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Author Topic:   Animal Intelligence and Evolution/Creation
CK
Member (Idle past 4128 days)
Posts: 3221
Joined: 07-04-2004


Message 61 of 102 (185806)
02-16-2005 9:42 AM
Reply to: Message 60 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 9:31 AM


Re: What is quality from the dimension of time?
quote:
Example; Animals might be unique in what they can do. But we are unique in what we can't do. I think this fundamental difference is a big example of how we are uniquely different. If a shark cannot fly - then that's the end of that. If a rat can only run fast, then that's the end of that. But when it comes to what we can't do, then we have an ability to defy our very natural limits, and do it anyway. Example, if we can't fly - we make planes. If we can't go fast, we build vehicles. This is our invisible ability, and it is evidenced through the fourth dimension of time, because it is not tangeable. It is essentialy, our ability to think/design like no other organism, and THEN put it into the practicle, and mold the shapes in our heads, from the world around us. This is the clincher for me. Our minds can overcome our nature. Is that a qualititive difference? If not - then nothing will ever qualify for this illusive title.
This is just not true.
If animals are not able to overcome the limits of their nature - how do beavers construct dams?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 60 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 9:31 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
Dan Carroll
Inactive Member


Message 62 of 102 (185816)
02-16-2005 10:17 AM
Reply to: Message 33 by mike the wiz
02-14-2005 9:28 AM


Re: Moses could use your ipod aswell
BUT - If we taught Moses to make or work an Ipod or Pc's etc..(like your chimps do) - he would be able to.
What are you, kidding me? I can't teach my grandfather to use an iPod.
Also, we play god - and mess with our genetic makeup, can any other species do this?
Every single species on the face of the planet that reproduces seuxally engages in sexual selection, Mike.

"Egos drone and pose alone, Like black balloons, all banged and blown
On a backwards river, infidels shiver In the stench of belief
And tell my mama I'm a hundred years late
I'm over the rails and out of the race
The crippled psalms of an age that won't thaw ringing in my ears"
-Beck

This message is a reply to:
 Message 33 by mike the wiz, posted 02-14-2005 9:28 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
Dan Carroll
Inactive Member


Message 63 of 102 (185818)
02-16-2005 10:23 AM
Reply to: Message 60 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 9:31 AM


Re: What is quality from the dimension of time?
We are, best described, as a WHOLE - as uniquely different from other animals.
So basically, you're slapping down arbitrary lines as to where you want to examine things... separating humans off from animals, and then saying, "Look! Look! Humans are separate from animals!"
Bravo, Mike.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 60 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 9:31 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1467 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 64 of 102 (185849)
02-16-2005 11:44 AM
Reply to: Message 56 by riVeRraT
02-16-2005 6:11 AM


Re: Question
I bet you could be that species right now, don't you.
Allow me to draw your attention to the forum guidelines, smartass:
quote:
3) Respect for others is the rule here. Argue the position, not the person. The Britannica says, "Usually, in a well-conducted debate, speakers are either emotionally uncommitted or can preserve sufficient detachment to maintain a coolly academic approach."
I answered your question, and your only response is to tell me I'm stupid?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 56 by riVeRraT, posted 02-16-2005 6:11 AM riVeRraT has replied

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pink sasquatch
Member (Idle past 6023 days)
Posts: 1567
Joined: 06-10-2004


Message 65 of 102 (185855)
02-16-2005 11:51 AM
Reply to: Message 60 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 9:31 AM


the clincher
But when it comes to what we can't do, then we have an ability to defy our very natural limits, and do it anyway. Example, if we can't fly - we make planes. If we can't go fast, we build vehicles. This is our invisible ability, and it is evidenced through the fourth dimension of time, because it is not tangeable.
Hey Mike, sorry to beat a dead horse (especially being a vegetarian and all), but I gotta say one last time:
Quantitative, not qualitative.
For example - If chimps can't crack nuts, they use a hammer and anvil. If chimps (and some birds) can't reach termites with their fingers, they use sticks. If certain bird species can't attract a mate, they collect ornaments to attract one. If many animals can't find a suitable place to live - they build hives/colonies/burrows/etc.
Our minds can overcome our nature.
I think the same can be said about cultural tool use among non-human primates - they are using their minds (learned knowledge and not instinct) to overcome their "nature" (natural limitations).
Another quick note on the dimension of time. We cannot use present day technology to define our species for the same reason we cannot use future technology to define our species. You haven't said - "if we can't to get from one planet to another in a nanosecond, we build teleportation". Even if interplanetary teleportation is developed at some point in the future, it cannot be used in that future as a species characteristic since it would fail to define our species in our present.
Earlier you mentioned "written language" and I said I thought that was a possibility. However, I now realize it possibly fails for the same reason - I don't know what the current thinking is on the abilities of early homo sapiens in the writing department.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 60 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 9:31 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
Tusko
Member (Idle past 101 days)
Posts: 615
From: London, UK
Joined: 10-01-2004


Message 66 of 102 (185859)
02-16-2005 12:08 PM
Reply to: Message 60 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 9:31 AM


Re: What is quality from the dimension of time?
Yay! I'm glad somebody likes me.. I often get the feeling that my contributions are politely ignored, like the batty ramblings of a senile aunt.. so I'm glad that's not the case here at least!
I've thought about your response, and I've only got time now to write down the first thing that came to my mind, so forgive me if its a bit sketchy.
How do we know that (to use my favourite example again) crows WON'T be using complex language and wearing air cushioned trainers in the future? If Einstein's brilliance would have been invisible in the Neolithic, are there crow-Einsteins strutting around now that, because they aren't in a complex enough crow-ish culture, aren't getting their potentially mind-melting, profound and brilliant abstract thoughts out of their heads?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 60 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 9:31 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
mike the wiz
Member
Posts: 4752
From: u.k
Joined: 05-24-2003


Message 67 of 102 (185892)
02-16-2005 2:18 PM


I think the answers to a lot of this stuff were in message #60. I hope people re-read it, maybe take it in some.
Tusko writes:
How do we know that (to use my favourite example again) crows WON'T be using complex language and wearing air cushioned trainers in the future?
Well, we don't. But again, I think that with the example of the chimp, if his technology is to use natural tools, and he's been around a long time like us, then why would he have not progressed? Or the crow? He or the crow, have both shown no ability.
If the animals are equivalently uniquely different, then they would surely equivalently produce and progress with time? If their unique traits were as equally effective and quality as ours, then they would have shown progression and accumulation of knowledge, in written form.
Yet I think the pyramids are a good example of the ability of humans early on. Also, the link I provided earlier in the thread certainly examines the abity we have to think.
Maybe a simple analogy is needed to articulate my points from message #60;
The animals are oranges, and apples and bananas. All with differences that are unique (I don't deny it). But we are chocolate. We really are.
Infact I don't know why this is even an issue as it's not even creo versus evo. It's simply to acknowledge the fact that there is something strange going on with humans, and something very unique.
I have shown that quality of ability can take time. Therefore quality = time. The animals have had the same time as us = [answer]
Charles writes:
If animals are not able to overcome the limits of their nature - how do beavers construct dams?
With their natural ability. They are infact by nature, able to construct them, because of their morphology. It's not a good example of what I mean.
Can a beaver fly by nature? He can build a dam by nature. Can a human fly by nature? No. He can fly despite this.
It's what a beaver can not do by nature, that s/he must do.
link writes:
The animal stands on its hind legs and gnaws at the tree trunk with its sharp chisel-like teeth. The branches are cut off and the tree is then dragged or floated to the chosen site to dam the water. The tree acts like a wall.
The beaver uses broken branches, stones and mud to make the dam watertight. On this structure it builds a large dome-shaped lodge with two underwater entrances. One is a general entrance while the other entrance helps the beaver escape the animals that could harm it.
http://www.pitara.com/discover/5wh/11.htm
This message has been edited by mike the wiz, 02-16-2005 14:34 AM

  
Quetzal
Member (Idle past 5872 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 01-09-2002


Message 68 of 102 (185895)
02-16-2005 2:33 PM
Reply to: Message 60 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 9:31 AM


Re: What is quality from the dimension of time?
Is that a qualititive difference? If not - then nothing will ever qualify for this illusive title.
Ya know, mike, you just put your finger on the whole point of what PS has been saying to you: the reason we're having a hard time coming up with a qualitative difference here is that it simply may not exist. All the arguments and examples you've put forward on this thread are quantitative (differences, sometimes extreme, of degree rather than kind). Unfortunately, since you're the one who is instisting that there's a difference in kind between humans and "animals", you're stuck in the position of finding support for the claim. Best of luck, but I think you're going to be disappointed.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 60 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 9:31 AM mike the wiz has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 69 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 2:44 PM Quetzal has replied

  
mike the wiz
Member
Posts: 4752
From: u.k
Joined: 05-24-2003


Message 69 of 102 (185898)
02-16-2005 2:44 PM
Reply to: Message 68 by Quetzal
02-16-2005 2:33 PM


Re: What is quality from the dimension of time?
Quetzal - that really doesn't mean much what you've just posted, apart from patting your ideologically inclined friend on the back. Because if one thinks that nothing would qualify as a qualititive difference, then "qualititive difference" means nothing. I'm not stupid, he won't show a qualifier yet untill he can think of something that will not be able to be met. And even then, surely the qualifier is man-made to fit the conclusion.
I said;
Example; Animals might be unique in what they can do. But we are unique in what we can't do. I think this fundamental difference is a big example of how we are uniquely different. If a shark cannot fly - then that's the end of that. If a rat can only run fast, then that's the end of that. But when it comes to what we can't do, then we have an ability to defy our very natural limits, and do it anyway
I think that this is most definitely a quality difference.
Unfortunately, since you're the one who is instisting that there's a difference in kind between humans and "animals", you're stuck in the position of finding support for the claim
Where did I mention difference in kind? Please quote me.
I'm sure that you think this commetn is a refutation, or that a synergetic group will make you right and mike wrong.
Look at your avatar, it shows actually shows a difference between a human and a dog in itself. You wear clothes, because you're not just an animal. When you press "reply" then what represents this oddity?
I've also said that quality = quantity.
This means that all animals have had time, over the years, to put their apparently equal(to humans) unique differences to the test, and they haven't shown anequivalent ability or quality. Chocolate and fruit.
This message has been edited by mike the wiz, 02-16-2005 14:48 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 68 by Quetzal, posted 02-16-2005 2:33 PM Quetzal has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 70 by pink sasquatch, posted 02-16-2005 3:07 PM mike the wiz has replied
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pink sasquatch
Member (Idle past 6023 days)
Posts: 1567
Joined: 06-10-2004


Message 70 of 102 (185902)
02-16-2005 3:07 PM
Reply to: Message 69 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 2:44 PM


qualitative qualifier
First let me say that there is no reason to believe that all species would develop reasoning/technology/culture at the same rate, so the idea that we should have seen more advanced technology from these creatures by now is a bit silly. Again, we could compare modern human technology to that used by humans a few hundred years ago and say the same thing - geolologically/evolutionarily a few hundred years is essentially no difference in time.
I'm not stupid, he won't show a qualifier yet untill he can think of something that will not be able to be met. And even then, surely the qualifier is man-made to fit the conclusion.
My qualifier is a qualitative difference. You just keep give me examples of human characteristics that are found in animals.
Actually, I've given you an example of what I think is a possible qualitative difference - religious worship (spirituality). However, I have qualified that this falls into a psychological realm that we may not be able to detect in animals, or that spirituality in humans is simply an extension of a base psychological urge. I don't think you really commented on that.
But when it comes to what we can't do, then we have an ability to defy our very natural limits, and do it anyway
I think that this is most definitely a quality difference.
I'll say it again - it cannot be a qualitative difference when animals also use their minds to "defy their natural limits". Chimps eat nuts that they cannot crack with their teeth or hands, only with a well-placed blow by a hammer-rock to a nut on an anvil-stone. This is not an genetic behavior, and is passed on culturally.
The chimps have used the ability to reason and learn to overcome their biological inability to crack and consume the nuts. Do you think this example somehow doesn't fit the characteristic you've described above?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 69 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 2:44 PM mike the wiz has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 71 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 3:19 PM pink sasquatch has replied

  
mike the wiz
Member
Posts: 4752
From: u.k
Joined: 05-24-2003


Message 71 of 102 (185906)
02-16-2005 3:19 PM
Reply to: Message 70 by pink sasquatch
02-16-2005 3:07 PM


Re: qualitative qualifier
I'll say it again - it cannot be a qualitative difference when animals also use their minds to "defy their natural limits". Chimps eat nuts that they cannot crack with their teeth or hands, only with a well-placed blow by a hammer-rock to a nut on an anvil-stone
This would come under natural ability. They can use natural resources with their hands, like the beaver uses it's teeth.
I'm talking about things we cannot do with natural endowment, pertaining to morphology. Example - a chimp cannot fly(naturally). Eating food and getting it, is an ability it does have.
It's what a chimp can't do.
Also, I apreciate your point about humans not having the means to show these abilities, but as message #60 says, that's because an invisible ability is not tangeable. Even if Moses didn't have a plane, it doesn't follow that he and his men didn't have the ability to design and create one. Indeed, if short periods of time hinders his ability - then quality = quantity, and also time.
I disagree aswell, about chimps. If they really could produce technology, then they wouldn't still be using natural resources, as they find them.
Remember message #60? and what I said about molding the earth to the designs we dream up in our heads. Does the cimp have this ability?
As for your qualifier of religion, this is met. Because we have design/create ability, we know that there must be a designer/creator.
Artificial;
Made by humans; produced rather than natural.
PS; Although you've said religion qualifies. Why does religion qualify but nothing else?
Although you've said that this does qualify as a qualititive difference, you haven't shown what it takes to be classed as one.
This message has been edited by mike the wiz, 02-16-2005 15:33 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 70 by pink sasquatch, posted 02-16-2005 3:07 PM pink sasquatch has replied

Replies to this message:
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pink sasquatch
Member (Idle past 6023 days)
Posts: 1567
Joined: 06-10-2004


Message 72 of 102 (185917)
02-16-2005 3:38 PM
Reply to: Message 71 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 3:19 PM


qualifying qualitative qualifiers
They can use natural resources with their hands, like the beaver uses it's teeth.
Right, just like humans use natural resources with their hands when they build a car. Humans just happen to use a variety of complex machines to manipulate the natural resources.
I disagree aswell, about chimps. If they really could produce technology, then they wouldn't still be using natural resources, as they find them.
They don't always use them as they find them. They alter termite sticks to an optimal design. At least one chimp population also strips bark off of trees and breaks and bends the bark to make seats and shoe-like pieces for use in climbing spiny fruit-trees. I've been having trouble finding the reference to this, which is why I haven't mentioned it until now (I guess I should go a-looking again). However, the use of bark to climb spiny trees gives the chimps access to fruit they wouldn't have access to based on their 'nature'.
Also, a note about hammer/anvil rocks - chimps may not manufacture these, but they are quite particular about them. They collect ones of optimum size and shape, and store and use the same ones sometimes for years on end.
Indeed, if short periods of time hinders his ability - then quality = quantity, and also time.
No, quality = quality. The fact that you have to twist your suggested qualitative differences into "quantitative differences at a precise moment in history" simply further demonstrates that indeed, they are NOT qualitative differences.
I apreciate your point about humans not having the means to show these abilities, but as message #60 says, that's because an invisible ability is not tangeable.
This again further demonstrates that you haven't supported your argument in the least - when you can't come up with a qualitative difference, you simply exclaim "it's invisible, it's not tangible, but it's there!" This is absurd, or at least invoking the supernatural, rather than supporting your claim.
As for your qualifier of religion, this is met. Because we have design/create ability, we know that there must be a designer/creator.
Huh!?! This doesn't make sense at multiple levels. The fact that we can create does not prove an ultimate creator. In fact your logical severly falls apart - since creators can only be created by creators, than no original creator could have existed. (Though we are now off-topic, methinks...)
Secondly, even if you feel that "we create, therefore God exists", this doesn't negate the possibility that non-human animals may experience spirituality, which is the point you have to answer in this thread.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 71 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 3:19 PM mike the wiz has not replied

  
pink sasquatch
Member (Idle past 6023 days)
Posts: 1567
Joined: 06-10-2004


Message 73 of 102 (185925)
02-16-2005 3:53 PM
Reply to: Message 71 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 3:19 PM


qualifying artificial qualitative qualifiers
Artificial;
Made by humans; produced rather than natural.
Ooooh boy, you got me there! You looked up a definition of a word that hasn't even come up in the discussion yet, and then put a smiley after it. Wow!
What exactly does this have to do with the discussion at hand?
Although you've said religion qualifies...
Although you've said that this does qualify as a qualititive difference,...
No, I did not.
you haven't shown what it takes to be classed as one.
Perhaps you should look up "qualitative" in the dictionary...
You are arguing for a qualitative characteristic that makes humans "uniquely different".
Therefore you need to come up with a "quality" that is not present in any degree in any non-human animal. If it is present in any degree it is a difference of "quantity", not "quality".
I figured you understood this since this is more-or-less the sort of argument you have been trying to put forth. Did you really not understand "qualitative difference"?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 71 by mike the wiz, posted 02-16-2005 3:19 PM mike the wiz has not replied

  
Quetzal
Member (Idle past 5872 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 01-09-2002


Message 74 of 102 (185934)
02-16-2005 4:13 PM
Reply to: Message 69 by mike the wiz
02-16-2005 2:44 PM


Re: What is quality from the dimension of time?
Quetzal - that really doesn't mean much what you've just posted, apart from patting your ideologically inclined friend on the back. Because if one thinks that nothing would qualify as a qualititive difference, then "qualititive difference" means nothing.
Thanks for the insult, mikey. You know, you've really become a jerk recently. What's up with that?
However, to address your "point", the reason everything you've presented obvious as "quality" - a measurable or quantifiable difference - over "quantity" - a matter of degree as on a continuum, is because they are NOT equivalent, in spite of your continued assertion to the contrary. Try thinking of it this way: a qualitative or categorical trait is one which you can use for classification of individuals (or populations or species or whatever) based on some attribute or characteristic. A quantitative trait allows a numerical or unique identifier to be applied to the population. IOW, it can be counted. A more germane use of qualitative in this context means a fundamental, functional difference (say, like between a house and a sidewalk). If humans ARE so different (i.e., not animals) and unique, a quantitative difference would be how you would approach it.
Example; Animals might be unique in what they can do. But we are unique in what we can't do. I think this fundamental difference is a big example of how we are uniquely different. If a shark cannot fly - then that's the end of that. If a rat can only run fast, then that's the end of that. But when it comes to what we can't do, then we have an ability to defy our very natural limits, and do it anyway
I think that this is most definitely a quality difference
No, it's a quantitative difference, as animals can and do engage in niche construction and modification of their environment for their own purposes. Just like humans. You seem to keep harping on our ability to use technology to transcend limitations as being a qualitative difference. Since there are numerous examples of animal species using tools of various sorts to overcome personal limitations, your examples are indeed quantitative, not qualitative.
Where did I mention difference in kind? Please quote me.
Oh, give me a break. I used "kind" not in the idiotic biblical sense, but in the sense of apposition to "degree", hence the expression: "difference in degree, not kind". Stop being deliberately obtuse, it doesn't become you.
Look at your avatar, it shows actually shows a difference between a human and a dog in itself. You wear clothes, because you're not just an animal. When you press "reply" then what represents this oddity?
I wear clothes in large measure because my ancestors evolved in an environment where they didn't have to. Clothing allowed us to move into unoccupied "large primate" niches unavailable to those without it. My dog, on the other hand, evolved in a much colder area, and therefore isn't REQUIRED to wear clothes for survival. She's got fur, after all. As far as "pressing reply", that's just technology - quantitative vice qualitative. Your argument from personal incredulity is failing here, mike.
I've also said that quality = quantity.
This means that all animals have had time, over the years, to put their apparently equal(to humans) unique differences to the test, and they haven't shown anequivalent ability or quality. Chocolate and fruit.
However, there have been "animals" over time that HAVE developed just as much chocolate-ness as we have. I give you the hominids (both ancestral and not) who manufactured tools, some used fire, almost all were cooperative hunter/foragers, etc. So basically although you continue to ASSERT that quality=quantity, you have neither made a cogent argument for us to accept it NOR have you provided any evidence to back up your claim.
edited to clarify, and to remove gratuitous insults.
This message has been edited by Quetzal, 02-16-2005 16:18 AM

This message is a reply to:
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mike the wiz
Member
Posts: 4752
From: u.k
Joined: 05-24-2003


Message 75 of 102 (185948)
02-16-2005 4:55 PM


ADDENDUM
The information in message #60 dealt with all that and provided the categorically vast implication of gargantua sorts pertaining to what we can do artificially. I hereby cannot take part because of insults and people not understanding my argument properly.
This has not been understood, or falsified. So far, all animals can eat and gather, and use their morphology to get by. But the point is that it is what they can naturally not do. For example, a beaver cannot naturally fly, and neither can a human. They both can NOT NATURALLY. Human's can artificially, not through quantity, but through ability. I am not looking at this from a viewpoint of nowaday technology (strawman). I am looking at it from a perspective of species. What can a species do. Can our species design/create artificially, to make up for what it can not do naturally? If it can, can other species pertaining to natural ability? No they can't. This is an ability, which sets us apart from other species. Therefore is is certainly your own incredulity to ignore all the inductive evidence. fallacy of slothful induction.
When one has gone back and read message #60 and understood it, then one will know that I am un-refuted.
Quantitive and qualitive is a moot strawman invoked by PS> I am arguing about our abilities as a species, therefore it wouldn't matter if it was quantitive evidence, it still shows our ability. WHy on earth do you ignore this evidence?
This message has been edited by mike the wiz, 02-16-2005 17:08 AM

Replies to this message:
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