[Updated 27 April - Go to bottom of this Topic and click for neat, well-produced video spoof.]On this 40th Earth Day, it seems Natural to reflect on Biologist and self-proclaimed atheist Richard Dawkins' words:
"...It is clear that here on Earth we are dealing with a generalized process for optimizing biological species, a process that works all over the planet, on all continents and islands, and at all times … if we wait another ten million years, a whole new set of species will be as well adapted to their ways of life as today’s species are to theirs. This is a recurrent, predictable, multiple phenomenon, not a piece of statistical luck recognized with hindsight." [Emphasis added, The GOD Delusion, p 139]
GOD = "General Optimizing Device" would seem to follow Naturally from the above statement.
The process of neo-Darwinian Evolution and Natural Selection is: OMNIPRESENT (“all continents and islands … all times”), OMNIPOTENT (“whole new set of species”) and OMNISCIENT (“as well adapted to their ways of life as today’s species”).
Lets kick it up a notch to:
GOD = "Gaia Optimizing Deity". Only something superior to and above individual biological life forms, including human life, could have the super-human powers described by Dawkins.
"Gaia" is the term used by James Lovelock (PhD scientist and inventor) to personify such a super-human force, the Greek "Goddess of the Earth" featured in a Nova PBS TV presentation reviewed by the NY Times. "Nova concerns itself with science rather than fiction, of course, and this segment skillfully reviews the subtle chemical and biological interactions that control the levels of carbon dioxide, oxygen, methane and other key gases in the earth's atmosphere. Dr. Lovelace [sic] presents his well-reasoned view that the existing proportions of gases in our atmosphere could only be maintained by the existence of life, and that in seeking life elsewhere in the universe, it is necessary only to look for similarly unstable mixtures of atmospheric gases."
Biological Organisms May Control Cloud Formation and Moderate Climate Change
Scientists at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography> sampled clouds in real time using aircraft. "By determining the chemical composition of the very cores of individual ice particles, they discovered that both mineral dust and, surprisingly, biological particles play a major role in the formation of clouds."
This opens the possibility that the biosphere could have evolved, over eons of climate change, the capability to moderate intense swings of climate by releasing biological chemicals that promote cloud formation during hot periods and releasing lower quantities during ice ages to reduce formation of clouds.
Possible Mechanism for Evolution of Biological Climate Moderation
The Sun was some 30% dimmer 3-4 billion years ago when biological life originated on Earth. Given a faint Sun, the Earth's surface temperatures must have been much colder than the coldest ice ages. Yet, for life to be viable, the surface temperatures had to be quite a bit warmer, within tens of degrees of current temperatures.
One explanation is that the Earth's atmosphere was far richer in CO2 and other carbon gasses when life originated. (~1% vs 0.04% now.) According to that theory, the carbon gasses would have promoted an intense "greenhouse" effect that kept the surface warm. Unfortunately for that explanation (but fortunately for us) it turns out that CO2 levels billions of years ago were much closer to current levels, so it was not the greenhouse effect!
The best explanation is that there were far fewer clouds billions of years ago. Since clouds are responsible for a net reduction in surface temperatures, their absence would have the opposite effect. But why would there be more clouds now, and why would they increase to moderate the effect of a brightening Sun?
Biological life originated and evolved starting about 3.5 billion years ago. As the Sun became progressively brighter, some life forms emitted chemicals that promoted cloud formation and thereby moderated the temperatures that otherwise would have risen in their area. Biological life that had a moderating influence on cloud formation is more "fit to the environment" (or , more properly, makes the environment more fit to life). Over the eons of evolution, biological life that had the power to moderate climate would spread at the expense of life that did not.
Quoting Dawkins again on the generalized optimizing process: "This is a recurrent, predictable, multiple phenomenon, not a piece of statistical luck recognized with hindsight."
But, Is the Gaia Sentient?
Well, how can you tell if an agent is sentient without being that agent?
[Added 10:30PM] The Gaia has given us an Earth Day present! Today, Arctic Sea Ice Extent has hit a high for the past eight years. Good news that may indicate that Global Warming is at bay, at least for a decade, and perhaps for more. See more details at Watts Up With That. Click image below for a larger version. I expect the ash clouds from the Iceland volcano to cause some additional cooling in the affected areas of North America and Europe for at least a month, perhaps more.
[Added 27 April] Turn up the sound and enjoy this well-produced video!
Ira Glickstein
Ira: First a comment comment about a detail. I noticed that one of the key words is "atheist". In a Time interview Richard Dawkins said this, "If there is a God, it's going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything that any theologian of any religion has ever proposed."http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1555132-9,00.html#ixzz0m9R3ErJg
ReplyDeleteSo the word "agnostic" should be added to key words since Dawkin's beliefs seem to lean more that direction.
More later.
Thanks Steve, "agnostic" is now in key words. Dawkins may be "A Tooth-Fairy Agnostic" or a "non-theist"(see quotes #2 and #3 below).
ReplyDeleteHowever, despite the agnostic-sounding Dawkins quote you included "If there is a God, it's going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything that any theologian of any religion has ever proposed." it is clear to me he excludes any kind of personal, Creator God external to the Universe. (See my review of his book, The GOD Delusion.)
His "bigger ... and more incomprehensible kind of God in your quote is Dawkin's "generalized process for optimizing biological species" that I call the General Optimizing Device. I don't think he would stretch as far as the Gaia Optimizing Deity of my posting. The later two ideas posit a totally Natural, self-organizing process that arose in an initially "random" way from Matter/Energy over Time/Space following the Laws of Nature.
Dawkins is quite clear about identifying with atheists in this compendium of atheistic quotes:
#1 An atheist before Darwin could have said, following Hume: "I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn't a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that somebody comes up with a better one." I can't help feeling that such a position, though logically sound, would have left one feeling pretty unsatisfied, and that although atheism might have been logically tenable before Darwin, Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist. [The Blind Watchmaker]
#2 A friend, an intelligent lapsed Jew who observes the Sabbath for reasons of cultural solidarity, describes himself as a Tooth Fairy Agnostic. He will not call himself an atheist because it is in principle impossible to prove a negative. But "agnostic" on its own might suggest that he though God's existence or non-existence equally likely. In fact, though strictly agnostic about god, he considers God's existence no more probable than the Tooth Fairy's.
Bertrand Russell used a hypothetical teapot in orbit about Mars for the same didactic purpose. You have to be agnostic about the teapot, but that doesn't mean you treat the likelihood of its existence as being on all fours with its non-existence.
The list of things about which we strictly have to be agnostic doesn't stop at tooth fairies and celestial teapots. It is infinite. If you want to believe in a particular one of them -- teapots, unicorns, or tooth fairies, Thor or Yahweh -- the onus is on you to say why you believe in it. The onus is not on the rest of us to say why we do not. We who are atheists are also a-fairyists, a-teapotists, and a-unicornists, but we don't' have to bother saying so.
#3 Perhaps the best of the available euphemisms for atheist is nontheist. It lacks the connotation of positive conviction that there is definitely no god, and it could therefore easily be embraced by Teapot or Tooth Fairy Agnostics. It is less familiar than atheist and lacks its phobic connotations. Yet, unlike a completely new coining, its meaning is clear. If we want a euphemism at all, nontheist is probably the best.
The alternative which I favor is to renounce all euphemisms and grasp the nettle of the word atheism itself, precisely because it is a taboo word carrying frissons of hysterical phobia. Critical mass may be harder to achieve than with some non-confrontational euphemism, but if we did achieve it with the dread word atheist, the political impact would be all the greater. -- [Free Inquiry, Summer, 2002]
Ira Glickstein
I wonder if the polar bears are thanking Gaia, GOD, or God about the polar ice? :)
ReplyDeleteA fascinating idea that biological organisms could potentially contribute to the makeup of the atmosphere. Sounds plausible that evolution could support such a feedback loop. Regarding sentience, there seems to be no evidence of planning or forethought on the part of the biosphere.
Steve and Ira, I agree that agnosticism is a more defensible concept than atheist. I always ask atheists: Whose god don't you believe in? It turns out that atheists are really objecting to a particular and therefore restricted view of god.
ReplyDeleteIra: I thought in this case Dawkins said something that in the context was more along the lines of agnosticism. In the quote Dawkins is responding to Francis Collins (Human Genome Lead Investigator). Yes clearly he's not a follower of a specific god - but I thought the comment was wonderful! And, of course, I like Collins' comment. "I'm interested in the Whys".
ReplyDelete_______
COLLINS: I just would like to say that over more than a quarter-century as a scientist and a believer, I find absolutely nothing in conflict between agreeing with Richard in practically all of his conclusions about the natural world, and also saying that I am still able to accept and embrace the possibility that there are answers that science isn't able to provide about the natural world--the questions about why instead of the questions about how. I'm interested in the whys. I find many of those answers in the spiritual realm. That in no way compromises my ability to think rigorously as a scientist.
DAWKINS: My mind is not closed, as you have occasionally suggested, Francis. My mind is open to the most wonderful range of future possibilities, which I cannot even dream about, nor can you, nor can anybody else. What I am skeptical about is the idea that whatever wonderful revelation does come in the science of the future, it will turn out to be one of the particular historical religions that people happen to have dreamed up. When we started out and we were talking about the origins of the universe and the physical constants, I provided what I thought were cogent arguments against a supernatural intelligent designer. But it does seem to me to be a worthy idea. Refutable--but nevertheless grand and big enough to be worthy of respect. I don't see the Olympian gods or Jesus coming down and dying on the Cross as worthy of that grandeur. They strike me as parochial. If there is a God, it's going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything that any theologian of any religion has ever proposed.
_________
But regardless, theist or atheist, neither position can be proven scientifically. But once one has decided that the evidence points toward God it is natural to try to attempt to know what that God is like - and so use my internal matched filter to fall victim to a specific religion! And I understand why Dawkins and others won't go there but I feel they may have chosen to limit themselves to reduced set of possibilities.
Could you explain a bit more about your GOD? I've read Blind Watchmaker and God Delusion and Dawkins would not agree with what I think you're implying. It doesn't sound like Lovelace would either.
Thanks Steve and Howard for your comments!
ReplyDeleteSteve asks: "Could you explain a bit more about your GOD? I've read Blind Watchmaker and God Delusion and Dawkins would not agree with what I think you're implying. It doesn't sound like Lovelace would either."
Dawkins and I (and Howard) accept the general scientific explanation that life originated on Earth around 3.5 billion years ago. It started with "random" combinations of atoms into molecules and molecules into long-chain molecules. The next, critical step, was when some long-chain molecules formed self-sustaining autocatalytic cycles and when some of these cycles evolved into primitive RNA that was self-reproducing. When RNA evolved into it's cousin, DNA, that added stabity and set the stage for evolution into the current genetic code.
Once the RNA/DNA world evolved, the process was no longer "random". The biological system was self-organizing in the sense that less fit sequences were discarded in favor of those that were more fit to the environment.
That is what Dawkins means when he says "It is clear that here on Earth we are dealing with a generalized process for optimizing biological species,..."
Note that our explanation has no place for an external God. I, and I think Lovelace, go a step further and believe (or want to believe) that the self-organizing Evolutionary process has created a super-organism (the biosphere) that has as its purpose its own self-preservation. Most scientists believe the opposite, that life and evolution are pointless.
According to the NY Times, Lovelace "presents his well-reasoned view that the existing proportions of gases in our atmosphere could only be maintained by the existence of life..." I am encouraged by the recent finding that cloud formation may be influenced by chemicals released by biological organisms and that may moderate temperature cycles and thereby promote survival of the biosphere.
A bacteria is merely an electro-chemical machine. Yet, it is alive and, due to its structure, strives to survive and reproduce. Multi-cell plants and animals do the same. Some animals, such as humans, are considered sentient.
If a complex electro-chemical machine can be sentient, I do not see why, in principle, a cooperative and competitive environment of bacteria, plants, and animals cannot be sentient.
If you could talk to one of the neurons in your brain or central nervous system that is, at this moment critical to your reading and understanding English, you would find that it has no idea what English is, or anything else in our world. "Hey," it would say (if it could speak and if we could understand), "All I do is send and receive chemicals and electrical impulses according to my structure". Yet, that neuron and all the other cells in your body, are dependent upon your living for their survival. You are, in essence, their "God", but all you are is the totality of their bodies!
According to the Gaia concept, we humans are merely cogs in the great Gaia brain and central nervous system. It is by our actions, and those of all other animals and plants and bacteria, that the Gaia lives and survives and evolves and perhaps "thinks".
So, in that way, the Gaia Optimizing Deity becomes something like a GOD. Just as some religious people find comfort in believing that a personal God cares for them and will protect them, it gives me comfort to believe the Gaia is watching out for life on Earth. It is not quite as personal and reassuring, but for those of us who cannot find the faith to believe in God, my GOD will have to do. Otherwise, there is just no point or purpose to life on Earth. Why do we work so hard, and argue with each other, and try to learn, and so on, if there is no ulitmate purpose to it all?
Ira Glickstein
I believe its Lovelock not Lovelace - my error.
ReplyDeleteI really like the idea of the super-organism and I wonder why more scientists don't consider this belief/hypothesis. It would make sense that organisms could evolve to create such a feedback loop. But where is the support for this? I saw your earlier mention of the Scripps study that but I guess I'm not seeing how that supports the Gaia case.
Are you saying that the initial production of oxygen by the first cyanobacteria was somehow to their benefit? Or was this too early, before the super-organism was formed?
Steve, it is Lovelock who popularized the Gaia hypothesis. (I was in error when I called him Lovelace - sorry.)
ReplyDeleteHow could the biosphere have evolved to stabilize temperatures by modulating cloud cover?
According to our best theories, single-cell (bacterial) life originated on Earth 3.5 billion years ago. Early on, bacteria changed the atmosphere of the Earth, making it more oxygen-rich. They also produced ozone that shielded the surface from UV light detremental to life. That promoted further evolution. Multi-cell life (plants, animals) evolved a couple billion years later. On each island, river valley, lake area and hilltop, environmental pressures and "random" mutations led life to evolve in different directions.
During this time period, the Sun slowly began to become brighter. It is now around 30% brighter than it was billions of years ago.
In some areas of the Earth, some of the local life forms, when stimulated by extra sunlight, happened to emit chemicals that promoted cloud formation. Clouds had a net cooling effect, counteracting the more intense sunlight. Life therefore continued to prosper in those lucky areas.
In areas where the local life forms failed to produce those cloud-promoting chemicals, the more intense sunlight reduced the viability of the local life, to the point some of it went extinct.
That provided an opportunity for the cloud-promoting life forms to invade the domains of non-cloud-promoting life until, over time, most of the equatorial and temperate zones were dominated by life that promotes cloud formation when solar-forcing increases.
Lovelock showed that "the existing proportions of gases in our atmosphere [CO2, methane, oxygen, etc.] could only be maintained by the existence of life". The recent Scripps data I referred to adds evidence in favor of Lovelock's hypothesis.
Some fifteen years ago, when I discussed the Gaia hypothesis with biology Prof. David Wilson of Binghamton University, he objected on the basis that the Earth could not be an evolving organism because it has no competition. (Dawkins, in his The GOD Delusion, calls David Wilson "the American group-selection apostle".) Wilson attended Howard Pattee's system science discussions. I attended and spoke at Wilson's classes. I still have the Darwin fish (like a Jesus fish but with legs) he gave me, as well as a copy of his Unto Others book that promotes concepts of group selection and altruism in biological life. I fondly remember the annual Darwin's Birthday party at Wilson's home.
In any case, after fifteen years, I finally have an answer to Wilson's objection to the Gaia hypothesis. Each river valley, lake area, hilltop and other more-or-less self-contained environment has its own mini-Gaia. These mini-Gaias compete and cooperate with the neighboring ones, encroaching on their territory, merging, and co-evolving. The Gaia of the whole Earth is a kind of Zeus-like GOD, ruling over an often fractious assortment of local gods.
Ira Glickstein
The Gaia is one of many speculations on alternative forms of life and thought other than normal biology. This has been a central issue in the fields of Artificial Intelligence (Turing’s question, “Can a machine think?), in Artificial Life (Can a machine evolve? HAL: “I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.”), and in Biosemiotics (When does a molecule become a message?).
ReplyDeleteIra’s example shows that for “thinking” a single neuron in a brain is too simple. This is a general principle ― simple structures can’t perform complex functions. To “compute” a single transistor gate is too simple. To replicate a single nucleotide in DNA is too simple. For nest-building a single termite, ant, or bee is too simple.
For over 50 years research in Artificial Intelligence and Artificial Life was guided by faith that computers are complicated enough to simulate complex systems like life and thought. What they ignored was that complexity always evolves from simplicity. They didn’t read Dobzhansky’s essay Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution.
AI now knows better. What we call thinking evolved from nervous systems that evolved for sensorimotor control. Swimming, walking, and flying are not simple. The origin of technology was simple tool-making ― a sensorimotor task that requires thought. For example, look at the behavior of the thinking crow.
Current artificial life research is now focused on situated robots (see Wiki) that like the crow learn from artificial neural networks interacting with real environments.
In all living systems studied so far, sensorimotor control requirescoordinated dynamical feedback with time resolution of less than 1/10th of a second. Sensorimotor robots are now faster by an order of magnitude.
Gaia is one form of a “coordinated dynamical feedback system” but it is very slow and it has not evolved very far or learned to speed up.
Thanks Howard for your fact-filled comment. You were the voice of reason who pulled me back from my excessive optimism about Artificial Intelligence and Artificial Life. But, I am still optimistic about the Gaia (or am I simply misty-optically?)
ReplyDeleteYou mention that all biological living systems have "time resolution of less than 1/10th of a second", which is true. The human alpha rate is about ten Hz. You also say "Gaia ... is very slow and it has not evolved very far or learned to speed up" which is also true.
However, taking a page from what you taught me, there are:
(1) time-dependent processes (a bird or bug has to flap its wings at a high rate, slow flapping doesn't simply result in slow flight but in no flight) and
(2) time-independent processes (such as digital computation that gets the exact same answer no matter how slow it goes, and slow thinking is still thinking).
So, how fast does the Gaia have to operate its “coordinated dynamical feedback system” to qualify as a sentient system? I agree the Gaia is more of a rate-dependent system than a rate-independent one, but what is the rate?
It seems to me that the Gaia has decades or centuries to regulate climate, for example, since the great ocean oscillations vary over two or more decades and the ice ages, probably due to Milankovitch cycles of the Earth's orbit, come about every 100,000 years. Even human release of carbon gases that have contributed to global warming has taken multiple decades to ramp up.
If the Gaia regulates the rise and fall of civilizations and military and economic powers, that too takes centuries to play out.
Of course technology has speeded things up. Nuclear power/weapons/mishaps, genetic engineering/potential disasters, and rapidly global economics, are testing the Gaia's dynamical rate limits. However, our worldwide electronic communications and computer networks have upgraded the Gaia's "brain" and central nervous system to rates far faster than the the olden days of written communications and trade caravans.
It took billions of years for the Geosphere to developed the Biosphere, which was a primitive, slow-moving Gaia. It took less than 10,000 years for humans to develop world-wide circulation of written knowledge, a major advance for the Gaia. Now, in our lifetimes, the Biosphere has given birth to an electronic, computational Noosphere (mind sphere). The Gaia is now far more developed, agile, and interactive.
The Internet allows anyone in the world to type anything, as you typed your comment and I am typing mine, and anyone else to read these words seconds after we type them (not that they will, but they could :^).
Ira Glickstein
It keeps getting better! New research by UC Irvine, Colorado State, and Yale, indicates soil microbes may react to global warming by reducing their emissions of CO2. CO2 from soil respiration is about 8 times greater than burning of fossil fuels, so a small percentage reduction there could cancel out some or all human-caused CO2!
ReplyDeleteThis seems like yet another trick the Gaia has evolved to moderate surface temperatures as life survived repeated global warming and cooling cycles over past eons of time.
When the soil warms, the microbes, as expected, produce more CO2 for a period of time. But, what was unexpected is that the period of increased CO2 production is short, and is followed by the death of many of the microbes and a net reduction in CO2 emissions, perhaps for as long as the warming period continues.
Global warming models are thus overly pessimistic when they assume a warmer Earth will result in more CO2 emissions from soil microbes. This may parially explain why the models have failed to predict the past decade of temperature stability and perhaps a bit of global cooling.
Over many alternating ice ages and warming periods, areas of the Earth that happened to have negative-feedback soil microbes may have prospered over areas where the soil microbes produced positive-feedback. The resultant temperature moderation in those fortunate areas may have allowed the negative-feedback soil microbes to prosper at the expense of their positive-feedback cousins, and eventually become dominant.
Ira Glickstein
In my opinion Gaiia is a notion fraught with the peril of mass delusion. It's an example of how sophisticated physicists have provided fodder that transforms into an anti-science mysticism when exploited by the popular press and gullibles of New Age orientation. Here's a excerpt from an interesting web site
ReplyDeletewww.humanismtoday.org/vol6/levinegaia.pdf
Gaia: Goddess and Idea
Laurence Levine Emeritus Professor of Biology. Wayne State
THE CHORUS OF CHILDREN'S' voices sends these lyrics rising to
fill the hall with their sweet innocent tones. They have just
finished their responsive readings and soon the dancers will
come and cast long writhing shadows before the fires. It is
around Christmas time, the dark terrors of winter are still
with them, and every person must help to make it through to
Spring. What better way is there than to buoy their Goddess
Gaia with song and dance and a rousing session on theory.
Theory? No, this is not a Druid rite, but the annual festival,
"Gaia Song," given by the Commonwealth Institute of London
under the partial sponsorship of IBM. And the theory the
children will learn has to do with ecology, not mythology, even
though it bears the name of the ancient Greek goddess for
earth.
The theory states that earth acts as a living thing, a superorganism
served by it constituents -- living and nonliving -- in
the same way that the organs of the body serve the person.
The rocks, oceans and atmosphere, the microbes, people and plants, participate together in tightly integrated systems to
regulate oxygen, carbon dioxide, and temperature at levels fit
for life. So we are here thanks to Gaia and shall stay because
she can also/heal herself.
Gaia has a natural constituency with broad appeal especially
for those interested in ecological and holistic thinking.
Many spiritually minded persons find her irresistible. She
shines, too, for the feminist extremists, the throngs of wholegrain
enthusiasts, and most of the other types often assembled
under the "New Age" umbrella.
A publishing industry has sprung up to supply disciples
with Gaian books, musings on massage, messages about endangered
species, and instructions on lifestyles. Gaian organizations
provide platforms for their adherents. The Liechtenstein-
based Foundation for Gaia, the Gaia Institute of the
Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City, founded by
Lindisfarne members, offer seminars, lectures, and entertainment
programs.
James Morton, the Dean of that institution, has found the
Gaia principle useful in bringing strays back into the fold. In
his hands, Gaia becomes a tool to counter the apathy, alienation
and secular pursuits that compete with religion. As he
explains, Gaia points to the greater whole in a religious way
since Gaia does what religion means to do - to knit together.
He has commissioned Paul Winter's help in the knitting process.
This composer, noted for the incorporation of nature
sounds into his music, has created a Missa Gaia. Now wolf
calls, whale sounds, and the voice of the loon rise with the
Kyrie and resonate with the Sanctus and the Benediction
among the high Episcopalian arches.
Thanks Joel for the link to http://www.humanismtoday.org/vol6/levinegaia.pdf.
ReplyDeleteProf. Levine got one thing partially wrong in his description of the Gaia hypothesis: "So we are here thanks to Gaia and shall stay because she can also heal herself."
The part I made bold is exactly backwards! The Gaia is here thanks to us, if the meaning of "us" includes all our ancestors back to the original blue-green algae of 3.5 billion years ago.
Levine seems to be concerned not with Lovelock's research and hypothesis, but with the later personalization, as the Goddess Gaia, of the self-organizing evolution and natural selection process of general optimization we all agree is responsible for the current state of life on Earth.
His problem, and I believe Howards and probably yours, is that we have no evidence the Gaia has reached a level of complexity and inter-communication that would prove She is sentient. In addition, even if the Gaia is sentient, there is no reason to believe She would hear our praise and prayers, much less respond to them.
I agree with the latter, but not the former. While we have no evidence the Gaia is sentient, we have no evidence to the contrary either. The only evidence we have is that the generalized process seems to not only optimize life forms, but also seems to have invented means that stabilize the ratios of certain life-supporting gasses as well as temperatures that promote continuation of life on Earth.
It seems to me we are in the same position as the biological cells that compose our bodies. They notice that temperatures and chemistry in the neighborhood of their cells is stable, and ask "is there a body? And, if so, does it care for me?"
What is the true answer? Well, there is a body, and, in a general sense, that body has a goal of promoting its own life by regular exercise and nutrition. So, that body does care for it's cells. On the other hand, if any of those cells pose a danger to life, such as cancer cells, or are inconvenient, such as too much fat or a pimple on the nose, that body will not hesitate to get a doctor to cut those cells out and kill them. Furthermore, if that body gets hooked on drugs, that may end badly for all the cells that give it life.
Ira Glickstein
Ira said: What is the true answer? Well, there is a body, and, in a general sense, that body has a goal of promoting its own life by regular exercise and nutrition. So, that body does care for it's cells.
ReplyDeleteJoel responds: I don't see any evidence that the body has such a "goal." I don't see any evidence that the body has ANY goal. The body certainly has drives for food, sex, etc., but I don't see any goals until you get to the level of mind. Goal only has meaning when planning is possible.
As I point out in another comment, this sort of talk gives rise to mysticism. Mysticism gives rise to a host of other irrationalities in the general public. I've met students in the arts who insist that the use of logic is just "linear thinking" which they avoid by using their feelings or "nonlinear thinking." Unfortunately, they often make incredibly foolish decisions in that guise. -Joel, Fully Declared Atheist
Joel wrote: "The body certainly has drives for food, sex, etc., but I don't see any goals until you get to the level of mind. Goal only has meaning when planning is possible."
ReplyDeleteEven plants and animals that lack a brain and central nervous system manage to maintain their body chemistry and temperatures and do things, such as a sunflower turning towards the sun, that promote survival and reproduction. We may not call such bodily behavior a "goal" or "purpose" because it is strictly due to the genetic-coded structure of that species of plant or animal. True enough, but I would say instinctual behaviors that further survival and reproduction have been learned at the species level, so the species are therefore sentient in that way.
Even in animals with a brain and central nervous system, including humans, most of our behaviors are genetically determined based on learning at the species level.
Furthermore, even intentional, goal-directed behaviors due to what you call "the level of mind ... when planning is possible" are carried out by a network of -guess what- biological cells that are, at bottom, electro-chemical machines just like other cells. Why do you classify "mind" behaviors due to neuronal cells differently from those due to other somatic cells?
As for your objection to irrational mysticism, you and I know that most of the people we depend upon to vote "our way" do so for mostly irrational reasons. That is why we promote "free enterprise" and "self-reliance" and "respect for the individual" and "take back our country" and all those other right-wing slogans, including many that specifically call to "God bless America" and our Judeo-Christian heritage in an appeal to the part of our base that is religious. (Of course, the other party makes use of even more irrational mysticism to unite their base.)
Ira Glickstein
Ira asks Joel, “Why do you classify "mind" behaviors due to neuronal cells differently from those due to other somatic cells?”
ReplyDeleteThe answer is in Ira’s previous sentence. Ira says, “goal-directed behaviors due to what you [Joel] call "the level of mind ... when planning is possible" are carried out by a network . . .” Ira then correctly notes that mind cells, “are, at bottom, electro-chemical machines just like other cells,” but that is irrelevant. My washing machine, at bottom, is an electro-chemical machine.
With a PhD in Systems Science Ira knows that systems function depends primarily on system organization rather than the material of the parts. By Ira’s reductionist argument above, one could not distinguish software from hardware or memory from muscle. We are distinguishable as unique individuals only because of the unique organization of our neural networks.
Ira said: You and I know that most of the people we depend upon to vote "our way" do so for mostly irrational reasons. That is why we promote "free enterprise" and "self-reliance" and "respect for the individual" ...
ReplyDeleteJoel responds: I actually happen to believe in those things. I don't see anything mystical or irrational about that. Politics makes strange bedfellows is not a new notion.
When Joel (and I) and many of our C-minded colleagues see 1) "free enterprise" and 2) "self-reliance" and 3) "respect for the individual" we think of: 1) How much better the free market serves customers than government bureaucracy serves citizens, 2) How much better it would be if people relied on themselves and their families and friends rather than become freeloaders in an ever-expanding welfare state, and 3) How each individual should be judged on their capabilities rather than skin color or national origin. We emote over these half-truths by summoning up idealizations (i.e., myths) stored deep in our psychies.
ReplyDeleteGiven the same phrases, many of our L-minded friends think of: 1) Robber barons and "race to the bottom" exploitation of child labor and the Enron scam and the recent shenanigans on Wall Street, and 2) The jungle or the Wild West where the cruelest creatures with the biggest teeth and claws and guns rule over everyone else, and 3) An excuse to discriminate against people of certain colors despite clear evidence they are victims of slavery and racial discrimination. They too emote on these half-truths with their own myths.
Emotion with a dash of truth is a far more powerful motivator than dry, truth-based reason ever will be.
***********************
Howard makes great points, as usual. However, I wonder how he distinguishes between "mind" learning which consists of changes in the strength of connections between neurons, and genetic-coded behaviors (that I think of as "learned" by the species) which also govern the interconnections between neurons.
The former are based on experiences of an individual animal. The latter are based on the experiences of that animal's ancestors. Other than the time factor, what is the difference between: a) Instinctual behaviors governed by gene-coded connections in the brain, b) Behaviors imprinted on immature brains during early developmental periods, and c) Behaviors learned through personal experience and planning?
Ira Glickstein
Ira says, and I agree we must face it, “Emotion with a dash of truth is a far more powerful motivator than dry, truth-based reason ever will be.” However, I completely disagree with any attitude, whether C- or L-minded, that is content with these uncontrolled emotions and irrational half-truths. The ideal of seeking the truth is what all religions, philosophy, and science is about!
ReplyDeleteThe Christian mystic Meister Eckhart (~1260-1327) stated this ideal so bluntly that he was charged with heresy: “What is truth? Truth is something so noble that if God could turn aside from it, I could keep to the truth and let God go.” (Of course, he was misunderstood. He meant that God was truth.)
Ira also wonders about the difference between primitive instincts, childhood imprinting, and experienced learning. We know they arise in that order, and that they occupy different regions in the brain. We all know from experience that there is a constant tension between them, and that often restraining the emotions with reason is difficult. St. Paul had this problem: “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.”
Spinoza expressed very much the same idea with more words: “Man’s lack of power to moderate and restrain the affects [emotions] I call bondage. For the man who is subject to affects is under the control, not of himself, but of fortune, in whose power he so greatly is that often, though he sees the better for himself, he is still forced to follow the worse.” [Preface, Fourth Part of the Ethics]
Later, Spinoza explains how to improve matters: “I pass, finally, to the remaining part of the Ethics, which concerns the means, or way, leading to freedom. Here then I shall treat of the power of reason, showing what it can do against the emotions, and what freedom of mind, or blessedness is.” [Preface to Fifth Part of the Ethics]
There is a Buddhist allegory of the river pilot who sees a man on a log in his path. His anger at the man distracts him from avoiding the log. What if there was no man on the log? Reason says suppress your anger at the man and avoid the log.
As you know, Howard, Spinoza is my favorite philosopher, but he was wrong wrong wrong about the role and reason for emotions.
ReplyDeleteWhen "reasoned" behavior, based on apparently rational planning, conflicts with instinctual behaviors, the emotions are the ombudsman for the tried and true way, inherited from eons of evolutionary experience, and necessary not only for the survival of the individual, but, more importantly, for his or her society.
When the "jungle drums" sound, it is nescessary for the population, particularly the young men, to voluntarily rise up and march off into the face of danger.
That is as true today as it was when the danger was posed by a marauding lion or an attack from a neighboring tribe. A society that supresses "patriotic" emotions may be a nicer place to live - but not for long. It will be defeated sooner or later and the people will be killed or taken into bondage.
Of course, in a civilized society we can't have everybody punching out anyone who wrongs them. So, we have instincts that make allowances for members of the same family or tribe. In modern society, we imprint and socialize our youngsters to moderate their emotional responses and report to "authority figures" who will settle these matters.
You say you agree with me that "Emotion with a dash of truth is a far more powerful motivator than dry, truth-based reason ever will be." You recommend "seeking the truth". Well the highlighted sentence is the truth. If not for our inflated self-regard, puffed up by our academic achievements, we would realize that sophist "reason" is no competition for the mature wisdom compiled into our genes by billions of years of adaptation.
ALL of our emotional ancestors survived and reproduced while many of their contemporaries did not.
Ira Glickstein
Coincidentally, the "Thought for the Day" in today's newspaper centers on emotions and truth:
ReplyDelete"The telling of jokes is an art of its own, and it always rises from some emotional threat. The best jokes are dangerous, and dangerous because they are in some way truthful" [Kurt Vonnegut]
Ira Glickstein
Ira’s opinion is that: “When "reasoned" behavior, based on apparently rational planning, conflicts with instinctual behaviors, the emotions are the ombudsman for the tried and true way . . . When the "jungle drums" sound, it is necessary for the population, particularly the young men, to voluntarily rise up and march off into the face of danger.”
ReplyDeleteIra’s faith in primitive emotions is consistent with the neoconservative mind-set. All the evidence I have still favors Spinoza. I agree that neocons have such an emotional philosophy. Bin Laden’s stated strategy was to provoke them into an endless and costly war, knowing they see the world in good vs. evil terms, an us-versus-them mentality, a low tolerance for diplomacy, and a crusading readiness to use preemptive military force. Neocon politicians often invoke the tribal emotion they label “patriotism” by which they mean a bellicose and blind belief in national superiority. Rational patriots call this chauvinism.
It is also significant that the neocons, Bush, Cheney, Rove, and Wolfowitz, had no experience in war. They avoided military service. As any reasonable person would expect, Father Bush, using his war experience and advice of other military experts like Scowcroft and Powell ran a more rational and more effective war.
Ira’s “tried and true way” may have been popular in the Stone Age, but I know of no military commander since Sun Tzu in the 6th century BCE (The Art of War) who does not advise a rational, cold-blooded (i.e., unemotional) approach to war strategy. The first lesson we practiced in WW2 boot camp, after learning to following orders, was not to engage an enemy out of anger or fear. You are trained to use your head and your skills.
Like Sun Tzu and all great military leaders, Spinoza would argue that neither commanders nor warriors should make decisions based on provocation or emotions like anger and fear. He knew first hand that churches and politicians use these low-grade “affects” (emotions) that “mutilate” and “confuse the mind.” This is how the masses are lead to war, particularly the paradoxical “war on terror” which is based on the emotion of fear. Spinoza knew about terrorism from experience and stayed alive because he used his head!
An Italian rightly critiqued the Pope and leaders of the Catholic Church for their pronouncements on sexuality as follows:
ReplyDelete"You no play-ah da game, you no make-ah da rules!"
That applies equally to Spinoza on anything to do with emotions. He never played that game! He had no close friends and no sexual life, never married, and, of course, had no children. He had been excommuncated by the Jewish community. He had little contact with his family. He had to keep his philosophical writings and communications with others of like mind secret because their religious views conflicted with those of the reigning Christian authorities. He lived a life of extreme caution. He had little personal contact with others. He earned his keep as a lens grinder, lived frugally, and died young, at the age of 45. His writings were published posthumously.
Thus, he had only slightly more personal acquaintance with human emotions than a space alien anthropologist. That is what gave him special insight into the truth of everything. That explains why he questioned the doctrines of the religion of his birth and the ruling religious and philosophical ideas of his time. He greatness, as the last of the ancient philosophers and first of the modern ones, is due to his pure rationality. Purity of mind enabled by his stunted emotional life.
Nevertheless, he understood the superiority of emotion to rational thought, as reported in Wikipedia:
"Spinoza differed sharply from the Stoics in one important respect: he utterly rejected their contention that reason could defeat emotion. On the contrary, he contended, an emotion can only be displaced or overcome by a stronger emotion. ..."
Ira Glickstein
Ira quoted wikipedia: Spinoza differed sharply from the Stoics in one important respect: he utterly rejected their contention that reason could defeat emotion. On the contrary, he contended, an emotion can only be displaced or overcome by a stronger emotion.
ReplyDeleteJoel responds: At the risk of sounding Clintonesque, I think the parsing is important. Rationality trumps or OVERCOMES emotion in many or even most people in many situations. as the expression goes "The heart wants what the heart wants." An emotion can rarely be changed just because we will it, but rationality controls whether of not we act on the emotion. It's decision making that's important. Emotion may produce a preliminary reflexive decision, but thankfully rationality most often overcomes that emotion in order to weigh the consequences. In some cases rationality can even replace an emotion with another one. After some training by a friend of mine who has overcome a lot of adversity in her life, I was able to actually change an emotion. I was feeling depressed when I was caught in one of our frequent bouts of Hawaiian liquid sunshine. By concentrating on the cooling sensation on my skin and imagining the water being sucked up by the beautiful flowers along my route, I was able to gradually change that feeling from depression to elation. Humans are capable of deciding or at least modifying what they feel using their rational mind.
Ira says we should discount Spinoza opinion on anything to do with emotions. Why? Because, “he had only slightly more personal acquaintance with human emotions than a space alien anthropologist.” I consider this one of Ira’s poorer arguments on at least two counts:
ReplyDeleteFirst, Ira has no reliable information about Spinoza’s personal feelings and emotions. Steven M. Nadler’s Spinoza: A Life is the only attempt at a personal biography that I know, and even Nadler says that we know very little. Lacking historical information, Rebecca Goldstein tries to imagine what Spinoza’s feelings were in Betraying Spinoza: The Renegade Jew Who Gave Us Modernity, but she admits it is not meant as history. I cannot imagine that anyone who lost his mother, father, and brother at an early age, and was subsequently excommunicated and cursed in words unmatched in viciousness toward any other Jew, and who lived his entire life in fear of martyrdom, was without strong emotions.
Second, and most important, this kind of ad hominem argument is irrelevant. Spinoza’s thoughts have stood on their own persuasiveness and survived critical philosophers as smart as Ira for over 300 years. What is impressive about Spinoza is that his thinking about the relation of emotions, feelings, and rational thought not only overthrew all previous philosophic and religious ideas but are now consistent with the latest neurosciences. This is discussed in Antonio Damasio Looking for Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain.
What is Ira’s argument? Why does he reject Spinoza view of emotions? Because he is, “Wrong, wrong, wrong!”
Howard objects to my ad hominem [against the person] argument about Spinoza's qualifications to balance emotions and rationality. He quotes with approbation my jest about my favorite philosopher's emotional life: "he had only slightly more personal acquaintance with human emotions than a space alien anthropologist." But, Howard leaves out the very next part of my statement: "That is what gave him special insight into the truth of everything. ... He greatness, as the last of the ancient philosophers and first of the modern ones, is due to his pure rationality. Purity of mind enabled by his stunted emotional life."
ReplyDeleteI agree with Howard we have "no reliable information about Spinoza’s personal feelings and emotions." As a human who had a tough personal life story, he certainly had emotions. By all accounts, though, he was estranged from his family and the Jewish community of his birth. He never married or had children and so he missed that part of a normal emotional life. I think that is a factor we should consider when Spinoza speaks of "human bondage" to emotions and seems to be ignorant of their origins and value to the survival and reproduction of societies.
As for ad hominem, how about Howard's critique of neo-cons for getting us into wars despite their having no experience in war? True, Cheney and others who have been called neo-con chicken hawks avoided military service, but other architects of the second Iraq war had considerable military experience. Secretary of State Colin Powell, for example, who gave the UN speech building the case for military action on the basis the Iraqis had WMDs, served in Vietnam and had been a General and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who was responsible for the "light force" policy, was a fighter pilot and had been Defense Secretary under President Ford. In hindsight, both men turned out to be mistaken, but not for lack of military experience and knowledge.
Indeed if you impose a requirement of military service to qualify as Commander in Chief with the power to take the country to war, that would eliminate virtually all women and the last two Democratic Presidents. (Hmmm! Perhaps you are onto something! :^)
Ira Glickstein
Instead of arguing about Spinoza’s view of emotion which is admittedly difficult to grasp unambiguously, I prefer to answer Ira’s view directly using what I understand about evolution and what neuroscientists tell me. First fact: evolution by natural selection depends on averages, not individual actions. The brain decides individual actions.
ReplyDeleteIra says, “When "reasoned" behavior, based on apparently rational planning, conflicts with instinctual behaviors, the emotions are the ombudsman for the tried and true way, inherited from eons of evolutionary experience, and necessary not only for the survival of the individual, but, more importantly, for his or her society.”
I agree that emotions (instincts) often conflict with reason, but it is not the final arbiter of decision-making. We have desires or fears (or any of a large zoo of emotions) that are often associated with the limbic system. If these primitive instincts are not modified by higher brain thoughts, like consideration of the consequences, they would cause us to act in a “programmed” way (e.g., run, fight, mate, eat, etc.). These acts are the result of long evolution and are therefore on average beneficial for survival.
Why did the higher brain evolve? The obvious reason is simply to improve the average for beneficial acts. If reasoned acts did not improve the average survival, thinking brains would not have evolved larger and larger cortexes.
As Joel demonstrates from experience, the higher brain can learn to override emotion-directed acts and moderate, but not eliminate, the emotion itself. One can love one’s enemy. This is the case not only for the emotions, but it is a demonstrable fact that the higher brain can learn to control sub-limbic actions such as heart rate, blood pressure and even body temperature.
Conclusion: The higher learning brain has power to moderate emotions and override emotions in making thoughtful (rational) decisions controlling individual acts (Spinoza’s point). I’m afraid that humans may kill each other off before they learn to follow Spinoza’s advice and control their actions by reason instead of primitive emotions. On the other hand, reason also creates weapons of mass destruction. From an evolutionary point of view, big “intelligent” brains are just an experiment, and natural selection always bats last in the game of survival
We agree, Howard, on many things related to emotions and rational thought. Certainly higher brains evolved "to improve the average for beneficial acts," modifying primitive instincts in ways that promote survival and reproduction. Programmed reactions to "run, fight, mate, eat, etc. ... are the result of long evolution and are therefore on average beneficial for survival."
ReplyDeleteDuring my time at Binghamton U. I was impressed by the "group selection" work of David Wilson and a course I audited on "Evolutionary Psychology" by a professor whose name excapes me. One example had to do with voles (meadow mice) that have an interesting "altruistic" behavior. When a vole spots a predator, it would be better off individually for it to run and hide, but they have evolved a tendency to sound an alarm and warn their comrades, which benefits their society.
This type of self-sacrificing behavior, which violates selfish "thoughtful" behavior, manifests itself in all social animals. The mother defends her cubs. Cattle form a protective circle. Parents hunt food for their young. Of course, these animals are acting instinctively, and have no idea why they choose to fight rather than run, why they choose to risk their own lives to feed their offspring.
These animals have conflicting emotions: flight vs fight. The former is basic self-preservation. The latter is preservation of the group and reproduction of the species.
The drive to mate leads animals (mostly males) to extreme measures. Love (or lust) is a powerful emotion that even drives old guys like us who are beyond reproductive age! We fight for our property and opinions (mostly with words at our age) and become angry more often than reason would dictate. Why do we, so close to the end of our lives, care about survival of the American Experiment? The only rational explanation is that our emotions are the ombudsman for the societies that gave us birth and nourished us. It makes us "feel good" to imagine the success of our children and grandchildren and generations not yet conceived.
Yes, our big thinking human brain has promoted survival and reproduction. But mostly through the invention of agriculture and domestication of farm animals and language and writing to pass wisdom to future generations, and customs to keep a modicum of peace within our societies, and trade and transport and corporations and communications technology, and, perhaps most important, organized armies and long-range weapons to dominate other societies and protect ours from invaders.
I think our thinking brains can moderate our emotions, but mainly by re-directing them and tapping into our social instincts.
Ira Glickstein
Ira, I think what you are pointing out is that some instinctive behavior like altruism has proven healthier for society than what reason might tell us. There must also be an instinct that stimulates religious feelings, and you have suggested that some religious memes have a beneficial social function. I think most people doubt that science and reason alone can provide an adequate moral system. A few like Sam Harris argue otherwise. Listen to Sam’s T.E.D. talk.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with most organized religions is that the simple religious instincts are loaded with excess baggage in the form of superstition and dogma. The moral rules are then often overridden by men with a strong instinct for power and authority over the baggage. The baggage also conflicts with science. Spinoza’s panentheism has the advantage that it is never in conflict with scientific knowledge because that is one aspect of God. Of course that view is why Spinoza was despised by all established religious authorities. It doesn't carry any of their baggage.
I watched Sam Harris's TED talk talk linked by Howard and found it almost completely vacuous.
ReplyDeleteHarris derides religion-based morality, showing an image of an ultra-orthodox Rabbi and the Pope and claiming their moral views are baseless because they come from revelations, totally ignoring the centuries of well-trod moral discussions and arguments among the rabbis and within and between the Catholic church and other churches.
He counterposes an image of the leading expert on string theory and himself, and says that if he showed up at a physics conference and expressed his views they would be and should be ignored. Of course Harris is correct that he is no expert on string theory, having no formal background in that area, or any area of physics.
Yet he claims that he can make better judgments on moral issues using a science-based method. His method is to counterpose two extremes on the moral spectrum and assume that correct morality, which will cause human life to flourish, lies somewhere in-between.
For example, Harris counterposes an image of Muslim women in heavy burkahs with images of half-naked women on the covers of porn magazines. Both are immoral, he claims, and true morality lies somewhere in-between.
He is no more an expert on what causes women's lives to flourish than he is on string theory, yet, using his half-baked moral sensibilities, he proceeds to spout judgments, still warm from being pulled out of his ass.
For example, who has the right to judge a woman who would rather earn big money showing off her healthy, athletic body than being cooped up as a secretary in an office? Or judge the men who buy porn? So long as the transactions are voluntary on both sides, where is the moral issue? Consider that the poor secretary may be a divorced single mother due to the infidelity or cruelty of her former husband, and she may be sexually harassed by her boss, while the porny woman may be in full control of her life and her lovers, living in high and healthy style!
The burkah women, Harris claims, are obviously suffering in a tight cloth bag in 120 degree heat, which amounts to abuse by their fathers and husbands. He ignores the fact that burkahs are worn only when in public, that these women spend most of their time in private with their families, and, in private, they wear more casual clothing. Even if they say they are voluntarily wearing burkahs, he says, they are lying or mistaken.
Well, I know several Jewish women who are college graduates and work in the professions -and are also extremely liberal in their political views- who, nevertheless, choose to attend Orthodox Jewish services where, due to their gender, they are not counted in the minyan (quorum), cannot be called up to bless the Torah, and have to sit in a women's section out of view of the men, lest the men be diverted from prayer by sexual thoughts! These are totally modern women, raised in the US and protected by our gender-equality laws and beliefs, who totally voluntarily choose what most of us would consider second-class status in the synagogue.
Ira Glickstein
Ira, I just read your response to Harris. On the one hand (my immediate emotional reaction), I agree with your liberal views about morality. If the behavior is consensual and not harming others, as you say, “Who has the right to judge?” (I thought that was also Harris’s position as he restated in the final question period.)
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand (my rational evaluation), I think it is likely that either lack of restriction on sexual behavior or the extreme control of women’s behavior by male religious authority will result in harming society. At least neither extreme appears to be optimum.
To me the basic crucial moral issue is whether the behavior is imposed by religious authority or the result of an educated personal free choice. Doesn't Harris agree?
I think Steven Weinberg has at least a half truth: “With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.”
I agree, Howard. I would not personally want to live in a burkah society nor would I want my daughters or grands to be porn stars. My only point is that some women will choose these paths and say (and even really believe) they did so totally voluntarily.
ReplyDeleteA psychiatrist may be able to prove they were indoctrinated (or imprinted) into that choice during their childhood by lack of other role models or alternatives, and that may be true in the case of the burkah women and even of the porny ones.
Some athiests claim that teaching young children religion is "real child abuse." For example, Dawkins argues that teaching children about hell and damnation is worse, in a way, than priestly pedophilia.
I have my preferences for customs and laws regarding sexuality, for example, and I vote for representatives who I think will pass reasonable laws in my community, state, and nation, but who am I to impose them on the whole world?
Let each jurisdiction pass what they think is best and, a hundred or a thousand years hense, we'll know which set of customs and laws resulted in the most survivable communities. In other words, which mini-Gaia was superior!
Ira Glickstein
Howard said:
ReplyDeleteEvolution by natural selection depends on averages, not individual actions. The brain decides individual actions.
These acts are the result of long evolution and are therefore on average beneficial for survival.
Why did the higher brain evolve? The obvious reason is simply to improve the average for beneficial acts. If reasoned acts did not improve the average survival, thinking brains would not have evolved larger and larger cortexes.
Ira said:
We agree, Howard, on many things related to emotions and rational thought. Certainly higher brains evolved "to improve the average for beneficial acts," modifying primitive instincts in ways that promote survival and reproduction.
Joel responds: I've been mulling the above over in order to see in what sense you both might be right. I can't figure it out. First of all, I don't know which average you're talking about; time average, average for a single individual over action or ensemble average over all individuals. Second, evolution depends on individuals and the propagation of their genes via reproduction. There is no average individual who is more important to evolution than an individual in the tail of the distribution. In fact, we might say that evolution depends on those in the tails being fitter and in time their genes becoming dominant or average if you like. But, once that happens the burden of evolution shifts to individuals in the distribution tails again. When it comes to the human brain, what's important to me is that the characteristics that fascinate us most are spanrels in the structure of lower level processing. What I mean is this. Our ability to plan for the future is just a consequence of prediction capability required for stalking and hunting. Our sense of time is a consequence of the need to forecast the maturing of berries, etc. The kind of thinking we so much admire is of slight value in evolution and survival. It seems to me that "average" is an excuse for overlooking the fact that alarm altruism in many cases is a detriment to the individual and that the genes for altruism should not have survived. Obviously they have, in crows, prairie dogs, etc. (I'm not satisfied with the notion of close relative survival.)
Great observations and questions Joel. Howard may have better and perhaps different answers from mine.
ReplyDelete1) Meaning of "Average":
Most genes that determine bodily characteristics and behaviors are handed down from parents to offspring without change at all. Crossover, the "random" mix and match of about half the genes from each parent for their offspring, puts proven, mature genes in different combinations. This usually results in relatively small changes.
Gene mutation is often detremental. Major evolutionary changes rarely survive.
Most evolution is relatively small creep of the average in response to relatively slow changes in the environment. There have been a few periods with rapid evolution, such as the Cambrian explosion, but even that took millions of years.
The "altruistic" alerting response of voles and other animals may require imprinting (observation of adults by immature offspring). The latter is called memetic evolution, and includes changes in behaviors, language, ideas and culture that occur much more rapidly than genetic evolution, but usually take hundreds of thousands of years. Thus, even in memetics, the creep of the average dominates.
In large-brained mammals such as primates, the process is a bit faster. In humans it has been somewhat faster, particularly in the past six thousand years with the invention of metaphoric language and then worldwide exploration, conquest, and trade in products and ideas over the past two-thousand years or so. The industrial revolution and the technological and informaiton explosions speeded things up even more. Genetic engineering, a wicked combo of meme-driven genetic evolution, will really speed things up!
2) Tail of the distribution:
Yes, the most rapid changes come from those individuals at the tail of the distribution - when they happen to land in a lucky niche and survive and reproduce. But, I would argue, even in our current rapidly evolving society, where geniuses and demagogues at the high end of mental capacity play on a world stage with near-instant results, the average is more critical. (For example, the roughly 3% average IQ superiority of East Asians will, over the coming 100 years, likely have more impact on worldwide economics than individual western leaders.)
3) High-Level Thinking:
Joel says "The kind of thinking we so much admire is of slight value in evolution and survival." I think the invention of agriculture and houses and advanced civilization and everything that goes with it -all the result of high-level thinking we admire- has certainly increased the survival and reproductive success of the human race. (But this may be a short-term burst - come back in a thousand or a million years to double check.)
4) "Altrusim" and kin selection
Joel wrote: "It seems to me that 'average' is an excuse for overlooking the fact that alarm altruism in many cases is a detriment to the individual and that the genes for altruism should not have survived. Obviously they have, in crows, prairie dogs, etc. (I'm not satisfied with the notion of close relative survival.)"
Well, there is a controversy over "group selection" but I side with Howard's colleague David Sloan Wilson, though I always put "scare quotes" around "altruism" because I believe in kin-selection altruism and reciprocal altruism, neither of which is altruism in the pure sense. However, I believe it has been demonstrated that many animals (including humans) will take risks and sacrifice their lives in nearly exact proportion to the level of genes shared. Eusocial insects, such as bees and ants who are all sisters, will certainly do so.
Ira Glickstein