if you consider
Gould as a top-down holist that looks at morphology and fossils and look at
Dawkins as a bottom-up reductionist who looks at gene effects (usually IIRC
of the polygenic variety) and behavior (ethology), then you get a better
grasp of the conflict. I'm getting a different ends of the same elephant vibe
here. It is up to the reader to decide which author has the elephant's rear
:-)
>
> How much of each "system" is jargon?
>
This is a good question. For starters you have terms like evolutionary stable
strategies and game theory with Dawkins. You have terms listed above like
contingency, exaptation and such with Gould.
>
> How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
>
Neither Gould nor Dawkins are bigtime philosophers, but Daniel Dennett mixes
philosophy and evolution a bit in his book _Darwin's Dangerous Idea_.
Scott Chase
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Scott Chase wrote:
>
> In article <7d5u7j$f9f$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>,
> Gah...@swns.net wrote:
> > Dear NG:
> > I give up.
> > Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
> >
>
> "Gouldist" is probably best considered a term of denigration that someone
> might use against a caricature of some of the stands Stephen J Gould has
> taken on evolution. A "Gouldist" could be a person who champions punctuated
> equilibrium, species level selection, developmental constraints, exaptation
> and "contingency", has a penchant for ridiculing "neo-Darwinism", (I've
> probably left a couple of other "Gouldian" concepts out... oh yeah, top down
> evolution in the Cambrian also). In reality, someone could follow Gould's
> arguments, agree here and disagree there, and not feel a major compulsion to
> attack Gould as the devil incarnate. For instance, I now have reservations
> about the arguments concerning human paedomorphosis that Gould makes in
> _Ontogeny and Phylogeny_ yet still consider that book very important for its
> history and references to biologists like Gavin de Beer and Walter Garstang
> to name a few.
>
Scott is better versed on these matters than I am, but my impression is that
the heart of the disagreement between Dawkins and Gould is in the extent to
which each is willing to accept that, if natural selection is "true", then
our genes should be doing their damnedest to influence us to be "ruthlessly
selfish" (Dawkins). My impression is that Gould is more impressed than
Dawkins with the harmony and lack of aggression he finds throughout much
of nature. By the way, if I'm wrong about this, I hope Scott will come
back here and straighten me out.
My view of Dawkins has always been that of someone who has the courage to
stand behind what the theory he favors predicts, EVEN IN THE LIGHT OF
EVIDENCE THAT THAT PREDICTION IS WRONG. In other words, I've always
viewed him as someone who was fully aware of just how inflammatory his
statements about "ruthless selfishness" were,
but had no choice but to make them, precisely because
that is what his theoretical point of view predicts. As such, I see him
as someone who has brought out into clear relief that there is actually
SOMETHING WRONG WITH NATURAL SELECTION AS IT IS CURRENTLY UNDERSTOOD.
However, far from being a bad thing, I believe this is a good thing,
since it is precisely this sort of theoretical anomality which is the
springboard from which all scientific advancement begins (Kuhn). But before
you can have this stage of a science, you are going to need a scientist
who doesn't mince words and refuses to glaze over the warts. That, to me,
is Richard Dawkins.
> >
> > How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
> >
>
> Neither Gould nor Dawkins are bigtime philosophers, but Daniel Dennett mixes
> philosophy and evolution a bit in his book _Darwin's Dangerous Idea_.
>
Actually, Dennett is a metaphysician who believes the advance of physical
science has given certain philosophers, such as himself, the license to
arrive at apodictic certainty on such matters as determinism, the mind/
body problem, computationalism, etc. But its still just metaphysics,
and you might want to keep that in mind when you find him deriding those
of us who actually think there are such things as thoughts and feelings
which are every bit as real as tables and chairs, but which do not at
present appear to be a part of our physical description of reality.
In other words, their are some of us who think the mind/body problem
is just that, A PROBLEM, and that the advance of physical science
has done nothing to make that problem go away -- that Dennett and
his ilk are simply engaging in PHYSICAL ROMANTICISM.
--
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Feelings of Worthlessness and So-Called Cognitive Science
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Gah...@swns.net wrote:
>
> Dear NG:
> I give up.
> Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
> Also, a "Hawkins-ist"?
> Are there real differences?
> How much of each "system" is jargon?
> How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
Yes, but its one which is so dark and disturbing that, so far, I haven't
found any takers:
A Sketch of a Divergent Theory of Emotional Disorder
Objective: To account for self-worth related emotion (i.e., needs for
love, acceptance, moral integrity, recognition, achievement,
purpose, meaning, etc.) and emotional disorder (e.g., depression,
suicide, etc.) within the context of an evolutionary scenario; i.e., to
synthesize natural science and the humanities; i.e., to answer the
question: 'Why is there a species of naturally selected organism
expending huge quantities of effort and energy on the survivalistically
bizarre non-physical objective of maximizing self-worth?'
Observation: The species in which rationality is most developed is
also the one in which individuals have the greatest difficulty in
maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth, often going to
extraordinary lengths in doing so (e.g., Evel Knievel, celibate monks,
self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.).
Hypothesis: Rationality is antagonistic to psychocentric stability (i.e.,
maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth).
Synopsis: In much the manner reasoning allows for the subordination
of lower emotional concerns and values (pain, fear, anger, sex, etc.)
to more global concerns (concern for the self as a whole), so too,
these more global concerns and values can themselves become
reevaluated and subordinated to other more global, more objective
considerations. And if this is so, and assuming that emotional
disorder emanates from a deficiency in self-worth resulting from
precisely this sort of experiencially based reevaluation, then it can
reasonably be construed as a natural malfunction resulting from
one's rational faculties functioning a tad too well.
Normalcy and Disorder: Assuming this is correct, then some
explanation for the relative "normalcy" of most individuals would
seem necessary. This is accomplished simply by postulating
different levels or degrees of consciousness. From this perspective,
emotional disorder would then be construed as a valuative affliction
resulting from an increase in semantic content in the engram indexed
by the linguistic expression, "I am insignificant", which all persons of
common sense "know" to be true, but which the "emotionally
disturbed" have come to "realize", through abstract thought,
devaluing experience, etc.
Implications: So-called "free will" and the incessant activity presumed
to emanate from it is simply the insatiable appetite we all have for
self-significating experience which, in turn, is simply nature's way of
attempting to counter the objectifying influences of our rational
faculties. This also implies that the engine in the first "free-thinking"
artifact is probably going to be a diesel.
"Another simile would be an atomic pile of less than critical size: an
injected idea is to correspond to a neutron entering the pile from
without. Each such neutron will cause a certain disturbance which
eventually dies away. If, however, the size of the pile is sufficiently
increased, the disturbance caused by such an incoming neutron will
very likely go on and on increasing until the whole pile is destroyed.
Is there a corresponding phenomenon for minds?" (A. M. Turing).
Additional Implications: Since the explanation I have proposed
amounts to the contention that the most rational species
(presumably) is beginning to exhibit signs of transcending the
formalism of nature's fixed objective (accomplished in man via
intentional self-concern, i.e., the prudence program) it can reasonably
be construed as providing evidence and argumentation in support of
Lucas (1961) and Penrose (1989, 1994). Not only does this imply
that the aforementioned artifact probably won't be a computer,
but it would also explain why a question such as "Can Human
Irrationality Be Experimentally Demonstrated?" (Cohen, 1981)
has led to controversy, in that it presupposes the possibility
of a discrete (formalizable) answer to a question which can only
be addressed in comparative (non-formalizable) terms (e.g. X is
more rational than Y, the norm, etc.). Along these same lines,
the theory can also be construed as an endorsement or
metajustification for comparative approaches in epistemology
(explanationism, plausiblism, etc.)
"The short answer [to Lucas/Godel and more recently, Penrose]
is that, although it is established that there are limitations to the
powers of any particular machine, it has only been stated, without
any sort of proof, that no such limitations apply to human intellect "
(A. M. Turing).
"So even if mathematicians are superb cognizers of mathematical
truth, and even if there is no algorithm, practical or otherwise,
for cognizing mathematical truth, it does not follow that the power
of mathematicians to cognize mathematical truth is not entirely
explicable in terms of their brain's executing an algorithm. Not
an algorhithm for intuiting mathematical truth -- we can suppose that
Penrose [via Godel] has proved that there could be no such thing.
What would the algorithm be for, then? Most plausibly it would be an
algorithm -- one of very many -- for trying to stay alive ... " (D. C.
Dennett).
Oops! Sorry! Wrong again, old bean.
"My ruling passion is the love of literary fame" (David Hume).
"I have often felt as though I had inherited all the defiance and all the
passions with which our ancestors defended their Temple and could
gladly sacrifice my life for one great moment in history" (Sigmund
Freud).
"He, too [Ludwig Wittgenstein], suffered from depressions and for long
periods considered killing himself because he considered his life
worthless, but the stubbornness inherited from his father may have
helped him to survive" (Hans Sluga).
"The inquest [Alan Turing's] established that it was suicide. The
evidence was perfunctory, not for any irregular reason, but because
it was so transparently clear a case" (Andrew Hodges)
REFERENCES
1. Cohen, L. Jonathan, Can Human Irrationality be Experimentally
Demonstrated?, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1981, 4, 317-370.
2. Lucas, J. R., Minds, Machines and Godel, Philosophy, Vol XXXVI (1961).
Reprinted in Anderson's, Minds and Machines, and engagingly explored
in Hofstadter's Pulitzer prize winner, Godel, Escher, Bach: An
Eternal Golden Braid.
3. Penrose, Roger, The Emperor's New Mind, 1989; Shadows of the Mind,
1994.
hemida...@my-dejanews.com
wirt...@aol.com (WirtAtmar) wrote:
> Arne writes:
>
> > I give up.
> > Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
> > Also, a "Hawkins-ist"?
> > Are there real differences?
> > How much of each "system" is jargon?
> > How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
>
> amorphous, homogenous singularity of initially minute size that later condensed
> into all of the various forms of matter-energy complexity that we see today in
> the universe.
>
>
> A "Gouldist" is someone who sees no "progressivity" in this pattern.
>
>
I guess this thread is more along the lines of cosmology then, not evolution
*per se*. I thought the poster might have misspelled Dawkins, since the
Dawkins/Gould conflict always seems to be popular in these parts. Maybe I was
wrong.
susanayb
hestitate to come to that judgement, because I have not read anything by Gould.
Which book is a good one of his to start with?
Baris
hemida...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> In article <7d5u7j$f9f$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>,
> Gah...@swns.net wrote:
> > Dear NG:
> > I give up.
> > Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
> >
>
> "Gouldist" is probably best considered a term of denigration that someone
> might use against a caricature of some of the stands Stephen J Gould has
> taken on evolution. A "Gouldist" could be a person who champions punctuated
> equilibrium, species level selection, developmental constraints, exaptation
> and "contingency", has a penchant for ridiculing "neo-Darwinism", (I've
> probably left a couple of other "Gouldian" concepts out... oh yeah, top down
> evolution in the Cambrian also). In reality, someone could follow Gould's
> arguments, agree here and disagree there, and not feel a major compulsion to
> attack Gould as the devil incarnate. For instance, I now have reservations
> about the arguments concerning human paedomorphosis that Gould makes in
> _Ontogeny and Phylogeny_ yet still consider that book very important for its
> history and references to biologists like Gavin de Beer and Walter Garstang
> to name a few.
>
> >
> > How much of each "system" is jargon?
> >
>
> This is a good question. For starters you have terms like evolutionary stable
> strategies and game theory with Dawkins. You have terms listed above like
> contingency, exaptation and such with Gould.
>
> >
> > How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
> >
>
> Neither Gould nor Dawkins are bigtime philosophers, but Daniel Dennett mixes
> philosophy and evolution a bit in his book _Darwin's Dangerous Idea_.
>
edser
Phil Roberts Jr wrote:-
> PR:-
> Scott is better versed on these matters than I am, but my
> impression is that
> the heart of the disagreement between Dawkins and Gould is in the
> extent to
> which each is willing to accept that, if natural selection is "true", then
> our genes should be doing their damnedest to influence us to be
> "ruthlessly
> selfish" (Dawkins).
JE:-
Selection is just an effect from an as yet, UNDEFINED cause.
The use of the term "selfish" is simply not an appropriate
term to use within evolutionary theory and neither is its
antithesis, "altruism". These terms are EMOTIONAL descriptions
not objectively defined actions. Some actions may appear "selfish
or "altruistic" but these mere appearances just provoke "feel good
political responses" in most evolutionary theorists, which provides
another interesting question rather than providing any reasoned
thesis about what is actually happening in nature ie these terms
seem not to ever be removed from the political lens of the
perceiver, resulting in poor scientific formulations.
Two major unanswered questions need to be resolved for
both "altruism" and "selfishness" to make any rational
sense within evolutionary theory:-
1) What is the unit of selection in nature?
2) How do these units relate to each other?
Unfortunately, is no will within the evolutionary theory
community to tackle these two basic questions.
John Edser
Independent Researcher
PO Box 266
Church Point
NSW 2105
Australia
email: ed...@ozemail.com.au
Anon.
> Phil Roberts, Jr. wrote in message <7dggrv$52s$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
> <snip>
>
> > . . . my impression is that
> >the heart of the disagreement between Dawkins and Gould is in the extent to
> >which each is willing to accept that, if natural selection is "true", then
> >our genes should be doing their damnedest to influence us to be "ruthlessly
> >selfish" (Dawkins). My impression is that Gould is more impressed than
> >Dawkins with the harmony and lack of aggression he finds throughout much
> >of nature.
>
> Well stated. Where Gould is strongest is in understanding and accurately
> reflecting the way nature actually is. Where Gould is weakest is in his
> explanations of the causal factors involved with how nature gets to be the
> way it is.
...which is where Dawkins is strongest. Which leaves me to suspect there's a
happy medium somewhere in between.
> Again, this is so very well stated. Dawkins deals directly with the cause
> and effect mechanics of evolution and, in so doing, exposes the shortcomings
> of the current paradigm with respect to its ability accurately describe the
> causal factors involved. For example, through reading Dawkins one can
> eventually become cognizant of the fact that one's choice of a unit of
> selection greatly colors the conclusions one draws since, in actuality, the
> process of natural selection involves selection on all levels at all times.
> Dawkins errs on the side of assuming an absolutistic interpretation of
> reality and he also reflects the simplistic assumption of the current
> paradigm that fitness can be measured in terms of differential replication
> on a generation to generation basis.
I would agree with Dawkins there, and my impression is that so would most other
population geneticists (OK, they might be biased). The question to ask is
whether we can explain multi-level selection in terms of selfish genes.
> The shortcomings of Dawkins become
> especially apparent when one attempts to apply his thinking to understanding
> phenomena like that associated with the Gaia hypothesis.
>
Odd. I have no problem with fitting the observation that underlies Gaia into a
Dawkins viewpoint. Homeostasis is maintained by feedbacks, and these can happen
at the ecological level.
> Since I am mostly interested in the understanding and improving upon the
> causal factors involved with how nature gets to be the way it is I find
> reading Dawkins to be more fulfilling. If however I was interested in a
> fuller more comprehensive appreciation of nature and its diversity I would
> not hesitate to read Gould. (Incidently another good book on this last
> subject is E.O. Wilson's, The Diversity Of Life.)
>
I recall reading one of his papers from about 1951 (something to do with the
Santa Rosalia debate, I think. Sorry, I can't get hold of the reference), and
the first page was very like the start of Diversity of Life. Worth reading,
just to realise how boring papers are nowadays.Another excellent book is 'Life:
An Unauthorised Biography' by Richard Foley (I think).
--
Bob
pet...@infocanarias.com
constructions. We construct and use them in order to designate the
mode of thinking and interpretation typical for that person when we are
at loss of a term which somehow indicates something about about the
semantic content of the mode of thinking which we are trying to name.
If possible, "Isms" with a concept´s name in front are therefore always
to be preferred from "isms" with a persons name in front.
"Isms" are necessary, because without them we neither would be capable
to sensibly distinguish between these modes of thought nor talk about
them. In fact: Since human thought can demonstrably be influenced by
the availability or nonavailability of a name for a given phenomenon,
the nonavailability of a term for that phenomenon can actually prevent
the recognition of its existence.
On the other hand, giving many names to the same phenomenon can also
prevent or at least hinder the recognition of what the underlying
phenomenon is about. We should therefore be very careful with assigning
superfluous "Isms".
For example: Since Marx was primarily concerned with interpreting the
history of human society, but not with a theory about how to install a
society which does away with the shortcomings which he detected, he was
not a Socialist. Hence, the term "Marxism" is a necessary one. The
terms "Leninism", "Stalinism" and "Trotzkism" are necessary, because
they designate conflicting views on Socialism (Trotzki was assasinated
in Mexico by Lenins emissaries, Stalinism was brandmarked after
Stalin´s death). "Breznjewism" doesn´t exist, because Breznjew was a
Leninist. "Gorbatschowism" doesn´t exist, because Gorbatschow is
associated with "Glasnost" and "Perestroika".
"Darwinism" is a more or less necessary term (perhaps just an honorary
one), because the idea of evolution predates Darwin by far, and Darwin
was "just" the one who finally cut the Gordian Knot for an
understanding of the enigma. But of course, in addition to Darwinism
there also exist terms of next to equal meaning, i.e. "Adaptationism"
and "Selectionism", which both emphasize the most salient (though not
sole) features of Darwinism.
On the other hand, the ideas of Dawkins are intimately associated with
Sociobiology, second perhaps only to the ideas of Wilson. The term
"Dawkinism" would therefore only make sense, if there existed a major
conflict between Dawkins and Wilson or some other major protagonist in
Sociobiology (e.g. "Dawkinism" vs. "Wilsonim"). But as far as I know,
this is not the case (I of course welcome other opinions on this). And
since "Sociobiologism" sounds a bit awkward, I would suggest we just
stick with (the ideas prevailing within) "Sociobiology". "Hawkinism"
does certainly not make sense, because there does not exist any real
conflict between Hawkins and other mainstream "Big Bang Cosmologists".
And even though there does exist a great conflict between H.Arp and the
Big Bang Cosmologists, "Arpism" is a joke because Arp has only a small
handful of supporters. So that if "Arpism" is a necessary term, then I
am the only "Holmist" alive.
Problem is: During for example the times of Lenin, using the term
"Leninism" within the Soviet Union could be a very unhealthy thing to
do, because it would indicate that "Socialism" and "Leninism" are not
the same thing. The term "Marxism-Leninism" (kind of like "theory and
practice") became established only after Lenins death.
And what we are witnessing in these weeks on this forum, are Gouldists
refusing to be called by some special term which indicates that their
view of Speciation differs radically from that of Darwin. Because if
any such term would become widely established, it would make it easier
to identify them for what they are. And this would, naturally, make it
more difficult for them to be accepted as the "Darwinist" mainstream
in biology.
And even though I doubt that Gouldists will be open to any constructive
suggestions with regard to this topic, let me nevertheless call back
into memory something I have said above:
""Isms" with a concept´s name in front are therefore always to be
preferred from "isms" with a persons name in front".
Therefore, and keeping in mind that Contingency governing Speciation in
the course of evolution is at the core of gouldian thought, it might
lead to an improvement in clarity if we were talking about
"Contingencism" vs. "Adaptationism" instead of about "Gouldism" vs.
"Darwinism".
At any rate: Disdaining Gouldists as insincere people can only be
justified for as long as they refuse to acknowledge that viewing
Speciation in evolution as governed by Contingency leads to an entirely
different (if any at all, IMHO) overall picture of evolution then does
Speciation as governed (though not in a truly totalitarian manner) by
Adaptation, in the manner as it was championed by Darwin. Because if
they would acknowledge this difference, they would also have to
acknowledge a unique "ism" for themselves naming this difference in
some manner.
Shall Gouldists fight for their peculiar way of interpreting evolution.
But then they shall fight as knights wearing their own coat of arms
instead of some dirty guerilla war and wearing disguise.
Peter Holm
Jim McGinn
Anon. wrote in message <7dofln$4me$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
>Jim McGinn wrote some things I've snipped out, as well as:
>> . . . one's choice of a unit of
>> selection greatly colors the conclusions one draws since, in actuality,
the
>> process of natural selection involves selection on all levels at all
times.
>> Dawkins errs on the side of assuming an absolutistic interpretation of
>> reality and he also reflects the simplistic assumption of the current
>> paradigm that fitness can be measured in terms of differential
replication
>> on a generation to generation basis.
>
>I would agree with Dawkins there, and my impression is that so would most
other
>population geneticists (OK, they might be biased).
It can be proven, and quite easily I might add, that reality is not absolute
and therefore any assumption that is based on it being absolute will lead to
error. And it can also be easily proven, also quite easily, that fitness
cannot be measured in terms of differential replication from generation to
generation. If, however, you were to attempt to demonstrate these facts to
population biologists they would ignore you. I guess it has something to do
with the fact that we would not expect them to be eager to find out that
biological phenomena is not as easily measured as they have come to believe.
>The question to ask is
>whether we can explain multi-level selection in terms of selfish genes.
No. The term "selfish gene" is very much a non-scientific term. This
becomes apparent to you if you try to define it concisely.
>
>> The shortcomings of Dawkins become
>> especially apparent when one attempts to apply his thinking to
understanding
>> phenomena like that associated with the Gaia hypothesis.
>>
>
>Odd. I have no problem with fitting the observation that underlies Gaia
into a
>Dawkins viewpoint. Homeostasis is maintained by feedbacks, and these can
happen
>at the ecological level.
Well, I know what you are saying. But I think the reason you are able to do
this is because you have seen past the limitations of the very narrow minded
assumptions that are part and parcel to Dawkins. Afterall Dawkins is very
much a neodarwinist. He brings with him all of the simplistic--and
innacurate--assumptions that are associated with neodarwinism. (Such as the
assumption that the correct way to calculate relatedness in Hamiltion's
equation is through genes through genes being traced through descent. Which
can very easily be shown to be wrong.)
Jim McGinn
The cause of human evolution is no longer a mystery. See my website:
URL http://www2.crosswinds.net/sacramento/~jimmcginn/unmissing/
Jan
>
> Scott is better versed on these matters than I am, but my impression is that
> the heart of the disagreement between Dawkins and Gould is in the extent to
> which each is willing to accept that, if natural selection is "true", then
> our genes should be doing their damnedest to influence us to be "ruthlessly
> selfish" (Dawkins). My impression is that Gould is more impressed than
> Dawkins with the harmony and lack of aggression he finds throughout much
> back here and straighten me out.
>
discussion asking a probably foolish question, but...
I really thought that this 'selfish genes' thing was just a sort of
smart buzz-word. I have never informed myself about what it is all
about, but it has strick several times as an inherently absurd thought
that genes should be 'selfish' - even in the sense that there should
be mechanisms in evolution that would have the apparent self-promotion
of genes as their effect. But I am open to proofs :-)
/jan
Ken Moore
<ed...@ozemail.com.au> writes
>[...]
>
>1) What is the unit of selection in nature?
Philosophical point: "unit of selection" is a concept that exists in the
brain. The best choice is consistent with the theory that most
accurately predicts what you observe in certain circumstances. In
principle (I don't have any views in practice) different experimental
circumstances might require different choices.
--
Ken Moore
k...@hpsl.demon.co.uk
Ken Moore
writes
>[...]
>(Trotzki was assasinated
>in Mexico by Lenins emissaries,
??????
A minor point in the present context, but Stalin engineered Trotski's
expulsion from the Communist Party after Lenin's death in 1924. T. left
Russia in 1929 and was assassinated in 1940. Lenin was ruthless but
much less vindictive than Stalin.
--
Ken Moore
k...@hpsl.demon.co.uk
edser
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sci.bio.evolution moderation account
> [mailto:s...@darwin.ediacara.org]
> Sent: Tuesday, 30 March 1999 4:11
But of course, in addition to Darwinism
> there also exist terms of next to equal meaning, i.e. "Adaptationism"
> and "Selectionism", which both emphasize the most salient (though not
> sole) features of Darwinism.
> On the other hand, the ideas of Dawkins are intimately associated with
> Sociobiology, second perhaps only to the ideas of Wilson. The term
> "Dawkinism" would therefore only make sense, if there existed a major
> conflict between Dawkins and Wilson or some other major protagonist in
> Sociobiology (e.g. "Dawkinism" vs. "Wilsonim"). But as far as I know,
> this is not the case (I of course welcome other opinions on this). And
> since "Sociobiologism" sounds a bit awkward, I would suggest we just
> stick with (the ideas prevailing within) "Sociobiology".
JE:-
The issue is simply what would be an actual cause of any evolution in nature
if we assumed that evolution exists. Darwin suggested a mechanism that he
believed could explain changes in organisms even up to speciation, but did
not explicitly define EITHER the units that were selected, or the exact
mechanism that selected them. His implicit "unit of selection", was the
fertile organism, not just the organism per se and he did not concern
himself with any exact relationship survival systems must have to
reproductive systems, within any of these units of selection allowing
Herbert Spencer's "survival of the fittest" to totally obscure evolutionary
theory, right up to today.
The mechanics of how Darwin's selection idea may work if the gene is
considered the unit of selection and not the fertile organism, was developed
by Fisher, Haldane and Wright as an oversimplification, at the turn of the
century and is today known as population genetics. Only Wright objected to
the oversimplification assumption of the genetic unit of selection since he
was an animal breeder and understood the practical significance of epistasis
to this assumption, while the others were armchair theorists.
Population genetics is only a simplified model of the Darwinian unit of
selection, the fertile organism, where in this model each gene is assumed to
be independently selected. However, in reality all genes are dependently
selected. The rules of the use of models is that any and all results
developed from the model MUST be put back into its parent thesis and the
predictions reworked from the parent thesis not from just the model. The
model is an aid for a thesis and never competing thesis in its own right.
This was simply ignored within most areas of Neo Darwinistic evolutionary
theory, so that today we have the absurdity of gene centric models of
selection "competing" against their parent organism centric, Darwinian
thesis of the unit of selection. It can be proved that all gene centric
views use organism centric suppositions to make so called "competing" gene
centric suppositions work. This is totally predictable if the gene centric
supposition is a derived simplified MODEL, from an organism centric THESIS,
which it is. Like any model it cannot support its own suppositions by itself
and is not designed to so. However any thesis must do so.
Thus Dawkins, Wilson etc represent the gene centric school of selection
developed primarily from Fisher's and Haldanes oversimplified model that has
been wrongly applied even up to today, because results from the model have
NOT been reworked using the original Darwinian unit of selection that
remains unrefuted, preferring to believe that their model is in fact
competitive to its parent thesis. This is an absurdity because if the
parental thesis is refuted in favour of its derived model, then the model
is in fact refuted as well.
The only REAL division within evolutionary theory today, is simply between
wrongly applied gene centric suppositions within Darwinian selection theory
and correctly applied gene centric suppositions within Darwinian selection
theory. Wrongly applied gene centric suppositions have led Gould to believe
that chance events are more important to evolution than non chance Darwinian
selection events. This is similar to supposing that mutation can replace
selection as a creative force within nature. This view continually recycles
itself throughout the history of evolutionary theory, and is rejected each
time since random events are just that, random, while Darwinian selective
events are not random. Random events cannot compete with non random events
since they are not directional. Wrongly applied gene centric views of
selection have confounded the crtical differences between systems of
variation for evolution and evolution ityself, since any unit of
organisation, or "an organism", ceases to exist within the model. However
only such an organism supposition allows any differences between what is
considered variation for selection to act on within that organism, and what
is considered to be actual evolution by that same organism. All genetic
variation is not evolution but within gene centic models it is, because
genes exist as independent units within the model, when in reality, they are
dependent units within a organism supposition.
edser
Jim McGinn wrote:-
> JMcG:-
> It can be proven, and quite easily I might add, that reality is
> not absolute
> and therefore any assumption that is based on it being absolute
> will lead to
> error.
JE;-
If you suggest its absolutely true there are no absolutes in the
universe, then you have said absolutely nothing, since such a
suggestion is an absolute self contradiction, absolutely.
> JMcG:-
> And it can also be easily proven, also quite easily, that fitness
> cannot be measured in terms of differential replication from generation to
> generation.
JE:-
This has been suggested by yourself on numerous occasions and you
have never produced your purported "proof" of this assertion.
edser
Ken Moore wrote:-
> >JE:-
> >1) What is the unit of selection in nature?
> KM:-
> Philosophical point: "unit of selection" is a concept that exists in the
> brain.
JE:-
Are you suggesting the CONCEPT should reside in some other
part of the anatomy, say the foot?
Perhaps you mean "units of selection" do not exist at all
in nature? If so, then selection itself cannot exist
at all in nature, only in peoples brains/feet...
The epistemology of science demmands testable, refutable
and competing concepts. These competing refutable concepts
are assunptions with unequal domains of truth. Truth
domains are sets of predicted observations from a theory.
No competing unit of selection assumptions, no testable
selection theory and no evolutionary science.
> KM:-
>The best choice is consistent with the theory that most
> accurately predicts what you observe in certain circumstances. In
> principle (I don't have any views in practice) different experimental
> circumstances might require different choices.
JE:-
Just "certain circumstances" and not all known circumstances?
That is what the Pope suggested when confronted with the view that
the sun may be stationary and the earth was moving. He preferred to
just observe the "certain circumstances" described by epicycles, since
it confirmed his prejudice. It seems little has changed since then,
cull the known facts to fit the prevailing prejudice, don't cull
any favoured theory when it fails to fit all the known facts for a
less favoured one, that does.
Regards,
John Edser
Independent Researcher
PO Box 266
Church Point
NSW 2105
Australia
Anon.
Jim McGinn wrote:
> Anon. wrote in message <7dofln$4me$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
> >Jim McGinn wrote some things I've snipped out, as well as:
>
> >> . . . one's choice of a unit of
> >> selection greatly colors the conclusions one draws since, in actuality,
> the
> >> process of natural selection involves selection on all levels at all
> times.
> >> Dawkins errs on the side of assuming an absolutistic interpretation of
> >> reality and he also reflects the simplistic assumption of the current
> >> paradigm that fitness can be measured in terms of differential
> replication
> >> on a generation to generation basis.
> >
> >I would agree with Dawkins there, and my impression is that so would most
> other
> >population geneticists (OK, they might be biased).
>
> It can be proven, and quite easily I might add, that reality is not absolute
> and therefore any assumption that is based on it being absolute will lead to
> error. And it can also be easily proven, also quite easily, that fitness
> cannot be measured in terms of differential replication from generation to
> generation. If, however, you were to attempt to demonstrate these facts to
> population biologists they would ignore you. I guess it has something to do
> with the fact that we would not expect them to be eager to find out that
> biological phenomena is not as easily measured as they have come to believe.
>
Your first point, as you stated it, is ridiculous. I assume you mean our
perception of reality, in which case I would agree with you, but would suggest
that we can't do anything else.
As for fitness, I always thought it was defined in terms of differential
replication, or to be precise relative fitness is defined in terms of changes in
the expected relative frequencies.
> >The question to ask is
> >whether we can explain multi-level selection in terms of selfish genes.
>
> No. The term "selfish gene" is very much a non-scientific term. This
> becomes apparent to you if you try to define it concisely.
>
OK, I'll restate more rigourously. The question to ask is whether we can
explain multi-level selection in terms of selection acting on genes.
> >> The shortcomings of Dawkins become
> >> especially apparent when one attempts to apply his thinking to
> understanding
> >> phenomena like that associated with the Gaia hypothesis.
> >>
> >
> >Odd. I have no problem with fitting the observation that underlies Gaia
> into a
> >Dawkins viewpoint. Homeostasis is maintained by feedbacks, and these can
> happen
> >at the ecological level.
>
> Well, I know what you are saying. But I think the reason you are able to do
> this is because you have seen past the limitations of the very narrow minded
> assumptions that are part and parcel to Dawkins. Afterall Dawkins is very
> much a neodarwinist. He brings with him all of the simplistic--and
> innacurate--assumptions that are associated with neodarwinism. (Such as the
> assumption that the correct way to calculate relatedness in Hamiltion's
> equation is through genes through genes being traced through descent. Which
> can very easily be shown to be wrong.)
>
I think he's just driven by a kind of religous fervour. Ironic, really.
--
Bob
Bob O'Hara
Department of Ecology and Systematics
Division of Population Biology
PO Box 17 (Arkadiankatu 7)
FIN-00014
University of Helsinki
Finland
email: bob....@helsinki.fi
ICQ: 7178841
tel: +358-9-191 7382
fax: +358-9-191 7301
To find out how the Finns waste their money, look at
http://www.helsinki.fi/science/metapop/
You can also admire the background at this site:
http://www.helsinki.fi/science/fragland/
Tim Tyler
: I really thought that this 'selfish genes' thing was just a sort of
: smart buzz-word. I have never informed myself about what it is all
: about, but it has strick several times as an inherently absurd thought
: that genes should be 'selfish' - even in the sense that there should
: be mechanisms in evolution that would have the apparent self-promotion
: of genes as their effect. [...]
The best way for you to familiarise youself with the ideas involved
would probably be to read a copy of Richard Dawkins' "The Selfish Gene".
--
__________
|im |yler The Mandala Centre http://www.mandala.co.uk/ t...@cryogen.com
GEnEGenEGenegeNEGenegeNEGenEGenegeNEGeneGenEGenEGenEgeNEGeneGEnEGenEGenE
Ken Moore
writes
>I really thought that this 'selfish genes' thing was just a sort of
>smart buzz-word. I have never informed myself about what it is all
>about, but it has strick several times as an inherently absurd thought
>that genes should be 'selfish' - even in the sense that there should
>be mechanisms in evolution that would have the apparent self-promotion
It's just a rather neater phrase than "non-altruistic gene". After all,
if someone tried to convince you that gens were altruistic, you would
think he was nuts.
--
Ken Moore
k...@hpsl.demon.co.uk
edser
Jan wrote:-
> J:-
> I really thought that this 'selfish genes' thing was just a sort of
> smart buzz-word. I have never informed myself about what it is all
> about, but it has strick several times as an inherently absurd thought
> that genes should be 'selfish' - even in the sense that there should
> be mechanisms in evolution that would have the apparent self-promotion
> of genes as their effect. But I am open to proofs :-)
JE:-
Yes, the view that genes are "selfish" is absurd.
Genes like most things are units of evolution, but they
are specifically, only units of conservation within a
unit of selection, they are not single units of
selection in themselves since:-
1) Selection only occurs on the phenotype.
2) All phenotypes are coded for by at least two
dependent loci within a "unit of organisation"
termed "the organism".
Selfish is just a euphemism for "maximal".
Neo Darwinism is still searching for a unit in
nature that is maximally reproducing itself.
Jim McGinn
edser wrote in message <7du2ts$7g$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
>
>
>
> Ken Moore wrote:-
>
>> >JE:-
>> >1) What is the unit of selection in nature?
>
>> KM:-
>> Philosophical point: "unit of selection" is a concept that exists in the
>> brain.
>
>JE:-
>Are you suggesting the CONCEPT should reside in some other
>part of the anatomy, say the foot?
I think what he's saying is that the unit one *chooses* when they are
discussing a selective event is dependent upon what explanatory ends one is
attempting to achieve with their choice of the unit of selection. For
example if one is measuring distance between cities the unit they choose
might be miles. If they are measuring a small volume of water the unit
might be mililiters.
>
>Perhaps you mean "units of selection" do not exist at all
>in nature? If so, then selection itself cannot exist
>at all in nature, only in peoples brains/feet...
Isn't this kind of like saying that if you don't assume miles that the
distance between cities does not exist?
>
>The epistemology of science demmands testable, refutable
>and competing concepts.
Units are not hypothesese. They are assumptions.
These competing refutable concepts
>are assunptions with unequal domains of truth. Truth
>domains are sets of predicted observations from a theory.
>No competing unit of selection assumptions, no testable
>selection theory and no evolutionary science.
Thus if we cannot assume the efficacy of miles then we cannot measure the
distance between cities? And since we must measure the distance between
cities we, therefore, must assume the efficacy of miles? Does this make
sense?
>
>> KM:-
>>The best choice is consistent with the theory that most
>> accurately predicts what you observe in certain circumstances. In
>> principle (I don't have any views in practice) different experimental
>> circumstances might require different choices.
>
>JE:-
>Just "certain circumstances" and not all known circumstances?
I interpret the word "circumstances" as "explanatory ends."
>That is what the Pope suggested when confronted with the view that
>the sun may be stationary and the earth was moving. He preferred to
>just observe the "certain circumstances" described by epicycles, since
>it confirmed his prejudice. It seems little has changed since then,
>cull the known facts to fit the prevailing prejudice, don't cull
>any favoured theory when it fails to fit all the known facts for a
>less favoured one, that does.
But you are changing the subject. The subject is units of measure. If you
were to be consistent you would be telling us that the Pope had some
prefered units of measuring the position of the planets.
Jim McGinn
edser wrote in message <7du2th$3f$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
>
>
>Jim McGinn wrote:-
>> JMcG:-
>> not absolute
>> and therefore any assumption that is based on it being absolute
>> will lead to
>> error.
>
>If you suggest its absolutely true there are no absolutes in the
>universe, then you have said absolutely nothing, since such a
>suggestion is an absolute self contradiction, absolutely.
Maybe I should qualify this statement by saying that that the way in which
us humans tend to characterize aspects of reality tends to assume that these
characterizations are absolute when in actuality they are relative. For
example us humans speak of enitities as if entities have absolute existence
when in actuality whether or not we consider and entity an entity is
relative. For example the closeness of the molecules that comprise and
entity are only relatively closer to each other than are groups of molecules
that we do not consider to be an entity. Similarly the qualities that we
ascribe to entities are also relative. An entity can only have a quality to
a relatively greater or lesser degree than another entity has the same
quality. Nevertheless us human tend to assume the existence of absolutes.
The reason probably has something to do with the fact that it is a lot
easier to process and communicate our understanding of reality if we just
assume that entities and their qualities are absolute. In most instances
that potential for error that this simplification that is associated with
this tendency to assume absolutes is negligible. When it comes to
evolutionary theory, however, where the need for concise definition is
paramount, this tendency to assume absolutes is often an insurmountable
obstacle for us achieving our explanatory ends.
>
>> JMcG:-
>> And it can also be easily proven, also quite easily, that fitness
>> cannot be measured in terms of differential replication from generation
to
>> generation.
>
>JE:-
>This has been suggested by yourself on numerous occasions and you
>have never produced your purported "proof" of this assertion.
In order for me to successfully submit such a a proof we would have to agree
on ground rules. And your insistence on the existence of absolutes and
usage creative logic shows that we could never agree on any such ground
rules.
Jim McGinn
Anon. wrote in message <7du2va$o0$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
>
>
>Jim McGinn wrote:
>
>> Anon. wrote in message <7dofln$4me$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
>> >Jim McGinn wrote some things I've snipped out, as well as:
>>
>> >> . . . one's choice of a unit of
>> >> selection greatly colors the conclusions one draws since, in
actuality,
>> the
>> >> process of natural selection involves selection on all levels at all
>> times.
>> >> Dawkins errs on the side of assuming an absolutistic interpretation of
>> >> reality and he also reflects the simplistic assumption of the current
>> replication
>> >> on a generation to generation basis.
>> >
>> >I would agree with Dawkins there, and my impression is that so would
most
>> other
>> >population geneticists (OK, they might be biased).
>>
absolute
>> and therefore any assumption that is based on it being absolute will lead
to
>> cannot be measured in terms of differential replication from generation
to
to
do
>> with the fact that we would not expect them to be eager to find out that
>> biological phenomena is not as easily measured as they have come to
believe.
>>
>
>Your first point, as you stated it, is ridiculous.
Maybe I should qualify this statement by saying that that the way in which
us humans tend to characterize aspects of reality tends to assume that these
characterizations are absolute when in actuality they are relative. For
example us humans speak of enitities as if entities have absolute existence
when in actuality whether or not we consider and entity an entity is
relative. For example the closeness of the molecules that comprise and
entity are only relatively closer to each other than are groups of molecules
that we do not consider to be an entity. Similarly the qualities that we
ascribe to entities are also relative. An entity can only have a quality to
a relatively greater or lesser degree than another entity has the same
quality. Nevertheless us human tend to assume the existence of absolutes.
The reason probably has something to do with the fact that it is a lot
easier to process and communicate our understanding of reality if we just
assume that entities and their qualities are absolute. In most instances
that potential for error that this simplification that is associated with
this tendency to assume absolutes is negligible. When it comes to
evolutionary theory, however, where the need for concise definition is
paramount, this tendency to assume absolutes is often an insurmountable
obstacle for us achieving our explanatory ends.
I hope that sounds less ridiculous
>I assume you mean our
>perception of reality
No, I mean reality itself. It is our perception of reality that the
absolutes come into the fray.
>, in which case I would agree with you, but would suggest
>that we can't do anything else.
Sure we can. Its simply a matter of being cognizant of this fact when we
define terms. Well, maybe I'm overstating how simple it actually is--in
fact on second thought it isn't very simple at all--but I know it can be
done because I have already done it.
>As for fitness, I always thought it was defined in terms of differential
>replication, or to be precise relative fitness is defined in terms of
changes in
>the expected relative frequencies.
This has been the assumption. The question is whether or not it is a
reasonable assumption. I contend that it is a very unreasonable assumption.
>
>> >The question to ask is
>> >whether we can explain multi-level selection in terms of selfish genes.
>>
>> No. The term "selfish gene" is very much a non-scientific term. This
>> becomes apparent to you if you try to define it concisely.
>>
>
>OK, I'll restate more rigourously. The question to ask is whether we can
>explain multi-level selection in terms of selection acting on genes.
For the most part I think the answer to this question is yes. And I think
that despite the limitations of his assumptions as well as the limitation
inherit to human communications (i.e. absolutistic assumptions) Dawkins has
done an exemplary job at doing this.
>
>
>> >> The shortcomings of Dawkins become
>> >> especially apparent when one attempts to apply his thinking to
>> understanding
>> >> phenomena like that associated with the Gaia hypothesis.
>> >>
>> >
>> >Odd. I have no problem with fitting the observation that underlies Gaia
>> into a
>> >Dawkins viewpoint. Homeostasis is maintained by feedbacks, and these
can
>> happen
>> >at the ecological level.
>>
>> Well, I know what you are saying. But I think the reason you are able to
do
>> this is because you have seen past the limitations of the very narrow
minded
>> assumptions that are part and parcel to Dawkins. Afterall Dawkins is
very
>> much a neodarwinist. He brings with him all of the simplistic--and
>> innacurate--assumptions that are associated with neodarwinism. (Such as
the
>> assumption that the correct way to calculate relatedness in Hamiltion's
>> equation is through genes through genes being traced through descent.
Which
>> can very easily be shown to be wrong.)
>>
>
>I think he's just driven by a kind of religous fervour. Ironic, really.
Well, I think I know what you mean and I kind of agree with you but I think
we have to consider that if Dawkins was not a person that has the ability to
focus in on the subject and ignore the conceptual limitations of his own
perspective as well as those of the current paradigm (something that Gould
is also good at doing) then we would not have the explanatory clarity that
his writing has put forth. Unfortunately when it comes to selling books on
this subject matter clarity and conceptual accuracy do not go hand in hand.
Tim Tyler
[Speciation: reduced inter-group fertility can cause...]
>>selection pressure acting (mainly) on the females of both 'species'
>>to avoid mating in error with males of the wrong 'species' in order to
>>avoid the possibility of going through aborted pregnancies - or worse.
>
>The primary cause of the speciation event has already happened by this
>point. [...]
If the two groups continue to interbreed (despite the reduced viability
of such offspring) then the divergence between the groups can be lost.
The mechanism described can be the process that makes or breaks a
speciation event - speciation is more frequent as a consequence of its
action.
>Your example seems to invoke changes in the mating choice of animals.
>While this might be interesting, you need to think in terms of a
>bigger picture of evolution. How does your idea apply to plants and
>mushrooms?
The mechanism is equally applicable to plants and mushrooms. If the
male is not visible to the female, then she can simply use clues in his
seed to identify his species. Female 'choosiness', allowing her to reject
seed from other species is virtually universal. It accounts for the fact
that pollen shapes are about as diverse as snowflakes.
This female 'choice' needs much less discrimination than that
responsible for sexual selection, as the latter must distuinguish between
males of the same species.
>It may be possible in limited cases that natural selection reinforces
>the primary mechanisms of speciation. I still don't think that this
>implies an important role for natural selection in speciation.
If you still doubt the importance of natural selection in speciation,
then consider the case of speciation in the fig wasp.
Different species of fig (and there are about a thousand of them) are
paired in an almost one-on-one fashion with different species of fig
wasp.
When a fig speciates (and for the sake of clarity, we'll imagine that
this is a sudden event, caused by e.g. chromosome doubling), it has
available the means to produce selection on the wasps that pollinate it to
also speciate - in order to reduce the costs of producing pollen which is
wasted on other species of fig.
However, when a fig speciates, due to the mechanics of the lifestyle of
the organisms involved, the fig wasps are initially unaffected, and may
freely interbreed with their companions who fertilise the original fig
species - only when the fig changes its pollen type and /male/ fig
flowers becomes able to distinguish between its pollen and the
neighbouring species' pollen on grounds of physical appearance will the
fig wasps notice that anything has changed.
In this case, it seems to me that the /primary/ cause of the fig wasp's
speciation is selection applied by the new species of fig tree.
--
__________
|im |yler The Mandala Centre http://www.mandala.co.uk/ t...@cryogen.com
She returned my letters marked: "Fourth class male".
Anon.
Jim McGinn wrote:
<snip>
> >
> >Your first point, as you stated it, is ridiculous.
>
> Maybe I should qualify this statement by saying that that the way in which
> us humans tend to characterize aspects of reality tends to assume that these
> characterizations are absolute when in actuality they are relative. For
> example us humans speak of enitities as if entities have absolute existence
> when in actuality whether or not we consider and entity an entity is
> relative. For example the closeness of the molecules that comprise and
> entity are only relatively closer to each other than are groups of molecules
> that we do not consider to be an entity. Similarly the qualities that we
> ascribe to entities are also relative. An entity can only have a quality to
> a relatively greater or lesser degree than another entity has the same
> quality. Nevertheless us human tend to assume the existence of absolutes.
> The reason probably has something to do with the fact that it is a lot
> easier to process and communicate our understanding of reality if we just
> assume that entities and their qualities are absolute. In most instances
> that potential for error that this simplification that is associated with
> this tendency to assume absolutes is negligible. When it comes to
> evolutionary theory, however, where the need for concise definition is
> paramount, this tendency to assume absolutes is often an insurmountable
> obstacle for us achieving our explanatory ends.
>
> I hope that sounds less ridiculous
>
Much better! The only absolute is 99.975% proof!
> >I assume you mean our
> >perception of reality
>
> No, I mean reality itself. It is our perception of reality that the
> absolutes come into the fray.
>
Now one of us is clouding the issue. I believe that, in some absolute sense,
the universe exists, but we can never be sure that we can see the absolute (this
line of thought goes all the way back to Plato's cavemen). In order for us to
understand the universe, we have to catagorise, which is where all the problems
spring from.
> >, in which case I would agree with you, but would suggest
> >that we can't do anything else.
>
> Sure we can. Its simply a matter of being cognizant of this fact when we
> define terms. Well, maybe I'm overstating how simple it actually is--in
> fact on second thought it isn't very simple at all--but I know it can be
> done because I have already done it.
>
Hmm. Well fitness is relative....
> >As for fitness, I always thought it was defined in terms of differential
> >replication, or to be precise relative fitness is defined in terms of
> changes in
> >the expected relative frequencies.
>
> This has been the assumption. The question is whether or not it is a
> reasonable assumption. I contend that it is a very unreasonable assumption.
>
Mathematically it's the definition - of a parameter in the models which is
normally called s. Is it possible to model selection without this parameter
(and in a way that can't be written in the classical way)?
Or are you arguing that the mathematical models aren't a good model of reality
(whatever that may be!)
He doesn't have to go _quite_ so far, though. This is a complaint about his
style, rather than his scientific substance of course.
Jim McGinn
Anon. wrote in message <7eaqab$va$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>...
See below.
>
>Or are you arguing that the mathematical models aren't a good model of
reality
>(whatever that may be!)
I'm not specifically making this argument. In principle I believe reality
is measurable. (I'm a diehard determinists, mechanist, and reductionist.
And I believe biology is reducible to physics.) However, I am saying that
when you get beyond the absolutistic assumptions that underlie most (all) of
the mathematical models in evolutionary biology and you replace them with
definitions that are built from the ground up using relativistic assumptions
(i.e. relativistic assumptions concerning what is or is not an entity, what
is or is not a quality of an entity, what is or is not cause and effect and
what are the time limits by which cause can achieve effect) it becomes
apparent that modeling reality is much more difficult than is presently
assumed.
I agree. A particular incident comes to mind. One time I was in a
geography class and the class was watching a film on the Gaia hypothesis.
Dawkins spoke in opposition to the Gaia hypothesis. His argument went along
the lines that if the Gaia hypothesis was correct that we would have to
imagine that the different planets were competing against each other. The
silliness of this argument was so charactestic of Dawkins absolutistic
misassumptions (unit of selection) that I couldn't help but laugh out loud.
The other people in the class must have thought I was nuts.
Anon.
Jim McGinn wrote:
"All models are wrong, but some are useful." - G.E.P. Box.Are your models really
that much more useful?
I feel it's a pity someone like John Maynard Smith isn't dragged out to talk to
the public a bit more.
Ian
>Actually, Dennett is a metaphysician who believes the advance of physical
>science has given certain philosophers, such as himself, the license to
>arrive at apodictic certainty on such matters as determinism, the mind/
>body problem, computationalism, etc. But its still just metaphysics,
>and you might want to keep that in mind when you find him deriding those
>of us who actually think there are such things as thoughts and feelings
>which are every bit as real as tables and chairs, but which do not at
>present appear to be a part of our physical description of reality.
>In other words, their are some of us who think the mind/body problem
>is just that, A PROBLEM, and that the advance of physical science
>has done nothing to make that problem go away -- that Dennett and
>his ilk are simply engaging in PHYSICAL ROMANTICISM.
Of course, anyone who thought that would be guilty of holding a belief not
in agreement with the main body of evidence.
Ian
>>Actually, Dennett is a metaphysician who believes the advance of physical
>>science has given certain philosophers, such as himself, the license to
>>arrive at apodictic certainty on such matters as determinism, the mind/
>>body problem, computationalism, etc. But its still just metaphysics,
>>and you might want to keep that in mind when you find him deriding those
>>of us who actually think there are such things as thoughts and feelings
>>which are every bit as real as tables and chairs, but which do not at
>>present appear to be a part of our physical description of reality.
>>In other words, their are some of us who think the mind/body problem
>>is just that, A PROBLEM, and that the advance of physical science
>>has done nothing to make that problem go away -- that Dennett and
>>his ilk are simply engaging in PHYSICAL ROMANTICISM.
>
>Patricia Smith-Churchland argues, in "Neurophilosophy", that scientists
>and medics. investigating and treating the brain have already modified
>some philosophical ideas. She instances the development of the
>consciousness altering drugs, such as sodium pentothal, as having
>resulted in a substantial deemphasis of the Nietschian concept of "the
>will".
There are many, many, MANY more examples. In fact, the _primary_ agent
behind advances in modern philosophy of mind is scientific discovery. In
the last few decades, we have gained useful access to the workings of the
mind for the first time, and the application of technology to do many
things previously regarded as mental tasks has arisen. This has
essentially destroyed a great many once-favored philosophies of mind,
because they made predictions or assertions that have finally been shown
not to correspond with empirical reality.
William Morse
"Phil Roberts, Jr." <phi...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>>Gahada@swns.n
>> Dear NG:
>> I give up.
>> Will someone please explain what a "Gouldist" is?
>> Also, a "Hawkins-ist"?
>> Are there real differences?
>> How much of each "system" is jargon?
>> How can anyone fit a concept like "evolution" into a "philosophy"?
>Yes, but its one which is so dark and disturbing that, so far, I haven't
>found any takers:
> A Sketch of a Divergent Theory of Emotional Disorder
>Objective: To account for self-worth related emotion (i.e., needs for
> love, acceptance, moral integrity, recognition, achievement,
> purpose, meaning, etc.) and emotional disorder (e.g., depression,
> suicide, etc.) within the context of an evolutionary scenario; i.e., to
> synthesize natural science and the humanities; i.e., to answer the
> question: 'Why is there a species of naturally selected organism
> expending huge quantities of effort and energy on the survivalistically
> bizarre non-physical objective of maximizing self-worth?'
I don't happen to think it is survivalistically bizarre, although I do not
entirely define the objective as "self-worth". I think there is a large
survival advantage to being in control of the environment, rather than
vice-versa. I think there is a general relation between feeling in control and
feelings of self worth. Thus, a selective advantage in maximizing self-worth.
>Observation: The species in which rationality is most developed is
> also the one in which individuals have the greatest difficulty in
> maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth, often going to
> extraordinary lengths in doing so (e.g., Evel Knievel, celibate monks,
> self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.).
>Hypothesis: Rationality is antagonistic to psychocentric stability (i.e.,
> maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth).
The problem is in distinguishing between "rationality" and high intelligence.
As an alternative, let me suggest that it may simply be that a brain as
complexly programmed as a humans is inherently unstable - this is well known
in the computer field. (Note that I am not sure that I disagree with you,
simply that there may be an alternative explanation).
>Synopsis: In much the manner reasoning allows for the subordination
> of lower emotional concerns and values (pain, fear, anger, sex, etc.)
> to more global concerns (concern for the self as a whole), so too,
> these more global concerns and values can themselves become
> reevaluated and subordinated to other more global, more objective
> considerations. And if this is so, and assuming that emotional
> disorder emanates from a deficiency in self-worth resulting from
> precisely this sort of experiencially based reevaluation, then it can
> reasonably be construed as a natural malfunction resulting from
> one's rational faculties functioning a tad too well.
Except that emotional malfunction occurs in many individuals, not just the
most "rational". Furthermore, there are numerous highly intelligent and
rational individuals who do not suffer from the problem of low self-worth. In
other words, I see no necessary correlation.
>Normalcy and Disorder: Assuming this is correct, then some
> explanation for the relative "normalcy" of most individuals would
> seem necessary. This is accomplished simply by postulating
> different levels or degrees of consciousness. From this perspective,
> emotional disorder would then be construed as a valuative affliction
> resulting from an increase in semantic content in the engram indexed
> by the linguistic expression, "I am insignificant", which all persons of
> common sense "know" to be true, but which the "emotionally
> disturbed" have come to "realize", through abstract thought,
> devaluing experience, etc.
I am a person of common sense, and I do not know it to be true that I am
insignificant. Certainly I have thought in some philosophizing moments that I
am insignificant, but apropos the Gould-Dawkins debate, I don't think either
would argue that I am insignificant. From a Dawkins standpoint I am
significant in that _every one of my forebears for the last several billion
years successfully reproduced_. From a Goulds standpoint I am significant in
that what I do will affect the contingent course of evolution for the
remainder of life.
>Implications: So-called "free will" and the incessant activity presumed
> to emanate from it is simply the insatiable appetite we all have for
> self-significating experience which, in turn, is simply nature's way of
> attempting to counter the objectifying influences of our rational
> faculties. This also implies that the engine in the first "free-thinking"
> artifact is probably going to be a diesel.
My interpretation is that the appetite is for control of our destiny. One may
easily confuse the two.
> "Another simile would be an atomic pile of less than critical size: an
> injected idea is to correspond to a neutron entering the pile from
> without. Each such neutron will cause a certain disturbance which
> eventually dies away. If, however, the size of the pile is sufficiently
> increased, the disturbance caused by such an incoming neutron will
> very likely go on and on increasing until the whole pile is destroyed.
> Is there a corresponding phenomenon for minds?" (A. M. Turing).
Yes, there is - it's called an epileptic seizure. The analogy is not complete,
but to stretch it a little further, normal minds under normal conditions
have safety circuits to prevent the phenomenon, just as nuclear reactors.
>Additional Implications: Since the explanation I have proposed
> amounts to the contention that the most rational species
> (presumably) is beginning to exhibit signs of transcending the
> formalism of nature's fixed objective (accomplished in man via
> intentional self-concern, i.e., the prudence program) it can reasonably
> be construed as providing evidence and argumentation in support of
> Lucas (1961) and Penrose (1989, 1994). Not only does this imply
> that the aforementioned artifact probably won't be a computer,
> but it would also explain why a question such as "Can Human
> Irrationality Be Experimentally Demonstrated?" (Cohen, 1981)
> has led to controversy, in that it presupposes the possibility
> of a discrete (formalizable) answer to a question which can only
> be addressed in comparative (non-formalizable) terms (e.g. X is
> more rational than Y, the norm, etc.). Along these same lines,
> the theory can also be construed as an endorsement or
> metajustification for comparative approaches in epistemology
> (explanationism, plausiblism, etc.)
I'm sorry to say you lost me here. If I get the time (which is unlikely but
unfortunate, because reading Dennett got me interested in the philosophical
implications of evolution) I will try to check the references.
> "The short answer [to Lucas/Godel and more recently, Penrose]
> is that, although it is established that there are limitations to the
> powers of any particular machine, it has only been stated, without
> any sort of proof, that no such limitations apply to human intellect "
> (A. M. Turing).
> "So even if mathematicians are superb cognizers of mathematical
> truth, and even if there is no algorithm, practical or otherwise,
> for cognizing mathematical truth, it does not follow that the power
> of mathematicians to cognize mathematical truth is not entirely
> explicable in terms of their brain's executing an algorithm. Not
> an algorhithm for intuiting mathematical truth -- we can suppose that
> Penrose [via Godel] has proved that there could be no such thing.
> What would the algorithm be for, then? Most plausibly it would be an
> algorithm -- one of very many -- for trying to stay alive ... " (D. C.
> Dennett).
>Oops! Sorry! Wrong again, old bean.
Actually, I don't see how you can say he is wrong, other than perhaps to argue
against the "most" as a modifier of "plausibly". I found Dennett's
disagreement with Penrose to be convincing, although that is hardly fair since
I haven't read Penrose. I have had numerous "insights" - not all of them
proved to be true. My vision system fills in numerous blanks for me, and does
not alway do so accurately. If it is on the whole accurate, and if its loss in
accuracy is offset by a gain in speed, it may very well be an algorithm for
staying alive. Simlarly my insights may be an algorithm for staying alive, and
it won't matter if sometimes they are false, and it especially won't matter
if they cannot be completely true in all situations. So I don't have to intuit
mathematical truth, I just have to intuit mathematical plausibility. My eyes
intuit visual plausibility routinely - what is the conceptual difficulty with
extending the analogy?
> "My ruling passion is the love of literary fame" (David Hume).
> "I have often felt as though I had inherited all the defiance and all the
> passions with which our ancestors defended their Temple and could
> gladly sacrifice my life for one great moment in history" (Sigmund
> Freud).
Standard desire for control.
> "He, too [Ludwig Wittgenstein], suffered from depressions and for long
> periods considered killing himself because he considered his life
> worthless, but the stubbornness inherited from his father may have
> helped him to survive" (Hans Sluga).
> "The inquest [Alan Turing's] established that it was suicide. The
> evidence was perfunctory, not for any irregular reason, but because
> it was so transparently clear a case" (Andrew Hodges)
In many cases depression is linked with chemical imbalance and can be treated
with chemicals. Disposition is also partially genetic. Your arguments are
thought-provoking, and despite my objections so far it is interesting that I
have heard it said that cranial size in humans has decreased over the past
35,000 years. But I remain unconvinced as to the emphasis on self-worth.
Yours,
Bill Morse
Phil Roberts, Jr.
There is just one little fly in all this ointment, i.e., no scientist has
even begun to tackle the evolutionary function of the intersubjectively
reproducible feature of nature referred to as 'feelings of worthlessness'.
A Sketch of a Divergent Theory of Emotional Instability
Objective: To account for self-worth related emotion (i.e., needs for
love, acceptance, moral integrity, recognition, achievement,
purpose, meaning, etc.) and emotional disorder (e.g., depression,
suicide, etc.) within the context of an evolutionary scenario; i.e., to
synthesize natural science and the humanities; i.e., to answer the
question: 'Why is there a species of naturally selected organism
expending huge quantities of effort and energy on the survivalistically
bizarre non-physical objective of maximizing self-worth?'
Observation: The species in which rationality is most developed is
also the one in which individuals have the greatest difficulty in
maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth, often going to
extraordinary lengths in doing so (e.g., Evel Knievel, celibate monks,
self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.).
Hypothesis: Rationality is antagonistic to psychocentric stability (i.e.,
maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth).
Synopsis: In much the manner reasoning allows for the subordination
of lower emotional concerns and values (pain, fear, anger, sex, etc.)
to more global concerns (concern for the self as a whole), so too,
these more global concerns and values can themselves become
reevaluated and subordinated to other more global, more objective
considerations. And if this is so, and assuming that emotional
disorder emanates from a deficiency in self-worth resulting from
precisely this sort of experiencially based reevaluation, then it can
reasonably be construed as a natural malfunction resulting from
one's rational faculties functioning a tad too well.
Normalcy and Disorder: Assuming this is correct, then some
explanation for the relative "normalcy" of most individuals would
seem necessary. This is accomplished simply by postulating
different levels or degrees of consciousness. From this perspective,
emotional disorder would then be construed as a valuative affliction
resulting from an increase in semantic content in the engram indexed
by the linguistic expression, "I am insignificant", which all persons of
common sense "know" to be true, but which the "emotionally
disturbed" have come to "realize", through abstract thought,
devaluing experience, etc.
Implications: So-called "free will" and the incessant activity presumed
to emanate from it is simply the insatiable appetite we all have for
self-significating experience which, in turn, is simply nature's way of
attempting to counter the objectifying influences of our rational
faculties. This also implies that the engine in the first "free-thinking"
artifact is probably going to be a diesel.
"Another simile would be an atomic pile of less than critical size: an
injected idea is to correspond to a neutron entering the pile from
without. Each such neutron will cause a certain disturbance which
eventually dies away. If, however, the size of the pile is sufficiently
increased, the disturbance caused by such an incoming neutron will
very likely go on and on increasing until the whole pile is destroyed.
Is there a corresponding phenomenon for minds?" (A. M. Turing).
Additional Implications: Since the explanation I have proposed
amounts to the contention that the most rational species
(presumably) is beginning to exhibit signs of transcending the
formalism of nature's fixed objective (accomplished in man via
intentional self-concern, i.e., the prudence program) it can reasonably
be construed as providing evidence and argumentation in support of
Lucas (1961) and Penrose (1989, 1994). Not only does this imply
that the aforementioned artifact probably won't be a computer,
but it would also explain why a question such as "Can Human
Irrationality Be Experimentally Demonstrated?" (Cohen, 1981)
has led to controversy, in that it presupposes the possibility
of a discrete (formalizable) answer to a question which can only
be addressed in comparative (non-formalizable) terms (e.g. X is
more rational than Y, the norm, etc.). Along these same lines,
the theory can also be construed as an endorsement or
metajustification for comparative approaches in epistemology
(explanationism, plausiblism, etc.)
"The short answer [to Lucas/Godel and more recently, Penrose]
is that, although it is established that there are limitations to the
powers of any particular machine, it has only been stated, without
any sort of proof, that no such limitations apply to human intellect "
(A. M. Turing).
"So even if mathematicians are superb cognizers of mathematical
truth, and even if there is no algorithm, practical or otherwise,
for cognizing mathematical truth, it does not follow that the power
of mathematicians to cognize mathematical truth is not entirely
explicable in terms of their brain's executing an algorithm. Not
an algorhithm for intuiting mathematical truth -- we can suppose that
Penrose [via Godel] has proved that there could be no such thing.
What would the algorithm be for, then? Most plausibly it would be an
algorithm -- one of very many -- for trying to stay alive ... " (D. C.
Dennett).
Oops! Sorry! Wrong again, old bean.
"My ruling passion is the love of literary fame" (David Hume).
"I have often felt as though I had inherited all the defiance and all the
passions with which our ancestors defended their Temple and could
gladly sacrifice my life for one great moment in history" (Sigmund
Freud).
"He, too [Ludwig Wittgenstein], suffered from depressions and for long
periods considered killing himself because he considered his life
worthless, but the stubbornness inherited from his father may have
helped him to survive" (Hans Sluga).
"The inquest [Alan Turing's] established that it was suicide. The
evidence was perfunctory, not for any irregular reason, but because
it was so transparently clear a case" (Andrew Hodges)
REFERENCES
1. Cohen, L. Jonathan, Can Human Irrationality be Experimentally
Demonstrated?, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1981, 4, 317-370.
2. Lucas, J. R., Minds, Machines and Godel, Philosophy, Vol XXXVI (1961).
Reprinted in Anderson's, Minds and Machines, and engagingly explored
in Hofstadter's Pulitzer prize winner, Godel, Escher, Bach: An
Eternal Golden Braid.
3. Penrose, Roger, The Emperor's New Mind, 1989; Shadows of the Mind,
1994.
--
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Feelings of Worthlessness and So-Called Cognitive Science
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Ian wrote:
>
> "Phil Roberts, Jr." <phi...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
> >Actually, Dennett is a metaphysician who believes the advance of physical
> >science has given certain philosophers, such as himself, the license to
> >arrive at apodictic certainty on such matters as determinism, the mind/
> >body problem, computationalism, etc. But its still just metaphysics,
> >and you might want to keep that in mind when you find him deriding those
> >of us who actually think there are such things as thoughts and feelings
> >which are every bit as real as tables and chairs, but which do not at
> >present appear to be a part of our physical description of reality.
> >In other words, their are some of us who think the mind/body problem
> >is just that, A PROBLEM, and that the advance of physical science
> >has done nothing to make that problem go away -- that Dennett and
> >his ilk are simply engaging in PHYSICAL ROMANTICISM.
>
> Of course, anyone who thought that would be guilty of holding a belief not
> in agreement with the main body of evidence.
No. They would be guilty of holding a belief that is not in agreement with
the current psychophilosophical fad. Rather than dabble in
metaphysics, a scientist's job is simply to assimilate ALL of the available
intersubjectively reproducible evidence into as simple and coherent a picture
of reality as possible. The fact that physical science has proceeded rapidly
and psychical science (psychology) has remained a basket case does not
constitute evidence that materialism is true, merely that psychical science
is probably a little harder to do, IMHO.
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Ian wrote:
>
> Ken Moore <k...@hpsl.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> >>Actually, Dennett is a metaphysician who believes the advance of physical
> >>science has given certain philosophers, such as himself, the license to
> >>arrive at apodictic certainty on such matters as determinism, the mind/
> >>body problem, computationalism, etc. But its still just metaphysics,
> >>and you might want to keep that in mind when you find him deriding those
> >>of us who actually think there are such things as thoughts and feelings
> >>which are every bit as real as tables and chairs, but which do not at
> >>present appear to be a part of our physical description of reality.
> >>In other words, their are some of us who think the mind/body problem
> >>is just that, A PROBLEM, and that the advance of physical science
> >>has done nothing to make that problem go away -- that Dennett and
> >>his ilk are simply engaging in PHYSICAL ROMANTICISM.
> >
> >Patricia Smith-Churchland argues, in "Neurophilosophy", that scientists
> >and medics. investigating and treating the brain have already modified
> >some philosophical ideas. She instances the development of the
> >consciousness altering drugs, such as sodium pentothal, as having
> >resulted in a substantial deemphasis of the Nietschian concept of "the
> >will".
>
As I have mentioned before, the fly in the physical romanticist's ointment
is the inter-subjectively reproducible feature of nature referred to as
'feelings of worthlessness'. And, THANK GOD, at least one natural
scientist (Dawkins) has come to appreciate the futility of the "Darwin
in a box" mentality being expressed by folks like Ian and Ken and pop
behaviorists like Churchland and Dennett. Here's one of my own memetic
theories hot off the press. Enjoy.
The Moralization Mechanism:
Why We Turned Out Like Captain Kirk Instead of Mr. Spock
(Abstract)
Diagrams A and B (below) represent someone's understanding, with
Diagram A representing an understanding which is relatively correct
and complete and Diagram B representing an understanding which is
less correct (slanted line) and less complete (missing line).
Diagram C is comprised of a number of A-like configurations which
have been conjoined to one another with asterisks which represent
associations. The configuration in the middle of the diagram,
labeled with an 'X', represents an individual's relatively correct
and complete understanding of her own interests (and taken to
include those of immediate kin). The conjoined surrounding
configurations represent this same individual's relatively correct
and complete understanding of the interests of others. As such,
Diagram C can be construed as a rough representation of the
cognitive profile we find in ourselves in that, where human beings
are concerned, it appears nature has been selecting for organisms
which are relatively cognitively objective.
By representing value in terms of the darkness of lines, it is also
possible to employ Diagram C to represent our species' predicted
valuative profile. This can be accomplished simply by making the X
configuration as dark as possible and the other configurations as
light as possible. That's because, at least according to most
sociobiologists, we should expect animate organisms to place
paramount importance on their own interests and, with the
exception of immediate kin, none whatsoever on the interests of
others Hamilton, Dawkins, Campbell, etc.).
| | | | |
- z - * - z - * - z - * - z - * - z -
| | | | | |
- X - * * * * *
| | | | | |
- z - * - y - * - y - * - y - * - z -
Diagram A | | | | |
* * * * *
| | | | |
- z - * - y - * - X - * - y - * - z -
| | | | |
/ * * * * *
- X - | | | | |
- z - * - y - * - y - * - y - * - z -
| | | | |
Diagram B * * * * *
| | | | |
- z - * - z - * - z - * - z - * - z -
| | | | |
Diagram C
While other species conform quite nicely, the valuative profile
in man has been a source of consternation, in that we are
considerably more other-interested than expected (Albert
Schweitzer, self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.). This could be
represented in Diagram C by making the lines in the peripheral
configurations more dark. Even more enigmatic, although
egregiously underappreciated by natural scientists, our species
is afflicted with a disturbing volatility in self-worth. Not
infrequently, this volatility manifests itself in a life
threatening deficiency in self-interest (apathy, recklessness,
suicide, etc.) represented by making configuration X less dark.
Since the proposed adjustments to Diagram C would result in
configurations which are more equal in darkness, it suggests that
other-interestedness and emotional instability are just different
manifestations of an "unwanted" (maladaptive from a "gene's"
perspective) increase in valuative objectivity. And, since I am
supposing that this "red shift" in our valuative profile is
indeed "unwanted", I have attempted to account for it in terms
of a leakage between the cognitive and valuative components of
our strategic profile.
This amounts to the supposition that the explosive increase in
cognitive objectivity (knowledge) emanating from the snowball
effect of cultural evolution (language, printing, scientific
method, etc.) has begun to have an objectifying influence on our
values. Combined with the fact that these influenced values
themselves become inculturated and amplified with time, the
cumulative effect has become sufficient to overwhelm nature's
incessant culling of the valuatively unfit, i.e., other-interested
and emotionally unstable individuals. Or, if you prefer, the
reason we turned out like Captain Kirk instead of Mr. Spock or
more like Mother Teresa than Joseph Stalin has been more a matter
of psychodynamic necessity than of survivalistic expediency.
In the remainder of the paper I elaborate on the mechanism presumed
responsible for the leakage, suggest some disturbing implications
(e.g., homo sapiens are becoming too rational) and, by incorporating
representations for Hume's three types of association, conclude by
employing Diagram C to represent several predictions of the theory.
---------- References ----------
1. W. D. Hamilton, The Genetic Evolution of Social Behavior, Journal
of Theoretical Biology, 7, 1964.
2. Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, 1976.
3. Donald Campbell, On the Conflicts Between Biological and Social
Evolution and Between Psychology and Moral Tradition, American
Psychologist, Dec. 1975.
4. David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, 1739. (48)(621)
Phil Roberts, Jr.
William Morse wrote:
>
> In article <7dggs9$56v$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>,
> "Phil Roberts, Jr." <phi...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > A Sketch of a Divergent Theory of Emotional Disorder
> >
> >Objective: To account for self-worth related emotion (i.e., needs for
> > love, acceptance, moral integrity, recognition, achievement,
> > purpose, meaning, etc.) and emotional disorder (e.g., depression,
> > suicide, etc.) within the context of an evolutionary scenario; i.e., to
> > synthesize natural science and the humanities; i.e., to answer the
> > question: 'Why is there a species of naturally selected organism
> > expending huge quantities of effort and energy on the survivalistically
> > bizarre non-physical objective of maximizing self-worth?'
>
> I don't happen to think it is survivalistically bizarre, although I do not
> entirely define the objective as "self-worth".
That would be the first step if you really didn't want to have to
confront the issue head on. And its not entirely
unreasonable, and might even be mostly
a difference in philosophy -- the difference between a gloomy gus, like
myself, who goes bonkers over anything that looks the least bit out of
place, and someone with a little hard headed common sense who thinks
there is little to be gained from making mountains out of molehills.
> I think there is a large
> survival advantage to being in control of the environment, rather than
> vice-versa.
I think so to. But I don't think its necessary for nature to inflict
an alpha male baboon with feelings of worthlessness in order to get
the job done. Feelings of fear, aggression, sexual arousal, etc. will
be all that's necessary, particularly when you consider the dehabilitating
effects when worthlessness becomes the soup of the day. Hey! I
don't know to what extent you've experienced them personally but, trust
me, it's not a pretty picture.
> I think there is a general relation between feeling in control and
> feelings of self worth.
True. But one can also acquire a sense of self-worth from being
controlled, e.g., an obedient wife, a celibate monk, etc.
> Thus, a selective advantage in maximizing self-worth.
>
I agree there is a selective advantage, I just don't agree that its
predominently physical. Rather, I believe maximizing self-worth is
crucial to maintaining a well motivated self-interest. But why?
That's the 64,000 question.
> >Observation: The species in which rationality is most developed is
> > also the one in which individuals have the greatest difficulty in
> > maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth, often going to
> > extraordinary lengths in doing so (e.g., Evel Knievel, celibate monks,
> > self-endangering Greenpeacers, etc.).
> >
> >Hypothesis: Rationality is antagonistic to psychocentric stability (i.e.,
> > maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth).
> >
> >Synopsis: In much the manner reasoning allows for the subordination
> > of lower emotional concerns and values (pain, fear, anger, sex, etc.)
> > to more global concerns (concern for the self as a whole), so too,
> > these more global concerns and values can themselves become
> > reevaluated and subordinated to other more global, more objective
> > considerations. And if this is so, and assuming that emotional
> > disorder emanates from a deficiency in self-worth resulting from
> > precisely this sort of experiencially based reevaluation, then it can
> > reasonably be construed as a natural malfunction resulting from
> > one's rational faculties functioning a tad too well.
>
> Except that emotional malfunction occurs in many individuals, not just the
> most "rational". Furthermore, there are numerous highly intelligent and
> rational individuals who do not suffer from the problem of low self-worth. In
> other words, I see no necessary correlation.
>
This is an excellent point. However, I would maintain that, in addition to an
increase in emotional instability, as a species becomes more rational its members
also become more individualized. As such, you have to become increasingly more
dependent on abstraction and generalization. And so my statement is based on
a species level abstraction which is crucial, i.e., the SPECIES in which
rationality is most developed is also the one having the most difficulty
in maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth. In other words, in order to
address your objection, and its a pretty good one, I would simply maintain
that you are painting with too fine a brush.
> >Normalcy and Disorder: Assuming this is correct, then some
> > explanation for the relative "normalcy" of most individuals would
> > seem necessary. This is accomplished simply by postulating
> > different levels or degrees of consciousness. From this perspective,
> > emotional disorder would then be construed as a valuative affliction
> > resulting from an increase in semantic content in the engram indexed
> > by the linguistic expression, "I am insignificant", which all persons of
> > common sense "know" to be true, but which the "emotionally
> > disturbed" have come to "realize", through abstract thought,
> > devaluing experience, etc.
>
> I am a person of common sense, and I do not know it to be true that I am
> insignificant.
Then you are not a person with much common sense, I'm afraid.
Phil Roberts, Jr.
William Morse wrote:
>
> In article <7dggs9$56v$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>,
> "Phil Roberts, Jr." <phi...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
> >Normalcy and Disorder: Assuming this is correct, then some
> > explanation for the relative "normalcy" of most individuals would
> > seem necessary. This is accomplished simply by postulating
> > different levels or degrees of consciousness. From this perspective,
> > emotional disorder would then be construed as a valuative affliction
> > resulting from an increase in semantic content in the engram indexed
> > by the linguistic expression, "I am insignificant", which all persons of
> > common sense "know" to be true, but which the "emotionally
> > disturbed" have come to "realize", through abstract thought,
> > devaluing experience, etc.
>
> I am a person of common sense, and I do not know it to be true that I am
> insignificant. Certainly I have thought in some philosophizing moments that I
> am insignificant,
I would maintain that in your philosophizing moments during which you
momentarily suspected you might be insignificant, you were actually
coming into more immediate contact with your significance from a
more global more objective perspective. And, I would maintain that
the reason various members of the most rational species are occasionally
able to acquire this perspective is, not because it is adaptive, but
rather because the capacity to reason, which IS adaptive, has begun
to get a little out of hand. As such, in your philosophizing moments I
would say you were momentarily beginning to REALIZE your insignificance,
but no longer maintain the engram in your oval office of consciousness
(because its unpleasant and counter-productive, for one) and now merely
KNOW what at that time you momentarily REALIZED.
> but apropos the Gould-Dawkins debate, I don't think either
> would argue that I am insignificant. From a Dawkins standpoint I am
> significant in that _every one of my forebears for the last several billion
> years successfully reproduced_. From a Goulds standpoint I am significant in
> that what I do will affect the contingent course of evolution for the
> remainder of life.
I am unaware that either Dawkins or Gould has ever even so much as
acknowledged that feelings of worthlessness are a part of the fabric
of nature, let alone had an opinion on their evolutionary function.
So I doubt they agree with your rather contorted reasoning that
their positions on evolutionary theory lead one to imply their
positions on whether you or I or anyone else for that matter is
REALLY significant.
>
> >Implications: So-called "free will" and the incessant activity presumed
> > to emanate from it is simply the insatiable appetite we all have for
> > self-significating experience which, in turn, is simply nature's way of
> > attempting to counter the objectifying influences of our rational
> > faculties. This also implies that the engine in the first "free-thinking"
> > artifact is probably going to be a diesel.
>
> My interpretation is that the appetite is for control of our destiny. One may
> easily confuse the two.
>
Possibly. But you are going beyond the information given. And you want to
be careful that the REASON isn't simply to spare you the cognitive discomfort
of having to completely rearrange your understanding and the emotional
discomfort of the dark and disturbing implications of my own view of the
matter. Can you provide any evidence to support your theory that feelings
of worthlessness should not be accepted at face value for what they appear
to be?
Also, you want to remember that the one of the most devastating forms of
worthlessness are those associated with guilt. How do you explain this
in terms of your 'they're not really feelings of worthlessness' hypothesis?
> > "Another simile would be an atomic pile of less than critical size: an
> > injected idea is to correspond to a neutron entering the pile from
> > without. Each such neutron will cause a certain disturbance which
> > eventually dies away. If, however, the size of the pile is sufficiently
> > increased, the disturbance caused by such an incoming neutron will
> > very likely go on and on increasing until the whole pile is destroyed.
> > Is there a corresponding phenomenon for minds?" (A. M. Turing).
>
> Yes, there is - it's called an epileptic seizure. The analogy is not complete,
> but to stretch it a little further, normal minds under normal conditions
> have safety circuits to prevent the phenomenon, just as nuclear reactors.
>
No one I know doubts that such a seizure is a physiological malfunction
of the brain. However, there are a lot of us who doubt that feeling worthless
is 100% a disfunction of the brain and not at least in part a disfunction of
the mind.
BTW, I've enjoyed your comments, and even though we appear to be on opposite
ends of the spectrum, I think your criticisms have been intelligent and reasonably
well informed.
Phil Roberts, Jr.
William Morse wrote:
>
> In article <7dggs9$56v$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>,
> "Phil Roberts, Jr." <phi...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
>
> >Additional Implications: Since the explanation I have proposed
> > amounts to the contention that the most rational species
> > (presumably) is beginning to exhibit signs of transcending the
> > formalism of nature's fixed objective (accomplished in man via
> > intentional self-concern, i.e., the prudence program) it can reasonably
> > be construed as providing evidence and argumentation in support of
> > Lucas (1961) and Penrose (1989, 1994). Not only does this imply
> > that the aforementioned artifact probably won't be a computer,
> > but it would also explain why a question such as "Can Human
> > Irrationality Be Experimentally Demonstrated?" (Cohen, 1981)
> > has led to controversy, in that it presupposes the possibility
> > of a discrete (formalizable) answer to a question which can only
> > be addressed in comparative (non-formalizable) terms (e.g. X is
> > more rational than Y, the norm, etc.). Along these same lines,
> > the theory can also be construed as an endorsement or
> > metajustification for comparative approaches in epistemology
> > (explanationism, plausiblism, etc.)
>
> I'm sorry to say you lost me here. If I get the time (which is unlikely but
> unfortunate, because reading Dennett got me interested in the philosophical
> implications of evolution) I will try to check the references.
Here's probably the best on the web for Godel.
The Unknowable, G.J. Chaitin
http://www.umcs.maine.edu/~chaitin/unknowable/
The short version -- the greatest development in mathematics in this century
has been the discovery by Kurt Godel that, and these are my words,
mathematical reasoning can't be reduced to logic. Of course,
the Godel version is a bit different, e.g., that all formal systems
are either inconsistent or incomplete, etc.
Actually, since a now famous paper by J. R. Lucas, who also has a
page on the web, there has been a ferocious war going on over the
implications of Godel, with Lucas and more recently the noble laureate,
Roger Penrose, maintaining that Godel also amounts to a PROOF that "minds
are different from machines", and all the mechanistic materialist types,
like Dennett and Hofstadter, standing their ground and valiantly beating
back the forces of mysticism. BTW, Hofstadter's 'Godel, Escher, Bach'
is a must read for anyone interested in this subject matter. It won
a Pulitzer prize.
Well, anyway, my own two cents worth in all this amounts to the
criticism of both camps for the faux paux of not appreciating that
you can neither establish nor defeat an empirical proposition (minds
are different from machines) with a logical proof. What is needed in
empirical matters is the marshalling of evidence sufficient to
convince reasonable persons beyond a reasonable doubt.
This is where my theory comes in, in that it amounts to the contention that
the reason homo sapiens are afflicted with feelings of worthlessness is
because they are becoming a little too objective, i.e., are becoming
LESS DETERMINED by nature's emotional mandate, 'place paramount
importance on your own interests', and are more and more requiring
reasons (empirical evidence of their importance) for doing nature's
bidding.
>
> > "The short answer [to Lucas/Godel and more recently, Penrose]
> > is that, although it is established that there are limitations to the
> > powers of any particular machine, it has only been stated, without
> > any sort of proof, that no such limitations apply to human intellect "
> > (A. M. Turing).
>
> > "So even if mathematicians are superb cognizers of mathematical
> > truth, and even if there is no algorithm, practical or otherwise,
> > for cognizing mathematical truth, it does not follow that the power
> > of mathematicians to cognize mathematical truth is not entirely
> > explicable in terms of their brain's executing an algorithm. Not
> > an algorhithm for intuiting mathematical truth -- we can suppose that
> > Penrose [via Godel] has proved that there could be no such thing.
> > What would the algorithm be for, then? Most plausibly it would be an
> > algorithm -- one of very many -- for trying to stay alive ... " (D. C.
> > Dennett).
>
> >Oops! Sorry! Wrong again, old bean.
>
> Actually, I don't see how you can say he is wrong,
Because some of the most eminent minds in the psycho-philosophical field
have told us POINT BLANK that they are NOT following algorhithms 'for
trying to stay alive', but for something else. And the implication of
your "theory" that it makes evolutionary sense for organisms who don't
achieve control to simply do away with themselves is a little hard to
swallow, if you don't mind my saying so. When's the last time
you saw a beta baboon doing away with itself because its aspirations
for alpha maledom simply weren't being fulfilled. And if what you
say is correct, why is the phenomenon only apparent to any extent IN
THE MOST RATIONAL species.
> other than perhaps to argue
> against the "most" as a modifier of "plausibly".
He's not wrong if, as you say, feelings of worthlessness are something
else which serves an obvious biological purpose and are merely masquerading
as feelings of worthlessness. But if, as I maintain, they are evidence
of an actual self-worth problem in homo sapiens, and which is simply a
matter of taking them at face value, then it is not at all
unreasonable to suggest that they might be construed as evidence that
we are beginning to become LESS DETERMINED, and that the program we are
actually following is not for staying alive, but for maximizing our own
self-worth/self-significance and even that one we bail out of every
now and then (suicide).
> I found Dennett's
> disagreement with Penrose to be convincing, although that is hardly fair since
> I haven't read Penrose. I have had numerous "insights" - not all of them
> proved to be true. My vision system fills in numerous blanks for me, and does
> not alway do so accurately. If it is on the whole accurate, and if its loss in
> accuracy is offset by a gain in speed, it may very well be an algorithm for
> staying alive. Simlarly my insights may be an algorithm for staying alive, and
> it won't matter if sometimes they are false, and it especially won't matter
> if they cannot be completely true in all situations. So I don't have to intuit
> mathematical truth, I just have to intuit mathematical plausibility. My eyes
> intuit visual plausibility routinely - what is the conceptual difficulty with
> extending the analogy?
>
I have no problem with any of the algorhithms you have mentioned, since I can
easily see how they might serve a useful function under the heading of
'maintain your physical well-being'. Its the algorhythm, "expend
90% of your effort and energy on the non-physical objective of maximizing
your self-worth" that I think is a bit of a sticky wicket.
> > "My ruling passion is the love of literary fame" (David Hume).
>
> > "I have often felt as though I had inherited all the defiance and all the
> > passions with which our ancestors defended their Temple and could
> > gladly sacrifice my life for one great moment in history" (Sigmund
> > Freud).
>
> Standard desire for control.
They didn't know their own minds, eh? Too bad they didn't have you along
to help them clear things up.
>
> > "He, too [Ludwig Wittgenstein], suffered from depressions and for long
> > periods considered killing himself because he considered his life
> > worthless, but the stubbornness inherited from his father may have
> > helped him to survive" (Hans Sluga).
>
> > "The inquest [Alan Turing's] established that it was suicide. The
> > evidence was perfunctory, not for any irregular reason, but because
> > it was so transparently clear a case" (Andrew Hodges)
>
> In many cases depression is linked with chemical imbalance and can be treated
> with chemicals. Disposition is also partially genetic.
You have a point. And it would be foolish for me to maintain that there is
NO physiological factors involved. But I think it is every bit as foolish
to try to pretend that this disorder is PURELY a matter of chemical
imbalance, etc. Like it or not, we are a species which is in the midst
of innumerable VALUATIVE emergencies.
I don't know if you saw it, but the front page of USA Today presented a study
which shows that the new psychotropics are actually no more effective for
the treatment of depression than psychotherapy. There is also another study
which shows that the more recent reuptake inhibitors (Prozac, etc.) are actually
no more effective than the older tricyclites, and despite all the whoopla. So
the current status of this particular argument is on hold.
> Your arguments are
> thought-provoking, and despite my objections so far it is interesting that I
> have heard it said that cranial size in humans has decreased over the past
> 35,000 years. But I remain unconvinced as to the emphasis on self-worth.
>
Again, thanks for your comments
Phil Roberts, Jr.
William Morse wrote:
>
>
> In many cases depression is linked with chemical imbalance and can be treated
> with chemicals. Disposition is also partially genetic. Your arguments are
> thought-provoking, and despite my objections so far it is interesting that I
> have heard it said that cranial size in humans has decreased over the past
> 35,000 years. But I remain unconvinced as to the emphasis on self-worth.
>
As I mentioned in a previous post, there are a number of studies now which
have taken the wind out of the sales of this particular argument. Here is
an article on this that appeared on the web:
NEW YORK TIMES
March 21, 1999
Placebo Nation
By JOHN HORGAN
Over the past decade, psychiatrists and the news media have proclaimed the
wonders of Prozac and the rest of a new generation of antidepressant drugs,
known collectively as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. Now a report
from the United States Department of Health and Human Services has confirmed
what has long been an open secret among mental-illness researchers: the
S.S.R.I.'s are no more effective at treating depression than older classes of
drugs, like tricyclics.
Buried within this report is a larger and more disturbing story.
During the past century, while scientists have acquired ever more detailed
information about the brain with ever more powerful technologies, there have
been virtually no genuine advances in treatments for depression and other
common mental disorders. From psychoanalysis to Prozac, all the therapies
offered so far are roughly equivalent in their effectiveness, or lack thereof.
Roughly two-thirds of patients receiving any form of treatment for depression
show some improvement. On the other hand, as many as half of those who don't
receive treatment improve anyhow.
The most common therapy in the first half of this century was the talking cure,
popularized by Freud. There are now hundreds of talking cures, from Jungian
dreamwork to cognitive behavioral therapy. Although each is touted as an
improvement over its predecessors, scientific tests have found that all
psychotherapies are basically equal.
The advent of drugs like tricyclics in the 1950's was initially seen as an
enormous advance beyond psychotherapy in treating depression. In fact, various
studies say that antidepressants and psychotherapy produce more or less the
same outcomes.
The new report, summarizing many studies, concludes that about 50 percent of
severely depressed patients taking the drugs improve, versus 32 percent of
those taking a placebo. Even this apparent advantage may be illusory, according
to researchers like Roger Greenberg, a psychologist at the State University of
New York Health Science Center at Syracuse.
Clinical trials are supposedly double blind: neither the test subjects nor the
researchers are told who is receiving the drug and who is receiving a placebo.
But because all psychiatric drugs have side effects -- like dry mouth,
constipation and sexual dysfunction -- both patients and researchers invariably
see through the double blind, according to Dr. Greenberg. When patients realize
they are taking the real drug, the placebo effect is especially strong,
particularly if they have read books and magazine articles lauding the
medication.
At least one prominent psychiatrist, Walter Brown of Brown University, has
proposed that placebo pills be the initial treatment for patients with mild or
moderate depression. Physicians would tell patients, in effect, "These pills
have no active ingredients, but studies show they help in many cases." Dr.
Brown cites evidence that patients will respond to placebo pills even after
being told this.
A more time-tested method for achieving relief was highlighted by a recent
study at Duke University. Researchers examined 87 depressed, elderly patients,
about half of whom were receiving psychotherapy, antidepressants or a
combination of the two. The best predictor of improvement was not these
expensive remedies but the "religiosity" of the patient.
The psychiatrist Jerome Frank warned in his classic book "Persuasion and
Healing" that the placebo effect might be the primary factor underlying all
psychiatric remedies. The latest research supports Dr. Frank's finding:
psychiatrists, psychologists and other "scientific" healers are really
exploiting the power of human belief, just as shamans and witch doctors do.
John Horgan is the author of ``The End of Science'' and the forthcoming ``The
Undiscovered Mind.''
Darwin and Darwinism http://www.human-nature.com/darwin/index.html
--
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Feelings of Worthlessness from the Perspective of So-Called
Cognitive Science:
An Amateur Psychologist's Documented Chronologue of a Frustrating
Conversation with the 'Society for Philosophy and Psychology'
Regarding a Psychical Anomaly
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476
Phil Roberts, Jr.
Oliver Sparrow wrote (posted via comp.ai.philosophy):
>
> "Phil Roberts, Jr." wrote:
>
> >John Horgan is the author of ``The End of Science'' and the forthcoming
> >``The
> >Undiscovered Mind.''
>
> I find this author incomprehensible. The first book says: "there is
> nothing new to find" and the second provides a rational sequitur: that
> "the mind is undiscovered." Perhaps he says that it never will be
> discovered.
>
Thanks for your input, Olly. I have to agree to a certain extent. I
think that, if taken at face value, he's trying to be controversial and
disturbing in order to sell lots of books. Hell, I bought the
first book for that very reason. That being said, I think if one
were to re-interpret the book as talking, not so much about the end of
science, as about the end of mechanistic materialism, then he
may not be so far off the mark. And, irrespective
of what you and I think about Horgan, I think it unlikely that he has
misreported the results of the studies BTW, I noticed a somewhat
similar message appeared on the front page of USA TODAY a week or too ago.
> Phil: the placebo problem makes trials difficult, but does not prevent
> trials from taking place once it is understood. The Hawthorn effect -
> in which workers perked up whenever managers instigated work place
> changes - was a similar limit on making the work place systematically
> better, but we have nonetheless succeeded, have we not?
>
My point is not so much that these matters can't be investigated and
understood, but that, on several occasions, this undertaking has been
sidetracted BY THE HYPE OF PHYSICAL ROMANTICISM. And, combined with the
fact that we WANT TO BELIEVE that emotional disorder is all just a
brain disfunction, there is ample reason for us to be extra vigilant
where this class of phenomena is concerned.
> Depression is clearly a complex, high level (set of) events, probably
> combining biochemical predispositions with the effects of stress or
> unresolved difficulties which the individual may face. It is too much
> to hope of a pill, that it offers a fix to all of this; or at least a
> fix in the way that - say - allopurinol 'fixes' a predisposition to
> build up uric acid, and thus develop gout and urate kidney stones. the
> one is a single enzyme to block, the other is a huge range of
> receptors and transmitters, all in dynamic equilibrium with each other
> and subject to a myriad of myriads of feedback.
>
Yes. That is one of the messages of the new philosophy of science, that
the notion that there are single causes of complex phenomena has little
to do with how nature herself operates. That being said,
your examples and focus seem oriented toward the PHYSICAL
causation of depression and, as such, could be construed as evidence that
you yourself may still be somewhat under the spell of the 'its all a brain
disfunction' paradigm.
I'm particularly alerted in this regard by your use of the phrase "the
effects of stress", in that it could be construed as buying into the
materialist hype that the reason America has lost more Vietnam vets to
suicide (85,000 or so, I believe) than were actually killed in the war
(56,000) is because their neurons are getting tired. Its not that this
might not be a part of the picture, but the problem of referring to the
"cause" as 'post traumatic stress disorder' is that it masks what in
all likelyhood is THE CENTRAL REASON, i.e., that Vietnam vets
are dieing by the thousands from A VALUATIVE AFFLICTION, a sense of
worthlessness and meaninglessness in their lives brought on by the
witnessing of events you and I probably can't even begin to imagine.
As one of many manifestations (sleeplessness, suicidal thoughts,
addictions, anxiety, depression), I suspect they also have some very
tired neurons.
> Your broader theme, as I understand it, is that we need to understand
> the role of the individual within society if we are to identify the
> ways in which specific individuals suffer or gain as a result of their
> participation. I cannot disagree.
If that's all you got out of it, either I haven't been very clear or
you haven't actually read my abstract, although I certainly appreciate
your at least having enough interest to express a conclusion. One of
the messages of the abstract is simply that I have discovered a
cognitive tool (Diagram C) which can be employed to represent
innumerable psychical features, among them, belief, value, correspondence,
coherence, meaning, faith, self-interest, prudence, emotional instability,
the moralization mechanism, and, by introducing representations for Hume's
three types of association, racism, kin concern, and several predictions
of my theory.
> Further, it is very clear that
> socially-mediated selection (of ideas and genomes) has been very
> important. Wild dogs cannot survive in the bush without instructions
> from other wild dogs; and which wild dogs pass on their genes depends
> on a social hierarchy that controls who breeds and who does not. To
> pretend that this equates to the blind forces of nature is wrong; not
> because wild dogs are not a part of nature, but because what they are
> doing is far from blind. One needs to take their social life into
> account if one wants to understand African ecology.
>
Yes. You have provided me with an excellent vehicle here. The central
theme of my abstract is that, unlike the memes of the wild dogs, which
ARE adaptive, we have a meme in homo sapiens (the meme for valuative
objectivity) which is maladaptive and perhaps even spreading out of
control. My explanation is that the meme is an "unwanted" by-product
of the evoution of knowledge in that "the massive increase in cognitive
objectivity emanating from the snowball effect of cultural evolution has
begun to have an objectifying influence on our values....sufficient to
overwhelm nature's incessant culling of the valuatively unfit." In other
words, I am suggesting that this increase in valuative objectivity is a
manifestation of the mechanics of genetic indeterminism and, with it, the
implication, not actually presented in my abstract, that 'feelings of
worthlessness' constitute an intersubjectively reproducible facit of nature
corroborating the Lucas and Penrose position on Godel. (Whew! That was
a mouthful.)
> How does this match to human behaviour patterns that have a large
> genetic element to them? Some may be the down side of a positive
> thing: sensitivity to ideas may lead predispose to hypersensitivity to
> stress, perhaps?
Ah yes. More tired neurons. :)
> Some may be to do with the negative effects of
> civilization: from circulatory disease to stress.
My point exactly. The maladaptive meme of valuative objectivity is
a product of the evolution of cultural or, more specifically, the
evolution of rationality, and is causing us to become LESS DETERMINED
by our genes. Although I'm not the only one with this message, the
WAY I have presented it and the more specific mechanics of how the
indeterminism transpires is, I believe, NEW. When's the last time
you heard talk of "a leakage between the cognitive and valuative
components of our strategic profile" or "the mechanics of
indeterminism"?
> Some may be
> recessives which show up only infrequently or late in life, and so
> have not been pruned. Some may be the consequences of incomplete
> evolutions, as the female pelvis and the infant brain size have become
> near-incompatible. We are a half-constructed building in a city in
> permanent ferment, and our species resembles a building carcass over
> which the assorted architects are in unceasing strife.
>
Yes. Its a mixed bag. My ex-girlfriend, during and after her divorce,
had terrible episodes of PMS. After we started going together
and she started to feel that she wasn't such a loser after all, her
PMS episodes became far more tolerable. From this, she herself
was able to eventually conclude (with a little encouragement from me,
of course) that her PMS had BOTH physiological AND VALUATIVE causes.
--
Phil Roberts, Jr.
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5476