Homo Sapians: Part of Nature or Above it

[heretic888]

I am curious as to how you define objectivity and subjectivity.

Objectivity = external phenomena. Subjectivity = internal phenomena.

Objectivity, as I have learned it, is the real world. It is what actually exists when no observer is present.

*chuckles* Assumptions like this are always amusing.

Was there ever a point in the history of the universe where there were "no observers present"?? Sure, an atom has nothing that any human would define as consciousness or awareness --- but it has its own degree of subjectivity, directly correlated with its degree of objective complexity.

The very simple truth is that every object is also a subject. This dualism has been around since the Big Bang.

Also, who is to say the world "out there" is any more "real" than the world "in here"?? That comes off as a gross assumption, from where I'm standing.

Subjectivity, on the other hand, is what the observer percieves. The moment we study the objective it becomes subjective.

No, it was never "purely" objective to begin with. That'd be like saying at one time the world was "purely" hot without any cold whatsoever --- a completely unintelligible claim.

Objectivity cannot exist without subjectivity. And vice-versa.

This does not mean that an object loses its objectivity though. It still exists even as we observe it. All objects are both objective and subjective.

That's kinda like what I said, except that all objects are also subjects. And vice-versa.

Also, objects exist without subjects because an object remains an object when when no one is there to observe it. We find particles from the early universe that were clearly around when there was no one to observe them. That is unless said observer was able to withstand the extreme conditions directly following the Big Bang, which is possible, yet unlikely given our current set of observations.

In that particular example, the particles in question where the observers themselves. Am I saying they are conscious, or sentient, or have feelings?? No such thing. But do they have some level or degree of subjective complexity?? Hell, yeah. Once again, the subjective complexity is directly correlated (and co-evolves) with the objective complexity.

Sorry, bro. But no dice. Laterz.

 

[Makalakumu]

There are consequences. If it's all just biology, women need to get their biscuits in the over and their buns in the bed, to quote Kinky Friedman. If it's all just biology, black kids need to quit dreaming of swimming for their country in the Olympics. If it's all just biology...well, you get my point.

Moreover, such arguments have an extremely ugly history.

Sorry, but among other errors, subjectivity is not the action of our perceptions. It's more like our reflection upon the actions of our perceptions.

Yes (again) biology is vital. So's understanding Nature. But human beings haven't lived in a pure state of nature since the Aboriginal population changed the Australian ecosystem by burning everything off some 40, 000 years ago...and longer than that, actually.

If we'd stayed wholly natural, we'd be extinct.

And I still don't understand your investment in biology uber alles.

Science has grown beyond those theories that have proven to be sexist or racist. By looking at the data and reanalyzing the picture, the ugly history that exists has been rewritten to reflect something more akin to what actually exists.

The moment we study something it is changed. We cannot look at an object without altering it some way. This has become known as the objective/subjective transformation and it is a cornerstone of modern physics. The Heisenberg uncertainty principal was the first thing to cast light on this property of the universe. So, I disagree that subjectivity is something that can be separated from observation, even if it is just our reflection...of course you could be talking about our brain analyzing the input it gets from the senses and calling THAT reflection...?

How have we not lived in a state of nature? Everything that we have created and every change that we have done to this earth is natural because we are part of nature. It is no different then an ant burrowing into the ground and altering the surrounding environment. I think the reason why you backpeddled on the 40,000 year date is because you realize this. One of the things that characterize homo sapians is there ability (limited) to change the environment to their needs. We have remained wholly natural throughout the history of our species and it STILL could lead to our extinction. Extinction is natural.

Nature Uber Alles. That is my position because it wipes away the regionalisms and the cultures and reduces homo sapian down to what they really are, biologic organisms interacting and evolving in a changing environment - nothing more and nothing less. This understanding purifies our understanding of ourselves and gives us a coherent picture of our place on this planet and in the universe. It is the only thing that makes sense...unless you have something to offer that does a better job?

 

[heretic888]

The moment we study something it is changed. We cannot look at an object without altering it some way. This has become known as the objective/subjective transformation and it is a cornerstone of modern physics. The Heisenberg uncertainty principal was the first thing to cast light on this property of the universe. So, I disagree that subjectivity is something that can be separated from observation, even if it is just our reflection...of course you could be talking about our brain analyzing the input it gets from the senses and calling THAT reflection...?

I find it very.... "interesting" how you think that subjectivity can't be separated from objectivity, but objectivity can somehow magically be separated from subjectivity.

You would be interested to know that many New Age and postmodern writers have been making the exact opposite claims that you make, purportedly basing their claims on the same Einsteinian physics you cite --- that all the objective world is ultimately a production of the subjective observer.

I personally think both of those views are hogwash.

Nature Uber Alles. That is my position because it wipes away the regionalisms and the cultures

Uhhhh.... no, it doesn't.

If anything, it intensifies the "racial" and "regional" adaptations of the various human cultures and accentuates territorialism and ethnocentrism. I don't see anything but Social Darwinism as being the logical result of your position.

This understanding purifies our understanding of ourselves and gives us a coherent picture of our place on this planet and in the universe. It is the only thing that makes sense...unless you have something to offer that does a better job?

Personally, I think Plotinus did a better job 1600 years ago.

Laterz.

 

[rmcrobertson]

I'm pretty much with The Heretic (can you be with a heretic?), except that I think there is indeed a real world out there.

I continue not to understand why in the world anybody would want to elide one of the most obvious, observable (yes, Virginia, "observation," rests upon a naive and perhaps finally unprovable phenomenology) facts about human beings: our having language, culture, history, and all the rest that is not wholly biological.

Or to paraphrase Robert Heinlein, don't know about YOU, tovarisch, but I am aware of myself as something separate from the biological program and the meat that program runs on. If we're simply meat machines, where'd self-consciousness come from?

It did indeed become common in the 1970s to collapse categories, and to con-fuse what Heisenberg had to say about the physics of the very, very small with all sorts of, "quantum," events thought to hold true at a macro level. It's fun to do--but I don't have the math and physics knowledge to even really get what old Werner was talking about (and neither do you, I'll bet). What's more, there's just as much pop physics to be gleaned from, say, a James Hogan novel or two that argues for free will, consciousness and all the rest--you know, the collapsing of the wave front of probabilities to specific outcomes based on the, "many worlds," theory of universes and anyway sf is fun, but not to be taken for serious.

When people write things like, "Everything that we have created and every change that we have done to this earth is natural because we are part of nature. It is no different then an ant burrowing into the ground and altering the surrounding environment," what they are doing is legitimating an awful lot of human stupidity and bad management and short-sightedness. I suppose we're supposed to believe that SUVs, Paxil, nuclear weapons, leaky oil tankers, Dan Quayle, the eradication of the North Atlantic fisheries, and toxic waste are, like, perfectly cool because, like hey? you know? they're just like in the genome.

C'mahn. If you'll actually go read some stuff on say, behavioral genetics (try Robert Plomin, and old teacher of mine), you will find all sorts of warnings against such reductionism and evasion of moral responsibility.

 

[Makalakumu]

Laws exist that dictate the structure and function of everything in the universe.

Your "biological laws" have little, if anything, to do with socioeconomic modes of production, the creation of art, or explaining how exactly we develop new thoughts and ideas. I'm sure these laws apply to the structure and function of everything biological in the universe --- but when I created the thought just a few moments ago, it had nothing to do with biology.

Although you have not brought God into the picture and I do not mean to cast this comment in that light I would like to say that this argument reminds me of the "God of the Gaps" explanation. Just because we do not know something does not mean that cannot ever KNOW it. Something that is unexplanable does not mean anything other then that it is unexplanable. I have a lot of faith in science. Its an essential part of the game and I would say that someday, if we are around that long, we WILL know how this thought came into my mind. I think a good start is to look at the equation that describes the frequency of mutation. If you plug in extremely large numbers like the number of connections in our brains, the frequency of mutation comes faster and faster indeed until they are constantly occuring. Remember, I said this was a start...

There is a work written by Dr. James Fetzer on Cognitive Science that does a nice job of reducing creativity to something explanable. I'll see if I can find some of it.

Reductionism is how the universe is constructed.

Balderdash.

Your reductionism can't explain how ANY phenomena is actually created --- despite the bluff of Western biologists, we don't actually know how new adaptations evolve in life. Sure, we can maybe pin down various selection processes as to why certain adaptations outlast others --- but that tells us nothing about how those adaptations arose in the first place.

Just ask any scientist to really create something new, something novel, out of something else in a laboratory setting --- he can't do it. Sure, we can make enzymes out of OTHER enzymes, we can make molecules out of OTHER molecules, and so forth --- but I can't artificially create sentience out of non-sentience, or life out of non-life, and so forth.

Why?? Because, for whatever reasons, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts --- and that's the ticker that reductionists have trouble grasping.

Although you did not claim to be a person of no faith, I would like to point out that neither did I. In fact, you show your faith with the statement above...yet we now come to the limits of what we understand and the scale of the phenomena you listed above is incredibly tiny. Everytime scientists described the above phenomena, they were reduced. And when we reduce them again, we will know more. Is there an end in sight or can something be reduced forever? My faith leads me to believe that we CAN reach that point.

Why is anything a human creates so different? How can anything we create be separate from our biology? No body has been able to answer this question.

I don't recall anybody claiming anything about humanity actually being separate from out biology, as opposed to not being reduced to biology. They are inseparable, yet distinct.

Please explain how they are distinct. You made the claim, not show me.

In fact all people have offered so far is a twisting out of philosophy that basically amounts to a rejection of humanity as a part of nature.

Again, with your "nature" rhetoric --- since when were "nature" and "biology" synonyms??.

Is it possible to separate nature from biology? I would say no.

I was referring to the discussion of reductionism and post-modernism. My intent was to reduce this discussion to observation.

None of your philosophical claims have actually been observed in the world, upnorthkyosa. Namely, because the basis of your entire conceptual framework is on the proposition of negatives --- and negatives cannot be observed or proven.

The entire basis for your scientism here is that nothing non-material exists because you believe it doesn't. Its really just blind faith, as a claim like that can never be proven.

Everything is based upon the proposition of negatives??? I believe that I have only asked for alternatives and have not asked for anyone to prove anything. On the contrary, I thought I was doing a good job bringing up specific examples of evidence :idunno:

Philosophy is a great subject because it talks about how we percieve the world around us. Yet, a real world exists and I would like to talk about what is IN that world.

I love the hypocrisy of this statement.

Here you were going on about how everything human is ultimately reduced to biology and objective phenomena, but now you admit philosophical pursuits as somehow being "other than" your "real world". Joyous.

You are also making the same gross assumption that we know ANYTHING about the objective world independent of our subjective filters and perceptions. Once you've tackled this perceiving without perceiving issue, be sure and explain it to the rest of us --- the postmodernists will be especially attentive, I'm sure.

Your criticism is warrented in this case. When we diverge into these philosophic pursuits, I am fully aware that I could be maked an A$$ out of myself. I'll do my best. My intent of the above statement if you can ignore the glaring hypocrisy was to look at observation.

[Perhaps, but some subjective phenomena operate independently of the observations of our biological five senses --- some forms of mathematics and Aristotlean logic, for example.

There's a difference between something being shaped or influenced by something else, and it being reduced to it.

In my field, I have studied quite a bit of mathematics and I admit that I do not understand everything, or even enough to go to the top of my field, but from my position, mathematics and even the Aristotlean logic reflect something in the universe. In fact, some people have even claimed that they are systems predictors.

Again, I am unsure how you define reductionism. If I use a shovel to make a sand castle, the marks of the shovel will remain and I will be able to see how that castle came to exist. Why I built the castle...well that is an argument along the anthropic principal now isn't it?

Am I the castle's God? (no megalomania intended)

Art is a form of expression of ideas. Art can be pleasing or it can be disturbing. Many of the things that please us and disturb us are determined by our biology and many of them are determined by culture - which comes from nature.

Art as nothing but hedonism on a canvas?? Delightful, an art scholar would eat your alive. :uhyeah:

Does taking the unknown away from something make it less special? If we create was reduced to biology would it totally lose its meaning? Again, art is shaped by our biology and determined by our sense. Can you imagine what art from a culture totally alien to ours would look like? If there was a source and I know you didn't claim their was one, would we expect any synchronicity?

Perhaps there is something metaphysical in the above that I am missing? If so, what?

Not our problem. You're the one making the absolutistic claims, thus the burden of proof is on you. Its not the critic's duty to provide counterproof for something that doesn't have any proof to begin with.

Kinda dodgy...I have asked for alternatives. You have hinted at more, I want to know what you think. Perhaps, instead of thinking of this as a peer review think of it as a conversation between peers. Perhaps I should just pin you down...where does creativity come from?

Once again, all your philosophical (not scientific) claims all basically come down to blind faith.

I think you've confused science and philosophy. They are inseparable...anyways. As to my knowledge, I've provided examples of data to support my assertions. As we continue this discussion, I will provide more as I think about it. I'm curious how I have not been scientific.

Maladaptive behaviors usually occur when the environment changes but they can spring from mutations (both genetic and behavioral). I would classify the things that you brought up as maladaptive to life on the planet with each other. So there is no disagreement, you are correct, and the biologic explanation of our origins remains intact.

Such explanations, of course, are wholly lacking.

Ask any biologist, and he'll tell you the most well-adapated organism on the planet are prokaryotic bacterium. These also happen to be the FIRST organisms on the planet --- thus all other subsequent organisms and species have been maladaptive evolutions. Kinda throws Neo-Darwinism for a loop, neh??

All other organisms on the planet have been maladaptive evolutions...I'm not sure this addresses the point I made above.

I'll reduce this discussion down to energy though. Life requires energy. Adaptations that allow an organism to gain more energy are adaptive. Adaptations that take away from an organisms ability to gather energy are maladaptive. It is much more useful to think of an organism adapting to take an available source of energy.

Complexity is the killer though. Complex organisms die quick because of their tendency to overspecialize. Hence the incredible longevity of said bacteria.

 

[Makalakumu]

I find it very.... "interesting" how you think that subjectivity can't be separated from objectivity, but objectivity can somehow magically be separated from subjectivity.

At the moment of the big bang, according the Standard Model, there was one object. This object broke the symmetry of the universe and was a thing of its own that physicists are just now starting to describe. Can you show me how this one object can be an observer onto itself?

Nature Uber Alles. That is my position because it wipes away the regionalisms and the cultures

If anything, it intensifies the "racial" and "regional" adaptations of the various human cultures and accentuates territorialism and ethnocentrism. I don't see anything but Social Darwinism as being the logical result of your position.

Could you elaborate on how a purely biologic postion accentuates territorialism and ethnocentrism? Remember, Social Darwinism is a theory that has been show to be incorrect the methods of science...

This understanding purifies our understanding of ourselves and gives us a coherent picture of our place on this planet and in the universe. It is the only thing that makes sense...unless you have something to offer that does a better job?

Personally, I think Plotinus did a better job 1600 years ago.

Interesting. Sarcasm or sincerity?

 

[Makalakumu]

I continue not to understand why in the world anybody would want to elide one of the most obvious, observable (yes, Virginia, "observation," rests upon a naive and perhaps finally unprovable phenomenology) facts about human beings: our having language, culture, history, and all the rest that is not wholly biological.

I don't see how recognizing the roots of everything we do makes us less. We just ARE. Ya know what I mean?

Or to paraphrase Robert Heinlein, don't know about YOU, tovarisch, but I am aware of myself as something separate from the biological program and the meat that program runs on. If we're simply meat machines, where'd self-consciousness come from?

The moment that advanced ET is discovered (or we are discovered by them) the speciality of conciousness will be blown away. For now, I continue to believe that in a universe as large as ours, sentience is not special. Look at what sentience has allowed us to accomplish? Surely this has evolved elsewhere - which was my point before with Drake and SETI. If there is correspondence, then there is a pattern. If there is a pattern, then there is a law.

It did indeed become common in the 1970s to collapse categories, and to con-fuse what Heisenberg had to say about the physics of the very, very small with all sorts of, "quantum," events thought to hold true at a macro level. It's fun to do--but I don't have the math and physics knowledge to even really get what old Werner was talking about (and neither do you, I'll bet). What's more, there's just as much pop physics to be gleaned from, say, a James Hogan novel or two that argues for free will, consciousness and all the rest--you know, the collapsing of the wave front of probabilities to specific outcomes based on the, "many worlds," theory of universes and anyway sf is fun, but not to be taken for serious.

I understand Old Werner. That is not to bad. Getting to that understanding is the hard part. If you can pull the threads together and derive what he did...well that is a different story and well beyond my ability. Heisenberg works on small scales and is nothing but an analogy on large or philosophic scale. It is helpful for understanding reductionism though, because one ends up at small phenomenon.

When people write things like, "Everything that we have created and every change that we have done to this earth is natural because we are part of nature. It is no different then an ant burrowing into the ground and altering the surrounding environment," what they are doing is legitimating an awful lot of human stupidity and bad management and short-sightedness. I suppose we're supposed to believe that SUVs, Paxil, nuclear weapons, leaky oil tankers, Dan Quayle, the eradication of the North Atlantic fisheries, and toxic waste are, like, perfectly cool because, like hey? you know? they're just like in the genome.

I don't think it justifies anything like that. I think it actually gives a reason as to why people make those decisions rather then letting us delude ourselves by calling them evil. That is what I mean by sharpening our understanding our our place and our effect on the environment around us. We see our connection to the system and we see how other species have disconnected from the system (gone extinct). Because everything that we are and everything that we do connects back to nature, that knowledge applies directly to us.

C'mahn. If you'll actually go read some stuff on say, behavioral genetics (try Robert Plomin, and old teacher of mine), you will find all sorts of warnings against such reductionism and evasion of moral responsibility.

I will put it on my reading list. Thanks. :asian:

 

[rmcrobertson]

Again: I agree that biology is a substrate to what we do as people. Sure. Got it. I agree. No problem.

You get all the Heisenberg? Could you show me the math behind the far-famed Uncertainty Principle stuff?

I don't say how saying that human culture is not simply biological says anything about intelligent life in the universe.

My argument of SUVs, etc., was precisely to the point. If everything we do is natural, then nothing we do can be wrong because it is part of Nature. If everything we do is natural, then sexism, discrimination, etc., all become part of Nature and therefore uncriticizable.

 

[Makalakumu]

Robert

I know just enough to understand Heisenberg. I could flash out a few problems...for instance if we have a particle in a box that was one dimension with a known position of x and we take a partial derivitive of the wave function...enough to use it. Not enough to show how it works...maybe in the future, may never. When I think about that stuff it makes my head hurt.

Consider extinction. Some things are good for species and some are bad. Would pure cut-throat capitalism be something that is maladaptive or adaptive to life on this earth? How about sexism or racism? What if we made decisions based upon our current scientific knowledge instead of religion and superstition?

Just because something is natural does not mean that its positive. Extinction is natural too.

 

[heretic888]

In regards to Robert:

I'm pretty much with The Heretic (can you be with a heretic?)

Looks like.

except that I think there is indeed a real world out there.

Whoa, now. Hold on a second...

I never said there wasn't an objective world "out there", only that we cannot perceive this without it being "contaminated" by our subjective filters (both material and non-material). The entire point I was trying to make all along is the fallacies of "pure objectivism" (trendy in modernism and 'hard scientists') and "pure subjectivism" (trendy in postmodernism and New Agers).

Subjectivity and objectivity, while distinct phenomena, are inexhorably inseparable --- both in an abstract (because objectivity and subjectivity are dualities that define one another) and concrete sense (because there seems to be a subjective correlate for every objective reality, and vice-versa). Thus, every phenomena is both an object and a subject.

That was the point I was trying to make --- that objectivity and subjectivity co-create one another, and co-evolve together.

I continue not to understand why in the world anybody would want to elide one of the most obvious, observable [...] facts about human beings: our having language, culture, history, and all the rest that is not wholly biological.

Indeed, it is an extremely counter-intuitive position.

I mean, speaking for myself, I daily experience what could be called a "self" distinct, or at least disembedded, from my biology --- my biological, organic body. Now, does this mean that body has no effect on this "self"?? No, of course not (but the opposite could be said as well).

But the simple truth is that this "physicalist" position is extremely counter-intuitive, and contradictory to what millions upon millions of human beings experience directly every waking second. It'll take a lot of explaining to do away with all that.

Or to paraphrase Robert Heinlein, don't know about YOU, tovarisch, but I am aware of myself as something separate from the biological program and the meat that program runs on. If we're simply meat machines, where'd self-consciousness come from?

Well said.

When people write things like, "Everything that we have created and every change that we have done to this earth is natural because we are part of nature. It is no different then an ant burrowing into the ground and altering the surrounding environment," what they are doing is legitimating an awful lot of human stupidity and bad management and short-sightedness. I suppose we're supposed to believe that SUVs, Paxil, nuclear weapons, leaky oil tankers, Dan Quayle, the eradication of the North Atlantic fisheries, and toxic waste are, like, perfectly cool because, like hey? you know? they're just like in the genome.

Yes, that was one of the points I was making beforehand --- that Social Darwinism seems to be the only logical conclusion of these "physicalist" positions. And one of the natural consequences of Social Darwinism is that if the environment suffers, its because it isn't "fit" enough.

It does depend on how you define "nature", though. If by "nature" you are strictly referring to the biosphere, then (most) humans are both a part of it and disembedded from it. The very fact that we can detachedly observe it is testament to this --- if you can step back, detach yourself, and observe something, then you obviously aren't that something.

I think if you're going to argue that humans are indistinct from "nature", then you need to seriously rethink your definition of "nature".

My argument of SUVs, etc., was precisely to the point. If everything we do is natural, then nothing we do can be wrong because it is part of Nature. If everything we do is natural, then sexism, discrimination, etc., all become part of Nature and therefore uncriticizable.

I agree.

Laterz. :asian:

 

[heretic888]

In regards to upnorthkyosa (and this one's gonna be long):

Although you have not brought God into the picture and I do not mean to cast this comment in that light I would like to say that this argument reminds me of the "God of the Gaps" explanation.

I actually believe there is a Creative Force underlying the universe, something analogous to Hegel's Spirit-in-Action ideas. But, really, we aren't discussing my beliefs in Kenosis, but yours in reductionism...

Just because we do not know something does not mean that cannot ever KNOW it. Something that is unexplanable does not mean anything other then that it is unexplanable.

Oh, please.

I'm afraid you're missing the point, man. I wasn't just talking about how new thoughts are formulated in the mind, I am referring to ALL novelty in the universe. Period. This is the point that the physicalist and reductionist has to resort to such contrived arguments as "inexplicable". Or, to put a sharper point on it: "We don't have a clue. We don't even begin to have a clue. But, I am confident we will one day figure it out with my Divine Biology of the One Great Theory because my reductionistic philosophy says so!!" Uh-huh.

Why can't we explain novelty, you say?? Well, let's take it to the laboratory. We've tried recreating life. Didn't work. We've tried recreating sentience (analogous to humans). Didn't work. We even tried recreating, in miniature form, the Big Bang. Didn't work. Seems to me that we can't actually artificially create anything new or novel whatsoever.

The problem is the reductionistic assumptions all these guys have going into the laboratory --- they think that if we put all the right enzymes and molecules together in the right sequence, that we'll get life. Or, that if we program just enough synapses in the right sequence, that we'll get mind.

Sorry, the very simple fact is that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. And reductionism cannot explain novelty for this very reason.

Although you did not claim to be a person of no faith, I would like to point out that neither did I. In fact, you show your faith with the statement above...

Yes. But the difference is that my "faith" doesn't try and explain away common experience and direct observation to try and force every discipline and truth in the world to conform to a type of biology.

Everytime scientists described the above phenomena, they were reduced. And when we reduce them again, we will know more. Is there an end in sight or can something be reduced forever? My faith leads me to believe that we CAN reach that point

Cute explanation. But it falls short, I'm afraid.

Reducing atoms to quarks doesn't tell us a damn thing as to why we can't make molecules out of atoms in the first place --- after all, molecules are just atoms, right?? Kinda like consciousness is just a result of the physical organism, right??

Oh, but wait, every empirical test thus far has indicated that those assumptions are a big load of dookey.

Okay, so we've reduced atoms to particles. This must mean we can now genuinely create something, something new and novel, a new atom, out of particles, right?? Okay, that didn't work, so let's reduce particles to quarks. Now we should be able to genuinely create something new, something novel, a new particle, out of these pre-existing quarks, right?? Okay, that didn't work, so let's reduce quarks to strings. Now we hopefully will be able to create something genuinely new, something novel, a new quark, out of these pre-existing strings, right?? Damn, that didn't work either --- but, wait, here comes the m-branes...

So on and so on to infinity. I see a trend.

Please explain how they are distinct. You made the claim, not show me.

Very simple --- I am observing, with my mind, my biology at this very moment. My hand can't observe itself, my brain can't observe itself --- but my mind can.

Is it possible to separate nature from biology? I would say no.

Then you have a very rigid definition of "nature". According to your view, "nature" didn't exist in the universe until Earth popped up a few epochs ago.

If I were you, I'd use more exact and relatable definitions, like biosphere or genome. Not "nature".

Everything is based upon the proposition of negatives??? I believe that I have only asked for alternatives and have not asked for anyone to prove anything. On the contrary, I thought I was doing a good job bringing up specific examples of evidence

*LAUGHS* You've brought evidence that shows the mind doesn't really exist?! Or, that shows there is no God?! Please. The only "evidence" you've shown is that there is a relationship between biology and psychology, not a causality.

You're philosophy is based on the proposition of negatives --- that there is no God, no mind, no soul, no emotion, nothing immaterial. You can't actually prove or test any of that (while I can disprove a negative), so its blind faith.

Causation is not correlation, m'boy. Basic, basic science.

In my field, I have studied quite a bit of mathematics and I admit that I do not understand everything, or even enough to go to the top of my field, but from my position, mathematics and even the Aristotlean logic reflect something in the universe. In fact, some people have even claimed that they are systems predictors.

*chuckles* I'll believe that as soon as you put the square root of -1 in front of my face. Until then, I must view it as a creation of the human mind that can influence the material world.

Again, I am unsure how you define reductionism.

The philosophical attempt to reduce everything to a single thing (sometimes atoms, sometimes particles, sometimes "sex drives", sometimes socioeconomic forces, etc).

If I use a shovel to make a sand castle, the marks of the shovel will remain and I will be able to see how that castle came to exist. Why I built the castle...well that is an argument along the anthropic principal now isn't it?

Am I the castle's God? (no megalomania intended)

I'm sorry, but I don't see at all how this analogy has anything to do with the discussion --- you didn't actually create anything new or novel. All you did was use pre-existing molecules (the shovel) to rearrange other pre-existing molecules (the sand) to make a pretty shape. Nothing "new" was created, unless you count your psychological countenance engaging in aesthetic pursuits...

If we create was reduced to biology would it totally lose its meaning?

Yes, it does. And any artist would agree with me on that.

In fact, according to your physicalist view of the universe, "meaning" does not exist. Therefore, nothing has meaning at all.

Again, art is shaped by our biology and determined by our sense. Can you imagine what art from a culture totally alien to ours would look like? If there was a source and I know you didn't claim their was one, would we expect any synchronicity?

Possibly, but I fail to see what this has to do with the discussion. Art as "biology on canvas" is meaningless. That's certainly not why I write music.

Kinda dodgy...I have asked for alternatives. You have hinted at more, I want to know what you think. Perhaps, instead of thinking of this as a peer review think of it as a conversation between peers. Perhaps I should just pin you down...where does creativity come from?

My personal view is that it is a manifestation of Spirit --- but that is a discussion for another time.

I think you've confused science and philosophy. They are inseparable...anyways.

I think you've confused the scientific method and scientism.

The scientific method, which is what science is, is nothing more than a means of acquiring information. Nothing more, nothing less. Your reductionistic assumptions are accretions that you have added to 'science' in an attempt to validate your personal philosophy.

But the scientific method is neither materialistic nor reductionistic in orientation, as any good psychologist will tell you...

As to my knowledge, I've provided examples of data to support my assertions. As we continue this discussion, I will provide more as I think about it. I'm curious how I have not been scientific.

Very simply, because you are inanely pretending to show "proof" for negatives. There is no "proof" that a God doesn't exist. There is no "proof" that mind doesn't exist. There is no "proof" that anything other than biology doesn't exist. Proof is, by nature, evidence for a positive assertion --- not a negative.

All you've shown throughout is that there is a relationship between biology and psychology (or, if you like, the biosphere and the noosphere). But you have done nothing to "prove" what that relationship is. Correlation is not causation.

All other organisms on the planet have been maladaptive evolutions...I'm not sure this addresses the point I made above.

Because you were trying to use natural selection as an explanation for the "why" that things are created and come about, and I'm simply pointing out that that is a wholly inadequate explanation. Bacterium are the most "adapted" and "fit" organism on the planet --- not humans. Yet, here we are.

Natural selection, at best, explains why when certain adaptations are ALREADY in existence, that they outlast others. It tells us nothing about where, why, and how they came about in the first place.

At the moment of the big bang, according the Standard Model, there was one object. This object broke the symmetry of the universe and was a thing of its own that physicists are just now starting to describe. Can you show me how this one object can be an observer onto itself?

Can you show me its not?? :uhyeah:

Seriously, though, every object is a subject. Objectivity and subjectivity define one another, they create one another. Its like having hot without any cold, or up without any down. Its completely inane and unintelligible.

Now, I'm not saying this first 'particle' or whatever it is supposed to be was conscious, or sentient, or aware, or had feelings, or a soul, or anything like that. Nothing of the sort. I am simply saying it had a degree, a level, of subjectivity directly correlated with its degree and level of objectivity.

'External' has no meaning if there is not an 'internal'.

Could you elaborate on how a purely biologic postion accentuates territorialism and ethnocentrism?

Because it accentuates the "biological" variations of humankind (what we call "races"), and results in ethnocentrism. Not worldcentrism.

This might be a shock, but true compassion --- a postconventional, worldcentric vision is a distinctly human trait. And, by Darwinian natural selection standards, it is very "maladaptive". It is something of a biological anomaly. Yet, here we are.

Remember, Social Darwinism is a theory that has been show to be incorrect the methods of science...

Not in biology. In biology, Social Darwinism is implicitly accepted (ex: the dodo bird died out because it wasn't "fit enough" for its environment). That's why biologists aren't the ones in psychology, sociology, and anthropology --- disciplines which have pretty much rejected Social Darwinism.

Interesting. Sarcasm or sincerity?

Sincerity. I find the Neoplatonic explanation much more cogent than your reductionism.

I don't see how recognizing the roots of everything we do makes us less. We just ARE. Ya know what I mean?

Ok. So does our psychology simply have "its roots" in our biology, or is it just a manifestation of our biology?? Which is it??

You seem to be changing your view a little bit here...

The moment that advanced ET is discovered (or we are discovered by them) the speciality of conciousness will be blown away. For now, I continue to believe that in a universe as large as ours, sentience is not special. Look at what sentience has allowed us to accomplish? Surely this has evolved elsewhere - which was my point before with Drake and SETI. If there is correspondence, then there is a pattern. If there is a pattern, then there is a law.

Personally, I'm not going to buy into "alien intelligence" until somebody actually has some proof. These hypothetical situations are amusing and all, but don't actually tell us anything.

In any event, even if it did happen, it wouldn't do anything to the "speciality" of self-consciousness. Its still evolution.

I don't think it justifies anything like that. I think it actually gives a reason as to why people make those decisions rather then letting us delude ourselves by calling them evil.

Actually, from where I'm standing --- using the logic of your physicalist/pseudo-Freudian position, if a person goes out, screws up his environment, put has a very pleasing life with lots of kids, then he has "adapted" quite well.

Its only with a detachment from the biosphere that we begin to understand that it should be preserved.

Would pure cut-throat capitalism be something that is maladaptive or adaptive to life on this earth? How about sexism or racism?

Who said anything about 'life on this earth'. Natural selection applies to the adaptability of individual species and organisms, not life as a whole.

If cut-throat capitalism, sexism, and racism ending up 'strengthening the species' or something like that, then they would be quite 'adaptive'. In fact, using your skewed adaptive vs maladaptive logic, every kid born with a genetically-inherited disease should be killed because it will "strengthen" our species' gene pool.

See how morality cannot be reduced to biology??

What if we made decisions based upon our current scientific knowledge instead of religion and superstition?

That'd be nice, but that's not what you're proposing. You're proposing replacing the traditional religions with your new secular religion.

How did somebody put it?? "Marxism became the opiate for the masses"??

Sounds very similar to what you're proposing...

Laterz.

 

[Cruentus]

Wow...Heretic. That was long! :ultracool

I have to chime in and say that while being too lazy right now to formulate my own arguement, I agree with Robert and heretic on this one.

 

[Makalakumu]

Thanks for the reply Heretic888, here is my response...

I actually believe there is a Creative Force underlying the universe, something analogous to Hegel's Spirit-in-Action ideas. But, really, we aren't discussing my beliefs in Kenosis, but yours in reductionism...

But this is the substance driving your arguments. Your belief in the spirit moves you to counter my arguments. The difference is that your belief in the spirit has no trail. It has no arrows that point in that direction unless you count the vast pool of psuedoscience out there. Reductionist view points, which make assumptions, are not bridging gaps that cannot ever be breached. Instead of replacing the end of the chain with the spirit, I believe that ALL scientists look for new knowledge.

I'm afraid you're missing the point, man. I wasn't just talking about how new thoughts are formulated in the mind, I am referring to ALL novelty in the universe. Period.

Question. What if scientists find that M-theory does a nice job in explaning the novelty of the universe? That is the proposition that is sitting out there right now. God and the "spirit" have been removed from so many places in our lives by observation that this kind of like the last assault on the fortress. Can you see the implications of something like this? Humans will have been able to explain the grandest novelty of them all...

Why can't we explain novelty, you say?? Well, let's take it to the laboratory. We've tried recreating life. Didn't work. We've tried recreating sentience (analogous to humans). Didn't work. We even tried recreating, in miniature form, the Big Bang. Didn't work. Seems to me that we can't actually artificially create anything new or novel whatsoever.

All this says is that we didn't have all of the variables. NOTHING else.

Sorry, the very simple fact is that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. And reductionism cannot explain novelty for this very reason.

But what if it can? What if the whole is not greater then its parts? Is anything else in the universe greater then its parts? I can take apart every single peice of my automobile and put it back together and it will still work. There are many objects in the universe that I am able to do this with. Is it too great of an assumption to say that, with the corrected technology, I could disassemble my body to its constituent parts and put it back together and get myself? It seems as if you have multiple classes for objects in the universe. One for objects that are the sum of there parts and one for objects that aren't. My question to you is this...where do you draw the line? How do you make this deliniation? What is the criteria for this classification?

This is where your argument will fail. :asian: (unless I have totally turned what you said into hamburger...)

Reducing atoms to quarks doesn't tell us a damn thing as to why we can't make molecules out of atoms in the first place --- after all, molecules are just atoms, right?? Kinda like consciousness is just a result of the physical organism, right??

Okay, so we've reduced atoms to particles. This must mean we can now genuinely create something, something new and novel, a new atom, out of particles, right?? Okay, that didn't work, so let's reduce particles to quarks. Now we should be able to genuinely create something new, something novel, a new particle, out of these pre-existing quarks, right?? Okay, that didn't work, so let's reduce quarks to strings. Now we hopefully will be able to create something genuinely new, something novel, a new quark, out of these pre-existing strings, right?? Damn, that didn't work either --- but, wait, here comes the m-branes...

I don't expect you to know the details of this process because its impossible to know everything these days, but let me straighten out this example.

We can make ALL of the stuff you mentioned above. Molecules are made out of atoms and we can put atoms together to make molecules. As of yet, some have proven to complex, but we do not yet know all of the steps to put them together...

Atoms themselves, are made of sub-atomic particles. Protons, Neutrons, and Electrons. Electrons are particles unto themselves, while Protons and Neutrons are made up of other stuff - Quarks. With a particle accelerator we can disassemble these particles and watch them reassemble.

Strings take the place of supersymmetric particles. This abstraction fits the equations better. There is no creation taking place here because that is not the point. The point is the taking apart process - which helps us understand the laws that put them together...which brings me back to the question I raised above.

If I were you, I'd use more exact and relatable definitions, like biosphere or genome. Not "nature".

Naw, this one works just fine for me. Nature = The Universe. What you object to is my claim that everything in the Universe obeys laws and that we can know these laws.

You're philosophy is based on the proposition of negatives --- that there is no God, no mind, no soul, no emotion, nothing immaterial. You can't actually prove or test any of that (while I can disprove a negative), so its blind faith.

That is not my philosophy. I believe ALL of those things exist, except that I believe that they are constructs of our biology. We created them. God, Mind, Soul, Emotion, its all in your head...

*chuckles* I'll believe that as soon as you put the square root of -1 in front of my face. Until then, I must view it as a creation of the human mind that can influence the material world.

Sure. Quantum Tunnelling.

I'm sorry, but I don't see at all how this analogy has anything to do with the discussion --- you didn't actually create anything new or novel. All you did was use pre-existing molecules (the shovel) to rearrange other pre-existing molecules (the sand) to make a pretty shape. Nothing "new" was created, unless you count your psychological countenance engaging in aesthetic pursuits...

The castle is nothing but a code of synapses in my mind that was recreated with my appendages. This code is contained in my neo-cortex in a specific region on the left side. You see, we have been able to show the general vicinity of this thought. In the future, we will be able to pinpoint it. All we need is better technology.

If we create was reduced to biology would it totally lose its meaning?
Yes, it does. And any artist would agree with me on that.

Why? Or is this just a value judgement that you have placed?

In fact, according to your physicalist view of the universe, "meaning" does not exist. Therefore, nothing has meaning at all.

Absolute meaning does not exist. Meaning depends on my definition doesn't it? (I can feel the flames of your response...be nice :asian: )

Possibly, but I fail to see what this has to do with the discussion. Art as "biology on canvas" is meaningless. That's certainly not why I write music.

Value judgement? Do you need god/spirit to make what you do meaningful?

The scientific method, which is what science is, is nothing more than a means of acquiring information. Nothing more, nothing less. Your reductionistic assumptions are accretions that you have added to 'science' in an attempt to validate your personal philosophy.

1. Question - question is asked in the face of the unknown.
2. Observation - A pool of data is examined regarding that question.
3. Hypothesis - an educated guess is made regarding the question.
4. Verification - an attempt is made to verify the guess.
5. Theory - An explanation is formed after multiple verification attempts.
6. Adaptation - New evidence is fitted into the theory or it is thrown out.

The scientific method is not as cut and dry as you make it sound. Some phenomenon that we study are incredibly complex and it is impossible (as of yet) for us to recreate all the variables in the lab. Therefore the jump from verification to explanation is going to be an assumption. At bet scientists triangulate. Gathering information is part of this process, but you have missed the point entirely if you think that reductionistic assumption plays no role at all in the scientific method.

All you've shown throughout is that there is a relationship between biology and psychology (or, if you like, the biosphere and the noosphere). But you have done nothing to "prove" what that relationship is.

First of all, you cannot prove anything with science. Secondly, I have shown how what we do understand obeys laws. My assumption is that what we don't understand also obeys laws. My assumption is that we can know these laws. If I did not have these assumptions, what would be the point of further research?

Because you were trying to use natural selection as an explanation for the "why" that things are created and come about, and I'm simply pointing out that that is a wholly inadequate explanation. Bacterium are the most "adapted" and "fit" organism on the planet --- not humans. Yet, here we are.

Bacteria are the most fit organism for their niche which is not the whole planet. A niche is like a pocket of energy that an organism can exploit, there are many niches on the planet and they are constantly changing. Evolution happens in response to these changes. Adaptive changes allow us to efficiently take/use energy. Maladaptive changes destroy this ability.

Natural selection, at best, explains why when certain adaptations are ALREADY in existence, that they outlast others. It tells us nothing about where, why, and how they came about in the first place.

Nope, but other things do. Free Radicals, cosmic rays, radio-active decay, all of these and more cause mutations in a DNA strand. What determines the particular sequence these phenomenon effect? Now that is a question...

Uh Randomness - how about that for a vagury? I have no explanation for THAT. This is where my argument fails.

'External' has no meaning if there is not an 'internal'.

I'll buy that.

This might be a shock, but true compassion --- a postconventional, worldcentric vision is a distinctly human trait. And, by Darwinian natural selection standards, it is very "maladaptive". It is something of a biological anomaly. Yet, here we are.

If you limit yourself to this solar system. Which is one of 200,000,000,000 solar systems in a medium sized galaxy in a cluster with 400,000,000 galaxies of similar size...

Not in biology. In biology, Social Darwinism is implicitly accepted (ex: the dodo bird died out because it wasn't "fit enough" for its environment). That's why biologists aren't the ones in psychology, sociology, and anthropology --- disciplines which have pretty much rejected Social Darwinism.

Social Darwinism is a theory that says that White people are the best adapted among human races. Social Darwinism is not Natural Selection. You confuse the two.

Personally, I'm not going to buy into "alien intelligence" until somebody actually has some proof. These hypothetical situations are amusing and all, but don't actually tell us anything. In any event, even if it did happen, it wouldn't do anything to the "speciality" of self-consciousness. Its still evolution.

The assumption of other intelligent life is a part of this discussion because it shows that things like sentience/intelligence are not unique. They evolve just like anything else. They follow laws just like everthing else. They are made of peices just like everything else. And they are beholden to those peices just like everything else in the universe.

Actually, from where I'm standing --- using the logic of your physicalist/pseudo-Freudian position, if a person goes out, screws up his environment, put has a very pleasing life with lots of kids, then he has "adapted" quite well.

Then you don't understand biology very well. If you mess up the environment and have more offspring then the carrying capacity of that environment, then you are reducing your ability to gather the energy you need for life. You have behaved maladaptively.

Its only with a detachment from the biosphere that we begin to understand that it should be preserved.

Not so. When you realize that you are an integral part of a system, then you work to keep that system healthy. If you are not a part of that system, then you have no responsibility for what happens to that system. This justification is replete in industrial religions because they needed a religious excuse for despoilation.

If cut-throat capitalism, sexism, and racism ending up 'strengthening the species' or something like that, then they would be quite 'adaptive'. In fact, using your skewed adaptive vs maladaptive logic, every kid born with a genetically-inherited disease should be killed because it will "strengthen" our species' gene pool.

First off, the gather of energy into large pools for use by a few weakens a population because those individuals and their actions make such a huge impact on that population. Spreading the energy out deadens the impact of those actions.

Also, children who are born with genetic mutations are useful. They provide variation to the gene pool and there may be something else that has been changed that is useful, but beyond a cursory inspection.

That'd be nice, but that's not what you're proposing. You're proposing replacing the traditional religions with your new secular religion.

Yes. All religious practices reflect environmental observation and attempt to give us laws to live in said environment. They are the attempts of the human brain to explain the unknown phenomena in our lives. We now know more about the environment then we ever did before, yet we rely on systems of belief that are thousands of years old. This is the source of the conflict between science and religion.

upnorthkyosa

 

[Makalakumu]

Wow...Heretic. That was long! :ultracool

I have to chime in and say that while being too lazy right now to formulate my own arguement, I agree with Robert and heretic on this one.

Why

 

[Makalakumu]

Now that I've had a moment for my mind to breath, I'm going to reduce what I said before and apply it with a broad brush on those who have participated so far...

1. I think that people are making value judgements based off of their cultural positions regarding spirituality. We are told that spirit is what makes us special. Spirit is something that makes us us. Does this apply to everything then? Is it something that truly defines us - makes us more then the sum of our parts? There are so many objects in this universe that we can take apart and put back together and they have the same structure and function. If we took apart a human and put it back together in exactly the same way it was before we took it apart, is that person still alive? Is that person still a person?

2. The other part of this is meaning. If something becomes beholden to its peices, does it lose meaning? If something obeys the laws of the universe does this make it less? If so, why? Is it because something NEEDS to have this spiritual component in order to be special? If, yes, then shouldn't everything have spirit? If, yes, then does this spirit go away when something is assembled and disassembled? If, no, then does spirit even matter?

upnorthkyosa

 

[rmcrobertson]

Sorry, didn't use the word "spirit," even once.

You are using the word, "biology," when you mean, "materialist."

 

[Makalakumu]

Sorry, didn't use the word "spirit," even once.

You are using the word, "biology," when you mean, "materialist."

I know that you did not use the word spirit. I think that it is implied is some of the resistance you have offered though. I think that your assertion that we are more then our biology is powered by this concept.

I agree with the second statement.

 

[rmcrobertson]

For the sixth time: I take language, culture, history, etc., as a material, not an abstract, reality.

So, stop saying, "biology," when that's not what you mean.

 

[heretic888]

Yikes. These posts are startin' to get uber-long. Oh well, why stop now??

In regards to upnorthkyosa:

But this is the substance driving your arguments.

Lies, I'm afraid. Not once in my critique of reductionism and physicalism did I ever mention Spirit or anything of the sort. I only brought it up because you asked what I believed as an alternative view. But, as before, this thread is not about my beliefs in Spirit or whatnot --- it is about your belief in biological reductionism.

Come now, man, your arguments are starting to border on silly desperation. Instead of defending your position with logic and evidence, you're beginning to attempt to debunk your critic, me, by attacking my beliefs. This is basic "attack the messenger" tactics. Slippery, slippery slope.

The actual substance driving my arguments is the absolute lack of evidence or logic to support reductionism, and your attempt to reduce science to scientism. Contrary to what you may think, I believe very strongly in good science (not scientism). That has very little to do with my belief in Spirit (set aside that my position is that good science supports that belief, as well).

Your belief in the spirit moves you to counter my arguments.

Maybe. Maybe not. Its certainly not the basis of my critiques of your position (meaning, I did not refer to Spirit once in my criticisms of reductionism), and you really have no way of knowing really what I believe or what actually motivates me. Again, this is bordering on silly desperation.

The difference is that your belief in the spirit has no trail. It has no arrows that point in that direction unless you count the vast pool of psuedoscience out there.

No trail, huh?? Psueoscience??

*chuckles* Absolute poppycock. I really don't care to get into a defense of my belief in Nondualism here (as its rather off-topic), but suffice to say I have a fair amount of both scientific and logical proofs for my position. Much moreso than your untestable reductionism does.

Reductionist view points, which make assumptions, are not bridging gaps that cannot ever be breached.

Actually. Yes, they are. I know you like to think otherwise, but that is your own philosophical beliefs at work again. Your scientism attempting to destroy science.

You cannot prove God does not exist. You cannot prove mind does not exist. You cannot prove Spirit does not exist. You cannot prove emotions or souls do not exist. These are all untestable, not because of their immaterial bases, but because they are negative claims --- negative claims (of these sort, anyway) cannot be proven. Thus, they are untestable.

Given that any of your claims are true, science can find out all the kinks and chinks of the system --- figure all the material stuff out, maybe something even lower than m-branes. But that doesn't prove anything about God or Spirit or mind. At best, it proves that there is a relationship of some sort between the two --- which is not in doubt.

You are once again commiting the most elementary or mistakes in science --- collapsing causation and correlation. You have yet to demonstrate why or even how your claims for biologic causation are not simply examples of correlation.

Instead of replacing the end of the chain with the spirit, I believe that ALL scientists look for new knowledge.

New?? Really??

You might be suprised how "new" a lot of the ideas Western science discovered actually are --- principles of evolution were discussed among Hellenistic philosophers for centuries before the Common Era, and many of the notions of quantum mechanics have interesting parallels in Mahayana Buddhist scriptures.

Question. What if scientists find that M-theory does a nice job in explaning the novelty of the universe? That is the proposition that is sitting out there right now.

The same things were said about atomism and quantum physics, too. Its a proposition with absolutely no basis whatsoever for belief --- outside of blind faith, that is.

Its basically similar to the arguments like "What if it turns out that THIS century sees the Second Coming?? Wouldn't that be utterly stupendous and novel?!". And, of course, it never happens.

God and the "spirit" have been removed from so many places in our lives by observation that this kind of like the last assault on the fortress.

No, you claim they have been removed. But this does not make it so. In fact, you're really just using a lot of rhetoric and polemic from positivism, which was just as "blind faith"-y in the 1800's, too.

Can you see the implications of something like this? Humans will have been able to explain the grandest novelty of them all...

Yup. The grandiose narcissism is always the dead giveaway.

You do realize that the entire basis of your arguments is that biology is the One True Discipline and all other arts and sciences are just jokes, right?? Do you have any idea how egotistically arrogant and inane all that is?? You're literally saying biologists know about the psyche than psychologists do, and know more about art than artists do --- its unbelievably conceited.

And its just the kind of thinking, and arguments, that clergyman used to rationalize religious fundamentalism for centuries, too. As well as rationalize their condemnation of every new scientific discovery we've come across, from heliocentrism to evolution to antibiotics to meteorology to the space program.

All this says is that we didn't have all of the variables. NOTHING else.

Apparently, we've never had all the variables for anything we've ever studied. What a rousing success we have here.

But what if it can? What if the whole is not greater then its parts?

And what if the moon is really made of cheese and we didn't figure it out until now??

'What ifs' are not the basis for a sound argument. They're the basis for desperation. You can argue for practically anything using 'what if'.

Is anything else in the universe greater then its parts?

Actually, everything in the universe is greater than its parts --- if we are referring to holons and not heaps/aggregates (if you'll pardon my use of Whiteheadian terminology).

I can take apart every single peice of my automobile and put it back together and it will still work.

Yet another poor analogy, since the automobile is an aggregate --- a collection of holons, and not an individual holon itself.

To put it another way, you can take apart all the molecules that make up the parts of your car and put them back altogether fine. But, you can't create those molecules from pre-existing atoms in the first place. Meaning, I couldn't try and create a car out of "just atoms" without recourse to creating molecules.

Is it too great of an assumption to say that, with the corrected technology, I could disassemble my body to its constituent parts and put it back together and get myself? It seems as if you have multiple classes for objects in the universe. One for objects that are the sum of there parts and one for objects that aren't. My question to you is this...where do you draw the line? How do you make this deliniation? What is the criteria for this classification?

I haven't drawn the line anywhere --- I am referring to objective and subjective levels of organization. Many of the "objects" you are referring to actually composed of MILLIONS of objects within a certain level of organization --- a rock, seen as a single "object", is basically just a collection of holons at a single level of organization (the molecular). A prokaryote, on the other hand, is but one holon at a higher level of organization --- and in no way can it be created with constituent molecules.

This is where your argument will fail. (unless I have totally turned what you said into hamburger...)

With a side order of onion rings, to boot.

don't expect you to know the details of this process because its impossible to know everything these days, but let me straighten out this example.

We can make ALL of the stuff you mentioned above. Molecules are made out of atoms and we can put atoms together to make molecules. As of yet, some have proven to complex, but we do not yet know all of the steps to put them together...

Balderdash. No scientist has, to date, artificially created a new molecule from constituent, pre-existing atoms in any type of laboratory setting. There's a lot of hypothetical framework tossed around, but no novel molecules have been created.

We HAVE created molecules from other molecules, and atoms from other atoms --- but molecules from pre-existing atoms?? Nope, sorry.

Atoms themselves, are made of sub-atomic particles. Protons, Neutrons, and Electrons. Electrons are particles unto themselves, while Protons and Neutrons are made up of other stuff - Quarks. With a particle accelerator we can disassemble these particles and watch them reassemble.

That's not the creation of novelty. That's like cutting a piece of flesh from a salamander, and watching the cells divide and re-assemble. Its an already-occuring natural process that we have very little to do with.

I'm talking about taking some subatomic particles and using them to CREATE an atom. I'm not talking about taking an atom apart and putting it back together in a different shape --- I'm talking about CREATING something new, something novel.

Strings take the place of supersymmetric particles. This abstraction fits the equations better. There is no creation taking place here because that is not the point. The point is the taking apart process [...]

In other words.... you can't actually create quarks from strings. As I thought.

Naw, this one works just fine for me. Nature = The Universe.

You just changed definitions. Before, you were going by nature = the biosphere. Very interesting.

What you object to is my claim that everything in the Universe obeys laws and that we can know these laws.

No. What I object to is your contention that the universe is solely made up of valueless matter --- which is, frankly, an untestable and completely unscientific claim (since it directly contradicts every observation any human being has ever made).

Sure. Quantum Tunnelling.

Be sure and copy a picture of a quantum tunnel, taken with whatever instrument you need, so that we can all see the material existence of the square root of -1.

This should be interesting.

The castle is nothing but a code of synapses in my mind that was recreated with my appendages. This code is contained in my neo-cortex in a specific region on the left side. You see, we have been able to show the general vicinity of this thought. In the future, we will be able to pinpoint it. All we need is better technology.

More blind faith. I challenge you to prove any of that.

Why? Or is this just a value judgement that you have placed?

You're joking, right?? You wouldn't actually consider something created as a result of biological instinctual drives to actually have 'meaning', would you??

That's like saying that when I murdered you last night because you were hitting on my 'mate' (as all significant others would be considered in your system), that it was a deeply meaningful and valued event.

A world of only matter is a world without meaning.

Absolute meaning does not exist. Meaning depends on my definition doesn't it? (I can feel the flames of your response...be nice )

An arrogant and hypocritical stance, as it claims to exclude itself from its own criticism of others.

Translation: Meaning depends on your definition and is relative to the person, except for the position that claims this is so --- for it is the ultimate presentment of meaning.

More ego. Beh.

Value judgement? Do you need god/spirit to make what you do meaningful?

Who said anything about God or Spirit?? Sounds like more desperation to me...

No, you don't need God or Spirit to confer meaning, but you need more than matter. Meaning, last time I checked, was an immaterial concept and couldn't be plopped in front of a microscope and dissected.

In your world of matter-only, you certainly don't have any tribalistic gods of spirit-kings. You also don't have any morals, values, meaning, purpose, or love, since these are all subjective phenomena.

Congratulations. You are proposing a world not worth living in.

1. Question - question is asked in the face of the unknown.
2. Observation - A pool of data is examined regarding that question.
3. Hypothesis - an educated guess is made regarding the question.
4. Verification - an attempt is made to verify the guess.
5. Theory - An explanation is formed after multiple verification attempts.
6. Adaptation - New evidence is fitted into the theory or it is thrown out.

The scientific method is not as cut and dry as you make it sound.

Actually, yeah. It is.

We can break down all that stuff you typed out in 3 simple steps, following the model of Thomas Kuhn:

1) Exemplar: Also called injunction, paradigm, or practice. Basically, it means --- if you want to know this, then do this (i.e., if you want to see if Galileo was right, look through the telescope and observe/record for yourself).
2) Datum: Also called information or illumination. This is the data gathered from the injunction. Pretty straightforward.
3) Falsifiability: Others that have also performed the prescribed injunction may validate or invalidate the datum you gathered.

Things like hypotheses and theories are useful, but not required, for good science. Only practice, data, and testability are ultimately required.

Of course, I could add that things like 'scientific method', 'theory', and 'hypthesis' are all immaterial concepts and, according to your reductionism, don't have any valid reality. Very interesting, neh?

Some phenomenon that we study are incredibly complex and it is impossible (as of yet) for us to recreate all the variables in the lab. Therefore the jump from verification to explanation is going to be an assumption. At bet scientists triangulate. Gathering information is part of this process, but you have missed the point entirely if you think that reductionistic assumption plays no role at all in the scientific method.

*laughs* Delightful. You've collapsed concepts and definitions. Again.

The "reductionism" employed in the laboratory is not the reductionism you've been arguing for. The reductionism used in the laboratory is an experimental procedure, and does not necessarily carry any proclamations about things like gods, spirits, and minds, and their supposed non-existence. The reductionism you've been arguing for is a philosophy that makes untestable, counter-intuitive, and anti-scientic claims.

At no point does the scientist necessarily assume the prokaryotic cell is just a collection of molecules --- he does, through his procedure, assume the cell is composed of molecules. Which, frankly, is a straighforward observation. But, never, not once, would a good scientist assume that they are just that. Because, once again, he couldn't test such a claim.

First of all, you cannot prove anything with science. Secondly, I have shown how what we do understand obeys laws. My assumption is that what we don't understand also obeys laws. My assumption is that we can know these laws. If I did not have these assumptions, what would be the point of further research?

Ummmm..... that's nice and all, but it has nothing to do with what I was talking about. I was talking about how you were collapsing causation and correlation, not whether everything follows "laws" or not.

Bacteria are the most fit organism for their niche which is not the whole planet. A niche is like a pocket of energy that an organism can exploit, there are many niches on the planet and they are constantly changing. Evolution happens in response to these changes. Adaptive changes allow us to efficiently take/use energy. Maladaptive changes destroy this ability.

Ummmm... that, again, is nice and all, but it has nothing to do with what I was talking about. The point still remains: bacterium, as any high school biology teacher will tell you, are the most well-adapted organism in existence. I didn't claim they could adapt to ANY environment, only they were the most well-adapted currently on earth. Thus making all subsequent organisms expressions of maladaptations. Thus also making your Neo-Darwinian model look pretty silly.

Nope, but other things do. Free Radicals, cosmic rays, radio-active decay, all of these and more cause mutations in a DNA strand. What determines the particular sequence these phenomenon effect? Now that is a question...

You've basically just agreed with my view that we don't know how novelty occurs, albeit in a roundabout fashion.

Uh Randomness - how about that for a vagury? I have no explanation for THAT. This is where my argument fails.

Ummmmm... ok.

If you limit yourself to this solar system. Which is one of 200,000,000,000 solar systems in a medium sized galaxy in a cluster with 400,000,000 galaxies of similar size...

Ok, and this has anything to do with my point (that compassion is "maladaptive" by Neo-Darwinian standards) how??

Social Darwinism is a theory that says that White people are the best adapted among human races.

*chuckles* Actually... no, its not. I suggest taking a few sociology classes.

Social Darwinism is the position that societies and cultures that are "less fit" will inevitably falter and collapse. It is a very natural and straightforward application of Darwinian biological theory, and is implicitly accepted in your model.

The assumption of other intelligent life is a part of this discussion because it shows that things like sentience/intelligence are not unique. They evolve just like anything else. They follow laws just like everthing else. They are made of peices just like everything else. And they are beholden to those peices just like everything else in the universe.

Did anyone here every say sentience is (or will be) unique to humanity?? Did anyone say sentience does not evolve (I, in fact, am actually aware of the particulars of this from developmental psychology)?? Did anyone say sentience does not follow laws (not necessarily the ones you're subscribing)?? Did anyone say they are not "built" upon earlier, more primitive foundations like matter does??

Sorry, bro, but I'm afraid you're projecting a lot to sustain these arguments.

Then you don't understand biology very well. If you mess up the environment and have more offspring then the carrying capacity of that environment, then you are reducing your ability to gather the energy you need for life. You have behaved maladaptively.

By that convoluted argument, any attempt to reproduce is a maladaptation --- since you are introducing new variables into the environment which will inevitably use up more resources and energy.

Not so. When you realize that you are an integral part of a system, then you work to keep that system healthy. If you are not a part of that system, then you have no responsibility for what happens to that system. This justification is replete in industrial religions because they needed a religious excuse for despoilation.

*shakes head* The point is you couldn't observe that system in the first place unless you were somehow differentiated or detached from it, at least to some degree. This is basic, basic, basic psychology and shows up all the time in the developmental of children.

First off, the gather of energy into large pools for use by a few weakens a population because those individuals and their actions make such a huge impact on that population. Spreading the energy out deadens the impact of those actions.

And that has anything to do with children with genetic diseases being "maladaptive" to the species... how??

Also, children who are born with genetic mutations are useful. They provide variation to the gene pool and there may be something else that has been changed that is useful, but beyond a cursory inspection.

They also provide genetic diseases that will inevitably kill future generations or inhibit the collective "fitness" of the species. By your warped Neo-Darwinian model, we should then collectively exterminate them, since their lives obviously don't have any meaning in and of themselves --- since meaning itself cannot be reduced to anything material.

What a delightful philosophy.

Yes. All religious practices reflect environmental observation and attempt to give us laws to live in said environment. They are the attempts of the human brain to explain the unknown phenomena in our lives. We now know more about the environment then we ever did before, yet we rely on systems of belief that are thousands of years old. This is the source of the conflict between science and religion.

Yup, just look at all those heated debates between scientists and Buddhists. *laughs*

Laterz.

 

[heretic888]

And, regarding your second post:

I think that people are making value judgements based off of their cultural positions regarding spirituality.

Cultural?? Sorry, silly boy, but I was raised Baptist and I most certainly don't believe any of that now. Nor do I believe most of the philosophy that gets fed to me in various outlets of the popular culture. But, I can understand why you feel the need to propose such silly arguments to attack others that disagree with you.

We are told that spirit is what makes us special.

When you actually know what I meant when I said "Spirit", you would understand the utter idiocy of that statement.

Spirit is something that makes us us. Does this apply to everything then?

In my view, yes. It makes everything everything. Sorry if that upsets your criticism there.

There are so many objects in this universe that we can take apart and put back together and they have the same structure and function.

And since when did "the same structure and function" equate that object to the same thing?? Assembly lines make objects of virtually identical molecular structure and function. Does that make every roll of toilet paper the "same object"??

If we took apart a human and put it back together in exactly the same way it was before we took it apart, is that person still alive? Is that person still a person?

With that convoluted argument, there is no qualitative difference between a person and his/her clone --- because its the same biology, right??

This is the major problem with this position, the underlying problem. It views human beings not as I's, but as its. And that, to many, is unacceptable.

The other part of this is meaning. If something becomes beholden to its peices, does it lose meaning? If something obeys the laws of the universe does this make it less? If so, why? Is it because something NEEDS to have this spiritual component in order to be special? If, yes, then shouldn't everything have spirit? If, yes, then does this spirit go away when something is assembled and disassembled? If, no, then does spirit even matter?

The problem, kyosa, is that "meaning" is an immaterial phenomena, very subjective in orientation. And, according to your system, it therefore does not exist.

And yes, as any good postmodern writer will tell you, "meaning" is conferred by Other. Matter has no meaning in and of itself unless something like mind or emotion or soul gives it a proper context to allow meaning.

Sorry, bucky, but no dice. Laterz.