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Author Topic:   The implications of Evolution
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 76 of 95 (796574)
12-31-2016 2:00 PM
Reply to: Message 74 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 1:51 PM


Re: Theories
You are conflating correlation with causation.
No I'm not.
When has anyone seen knowledge in the brain?
Why would anyone need to?
Knowledge is semantic and symbolic.
So?
Your claim is that my brain somehow knows whether a man is fertile or not.
No it isn't.
We don't know what causes sexual attraction.
The brain.
And ironically most of the literature has focused on homosexuality and ignored what might cause someone to become attracted to the opposite sex.
I disagree. Perhaps you might consider using evidence rather than assertion? Might help.
For me I am attracted to a man because I am in a male body and I know what my erogenous zones are. I can know what having someone touching my penis is like. I don't know what having someone touching a clitoris is like.
This does not explain why you, or more generally homosexual and bisexual people, find people of the same sex as them attractive. Indeed it is a tautology much like 'I like chocolate because I like chocolate'. You find men attractive because you are attracted to men? Not all that explanatory is it?
abe: I should clarify I'm being charitable. Taking your words as you wrote them, I can refute your 'explanation' by pointing to heterosexual men with all the same properties you describe.
Once again you are conflating the evolutionary usefulness of something with its causal account.
No I am not. I am talking about homosexuality clustering in families does not have to be a problem for evolutionary theory. Because you know, you brought it up.
It is also ironic that some of the least attractive humans have lots of children.
This can only makes sense if you think attractiveness is some kind of objective or intrinsic property exactly the opposite of what I've been saying.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

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AndrewPD
Member (Idle past 2416 days)
Posts: 133
From: Bristol
Joined: 07-23-2009


Message 77 of 95 (796575)
12-31-2016 2:34 PM
Reply to: Message 71 by Modulous
12-31-2016 1:22 PM


Re: reductionism
Altruism is only a problem because of assumptions made in theories of Evolution. Dawkins say in TSG Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are all born selfish. Which implies he doesn't see it as innate.
The idea is that things can only survive by being "self" centred. Which is strange considering sexual reproduction combines two sets of genes so an individual is far from being a replication of someone else. What constitutes a things is problematic as well. Humans are made of trillions of differentiated cells and foreign organism. What is the thing that is trying to survive?
If I had children with an outer Mongolian sheep farmer lady the amount of diversity in our genes would mean our offspring would a have a wide range of genetic relatives to consider when being altruistic. (In my own case I am mixed race with parents born thousands of miles apart.)
Altruism is irrelevant in one sense considering we are condemned to die. There is no behaviour we can exhibit that will ensure the continuation of ourselves. I am actively trying to ensure my genes don't continue here after me.
I think helping others is praiseworthy on the grounds that it reduces harm and not on the grounds that it inadvertently in some cases aids our own genes survival. *I think rationality is the biggest threat to reproduction as it offers us no reason to continue reproducing.* I don't see how altruism is a threat to reproduction.
It is not really possible in my opinion to know why organisms try to survive. Postulating metaphorical selfishness in their genes is imposing a framework or lens through which to analyse things that are not happening in the realm of the origin of said terminology.
You seem to have missed this:
Dawkins says in The Selfish Gene
"We are survival machines — robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the *selfish* molecules known as genes. This is a truth which still fills me with astonishment."
That is plainly reductionism it is not equivalent to explaining how a computer emerges from its parts but rather how behaviour we value is actually based on amoral selfish behaviour.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 71 by Modulous, posted 12-31-2016 1:22 PM Modulous has replied

Replies to this message:
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jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 78 of 95 (796576)
12-31-2016 2:42 PM
Reply to: Message 77 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 2:34 PM


Re: reductionism
You do realize that neither Dennet or Dawkins is a participant in this thread. What Dennet or Dawkins might say really has little or nothing to do with this forum or this topic or this thread.
So what again is the subject you want to discuss?

My Sister's Website: Rose Hill Studios My Website: My Website

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PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 79 of 95 (796577)
12-31-2016 2:43 PM
Reply to: Message 77 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 2:34 PM


Re: reductionism
quote:
Altruism is only a problem because of assumptions made in theories of Evolution. Dawkins say in TSG Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are all born selfish. Which implies he doesn't see it as innate.
Or maybe, as a parent, he has observed very young children.
Altruism is a "problem" in evolutionary theory because a naive understanding of evolution would have it encouraging selfishness. The problem is solved by taking a wider and deeper view - as Dawkins argues.
quote:
You seem to have missed this:
Dawkins says in The Selfish Gene
"We are survival machines — robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the *selfish* molecules known as genes. This is a truth which still fills me with astonishment."
That is plainly reductionism it is not equivalent to explaining how a computer emerges from its parts but rather how behaviour we value is actually based on amoral selfish behaviour.
Not when it is properly understood. Dawkins is offering only an explanation of how we came to be, not a complete description. Reading "nothing but" into it is an error and if you bothered to understand Dawkins' work you would know that.

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Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 80 of 95 (796578)
12-31-2016 2:49 PM
Reply to: Message 77 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 2:34 PM


Re: reductionism
Altruism is only a problem because of assumptions made in theories of Evolution.
What assumptions?
Dawkins say in TSG Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are all born selfish. Which implies he doesn't see it as innate.
An implication disabused by reading more.
quote:
This brings me to the first point I want to make about what this book is not. I am not advocating a
morality based on evolution. I am saying how things have evolved. I am not saying how we humans
morally ought to behave. I stress this, because I know I am in danger of being misunderstood by those
people, all too numerous, who cannot distinguish a statement of belief in what is the case from an
advocacy of what ought to be the case. My own feeling is that a human society based simply on the
gene's law of universal ruthless selfishness would be a very nasty society in which to live. But
unfortunately, however much we may deplore something, it does not stop it being true. This book is
mainly intended to be interesting, but if you would extract a moral from it, read it as a warning. Be
warned that if you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and
unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature. Let us try to
teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish
genes are up to, because we may then at least have the chance to upset their designs, something that no
other species has ever aspired to.
As a corollary to these remarks about teaching, it is a fallacy-incidentally a very common one-to
suppose that genetically inherited traits are by definition fixed and unmodifiable. Our genes may
instruct us to be selfish, but we are not necessarily compelled to obey them all our lives. It may just
be more difficult to learn altruism than it would be if we were genetically programmed to be
altruistic. Among animals, man is uniquely dominated by culture, by influences learned and handed
down. Some would say that culture is so important that genes, whether selfish or not, are virtually
irrelevant to the understanding of human nature. Others would disagree. It all depends where you
stand in the debate over 'nature versus nurture' as determinants of human attributes.
quote:
This gene selfishness will usually give rise to selfishness in individual behaviour.
However, as we shall see, there are special circumstances in which a gene can achieve its own
selfish goals best by fostering a limited form of altruism at the level of individual animals
quote:
It is important to realize that the above definitions of altruism and selfishness are behavioural, not
subjective. I am not concerned here with the psychology of motives. I am not going to argue about
whether people who behave altruistically are 'really' doing it for secret or subconscious selfish
motives. Maybe they are and maybe they aren't, and maybe we can never know, but in any case that is
not what this book is about. My definition is concerned only with whether the effect of an act is to
lower or raise the survival prospects of the presumed altruist and the survival prospects of the
presumed beneficiary.
It is a very complicated business to demonstrate the effects of behaviour on long-term survival
prospects. In practice, when we apply the definition to real behaviour, we must qualify it with the
word 'apparently'. An apparently altruistic act is one that looks, superficially, as if it must tend to
make the altruist more likely (however slightly) to die, and the recipient more likely to survive. It
often turns out on closer inspection that acts of apparent altruism are really selfishness in disguise.
Once again, I do not mean that the underlying motives are secretly selfish, but that the real effects of
the act on survival prospects are the reverse of what we originally thought.
I am going to give some examples of apparently selfish and apparently altruistic behaviour. It is
difficult to suppress subjective habits of thought when we are dealing with our own species, so I shall
choose examples from other animals instead
quote:
Laying down one's life for one's friends is obviously altruistic, but so also is taking a slight risk for
them. Many small birds, when they see a flying predator such as a hawk, give a characteristic 'alarm
call', upon which the whole flock takes appropriate evasive action. There is indirect evidence that the
bird who gives the alarm call puts itself in special danger, because it attracts the predator's attention
particularly to itself.
This is only a slight additional risk, but it nevertheless seems, at least at first sight, to qualify as an
altruistic act by our definition.
The commonest and most conspicuous acts of animal altruism are done by parents, especially
mothers, towards their children. They may incubate them, either in nests or in their own bodies, feed
them at enormous cost to themselves, and take great risks in protecting them from predators. To take
just one particular example, many ground-nesting birds perform a so-called 'distraction display' when
a predator such as a fox approaches. The parent bird limps away from the nest, holding out one wing
as though it were broken. The predator, sensing easy prey, is lured away from the nest containing the
chicks. Finally the parent bird gives up its pretence and leaps into the air just in time to escape the
fox's jaws. It has probably saved the life of its nestlings, but at some risk to itself.
Turns out, 'altruism' is, in practice, innate in certain cases.
Nuance, eh?
The idea is that things can only survive by being "self" centred.
Almost self-evidently true, isn't it? The Selfish Gene is about how it is the genes are that self centred, and that this can seemingly paradoxically result in individual 'survival machines' acting against their own survival for the benefit of the selfish genes.
Humans are made of trillions of differentiated cells and foreign organism. What is the thing that is trying to survive?
Genes. Have you read the book by any chance?
If I had children with an outer Mongolian sheep farmer lady the amount of diversity in our genes would mean our offspring would a have a wide range of genetic relatives to consider when being altruistic. (In my own case I am mixed race with parents born thousands of miles apart.)
Of course, the genes don't know any of that as the book describes in the section on kin selection, a small section I quoted earlier.
You seem to have missed this:
Except the part where I addressed it. Apparently you missed that.
That is plainly reductionism it is not equivalent to explaining how a computer emerges from its parts but rather how behaviour we value is actually based on amoral selfish behaviour.
Of genes.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

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AndrewPD
Member (Idle past 2416 days)
Posts: 133
From: Bristol
Joined: 07-23-2009


Message 81 of 95 (796579)
12-31-2016 2:54 PM
Reply to: Message 71 by Modulous
12-31-2016 1:22 PM


Re: reductionism
"The idea that altruism is moral is a *genuine* tautology."
What is the relevance of this statement?
You can't derive morality from altruism you can simply attach the label "moral" to altruism arbitrarily. There are also a lot of moral standpoints that aren't altruistic.
Including my own antinatalism and things such as the idea that it is wrong to lie.
There is a difference between disapproving of people being harmed and actively helping people.
Helping people create more children and creating a big business etc is not entirely (if at all ) altruistic, it is just keeping the mindless merry go round going. Also Nazis were altruistic when they gave their lives for the Fuehrer.
Selfishness is clearly not the only way genes can survive because having two children and spending a lot of time caring for them is better than having twenty children that you can't look after. Also destroying your own environment isn't selfish because it just ruins your own lifestyle and the future for your genes.
I actually advocate selfishness in the sophisticated sense. In the sense of realising that it is in your own interest to do X,Y and Z. This depends on whether you think selfishness can be reduced to mechanism. I don't think it can.
So If I want to be selfish, just rampaging through society will lead to my quick demise. I couldn't create the internet on my own etc so massive cooperation is more likely to fulfil my desires. I can't think of a situation in which the cliched notion of Selfishness is beneficial except to an egotist.
Having a billion pounds and no children isn't going to spread your genes. There actually seems to be no way to ensure your genes survive because we don't know what the future holds)

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Tangle
Member
Posts: 9489
From: UK
Joined: 10-07-2011
Member Rating: 4.9


Message 82 of 95 (796580)
12-31-2016 2:56 PM
Reply to: Message 77 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 2:34 PM


Re: reductionism
AndrewPD writes:
Dawkins says in The Selfish Gene
"We are survival machines — robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the *selfish* molecules known as genes. This is a truth which still fills me with astonishment."
That is plainly reductionism it is not equivalent to explaining how a computer emerges from its parts but rather how behaviour we value is actually based on amoral selfish behaviour.
You seem very impressed by this - as you should be - it's a game-changing truism missed by humanity for thousands of years for lack of knowledge.
But now we understand it, what's the problem? It doesn't mean that you are a mindless robot. It's a metaphor. The evidence of your own behaviour should tell you that for the most part you have control over your actions. You're capable of choices that work against this gene-driven objective of making more of itself.
It's sort of a proof that the ToE is correct that it accidentally created something that has the ability to defy its objective - should it so wish.
Of course, the evidence works the other way - H. Sapiens is amazingly successful, out competing all its rivals and reproducing vast quantities of genes. (Although if simple numbers of genes is the goal, there was no point going beyond bacteria and micro-organisms.)
You seem totally hung up on metaphysical nonsense. What is to be gained by tilting at these windmills?

Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien.
"Life, don't talk to me about life" - Marvin the Paranoid Android
"Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.
Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved."
- Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.

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Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 83 of 95 (796581)
12-31-2016 3:04 PM
Reply to: Message 81 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 2:54 PM


Re: reductionism
You can't derive morality from altruism you can simply attach the label "moral" to altruism arbitrarily.
Great.
On the other hand you can explain how altruistic behaviour can be adaptive/evolved traits, which is what I've been saying.
Morality is basically this + culture/learning.
There are also a lot of moral standpoints that aren't altruistic.
Quite so.
Including my own antinatalism and things such as the idea that it is wrong to lie.
Not lying is altruism as it can harm the individual to benefit others. Likewise you are harming your reproductive success to avoid harming potential offspring and other members of society. So actually, altruism comes into play here.
Also Nazis were altruistic when they gave their lives for the Fuehrer.
Indeed, do you have a point? Are you confusing altruism and morality with 'universally agreed to be objectively good'?
Selfishness is clearly not the only way genes can survive because having two children and spending a lot of time caring for them is better than having twenty children that you can't look after.
Which, if true, would be of benefit to the genes by maximising the chances of them being reproduced by those children. If you had read Dawkins you'd have come across his discussion of optimal strategies for 'brood size' and why it isn't 'as many as is possible'.
So If I want to be selfish, just rampaging through society will lead to my quick demise. I couldn't create the internet on my own etc so massive cooperation is more likely to fulfil my desires. I can't think of a situation in which the cliched notion of Selfishness is beneficial except to an egotist.
Exactly. Getting killed doesn't help your genes to replicate so they 'selfishly' inhibit this behaviour. Cooperating can help your genes replicate, so they 'selfishly' promote this behaviour.
Having a billion pounds and no children isn't going to spread your genes.
Not true. If you use that billion pounds to help your society to prosper, there is a reasonable chance copies of the genes in your body will reproduce more than if you didn't. Your genes generally don't just exist in your body, remember - there are lots of copies of them out there.
I think that is the final piece of evidence you haven't actually read The Selfish Gene or indeed much of anything on this subject.
There actually seems to be no way to ensure your genes survive because we don't know what the future holds
Which is why, had you actually read anything on this subject as you implored me to earlier, you would see 'on average' and 'tendency' and 'stochastically' a lot.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1405 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 84 of 95 (796587)
12-31-2016 7:20 PM
Reply to: Message 73 by AndrewPD
12-31-2016 1:40 PM


Re: On ramifications...
Science has gone beyond saying how things work. It has to speculate and make assumptions first as well. Science is part of technology which has radically changed the world. So a lot of science has implications or is done with goals and unspoken metaphysical or philosophical frameworks in mind .
No. Science provides information on how things work, then it is engineers and technicians that figure out how to make practical use of that information. For instance scientists don't design and build nuclear power stations, nuclear engineers do. Whether people decide to use the process makes a bomb is not done by scientists either, but by politicians, and then the engineers design them and the technicians build them.
I think what is classed as science is just a facet of the human mind. Someone tries to understand reality or theorises about it and then designs experiments. Science then contains symbols which do not denote actual reality. For example the concept of an atom changed several times but the word stayed the same so the word Atom has denoted different theories about a phenomenon from indivisibility to sub atomic particles through to quantum effects.
Curiously that changing definition is (a) a central facet of science when new information is discovered and (b) of little impact on the common person. Same with new discoveries in evolution.
That's because the new information gets filtered through the new technologies and the engineers and technicians that facilitate it's incorporation into things people use. Thus cell phones and solar panels go from scientific discovery to engineering application and eventually they become common use items by people.
At this point I am assuming you have little formal training in science, and less idea about how it gets turned into practical use.
I don't see anyway that knowledge can exist outside of the mind. Knowledge in a book only exists when we interpret the symbols. A Chinese textbook conveys no information to me.
So?
You said science describes how things work and now you are trying to cross the is-ought gap. There is no reason why peoples behaviour *ought* to change in the light of scientific findings ...
Curiously not what I said. People can use the information, they are not bound to do so. Take for instance the age of the earth. The science tells us it is 4.55 billion years old, but YEC believers ignore this evidence and convince themselves it is only ~5k years old.
... and another issue is whether the theory is actually correct. It would be unwise to change ones beliefs and behaviours based on blind face in the infallibility of a scientific claim.
And yet it is very unwise to behave as if Global Climate Change is not occurring.
The notion of rationality is problematic as I suggested above because it crosses the is-ought gap. And what is rational is controversial. It might be rational to believe the earth is flat from one perspective. Rationality is also a value judgement about implications such as saying based on this evidence you ought to believe and do something else..
Ummm No. It is not rational to believe the earth is flat because evidence readily available shows otherwise, and this is something you can test. Belief in something that is invalidated by evidence is not rational, it is the definition of delusional:
de•lu•sion -noun (American Heritage Dictionary 2009)
  1. a. The act or process of deluding.
    b. The state of being deluded.
  2. A false belief or opinion: labored under the delusion that success was at hand.
  3. Psychiatry A false belief strongly held in spite of invalidating evidence, especially as a symptom of mental illness: delusions of persecution.
People can believe a scientific claim without understanding it which amounts to faith not rationality. To claim ones beliefs are rational or irrational you would have to work out whether there beliefs where consistent or contradictory etc which would be a mammoth task.
There is a difference between blind faith and accepting concepts with high confidence of being as correct as we currently know.
Gravity is a high confidence concept.
Evolution is a high confidence concept.
There may be adjustments when new information becomes available, but those adjustments will still include the previous concept while adding more detail.
The difference between Newtonian physics and Einstein's physics is negligible on earth, and even out to Mars. Even though the equations are quite different the results in near earth locations is negligible.
A lack of belief seems less problematic than a belief because beliefs especially dogmatic ones are usually at the root of extreme actions.
Agreed.
Enjoy

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NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 85 of 95 (796608)
01-01-2017 12:07 PM
Reply to: Message 84 by RAZD
12-31-2016 7:20 PM


Re: On ramifications...
Whether people decide to use the process makes a bomb is not done by scientists either, but by politicians, and then the engineers design them and the technicians build them.
Your statement is a gross over simplification. For example, in the case of the Manhattan project, it is true that politicians made the decision to pursue bomb research. However, that decision was in part prompted via the urging of famous scientists like Einstein, Leo Sziard and Eugene Wigner. The Manhattan project itself involved basic research, applied science, and engineering and it at least some cases that involved scientists doing engineering work and engineers doing scientific research. If we are going to force our definitions and call such folks, scientists, politicians, and technicians/engineers depending on whether they are currently holding a clipboard, test tube, screw driver, or fountain pen, then perhaps our distinction is meaningless.
AndrewPD gave three possibilities, that science has implications or that science is done with goals and unspoken metaphysical or philosophical frameworks in mind. And he did not even say that all science fit into those alternatives. He said "a lot of science"
Often science does have implications and in some cases we can point to scientist being aware of and acting on those implications. Sometimes science is done with goals. Surely breast cancer research has a goal. So his statement is trivially true even if his "unspoken" accusations are never true. However, tacking on hidden agenda conspiracy nonsense as alternatives while not making such statements false, is total BS unless Drew intends to back up his assertion with some proof that evolution falls into one of those alternatives.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people. Martin Luther King
I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend. Thomas Jefferson
Seems to me if its clear that certain things that require ancient dates couldn't possibly be true, we are on our way to throwing out all those ancient dates on the basis of the actual evidence. -- Faith
Some of us are worried about just how much damage he will do in his last couple of weeks as president, to make it easier for the NY Times and Washington post to try to destroy Trump's presidency. -- marc9000

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AndrewPD
Member (Idle past 2416 days)
Posts: 133
From: Bristol
Joined: 07-23-2009


Message 86 of 95 (796610)
01-01-2017 12:25 PM
Reply to: Message 84 by RAZD
12-31-2016 7:20 PM


Re: On ramifications...
Ummm No. It is not rational to believe the earth is flat because evidence readily available shows otherwise, and this is something you can test. Belief in something that is invalidated by evidence is not rational, it is the definition of delusional:
I said it might be rational to believe that the earth is flat from one perspective. The kind of perspective I am referring to is people who prior to space travel and modern science had little direct evidence that the earth was a sphere.
The problem is that dependent on your evidence base different beliefs become more rational and every one has a large unique set of evidence points. So it is problematic that someone living in a flat country like an Australian Aborigine would be irrational to believe the earth is a sphere based on immediate evidence.
I was thinking recently that some crazy beliefs are not irrational as long as two contradictory beliefs don't meet. For instance you could believe that Reginald Dwight was born in Pinner but believe Elton John was born somewhere else if you didn't know they were the same person.
I think a problem with deciding implications of knowledge is whether or not the knowledge is complete and whether or not it any of it challenges other parts of it.
I think one area which is on very shaky ground is most of societal norms like laws, banks, education, morality, societal structures, goals etc. People say we ought to believe science to have more rational beliefs but our societies are invented on unjustified constructs. People don't demand the same level of justification in general life and society as is demanded in science. So apparently it is okay to completely arbitrarily invent societies and have goals not based on sound reason whilst paying lip service to science.
This can be an argument for the massive disregard for life by several regimes in the twentieth century. They weren't presented with an argument for the sacredness of life. They didn't feel compelled to follow any of the supposedly instinctual moral systems that implied killing was wrong.

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AndrewPD
Member (Idle past 2416 days)
Posts: 133
From: Bristol
Joined: 07-23-2009


Message 87 of 95 (796611)
01-01-2017 12:43 PM


On the topic of nuclear weapons. I don't see how a non scientist could create a nuclear weapon. I think it is possible to have ethical problems with scientific research. For instance, research into race differences and sex differences and sexuality differences can be harmful/pernicious.
The idea that scientists should be allowed to do what they please because science is neutral holds no water with me.
A scientist can ask all manner of questions like "how long will it take for a bear to drown in a vat of oil". There can be factual answers to all manner of macabre questions. There is a process by which "appropriate" questions are selected. This is influenced by biases, ideologies and historical eras etc.
One problem is whether the scientific paradigm has access to all facts or areas of enquiry. And so when you get an area like mind which is only available to one person (the subject) science can just dismiss first person evidence or try and down play it's relevance. So this at its extreme has led to theorists like Dennet and The Churchland's denying mental states (Eliminative materialism) that we know immediately from direct experience exist.
This privacy of mental states leads to a lot of problems including diagnosing mental illness. (I have personal experience here) And people have made allegations of historic child abuse that they can't prove because the main remaining evidence is in their private memories. I personally would love to have CCTV footage of my childhood to show people and to clarify to myself what actually happened. Thankfully I can prove somethings happened to me through collaborative witnesses.
Cognitive scientists have cast doubt on the validity of memories which is damaging. I know which schools I went to and where I lived as a child and I can prove it by documentary evidence. We have a lot of reliable memories for instance we know the meaning of thousands of words we learnt decades ago and we remember how to get around town and that 2+2=4. Yet cognitive scientist are trying to under mine the reliability of our cognitive states in an attempt (I think) to try and create a false objectivity about mind.
So I agree with Thomas Nagel when he said "Objectivity is a view from nowhere" We are embedded in our minds.

Replies to this message:
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frako
Member (Idle past 306 days)
Posts: 2932
From: slovenija
Joined: 09-04-2010


Message 88 of 95 (796613)
01-01-2017 1:21 PM
Reply to: Message 87 by AndrewPD
01-01-2017 12:43 PM


I don't see how a non scientist could create a nuclear weapon.
Well usually they are made by engineers, scientist just figured out the prinicples behind the nuclear bomb.
. I think it is possible to have ethical problems with scientific research.
I dont think so, you can have ethical problems with research methods but not research itself. Research is gathering information unless you are arguing its better to be ignorant then informed. What you do whit that information though has moral and ethical implications.
For instance, research into race differences and sex differences and sexuality differences can be harmful/pernicious.
Unless research reveals there are no real differences that count ending racism and mesoginy in one research paper. but we dont know unless we do the research.
The idea that scientists should be allowed to do what they please because science is neutral holds no water with me.
The idea of blocking research sounds like censorship to me.
There is a process by which "appropriate" questions are selected. This is influenced by biases, ideologies and historical eras etc.
Oh what is this process
One problem is whether the scientific paradigm has access to all facts or areas of enquiry. And so when you get an area like mind which is only available to one person (the subject) science can just dismiss first person evidence or try and down play it's relevance. So this at its extreme has led to theorists like Dennet and The Churchland's denying mental states (Eliminative materialism) that we know immediately from direct experience exist.
This privacy of mental states leads to a lot of problems including diagnosing mental illness. (I have personal experience here) And people have made allegations of historic child abuse that they can't prove because the main remaining evidence is in their private memories. I personally would love to have CCTV footage of my childhood to show people and to clarify to myself what actually happened. Thankfully I can prove somethings happened to me through collaborative witnesses.
Cognitive scientists have cast doubt on the validity of memories which is damaging. I know which schools I went to and where I lived as a child and I can prove it by documentary evidence. We have a lot of reliable memories for instance we know the meaning of thousands of words we learnt decades ago and we remember how to get around town and that 2+2=4. Yet cognitive scientist are trying to under mine the reliability of our cognitive states in an attempt (I think) to try and create a false objectivity about mind.
Yea that's why most of these social sciences are labelled soft science.

Christianity, One woman's lie about an affair that got seriously out of hand
What are the Christians gonna do to me ..... Forgive me, good luck with that.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by AndrewPD, posted 01-01-2017 12:43 PM AndrewPD has not replied

  
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 89 of 95 (796616)
01-01-2017 4:19 PM
Reply to: Message 87 by AndrewPD
01-01-2017 12:43 PM


So this at its extreme has led to theorists like Dennet and The Churchland's denying mental states (Eliminative materialism) that we know immediately from direct experience exist.
quote:
I grant moreover that each person's states of consciousness have properties in virtue of which those states have the experiential
content that they do. That is to say, whenever someone experiences something as being one way rather than another, this is true in virtue of some property of something happening in them at the time
quote:
My claim-which can only come into focus as we proceed-is that conscious experience has no properties that are special in any of the ways qualia have been supposed to be special.
Dennett {Two T's} - Quining Qualia
He doesn't deny mental states. He doesn't deny subjective experiences. He claims that 'qualia' are like 'phlogiston' or 'elan vital' or 'the homunculus of the mind'. They are magic, unexplanatory and/or circular.
Cognitive scientists have cast doubt on the validity of memories which is damaging.
There is a lot of evidence in their favour. And relying on the validity of memories too much is also damaging (ask anybody falsely convicted based on faulty eyewitness or victim memory).
Of course, this is nothing to do with the implications of evolution - but you seem to have switched over to this so I thought I'd add the counterpoint.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by AndrewPD, posted 01-01-2017 12:43 PM AndrewPD has not replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1405 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 90 of 95 (796617)
01-01-2017 5:08 PM
Reply to: Message 86 by AndrewPD
01-01-2017 12:25 PM


Re: On ramifications...
I said it might be rational to believe that the earth is flat from one perspective. The kind of perspective I am referring to is people who prior to space travel and modern science had little direct evidence that the earth was a sphere.
The Greeks figured out that earth was round and the worked out a pretty good estimate for the diameter.
The problem is that dependent on your evidence base different beliefs become more rational and every one has a large unique set of evidence points. So it is problematic that someone living in a flat country like an Australian Aborigine would be irrational to believe the earth is a sphere based on immediate evidence.
Evidence doesn't change based on your belief. The difference is seeking and testing concepts, like the Greeks did. The question becomes relevant when confronted with evidence that your belief is invalid that you change your belief to accomodate the new information.
I was thinking recently that some crazy beliefs are not irrational as long as two contradictory beliefs don't meet. For instance you could believe that Reginald Dwight was born in Pinner but believe Elton John was born somewhere else if you didn't know they were the same person.
So you can be rational by being ignorant. Fascinating.
I think a problem with deciding implications of knowledge is whether or not the knowledge is complete and whether or not it any of it challenges other parts of it.
Which is a good argument to maintaining a skeptical open mind, and to keep looking at new information. Curiously I haven't found any contradictions yet.
I think one area which is on very shaky ground is most of societal norms like laws, banks, education, morality, societal structures, goals etc. People say we ought to believe science to have more rational beliefs but our societies are invented on unjustified constructs. People don't demand the same level of justification in general life and society as is demanded in science. So apparently it is okay to completely arbitrarily invent societies and have goals not based on sound reason whilst paying lip service to science.
Yes we have delusional people in government. Elected by delusional people. Recent election is a prime example of what happens.
That doesn't change reality: global climate change will still be happening at an increasing rate in spite of electing a scientific moron for president.
This can be an argument for the massive disregard for life by several regimes in the twentieth century. They weren't presented with an argument for the sacredness of life. They didn't feel compelled to follow any of the supposedly instinctual moral systems that implied killing was wrong.
Curiously our current government seems to have litte regard for the sanctity of life based on their professed Christian beliefs.
But I guess that's okay because hey they are rational because they are ignorant.
Enjoy

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
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This message is a reply to:
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