Biological Evolution (part 2 of ?)

[Ripley747]

Did I miss something? It sounds like your beef is with amateur "evolutionists." Professional evolutionary biologists and biologists are about as certain about evolution as physicists are with gravity. They know it's there but they NEVER said they know everything about it. What they do know is that there is no evidence for biblical creation (there is even evidence against) and there is overwhelming evidence for evolution. They have a good picture but will never say it's complete.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"taking one side to seriously"?

There AREN'T two sides. One side is a science -- the other is an ancient work of fiction. Certainty? That exists ONLY in religion. In science there are merely the most well supported theories. Materialistic? That's a practical necessity of science; it may have limits, but it is PROVEN to work. Dogmatic? That's argument by authority, which again, exists ONLY in religion, and it rejected by the scientific method. Your reasoning is terrible.

[0ThouArtThat0]

Materialism is not a practical necessity of science. It is a metaphysical belief system which to me (at least in its extreme form) is just as absurd as the belief that a man in the sky created us 6000 years ago. Science can apply methodological reductionism, or methodological holism to discover certain abstract patterns in nature. To understand what these patterns mean (ie, how they relate to ultimate causes), though, we need a metaphysical system...

[0ThouArtThat0]

...I'd reject both the standard theistic (or Creationist) and materialistic metaphysical systems because I think they both wrongly approach the natural world as a machine. Creationists think the machine was built by God; Materialists think it was built by arbitrarily imposed physical laws. Both of these seem inadequate to me. I'm more drawn to a panentheistic interpretation of nature and evolution. It seems to answer more questions and cause fewer paradoxes than the materialist account.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Creationists think the machine was built by God"

It's the REASONS for belief which crucially distinguish science from all other form of knowledge-seeking known to man. Creationism is born of ignorance, from a past where we knew NOTHING about the phenomena around us, so we pulled explanations out of our asses. We have 3000+ gods showing how worthless that approach is. Those gods have all vanished under the floodlights of science, pushed back (as always) to the shadows where we remain ignorant.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Materialists think it was built by arbitrarily imposed physical laws."

ARBITRARILY IMPOSED? Do you even know what the word "law" MEANS in science? It is not IMPOSED, it is OBSERVED. It is nothing more than a pattern found in a large body of observations, such as Kepler's OBSERVATION that planetary orbits are always ellipses. If anything is found that violates the law, it is NO LONGER A LAW. Science does not IMPOSE anything on nature, Scientific knowledge is dictated by nature.

[0ThouArtThat0]

I was not talking about laws in science, but in the metaphysics of materialism.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"I was not talking about laws in science, but in the metaphysics of materialism."

You said "imposed physical laws". The last time I had a conversation with you, nearly a year ago, I came away with the impression that you are lost in a cloud of fuzzy semantics. If you didn't mean "physical law", then don't say "physical law". And if that's what you meant, then you should know what it MEANS in science. Science does not impose on nature, it listens. Laws are not imposed, they are observed.

[0ThouArtThat0]

What is meant by physical? You can't define it scientifically, only metaphysically. What we experience through our senses has as much to do with our brain chemistry/anatomy as with anything existing independent of our embodied experience.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"What we experience through our senses has as much to do with our brain chemistry/anatomy as with anything existing independent of our embodied experience."

Yes, but you seem to think that means we're unable to distinguish between what's manufactured in the head, and what's not. If that were the case, we wouldn't HAVE science. The reason science adopts methodological materialism (if not philosophical) is BECAUSE requiring evidence is PROVEN to produce reliable knowledge.

[0ThouArtThat0]

If you think philosophical reflection is fuzzy semantics, I don't know that I'll be able to convince you otherwise. My perspective is that science is only good for building fancy new technologies unless we've got an adequate philosophical and metaphysical system underlying it. Only then can it provide us with Knowledge.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Materialism is not a practical necessity of science. It is a metaphysical belief system which to me (at least in its extreme form) is just as absurd as the belief that a man in the sky created us 6000 years ago."

*rofl* Your head has to be pretty far up your ass to make a statement that demonstrably wrong. That so-called "absurd belief" has transformed human civilization; you own your lifespan to it, and are SURROUNDED by it's fruits, including the machine you're looking at right now.

[0ThouArtThat0]

Materialism is a metaphysics that opened the door to technological advancement and the benefits thereof. It also completely closed the door to our gaining an appreciation for how the natural world functions absent human interference. It is a belief that has transformed civilization, and while there have been a few benefits, I would say there have been far more disasters, the ecological crisis chief among them. Understanding the earth as a collection of objects was good for economy, but has left

[0ThouArtThat0]

the planet's ability to regulate itself in dire straights and is turning out to be very bad indeed for life, human or otherwise.

The fruits of materialism are poisonous when consumed in the dosages our civilization has been gorging itself on.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"The fruits of materialism are poisonous when consumed in the dosages our civilization has been gorging itself on."

That's bullshit. There are billions of people on this planet would NEVER HAVE BEEN BORN if not for science, and billion who will live much longer lives as a result of science. Our planet itself is vulnerable to long term threats which ONLY science will be able to deal with.

Moreover, even if your statement was TRUE, that's merely an appeal to consequences of a belief fallacy.

[0ThouArtThat0]

Beliefs do have consequences. I fail to see the fallacy.

You're right that many would never have been born if not for science, but as unfortunate as it is, the Earth does not have the carrying capacity for +7 billion people indefinitely. We'd need 5 planets to have enough resources to sustain so many people.

It is not science that created the problems, but science co-opted by industry and materialist ethics. We do need science to solve the problems such practices have created, I agree.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Beliefs do have consequences. I fail to see the fallacy."

So you fail to see why Appeal to Believe in Consequence is a textbook logical fallacy?!

"science co-opted by industry and materialist ethics"

Religion gets co-opted in the same way; science is just more powerful (because it's not bullshit). However, science ALSO reveals far more about HUMAN NATURE than any religion, about what makes us tick, which can lead to MORE ethical behavior. Look at science vs religion on homosexual rights.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"What we experience through our senses has as much to do with our brain chemistry/anatomy as with anything existing independent of our embodied experience."

Yes, but you seem to think that means we're unable to distinguish between what's manufactured in the head, and what's not. If that were the case, we wouldn't HAVE science. The reason science adopts methodological materialism (if not philosophical) is because it is PROVEN to workaround the problem of cognitive bias to produce knowledge.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Materialism is a metaphysics that opened the door to technological advancement and the benefits thereof."

You seem to forget that it has done this by INCREASING OUR KNOWLEDGE; real, verifiable knowledge of objective reality. Tens of thousands of years of navel gazing and religion produced NO reliable knowledge; a few hundred years of Science revealed a Universe religion could NEVER have imagined; unspeakably ancient and vast, with hidden realms atoms, electromagnetism, and more.

[0ThouArtThat0]

I agree about science. But I am talking about materialist metaphysics. Depending what you mean by materialism, I don't think the findings of the scientific method can be explained by materialism. Quantum physics destroyed the materialist conception of matter, and complex systems theory has shown that the whole is often greater than the sum of its parts. Materialism is an outdated mataphysics. Are you familiar with A. N. Whitehead's attempt to come up with a scientifically adequate metaphysics?

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Quantum physics destroyed the materialist conception of matter, and complex systems theory has shown that the whole is often greater than the sum of its parts."

Where has science shown the whole is greater than the sub of it's parts? I'd love to see an example.

[0ThouArtThat0]

It has shown it in any complex phenomena, from living cells to ant colonies. See Emergence.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"It has shown it in any complex phenomena, from living cells to ant colonies. See Emergence."

What evidence is there that an ant colony's behavior is "more than the sum of it's parts"? And how could you even demonstrate such a thing, given how little we know about how ant brains work? This is more "god of the gaps" bullshit, AFAIK -- filling in knowledge gaps with unexplained magic, for no good reason.

[0ThouArtThat0]

There is no filling in gaps with something supernatural here. Wholeness is a natural phenomenon. The emergence of global states of order capable of influencing local states has been modeled mathematically by neuroscientists to help them better understand the phase synchrony observed in different regions of the brain during certain cognitive tasks, to take one example. I recently uploaded a lecture by E. Thompson speaking at Colombia U where he discusses this.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"Creationists think the machine was built by God"

It's the REASONS for belief which crucially distinguish science from all other form of knowledge-seeking known to man. Creationism is born of ignorance, from a past where we knew NOTHING about the phenomena around us, so we pulled explanations out of our asses. We have 3000+ gods showing how worthless that approach is. Those gods have all vanished under the floodlights of science, pushed back (as always) to the shadows where we remain ignorant.

[0ThouArtThat0]

Sorry someone spammed your comment. I agree that Creationism in its modern form is born of ignorance. But I think pre-modern people literally experienced the world in a different way than we do today. They didn't believe in gods, they felt their presence in the weather and the night sky, etc. I wouldn't call this ignorant; in fact, I'd say we moderns need to cultivate this sense for the sacred in nature, albeit while keeping our modern scientific knowledge in mind.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"But I think pre-modern people literally experienced the world in a different way than we do today. They didn't believe in gods, they felt their presence in the weather and the night sky, etc. I wouldn't call this ignorant"

If anthropomorphizing nature isn't ignorance, what IS? *lol*

"I'd say we moderns need to cultivate this sense for the sacred in nature"

The Universe revealed by science is FAR more awe inspiring and glorious than anything conceived by a primate brain out of ignorance.

[0ThouArtThat0]

I don't disagree that scientific study has revealed to us a cosmic story far more awe inspiring than any to come before it. But you have to keep in mind that this universe IS a human universe. We grew out of it. It is important to stay cognizant of projection, but at the end of the day, how can we understand how we came out of this universe without anthropomorphizing it? It is just as ignorant to entirely separate human consciousness from nature as to naively identify it with nature.

[0ThouArtThat0]

There is a middle path here. Nature is not lacking a subjective component; it is not merely a collection of dead atoms. We just have to be able to recognize the various ways subjectivity manifests itself in relation to the physical organization it is associated with. Atoms are less experiential than molecules, which are less experiential than cells, which are less " than animals, etc. Awareness deepens as evolution progresses.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"There is a middle path here"

Between what? A middle ground between bullshit and truth is still bullshit.

"It is just as ignorant to entirely separate human consciousness from nature as to naively identify it with nature."

Huh? Who's trying to separate it? Human consciousness is part of nature, but that doesn't mean nature is created by consciousness.

"it is not merely a collection of dead atoms"

What evidence do you have for that, other than wanting it to be so?

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"It is important to stay cognizant of projection, but at the end of the day, how can we understand how we came out of this universe without anthropomorphizing it?"

More semantic confusion. Do you know what the word means? Anthropomorphication is an example of cognitive bias, it is an ERROR of perception, by definition. When we project human traits onto non-humans (animals, machines, natural phenomena, etc.) it is a MISTAKE, the brain's misapplication of a normally adaptive trait (empathy).

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"this universe IS a human universe"

*lol* How do you figure that? Obvious, the only Universe we can directly experience is a heavily cooked model presented to perception based on limited sensory apparatus (which is why navel gazing is such an ineffective investigation method) -- I supposed you could call THAT the "human Universe" -- but the Universe *outside* our heads is not ours or "of us", it existed long before us and will after us, and the vast majority is not directly accessible to us.

[Canteatpancakes]

Would it be accurate to say: in every articulation is great extrapolation?

A feeling of understanding seems to arise for me, when any given phenomena is represented or modeled in many different ways - but it is only a feeling.

[PianoOrganPlayer]

No scientist has ever stated that they are certain of exactly how evolution works. I don't know were you heard that.

[Canteatpancakes]

I agree - Down with certainty! :)

[RazorBoy55]

Is it wrong to be certain that vampires and witches do not exist? Certainty that gods do not exist is not such a stretch from those beliefs.

[0ThouArtThat0]

I think it is important to keep in mind that often times evolutionists and creationists are speaking different languages that apply to different ontological levels of description. Usually they do not know that this is the case. Of course witches and vampires do not exist "in reality." But we are talking about them, so they do exist "in imaginary."

When a sophisticated Christian talks about God, they do not literally mean an old man with magical powers who lives in the sky...

[0ThouArtThat0]

...they mean a certain structural principle that is foundational to their worldview. The evolutionists foundational principle is "matter," but such an idea is no less "imaginary" than the Christian's "God." By "imaginary" I do not mean false. The imagination is what structures this place we call "reality." Without an imagination, absolutely nothing about our sensory experience would make sense to us. It'd be an incoherent jumble of perceptions.

[0ThouArtThat0]

There are many ways that imagination can structure reality for us, and any attempt to say some structures are true and others false completely misunderstands the role of imagination. Now it goes without saying that a religious person who thinks their particular way of imagining reality is the only right one is mistaken. All I am saying is that no amount of science could ever prove that "matter" is the only structuring principle that is "real."

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"There are many ways that imagination can structure reality for us, and any attempt to say some structures are true and others false completely misunderstands the role of imagination."

If by "true" you mean "corresponds to reality outside one's head", then your statement is complete bullshit.

"no amount of science could ever prove"

We can stop there. Science never proves anything; proof is a mathematical term, not applicable in science.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"but such an idea is no less 'imaginary' than the Christian's 'God.' By 'imaginary' I do not mean false. The imagination is what structures this place we call 'reality.'"

Yes, but we have means of DISTINGUISHING that which is purely in our head, and that which is not. That is precisely WHY science, which does not require philosophical materialism, requires methodological materialism as a matter of practical necessity. And it works, as evidence by the machine you're reading these words on.

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"When a sophisticated Christian talks about God, they do not literally mean an old man with magical powers who lives in the sky..."

Then they aren't Christians, because that's damn well what the authors of the Bible had in mind when they invented God. Human gods are universally anthropomorphic, because THAT IS THEIR SOURCE. It's a misapplication of empathy, projecting the model of mind inappropriately and seeing sentience where none exists.

[0ThouArtThat0]

Couldn't we say that you may be inappropriately projecting a model of mind onto the authors of the Bible that is simply a reflection of your modern conception of religion and has nothing at all to do with how they understood their experience in their own time?

[ReductioAdAbsurdum]

"If you think philosophical reflection is fuzzy semantics"

No, I think YOUR philosophical reflection is grounded in fuzzy semantics, which is why you can't distinguish between Creationism and Evolution, or make statements such "materialists think it was built by arbitrarily imposed physical laws".

[henryintelligence]

You might be interested in the "Slavoj Zizek Materialism and Theology" video also on youtube. He lectures about materialism and theology, Charles Darwin, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and the psychoanalysis of culture and societies in this video.

[0ThouArtThat0]

I bought his book "The Parallax View" because it talks extensively of Dennett's view of the mind. It is dense and difficult to read, and many of the continental philosophy he refers to is new to me, but I definitely appreciate his perspective and I will make my way through the book eventually. I definitely enjoy continental philosophy, probably much more than I do anglo-American stuff. But I am in America, so I have been more exposed to our brand of phil. than Europe's.

[henryintelligence]

Great video. I think the creationists, the hardline scientists, and even the skeptics are subject to, and also subjects of, "certain" ideologies, be they cetainty in teleology, in reductionism, or in doubts. The subject gains his/her subjectivity by answering the interpellation of ideology. I'm more interested in syncretism, possibility of hybridity, such as an evolutionist creationist, a creationist materialist , or a skeptic, who, by doubting everything, believes in everything.

[perfidil]

You seem to propose a middle way, which is typical of contemporary politics, where no one is certain on the right or the left, so let's make a middle way (Clinton/Blair). I would have found it more interesting however, if you continued from the previous video and showed where biologists "have to resort to teleology." &/or where creationists have to resort to empiricism.

[0ThouArtThat0]

This is only part 2 ; )

[LimpLoser]

0ThouArtThat0 . Hi. do you think mind and brain are the same? and if not, why not? ^_^

[loneskeptic]

This reminds me of "The Wisdom of Insecurity". Have you read it?

[CousinoMacul]

Stuart Kaufman wrote an essay in the "Perspectives" section of the May 7 issue of NewScientist (it's online) that I think you would like.

[0ThouArtThat0]

Thanks for the heads up. Just read and responded to a comment I found dubious below the article. I have heard Kauffman make these arguments before, of course, but it is good to see them getting a bit of mainstream play.

[UniversalBrother108]

evolution, creationism , both not far from the truth. Doesn't something first have to exist, in order for it to evolve?