The third rampage of evolutionism: evolutionary pscyhology

Why do you need to look at the brain? Why not just study the behaviour? You can identify behavioural phenotypes in lab animals without studying their brains, why should it be any different for humans?TTFN,WK

Shame on your Parsimonious Razor, how could you neglect to address such clear cut issues.TTFN,WK

Awww, come on Syamsu, that post to Parsimonious razor was just an excuse to show off your grasp of consonance, assonance and alliteration, admit it!TTFN,WK

Certainly none whose points you care to actually address. So what? Particle physics does this as well. Quarks are called 'strange' or 'charm'. The mere overlapping of words is completely irrelevant to the scientific merits of a theory. Are you saying that you would be completely happy with the theory of evolution if we just changed all the words you object to to made up words, even if they still meant exactly the same thing in terms of the theory? But a truth which seems to have no supporting evidence, and indeed a lot of contradicting evidence, i.e. all of the many scientific papers which discuss probability and indeed the fundamental nature of experimental design. No it isn't, neutral selection is perfectly well accounted for in the population genetics based approaches to evolution. And saying 'when the fittest don't reproduce' is entirely non-sensical, 'Fitness' is a post-hoc measure based upon reproductive success not some platonic ideal. More like castles in the air.TTFN,WK

Thanks for the recap, do you have any actual evidence yet that would contradict either of those things?As for a specific term for the point where a probability changes, I have suggested a number of terms for the point where a probability reaches unity, such as 'the point where a probability reaches unity'. Why does a specific one word label add anything to the discussion? Not given your loaded usage of 'decision'. Again, I disagree with your terminology. No, I just don't want you to act as if you already have all the answers to questions which have yet to be answered scientifically, if you have any evidence to support the answers you put forward I would be interested to see it.TTFN,WK

Please try and learn some science. Unity is already a well established term for 1 in mathematics and statistics. Why is it a bad 'wordchoice'. And I can't discuss science meaningfully with someone who is ignorant of a topi he chose to address and totally resistant to the idea that he might not already know everything. And yet you have never provided a single scrap of it. Nor have you addressed the many counter-evidences I have proposed.TTFN,WK

Now, what does that remind me of? Ah yes, your style of argument.TTFN,WK

I don't know, why don't you ask him? I would have thought so, there must be quite a bit of stats involved in evo-psych. Um, no. I have never denied the existence of choice, I have only denied that we know for sure that 'real' choice exists, I have never denied the existence of the experience of choice.TTFN,WK

Things can go either way right up until the point where the probability reaches unity, surely that is the irrevocable point where any final 'realisation' or 'decision' occurs. Yes, it is certainly worthwhile investigating why people make choices, it is a large focus in psychology and also behavioural sciences. Why do you think that people don't do this already?TTFN,WK

Up until the probability of an event = 1 or unity, there is still a probability that it will have a different outcome. If there are only two possible outcomes then their probabilities are reciprocal, i.e. p(heads)=0.5, p(tails)=0.5. Allowing for a probabilistic universe we can expect to see the probabilities changing as the coin is flipped. The p values will vary, but will always be reciprocal. Eventually the point will be reached where only one outcome is possible, at that point p(heads)=1, for example, and p(tails)=0.What other possible way is there of characterising the point where something goes one way or another, right up until p=1 there is still a possibility of something going the other way. How is that different to what you are talking about? Once a rock goes left there is no possibility that it went right, at least in this layer of reality. The instant when that occurs is when p=1. Ahh, you mean the type of study that I have been asking you to provide which would substantiate your claim that the universe is fundamentally indeterministic. I don't think any such studies exist due to the impossibility of providing exactly identical starting conditions.TTFN,WK

No Syamsu, I am not having to guess what it means, I am having to guess why you think it is different because your answers are getting totally incoherent. Surely a cellular automaton is very far from indeterminism, something other than a vague recollection might be useful to understand Wolfram's perspective on the issue.TTFN,WK

Good Lord!!!!! How can you be so obtuse!! All you are doing now is complaining that science doesn't insist on being as arrogant as you in insisting that the universe is fundamentally indeterministic.To the best of our knowledge before the probability reaches unity there is still a chance of the outcome being different. Our knowledge is based on previous observations of other outcomes, and is only as good as those previous observations were representative. Without being able to reproduce the exact initial conditions this is the best we can do.Once again you assume your preferred scenario is the one which represents reality.Please, please, please try and understand how probabilities are actually calculated and used.TTFN,WK

If your explanation was this... ...then I can only restate my plea that you actually try and learn something about probabilty.Just to add, nothing reaches unity by being close to 1, either it is 1 or it isn't, the possible exception might be 0.9 recurring. Or rather none of us know what you are talking about.TTFN,WK

I never said that you did. You aren't just misconstruing what I say, you are making it up as you go along. Again you show your flawed grasp of probability. Our calculations of
when p=1 are based on our previous observations of related phenomena. If something is in a state we have previously observed many times and in every previous case the outcome has been of one type then we would probably give it p=1 to be of that type again. Up until it reached that point there were a variety of possible outcomes, therefore when that particular point is reached it is determined which outcome will be realised, i.e. which way things will go. [qs] as far I can tell a probability reaching unity is simply the opposite of a probability reaching zero.[qs] As I pointed out before, in a binary situation p=0 is the complement of p=1, the point at which one possible outcome becomes certain to happen and all the others are precluded, i.e the point when things go one way instead of any other.TTFN,WK

With all due respect, you are simply assuming that because you have come across the term in one specific context then that is the only context in which it can ever be applied.Probabilities have a number of different applications, the term unity is applicable for all of them for p=1. But the point when something goes one way or another is the point when it can't go any other way. Obviously you actually want the point just before things go one way or another, but at that point nothing has been determined.p can be equal to 1 for an awfully long period of time but the instant when p becomes equal to 1 is the same instant at which the determination of the outcome occurs. How is this not what we were talking about?TTFN,WK