Proposed new "law" of evolution
Yesterday, I came across an online headline that caught my eye, due to my philosophical interest in the role of Information in the world, and in evolution in particular. One title, on a science news mag, grandly announced "Scientists Unveil Nature’s Missing Evolutionary Law". And I quickly found several other sites with references to a "missing law" to be added to Darwin's 4 or 5 "principles"*1. The major novelty is that this proposed "law" applies to every phase of nature, not just biology. Another difference is its use of "information" in a modern, post-Shannon sense. The articles don't mention it, but I see a relationship to Integrated Information Theory (IIT), which is not yet a law, but a hypothesis. Below, I post a few quotes from three different articles, to invite commentary. In a separate post, I'll add some comments of my own. :smile:
*1. What are the 4 laws of evolution?
The four propositions underlying Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection are: (1) more individuals are produced than can survive; (2) there is therefore a struggle for existence; (3) individuals within a species show variation; and (4) offspring tend to inherit their parents' characters.
https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/natural-history/evolution-through-natural-selection/content-section-4.1
PS Note --- Survive = not Life, but mere persistence of whole System ; Struggle = competition for resources (not applicable to non-living?) ; Variation = statistical randomness (non-linear energy -- Brownian motion?) ; Inherit = propagation of defining information (pattern ; design)
A. Scientists Unveil Nature’s Missing Evolutionary Law
https://www.sci.news/physics/law-of-increasing-functional-information-12369.html
Cornell University’s Professor Jonathan Lunine, Dr.Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution for Science and their colleagues propose that an additional, hitherto-unarticulated law is required to characterize familiar macroscopic phenomena of our complex,evolving Universe. In essence, the new ‘law of increasing functional information’ states that complex natural systems evolve to states of greater patterning, diversity, and complexity
[i]# The new work postulates a ‘law of increasing functional information,’ which states that a system will evolve ‘if many different configurations of the system undergo selection for one or more functions.’
# In the case of biology, Charles Darwin equated function primarily with survival — the ability to live long enough to produce fertile offspring.
# The third and most interesting function according to the researchers is ‘novelty’ — the tendency of evolving systems to explore new configurations that sometimes lead to startling new behaviors or characteristics, like photosynthesis
# “If increasing functionality of evolving physical and chemical systems is driven by a natural law, we might expect life to be a common outcome of planetary evolution.”
# “The Universe generates novel combinations of atoms, molecules, cells, etc. Those combinations that are stable and can go on to engender even more novelty will continue to evolve. This is what makes life the most striking example of evolution, but evolution is everywhere.”[/i]
B. Missing law of universal evolution
Axios : Scientists propose a "missing law" for evolution in the universe
https://www.axios.com/2023/10/22/evolution-complexity-law
# The law could help to explain the emergence of complex systems around us
# "In a deep sense, there are two time arrows that we experience in life," says Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution for Science and who is a co-author of a paper published this week in PNAS describing the proposed law. "One is the idea of aging and death and the other is the idea of renewal and organization
# "The second law must be obeyed by all systems, but there's still something missing that needs to be articulated to effectively describe all the richness that we see in our everyday lives and also across the cosmos," says Michael Wong, an astrobiologist and planetary scientist at the Carnegie Institution and co-author of the paper.
# "You have a universe that keeps mixing things up and then trying out new possibilities," Hazen says, adding that it encompasses biological evolution, too. Things that work are selected for, he adds. "That works on nonliving worlds, and it works on living worlds. It's just a natural process that seems to be universal."
# The team's notion of fitness beyond biology is "really subtle, complex and wonderful," Stuart Kauffman adds.
# And, some say evolution is strictly about Darwinian natural selection and common descent, Hazen says. But, "I'm talking about diversification and patterning through time" from one stage to the next,
C. Scientists propose 'missing' law for the evolution of everything in the universe
https://www.space.com/scientists-propose-missing-law-evolution-of-everything-in-the-universe
[i]# This new law identifies "universal concepts of selection" that drive systems to evolve, whether they're living or not.
# The research team behind the law, which included philosophers, astrobiologists, a theoretical physicist, a mineralogist and a data scientist, have called it "the law of increasing functional information."
# The law applies to systems that form from numerous components — such as atoms, molecules and cells —which can be arranged and rearranged repeatedly and adopt multiple different configurations, according to the statement. The law also says these configurations are selected based on function, and only a few survive.
# theoretical biologist Stuart Kauffman, professor emeritus of biochemistry and biophysics at the University of Pennsylvania, said the study is a "superb, bold, broad,and transformational article,"[/i]
Fundamental Functions of information evolution :
Stability -- integrated components form a persisting system
Action -- systemic energy allows the system to move around, to forage
Novelty -- system can reproduce itself to form new systems.
Note --- Integrated Systems are holistic in their collective function
Missing Law of Evolution video
https://youtu.be/Gz1-ubJShNA?si=3uTorrUrokT0a1SP
*1. What are the 4 laws of evolution?
The four propositions underlying Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection are: (1) more individuals are produced than can survive; (2) there is therefore a struggle for existence; (3) individuals within a species show variation; and (4) offspring tend to inherit their parents' characters.
https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/natural-history/evolution-through-natural-selection/content-section-4.1
PS Note --- Survive = not Life, but mere persistence of whole System ; Struggle = competition for resources (not applicable to non-living?) ; Variation = statistical randomness (non-linear energy -- Brownian motion?) ; Inherit = propagation of defining information (pattern ; design)
A. Scientists Unveil Nature’s Missing Evolutionary Law
https://www.sci.news/physics/law-of-increasing-functional-information-12369.html
Cornell University’s Professor Jonathan Lunine, Dr.Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution for Science and their colleagues propose that an additional, hitherto-unarticulated law is required to characterize familiar macroscopic phenomena of our complex,evolving Universe. In essence, the new ‘law of increasing functional information’ states that complex natural systems evolve to states of greater patterning, diversity, and complexity
[i]# The new work postulates a ‘law of increasing functional information,’ which states that a system will evolve ‘if many different configurations of the system undergo selection for one or more functions.’
# In the case of biology, Charles Darwin equated function primarily with survival — the ability to live long enough to produce fertile offspring.
# The third and most interesting function according to the researchers is ‘novelty’ — the tendency of evolving systems to explore new configurations that sometimes lead to startling new behaviors or characteristics, like photosynthesis
# “If increasing functionality of evolving physical and chemical systems is driven by a natural law, we might expect life to be a common outcome of planetary evolution.”
# “The Universe generates novel combinations of atoms, molecules, cells, etc. Those combinations that are stable and can go on to engender even more novelty will continue to evolve. This is what makes life the most striking example of evolution, but evolution is everywhere.”[/i]
B. Missing law of universal evolution
Axios : Scientists propose a "missing law" for evolution in the universe
https://www.axios.com/2023/10/22/evolution-complexity-law
# The law could help to explain the emergence of complex systems around us
# "In a deep sense, there are two time arrows that we experience in life," says Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution for Science and who is a co-author of a paper published this week in PNAS describing the proposed law. "One is the idea of aging and death and the other is the idea of renewal and organization
# "The second law must be obeyed by all systems, but there's still something missing that needs to be articulated to effectively describe all the richness that we see in our everyday lives and also across the cosmos," says Michael Wong, an astrobiologist and planetary scientist at the Carnegie Institution and co-author of the paper.
# "You have a universe that keeps mixing things up and then trying out new possibilities," Hazen says, adding that it encompasses biological evolution, too. Things that work are selected for, he adds. "That works on nonliving worlds, and it works on living worlds. It's just a natural process that seems to be universal."
# The team's notion of fitness beyond biology is "really subtle, complex and wonderful," Stuart Kauffman adds.
# And, some say evolution is strictly about Darwinian natural selection and common descent, Hazen says. But, "I'm talking about diversification and patterning through time" from one stage to the next,
C. Scientists propose 'missing' law for the evolution of everything in the universe
https://www.space.com/scientists-propose-missing-law-evolution-of-everything-in-the-universe
[i]# This new law identifies "universal concepts of selection" that drive systems to evolve, whether they're living or not.
# The research team behind the law, which included philosophers, astrobiologists, a theoretical physicist, a mineralogist and a data scientist, have called it "the law of increasing functional information."
# The law applies to systems that form from numerous components — such as atoms, molecules and cells —which can be arranged and rearranged repeatedly and adopt multiple different configurations, according to the statement. The law also says these configurations are selected based on function, and only a few survive.
# theoretical biologist Stuart Kauffman, professor emeritus of biochemistry and biophysics at the University of Pennsylvania, said the study is a "superb, bold, broad,and transformational article,"[/i]
Fundamental Functions of information evolution :
Stability -- integrated components form a persisting system
Action -- systemic energy allows the system to move around, to forage
Novelty -- system can reproduce itself to form new systems.
Note --- Integrated Systems are holistic in their collective function
Missing Law of Evolution video
https://youtu.be/Gz1-ubJShNA?si=3uTorrUrokT0a1SP
Comments (154)
How would 'the universe' be, if the observable increases in complexity that gave rise to matter and then to life didn't hold? I expect we would never be in a position to know, because it has to be as it is to give rise to the kinds of worlds that accomodate beings such as ourselves. On the other hand, it might have been more organised, or even less organised, but we would never be in a position to make an empirical judgement about the comparative degree of organisation in different universes, as we couldn't ever compare them.
Lord Martin Rees, whose book Just Six Numbers is a well-known popular book on the cosmological constants, said “Given an immense amount of space and time, and the laws of physics and chemistry, an expanding variety of materials, environments and structures will emerge in the inanimate world,” said Prof Martin Rees.
“But I don’t see that this need be a manifestation of any new underlying principle analogous to the role of Darwinian selection via inheritance in the biological world.”
Synch by Strogatz is a pretty neat book on how different mathematical phenomena appear at different scales in a host of living and non-living phenomena. E.g., the mechanics behind the how heart cells synchronize a beat turns out to be similar to how Asian fireflies synchronize their blinking and how earthquakes form.
One thing to note here is the fractal recurrence. You have the same patterns repeating at both different scales and different levels of complexity/emergence. So, with life, you have information about the environment being encoded in genomes, but then again in nervous systems (at multiple levels), and then again in language, and then again in written texts, up to the human organizational level.
Selection-like effects have also already been studied vis-a-vis languages, corporate survival, state evolution, etc.
Right, but studies of these similarities do make specific predictions about each specific phenomena. What they note is that the mechanisms and mathematical descriptions are shockingly similar, in some ways modeled almost identically, at very different levels of scale and emergence. The finding arises from comparing specific predictive models, thus the prediction is "baked-in" already. The question is: if the mechanism by which complexity arises in bacteria evolution, autocatalysis, galaxy formation, ant hive construction, etc. is modeled similarly, doesn't that denote a larger general principle.
Mathematics is incredibly wide, and a lot of mathematics is developed precisely to model nature. The information theory and chaos theory/complexity revolutions are surprising because the patterns across disparate fields that don't seem like they should have anything in common end up looking shockingly similar.
Maybe this shouldn't be surprising, since the same "rules" are in effect, but it does speak to fractal recurrence as its own sort of "trait of the universe."
I'm not saying this "new law" is a law, or even a good idea. I just don't think the criticisms offered are actually giving it a fair shake.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2310223120
Some healthy skepticism as they were funded by the John Templeton foundation, founded with a partly religious aim? But an open one, and I see they funded the collating of Darwin's letters (many of which were to religious officials). I liked the letter where he said something about life being special, how if it was just microbes shaking about in the middle of the moon, would we think as much of it?
I wonder how this article may fit with what I was just posting about first order functionalism, they talk about first order selection. But firstly how are they making use of the idea of selection? Darwin used it by analogy to domestic breeding by humans. Possibly it also fit ok with the design arguments that were widely held then? But he meant it as just the relevant nature around an organism/population. But what does it mean in this broader astrophysics sense.
They say regarding persistence despite energy entropy
"Unlike static persistence, which only requires dissipation during formation, dynamic persistence requires active dissipation. Other functions—such as autocatalysis, homeostasis, and information processing—can emerge that prolong the act of dissipation through space and time. For example, self-replicating systems—including life as we know it—are necessarily autocatalytic; all else being equal, variations of such systems that have greater autocatalytic prowess will propagate faster and can be characterized as having a higher “dynamic kinetic stability”
Ok. By autocatalytic do they mean DNA develops into organisms and more DNA by itself?
"Perhaps the dominance of Darwinian thinking—the false equating of biological natural selection to “evolution” writ large—played some role. Yet that cannot be the whole story."
Darwin didn't say that the term evolution can't be applied to anything else, did he? He was just focusing on variation from parent to child, as a cause of speciation etc. He didn't yet know about DNA. Americans do seem to tend to have a real antipathy toward Darwin. Not just the religious fundamentalists. I suspect Darwin did overemphasise overpopulation and culling in the struggle between 'races', because he'd based ideas on Malthus. But he was quite anti-racism (his granddad Erasmus was a leading abolitionist, not to mention physician and botanical poet who changed the family crest to say "everything from shells" due to belief in evolution from sea). I read it was actually powerful racists from the USA who influenced institutions in the UK and this pressured Darwin in his later writings where he was less antiracist reportedly). Anyway
"A more deeply rooted factor in the absence of a law of evolution may be the reluctance of scientists to consider “function” and “context” in their formulations. A metric of information that is based on functionality suggests that considerations of the context of a system alters the outcome of a calculation, and that this context results in a preference for configurations with greater degrees of function. An asymmetric trajectory based upon functionality may seem antithetical to scientific analysis. Nevertheless, we conjecture that selection based on static persistence, dynamic persistence, and novelty generation is a universal process that results in systems with increased functional information.
Interesting. So where does this functionality come from (other than random asymmetries from the big bang).
Quoting Count Timothy von Icarus
Now you put it like that, I'm starting to see the point (and to be honest, I ought to have read more of the actual paper before responding.) It ties in with Wigner's 'unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics', does it not? And also with orthogenesis, it seems to me, which is said to have fallen out of favour, but which has always appealed to me.
I'll read the remainder of it before commenting further.
Quoting Danno
I have an antipathy towards neo-darwinian materialism, which draws many existential conclusions about life from scientific conjecture about its development (the subject of Thomas Nagel's 2011 book Mind and Cosmos). I have never had any doubt about the reality of evolution - I grew up on the superb Time Life books on naturalism in the 1960's - but I don't much like the role that neo-Darwinian theory, when allied with philosophical materialism, occupies in contemporary culture. But I'll admit, one of the reasons for my initial reaction to the paper was 'oh no, yet more darwinism' - in the sense that 'natural selection' seems to be a kind of omnibus principle that is now taken as a kind of master hypothesis. (There's been theory around called 'quantum darwinism' for some time already.)
The scientists involved didn't present their findings as a Theory of Everything, but merely one thing (a new law) to explain three things (novelty, stability, reproducibility) that were not covered by Darwin's biological theory, and not possible in view of the conventional Big Bang Theory.
The authors didn't mention Holism, perhaps to avoid criticism as a New Age notion. But the proposed "law" is definitely not Reductive. Because it envisions functions of collective Systems that are not characteristic of their individual components. For example, traditional Atoms evolved by simple addition, but this law allows evolution by multiplication.
I expect that this theory of creative complexification will be quickly accepted as evidence for various religious doctrines. And it will be difficult to translate into empirical evidence. But the proof of the philosophical pudding will be in its explanatory power. Besides, the term Holism was originally presented in a scientific evolutionary context, not as a buzzword for Hinduism or Buddhism or
Taoism. :smile:
Quote from Cornell-Carnegie description above
the new ‘law of increasing functional information’ states that complex natural systems evolve to states of greater patterning, diversity, and complexity
Essentially, Hegel is right. There are contradictions internal to systems. Their representation of the world is at odds with it. Thus, they need to absorb, to sublated the contradictions. It's a sort of selection process.
Quoting Gnomon
I don't get the motivation why complex natural systems would ever want to 'evolve' into anything else if they already survive as they are. This is not a given. Most existent species will never evolve into anything else. Man will never become superman.
Perhaps I'm looking at this too much in a Darwinian sense of evolution being just one possible version of natural adaptation to an unpredictably changing world. Darwin started from a simple mathematical feature of all random statistical variation of traits becoming the effective connection between genetic inheritance and the unknowable physical world. Those that are not already adapted by chance die off. Where does information come into play?
I was sceptical first up, but having started to read it, I'm coming around to it.
Thank you. The problem I have is the same mentioned by . Darwin tried to sell natural selection by pointing out that selective breeding of animals and plants was an established practice already. For artificial selection there is a human breeder who is selector for some trait. But natural evolution is on autopilot, it is purely a discrete non-continuous mathematical system that responds time-to-time however it can to an independent therefore unknowable environment. Artificial selection of trait or function is directed by a God-like agent. Darwinian natural law relies on a Platonic mathematical statistical intermediary that automatically relates two unlike realms without the need for a selector other than de facto survival.
I suppose examples from organic and biochemistry might be more convincing but that would be still more technical. But then again I probably still don't understand what the authors are saying.
Thanks. I will appreciate your fair & balanced report on the technical paper. I have only read the news articles that summarized the original study. I got the impression that this was not a report on a specific scientific empirical experiment, but a philosophical analysis of general observational evidence.
Nevertheless, my takeaway is that it supports the philosophical and scientific approach to the physical world that is encapsulated in the concept of Holism (and Systems Theory)*1. Despite its first modern application to causes of Evolution, I don't view Holism as an empirical scientific theory. Instead, it's a rational philosophical hypothesis*2. It attempts to "establish causation" in the Aristotelian sense of Final & Formal causes, not in the physical sense of Material causes : post hoc ergo propter hoc.
This new study probably won't satisfy those who demand empirical proof for any generalized concept. Science deals with Specific Facts, while Philosophy is focused on Universal Principles. Besides its support from the Templeton Foundation*2 will blemish its findings with rumors of religious bias. :smile:
*1. Systems theory is the transdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or human-made. ___Wikipedia
*2. Why is holism not scientific? :
However, holistic explanations do not establish causation because they do not examine behaviour in terms of operationalised variables that can be manipulated and measured. This means that holistic explanations are view as unscientific
https://www.tutor2u.net/psychology/reference/issues-debates-evaluating-the-holism-and-reductionism-debate
Note --- This is why I would characterize Holism as a philosophical approach to complex questions, not a scientific fact for specific applications. It produces plausible "explanations" not "operationalised" tools for physical manipulation and measurement.
*3. John Templeton Foundation :
the Foundation is, and always has been, run in accordance with the wishes of Sir John Templeton Sr, who laid very strict criteria for its mission and approach", that it is "a non-political entity with no religious bias" and it "is totally independent of any other organisation and therefore neither endorses, nor contributes to political candidates, campaigns, or movements of any kind"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Templeton_Foundation
Note --- JTF does have an explicit bias toward encouraging "human flourishing".
It's erroneous on it's face.
I guess it depends in how you define complexity. For instance, how should we weigh decreasing bio-diversity against increases in human cultural and technological complexity?
Quoting Wayfarer
I love how the the authors locate the ‘true’ meaning of human cultural products like art and literature in evolutionary adaptivity, a purpose only indirectly connected to the expressed or implicit motivation of the artist, but outside the bounds of their awareness. This true meaning grounds itself in an origin depicted as the universal lawfulness of empirical objectivity. The theological thinking of origin as the pure self-persistence of law is evident here, which is why Kierkegaard scholar Mark C Taylor embraced similar ideas in his 1999 book, The Moment of Complexity.
I’ve often felt like asking, is the idea that evolutionary biology tends towards higher levels of intelligence within the scope of evolutionary theory? I discussed this on the previous forum at some length and the response was always dismissive. It seems to be, ‘sure, evolution happened to produce h. Sapiens, but it also gave rise to many other species and kinds of life that have persisted across far greater time-scales.’ Again the idea is that of fortuitous origins, and again I fail to see how that is justified by science. I think it more likely reflects the ‘conflict thesis’ of Victorian culture than anything in science itself.
One of the news items on the article says
It seems implicitly value-laden (and, so, teleological) - what does ‘well’ mean, in this context? What is ‘an improvement’? Why is it that persistence of increased complexity is a desideratum? If so, who wants it? It seems to imply ‘working towards an outcome’. It’s very much like Schopenhauer’s ‘blind will’.
Fortunately for the theory of evolution, it is not "the idea that life, or for that matter cosmic order, is a chance occurrence". The theory of evolution is supported by an enormous amount of scientific evidence, which is being added to daily. I recommend giving that evidence some serious consideration if you want to know yourself better.
Quoting Wayfarer
Of course. Abilities like being able to outrun, outclimb, outhink... tend to be adaptive. Why would you think otherwise?
Adaption to the environment is a different thing to general intelligence. General intelligence may provide for greater versatility, but it saying that is all that it does rather sells it short.
I know evolutionary biology quite well, but it’s also often used in support of philosophical arguments that are well beyond the scope of the theory itself. Although you would have to have some appreciation of philosophy, as distinct from science, to appreciate that, I expect.
Yes, there are an enormous number of ways to be adapted to environments.
Quoting Wayfarer
Did anyone say that in this thread? I'm fairly confident that nobody did.
Often before, I've seen a lot of the sort of straw manning you are doing here. I find it really tiresome. I'd appreciate if you could try to cut back on the habit.
Quoting Wayfarer
I suppose "quite well" is relative to one's own perspective. Your comments show that there is a lot of room for improvement.
Quoting Wayfarer
That is quite a conceit.
Look up a book called Chance and Necessity: An Essay in the Natural Philosophy of Biology, Jacques Monod. He was a Nobel prize winning biochemist, and that book, published 1970, articulates the argument that life arises as a consequence of pure chance. It's a very tightly-argued book and quite influential. '...chance alone is at the source of every innovation, and of all creation in the biosphere. Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, at the very root of the stupendous edifice of evolution..'
That's what I mean by 'chance occurence'. It is not at all unique to Monod, although he articulated it very thoroughly. But you find many similar ideas in 20th century thought.
Quoting flannel jesus
It's actually not as straightforward as it seems. There is a concept called the protein hyperspace. Proteins are made up of long chains of amino acids that fold into complex three-dimensional structures. The process of folding is determined by the sequence of amino acids and their chemical interactions. Because there are 20 standard amino acids, the number of possible combinations and resulting structures for even a small protein is astronomically high—hence a "hyperspace" of potential structures. But of these, only a minute fraction of possible formations can form viable proteins. If it were a matter of pure chance, there is not enough time in the history of the cosmos for all of them to be formed, so if left to chance alone, the chances of them forming are astronomically slight. There are other similar anomolies cosmology and biology. It doesn't mean 'god did it', but it does throw shade on the appeal to chance as any kind of formative hypothesis. I think Monod's kind of argument only makes sense as a counter to a rather simplistic form of creationist theory - that pure chance and deliberate intention are the only two possibilities available.
Quoting flannel jesus
That's the kind of dichotomy underlying the whole debate. Obviously it's a vexed issue and the source of many arguments, and I have hashed it out here for many years. I will say I'm reasonably conversant with scientific cosmology and evolutionary biology and would never challenge the empirical facts of the matter. But there's also the meaning of the facts to consider. In the case of evolution, we're not only the objects of analysis, we're also subjects of experience, and there is more to human existence than what is determined solely by biology. I do say from time to time that in some vital sense h. sapiens transcends biology, by being able to grasp domains of being that are not perceivable by simpler organisms. You can call that a religious sentiment if you like, but it's not aligned with any type of creation theory.
To go back to the article in the OP (still haven't finished it yet!), as I think I mentioned, I'm quite interested in the hypothesis of 'orthogenesis'. This is the theory that evolution has an overall direction - towards greater intelligence, say. It is widely viewed as discredited, but I wonder how you would validate or falsify such an hypothesis. But I do consider the idea that the evolution of rational sentient beings is in some sense purposeful - doesn't mean that some super-designer set out to execute a plan.
My skim of the article suggests no distinction.
There is at least a suggestion around that the complexity of human style intelligence is more like a peacock's feathers, than a genuine step forward in survival ability. (an explanation of the lack of intelligent alien civilisations). On the other hand, if one were looking for the fantastic complexity of the Amazon rain forest ecosystem up in the sky, one might never find it though it could be quite common. I would ask my pet dinosaur about this, but she died.
One might conclude, that when evolution takes a particular direction, it tends to be an arms race or a beauty pageant, rather than a move towards a general goal, and such directions commonly lead to fragility to environmental change, where more simple organisms and ecosystems will have the advantage.
It's not a proposed law of physics, as such, but of nature, more generally. They're attempting to identity what disparate complex phenomena have in common, what are the principles that lead to the growth of complexity and information-encoding capacity in very different kinds of systems where an “evolving system” is a "collective phenomenon of many interacting components that displays a temporal increase in diversity, distribution, and patterned behavior."
[quote=Commentary; https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1004265]The new work presents a modern addition — a macroscopic law recognizing evolution as a common feature of the natural world’s complex systems, which are characterised as follows:
* They are formed from many different components, such as atoms, molecules, or cells, that can be arranged and rearranged repeatedly
* Are subject to natural processes that cause countless different arrangements to be formed
* Only a small fraction of all these configurations survive in a process called “selection for function.” [/quote]
There's more to it than "stuff happens".
Something that occurs to me, though, is that 'selection' is a transitive verb. It implies a sense of agency - that something is doing the selecting. I'll have to think about that some more.
"What more?", is the question I am asking. I'm suggesting basically that it is merely an aspect of entropy:- order decreases <—> information increases. A universe of hydrogen has nothing else to do, but make heavier atoms; life can't get going until carbon oxygen nitrogen etc are formed, life can only start simple and get more complicated. What am I missing that they are saying? Electronics start simple and get complicated, because ...?
that none of this is implied by or can be justified on the basis of currently-understood natural law, which they quote at the head of the paper. As you no doubt recall, the second law of thermodynamics has it that entropy always increases, the total order of a system decreases. Here is a proposal to explain why despite this, the total information density (a measure of order) of the universe increases. At least that is my gloss on it. (I stalled at the section with the equations, as always :yikes: )
For my own convenience, here are the bullet points from the article, and some comments from the authors and some from me
1.
EG. Dynamite is fairly stable until a spark of energy favours its rapid decomposition into more stable (lower energy} configurations of CO2 and other byproducts with the release of dissipating shockwaves and heat. This is a combination of Newton's first law, and entropy.
2.
This is the beginnings of systems theory, expressed in terms of an elaboration of the law of entropy. A hurricane is formed from temperature inversions from some random fluctuation in the first instance and 'functions' to transfer hot air from the lower atmosphere to the upper, because hot air is lighter. when it runs out of hot air at sea level, it slowly dissipates.
3.
This seems definitional/tautological, or else plain false. But an example can give the sense of it, I think:
Experiment: take an uncapped bottle of water and invert it, creating an analogue of the temperature inversion of the atmosphere; the water wants to fall out and the air has to get in. The result is a chaotic series of "glugs" as first some water comes out an then some air gets in. Time how long it takes to reach the stable lower energy of the water all in the sink and the bottle full of air. Now repeat the experiment but this time as the bottle is inverted, give it a swirling shake to initiate a whirlpool effect. The bottle will empty smoothly and much faster. The dynamic system of the whirlpool increases the entropic energy flow, by introducing a dynamic system of order. the whirlpool once initiated is self sustaining as long as the potential energy of water in the bottle persists.
4.
This is largely speculative, if not mere wishful thinking. This is as good as it seems to get:
So there might be a top down pressure from the environment against the surplus of intelligence that can destroy the ecological balance that supports it. This by way of my own warning to shareholders, that "prices can go down as well as up" - and complexity also, as every dinosaur knows. In the case of dinosaurs they did not engineer their own demise, because either they hadn't the intelligence, or their arms were too short to manipulate the environment effectively.
5.
BUT:
All in all this is disappointingly hand wavy and vague, equations notwithstanding, and as far as I can see is far less rigorous and convincing than the Bateson book I have started to discuss here, where a close examinations of how causality operates in complex systems (defined in terms of causal loops) such that a change anywhere in the loop has effects on every other part of the loop. The concept of 'functional information' is related to but less clearly distinguished than Bateson's "difference that makes a difference".
I'm afraid it all looks like physics envy, allied to loose use of metaphor. This is systems analysis masquerading as fundamental physics when it is quite patently emergent physics. Read Bateson, chaps, this is all derivative and the original is clearer and more challenging to the current philosophy of science.
I agree that Darwin's word-choice of "selection"*1, to describe how Evolution works, inadvertently implied some "agency"*2 doing the choosing from among the options, both fit & unfit, generated by random mutations. His model for "selection" was the artificial evolution of domesticated animals suitable for human purposes. But the notion of natural selection suggests some kind of universal teleological agency programming the mechanisms of Evolution to work toward an inscrutable Final Cause : the output of evolution.
Ironically, most scientists emphasized the role of Random Accidents (lawless Chaos) to provide the physical variants from which Nature could choose, in order to construct the law-abiding Cosmos we see around us. The article linked below*3 refers to the implicit intentional agency of evolution who created "deterministic constraints", equivalent to Natural Laws, but who is the Natural Lawgiver? :smile:
*1. Evolutionary Selection :
Darwin and other scientists of his day argued that a process much like artificial selection happened in nature, without any human intervention. He argued that natural selection explained how a wide variety of life forms developed over time from a single common ancestor.
https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/natural-selection/
*2. Agency : In very general terms, an agent is a being with the capacity to act, and ‘agency’ denotes the exercise or manifestation of this capacity. The philosophy of action provides us with a standard conception and a standard theory of action. The former construes action in terms of intentionality, the latter explains the intentionality of action in terms of causation by the agent’s mental states and events.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/agency/
*3. Randomness isn't random :
A useful analogy can be made with the role of randomness in evolution. Darwin was not the first biologist to suggest that species changed over long periods of time. His two new fundamental ideas were that (1) the changes arose through random genetic variation, and (2) changes that enhanced the organism's ability to survive and reproduce would be preserved, while maladaptive changes would be eliminated by natural selection. Doubters of evolution often consider only the first point, about the randomness of natural variation, but not the second point, about the systematic action of natural selection. They make statements such as, “the development of a complex organism like Homo sapiens via random chance would be like a whirlwind blowing through a junkyard and spontaneously assembling a jumbo jet out of the scrap metal.” The flaw in this type of reasoning is that it ignores the deterministic constraints on the results of random processes.
https://phys.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Conceptual_Physics/Book%3A_Conceptual_Physics_(Crowell)/14%3A_Quantum_Physics/14.01%3A_Rules_of_Randomness
Only if one elects to remain ignorant as to what biologists mean by natural selection.
Personal comments on topics of the OP :
1. Fitness : Darwin's biological criteria for Fitness was limited to living creatures. But this Information-based “fitness” includes all elements of the physical world. And could be extended to cover the meta-physical (Life & Mind) aspects of the world. For living organisms, fitness is Health (literally Wholeness). A broader definition of Fitness is Wholeness or Integrity or Functional Organization.
2. Selection : To select or choose functional outcomes is contrasted with random or accidental change. A selection is motivated by a future-directed input of Causation.
To select =
a> carefully choose as being the best or most suitable.
b> (of a group of people or things) carefully chosen from a larger number as being the best or most valuable.
3. Function : A process directed toward some defined goal or purpose. A functional relation is a meaningful connection between information inputs and outputs. What is the function of a non-living or non-thinking thing? This could only apply to evolution if the process is directional, not random.
Examples : Mind is the function of Brain. Organization & Complexity are functions of Evolution.
4. Relation : A functional interconnection or bond or alliance with other entities. A complex organism is bonded or merged into an interrelated system by mutual purpose : correlation of direction toward a final state. Single elements are inert, and have no purpose, only action & reaction. Organisms share energy inputs to redirect reactions toward fitness of the system. A whole or integrated or interrelated System has multiple parts that work together toward some goal, beginning with continuation of the system over time.
5. Information : To Inform is to provide an essential or formative principle or quality to something. ___Oxford Languages
Formative Principle :
[i]a> of or relating to formation, development, or growth
b> the active, determining principle or law defining a thing.[/i]
Qualia : instances of subjective, conscious experience.
I'm not a Biologist. And not "ignorant" of the official biological application of "Selection". For philosophical purposes, I'm not bound to that physically focused meaning. See my post above for an alternative philosophical metaphysical definition of cosmic selection, that is not limited to living creatures, as mentioned in the OP articles. :smile:
Quote from OP :
# "The team's notion of fitness beyond biology is "really subtle, complex and wonderful," Stuart Kauffman adds".
Then to be clear you ought to use distinct terminology. (I suggest "gnatural selection".) You wouldn't want anyone to get the impression that you are talking about the same thing as scientifically informed people are talking about.
Speaking of metaphor.....
Quoting wonderer1
Interesting that one of the first mentions of the term in the linked article encloses it in quotations:
In the Origin of Species, Darwin wrote:
(Emphasis added). It's a metaphor, yet at the same time central to the theory. I think this lives on in the popular mind where we speak of the 'wonders' of evolution, as if evolution itself were an agent, when in reality, the only agents in the frame are organisms themselves.
As the Wikipedia I linked says: [My emphasis.]
It is mostly a matter of teleological language being more expedient for conveying things evolutionary. It is much more linguistically cumbersome to discuss natural selection ateliologically. Teleology isn't central to the theory, as the scare quotes around "selects for" indicate.
I assume it was Gnomon who you were categorizing as "ignorant" of Science. And the imputation of Agency as non-scientific. Please note that Darwin's Artificial Selection required intentional agents (humans) to make the teleological (I want more of this good stuff) choices that resulted in today's artificial soft sweet corn, instead of the natural hard-kernel starchy maize.
Also note that the authors, of the article this thread is based on, are professional scientists*1 ; so I must assume that they are "scientifically informed people". But they didn't bother to redefine the word "selection"*2 ; they only broadened its application from the Biology-of-living-things to everything else in the natural world, from Cosmology to Mineralogy. Maybe even Psychology was a product of natural selection. Or do you think Mind Functions were a cosmic accident?
However, since you feel the need for a new name for the cosmic process, by which Nature evolves novel Functions from older Forms, how about "Universal Selection", or "General Selection", or "Post-Darwinian Natural Selection"*3, as opposed to the "Special Selection" of Darwin's biological application? Are those Universal Laws too philosophical for you?*4 Are "functions" (how things work) too immaterial for your materialistically "informed" taste? :smile:
PS___The article did not imply an unconventional meaning of the verb "to select". They merely noted that the object of selection was not mere matter, but operational Functions of the various forms of matter.
FUNCTION Meaning: "one's proper work or purpose; power of acting in a specific proper way," https://www.etymonline.com/word/function
Artificial selection is an evolutionary process in which humans consciously select for or against particular features in organisms – for example, by choosing which individuals to save seeds from or breed from one generation to the next.
https://evolution.berkeley.edu/lines-of-evidence/artificial-selection/
What is agency in biology?
Agency is defined by Webster's dictionary as “the capacity to act or exert power”, and in robotics and AI research a system that can act in any way in response to environmental stimuli is sometimes considered agential. But in biology, typically something more is demanded.
https://www.templeton.org/discoveries/agency-in-biology
Quotes from OP :
*1. # The research team behind the law, which included philosophers, astrobiologists, a theoretical physicist, a mineralogist and a data scientist, have called it "the law of increasing functional information."
*2. # The law also says these configurations are selected based on function, and only a few survive.
*3. # And, some say evolution is strictly about Darwinian natural selection and common descent, Hazen says. But, "I'm talking about diversification and patterning through time" from one stage to the next,
*4. # "You have a universe that keeps mixing things up and then trying out new possibilities," Hazen says, adding that it encompasses biological evolution, too. Things that work are selected for, he adds. "That works on nonliving worlds, and it works on living worlds. It's just a natural process that seems to be universal."
MODERN SWEET CORN artificially evolved to suit human taste
[quote=op]You have a universe that keeps mixing things up and then trying out new possibilities," Hazen says, adding that it encompasses biological evolution, too. Things that work are selected for, he adds. "That works on nonliving worlds, and it works on living worlds. It's just a natural process that seems to be universal."[/quote]
What I fail to understand at bottom is how this new principle or law or whatever it is is something other than the law of entropy. Energy dissipates, disorder/information increases. this allows that life, or a hurricane can produce temporary order that functions to increase total entropy.
The confusion I think arises for many through a misunderstanding of information and its relation to complexity. Maximal order is minimal total information. Everything starts simple and gets more complex and order is simplicity. "functional information" ( as opposed to "total information") is just that temporary ordering of the entropic flow that spontaneously arises by chance, because it 'eases' the flow.
Thought experiment.
Imagine a flask of gas an isolated system an equal mix of CO2 and O2 separated by an impermeable but insubstantial barrier the whole at standard temperature and pressure. The total information of the system includes the position, velocity and identity of each molecule but the identity information is highly ordered and compressible to " all the molecules on this side are oxygen, and all the molecules on that side are CO2. The magic barrier functions to maintain this order so in effect there are two isolated systems at energy equilibrium.
Now remove the magic barrier without disturbing the gasses. They will start to diffuse into each other by the random movement of the molecules, until they are completely randomly positioned. This will be the new equilibrium of the now single system, and total information required will have increased because each molecule will have to be identified individually. Total information increases as disorder increases; The information is trivial and meaningless; for human purposes, "the gasses are mixed" is all we care about.
Edit: Functional information, which is information we care about (aka a difference that makes a difference{to someone}) is information about order which is to say about disequilibrium and therefore exploitable energy. The details of a state of equilibrium are un exploitable and therefore useless.
An omniscient being would gain no information from the removal of the barrier because he would know from the layout of the molecules exactly what would occur once the barrier is removed. The information contained in the divided state would therefore be no different from the mixed state because the expected result of the mixture would inform from the divided state.
We learn from dividing an atom the explosion that would follow, but we can also be said to have known some the result prior ot the division. This would seem to be the crux of the intelligent designer's position, which is that impregnated into every simple system is that complexity will emerge, leading some to the conclusion that the result of the interaction was knowable, predictable, and therefore (and this is the questionable part) planned.
Even assuming indeterminism, I think you're still left with the idea that prior to a chaotic state you have the same complexity as a controlled state, simply because we don't challenge that State A (equilibrium) caused State B (chaos), even in an indeterminate way.
I just see State A as describing a predictable pattern of variable interaction and State B as not, but both have just as much information.
Oxymoronic warning. Please don't make stuff up about entropy (or God) unless you really do understand it.
Knowing Euclid's definitions and axioms does not entail knowing Pythagorus' theorem even though it 'follows' from them. The information of the theorem has to be 'unfolded' from the axioms by a particular series of steps that are not specified by the axioms themselves. Similarly, the unfolding of physical processes in time produces new information even if that information is predetermined. If you like, existence is the unfolding of God's omniscience.
The OP articles didn't mention Entropy specifically, but you may have a good point : to include "energy dissipation" as a necessary investment in evolutionary progress. That's how the "new law" works to transform an older adequate configuration into a novel & durable functional form*1. The "temporary disorder" is the price Nature pays for a step-up in functional value. For example, the disorderly Plasma of the Big Bang was essentially formless, and good for nothing but raw material for conversion into stable particles of elementary matter.
Energy per se causes Change (novelty), but Change/Novelty per se is not informative unless it produces a persistent function or meaning. Dissipation is not a good thing unless it leaves behind a stable form of organization, which is the payoff for the expenditure of Energy. As Entropy of a system temporarily increases, local organization may permanently increase, but only if the novel form fills a functional need for the environment of the system. Otherwise, the energy would be wasted. :smile:
# “The Universe generates novel combinations of atoms, molecules, cells, etc. Those combinations that are stable and can go on to engender even more novelty will continue to evolve. This is what makes life the most striking example of evolution, but evolution is everywhere.”
*1. Entropy (information theory) :
In information theory, the entropy of a random variable is the average level of "information", "surprise", or "uncertainty" inherent to the variable's possible outcomes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_(information_theory)
Note --- what's "surprising" about the transformation of a prior orderly state to a later organized state is the novelty that we define as meaningful or transformational Information : the difference that makes a familiar thing into an unfamiliar thing, or to force the observer to see an old thing from a new perspective.
Quoting unenlightened
Yes! "Functional Information" may make a difference to the material Universe, in terms of advancing the physical evolution of the Cosmic System. But, in order to be meaningful (something we "care about"), the change must have some positive effect on a human mind. We upright apes have learned to "exploit" the available Energy of our local physical system to serve our own physical fortunes (e.g. technology), and in hopes of advancing our metaphysical interests.
For living creatures, "equilibrium" is not a good thing. Like sharks, who are said to "swim or die", we humans must evolve or die-out. As a species, we survive by learning better ways to exploit the resources of the world, and to avoid repeating past mistakes, such as incomplete carbon exploitation that leaves behind toxic substances. Human technology has accelerated the progress & stability of evolution, but also the digress & instability --- hence we progress or die. In terms of "things we care about" it's metaphysical evolution, the subject matter of Philosophy. :nerd:
Quote from OP :
# the new ‘law of increasing functional information’ states that complex natural systems evolve to states of greater patterning, diversity, and complexity
Quoting unenlightened
Interesting. Would Mary learn something new when she saw red if Mary were God?
I'll have to think about that one. Omniscience entails knowledge of everything and if certain knowledge is only knowable through experience, then we'd have to say that omniscience entails omni-experience, meaning you'd have had to experience everything to know everything, but it seems a limitation on God to require he do something to know something.
As to the logical implications entailed by certain axioms, I do think they'd be immediately known to an omniscient being. I also don't see that as an example of an unfolding because it's just the drawing out of logical deductions, not the revelation through empirical means.
Quoting unenlightened
The crux of my disagreement is that you make order synonymous with simplicity and chaos synonymous with chaos. Under this view, the primordial pre-bang mass woudl be the most perfect example of order and what followed the big bang would be that of increasing chaos. My position is that order is not simple, but within it all possibliites are contained.
Quoting unenlightened
How does that follow? Information is ordered, isn't it?
Quoting Hanover
It's not my theory. It's Shannon's.
Quoting Wayfarer
I understand this claim, it seems intuitively true, but it isn't, the opposite is true, and the thought experiment above was intended to convince you. I'll have another go.
Consider a computer image let's say 100 by 100 pixels, black and white so 10,000 bits. There are a lot of different ways this can be ordered; I will consider one simple one, where the bottom half is a repeat of the top half. It is surely immediately clear, that the information content is halved?
And any order involves repetition with or without reflection, inversion, negation, etc. and any repetion is a reduction in the information. This is the principle that allows data compression. The information that we are interested in is almost always ordered and structured, and to the extent it is ordered, it can be compressed. the result of compression is a smaller less ordered amount of information that decompresses to the original file (we hope, barring copy errors).
If the same image is repeated twice, then I suppose the same information is presented twice. But the correct comparision is between any image and random number of pixels with no image. Isn't it the case that the latter contains, and therefore conveys, no information?
No it isn't the case. What is the case is that you are not interested in the information, but in the patterns and orders. But if you happened to be a computer, you would read that random pattern like a QR code.
Can't see it. If I zero out a hard drive, then it's physically the same as a hard drive with a thousand gigabytes of information. But there is no order. A 'random pattern' is oxymoronic, as patterns are by definition not random, but ordered. A pattern is 1. a repeated design 'decorate with a repeated design.
"he was sitting on a soft carpet patterned in rich colours"
2. give a regular or intelligible form to.
"the brain not only receives information, but interprets and patterns it"
No, there is perfect order, like a blank piece of paper. Perfect order, and no information. The singularity before the bang. Information is written onto a piece of paper or onto a hard drive, bringing disorder to perfect symmetry. I sense your shock and dismay, but it is just a change of view.
You're right, but wrong about this. the order is pre-specified as "a square of pixels 100 by 100 each either black or white" . So any combination whatsoever that you see as 'random' can be read as a unique meaningful image by a computer - a language of 2 raised to the power of 10,000 words. That's a huge number.
Nothing is meaningful to a computer, though. You could program the computer to register any combination of pixels as a representation, but that would require an intentional act on the part of the programmer.
It might help to make it clearer if you substitute 'arrangement' or 'configuration' for 'pattern'. The amount of information required to specify the positions of and relations between an ordered arrangement is obviously less than the information required to specify a random arrangement.
In cosmology the idea is that the microwave background state, which is believed to have been almost entirely uniform can be described much more simply than the subsequent states of galaxy and star formation.
So, the information has obviously increased in the latter case due to the initially minor variations becoming magnified over time. It is only energy that allows the formation of "islands" of relative order or negentropy, such as galaxies, stars, solar systems, planets and, of course, organisms. The theory is that disorder will increase as energy is dissipated and the entire universe has pulled apart and reached thermal equilibrium, a state in which particles will be scattered in a disorderly way everywhere.
You know the famous anecdote of how the relationship between entropy and information theory was drawn, right? John Von Neumann was a professional colleague of Shannon.
From here.
Unfortunately knowledge of that anecdote tends to undermine the advantage!
In any case, Shannon’s famous information theory is specific to a context, namely, the transmission of information via a medium. It was his work, as you said, which made data compression possible. But I’m failing to see the relevance that has to the general relationship between order and entropy.
As I understand it, entropy is a measure of the degree of disorder or randomness in a system. An increase in entropy typically corresponds to a decrease in order: as a system becomes more disordered, its entropy increases. Conversely, when a system is more ordered, its entropy is lower. This concept is a cornerstone of the second law of thermodynamics, which states that the total entropy of an isolated system can never decrease over time.
So far so good?
In information theory, the information content of a message is related to its unpredictability or its entropy (per Shannon). A completely random set of symbols contains a lot of potential information but it does not contain meaningful structure or order.
For example, if rocks are arranged to spell out a message, the specific arrangement reduces the entropy of the system in terms of its information content because it is now a highly ordered state compared to a random pile. The ordered arrangement conveys meaning (information) to someone who can interpret the pattern of rocks as letters and understands the language. So in this context, the order is directly related to the ability to convey information.
In summary, while high entropy (disorder) suggests high information content in terms of unpredictability, meaningful information is actually conveyed through ordered and structured arrangements that have lower entropy compared to a random state. So, greater information content corresponds with lower entropy.
Again, this is against the background of information transmission and error correction.
Aha, now I’m getting it:
Quoting unenlightened
That would be minimum total information required to encode and transmit that information.
Like, if you wanted to encode and transmit white noise, you couldn’t do it, because it would be computationally irreducible, as there is no pattern or repetition to capture. You would need to send a 1:1 reproduction of that exact white noise. But, given written information, then you can reduce a very large body of text, because you’re able to assume grammar, vocabulary and syntax which can be used to represent that text. That’s what makes it compressible. That’s what Shannon’s law enabled and why it was fundamental to what came to be known as data compression (which we’re all using every second on these devices).
Have a look at @Gnomon’s OP, he does a good job of capturing some of the key points. Also that post from @Joshs about Kaufmann. (I bought Kaufmann’s book At Home in the Universe in the 1990’s but it contained too much heavy-duty biological science for my limited education ;-) )
As anyone will know, I’m fiercely opposed to physicalist reductionism, but for some reason this paper doesn’t ring true for me. I suppose, from a philosophical perspective, a critique of reductionism needs to be much simpler than trying to prove a kind of ‘law of increasing complexity’ operating throughout the Universe. Can’t quite put my finger on why yet, but that’s my feeling at this point.
I think the more appropriate question is, does God learn something new if Mary sees red. It appears necessary that God must learn something new every time a person learns something new, because God must learn that the person has learned.
This is similar to the problem Augustine addressed concerning the apparent contradiction between a human being's free will, and God's omniscience. Simply put, the idea of an omniscient God appears to imply determinism. Yet human experience appears to justify "free will". I don't think that Augustine came up with a satisfactory answer to this problem, only suggesting that the nature of time is very difficult for us to understand. And I think that's the lesson we ought to learn from problems like this, that we do not have a very good understanding of time.
This is why "experience" is such an important part of knowledge. We can make all sorts of speculations, hypotheses, and theories about the nature of time, but the only way to actually understand the passing of time is by analyzing one's own experience. This is the aspect of knowledge which is provided by experience, which cannot be derived from any other principles, the role of time.
Where you say "Maximal order is minimal total information," it implies information is an element within a system as opposed to an element within a person's understanding. A more correct statement is that maximum order has a maximum level of predictability and therefore requires fewer binary bits of questions to accurately predict outcome, and thus demands less information. That is, the higher the entropy level, the less predictable the next result, therefore a person is less informed of what will happen next based upon the information he has?
It's not that ordered systems are composed of less underlying causes or actions than an entropic one. It's that entropic ones just require more information to predict results of that system.
This is where I think we're disagreeing, which was in what I took (perhaps mistakenly ??) to be meant by your term "simple," as if something inherent in the composition of ordered systems was less dynamic than in entropic ones.
I think it would be accurate to say that an observation of a chaotic event would yield less information to the observer in terms of what is needed for accurate predictability than an ordered one, not vice versa.
This discussion of entropy therefore doesn't lend itself to the evolutionary debate as I think you suggest, which I took to be that evolution was just another iteration of law of entropy in that it revealed more complex systems from simpler ones.
My position is that complexity in evolutionary biology references the organism's higher levels of organization from a functional level and employs concepts like "organization" and "complexity" quite differently. We would not say a human is more complex than an amoeba because the human is more entropic.
This only works if free will is knowledge itself, but I don't think God can't know everything, including what is not known by any person currently. That is, God wouldn't necessarily know if Mary was ever going to choose to step outside and see red under your argument, assuming that was purely a function of her free will, but he would know what Mary will learn upon seeing red, even if Mary never does see red.
God could know the result of every unrealized hypothetical, though. He just couldn't know which choice we're going to make if you believe pre-knowledge entails determinism and therefore negates free will.
I don't see the critical problem of free will to be how we can make it compatible with omniscience (which is really the free will/determinism debate recast), but how it makes sense at all as an uncaused cause. I also don't see how it makes sense to say we don't have free will either, so I just hold it fundamental to the understanding, like time and space.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/meet-the-money-behind-the-climate-denial-movement-180948204/
Yes.computers manipulate information; we provide the meaning. The billionth decimal iteration of pi has a value between 0 and 9, and it means nothing to me, but it is a piece of information.
Conversely there is an elaborate machine that generates completely meaningless random numbers with balls being stirred by paddles called a lottery machine: a bunch of completely random numbers that becomes life transforming for the lucky winner. We supply the meaning, the machine the information
Quoting Wayfarer
Exactly so. total disorder = maximal information.
Order = redundancy.
Now when it is a matter of communication, such wot us is doin' 'ere. sum dundency is agoodthing, cos my mean ing will be 'stood even iv i mean lots of mystics. If a single typo or grammatical error destroyed the entire communication of a post, this forum would be much much quieter.
Quoting Wayfarer
We are of one mind here. I was disappointed. There seemed to be nothing new at all and just this equivocation between meaning and information that actually reduced life to mere physical phenomena like whirlpools.
By contrast, Bateson equates life and mind with meaning and clearly distinguishes meaning, a difference that makes a difference (to an organism) from mere information such as what one hopes to forget as soon as the exams are over.
I have just posted his totally definitive take-down of the fundamentals of behaviourism— a joy! Fear-not, @Wayfarer, Bateson and I are on your side, and Bateson is a very special and deep thinker.
That necessitates a division between thinking and choosing. It's part of the reasoning which led Augustine to propose a three part intellect, memory, reason, and will. The will, as "choice" in your example, does not necessarily follow the thought in a cause/effect manner. So the result of a thought cannot be said to be the choice, as there is a separation between these two which allows the choice to be inconsistent with the reasoning.
It really doesn't solve the problem though, because if the choice does not follow directly from the reasoning, as necessitated by the reasoning, then it must be "caused" by something else. If God knows everything, then God must know what that other cause is, or will be, prior to it occurring, and this entails determinism.
If the will is truly free, and God does not know the choice which will be made, prior to it being made, then the choice is caused by something which God does not know. This prevents the possibility of God knowing everything. To maintain this premise, that God does know everything, we'd have to allow that the choice is not caused. This would imply random uncaused actions. That's how I interpret what you say here, that freely willed choices are not known by God, who knows everything knowable, therefore they are unknowable, as completely random, uncaused actions. Or would you propose another category of actions which are unknowable to God who knows everything, but in some way still caused. The cause would be outside the realm of "everything".
Kudos on your review of possibilities.
I'd add a few observations.
First, as metaphysical entities gods to my view can in fact "know" the outcome of random events (which, of course are unknowable to physical entities like humans and computers). For example being able to fool gods with card tricks and coin flips is considered ludicrous to theists and most atheists.
Secondly, humans clearly have a robust ability to make quick decisions in cases with equal supporting data for each choice, or no data whatsoever. This is commonly glossed over by Determinists. Thus there clearly is a separate process from that of memory and reasoning. Whether this is called Will or randomness or whathaveyou doesn't matter but it does explain why to my way of thinking, antecedent state X can lead to multiple possible resultant states, ie Y and Z.
I suspect that 's black vs white terminology is giving you problems. Apparently, what he means by "order" is absolute perfect order as contrasted with absolute "disorder". Both of those states provide zero information. For example, on a computer screen, total randomness of pixels (uniform gray) is meaningless. But total order, such as all black or all white, is also meaningless. Hence, useful information requires some degree of distinction (contrast) in order to make a meaningful "difference" to an observer.
Mathematically, Information is defined in terms of Entropy because it's a relative measure in between the ideal extremes of absolute Black or White. In reality, we seldom encounter such unqualified perfection. So, his assertion that "maximal order is minimal total information" sounds counter-intuitive. And the association of Information with Entropy sounds like a negative definition. As von Neumann said : "no one understands entropy". The human mind is not a digital computer (1/0). So, for our meat brains, "meaning" is relative & analog (1/37). :smile:
Entropy and disorder also have associations with equilibrium. Technically, entropy, from this perspective, is defined as a thermodynamic property which serves as a measure of how close a system is to equilibrium—that is, to perfect internal disorder. Likewise, the value of the entropy of a distribution of atoms and molecules in a thermodynamic system is a measure of the disorder in the arrangements of its particles.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_(order_and_disorder)
OK, suppose a god can know the result of a proposed coin toss prior to the toss occurring. How would this type of knowledge work if there is no reasonable explanation why one result is favoured over the other? If the result is truly random chance, there could be no explanation, so the god would be just guessing. If the god really knows then there must be a reason which validates that knowledge, and it is not random chance.
Or, are you proposing that the god knows the outcome through some other means, perhaps by actually having observational capacity in the future, while existing at the present? So the god, at the present, would know the future outcome by observing it before it actually happens for us, at the present. But wouldn't this just be determinism, if future acts, which are dependent on present choices, can be observed by God, before they are chosen by the person at the present?
In the context of information theory, entropy represents the amount of uncertainty or information content in a message, rather than the loss or absence of information per se. It quantifies the average amount of information produced by a stochastic source of data, or in other words, the potential information that might be received from a signal. The higher the entropy, the more information the message potentially contains because it is less predictable.
When a signal is transmitted, information theory also considers the concept of “channel capacity,” which is the maximum amount of information that can be reliably transmitted over a channel. If the information transmitted has a higher entropy than the channel capacity, there can be a loss of information due to the need for compression or due to errors in transmission, which is often measured by another concept known as “mutual information.”
So in Shannon’s framework, entropy isn’t about the loss of information per se, but rather a measure of the amount of information and unpredictability in a message before it’s transmitted. The loss of information in the process of transmission due to various factors (like noise in the channel) is dealt with separately within the theory.
But caution is indeed required when comparing the concept of entropy in information theory with its use in thermodynamics or other contexts (let alone in this context where it is being discussed in a philosophical sense as a measure of the overall information content of a given system). While both concepts deal with a statistical measure of disorder or unpredictability, the implications and applications of entropy in these fields are quite different:
- In thermodynamics, entropy is a measure of the disorder of a physical system, with higher entropy indicating more disorder and lower energy availability for doing work. It's a fundamental concept that helps explain the direction of spontaneous processes and the flow of heat.
- In information theory, entropy measures the uncertainty or the average information content in a message. It's a concept that helps in understanding communication systems, coding, and data compression. High entropy in this context means the source emits a very unpredictable signal, which can carry a lot of information.
- In the context of the article which is subject of the OP, there is also the concept of ‘information density’ as a measure of the increased complexity (and therefore development) of various kinds of systems both organic and inorganic. It is in that context that I was arguing that higher degrees of order implies lower entropy (as information is necessarily ordered). I think it’s in that context that living systems have been described as ‘negentropic’.
These different uses of the term "entropy" rely on the underlying mathematics of probability and statistics, but they should not be conflated without careful consideration of the context in which they're being applied. (Tip of the hat to ChatGPT for help with this summary.)
If the formation of galaxies, stars, solar systems and planets results from small fluctuations or irregularities in the very simple CMB, and the formation of more complex elements subsequently results from supernovae, should we not expect an increase of complexity over time?
Not as a result of pre-existing "laws" but from the unfolding of the potential inherent in the simple elements that is enabled by the chance evolutionary inception of suitable conditions. This would seem to be in keeping with Peirce's "tychism".
I didn't see the post you refer to until after I made my own post regarding your previous exchange with *1. I inferred that he was talking about the extreme brackets within which relative-minded humans are able to detect meaningful information. But that uncertain contingency is not how natural laws are typically defined, hence his doubt that the topical hypothesis qualifies as a "law". So, I shared his skepticism, but on different grounds.
Thermodynamics doesn't deal with Uncertainty, but merely the normal range of temperatures between Planck Heat & Absolute Zero. Yet, Information was defined in terms of a relative position between absolute Certainty and absolute Ignorance. Both mathematically idealized thermal states are devoid of "Difference", being All or Nothing. Anything outside that natural range would be super-naturally Certain.
As usual, your post above is an excellent summary of a subtle distinction : the relative "Difference that makes a Difference" in meaning to an analog mind. By contrast, Unenlightened seemed to focus on a mathematical definition of Entropy instead of a mental meaning. So, I commented on his example of "temporary order" that can be found within a general state of Chaos. That's the feature of Natural Evolution which allows bits of random Freedom within Determinism, making room for organized Life in a mostly random universe of dead matter. Life is always "temporary"& impermanent, hence easy to snuff out. However, since that concept is controversial & complex, I didn't go off-topic to pursue it.
I also didn't mention the potential for bias that might influence the Templeton Foundation in its support for this thesis. But over several years, I have not found signs of its support for any particular religious doctrine. If anything, the foundation seems to lean toward philosophical interpretations of scientific evidence. Hence it tends to contribute to scientific research on the margins of doctrinal Materialism ; not necessarily religious dogma. For example the Santa Fe Institute for the study of Complexity is necessarily Holistic instead of Reductive. On the other hand, for some on this forum, any deviation from Classical Determinism is suspect. :smile:
*1. What I fail to understand at bottom is how this new principle or law or whatever it is is something other than the law of entropy. Energy dissipates, disorder/information increases. this allows that life, or a hurricane can produce temporary order that functions to increase total entropy. — unenlightened
But that’s where the cosmological constants and fine-tuned universe arguments come into play - Martin Rees' 'six numbers'. They themselves might not amount to laws, but they're constraints in the absence of which nothing would exist (see also 'naturalness problem').
Quoting Gnomon
I've been aware of Templeton for years, I've often read works by and about Templeton Prize winners, including Paul Davies, Bernard D'Espagnat and others. I think they do attempt to be objective but their attempt to connect science and spirituality makes a lot of people suspicious. (That saying 'the hermeneutics of suspicion' seems apt. There was a link provided above purporting to show their financial support of climate-change denial organisations, but the evidence doesn't seem clear-cut to me.)
Quoting Gnomon
From what's been said above, that doesn't necessarily follow at all. There's a very interesting Wikipedia article on Entropy and Life, which talks about this. I think the key idea is that organisms are able to utilise and channel available energy to create greater degrees of order in the form of (drum roll) information, namely, DNA. But I don't think that 'energy dissipates therefore information increases' follows from that. In the non-living universe - from what we know the vast majority of the cosmos - there's no such 'increase in information' at all. Only occurs when organisms enter the picture, and why that should be still remains an open question, doesn't it? ('Warm little pond', anyone?)
@apokrisis ....if you're around, this thread could really use some input from you....
No, not constraints in the absence of which nothing would exist. Something would exist, we just wouldn't be a part of what exists.
Not according to the book cited, Just Six Numbers, Martin Rees, the UK's astronomer royal (and 2011 Templeton Prize winner, as it happens.) Were any of the six fundamental constraints different in very small ways, matter would not form, 'the universe' would comprise plasma or something. Review here.
Plasma or something is not nothing.
However unlikely it might seem that all the cosmological constants just happen to line up such as to allow things to exist. looking at it from the other way around, we would not be here to talk about it if they had not lined up.
The other point is that those constants and their estimated statistical likelihood may just represent human understanding and may not correspond to anything real beyond that. How can we assess the statistical likelihood of things from within the very system that purportedly depends on those very things?
What is your favoured implication; that these constants were somehow established from "outside" of the universe prior to its existence? How could we ever establish that, and even if we could, what implications could it have for life, for our lives?
Quoting Wayfarer
It also pays to remember that this is inference or conjecture, not established fact.
damn close. No stars, matter or living beings, and certainly nobody to converse about it with.
Quoting Janus
Your relativism is showing again. Have you no faith in science :brow: ?
Quoting Janus
It's that naturalism doesn't go 'all the way down'. Naturalism starts with the empirical facts, and discerns causal relationships that give rise to them. But when it comes to such questions as the origin of the cosmic constraints, naturalism can't make such assumptions, because at the point of the singularity all laws break down. What that is taken to mean is then up for debate - natural theology is inclined to argue that the laws are pre-ordained by God. But then Martin Rees, in his book Just Six Numbers, never would make such an argument. He says elsewhere:
[quote=Martin Rees;https://www.themarginalian.org/2017/06/19/martin-rees-interview-science-religion/]I was brought up as a member of the Church of England and simply follow the customs of my tribe. The church is part of my culture; I like the rituals and the music. If I had grown up in Iraq, I would go to a mosque… It seems to me that people who attack religion don’t really understand it. Science and religion can coexist peacefully — although I don’t think they have much to say to each other. What I would like best would be for scientists not even to use the word “God.” … Fundamental physics shows how hard it is for us to grasp even the simplest things in the world. That makes you quite skeptical whenever someone declares he has the key to some deeper reality… I know that we don’t yet even understand the hydrogen atom — so how could I believe in dogmas? I’m a practicing Christian, but not a believing one.[/quote]
Me, I'm inclined to a traditionalist view of the 'harmony of the Cosmos'. Call me a romantic but I think it's part of my cultural heritage, and one that I'm not at all wanting to be rid of.
This is basic Kant. The observational part of science shows us how phenomena manifest and quantifies, measures and explicates its qualities. The abductive phase creatively imagines hypotheses which either can or cannot be tested. The constants may tell us what is required for matter and life as we understand it (as it appears to us) to exist. That is all it tells us, it doesn't tell us that nothing at all beyond plasma could possibility exist outside of those parameters. How much faith do you have in science? You can't have it both ways.
Quoting Wayfarer
Causal relationships are not discerned but inferred as I understand it. To my way of thinking the (hypothetical) breakdown of physical laws at the (hypothetical) singularity is an inference, a theory, not a fact, and given that we accept it there is no way to even begin to decide what that means, so I don't see it as a matter of debate at all. If we want to believe in some speculatively imagined "pre-singularity" scenario, then it becomes entirely a matter of faith. The closest thing we have that is mathematically supported at least is the 'many worlds' or 'many universes' theory. God is another theory which is not mathematically supported. Can you think of any others?
Rees comes across to me as a Christian apologist who wants to make his claims seem stronger by pretending that, although he practices Christianity, he doesn't really believe in it. Smells fishy to me! If we don't even understand even the hydrogen atom, then how could we know that no existence absent the constants would be possible?
Quoting Wayfarer
Fair enough, but that is a matter of faith, says more about you than the cosmos and is not something that can be coherently argued for. We know only the order that we interpret as such.
Ah, you missed my reference to gods being metaphysical. I am not necessarily proposing any particular mechanism for the operations of gods because 1) being personally physical, I (and you, perhaps?) have no experience with the metaphysical and more importantly, it's inner workings and 2) I don't personally believe gods exist objectively (they do exist inter-subjectively).
Though I completely agree with your assessment of the potential situation, logically speaking.
The mission statement below*1 does include "Theology" & "Philosophy", under the heading of Sciences and Scholarship. Also, "creativity, forgiveness, and free will" would disqualify their subjects from consideration, or to warrant "suspicion", by the Pro-Science / Anti-Religion posters on this forum.
But IMHO, that meta-physical subject matter shouldn't be disallowed on The Philosophy Forum. Their official mission is to promote "human flourishing", not promotion of any specific religious doctrine, as the Antis suspect. A more equal-opportunity posture toward Climate Change might include both Pro and Con research*2. :smile:
*1. What are the priorities of the Templeton Foundation?
We fund work on subjects ranging from black holes and evolution to creativity, forgiveness, and free will. We also encourage civil, informed dialogue among scientists, philosophers, theologians, and the public at large. Our grantees produce field-leading scholarship across the sciences, theology, and philosophy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_and_life
*2. Templeton International Climate Change Fund :
An active approach to climate change investing. We favor companies providing low carbon solutions, companies transitioning to a low carbon economy and companies ...
https://www.franklintempleton.com › products › TICGX
Note --- The quote is from , not Gnomon. My response was to suggest an alternative role for Entropy in "information increase" : to include "energy dissipation" as a necessary investment in evolutionary progress. Hence, Information Increase follows from Energy expenditure, which increases Entropy. :cool:
Quoting Wayfarer
Yes. My post disagreed that information increase results from Entropy. Instead, "emergence of complex systems" such as Life, results from negative entropy, or EnFormAction*3, or Enformy*4 as postulated in my thesis --- perhaps to close Schrodinger's "open question". Even so, the role of Entropy (Energy dissipation) must be acknowledged as a hurdle for complex systems to overcome, in order for Information to increase.
Why Life & Mind could emerge within a cosmic system that was lifeless and mindless for 14 billion earth years remains an "open question" for reductive & materialistic Science. But, in a Holistic & Information-based world, the eventual emergence of Life & Mind, could be explained in terms of Enformationism*5. :nerd:
*3. Entropy and Life :
The 1944 book What is Life? by Nobel-laureate physicist Erwin Schrödinger stimulated further research in the field. In his book, Schrödinger originally stated that life feeds on negative entropy, or negentropy as it is sometimes called, but in a later edition corrected himself in response to complaints and stated that the true source is free energy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_and_life
*4. Enformy :
[i]A quality of the universe modeled as a thermodynamic system. Energy always flows from Hot (high energy density) to Cold (low density) -- except when it doesn't. On rare occasions, energy lingers in a moderate state that we know as Matter, and sometimes even reveals new qualities and states of material stuff, such as Life. Enformy counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
The Second Law of Thermo-dynamics states that, in a closed system, Entropy always increases until it reaches equilibrium at a temperature of absolute zero. But some glitch in that system allows stable forms to emerge, that can recycle Free Energy in the form of qualities we call Life & Mind. That "glitch" is what I call Enformy.[/i]
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
*5. Enformationism :
[i]As a scientific paradigm, the thesis of Enformationism is intended to be an update to the obsolete 19th century paradigm of Materialism. Since the recent advent of Quantum Physics, the materiality of reality has been watered down. Now we know that matter is a form of energy, and that energy is a form of Information : EnFormAction --- A proposed metaphysical law of the universe that causes random interactions between forces and particles to produce novel & stable arrangements of matter & energy. .
As a religious philosophy, the creative power of Enformationism is envisioned as a more realistic version of the antiquated religious notions of Spiritualism. Since our world had a beginning, it's hard to deny the concept of creation.[/i]
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Quoting Yunus A. Çengel
Information here is a synonym for entropy.
I don't call myself a "metaphysician" for nothing. I think I have a lot of experience with the metaphysical.
Yes, the link between the semantics of words like "information" and the shannon formalism is vague at best. I think entropy is best characterized as uncertainty, not information. Maybe you can think of it as quantifying the capacity of an information source to send different messages. But to me, the concept of information makes sense best as the reduction of uncertainty i.e. reduction of entropy based on an observation, not dissimilar to the formal concept of mutual information. The concept of surprisal/self-information seems even more messy imo.
Okay, then why did you limit the options of gods to the logical?
I did not restrict the options of gods to the logical, because I was not talking about the options of gods. I was talking about the type of knowledge which a god could have, and the question of whether omniscience is compatible with free will. You seem to have jumped to the unwarranted conclusion that I was talking about the operations of gods, when I was just talking about the knowledge of gods. That is a distinction between an active god, and a passive god. I was talking about a passive god, who is supposed to be omniscient.
So, I restricted knowledge, knowing, to the reasonable because that is how we understand the nature of "knowledge". I said that if a god knows something, then there must be a reasonable explanation for the thing known by that god. I then classified a chance or random event as something without a reasonable explanation, and so I questioned how a god could "know" this type of event, according to how we understand "know".
I assumed that the only way to know such an event would be to observe it in its occurrence, because no other information could necessitate the logical conclusion of the event's occurrence. Therefore the event's occurrence could not be known in any other way. This creates a problem if we want to say that the god knows the event prior in time, to the event's occurrence. It implies that the god must be capable of observing the event, prior in time to the event's occurrence. And this appears to imply determinism.
A missing law to be added to Darwin's theory? Darwin's theory was made in 1859 and is outdated... Darwin didn't even know about genes, we've unraveled so many other mechanisms for evolution since then, such as genetic drift, gene flow, mutations,...
Nowadays you can't study evolution without genetics, so if a new law is made and doesn't necessarily require genes, it certainly can't be added to our current theory of evolution.
Now, from a rational point of view, the reason why we could build the theory of evolution is because living beings all have nucleic acids molecules (DNA, RNA), so in a way we somehow identified how these molecules behave in the environment, their properties. If we were to make an "evolutionary" theory for non living things, which molecules would we study, all of them?
What makes these molecules unique is replication, and then reproduction of the living beings. If an entity randomly generated laws that prevented it from destruction, in order to last longer, it has to reproduce and mutate to be able to adapt to changing environments. To my knowledge, there are no Non nucleic acids molecules having that property. Sometimes stable complex entity are formed, but without reproduction, they won't "survive" if the environment keeps changing. Crystals can grow but their property don't include reproducing, there is no "release" of baby crystals. It can happen if something breaks the crystal but it's not a property of the crystal itself. This is why living beings are able to "override" the law of entropy by being complex "stable" entities and why non living things are less complex.
I find it odd that the article doesn't discuss the importance of replication or reproduction since they're necessary for evolution.
Quoting flannel jesus
That's not what the theory says. "the functional information of a system will increase over time when subjected to selection for function(s)." There is a big WHEN. If it was true for everything, it would be in contradiction with the law of entropy.
I might be wrong but the way I understand it is: "the functional information of a system will increase over time when the environment around the system is favorable for that to happen".
That phrasing borders on tautological. "X will tend to happen in a system when the environment around that system is favourable for X". Replace x with literally just about anything and that sentence structure holds. Right?
Yes absolutely! To me, what they call "selection" has nothing to do with evolutionary selection, they created similar words to state the obvious, unless of course, I'm missing something!
Well, it's not a tautology according to them since the new element is that they call certain phenomena "selection" because it would be similar to the "selection" in the evolution theory, which, to me, isn't similar at all. So all that's left is a tautology.
Oh, I got that originally. My point was why look at the issue solely "logically" when the hallmark of the metaphysical is the "magical"? After all, that was the whole reason humans invented the metaphysical, namely to explain the (currently) unexplainable.
BTW, don't get me wrong, I agree your analysis makes "logical" sense.
That is a common misinterpretation of Shannon's definition of Information, in terms of abstract mathematics, not of human vocabulary. As I attempted to describe in a post above, Shannon bracketed the meaningful realm of Information mathematically, within a broad range of possibilities from [100% to 0% (White or Black pixels) ] (typically expressed as "1/0" {all or nothing})*1. But the meaningful information is limited to the [something] range between {99% and 1%} : shades of gray.
Those extreme (all or nothing) cases are completely meaningless {entropic} except to denote statistical probabilities. Hence, digital computer "bits" are inherently open & undefined, allowing them to communicate almost infinite expressions of meaning, for interpretation by our imperfect analog minds. Hence, Information is a synonym for "Knowledge" & "Intelligence" & "Negentropy" (the opposite of Entropy).
Secret "codes" are unintelligible, until interpreted by the receiver. So, Shannon developed an automatic method for "breaking" the code, via standardized rules*3. :nerd:
*1. What is the Shannon theory of information entropy?
Shannon considered various ways to encode, compress, and transmit messages from a data source, and proved in his famous source coding theorem that the entropy represents an absolute mathematical limit on how well data from the source can be losslessly compressed onto a perfectly noiseless channel.
___ Wikipedia
*2. Negentropy :
In information theory and statistics, negentropy is used as a measure of distance to normality. Out of all distributions with a given mean and variance, the normal or Gaussian distribution is the one with the highest entropy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negentropy
Note --- Normal distribution (average) lacks the "Difference that makes a Difference" that we know as "Meaning" for the human Receiver of data. For a computer, the meaning does not matter.
*3. Encoded Information :
In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communication channel or storage in a storage medium.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code
Binary Code :
Does this series if 1s & 0s (computer language) mean anything to you?
If not, then it's Entropic (zero information) compared to natural language text.
Yes. Darwin's theory was limited to Biological systems, and he could only guess about some unknown means for communicating information from one generation to another, and one species to another : what we now know as "Genes". So, his theory of how animals & plants evolve was long overdue for a scientific update.
Ironically, this new "law" is an addition to Physical systems ("classical laws of motion, gravity, electromagnetism, and energy") and also to Meta-physical systems ("We identify universal concepts of selection—static persistence, dynamic persistence, and novelty generation—that underpin function and drive systems to evolve through the exchange of information between the environment and the system.") The latter are not physical/material things, but merely "Patterns" & "Configurations" and Memes that are not Perceived, but Conceived.
Note --- Quotes above are from the PNAS paper, proposing a "New Law" or Principle of progressive change in natural systems.
Gnonsense.
You seem confused. I agree that metaphysics looks to explain what hasn't yet been explained, but magic is not the hallmark of metaphysics. Magic doesn't explain anything, so metaphysicians cannot turn to magic, in their efforts to explain. In fact, that is what metaphysicians try to avoid, by showing that what is currently unexplainable, inclining people toward "magic", can actually be explained in ways other than magic.
Sorry for the confusion. I was groping for a polite way to make "sense" of an erroneous assertion by ?unenlightened : that "Information is Entropy". I noted that it's a common misunderstanding, but one that might reveal a novel way to look at the antithetical relationship between Information and Entropy*1. Those terms are not equal, but opposite in meaning. Instead, Information is equal to Negentropy*2.
So, I re-interpreted Shannon's definition of Information in terms of 1s & 0s, as a reference to Bookends, not the Books ; Carrier of meaning, not the Content. Unfortunately, my groping attempt to describe that unfamiliar & unconventional perspective may sound like "Gnonsense", because it is literally Unorthodox, Atypical, and Eccentric. Maybe, over time, I will be able to find a more Gnomeaningful way to express that contradiction. :joke:
*1. In information theory, the entropy of a random variable is the average level of "information", "surprise", or "uncertainty" inherent to the variable's possible outcomes. ___Wikipedia
Note --- 100% and 0% quantities of Information are not "averages", but Extremes. Which I referred to metaphorically as "Brackets" or "Bookends".
*2. Negentropy is reverse entropy. It means things becoming more in order. By 'order' is meant organisation, structure and function: the opposite of randomness or chaos.
https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negentropy
*3. Quote from a previous post to trying to untangle the babble :
Quoting Gnomon
INFORMATION IS IN THE MIDRANGE, NOT THE EXTREMES
Several things:
First, unless you want to redefine metaphysics in the current era from what it has meant historically, the role of "magic" cannot be excluded from it's repertoire.
To be clear I am NOT using the term "magical" perjoratively or dismissively. Rather I mean it as a explanation that defies observation, experience and knowledge.
If one is intellectually honest one cannot reasonably evaluate the role of metaphysics using it's current application, because in the current era we can only know the question, never the (true) answer. No, in order to fully evaluate what metaphysics is (and more importantly for this conversation, what it is not) we must use historical examples and put ourselves in the mindset of those in that era.
For example explaining lightning in the absence of an understanding of electricity. Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Hinduism all ascribed lightning to the workings of gods (surprising no one) when those religions were invented in the Bronze and Iron ages, clearly not science, that's metaphysics. However, in Medieval times lightning (which commonly struck the tallest structures ie churches) was either thought to be prevented by the piety of the ringing of church bells warding off evil spirits (a metaphysical proposal) or that the sound of the ringing of the bells disrupted the air and thus prevented the lightning from striking the tower (a physical or a scientific theory).
I don't see how it means anything to say you have "re-interpreted" Shannon's definition of information, when you show no indication of having ever understood Shannon's definition of information in the first place. You've demonstrated over and over that you have no meaningful understanding of what is meant by "a bit". It is ludicrous to think that you have any meaningful degree of understanding of Shannon's theory, when you don't understand such a basic element of it.
And yet you won't stop pretending that you understand information theory...
It's not eccentric or unorthodox. What it is, is silly pretension to having expertise that you don't have.
For better or worse, I've had enough experience with people who think like you, to know the pattern pretty well.
:smirk: Gnice...like a gnife to the gnuts...
:naughty:
I’ve often made the point that there is a well-known meme from Norbert Weiner, founder of cybernetics, often quoted on the internet, to wit ‘information is information, not matter or energy.’ This has been seized on in such a way that information is regarded as a kind of updated or more sophisticated form of matter-energy, or that by substituting the concept of information for that of matter, a more adequate metaphysics can be developed. The problem is that information is not a metaphysical primitive in the sense that matter or energy were thought to be. There is no such thing as information per se, it something that is always output or derived. Hence treating information as a metaphysical ground of being, akin to how materialism regards matter, is complex and controversial.
The complexity arises because information, unlike matter or energy, doesn’t exist independently of interpretation and context. Information requires a sender, a message, and a receiver, and its meaning is shaped by the context in which it is created and received. This relational and contextual nature of information makes it a concept that’s not easily pinned down as a fundamental substance in the same way as matter or energy.
The idea of information as a metaphysical foundation also runs into challenges when we consider the diversity of what can be classified as information. For instance, the genetic information in DNA, the information contained in a book, and the information in a computer program all have different qualities and roles. This diversity suggests that information might be better understood as a property or behavior of systems, rather than a fundamental entity in its own right.
The fact that information is always derived or output and always contextual is crucial. It indicates that information is deeply intertwined with the physical and social worlds, suggesting that any metaphysical consideration of information must account for these ties and cannot treat information as an isolated or simple concept. This perspective aligns more with a holistic or systems-oriented view, where information is one aspect of a larger, interconnected reality.
Don't you think, in a way, that qualia is just what it is like to be information?
I've read a lot of metaphysics, and I've never seen magic in the repertoire. Maybe an example would help.
Quoting LuckyR
Such a "magical" explanation would not be metaphysics. Metaphysicians work toward explanations which are consistent with observation experience and knowledge. An explanation which defies these would be illogical, and not acceptable to anyone, so a metaphysician would know to stay away from that.
Quoting LuckyR
I haven't seen lightening ascribed to gods in any metaphysics. Nor have I seen any metaphysical proposals about church bells. It's become quite evident that you don't know what you're talking about.
I’ve noticed a classic sociological text on the Routledge book stands, A General History of Magic, by Marcel Mauss, apparently a very good book. I was amused to see a reader comment on the Amazon edition, ‘this book is crap. I bought it and it doesn’t contain a single trick’.
The use of "natural selection" should not be problematic. It means adaptation and change. Phenotype can change. We're in the philosophy forum, that's why you think we should apply the scrutiny in word usage and meaning.
Your post makes sense if the definition of metaphysics is the musings of ivory tower metaphysicians. Whereas, to me the purported beyond physical actions of metaphysical entities also qualifies.
As usual, perspective is key.
Perhaps one is "Metaphysics" and the other is an example of the metaphysical.
If magic is aprioristically understood as nonsensical, then metaphysics—such as the study of causality - has nothing to do with magic: for metaphysics attempts to make sense of what is, i.e. of the ontic, thereby being the ideally both coherent and consistent understanding of ontology and its various aspects (e.g., causality, time, identity, reality, etc.). These musings are what all science is founded upon, without which no science could be possible.
If however magic is understood in a more sensible manner - such as along the lines of “the process of aligning one’s environments(s) to one’s will” * - then certain types of metaphysics will indeed address magic: predominantly those which do not deny the possibility of us having some capacity of free will (there can be no conformity of environments to one’s will in ontologies such as that of eternalism (aka the Block Time model of reality), for one example). But then, the mere act of blowing one’s nose will be, of itself, an act of magic ** - making magic a very trite reality that can be deemed to apply to all sentient beings that in any way conform their environment to suit their own will/volition, this all the time and without exception.
In support of the latter affirmation, as is maintained by many modern pagans:
* Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_(supernatural)
** Quoting https://pagan.fandom.com/wiki/Magick
-----------
The non-pagan communities which don't in any way practice magic thinking it nonsensical will of course want to define magic differently - but then you have the aprioristic understandings of magic being nonsensical, which is not sponsored by those who do uphold that magic is real. All this overlooking the Abrahamic admonition against it as evil ... although Mr. JC sure seems to fit the description of someone who practiced magic, for one example. :grin:
Exactly. As an aside, I thought it was interesting the you distinguished stage magic from purported Magick, since stage magic is, of course completely logical and scientific ie in no sense metaphysical.
Anyway, your example of religious miracles as an example is right on. How do the academic Metaphysicians describe the parting of the sea, or the multiplication of the fishes and loaves? Myth? Magic? Some rationalization using vague pseudoscientific terminology?
Hope you don't mind if I but in but I think you have the wrong idea about metaphysics. It's not really 'primitive science' although it is of course true that its origins lie in ancient culture which was not at all scientifically developed in our sense. But the term 'metaphysics' itself comes from Aristotle's works. It was devised by an editor of Aristotle's works, well after Aristotle had died, to distinguish the writings on a set of subjects that come 'after the physics'. Here's a crib:
Your examples above of how to account for lightning would not, I expect, find their way into these volumes, but more likely in his Physics (although that's only a hunch.) But Aristotle did distinguish metaphysics from the other sciences such as biology and physics.
And metaphysics is not dead! Current issues include:
Nature of Consciousness: exploration of how consciousness arises, whether it can be fully explained by physical processes, and the implications of phenomena like qualia (subjective, individual experiences).
Free Will and Determinism: Modern discussions often intersect with findings from neuroscience and psychology, examining whether human actions are predetermined by neural processes or if there is room for free agency.
Metaphysics of Time: Questions include whether time is fundamental or emergent, the reality of the past and future, the nature of temporal experience, and whether time is really objective or relies on subjective apprehension.
Emergent Properties: debates how complex systems give rise to properties that their individual components do not possess, like how consciousness emerges from brain activity. The discussion also ties into questions about the relationship between mind and matter, and how to account for the subjective unity of experience.
Interpretations of Quantum Physics and the Nature of the Wave Function: includes discussions about the nature of the wave function, which describes the quantum state of a particle or system. Key questions include whether the wave function represents a real physical entity or is merely a statistical tool, the implications of wave function collapse, and the reality of quantum superposition. These debates often touch upon the foundational nature of reality and challenge our classical understanding of the physical world. Different interpretations, such as the Copenhagen interpretation, Many-Worlds interpretation, and pilot-wave theories, offer varied metaphysical perspectives on these quantum phenomena.
Multiverse Theories: The concept of multiple or parallel universes, arising from cosmology and quantum mechanics, presents metaphysical questions about the nature of reality and existence beyond our observable universe.
Identity and Personal Identity: Questions about what it means for something to be the same over time, and the nature of personal identity, especially in the face of change, continue to be major topics.
Meta-Ontology: This concerns the methodology of metaphysics itself, questioning how we should go about understanding what exists, and the criteria for something to be considered real.
Quite a bit of it cutting-edge! I'm personally interested in the subjects of platonic realism (i.e. the sense in which number is real) and the observer problem in quantum physics. I've noticed an external course in metaphysics run by Oxford, Reality Being and Existence. So - metaphysics lives on.
Quoting LuckyR
Yet, as per my intended point in my previous post, the logical and scientific is itself fully grounded in pre-established metaphysical concepts and, thus, is itself metaphysical. Here’s where I find the colloquial use of “metaphysical” as that which is illogical and contrary to science fits in: the logical and scientific as we currently know it today is grounded in a set of metaphysical understandings which those who want to preserve the status quo don’t want to be interfered with. To such, metaphysics—such as everything which @Wayfarer addressed as examples—is a done deal that shouldn’t be meddled with. As such it ought to no longer be in any way addressed. So when such people hear that there is metaphysical debates and enquiries going on, they reflexively view it as an assault upon the status quo on which current logic and science is grounded. Thereby resulting in the purely colloquial understanding that enquiry into metaphysical issues entails that which is not supported by modern-day logic and science.
If this appraisal happens to at least partly describe your own view on the matter, then—as @Wayfarer points out—metaphysical issues as a grouping are in no way satisfactory resolved. Logic without identity is not logical. Science without temporality is not empirical science (at root: knowledge gained via experience), for experience of anything other necessitates duration. And yet what identity and time are—to readdress just two examples of metaphysics—is in no way satisfactorily resolved. Moreover, any new metaphysical understandings regarding, for example, identity and time would not destroy the logic and science of today. It would only better account for what is currently known, this in more coherent and consistent manners. Via analogy, the Theory of Relativity does not destroy the knowns addressed via Newtonian physics, but only better accounts for the knowns which Newtonian physics sought to explain (and yes, the ToR introduces new metaphysical notions, such as the nature of time; without these, the mathematics required for ToR would not be possible, or, at least, in any way intelligible ... to the best of my knowledge on the matter).
In short, current day logic and science is in every way metaphysical (invariably comprised of metaphysics of a certain type).
And, as it currently stands, these currently established metaphysics have been unable to resolve some of the core issues humanity at large is concerned with; for one example, the nature of consciousness and its volitions. Nor, for that matter, have they facilitated anything close to a physical Theory of Everything.
Quoting LuckyR
Well, in my own opinion, the "academic metaphysician" wouldn't touch such an issue with a ten foot pole. It would be fully out of scope of what academic metaphysics entails (unless one happens to be a metaphysician upholding metaphysical notions of causality, time, etc., which ground some system of atheism; in which case their explanation would consist of all it being bogus, with the case closed).
The closest that academics would get to it is via comparative religion studies; such as those done by Joseph Campbell and Mircea Eliade, and I suppose one could add Carl Jung to the list. But such studies wouldn't be metaphysical studies, not by a very long shot.
All of the latter, to hold any water, need to be coherent and consistent in what they explain. So—unless someone somehow develops a coherent and consistent metaphysical account of (not just one, but) all spiritualities the world over which can thereby stand up to logical scrutiny and is not in conflict with empirical data—one has no business in metaphysically explaining JC's reported miracles (if, that is, any aspect of them happened to ever occur).
Comment on this second article appeared in The Conversation, A new theory linking evolution and physics has scientists baffled.... That article refers to (and criticizes) a Nature article, Assembly theory explains and quantifies selection and evolution. It starts:
Compare that with the opening paragraph of the article linked from the OP:
When the second of these two articles appeared in my news feed, I naturally assumed it was about the article that was subject of this OP. But no! It's a completely different article, and with a very different explanatory framework, but they're both addressing the same general issue. The second article - the one I've just encountered - is under pretty heavy criticism from the scientific community for smuggling in 'intelligent design tropes'. The author in The Conversation discussion (a scientist) fails to see the problem the paper is attempting to resolve.
Somehow, I feel the publication of these two articles, from different teams, using different theories, about the same general issue, is more than coincidence (queue X Files theme).
I have saved a PDF of the Assembly Theory article*1, but haven't read it in detail yet. Coincidentally, I noticed that one of the authors is Sara Walker*2, of the Santa Fe Institute (SFI) for the Study of Complexity*3. She is a physicist and an astrobiologist, and that combination of abstract Math & ambitious Life may require looking at the world from a different perspective. Ironically, this "theory was developed as a means to detect evidence of extraterrestrial life from data gathered by astronomical observations or probes" ___Wiki.
The alternative perspective of the SFI is Holism, the key to emergence of complex physical & meta-physical systems. Yet, as you well know, the notion of Integrated Whole Systems is often met with knee-jerk negativity by those who are prejudiced against, what they label as, a "New Age" worldview. FWIW, I am, in no meaningful sense, a disciple of New Age gurus. And my philosophical thesis is intended to be a post-quantum-science update of the worldwide Spiritualism of pre-scientific ancient cultures. But, I am sympathetic to it's generalizing, inclusive, and comprehensive philosophical perspective*3, which is literally non-scientific (non-reductive), but not anti-science (opposed to scientific methods)*4.
A related article is entitled : How Purposeless Physics underlies Purposeful Life*5. How did inert Matter (momentum) manage to become self-motivated (purposeful)? Such "how" or "why" questions shine a spotlight into the gap to be filled by a Missing Law of Complexification in Evolutionary Theory. Darwin proposed two requirements for the emergence of biological novelty : Variation & Selection. But, the latter is a negative, weeding-out, action*6. And, the positive production of novel forms is unexplained by the laws of physics. So, the source of variation & complexification may await a 21st century law of evolution. Hence, the need for something like Assembly Theory.
Is this confluence of science & philosophy a coincidence, or a conspiracy? :cool:
*1. Assembly Theory :
Scientists have grappled with reconciling biological evolution with the immutable laws of the Universe defined by physics. These laws underpin life’s origin, evolution and the development of human culture and technology, yet they do not predict the emergence of these phenomena. Evolutionary theory explains why some things exist and others do not through the lens of selection. To comprehend how diverse, open-ended forms can emerge from physics without an inherent design blueprint, a new approach to understanding and quantifying selection is necessary
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06600-9
Note --- The term "design blueprint" in connection with Evolution, is a trigger-word to those for whom "design"*5 is a taboo notion, associated with monotheistic religions. Unfortunately, my information-based term EnFormAction is also booed & tabooed by those who believe in the creativity of random accident.
*2. Sara Imari Walker is an American theoretical physicist and astrobiologist with research interests in the origins of life, astrobiology, physics of life, emergence, complex and dynamical systems, and artificial life. ___Wikipedia
*3. What is complexity science theory? :
Complexity science suggests that the whole is not the sum of the parts. Emergent properties of the whole are inexplicable by the parts. In complexity, studies of natural and human systems are explained by both kinds of analysis - micro (or analysis of the parts) and macro (or holistic analysis).
https://www.napcrg.org/media/1278/beginner-complexity-science-module.pdf
*4. Complexity Science :
Our traditional views of cause-and-effect assume a linear worldview in which the output of a system is proportional to its input. This predictable perspective derives from an additive model in which the system is the sum of its parts.
https://www.napcrg.org/media/1278/beginner-complexity-science-module.pdf
*5. Darwin’s Greatest Discovery: Design Without Designer :
" Darwin accepted that organisms are “designed” for certain purposes, that is, they are functionally organized." ___Francisco Ayala, evolutionary biologist
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK254313/
*6. Natural selection works by weeding less fit variants out of a population.
https://evolution.berkeley.edu/misconceptions-about-natural-selection-and-adaptation/the-bad-gene/
I don't think so, but the question is obviously pressing. And why is it pressing? It wouldn't be because those despised 'Intelligent Design' advocates, Michael Behe and others, have actually hit a nerve? Heaven forbid!
Quoting Gnomon
I refer again to [url=https://bwo.life/mqual/genome_6.htm]From Physical Causes to Organisms of Meaning.
Okay, I guess my previous understanding is correct. Namely that academic Metaphysics does NOT necessarily (even with a ten foot pole apparantly) address the actions of "metaphysical" entities. That second use of the word perhaps being a "colloquial" use of the term.
So we're addressing two different uses of the term.
Yeah, the issue of misinformation is a pressing one.
Quoting Wayfarer
It sounds like you are a cdesign-proponetsist. Perhaps you are fooling yourself about being on the side of the angels here?
Yes, two different usages of the term, but I for whatever reason feel that I've not been quite understood. So I'll write a bit more.
I’m assuming you were referring to this statement:
Quoting LuckyR
In the context of philosophy, metaphysics is neither an atheistic nor a spiritual discipline; it’s indicative of neither. Its hallmark is, pure and simple, the study of reality’s fundamental principles. As such, its hallmark is not magic but reasoning, logic as you say.
Whereas the terminology of a “metaphysical entity”—by which I interpret you meaning a god, ghost, or the like—to me lucidly illustrates the prejudice against tampering with physicalist metaphysical principles which I previously mentioned. This as though physicalism is not of itself a metaphysical doctrine through and through.
To better illustrate this point: The claim what we as conscious beings transcend into a state of absolute nonbeing (of nothingness) upon our corporeal death is not commonly considered metaphysical but rather factual (this by the typical atheist at least), though it is an inferred conclusion that is usually derived in full from the purely metaphysical principles of physicalism/materialism (again, its interpretations of causation, substance, and the like)—and is thereby a metaphysical conclusion.
If you want to use “metaphysical” to address divinations, ESP, house fairies and the like, so be it. But, as I previously argued, that meaning seems to stem from a derogatory and reactionary interpretation of any academic metaphysics, else of metaphysics as a philosophical study, that questions the physicalist/materialist metaphysical worldview. And that meaning is certainly not what “metaphysical” means within philosophical contexts, such as the one we’re presently in.
Certainly one can find synonyms such as "supernatural", "spiritual", or "supernal", this while on a philosophy forum, rather than claiming that metaphysics is founded upon, or else is about, magic. Or at least qualify what type of metaphysics one is referring to. Or not. At the end of the day, just sharing perspectives here.
The reality of "metaphysical entities" beyond physical actions is necessitated by logic. That is, sound logic demonstrates the reality of "metaphysical entities" beyond physical actions. This is why metaphysics is, and has always been an important discipline. It is not magic though.
The simple fact is that there are limits, boundaries to how far "physical actions" can take us in explaining what is real. Logic demonstrates that we must turn to something beyond physical actions to understand these aspects of reality which are beyond those boundaries (intentional design, and free will for example), and this is metaphysics. Insisting that these aspects (like free will) are not real, would simply be denial of the evidence.
Hey thanks for the more thorough discussion. I agree with using the term supernatural (to separate from the field of philosophical metaphysics). So at least for the purposes of this conversation let's call philosophical metaphysics "metaphysical" and divination, ESP, ghosts etc "supernatural", okay?
So, this part of the thread started with theorizing on possible actions and explanations of actions of gods. In your understanding are the purported behaviors and actions of gods (as described by religions), "supernatural", examples of the "metaphysical", or both?
One can find variations. For example, if one’s belief is that lightning is caused by Zeus because that’s what everybody else says, or because so it was somewhere written, but one does not hold a coherent and consistent explanation of why this is the case, then one will be holding supernatural beliefs without engaging in the philosophy of metaphysics. If, on the other hand, one for example hypothesizes that a god Zeus holds the properties of being all-powerful and all-benevolent as a premise and then processed to conclude that such a Zeus is existentially impossible on grounds of contradictions (lack of consistency)—e.g., that of Zeus not being able to create an object that is too heavy for him to lift, and that of evil occurring in the world—then one would here be engaging in the philosophy of metaphysics without upholding supernatural beliefs. And then there might be instances where the two converge. Here, Heraclitus philosophy comes to mind: he’s well enough known as a forefather of process philosophy (which is metaphysics) but, for example (from about 2/3 into §4):
Quoting Heraclitus - SEP
---------
In the context of this thread, I so far take the issue of god/s to have been addressed with the intent of addressing philosophical metaphysics in the absence of supernatural beliefs.
That is an important distinction for understanding the multipurpose roles of Information (EnFormAction) in the world. Some TPF posters like to think of Information as-if it's an objective (physical) thing, such as a bit of Matter, or a unit of Energy. Instead, it's a (functional) relationship and a dynamic (meta-physical) process, that unites disparate parts into meaningful patterns of wholeness. I often refer to Information as a "shape-shifter" that can't be pinned-down to a single Particle or Shape. Instead, it's the Platonic Principle of Form. :smile:
Quote from OP :
"In essence, the new ‘law of increasing functional information’ states that complex natural systems evolve to states of greater patterning, diversity, and complexity "
Enformy :
In the Enformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, metaphysical, and natural trend, force, or principle, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Note --- You won't find this term in science books, because it's a custom-made coinage to describe a novel concept, that has not yet been recognized in the context of reductive & materialistic Science. Yet, it may serve as a shorter name for the "Law of Functional Information" referred-to in the OP. I doubt that it qualifies as a (reductive) Scientific "Law", but more like a (holistic) Philosophical Principle.
Forms :
Platonic Forms are Archetypes : the original pattern or model of which all things of the same type are representations or copies. Eternal metaphysical Forms are distinguished from temporal physical Things. These perfect models are like imaginary designs from which Things can be built.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page13.html
Note --- Archetypes are not real implemented objects, but ideal design concepts --- universal potential, not actual instances.
Off-topic :
I like to use "Meta-Physics" as a synonym for Philosophical issues. And the referent - antecedent-denotation is to Aristotle's ancient writings, not to medieval Catholic scholarship, or modern academic arguments. So, I use the term primarily to distinguish mental-rational-holistic topics from material-scientific-reductive studies. Unfortunately, some on this forum seems to insist that it's a synonym for "anti-science".
On TPF, it seems impossible to work around the hard prejudice attached to that taboo term ; even when I specify "what type of metaphysics" I'm referring to. I could just say "philosophy", but for Materialists & Physicalists, even that well-known category seems to be limited to objective sense-based themes, and excludes any subjective concepts known only via Reason, such as the possibility of Kantian transcendence. That anti-philosophy bias strictly limits the range of topics we can discuss calmly & rationally to those certified by pragmatic Science. Are you aware of any common synonyms of Metaphysics that are not associated with "supernatural" or "spiritual" or "religion" or "magic"? :smile:
This is a bit like preaching to the choir, here. :smile: I’ll only add that any new metaphysical postulations (e.g. as to the nature of causality) will need to remain conformant to established data obtained via the scientific method. But maybe this goes without saying.
Unfortunately, although most of the authors of the original paper --- On the roles of function and selection in evolving systems --- are professional scientists, their collective conclusion (postulation) seems to be based on speculative philosophical reasoning instead of firmly "established" scientific data.
So, your cautionary note made me question the scientific criteria for Causality*1. And it seems that scientists typically depend on philosophical reasoning for such immaterial & non-sensory connections between a physical input (cause) and a material output (effect). Moreover, Kant & Hume*2 cast doubt on our ability to firmly "establish" scientific criteria to prove physical causation. And any attempt to define Causation metaphysically gets befogged in the murk of philosophical jargon and denial of its provability*3.
Even Darwin's presumption --- of a causal connection between one generation of a species and a later different form --- seems to be little more than a personal opinion. Was Selection the Cause of evolutionary novelty? If so, determined by whom? The lack of a defined beginning of the series, and the missing links between stages, seem to imply that the phenomenon of "Causation" itself is a subjective logical inference (belief), instead of an objective sensory observation (fact). Such open questions suggest that, without a specified First Cause, any postulation of Causation, and Evolution, becomes circular*4. Hence, the necessity for a conjectured "Law" to fill the causal gap. :smile:
*1. What is scientific definition of causation?
Causality (also called causation, or cause and effect) is influence by which one event, process, state, or object (a cause) contributes to the production of another event, process, state, or object (an effect) where the cause is partly responsible for the effect, and the effect is partly dependent on the cause.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality
Note --- No mention of a causal Agency to initiate a sequence of events. Hence, either infinite or circular.
*2. Kant and Hume on Causality :
Kant agrees with Hume that neither the relation of cause and effect nor the idea of necessary connection is given in our sensory perceptions; ...
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-hume-causality/
Note --- The relation between Cause & Effect is an Induction, not a Deduction ; a theory not a fact.
*3. The Metaphysics of Causation :
For each of these putative causal relations, we can raise metaphysical questions: What are their relata? What is their arity? In virtue of what do those relata stand in the relevant causal relation? And how does this kind of causal relation relate to the others? Of course, there is disagreement about whether each—or any—of these relations exists. Russell (1912: 1) famously denied that there are any causal relations at all, quipping that causation is “a relic of a bygone age, surviving, like the monarchy, only because it is erroneously supposed to do no harm” (see also Norton 2003). Others may deny that there is a relation of general causation or influence at all, contending that claims like 2 and 3 are simply generalizations about token causal relations (see §2.1 below). There will also be disagreement about whether these relations are reducible, and, if so, what they can be reduced to—probabilities, regularities, counterfactuals, processes, dispositions, mechanisms, agency, or what-have-you.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-metaphysics/
*4. Evolutionary Causation :
Most scientific explanations are causal. This is certainly the case in evolutionary biology, which seeks to explain the diversity of life and the adaptive fit between organisms and their surroundings. The nature of causation in evolutionary biology, however, is contentious. How causation is understood shapes the structure of evolutionary theory, and historical and contemporary debates in evolutionary biology have revolved around the nature of causation. Despite its centrality, and differing views on the subject, the major conceptual issues regarding the nature of causation in evolutionary biology are rarely addressed. This volume fills the gap, bringing together biologists and philosophers to offer a comprehensive, interdisciplinary treatment of evolutionary causation.
https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262039925/evolutionary-causation/
It seems I might have been too terse in my reply. Certainly: science is thoroughly founded upon philosophy and in no way the other way around. By “science” I am here strictly referring to the scientific method regardless of domain—which is fully fallibilistic in both theory and practice (this as per fallibilism …. aka, a newly coined term for the academic skepticism of ancients such as Cicero)—and in no way things such as technology, scientism, or the like. So understood, science is strictly in the business of gathering dependable data, which is equally available to all in principle (overlooking its sometimes corporatized aspects, e.g. typical pharmaceutical research), via which to validate our best suppositions and to falsify our erroneous beliefs. In so being, it is strictly limited to those observables that are observable by all in principle (this leading to the somewhat different issue of things such as consciousness not being scientifically evidenced, this in the strict sense of science just expressed). The theory or evolution and that of relativity were not in and of themselves in any way developed through the scientific method—but are very well supported by data that has been thus obtained while providing best explanatory power for the said data to date, and are thereby scientific only in this latter sense. These two examples of scientific theories illustrate how science is founded upon philosophy, but things in fact get more complex, for all science (be it today’s, yesterday's, or tomorrow's) is founded upon metaphysical postulates, such as that of causality as we currently interpret the term.
In large part due to Descartes, we now largely consider two out of Aristotle’s four causes to lack ontic reality (this contra the reality of someone’s mind and belief structures therein): formal causation and teleological causation. Moderners thus do not believe that there are teleological causes in the world, but answering the question of “What caused you to rob the bank?” with “I needed money” is in no way outdated, being deemed a rational (if in no way reasonable) answer to give. Here, then, is teleological causation: “the want to have money in the future” will, as telos/goal/aim, significantly determine what one presently does or formerly did.
At any rate, science cannot establish via its data acquisition whether teleological causation is real or only imaginary, for example. Were there to be an ontology proposed which incorporates teleological causation, it would nevertheless need to not contradict the established data obtained via the scientific method (say, like insisting that dinosaurs and humans once coexisted so as to fit data into a Young Earth Creationism account of things—which would contradict the established data of fossil records in layers of earth; else, were free will to be real, it could not contradict the established data regarding our central nervous system’s operations). Again, the occurrence or absence of teleological causation is not something that science can establish. Current science operates upon the philosophical position that teleology does not occur. Yet an ontology of teleology, in order to be coherent and consistent, would a) need to hold a greater explanatory power than the established philosophically metaphysical position that teleology is nonexistent and b) be conformant to all data (rather than theory) we hold regarding the world and ourselves. Were at least (b) to occur, then one could then uphold a new metaphysical postulate (relative to current day postulates) in coherent and consistent manners. And the scientific method as practice would continue just as before.
I hope this better presents my position regarding science and causation (as just one example of science and metaphysics in general).
No worries mate. :wink:
Sorry, if I gave the wrong impression. I was not criticizing your post. But, I was prompted to do some Googling on the Science vs Philosophy, and Causation vs Randomness, questions. I happen to agree with your position on the primacy of Philosophy, not only in history, but also in generality. However, some posters on TPF seem to feel that Philosophy is little brother to its dominant younger sibling in terms of economic importance. Yet that top 10 rating depends on where you place your values : material vs mental, or instrumental (means) vs terminal (ends).
Regarding Causation, the origin & direction of causation (First Cause ; Teleology) is not important for materialists. What matters to them is tangible results. Modern science is unsurpassed in producing predictable products and marketable merchandise*1. The quantum genie is now out of the bottle, and granting all kinds of pragmatic wishes. But few are asking philosophical questions about Wisdom, Ethics, & Proportion.
I suppose the postulated New Law of Evolution will be judged, not by its abstract universal Truth, but by its concrete lab Results. :smile:
*1. The Manhattan Project grew rapidly and employed nearly 130,000 people at its peak and cost nearly US$2 billion (equivalent to about $24 billion in 2021). Over 90 percent of the cost was for building factories and to produce fissile material, with less than 10 percent for development and production of the weapons.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project
Apparently the cost to produce two bombs was "worth it" in terms of the existential threat of German & Japanese political, economic & military dominance. For more philosophical considerations, some would disagree. Especially, since one psychologically expensive product of that technology is the mushroom cloud hanging over mankind. Perhaps, some of that psychic cost is offset by the income from almost a century of high-grossing apocalyptic movies. :wink:
:grin: :up:
Quoting Gnomon
Hm. I rather think that explanatory power is the principle issue, and that this is the "tangible result" that most are interested in. For instance, between things such as "getting what is the point of this life/existence" and things such as "having a gadget that technologically surpasses all gizmos previously owned", I'm wagering that most would choose the former (granting that it manages to make any coherent sense)
But in the absence of the former, as most of us happen to be, the latter serves as a very good means of distraction and, thereby, amusement. With a little bit of functionality thrown in.
Quoting Gnomon
This gets back to its explanatory power, I think.
BTW, used to contemplate the notion of universal evolution a lot in collage days. Given a) some ready established forms and b) a force placed upon them, they will most often naturally develop into a new structure whose form as such was selected by (a) and (b). For instance, take ten randomly placed coins in one's palm or in a cup, randomly shake them, and they will naturally organize into one or more columns. Same can be said for most anything, with no life required for this selection of form. But the philosophical underpinnings here get complex. At any rate, a universal evolution would help explain how life evolved out of nonlife, but its mechanisms would need to be ironed out properly in order to be taken seriously, or at least so I find.
But this all becomes, in my view, the ultimate case of the baby being thrown out with the bathwater. The antagonism (which becomes a prohibition) against the idea of telos as final cause, is baked in to the modern scientific outlook as a consequence of these developments. And more than science - it spills over into culture generally, and is behind the anguished expressions of the 'purposeless universe' that are found everywhere in today's society.
Edward Feser gives an in-depth analysis of this in his book Aristotle's Revenge. The key feature of the modern worldview is the mechanistic model which, because it has rejected the Aristotelian principles of final causation and substantial form, also looses sight of the distinction between the artificial and the natural. This is because in natural beings - organisms - have an intrinsic nature ('substantial form') by which all of their separate functions are ordered, whereas artificial devices (machines) have extrinsic form, imposed on them by their artificers (humans) and no purpose other than to perform the functions assigned to them by their designers. Here in one fell swoop, any idea of purpose in nature - hence, I would argue, purpose in any sense other than the instrumental - is laid waste. (See this recent thread for examples.)
I'm inclined to see evolution of scientific understanding as having resulted in recognition of "system structure" as playing a role analogous to that of "form" for Aristotle.
In the case of final causation, it is more a matter of 'having no need of that hypothesis', and Ockham's razor, than it is a matter of rejection.
In reality, something of momentous importance was rejected. And it's a matter in intellectual history that Ockham has a lot to do with this, as his principle was grounded in a misunderstanding of the nature of teleological explanation. But it's beyond the scope of a forum post to spell out the details of that momentous event.
[quote=Richard Weaver, Ideas have Consequences]Like Macbeth, Western man made an evil decision, which has become the efficient and final cause of other evil decisions. Have we forgotten our encounter with the witches on the heath? It occurred in the late fourteenth century, and what the witches said to the protagonist of this drama was that man could realize himself more fully if he would only abandon his belief in the existence of transcendentals. The powers of darkness were working subtly, as always, and they couched this proposition in the seemingly innocent form of an attack upon universals. The defeat of logical realism in the great medieval debate was the crucial event in the history of Western culture; from this flowed those acts which issue now in modern decadence.[/quote]
Demonizing those who understand things differently than you. Nice.
By "universal evolution" are you referring to the theory of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin*1? As I understand it, such a teleological process is directed by divine Will (intention ; orthogenesis ; programming ; elan vital)*2. If so, the theory's "explanatory power" would interpret the Effects in terms of the Cause --- and vice-versa. Also, the final Form could be predicted based on the original Information (program ; design). Can we do anything more than speculate on the First Cause? Would such religio-philosophical guessing be "taken seriously" by pragmatic scientists?
Since we find ourselves in the middle of a single instance of Universal Evolution, how could we verify that our understanding of the "mechanism" is correct, without knowledge of the design intent? Is there a Final Form toward which the world is enforming? Could this OP's information-based "new law" shed any light on the "mechanisms" of evolution? :smile:
*1. Universal evolution :
Universal evolution is a theory of evolution formulated by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Julian Huxley that describes the gradual development of the Universe from subatomic particles to human society, considered by Teilhard as the last stage.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_evolution
*2. Teilhard inspired by Bergson's Creative Evolution???
Creative Evolution (French: L'Évolution créatrice) is a 1907 book by French philosopher Henri Bergson. Its English translation appeared in 1911. The book proposed a version of orthogenesis in place of Darwin's mechanism of natural selection, suggesting that evolution is motivated by the élan vital, a "vital impetus" that can also be understood as humanity's natural creative impulse. The book was very popular in the early decades of the twentieth century.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Evolution_(book)
It doesn't say anything like that in the wiki you linked. Where are you getting that from?
Yes. My own EnFormAction hypothesis, based on a philosophical mash-up of Quantum & Information theories, is essentially a Teleonomy. But I didn't know that term before devising the hypothesis of information-based intentional (programmed) progression, as an alternative to the common notion of pointless random evolution. Darwin's use of the term "to evolve" meant simply "to change", but we can now see a trend toward complexity & consciousness. Whether that trend will end in Nirvana or Armageddon remains to be seen. :nerd:
The EnFormAction Hypothesis
https://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html
Quoting Wayfarer
I entered a review of Feser's book in my blog, comparing the worldviews of Aristotle and Einstein. :smile:
Teleonomy & Emergence :
https://bothandblog6.enformationism.info/page76.html
In relation to what I said, most definitely not.
Quoting Gnomon
I'm in agreement with here.
Quoting Gnomon
Most all cosmologies speculate on what the "final form" of being might be. Here fully including those cosmologies of eternal return that postulate no final form whatsoever. As to the commonly accepted variants that can be currently found, there's a big freeze, a big crunch, a big rip, etc. And then you have the big bounce which fits an eternal return model.
Teilhard's final form, what he termed the omega point, is most certainly non-materialist in nature. As can also be said for notions such as those of Moksha or Nirvana. But that doesn't mean that materialists uniformly reject there being a final form of the world.
So the question is not as esoteric as some might make it out to be, this even from a materialist's pov.
That's my remembrance from Chardin's Phenomenon of Man essay, which I read many years ago. :smile:
The Phenomenon of Man :
Teilhard argues that just as living organisms sprung from inorganic matter and evolved into ever more complex thinking beings, humans are evolving toward an "omega point"—defined by Teilhard as a convergence with the Divine.
https://www.amazon.com/Phenomenon-Harper-Perennial-Modern-Thought/dp/0061632651
It occurred to me the other day that one of the difficulties with Aristotle's other causes is that they don't make sense without the concept of potentiality. Yet, since potentiality can't be observed, we've ditched it with essences (only to work it back in through a variety of metrics). It's a problem for empiricism in general. You only observe the things you observe and only what actually happens happens. Even if potentials are needed to explain the world, they remain tricky.
Terrance Deacon's Incomplete Nature gives some good examples of these sorts of phenomena, building off less complex examples to more complex ones like the auto-catalyses that must have been involved in the formation of early life. One of the simple ones he gives is how boiling oil will form hexagonal convection cells. The hexagonal form is a constraint, but it exists because of a thermodynamic gradient that this form discharges more efficiently. You see the same thing with frost heaves in the arctic, or cracking dry soil, although the arctic version is more impressive because you can end up with almost perfect hexagons stacked across an area.
Anyhow, I like his terminology for this:
IDK, while less "hard science," I can certainly think of evidence to support this in the political science, military science, and business literature. The idea that open endedness and innovation are adaptive are extremely strong there, and there is definitely a case to be made for selection-like effects on the "evolution" of states, businesses, languages, programming languages, etc.
Re the problem of "self destruction," I would think this represents an equilibrium trap, a valley is the landscape so to speak. But chaotic systems exhibit that sort of reversal all the time.
There is also to consider the fact that a "tendency to x" doesn't mean that a system necessarily achieves x. Contingencies still exist.
I recently read two essays relevant to philosophical questions about the hows & whys of the Emergence of Life and Mind from a material world. The first is a neuroscience article by philosopher Phillip Goff, on why Consciousness is not the kind of phenomenon to be studied by scientific methods. Which seems to be an argument for a non-reductionist (Holistic) approach to understanding such immaterial features of the world.
Goff begins with a note about the Integrated Information Theory, which tries to tightrope the line between Reductionism and Holism*1. Next, he argues in favor of the opposite perspective, although he avoids using the fraught term "Holism"*2. Then he mentions the "proposed new law of evolution" that we are discussing in this thread*3. And finally, he tentatively proposes that there must be an alternative yet-to-be-discovered process to derive Mind from Matter. He concludes with a suggestion pertinent to this Science-dominated forum: "We need to let the philosophers do the philosophy and the scientists study the brain". :smile:
*1. Consciousness can't be explained by brain chemistry alone :
" In September, over 100 consciousness researchers signed a public letter condemning one of the most popular theories of consciousness— the integrated information theory — as pseudoscience. This in turn prompted strong responses from other researchers in the field. Despite decades of research, there's little sign of consensus on consciousness, with several rival theories still in contention."
https://www.livescience.com/health/neuroscience/consciousness-cant-be-explained-by-brain-chemistry-alone-one-philosopher-argues
*2. I argue that we can account for the evolution of consciousness only if we reject reductionism about consciousness.
*3. And the assembly theory of chemist Lee Cronin and physicist Sara Walker decisively rejects reduction to microscopic-level equations, arguing for a kind of memory inherent in nature that guides the construction of complex molecules.
*4. For any adaptive behaviour associated with consciousness, there could be a nonconscious mechanism that instigates the same behaviour.
Note --- I interpret the information-based "New Law" of evolution to postulate something more like a goal-directed "Program" --- with memory & rules --- than a mere chain-of-events "Mechanism".
The second article is a Mind Matters review of Goff's forthcoming book How Life Works*5. Denyse O'Leary's article*6 begins with "Science writer Philip Ball, facing cancer surgery, struggles to find meaning and purpose in a wholly material world. He is looking in the wrong place". She notes that Goff is an Atheist, and implies that he is blind to the "true" solution to the Life & Mind problem, substituting philosophical metaphors --- "self-organized knots of energy and matter" --- in place of a traditional story of creation.
She quotes from the book : "To risk an anthropomorphism, evolution chose to work this way". Then, "Either all that order arose from some random drift of the universe as Ball, an atheist, seems to think or an intelligent agent chose it". Finally, she concludes : "Sorry but no. The biologists who want to banish meaning and purpose from science do so because they are materialists. They know perfectly well that only an immaterial mind can recognize meaning in anything. That’s in the nature of what meaning is."
It's probably too early to see whether the New Law of Evolution will shed any light on the perennial questions that leave philosophers floundering in the muddled middle between Materialistic Science and Spiritualistic Religion. :cool:
*5. How Life Works / A User’s Guide to the New Biology.
https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/H/bo207403562.html
*6. Only An Immaterial Mind Can Ask “How Does Life Work?”
https://mindmatters.ai/2023/11/only-an-immaterial-mind-can-ask-how-does-life-work/
You think? Read this. The wave function describes potentialities, according to Heisenberg. The wave function is not ‘in’ space time - that’s why the rate of electron discharge doesn’t affect the distribution pattern.
Please elaborate on the "system structure" relative to Aristotelian "form"*1. Is it your own insight, or do you have links to sites that explore that relationship? I too see a similarity between a functional system of things and the collective Form (interrelationships ; patterns) of multiple entities*2.
I agree that pragmatic scientists "have no need" of non-mechanistic models of causation. Classical physics works fine for manipulating macro scale mechanical systems. But not so well for quantum-scale systems. Therefore, theoretical scientists and philosophers tend to look at the gap between Cause & Effect, and ask "What's the connection"*3. For example, how is mathematical momentum (a property or qualia) of one mass transmitted to another material mass? So, this forum should be an appropriate venue for exploring such impractical open questions.
Pertinent to the OP, the universe seems to work as an evolving system, bound together by Gravity --- formerly imagined as spooky action at a distance. But now we are told that Gravity is merely Geometry, a mathematical inter-relationship. So, what's the connection? Is Gravity Aristotelian? :smile:
*1. Form vs. Matter :
Aristotle famously contends that every physical object is a compound of matter and form. This doctrine has been dubbed “hylomorphism”,
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/form-matter/
*2. What is a system? :
A system is a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole. ___ Wikipedia
*3. Cause and Effect :
'Cause and Effect' considers Hume's view that the relation of cause and effect supplies the basis for our factual beliefs. Observation leads us to believe in connections between physical objects and events. The power and force of these connections are not observable, only the changes in spatio-temporal relations.
https://academic.oup.com/book/400/chapter-abstract/135206122?redirectedFrom=fulltext
To make sure I understand what you meant by "universal evolution" I googled the term and found the Chardin site. If you were not referring to that particular theory, is there another reference I can look at? Or were you just implying that Darwin's "evolution" was not "universal"? Is there more than one general theory of evolution that the "new law" might apply to? :smile:
I'm currently not antagonistic to to Chardin. But, back then, I couldn't have cared less.
Hope that clarifies things.
Yes, but. By "universal truth" I was referring to "explanatory power". But both of those idioms may be judged critically on the basis of physical evidence, not just logical consistency. Philosophy may be distinguished from Science in that it is not content to observe a repetitive series of events (C-D-E)), but stubbornly strives toward the possible original input or Cause and the probable ultimate end or Consequence (A . . . Z).
As Hume noted, causation is not a physical observation, but a metaphysical inference : putting 2 & 2 together to get to 4, or connecting C to E by imagining an invisible link between them. For simple mechanical systems, the link is obvious. But for complex and on-going universe-wide processes, that can only be observed locally & incrementally, the causal relationship is more of a leap of imagination.
Pragmatic Scientists may be content to infer that C predicts E, even though D may also be part of the explanation. Yet, idealistic Philosophers tend to look beyond those local physical steps toward universal metaphysical origins & codas. You will never observe those extreme causes --- First & Final --- in a laboratory. Which is why we debate their reality & applicability in our forums.
At this moment, the New Law of Evolution seems to be more philosophical than scientific ; more metaphysical than physical. So, it won't be accepted as an actual empirical law of Nature, until the C-D-E steps, and their information links, can be demonstrated, either in a lab, or mathematically. I guess we'll have to stay tuned for further developments. But, due to my information-centric personal worldview, I'm inclined to provisionally accept the causal role of invisible EnFormAction in universal Evolution. :smile:
EnFormAction :
The concept of a river of causation running through the world in various streams has been interpreted in materialistic terms as Momentum, Impetus, Force, Energy, etc, and in spiritualistic idioms as Will, Love, Conatus, and so forth. EnFormAction is all of those.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Sorry. I thought you were referring to a more universal theory of evolution, that would expand on Darwin's biological focus, to a more general understanding of how the primitive proto-physics of the Big Bang has matured into current cosmic-scale, macro-scale, and sub-atomic physics. That incremental process of Emergence*1 has now progressed to the point of producing, not just more complexity, but the astonishing emergence of novelty, including meta-physical Minds, and "non-physical" Consciousness.
The Phenomenon of Man was such a theory. But that was a century ago. I would be interested in an update, that attempts to explain Natural Selection on a cosmic scale. In fact, I have made my own amateur attempt at a hypothesis of Cosmic Evolution, based on 21st century Information Theory*2.
Darwin saw a parallel, with "Selection" by human minds, in the workings of Nature. Both are Natural in the sense of A> a teleological act by a physical organism, and B> a mathematical computation of inputs & outputs. No divine intervention was necessary to convert a wolf into a dog. It's doubtful that such a human-friendly predator would have evolved without Artificial selection. And it's unlikely that the various ancient human breeders had any far future vision of the domesticated results of their individual personal-preference choices.
Yet today, genetic engineers, are able to create designer dogs to specifications. However, the basic principles*3 of genetic evolution are inherent in Nature, and one species of Nature's pets has discovered those universal truths, and learned to apply them with god-like creativity. So, it seems that Nature has evolved it's own lineage of little creators.
The postulated "new law of evolution" seems to focus on the mathematical/logical functions*4 of the process of creating new forms from old. But didn't I see much elaboration on that aspect in the Abstract. And I doubt that the scientists were thinking in terms of PanTheism or PanPsychism, but they may be presciently & unknowingly thinking in terms of Enformationism*5. :joke:
*1. Emergence :
In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence occurs when a complex entity has properties or behaviors that its parts do not have on their own, and emerge only when they interact in a wider whole.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence
Note --- This is a Holistic term, not normally used in Reductive Physics
*2. Novelty, Information and Surprise :
The generalized information concept is called novelty and it is accompanied by two concepts derived from it, designated as information and surprise, which describe "opposite" versions of novelty, information being related more to classical information theory and surprise being related more to the classical concept of statistical significance.
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-662-65875-8
*3. Evolutionary dynamics :
Evolutionary dynamics is the study of the mathematical principles according to which biological organisms as well as cultural ideas evolve and evolved.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_dynamics
*4. Quote from OP
"The new work postulates a ‘law of increasing functional information,’ which states that a system will evolve ‘if many different configurations of the system undergo selection for one or more functions".
*5. Enformationism :
A philosophical worldview or belief system grounded on the 20th century discovery that Information, rather than Matter, is the fundamental substance of everything in the universe. It is intended to be the 21st century successor to ancient Materialism and/or Creationism. An Update from Bronze Age to Information Age. It's a Theory of Everything that covers, not just Matter & Energy, but also Life & Mind & Love.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Note --- En-Formation is causal Energy plus limiting Laws (directional regulation). Equivalent to Plato's First Cause, aka Logos. Enformationism is an information-based philosophical theory of Cosmic Evolution.
In his "On the Origin of Species", I don't recall Darwin mentioning natural selection to necessarily incorporate "a teleological act by a physical organism", or by any other type of psyche whatsoever for that matter (this being strictly limited to artificial, rather than natural, selection). One can find arguments such as this paper presents that Darwin was in fact utilizing teleology (one can simply read the article's abstract and conclusion for the general idea), but Darwin was by no means one to believe in a global-watchmaker-god sort of mindset as concerns any of the teleological processes involved in natural selection. Nor does he anywhere mention anything close to "a mathematical computation of inputs & outputs" - Malthusianism is certainly not that, for example. To the extent that I find the quote above rather jarring.
Quoting Gnomon
Yes, so would I. My own criteria for accepting any novel idea in this regard to me seems rather simple: does it manage to ontologically explain how life and its biological evolution evolved from nonlife and its here assumed cosmic evolution - this rather than merely supposing that it somehow did. If yes, then I'll bite.
----------
ps. "On the Origin of Species" is a very worthwhile read. And one can arguably find heavier leaning on teleological reasoning - i.e., explanations in terms of ends, or objectives, etc. - in his third book "The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals", which to me is an essential read for the field of psychology (and this coming from a present non-physicalist).
Yes. My use of "teleology" in the quote was ironic. Darwin's term "natural selection" was probably intended to avoid any interpretations of super-natural intervention. But his model for how natural selection works was based on examples of artificial (human) selection. Yet, what was supposed to distinguish Natural Selection from Artificial Selection was the assumption that teleological foresight of a sentient being was un-necessary. However, Darwin later admitted that Random Chance was not a reasonable alternative to some kind of Intentional Causation*1.
In retrospect though, the article you linked to does find implications for a necessary teleological interpretation of natural evolution*2. And that is just what I concluded in my own Enformationism thesis. As a non-theist, I was not looking for a super-natural explanation for the origin & evolution of the real world*3. And I don't accept ancient myths as reliable sources of technical information about how & why the world came to be, and to become. So, I typically use ancient philosophical terminology to describe my incomplete understanding of those hows & whys. Personally --- philosophically and scientifically --- I have a preference for Logical Teleology over Accidental Cosmology*4.
Plato's notion of Ideal Forms --- as the source of all Real Things in the known world --- is one such term. Also, Aristotle's Prime Mover & First Cause*5 arguments make sense to me, even in the light of modern post-Bang cosmology, which is temporally finite. Likewise, my own speculations about a pre-Bang creation event use non-religious terminology, in a futile attempt to avoid denunciations due to prejudice against both religion-in-general, and pre-science philosophy in particular. Yet, since empirical Science has no actual evidence of the origins of the Evolution Algorithm, why not use the theoretical methods of philosophy to go beyond the Big Bang barrier? :smile:
*1. Darwin's First Cause :
Even Darwin himself admitted, regarding “blind chance or necessity”, that “I am compelled to look to a First Cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man and I deserve to be called a theist”. Perhaps not a biblical Theist, but an enlightenment Deist. Even theistic botanist, Asa Grey, noted that, “Darwinian teleology has the special advantage of accounting for the imperfections and failures as well as for successes”. And that is also the case for the Intelligent Evolution corollary to the thesis of Enformationism.
http://bothandblog7.enformationism.info/page14.html
https://www.azquotes.com/quote/575509
*2. Teleological Selection :
[i]Darwin's explanatory practices conform well, however, to recent defenses of the [b]teleological
character[/b] of selection explanations.[/i]
https://inters.org/files/lennox1993.pdf
*3. Teleological Creation :
From a philosophical perspective though, my interest is universal & cosmic. And modern Cosmology has confirmed the intuition of the ancients, that the Cosmos is distinguished from Chaos in that it is precisely enformed : apparently structured to serve some overall purpose.
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/13752/why-science-has-succeeded-but-religion-has-failed/p9
*4. Logical Teleology vs Random Cosmology :
https://bothandblog7.enformationism.info/page14.html
*5. The Cosmological Argument :
Aristotle rules out an infinite progression of causes, so that led to the conclusion that there must be a First Cause.
https://www.qcc.cuny.edu/socialSciences/ppecorino/INTRO_TEXT/Chapter%203%20Religion/Cosmological.htm
In my Enformationism thesis, life-from-non-life was the core mystery to be explained by any new Cosmology. Materialism has nothing to offer on that front. And Spiritualism is tainted with millennia of religious & philosophical debasement. So, my amateur proposal is based on the ubiquity of generic Information at all levels of cosmic ontology : Matter, Life, & Mind. In the thesis & blog, I have been exploring that angle for several years. But the diverse roles of Information, in the development of a simple Singularity into a complex Cosmos, are usually viewed in isolation, rather than in conjunction --- as a whole system.
My own journey of exploration of Information began with John A. Wheeler's*1 "it from bit" conjecture, back in 1989. Yet, that postulation wasn't taken very seriously by his fellow physicists. Except for Paul Davies*2, who has made a new career path from following that notion wherever it leads. Since then, I have been trailing the pioneers --- who are mostly physicists & mathematicians, along with a few philosophers --- in order to develop my own personal hypothesis of Enformationism*3. It postulates how a primitive Big Bang could create the amazing world --- of Matter, Life & Mind --- that we now observe, up close & personal, and through the far-seeing Webb space observatory.
A key concept of the thesis is that the word "Information" refers to the act of giving meaningful or functional Form to something : originally a human mind*4. But physicists now equate causal Information, not just with computer Data, but also with universal physical Energy. So, in the beginning, there was Information as the creative Energy of Big Bang, and as the informing algorithm of the Singularity. All together, those elementary forces have constructed a universe of Matter, Life & Mind. :smile:
*1. Forget Space-Time: Information May Create the Cosmos :
[i]What are the basic building blocks of the cosmos? Atoms, particles, mass energy? Quantum mechanics, forces, fields? Space and time — space-time? Tiny strings with many dimensions?
A new candidate is "information," which some scientists claim is the foundation of reality. The late distinguished physicist John Archibald Wheeler characterized the idea as "It from bit" — "it" referring to all the stuff of the universe and "bit" meaning information.[/i]
https://www.space.com/29477-did-information-create-the-cosmos.html
*2. The Search for Biogenesis :
[i]Cosmologists, physicists, biologists—there is no shortage of scientists who have sought to explain how living things might have arisen on Earth and elsewhere in the universe. . . . .
Of those who have studied the origin of life, among the most prolific and influential is Paul Davies, an expert in each of the aforementioned fields. Now a professor at Arizona State University, Davies spent the first decades of his award-winning career studying quantum physics; in the 1990s, he started expanding his focus to astrobiology and cosmology, drawing on his background as a physicist to bring an uncommon perspective to the problem of biogenesis.[/i]
https://www.magiscenter.com/blog/paul-davies-the-search-for-biogenesis
*3. Enformationism :
A worldview or belief system grounded on the assumption that Information, rather than Matter, is the basic substance of everything in the universe. It is intended to be an update to the 17th century paradigm of Materialism, and to the ancient ideologies of Spiritualism. It's a "substance" in the sense of Aristotle's definition as metaphysical Essence.
https://enformationism.info/enformationism.info/page2%20Welcome.html
*4. Information :
[i]According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the earliest historical meaning of the word information in English was the act of informing, or giving form or shape to the mind, as in education, instruction, or training.
The English word was apparently derived by adding the common "noun of action" ending "-ation"[/i]
___Wikipedia
https://enformationism.info/enformationism.info/page2%20Welcome.html
Note --- Hence, En-Form-Action --- my coinage for Programmed Energy.