Evolution and free will
The main idea in the video I want to contextualize the discussion on free will is viz. NATURE'S EFFICIENCY (NE)
By NE I understand that all processes in nature have evolved to achieve stability with the minimum of energy expenditure and it exists as a fundamental rule of the processes of nature whether living or non-living.
If, as they video claims, NE is an overarching principle of nature, then the intelligence to identify the most efficient method of any and all processes must be coupled with free will to enable an organism to choose the most efficient method so identified.This suggests that free will would evolve naturally and that our intuition of possessing free will may not be an illusion after all. Life requires an agency capable of discovering the most efficient processes to perpetuate itself with the ability to choose these processes in order to do so.
In fact it could be said that if nature is truly efficient it would favor directed evolution which necessitates an agent with intelligence AND free will rather than just leave everything to the vagaries of chance.
However, notice that the organism with free will must always conform to the basic principle of NE otherwise there's the danger of extinction. Given this is so some may object by saying that organisms purported to have free will actually don't have a choice but to follow, like water, the path of least resistance - the most efficient pathways.
We're in a catch 22 situation. The ability to choose - free will - combined with intelligence would favor life but then there would be no choice but to follow the most efficient processes.
Perhaps we could frame the issue in terms of intelligence alone not being adequate because then there would be nothing to make a choice to follow the most efficient processes to perpetuate itself. There is a need for the ability to choose (free will) even if in the broader context these choices are limited by NE.
Comments...
Comments (88)
"intelligence" is basically just a type of pattern and process
and free-will just means you have no gun to your head forcing you. real free-will would require something from nothing which is impossible
reality is patterns and cause&effect. these two things explain nature well enough on their own without needing to bring mysticism into it
Mysticism? Everyone is really under the impression that what they think, speak and do is volitional - choices made without any coercion and/or unconscious influence. What is mystical about that? Of course it maybe an illusion but you can't deny it.
i dont deny the illlusion, caused by ignorance of cause and effect
I don't think this adds up. Free will gives the option to NOT pick the most efficient method. So the best (most efficient) way would be better achieved without free will, as it would ALWAYS occur. If we can identify anything as "best" or "most efficient" then free will's only significant function would be to choose otherwise.
Is it actually a truth that the most efficient survive? I donāt know how we can really know that without knowing what the alternative might have been. Is our position on the planet, the result of evolution, one of being the most efficient? Is this the best we could be? Would we have been more efficient with an eye in the back of our head, or two hearts sharing the load?
You make a fantastic point here. I see this, let's call it rebellion - the ability to choose the "wrong" path - as something of a necessary evil. I think we have a very good analog in our lives viz. what I hear quite often but don't engage in, at least not voluntarily. That's the so-called package deal.
In order to achieve its ultimate goal of survival, life (is this personifying?) needs itself to be able to choose the most efficient means of survival. In order to do that we need organisms that
1. Can think and know what these most efficient pathways are
2. Can choose to go down those life-sustaining and life-promoting paths
As a side-effect we also gain the ability to deny these obvious routes to biological success - survival.
A hint that this is true can be seen in our ethics; especially how it has spread out into environmental issues. Are humans not trying to preserve the totality of the ecosystem which is another way of saying isn't life trying to preserve and promote itself through us, the only organisms endowed with the two abilities I mentioned above.
The quite apparent fact that this isn't working - people don't give a damn about ecology - is evidence that humans have free will that is powerful enough to reject options that clearly have a real impact on their ultimate survival as a species.
I could offer an "explanation" for what is quite frankly an odd situation - evolution backfiring in this case as endowing us with free will seems to have a net negative effect on the living world. Could it be that there's an equilibrium down the road where the species (us) aligns its goals with the 5 kingdoms of life?
Great observation. I wasn't clear enough so my fault. Efficiency here represents all principles active in the process of evolution. I'm unfortunately not aware of them. It suffices to say that these evolutionary laws/rules make some pathways of biochemistry and physiology more favorable than others. This is what I'm referring to with efficiency of life.
Doesn't it just need to obtain/use the most efficient means? Why is choice needed? Are you suggesting that microbial life is somehow "choosing" the most efficient method? Or are you just saying that "choice" would be a pinnacle of evolution as it allows the possessor to INTENTIONALLY select the most efficient method? I still think being compelled to use the most efficient method is better (would yield consistently better results) than choosing the most efficient method.
Or maybe you are using "choose" separate from will? Something like: "evolution chooses the most efficient method."
On a separate note, I would point out that survival only needs "efficient enough to survive", it doesn't require the "most efficient". But that is a separate point from what I think you are hoping to discuss, so I will ignore that for now.
Quoting TheMadFool
Instead of these two, in a compelled version:
1. Organism that do not use the most efficient methods die.
2. Those that don't die are using the most efficient methods.
Where is choice NEEDED? How would it help?
I donāt see āchoiceā being a factor, nor do I even see it as a fact in evolution. And if thereās no choice then thereās no proof of free will. Not that Iām disputing free will necessarily, only that this doesnāt suggest it.
Itās only after the fact that the efficiency is evident, isnāt it? No one can know what the future holds. I tend to regard what you see as efficiency as advantageous, in relation to future events. Those with the fortunate advantages advance, survive and pass on their genes. That may look like efficiency in the long run because of the perfect fit.
Is it possible for humans to make efficient choices regarding evolutionary survival? What efficiency would we chose for an unknown future? Who can know except those in the future? Is climate change a slow, inevitable process that reduces human numbers? If so then our contribution to climate change is an efficiency to reduce numbers to a level where we can survive and continue our evolution. Or should we fight climate change because it threatens the species?
The irony is that choosing the most efficient process is actually having no choice ("being compelled") other than that particular process because if an organism opts for another less efficient process its survival prospects are reduced. It's like telling someone to choose but giving only ONE option (the most efficient process). However this isn't the complete story as you yourself mentioned in a previous post:
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Quoting ZhouBoTong
Yes, but you won't disagree that if the most efficient process is adopted by an organism it greatly increases the chances of its survival.
Quoting Brett
But we can and do plant the future don't we? The success of such plans may be less than certain but if we look at the way the world's turned out we do have an acceptable hit rate with our plans. Similarly I'd say that knowledge of life processes will give us an advantage for we can select the best processes that give us a survival advantage and discard those that are detrimental.
Quoting TheMadFool
Iām just not sure thatās true. Wouldnāt it be the case that itās only true if we had somehow stepped out of the condition of evolution as it applies to the past and other life forms? That we are no longer bound by nature. And that might be the case.
Quoting TheMadFool
So which would be the best process to consider in my point about climate change? Which would be the decision that has most efficiency for our survival?
Actually, I might have just clarified one of my doubts. Regarding my example of climate change I am quite aware of the choice. I just donāt know which is the most efficient.
Yes. That's why I have concluded that human Free Will is limited to a conscious Veto over the options presented by automatic sub-conscious calculations. Our "selfish genes" program the subconscious to calculate what's "best" for survival and reproduction. But our mental Selves may have other priorities, such as morality. So freewill is not quite as free as some would like to believe, but it's also not an illusion as others would prefer.
The human brain is a future-predicting machine, but the human mind has an over-ride vote : an unforced choice. Unfortunately, many of us allow a coin-flip to decide; hence, no better than robots.
Quoting Gnomon
I donāt know if I accept the idea of āthe selfish geneā. So on that basis the human Free Will has even less presence or effect over whatās ābestā. And even less as a āfuture-predicting machineā.
But thatās purely on the basis of my position on the selfish gene.
I think I agree overall, assuming you are using some figurative language. But as a small disagreement, couldn't our sub-conscious also be influenced by morality and other non-survival concerns? If I spend a lot of time consciously thinking about "x", won't it naturally get integrated into sub-conscious thought? Not that that necessarily causes any problems for your overall point.
So if you look at humans who can make choices, and then organisms that can't, which one selects the most efficient path most often? Humans very regularly do not. For MOST meals, I compromise on perfectly healthy in some way. And statistically, I eat healthier than the average human. I get that half the planet is ill informed on such things, but I would bet against the informed making proper choices if "proper" is inconvenient or uncomfortable.
I would also point out that the "choices" we are discussing happen during one's lifetime, and therefor have very little to do with evolution (how many of those choices actually effect the passing on of genes?), unless we are bringing Lamarckian evolution back. Notice that "unhealthy" choices like having loads of unprotected sex are actually very "fit" according to evolution.
One could say that life has achieved self-awareness through humans. This isn't such a difficult proposition to consider. Look at the human body. Is our liver or heart or lungs or our toes conscious? No. Yet the brain, the conscious part of our body, works to ensure the survival of the whole body. Similarly, life is like the body and humans are like the brain. We humans, conscious and capable, must work to ensure the survival of the entire biosphere. Trying to prevent and reverse climate change is beneficial to the entire ecosystem. We may not be in the know about which methods/processes can solve the problem of climate change in the most efficient way but we are looking aren't we?
We need to look at the time-frame if you want to see the difference between blind evolution and human-directed evolution. Blind evolution would require an immense amount of time to get things right. Human-directed evolution would arguably achieve optimum efficiency in a shorter period. Which situation would have a higher hit rate? You firing your gun randomly or a trained sniper?
Quoting TheMadFool
But I doubt we can know the best course to take, despite our self awareness.
Quoting TheMadFool
Possibly, but not necessarily so. What if we didnāt reverse climate change, that we let it go, that in time (maybe a hundred years, maybe more) the climate caused a reduction in human numbers, a reduction in the demand for food, a reduction in tensions over resources and borders and instead there was a more balanced environment, occupied by people who had the time to consider decisions more temperately.
That could be the greater efficiency than fighting climate change. But how do we chose, how do we decide?
Not only that, but what is a collective choice? Is there such a thing, or is it the choice imposed from above where the ārightā decision has been weighed and implemented.
Second thought: and, if I am correct (of course I think I am), then what exactly and what value is the āself-awarenessā?
[quote=Socrates]The unexamined life is not worth living[/quote]
If truth is our ultimate goal then self-awareness is a necessary step. I can work in my own favor only if I know I exist. Right? It appears that life and by extension the universe wants a "life" that isn't at the mercy of chance. Life, the universe, has become self-aware AND rational. Essential ingredients for success, don't you think?
Quoting TheMadFool
So, the evidence of our self awareness, our quest for truth, is also evidence of the universe seeking the same, recognising and choosing order over chaos, choosing rational thought and naturally efficiency to reach that ultimate goal, and that this is evidence of free will in action.
But my feeling is, and this partly tied to the selfish gene idea, that the only act of free will we have is to go against our nature (I donāt know if this what ZhouBoTong is suggesting, maybe) which is moral anyway, and that would be a destructive act and consequently irrational. If self awareness amounts to the ability to make that choice, then what could the benefit be?
We cannot chose efficiency because we can only know the present. The future waits to act on us.
I
I've heard that evolution finds it difficult to explain morality, given the fact of the selfish gene. I find this rather odd point of view considering how a person's sense of wellbeing seems to lie beyond the self too - in family, friends, communities, nations, etc. It isn't too much of a stretch to see where this is going. Haven't we realized that the health of the ecosystem we live in is critically dependent on each element in it? It seems the so-called selfish gene will shrink and fade away with an ever-expanding familial connection, as evidenced through biology, between all species. This realization - that we're all family - is the truth that there is no us vs. them but that everything is us.
You cannot make the right or efficient choices for a future you do not know, and the choices you do make are very minor in the scheme of things, and whether they are the right choice in terms of evolution cannot be known.
So is there evidence of choices determining our future that overrides our nature? The only evidence of a choice is in going against our nature, as I said, which is no different than suicide, itās more an act under duress, which is not much of a choice. Could that affect our evolution? Possibly, if there were enough people making the same type of unstable decisions, but then again the decisions are unstable and not conducive to survival.
So, if there is no choice then there is no free will.
Quoting TheMadFool
Itās not hard to explain evolution and morality if you throw out the idea of the selfish gene. A discussion weāve all been through before.
Yes, our well-being does lie outside of ourselves. Family, communities, lie at the core of our evolution. The morals we feel to be real today are the ones that formed those communities and were perpetuated by the success of those communities, both owe their success and endurance to each other.
By and large our choices are framed by those morals. Being moral is not a matter of choice, itās what we are. This doesnāt mean that people wonāt behave badly. So there is no free will except in going against our nature, which takes us nowhere.
So I donāt believe we can make choices that we might call efficient to shape the future according to our desires. As I said which is the best choice about my climate change dilemma?
Yes, everything is āusā in the sense that no one can get off the train. But we can only affect what happens around us now, through our ideas of morality, which are essentially the protection and well being of the family and community, which is what enabled our evolution to this point.
Could that aspect of human nature, that morality, be destroyed. I donāt think so, but it could become dormant if the idea and importance of family and community is whittled away and the idea of the individual is made paramount and promoted as the essential way to survival. Then you will see ideas of efficiency working their way through society and morality regarded as old fashioned, inefficient and burdensome.
In fact the use of the word efficient in terms of society makes me nervous.
Why do you say that? Have you never planned for the future? Did you not plan yesterday that you would respond to my post? If you say "no" then, like me, you're a rarity in the world of humans who do make plans for the future and most of the times these do bear the desired fruit. Human society has a structure that depends on considering future outcomes which seem to, on mos occasions, work quite well. Don't you think?
I'd like to request a good justification for the words "future you do not know". If you mean to critique causality, the basis of all planning, then I'm all ears.
Quoting Brett
Not having knowledge is not the same as not wanting knowledge. You can't hold a toddler responsible for not knowing a match causes fire but one would be concerned if s/he has no desire to know.
Quoting Brett
Yes, I understand what you mean. For one it may be extremely efficient to kill of all people who have "unhealthy" genes. However, this is a non-issue because, having achieved total control of our genes, this problem would simply vanish on it's own accord. Do we worry about small pox these days? However, your concern is of great importance because as Dosotevsky pointed out "without God everything is permissible". To navigate the perilous seas will require more wisdom than we can credit even the wisest amongst us.
Nonetheless, we can agree that morality, in essence, is about inclusion contrasted with exclusion. We always think twice about hurting those we include in our personal space. We usually don't give a damn about or feel no qualms about hurting those we exclude as not-us. I must say we can pin the blame for this situation squarely on the selfish gene.
However, consider how knowledge gained through our rational mind, itself a product of the "selfish" gene, has quite literally unveiled a truth of great consequence viz. we're all connected in a way that to heed only the call of our selfish genes is to invite disaster one of which you mentioned - climate change.
While this may be viewed as the height of vanity - the acme of selfishness where humans broaden their concern to other life-forms only because ultimately we care for ourselves - it can also be construed as life itself recognizing it's own nature and wanting to self-correct. Viewed this it isn't selfishness. Rather it's, for lack of a better word, an Awakening.
It's just a metaphor. You can substitute whatever "programming" results in the body's ability to run itself, like a robot, without the mind consciously directing a million events every second.
Yes. I use metaphors as a short-cut for extremely complex "mechanisms". And I agree that the sub-conscious mind can be "programmed" by conscious concerns for morality : that's what we call "developing Character". But, once programmed, the subconscious system operates the body automatically, until some problem requires an executive decision. For example, the emotions quickly prime the body for "fight or flight". But the exec has to decide which. That's why we tend to freeze, when startled, long enough to assess the situation. Of course, when faced with a seven foot tall, 800 pound bear, the feet may start running before the exec even gets the request for orders. :smile:
Quoting Gnomon
Yes, Iām aware itās a metaphor and I disagree with the concept it represents.
Quoting TheMadFool
Of course I plan for the future. However I might make a plan for going from Australia to New York, book flights, hotels, anticipate the weather and choose appropriate clothing, change my money, work out how long it takes from home to the airport and arrive in time to board the plane. What I didnāt plan for was the plane crashing into the Pacific Ocean.
[quote="TheMadFool;354822"
]I'd like to request a good justification for the words "future you do not know"[/quote]
Iād like to hear a justification for the words āfuture I do knowā.
I donāt mean this as confrontational as it sounds.
No plan is perfect but no objective is under the sway of every possible contingency. Right? You didn't expect the crash but at least you thought, for a good reason, that sailing there on home-built raft is not the best you could do.
Your concern on the difficulty of planning to be 100% successful is valid. However don't compare the success rates of planning for the future to 100%. Rather weigh it against random probability. You can't deny that your well-conceived plan to travel to Australia isn't better than walking randomly in the streets and if and when you chance upon a travel agent to throw a dice to choose your destination and so forth, hoping that in behaving this way you'll reach your desired destination, Australia?
Wait, do you mean like eugenics or genetic engineering? I agree that those will move evolution along quicker than the natural environment, but those seem different from what we were talking about in relation to "choice"?
Besides intentional genetic manipulation though, hasn't human society largely eliminated the "survival of the fittest" thing? Nearly all humans will have the opportunity to reproduce if that is their life goal. What choices do I need to make in order to successfully pass on my genetic material?
Quoting TheMadFool
Again, if you mean genetic manipulation, I can only agree. If "directed evolution" means that the average Joe takes all applicable factors into account then chooses the most efficient way to live and reproduce, then I am yet to be sold.
Quoting TheMadFool
This analogy suggests we are definitely talking genetic manipulation as "the average Joe" would not count as "trained" right?
And I am cool with that. I thought Gattaca was a sweet movie, and not because I was rooting for Ethan Hawke to show the superiority of normies :smile:
Good, as that was how I understood it :smile:
Quoting Gnomon
That is possibly a bit stronger than I would phrase it, but I don't think we are too far apart here.
Quoting Gnomon
I must get stuck in that moment of decision then. My fight or flight is f***ed. It almost always results in freeze. I did kickboxing for about a decade and the only fights that went well were the ones where I was calm enough for fight or flight to never kick in.
The path from random evolution to well-orchestrated efficient evolution has its slippery slopes. In my humble opinion morality is as distinct a human characteristic as rationality. I think Aristotle defined humans as rational animals. A slight modification is in order if we're to think, as Aristotle probably did, in terms of essential characteristics. This is to define man as rational and moral animal.
So, directed evolution needs to be framed in the context of rational faculties AND ethical sense. To immediately think of eugenics and genetic engineering would be incorrect. Nevertheless, I think it's important to point out the dangers.
Quoting ZhouBoTong
The efficiency of the l'homme moyen is so well-concealed that it sometimes appears as the exact opposite - inefficiency. I agree that there are individual differences which are more obvious than the similarities that unite us because evolution seems to have favored the ability to see distinctions better than resemblances. It is better to recognize a tiger than to fail to recognize your wife. ( :joke: I think I'm taking this a bit too far). The point is the concerns that unite us seem to fall in line with the concern for survival. Ergo, something in the way of addressing these concerns in an efficient way is in order.
Quoting ZhouBoTong
You donāt need to make many choices to pass on your genetic material, but your choices might determine the nature of its future. See my comments to TheMadFool about climate change.
I think where we clash here is in the idea that we can consciously shape and plan for the future, whereas I donāt think we can because the future is unknowable and cannot be planned for.
Edit: I am talking about time in evolutionary terms here.
Second thought: actually thatās not necessarily so. In terms of climate change the changes and demands are going to happen in a very short time, possibly, maybe. But itās not going to be hundreds of years, or more.
I didn't mean either of those quite so negatively (although eugenics certainly deserves it). When you talked about speeding evolution, that has to be more than individual choices...right? I think of dogs as a good example of accelerated evolution. Are humans making any decisions that are speeding evolution in any sort of similar way?
My point about EVERYBODY reproducing was to suggest that there is no targeted improvement happening if everyone is passing on genes.
I feel like I am NOT really addressing what you are getting at. Can you give me an example of how humans are speeding up their evolutionary development?
Unfortunately, the choices of the other 7 billion breeders will also determine its future. (which I am fairly sure is part of your point)
Ha! That's why martial arts and competitive sports emphasize "practice, practice, practice". When you practice a move, your conscious mind analyzes the motions into small details. But your subconscious mind remembers only the whole movement (muscle memory). Eventually, you no longer need to freeze long enough to analyze, you just do it without thinking --- without willing. I suspect you may be an introvert, who is always consciously monitoring what you are doing. Top athletes and artists just go with the flow. :smile:
Flow : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)
Maybe TMF is talking about Cultural Evolution in general, rather than Eugenics or Transhumanism in particular. Cultural Evolution occurs much more rapidly than Natural Evolution. Cultural Selection is cumulative human choices. Unfortunately, the "unfit" consequences of our short-term efficiencies come back to haunt us quickly (e.g. burning fossil fuels, buried over millions of years, turned into aerosols in just a few human generations). Fortunately, if we learn from history, we can try to avoid making the same short-sighted choices over & over.
Cultural Evolution : http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page12.html
Are you suggesting 'free will' had a hand in Evolution?
Let's say for example that the universe is a multiple choice exam.
For each situation you are given a finite set of choices and you can choose freely the one you want.
Is that free will? A limited number of choices?
The knowledge and experiences we have and the ones we remember at the time of the choice is a finite set so they represent the multiple choices.
So If I don't see an option (for whatever reason) I can't choose it even though it is there.
Only omnipotent beings have true free will. They have the knowledge and power to choose whatever they wish from all available choices even if the number of choices are infinite.
In conclusion if you have a limited number of choices that are a subset of the actual number of choices do you have free will?
So, you think evolution "intended" to create intelligent agents all along, but it took 14 billion years to create a working prototype? I'm kidding, but most materialists would find the notion of teleology in Nature to be magical thinking. I happen to agree with your intuition, but instead of promoting Intelligent Design (ID), I propose Intelligent Evolution (IE).
The primary difference between blind groping evolution and directed evolution is the foresight to imagine something better than what is. According to Darwinism, Nature is an ad hoc process : it works with what worked in the past, and adapts it to a new function. Early humans were not much better. They found rocks lying around and used them to pound on nuts. Only thousands of years later did their intelligence invent the hammer, which is intended specifically to pound on nails.
Intelligent Design envisions a world that began as a perfect design, but has been corrupted by an evil deity. Intelligent Evolution proposes a world that began as a primordial Egg, and is still developing and evolving toward the complete design. Both theories explain the imperfections, but only one explains the necessity for gradual evolution, and for the belated emergence of Intelligence, Will, and Morality. :smile:
Intelligent Evolution : http://gnomon.enformationism.info/Essays/Intelligent%20Evolution%20Essay_Prego_120106.pdf
I still can't figure out why you think the future is unknowable. There's only one thing I know that can justify such a claim - chaos - and the world we live in is ordered enough to permit realizable plans for the future.
Are you saying the world is in chaos? I'm willing to admit that there's a lack of coordination in the world and this may be source of your confusion; you're mistaking poor teamwork for chaos. The uncoordinated world does make it difficult to plan but this is not the same as saying the future is unknowable. I think it's just a lack of trying.
I agree that the picture of directed evolution doesn't reflect the truth as it is now. What I'm saying boils down to the fact that intelligent design is better than blind evolution. If you look at how scientists argue against intelligent design you'll see one common motif - that our biology has countless structural and functional flaws. Implicit in that claim is an intelligent designer would've done a better job than probability-based evolution.
I think we're on the same wavelength though I must confess that you saw the connection intelligent design and intelligent evolution but I only strayed into these domains in my discussion with @ZhouBoTong.
Since you're in the right conceptual spot to get the main thrust of my argument all I'll say is that the methods scientists use to attack intelligent design is to point out the many structural and functional flaws in the living world. Surely an intelligent designer could've done better. In fact even humans, as imperfect as we are, can detect flaws in our biology. Isn't this a tacit affirmation that, given the means and opportunity, an intelligent designer can surpass blind evolution in every way?
As I mentioned in my post that choosing the most efficient/bestest path isn't a choice at all. However to enable us to find such paths requires intelligence and to take us on the paths requires an ability to choose even if this is just illusory.
Quoting TheMadFool
Okay, letās define, or agree somehow, on what we mean by āthe futureā. To me itās the absolute unknown, it doesnāt exist. And yes, for me, the universe is chaos.
:ok:
Yes, but that assumes the Designer intended to create a perfect Garden of Eden. If so, then we have to invent an evil god who is powerful enough to foil that intention. However, what if the whole point of creation was to produce a self-perfecting Experiential Process? Some philosophers have postulated that God experiences reality through our eyes, ears, and feelings. I can't speak for God's intentions, but the self-improvement Process of Intelligent Evolution makes more sense to me than the failed Perfection of Intelligent Design. :smile:
Omega Point : Perfection at the end rather than the beginning of the creation process.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_Point
Part of, I think the most vital part of, self-improvement is having the ability to recognize the most efficient processes of life and then choose them.
Well that could certainly be possible. We all throw the word "evolution" around, and we don't always mean biological evolution...and yet I can't help but think of the specific biological evolution when OTHER people use the word "evolution"...must be some sort of bias on my part???
Quoting Gnomon
That's a BIG "if" :razz: But I am with you.
Wow, well I apologize. I would have to go back and re-read the whole thread to see where I missed it, or got off track...but I don't think I was ever aware we were talking about intelligent design :yikes:
I thought we were talking about the will of those being evolved as affecting their evolution. My bad.
Quoting TheMadFool
I thought the main objections would be that intelligent design theory is NOT falsifiable and it does NOT make predictions (please correct me where wrong), which places it outside the realm of science (it can still be philosophy or theology - obviously). Some sort of rigor needs to be added to make it a viable scientific theory...again, I am willing to rethink if I am missing something.
Quoting TheMadFool
And this is where "intelligent" humans look at our "design" and immediately think of improvements (like not breathing out the same hole I shove food into)...which at the very least suggests a less intelligent designer (which makes almost no sense).
So to summarize my view...how would one prove intelligent design wrong? and what useful predictions do we expect to get from the theory? If there are reasonable answers to these questions, then I may have to reconsider intelligent design. Until then, what would I even be considering?
Does intelligent design say anything more than "there is a god that created the universe"?
Perhaps. If the final outcome was the most important goal of the designer. But multiplayer video games are intended to provide an ongoing experience for the players, not to rig the game for a predetermined end state. So, maybe the "designer" of our world was more interested in the Process than the Product.
As you suggested, "given the means and opportunity", why should it take over 14 billion human years to create a perfect world with perfect people? In Genesis, the Creator produced a perfect paradise, complete with vegetarian lions and innocent humans, in only six days, and then took some time off. Ironically, during his vacation, a Troll hacked-in to paradise and "put up a parking lot".
However, since our turbulent Game of Thrones is still evolving in fits & starts, I must assume the Designer is either absconded, or incompetent, or is enjoying the ride, and in no hurry to see the drama end. :smile:
Fascinating. I would also argue to believe you have free will in the traditional sense leads to an increase in depression. Depression is not the path of least resistence. I would argue an animals ability to understand abstract concepts like law and money will lead to that animal to have deep and serious depression. Once again not the path of least resistence.
Thanks for this post. Once again very fascinating.
I don't intend to argue for god conceived as an intelligent designer. Our conversation is, not surprisingly, drifting in that direction because of the obvious connection - intelligence & design. Let me categorically state that I'm not arguing for the existence of a creator deity.
What I mean is that given any project - life and anything else for that matter - an intelligent person with a good plan will be produce better and faster results than a person without a plan. Analogously if life had been the work of someone with a plan it wouldn't have the imperfections, like our eyes having blind spots etc, atheists are so happy to point to creationists. This inevitably leads us to the conclusion that if an intelligent being (only humans in that category) were to now take the reins of this capricious wild horse we call evolution by understanding and controlling the forces involved we might just be able to give life a good chance of success.
Indeed we're not in a position to know the intentions of a creator if it exists. For all we know we may be just the random mold growing in its trash.
However, what is obvious from how life behaves is that life wants to continue its existence. To do this it has evolved, through mere chance, mechanisms that can either block or delay natural processes that are life-threatening. From this we can infer that the processes are tailored for the survival of the product for as long as needed to allow a chain reaction of life. Given this is so, it seems an obvious goal for intelligent life like humans is to manipulate the processes (evolution) to give the product (life) an increased chance of survival. To add, human objectives in life have gone beyond mere survival and now include the quality of life itself.
Yes, I agree there. We may be at that point now. But what should we do?
The way the world is and not what it ought to be should depress everyone. That's why life should evolve intelligence to recognize this is-oughy gap and free will to enable us to make the right choices to change the is to an ought.
Actually some people say a certain hero from a particular religion had the correct dna and lived in a world that was corrupt. He/She obeyed every axiom he was supposed (100s of axioms over many decades). His followers however all had sub optimal or bad dna. Not sure how it ended for his followers and converts in terms of their dna.
Quoting TheMadFool
Iāve been thinking about this and in relation to other posts, and from memory I may have disagreed. But on reflection thereās no reason that this shouldnāt happen.
Nothing is fixed. Morals can evolve in any direction if they no longer serve our survival. The way we view ourselves and the world can change. Like physical attributes, intellectual attributes, over time, can also change. We can override ideas. Like I said, we are moral creatures but we must chose to be moment to moment. Even if itās only in terms of survival and not quality of life we can chose the next step, which is not choosing the future (where I think we disagreed) but will affect our future. How to chose is the problem, on what basis? Now I find myself returning to the beginning; on what basis do we make these decisions?
I agree. But I'm not talking about an "intelligent person" whose intentions and methods are presumably similar to my own. Just as the Atheists argue, the fact that our world is flawed, indicates that a traditional creator-entity failed to achieve his goal of perfection, either because he was a flawed designer (demiurge), or that his perfect plan was opposed by an evil deity (Devil). A variety of such rationales have been proposed in the past. But my thesis reverses that assumption of divine intention. What if the "plan" was to create an evolving process instead a perfect world?
Since evolution does show signs of progress toward some ultimate goal*, I must assume that the intention was not to instantly create a Garden of Eden 6000 years ago. Instead, the intent was focused either on a distant future resolution, or on the process itself. As I suggested, human multi-player game designers (SimCity; Dungeons & Dragons) don't create a perfect world, but provide a base reality, and then allow the players enough freewill to evolve their world according to a collective intention. The omniscient designer turns over the base design to the hive-mind of fallible players with selfish motives.
I don't mean to take the simulated world theory (Matrix) literally, but just as a metaphor for a designed Process instead of a designed Product. The ultimate end of such a process might be perfect in some sense, or it might just play itself out as entropy reaches a maximum. I take an optimistic view based on the novel concept of Enformy (negentropy). Enformationism is a theory of an Enformed System.
Enformy : In the Enformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, metaphysical, natural trend or force, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Theory of Enformed Systems : http://hilgart.org/enformy/$wsr02.html
https://hilgart.org/enformy/enformy.htm
Simulated Reality : https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/11/simulated-world-elon-musk-the-matrix
https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/are-we-living-simulated-universe-here-s-what-scientists-say-ncna1026916
* Progression of Evolution : http://www.bothandblog.enformationism.info/page29.html
I have nothing against the idea of process being the purpose rather than products. Assuming a designer for the moment it's possible that s/he wants to create a robust life principle capable of spontaneous generation and able to sustain itself against great odds.
I wonder now whether in this context intelligence is just one of the tools life evolved to perpetuate/steer/accelerate the process towards something even bigger.
Paleontological evidence doesn't confirm this hypothesis. After all the dinosaur age makes it quite clear that intelligence isn't necessary for life. That said intelligence does give us an edge in the survival business doesn't it? The USA has a program that scans the skies for large asteroids that could precipitate a global extinction event like the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. Of course we have to factor in the possibility that intelligence, in human form, is itself an extinction event. Looks like intelligence is like weapons of mass destruction - capable of preventing catastrophes but is itself a major threat.
Maybe a slight edge. Arthur C. Clarke once wrote, "It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value." I don't know if he was being sarcastic, but biologist Ernst Mayer also voiced that same opinion. Yet how else do you explain that, of all vertebrates, only humans have adapted to every environment on Earth, and even in space? Plus, of all mammals, humans are the only ones increasing in population, while many others are facing extinction. If successful reproduction is a sign of evolutionary fitness, then intelligence must be a big success. Unfortunately, as you noted, intelligence can be a two-edged sword, like the taming of fire. And intelligent humans have only one rival in the survival business : other humans. :cool:
PS___Birds are considered to be the literal descendants of dinosaurs, and they seem to be doing pretty well considering, millions of years after the Saurian "Extinction". Relatively smart, and warm-blooded.
Quoting Spirit12
Maybe not a purpose but a consequence that may in the long term be a disadvantage, Assuming that by disagreement with our own selves you mean the dilemmas we face as conscious and reflective beings
Quoting TheMadFool
Thatās a very interesting point. Iād like to hear more on that.
Is it purely disadvantage in all ways? If I have no ability to second guess myself then maybe I fail and fall and die first time instead of using willpower to question whether had taken enough thinking time.
So long as we reject magical conceptualization for explanation of phenomenon of Will, then maybe we can think in this way.
Quoting TheMadFool
This a very interesting discussion. Iād like to throw in a suggestion:
Perhaps we could frame the issue in terms of will as part of the directed evolution itself. Rather than simply the ability to āchooseā the most efficient processes, what directs evolution even prior to life is an impetus to discover or at least prefer what it perceives (in its limited awareness) as the most efficient processes for a sustainable existence. This develops as an underlying impetus to increase awareness, connection and collaboration - although an individual will has always been in a position to alternatively ignore, isolate and exclude with every interaction, depending on its limited awareness of what constitutes āsustainable existenceā.
Global warming, nuclear weapons, pollution, climate change, etc.
:lol:
Quoting TheMadFool
Thatās a list. I as really alluding to the idea of whether intelligence is an advantage or mistake of evolution, or if it has its limits and where those limits might be? Or if we can step back and observe or correct our intelligence? Or is intelligence a force that occupies the mind, like a virus?
Itās not whether we can prevent our extinction Iām interested in, itās about the nature of our intelligence.
So, has it done a good job or not?. What should we expect from it?
If successful reproduction is a sign of evolutionary fitness, then intelligence must be a big success.[/quote]
Iām not sure, but I think viruses are more successful in reproducing than us. But we would not regard them as intelligent. But then again itās us ourselves defining intelligence. Not the most unbiased assessment.
The list I provided was meant to show how intelligence can lead to global catastrophes. After all man-made stuff like the industrial revolution and the nuclear arms race have been paraded to the public as real existential threats.
Yes, I understand that. So then, intelligence can be viewed as a threat to its host.
Quoting ovdtogt
And the only one capable of creating our own extinction.
Anything's possible.
Quoting ovdtogt
Though nothing can survive extinction. Maybe you mean avoid extinction. What do you think the number of people being alive would qualify as āclose to extinctionā?
2. Adam and Eve
Most animals don't make choices. Their actions are instinctive. They respond to the environment in programmed ways. The program is a general response to a variety of circumstances. Bees evolved to instinctively use the Moon as a means of navigation, and a porch light can be mistaken for the Moon and cause the bee to fly around and around until it dies of exhaustion. The bee has no choice. It simply does what it was programmed to do and can't distinguish the Moon from a porch light.
Humans have more freedom because we can make choices. We can make distinctions between the Moon and porch lights. Being able to make more distinctions enables us to make more choices. Our ability to plan ahead and store a significant amount of information in our brains also provides us with the ability to make choices. Sometimes, though, having too many choices is a detriment. It can freeze us in place as we try to make a decision about what to do when it might become to late to act. Instinctive behaviors are good in the way that they limit response times to changes in the environment, while decision-making can fine-tune our responses to the variety of environmental changes that occur. Both have their pros and cons. Nature is simply trying different tactics to see what works best. If humans end up destroying themselves, then one might make the case that freedom and choices are more of a detriment to organisms over the long term. But then, humans have been able to use their intelligence to learn of the threats to our existence that other animals are oblivious to, and enables us to take actions to prevent it. The jury is still out one whether or not one is better than the other.
Totally agree with you there. No such thing as absolute freedom. The more choices (options) you have the more freedom you have. This is also the reason a lot of people are so dissatisfied with life. They see other people who have more freedom (choices) in life than they do, not realizing that being free from loneliness, fear, pain, hunger, and the other necessities for survival is all that is required for a 'good' life.
That's why I limited my example to vertebrates. For sheer reproductive power, single cells that divide every few minutes don't need much intelligence to survive as a species. Ironically, as humans have expanded their mental power (not just intelligence) via science & education, they have tended to reproduce less often. Perhaps that's because the human mind is gaining more survival advantage from their memes, than from their genes.
Memetic Evolution : http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/MEMEEVOL.html
PS__ world evolution has evolved from slow erratic Natural Selection to rapid targeted Cultural Selection.
The answer to that question depends on whether the "goal" of evolution is Quantitative (reproduction) or Qualitative (teleology). Atheists assume that evolution has no ultimate aim, hence it's only the raw numbers that count. If so, then the emergence of Intelligence is not necessarily a mistake, but merely a Spandrel. However, non-atheists may see signs of intention and qualitative progress in evolution. If that is the case, then Intelligence -- and perhaps freewill -- may be an essential function for the program of gradual improvement.
Spandrel : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spandrel
Evolutionary Progress : http://www.bothandblog.enformationism.info/page29.html
Progressophobia : http://bothandblog2.enformationism.info/page27.html