Behavior OnLine Forums

Behavior OnLine Forums (https://www.behavioronline.net/)
-   Evolutionary Psychology (https://www.behavioronline.net/evolutionary-psychology/)
-   -   Intelligent Design and Why Not (https://www.behavioronline.net/evolutionary-psychology/601-intelligent-design/)

James Brody October 12th, 2005 05:15 PM

Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Intelligent Design and Why Not

"The universe is synchronized and integrated in a manner that reflects intelligence." Of course, this worm covers a hook, a belief that design implies "a designer." Creationists swallow that hook and expect the rest of us to do likewise even though we have a different set of genes and a different set of beliefs.

The Victorians faced a similar confusion. That is, cathedrals and species spilled from a top-down organizer called architect or God. Lots of people knew that oaks grow from acorns but few of those same people considered both St. Paul's and Thom Huxley to be emergents from millennia of simpler organizations, organizations that survived, reproduced, and formed the mosaics for even larger organizations.

A second problem for the Victorians: a clever designer would not waste resources on mistakes. The next stone, a very short step in the middle of this stream, was to conclude that whatever is, is meant to be. According to Loren Eiseley, (1961) fossils, however, provided a substantial challenge to this second idea: the designer became a collage-maker who threw away far more than he saved, a wanderer who frequently traveled down several roads at the same time!

First, the persistence of "Designer Thinking" likely comes from a mental adaptation that shows itself in subtle ways. For example, train a monkey to press a lever for food but have him work in the company of an idle monkey. Shock the worker and he immediately bites the second monkey! A second example: a mother explained a recent earthquake to her young daughter. The explanation was said to be scientific but the little girl later told her father, "A nasty man made the ground shake!" Flip Wilson's antic manic loveable Geraldine exclaimed "The Devil made me do it!" She made us laugh but she also hinted of a far deeper truth about our mentation. We blame males for big events and save the bland PR to those clever round liars, females. Our rendering God as a male rests not on sexism but on fear of our universe. And the "design people" merely follow their instincts and strive for the same outcomes as a Victorian!

Second, I suggest that Intelligent Design will be challenged best when the physics people show us the fossils left by failed universes: designs that represent exploratory throws of the dice, grand experiments that sometimes produced an Earth but also left a trail of abortions, misfits, and failures. Could it be that Dark Matter represents outcomes wherein both the organization of energy and its measured release failed to emerge! Or that black holes are gateways to chaos and stasis on scales that we have not encountered before? Or will we see Neptune and Earth as equally evolved organizations but for different niches?

Physicists might also give a developmental path, a Chain of Being, for suns, planets, and varied types of matter. And how wonderful if we also describe a recapitulation model in which changes in solar systems parallel or somehow repeat the changes that occur in planets!

Finally, they need the equivalent to a "gene": an organizer, a transcriber, a collector and arranger for surrounding materials, a local spider that makes webs from the elemental particles in his immediate vicinity.

Of course, none of this stuff will change the minds of individuals who look for a Designer: their search reflects a gene for flocking and flocks too easily imply a leader and carriers of that gene go nuts if environment doesn't permit one. Even clumps fo grass must have had a first blade! (One alternative finds leadership to be dispersed in a collective intelligence, a whole that depends on sync and synergy between its members as they follow simple rules. The rules for "boids" is an example: "fly toward the middle" and "don't hit another boid." A flock, a school, or a congregation emerge. Thus, it might be that no one duck knows the entire route to Florida. Or does every single duck have receptors that track subtle differences in visible light, differences that correlate with the seasons? Scatter the flock and its members all hit the same pond in the Everglades at about the same time. A relatively simple tool once more replaces a Great Schemer!)

References
Ball, P. (2004) Critical Mass: How One Thing Leads to Another. NY: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux.
Eiseley, L. (1961) Darwin's Century: Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It. NY: Doubleday. (Still a splendid introduction to Hutton, Lyell, Hutton, Ray, Chambers, and many others. JB)
Gaulin, S. & McBurney, D. (2001) Psychology: An Evolutionary Approach. NY: Prentice Hall. (Limited speculation on the evolutionary foundations for causality. Not sure anyone picked up on their lead.)
Wilson, Flip (1960s). Wherever he is now.

Copyright, James Brody, 2005, all rights reserved.

Fred H. October 14th, 2005 11:45 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hey JimB, waddup? I finally was banned from the atheist forum—I think it was my lack of reverence for their belief in chance, not to mention my occasional lack of tact.

Quote:

JimB: Creationists swallow that hook and expect the rest of us to do likewise even though we have a different set of genes and a different set of beliefs.
Yes, there does seem to be a “different set of beliefs” among various groups of folk, although I don’t know how much of that difference we can actually blame on a “different set of genes”—brothers have been fighting turf wars and slaughtering one another for millennia.

Quote:

JimB: Second, I suggest that Intelligent Design will be challenged best when the physics people show us the fossils left by failed universes: designs that represent exploratory throws of the dice, grand experiments that sometimes produced an Earth but also left a trail of abortions, misfits, and failures. Could it be that Dark Matter represents outcomes wherein both the organization of energy and its measured release failed to emerge! Or that black holes are gateways to chaos and stasis on scales that we have not encountered before? Or will we see Neptune and Earth as equally evolved organizations but for different niches?
Yeah, actual science/evidence for infinite universe(s) would help—but then with randomness and the infinite universe(s), everything is possible, including a universe where elephants wear pink dresses and atheists outbreed Mormons. Unfortunately however, for those who believe in infinite universes, the current science/evidence actually points only to one universe having one beginning, from a singularity 14 billion years ago, having inexplicably low entropy.

Here’s a short (4½ pages) piece you may or may not be interested in—a July 2005 paper on the Arrow of Time and initial conditions: http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/gr-qc/pdf/0507/0507094.pdf , Robert M Wald, Enrico Fermi Institute and Dept of Physics, U. of Chicago—the paper notes that entropy at the time of the BB was extremely low, that the “initial state of the observable portion of our universe at/near the BB was “very special”—and argues that it “it is not plausible that these special initial conditions have a dynamical origin [e.g., inflation scenario, currently a popular view among many cosmologists, essentially requiring infinite random cosmic farts that eventually result in our universe].”

James Brody October 22nd, 2005 11:45 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Fred,

You and Shelly are welcome anytime the other bars throw you out...

I grant you that it's peculiar to believe in alternate universes but it's also peculiar to believe in only this one. The data are still out. Selection appears so damned flexible and so damned opportunistic.

Brothers against brothers .... only 50% related. Replays of sibling rivalry? The challenge to genes might arise from the fact that identical twins are usually soul mates rather than bitter rivals for the same resources...therein lurks a prize to be won.

Even your devil might choose the most able sinners and roast them one way but we mediocre types another. Would Lucifer turn up the heat for his nearest competitor or welcome her as an ally? And if the latter, imagine the bitterness in cooking your soulmate or in making her scream without screwing her.

A hot question, no doubt. Could get me cooked by a mullah someday!

My best to you both...

Jim

Fred H. December 2nd, 2005 10:58 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

JimB: I grant you that it's peculiar to believe in alternate universes but it's also peculiar to believe in only this one….
It’s been said that the devil is in the details. But then the principle of parsimony, not to mention a lack of evidence, seems to preclude any rational belief in multiple universes . . . or devils. I find it more reasonable to believe in the 14 billion year old universe that we seem to perceive and find ourselves in, the inexplicably low entropy at the beginning, and, of course, first cause—infinite universes and devils are just too peculiar, unsubstantiated, and extravagant.

James Brody December 3rd, 2005 09:57 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Fred...

I have a traditional Catholic client who asserted: "It is no more rational to believe in a big bang than it is to believe in a creator."

I agreed with him and find that your point reminds me of his. if you insist on a creator, why limit His, never Her, ability in regard to the number of universes?

And the phase transition idea that works so well in physics and in cognition seems adaptable to the evolution of universes...a narrow range of conditions favor chaotic or rigid organizations. Neither of them evolve. And one key variable for pliant, exploratory organizations is the average number of interconnections between participants. About 2.5 worked for Stu Kauffman's simulations, it also appears in many power law descriptions of emergent networks that are characterized by clustering and by close connectivity, a set of relationships that resist jamming...

I dare not believe that so much can unfold from such basic stuff, but just maybe we are on the verge of understanding some very fundamental stuff...

PS: I think I love your wife....

Jim

Fred H. December 5th, 2005 04:44 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
I’m inclined to agree that it’s no more, nor no less, “rational to believe in the big bang than it is to believe in a creator"—the current science/evidence points to the one 14 billion year old entropy-only-increases universe that we find ourselves in; and implications of first cause, I think, are unavoidable.

Shortly after we got engaged (after several dates), and the news was out, two of my betrothed’s old boyfriends also proposed to her—I’m not sure how serious they were, but it does seem that guys often miss the mark, wasting energy on coveting, and multiplying entities beyond necessity.

Of course with infinite universes and “randomness,” the probability of a universe like ours, where Shelley marries me, is 1—and sure enough, here we are—as is the probability of other universes, where Shelley instead marries someone else. So with infinite universes, not only are all things possible, all things are 100% probable, with little need for Yahweh. Oh happy day . . . I’m reminded of that old favorite:
Quote:

Now that ain't workin' that's the way you do it,
You play the guitar on that MTV.
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it,
Money for nothin' and your chicks for free.
I want my, I want my, I want my MTV.
But alas, the many universes scenario lacks evidence, science, and elegance. Besides, isn’t one universe, like one wife, more than enough? Nevertheless, if my liver completely shuts down, then you and the others may have an opportunity . . . but probably not—for as my beloved has occasionally said, “Once you go Fred, you never go back.

sk8rgrl23 December 14th, 2005 12:23 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
This is all nothign more than a splitting of hairs, the underlying motive being to banish anything from our schools that contradicts the literal word of the Bible. Some people can't tolerate the idea that they will have to send their children forth into the world to be faced with new ideas, and God forbid! end up raising questions their narrow-minded parents can't answer. the whole argument about a higher power creating all this is a false argument, as many if not most evolutionary scientists have a beilef in a higher power and see no conflict with evolution and God.

James Brody December 17th, 2005 03:40 PM

Biology & Atheism
 
There are data "somewhere" that most biologists are atheists, most astronomers are theists...

JB

James Brody December 17th, 2005 03:45 PM

Per Bak on Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Bak is a Dane, he's also a physicist who pushed the idea of "self-organized criticality" but with mixed success among his peers.

I recently got Bak's 1996 (a VERY good year for books on evolution) and found this quote that made me think of Fred.

P. 86. Re conservatism in science:

"I once raised this issue among a group, not of geophysicists, but of cosmologists at a high table dinner at the Churchill College in Cambridge. "Why is it that you guys are so conservative in your views, in the face of the almost complete lack of understanding of what is going on in your field?" The answer was as simple as it was surprising. "If we don't accept some common view of the universe, however unsupported by the facts (emph added), there would be nothing to bind us together as a scientific community. Since it is unlikely that any picture that we use will be falsified in our lifetimes, one theory is as good as any other."

As Pinker (2002) remarked, our reasoning can be a spin-doctor.

JB

Bak, P. (1996) How Nature Works: The Science of Self-Organized Criticality. NY: Springer-Verlag.
Pinker, S. (2002) The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature. NY: Viking.

Charles McNeil December 22nd, 2005 12:13 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by sk8rgrl23
This is all nothign more than a splitting of hairs, the underlying motive being to banish anything from our schools that contradicts the literal word of the Bible. Some people can't tolerate the idea that they will have to send their children forth into the world to be faced with new ideas, and God forbid! end up raising questions their narrow-minded parents can't answer. the whole argument about a higher power creating all this is a false argument, as many if not most evolutionary scientists have a beilef in a higher power and see no conflict with evolution and God.

I'm reminded of an aboriginal belief in existance, but I would describe it differently: reality rests on the back of a "higher power" and it's higher powers all the way up! :D

Fred H. December 23rd, 2005 10:10 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

CM: I'm reminded of an aboriginal belief in existance, but I would describe it differently: reality rests on the back of a "higher power" and it's higher powers all the way up! :D
I’m reminded of an inflationist belief in the infinite universe(s)—the probability of our universe, and indeed all universes, is 1. (See http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/gr-qc/pdf/0507/0507094.pdf , July 2005 paper on the Arrow of Time and initial conditions by Robert M Wald, Enrico Fermi Institute and Dept of Physics, U. of Chicago.)

And it’s universes all the way up, down, and sideways. :D

Fred H. December 23rd, 2005 11:07 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

sk8: This is all nothign more than a splitting of hairs, the underlying motive being to banish anything from our schools that contradicts the literal word of the Bible.
Undoubtedly there are those with fundamentalist creationism agendas. But the larger issue is that neo-Darwinianism, as it is generally presented in it's current mutation—essentially a directionless evolution resulting from random mutation and an indefinable natural selection—inescapably points towards a universe that is best described by it’s current high priest, Richard Dawkins:
Quote:

"In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference."
However, many great physicists, undoubtedly smarter and better equipped to make such judgments than Dawkins or pretty much any biologist, have seen things differently—
Quote:

Einstein: “Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe—a spirit vastly superior to that of man....”

Max Planck: “There is no matter as such! All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind. This Mind is the matrix of all matter.”

Roger Penrose, the eminently qualified Oxford physicist who wrote The Road to Reality, A Complete Guide to the Laws of the Universe, 2005, “The most complete mathematical explanation of the universe yet published,” has stated elsewhere: "I would say the universe has a purpose. It's not there just somehow by chance."

alexandra_k January 11th, 2006 11:47 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
If science is the study of the natural world, then what caused the first event in the natural world is always going to lie beyond science. But what lies beyond science is not part of science and thus should not be part of the science curriculum. I think it is a tricky one because there are different versions of the intelligent design hypothesis. The trouble is that they seem to be either false or to lie beyond science. The limits of science are an interesting matter but I am not in favour of diluting the science curriculum in order to teach it in the schools. It is a subject matter for philosophy of religion and philosophy of science which might be interesting as an option, and can certainly be studied at university. But evolution by natural selection is a complicated topic and most students don't seem to have an adequate understanding of it. To dilute the science curriculum is likely to lead to even more misunderstandings of the theory.

I do find it interesting how people respond to the idea that there is no intentionality / mentality in the world that is independent of what humans (as beings with minds) project on to it.

Okay so there is no goodness or caring in the world-in-itself...
But there is no badness or malevolent intent either.

And as for the physicists... It used to be thought that they studied the nature of mind independent reality. Then we started to grasp that they study our observations of reality (hence inter-subjective reality). Hence our projections of meaning / purpose / intentionality may well be an integral part of our experience of the world. And the world-in-itself lies beyond our understanding as a matter of definition...

Margaret McGhee January 12th, 2006 11:54 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
As I understand it, intellignce is used for only one thing in the whole of the universe (that I know of) - to help creatures who have some of it choose the best alternatives from those available by making better predictions.

Or, it has the same function as a cheetah's speed or any other evolutionary adaptation - to increase the chance that the cheetah's DNA will appear in future generations of cheetah-like creatures.

This raises the question in my mind of why an omnipotent immortal God would need to have intelligence (if Her decisions could not kill Her or reduce Her fitness). Or why she would have a need to use that intelligence to design other mortal creatures and then have to share Her space with the disgustingly flawed results. Seems like a lot of trouble just to make Her life complicated.

I mean one day She's sitting there reading a good book, enjoying a cosmic latte - and the next She's got people trying to mug Her and sell Her shit, and a humongous extended family with serious relationship problems looking for special favors.

Seems like a pretty unintelligent thing to do.

James Brody January 14th, 2006 06:39 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not (Parsomony)
 
"But then the principle of parsimony, not to mention a lack of evidence, seems to preclude any rational belief in multiple universes ."

I think Lewontin pointed out that nature is not parsimonious even though human beliefs attempt such in science. Occam's razor emasculates sexual selection: the displays that Geoff Miller described as an underpinning for human smarts and that Pinker called a "spin doctor."

Jim

James Brody January 14th, 2006 06:44 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not: Smart Gods
 
As to "intelligence"
Please consider arguments that it's about getting laid, not about making the "best choices." Geoff Miller supplies many planks that support that argument. Consider also intelligence as a weapon in social contests: we need to be bright in order to survive the company of other cheaters. And the idea that intelligence and language grew as replacements for grooming. And finally my own, and therefore favorite hunch: intelligence is one of many many exploratory systems that baton our development...

Thanks for being here!

JimB

Margaret McGhee January 15th, 2006 03:15 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hi JimB, Thanks for the welcome.

You said,

Please consider arguments that it's about getting laid, not about making the "best choices."

From reading that and several of your other essays here I suspect we have some fundamentally different ideas about how the human mind works.

But first, it seems to me that what it’s about – is trying to increase the probability that more of our DNA will appear in succeeding generations riding around in cells within descendents that can do the same. And that is not necessarily just boinking. First, one has to live to sexual maturity. By that time a person will have made several million choices - like not to crap in the cave and not to irritate that lion and to sit under a tree at mid-day and not to drink water from that puddle.

Then, if you make enough of those good choices to live to boinking age there’s the question of whom to boink. There have been few primate societies where boinkees are an unlimited resource.

I would assume that the sweet young thing with the clear complexion would likely produce more healthy offspring for a hunky hunter than that older one with the missing teeth. But the young one has no dowry or lineage – and she has a jealous suitor who wields a mean club. The older one is the chief’s widowed daughter whose offspring will surely get the royal treatment should they be born - and whose husband will gain great status. Ah, choices, choices. Most of them better be good ones too because one wrong choice can kill you long before your first sperm finds an egg.

And the more intelligent human will probably make better choices. Possibly even choices that would lead to less pleasurable or even less frequent boinking, but a greater chance that more of his or her DNA will be riding around in the cells of fit future offspring.

Certainly males and females have different mating strategies but in terms of the energy spent and the risks taken in life I'd say both men and women spend thousands of times more of that making and acting on choices that are not directly associated with boinking than those that are - don’t you think? OK, frat boys and travelling salesmen excepted. ;)

PS - I've always considered baton a noun and that makes your favorite hunch unintelligible for me. I need a clue.

James Brody January 15th, 2006 12:21 PM

Choices & Procreation: Triver's Balls
 
I think we agree on basics but focus differently on proximate and distal motives. I also side-tracked on the "choices" phrase because of my annoyance with current educational blather about "teaching kids to make good choices."

Anyhow, Bob Trivers captured the essence in one of his talks at a Princeton meeting of Georgetown Family Systems group: He stood tall in front of this mostly female, mostly social-worker audience, bent backwards, grabbed his testicles, lifted them upwards, and proclaimed, "I'm working for these."

Glad he did it, I would have been too embarrassed...

As to "baton": you can figure it out. Also consult Pinker on the Language Instinct (grammar tends to endure, nouns and verbs mutate quickly), and some obscure thoughts by one Brody on language as an exploratory system. Check also Barabasi on emergent networks in regard to hubs and nodes.

JB

Margaret McGhee January 15th, 2006 04:49 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
JB: I think we agree on basics but focus differently on proximate and distal motives.

MM: From reading the rest of your post I still think we disagree on the fundamentals. If you believe that what you said is true - it deserves a clearer statement of where you think we agree and disagree. IMO that's the first step in these discussions - if we're actually interested in comparing and exploring ideas.

JB: Anyhow, Bob Trivers captured the essence in one of his talks at a Princeton meeting of Georgetown Family Systems group: He stood tall in front of this mostly female, mostly social-worker audience, bent backwards, grabbed his testicles, lifted them upwards, and proclaimed, "I'm working for these." Glad he did it, I would have been too embarrassed...

MM: Nothing creates emotional excitement like having one's core beliefs massaged (or attacked). From noticing the things in your essays that seem to get you excited - I'm detecting a strong whiff of the socially-conservative, anti-PC, pseudo-science that is popular at places like Steve Sailer's repugnant HBI website. Please say it isn't so. You're not another member of his infamous mail-list are you?

JB: As to "baton": you can figure it out. Also consult Pinker on the Language Instinct (grammar tends to endure, nouns and verbs mutate quickly), . .

MM: If people want to discuss complex ideas intelligently they need to understand as accurately as possible what each other mean when they make a statement. If either side asks for a clarification that's a sign that they are sincerely trying to understand your meaning. I can certainly guess what you mean by baton in this context but then I'd never know if I got the true meaning of your statement or just my own version. I'm surprised someone educated in science would be so dismissive.

JB: . . and some obscure thoughts by one Brody on language as an exploratory system

MM: If your obscure thoughts are relevant here it shouldn't take more than a paragraph to lay them out and explain why. Sounds like they could be interesting. Since you didn't say another Brody I'll assume you don't mean Richard.

JB: Check also Barabasi on emergent networks in regard to hubs and nodes.

MM: I could list several significant books and authors from which I inform my understanding of human nature. I'm sure we've read many of the same ones despite that we probably have some different conclusions. But, when I'm trying to make a point in a discussion I figure that if I can't state the relevant principles that support my point clearly enough and in my own words - then I probably don't have an argument.

As I read through your essays I find very little discussion of principles and a lot of anecdotes that seem to affirm some imputed beliefs - although they're all fun to read. I'm more interested though in the principles and reasoning that support your beliefs. That's assuming that you just like to write entertaining essays that happen to support some anti-PC beliefs (especially those that deal with boinking) and that you are not an anti-PC ideologue.

If you are (I really hope not) then you're probably miffed by my dismissive attitude toward such things. In any case, I'd still be interested in a discussion of how we come to have the beliefs that we do and how they can become such strong forces in our lives - which actually speaks to the very heart of evolutionary psychology in my opinion - and will probably come up in any case.

MM

Fred H. January 19th, 2006 08:25 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

alexandra: And as for the physicists... It used to be thought that they studied the nature of mind independent reality. Then we started to grasp that they study our observations of reality (hence inter-subjective reality). Hence our projections of meaning / purpose / intentionality may well be an integral part of our experience of the world. And the world-in-itself lies beyond our understanding as a matter of definition...
All of this seems to boil down to whether there is objective truth and whether we can know it—since mathematics seems to explain the physical world amazingly well, the issue is whether 1 + 1 = 2 is real and objectively true, or whether it’s merely social constructivism.

As I see things, 1 + 1 = 2 is an objective truth—mathematical realism holds that mathematical entities exist independently of the human mind, that we don’t invent mathematics but rather discover it, and that any other intelligent beings in the universe would presumably do the same.

Many working mathematicians, and certainly all the great ones, are/were mathematical realists (essentially Platonists, if not openly then certainly in their hearts); and I suspect the same could be said of the greatest physicists.

For those having a social constructivism POV, everything tends to be relative and subjective and nothing ever seems to add up.

alexandra_k January 19th, 2006 08:59 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
> All of this seems to boil down to whether there is objective truth and whether we can know it...

In philosophy we distinguish two different fields of inquiry:

1) Metaphysics - the study of what is, what exists.
2) Epistemology - the study of knowledge, what (if anything) we can know about it.

It would seem that either phi is finite or it is infinite regardless of whether we ever manage to construct a proof either way.

Sometimes people think they are intimately connected so, for example, it is senseless to talk about a reality that is beyond our grasp as a matter of principle. But it seems to make sense that either there is a super-natural entity or there is not (which is to say there is a fact of the matter) regardless of whether we can ever know that fact or not.

Kant distingushed between two senses of reality that roughly map on to my mind-independent / inter-subjective distinction. Noumena (things in themselves) are beyond our grasp as a matter of principle. Phenomena (how things appear to be) are within our grasp, however. If you add up all the observers observations of the world... Then you get inter-subjective reality. What does an experiment purport to show us but 'if you did the experiment then you too would observe these same results'. If we consider science to be the investigation of mind-independent reality, then radical scepticism will always be a problem. Radical scepticism appears as the question 'how do you know things are (in themselves) the way they appear to us to be?' We simply cannot grasp mind-independent realilty (how things are in themselves) as a matter of principle. This is because to grasp it is to bring the mind into it once more. If we consider science to be the investigation of inter-subjective reality (so that the aim is convergence on observations) then radical scepticism isn't a problem. I think that mind-independent reality isn't really what interests us anyway. I think that we are more interested in inter-subjective reality. We are more interested in what we are likely to observe in the future (predictions) and explanations for our observations. We aren't so much interested in the essential nature of the world as we are interested in our experience of the world (though all of this is controversial).

> mathematics seems to explain the physical world amazingly well

Does mathematics 'explain' or does it describe? Does mathematics tell us what exists and does not exist, or does it merely describe what is observed and provide a formula that when applied to our observations delivers fairly accurate predictions on what will be observed in the future?

> the issue is whether 1 + 1 = 2 is real and objectively true, or whether it’s merely social constructivism. As I see things, 1 + 1 = 2 is an objective truth—mathematical realism holds that mathematical entities exist independently of the human mind, that we don’t invent mathematics but rather discover it, and that any other intelligent beings in the universe would presumably do the same.

Given the meanings of the terms '1', '+', '=', '2' the statement is true by definition in the same way that 'p=p' is true by definition or 'either p or not p' is true by definition. It is contingent / arbitrary (or a social construction if you like) that we have assigned those meanings to those terms, but given the fact that we have assigned those meanings to those terms the statement is true by definition.

> Many working mathematicians, and certainly all the great ones, are/were mathematical realists (essentially Platonists, if not openly then certainly in their hearts); and I suspect the same could be said of the greatest physicists.

Platonic realism is typically considered (in philosophy circles) to be old, outdated metaphysics. Consider 'redness'. Does redness exist? Would redness exist if there weren't any red things? Consider 'seven'. Does seven exist? Would seven exist if there weren't seven things? Why posit an entity that resides in a Platonic realm of forms? Why consider that redness or seven would exist if there weren't any red things or if there weren't seven things? We don't believe in an ideal table existing in Plato's realm of forms, we don't believe in redness existing in Plato's realm of forms, so why believe in the number seven existing in Plato's realm of forms?

Fred H. January 20th, 2006 06:00 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

AK: Does seven exist?
If 7 = 7, or 1 = 1, isn’t real and true, what then can ever possibly be true?

But here’s the rub: While 1 = 1 is timelessly and objectively true, “1 thing = 1 thing,” in our physical world, probably isn’t since “things” never seem to be truly identical in our physical world. Plus, best I can tell, “1,” in and of itself, doesn’t necessarily seem to exist in our physical world.

Nevertheless, “1 = 1” is a timeless and objective truth that we all seem to have access to, and that existed b/f there were evolved creatures with subjective mental constructs and definitions.

Should anyone unable or unwilling to acknowledge the reality and objective truth of 1 = 1 ever be taken very seriously? I’d say no, but maybe that’s just me.

alexandra_k January 20th, 2006 07:43 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
> But here’s the rub: While 1 = 1 is timelessly and objectively true, “1 thing = 1 thing,” in our physical world, probably isn’t since “things” never seem to be truly identical in our physical world.

Ah. At any one moment in time a thing is identical to itself. I think this is one of Leibniz laws (which Wittgenstein went on to mock because it does sound rather trivial indeed). So where you have the same thing on different sides of the = sign then the second equation would be true. Sometimes identity claims are not trivial so for example it was a significant discovery that the morning star = the evening star; that water = H2O (roughly); that superman = clarke kent (though this is disputed a little in the philosophical literature); and the identity theory of the mind-body relation holds that pain = brain state x (where x is to be determined by science).

Philosophy of math (or physics or logic for that matter) isn't really my area... But I guess I think of numbers as sets. There was work (Frege, Russell etc) on trying to reduce mathematics to logic (via set theory I think) and so the meaning of '1' might be a set with one member in it. Apparantly... Their program failed, but anyway... If '1' is a set with one member in it then the identity of the member is irrelevant. Like how if 'money' is defined by its function in social life then it can be multiply realisable on the physical level (could be coins, or paper, or cowrie shells). All that is relevant to numbers is... How many. There could be a set with one coin in it, another set with one piece of paper in it, another set with one cowrie shell in it and they are identical in the relevant respect in the sense that each set has just one member. Maybe we need to introduce a number line to deal with negative numbers... I don't really know...

> Nevertheless, “1 = 1” is a timeless and objective truth that we all seem to have access to, and that existed b/f there were evolved creatures with subjective mental constructs and definitions.

Yes. At any one moment in time... A thing is identical to itself.

> Should anyone unable or unwilling to acknowledge the reality and objective truth of 1 = 1 ever be taken very seriously? I’d say no, but maybe that’s just me.

1=1 is true by definition. If there were a race of alien beings who had a radically different logic or mathematics to us... Then we could not comprehend them. Logic and mathematics are considered to be the two a-priori disciplines. That is to say that (in theory) you don't need to look to the world at all. Once you have grasped the relevant concepts (the meanings of '1' '=' etc then... The rest of it deductively follows.

On a bit of a tangent philosophers often talk about possible worlds.
1) It is possible that I never posted to this board (for instance).
That seems to be true. Why is it true?
2) Because it is true that there is a possible world in which I never posted to this board.
But that entails
3) There is a possible world (that is not the actual world)
And that entails
4) There are possible worlds!
I do believe... David Lewis argues for the reality of possible worlds (or alternative universes causally isolated from our own, if you like) in this vein. He considers that it is too counter-intuitive to common sense to deny the truth of 2 and from there...

Am I giving philosophy a bad name yet?

;-)

Fred H. January 21st, 2006 12:28 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

AK: Yes. At any one moment in time... A thing is identical to itself.
1 + 1 = 2. Using algebra we subtract 1 from each side and get: 1 = 1. I’d not consider this a “thing identical to itself.” You may equal yourself, but I doubt your clone and you would ever be truly, completely, objectively equal. Best I can tell, your sympathies lie with the social constructivism POV.

So I’ll finish with this: There are infinitely many prime numbers—this is a reality and a timeless objective truth—it was true when Euclid discovered it; it’s true today; and it was true before conscious beings evolved. I’d say the evidence is overwhelming that there is indeed a separate world of timeless and objective mathematical truth (and beauty?) that we are able to consciously access and comprehend. (But there’s currently no evidence indicating that there are infinite and/or alternative universes.) You get the last word, and enjoy LeDoux’s book. :)

alexandra_k January 21st, 2006 04:06 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
I'm getting a little lost truth be told. I found this if you are still interested, however, and it summarises a range of views on the issue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_mathematics

My knowledge of math is extremely limited. I think I may have done something dodgey with the '=' sign. I think it may have a different meaning in math than it does in logic (where it symbolises an 'is' of identity).

Anyway thanks for chatting to me. I will be sure to get that book. :)

James Brody January 21st, 2006 04:48 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
"I'm getting a little lost, IF TRUTH BE TOLD (emph added)"

I'm glad that you two connected...Fred's Alzheimers won some tactical victories when he was between external foes...

And, I promise!, to weed through Alexandra's arguments and perhaps shake a leg to Wikkipedia!

Thanks both of you!

JB

Fred H. January 26th, 2006 10:56 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

JimB: Fred's Alzheimers won some tactical victories when he was between external foes...
Hmmm. I originally said that, “the principle of parsimony, not to mention a lack of evidence, seems to preclude any rational belief in multiple universes”; and you countered that, “nature is not parsimonious even though human beliefs attempt such in science." But then, responding to Margaret, you argued that, “As to ‘intelligence,’ please consider arguments that it's about getting laid, not about making the ‘best choices.’”

“Getting laid” sounded parsimonious enough to me, a position I’m disinclined to argue against—any chance the Alzheimer’s is more on your end? . . . although if it is, how would you know?

Margaret McGhee January 28th, 2006 12:07 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
I keep hoping to see some meaningful discussions here that would illuminate some of the ways that Evolutionary Psychologists would look at human nature that would be different from other psychologists and scientists.

I hoped that some of my past comments might have encouraged that type of discussion. Let me try this - is there a coherent functional model of the mind that most (or many) Evolutionary Psychologists would generally agree on? Something that would show the various elements of the mind and how they relate to each other - such as intellect, emotion, disposition, instinct, etc.

I've read several of the more popular EP authors and I get the gist of it (I think) but none of them seem interested in providing such a specific model. Maybe there is one out there and I just haven't found it yet.

Margaret :confused:

Fred H. January 30th, 2006 12:00 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Quote:

Margaret: I keep hoping to see some meaningful discussions here that would illuminate some of the ways that Evolutionary Psychologists would look at human nature that would be different from other psychologists and scientists.
Hi Margaret: Perhaps not really what you’re looking for, and I don’t know that JimB necessarily sees things this way, but I like neuroscientist Joe LeDoux’s “mental trilogy” model of the human brain/mind (and its shaping by evolution and resulting weakness of cognitive influence over the emotional and motivational systems). I see it as the only reasonable way to begin to view and explain the brain/mind (and human nature and all the “unnecessary” human suffering that I myself have been wont to obsess over on occasion).

As I’ve already posted to Alexandra in another thread, the neuroscientist Ledoux notes how cognition, emotion, and motivation – the mental trilogy – actually work and what they are. In the last pages of his excellent book, Synaptic Self (2001), LeDoux writes the following:
Quote:

... there is an imperfect set of connections between cognitive and emotional systems in the current stage of evolution of the human brain. This state of affairs is part of the price we pay for having newly evolved cognitive capacities that are not yet fully integrated into our brains. Although this is also a problem for other primates, it is particularly acute for humans, since the brain of our species, especially our cortex, was extensively rewired in the process of acquiring natural language functions.

Language both required additional cognitive capacities and made new ones possible, and these changes took space and connections to achieve. The space problem was solved…, by moving some things around in existing cortical space, and also by adding more space. But the connection problem was only partially solved. The part that was solved, connectivity within the cortical processing networks, made enhanced cognitive capacities of the hominid brain possible. But the part that hasn’t been fully solved is connectivity between cognitive systems and other parts of the mental trilogy – emotional and motivational systems. This is why a brilliant mathematician or artists, or a successful entrepreneur, can like anyone else fall victim to sexual seduction, road rage, or jealousy, or… depression or anxiety. Our brain has not evolved to the point where the new systems that make complex thinking possible can easily control the old systems that give rise to our base needs and motives, and emotional reactions. This doesn’t mean that we’re simply victims of our brains and should just give in to our urges. It means that downward causation is sometimes hard work. ‘Doing’ the right thing doesn’t always flow naturally form ‘knowing’ what the right thing to do is. [From LeDoux’s Synaptic Self, (2001), pgs. 322-323]
Several years ago a Todd Stark—who I’ve not seen posting here for some time—and I discussed/argued this area at some length, and JimB sort of refereed. I’m not sure where we ended up, but I remain convinced that LeDoux’s mental trilogy model is currently the best and most realistic way of thinking about human nature.

Margaret McGhee January 30th, 2006 07:48 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hi Fred, I haven't read LeDoux but it looks like I should. I just ordered that book from Amazon. Thanks. I have come to some generally similar conclusions as yours from reading DaMassio and Calvin and a few others lately.

Re: The LeDoux excerpt you quoted. LeDoux sees " . . an imperfect set of connections between cognitive and emotional systems in the current stage of evolution of the human brain."

My current view is that our conscious mind can only deal with cognitive images - while our actual motivation and decision-making occur at the emotional level largely unnoticed. We therefore "think" that our intellect is in charge. I think it's just along for the ride.

Margi ;)

Fred H. January 31st, 2006 09:27 AM

Re: intellect in charge?
 
Quote:

Margaret: My current view is that our conscious mind can only deal with cognitive images - while our actual motivation and decision-making occur at the emotional level largely unnoticed. We therefore "think" that our intellect is in charge. I think it's just along for the ride.
Yeah, there doesn’t currently seem to be much science or evidence supporting our belief that intellect is in charge, that we have “free will.” But I doubt anyone truly believes that it’s all just an illusion. Best I can tell, we all assume and are convinced, at least viscerally, that we do have at least some conscious free will.

I think there’s a lot more science & evidence to support a belief in objective truth and first cause than free will. And I suppose that’s kind of how I get to it—convinced there is some sort of “spirit vastly superior to that of man,” and convinced there’s objective truth, the leap to at least some, perhaps limited, human free will is fairly easy.

I’ve also read several of Damasio’s books—Feeling of What Happen and Looking for Spinoza—I really like his books and think that he and LeDoux probably see many things similarly, although LeDoux’s Synaptic Self seems to have more substance as I recall. Hope you enjoy it.

Margaret McGhee January 31st, 2006 02:40 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hi Fred, From your last post I think I should clarify some things lest you take some things from my posts that I don't intend to convey.

My demotion of intellect has more to do with my peculiar model of how the brain might work - than with any acceptance I have of cosmic or spiritual forces at work in its stead.

However, I don't at all mean to be dismissive of your notions of such things as "first cause" or a “spirit vastly superior to that of man”. The whole topic of spirituality as it appears in so many similar forms and in different cultures through time is fascinating and important to any view of human nature.

I also find that everyone holds beliefs that are not logically grounded. We may not always consider those to be spritual but I'm sure they serve some of the same mental purposes.

Re: Free will. That's a tough one to hit head on. I suspect as time goes by we'll get a better picture of how we each see it.

Just for the record I am a fallen Catholic who turned her back on the church at fifteen. :cool:

alexandra_k February 1st, 2006 01:54 AM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hmm. Is the thought that...

The comparatively primative brain structures (which have a lot to do with emotion processing) cause behaviour before it gets a chance to be processed by the comparatively recent brain structures (which have a lot to do with cognition / thought processing)?

So... Our behaviour is caused by things that we aren't really consciously aware of?

If you are thinking something along these lines... I am very much interested in that notion too. In the seperation / relation between thought and emotion.

Also... The importance of past experience (rft history) in the production of behaviour and to what extent that can be modified by cognition / imaginings etc.

Regarding free will... It all depends on what you mean by 'free will' (hate to do that - but must be done).

Libertarian Free will is incoherant and thus cannot possibly be the case.
Dennett (and others) are compatabilists which means that they think that we need to revise out concept of freedom so that it is in line with determinism. That isn't to say that determinism IS true - just that IF determinism is true THEN it is still possible for us to have free will. There is fairly much a consensus that compatabilism is the way to go (in philosophy circles). All thats left to be done... Is to work out the details...

Margaret McGhee February 1st, 2006 01:57 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hi Alexandra, Those are really interesting questions. I think about that stuff a lot. Here' my uneducated two-cents-worth.

Re: Thought, emotion, experience, etc.

Aside from maintaining body-state in the background the main purpose of a CNS is to make decisions and excute them. I have come to the provisional view that our basic decision-making calculator is an analog device in our limbic system that can only process emotional inputs, just as it does for all mammals.

I suspect that our intellect participates in our decisions by sending the emotional weight of our logical conclusion to that calculator (that would be the confidence that our intellect has in its results) - while it holds those results provisionally in working memory for execution should the decision require it. But first those emotions get summed along with other emotions from instincts, past experience, the social emotions from our pre-frontal cortex, etc. to actually make the decision.

In some cases, like when we have great fear, the strong emotions of the urgency of the situation will cause us to execute a limbic decision before our slower intellect has a chance to provide its input. Or, the strong emotions from the situation prevents our intellect from functioning at all. Or, if it does come up with a logical solution it's results could get completely swamped by our stronger instinctual emotions. In those cases we're operating just like our non-thinking mammalian relatives.

I suspect that our intellect has a somewhat more limited role in our decision-making than we imagine and that our more basic emotions often over-ride the emotions we attach to our intellectual conclusions - like every time someone buys a lottery ticket. :rolleyes:

Re: Free will.

I think that's a concept that could only be considered by an intellect that thinks it is in sole control of our lives and isn't aware of how our decisions are actually made (see above). Our conscious mind is largely unaware of our emotions. That's good because it allows it to act in a complementary way to our limbic system to provide conceptual rather than emotional solutions to problems (and come up with far-fetched explanations for things like this post). But that also allows it to "think" that it is in charge of things.

I'm sure my notions of the brain will seem naive to the real scientists around here. Please just think of them as the wild-assed-guesses of a non-scientist who is totally captivated by the neat stuff you folks are researching and writing about.

BTW - What's (rft history)?

Margaret

Fred H. February 2nd, 2006 12:46 PM

Re: Free will
 
“Free will” is probably impossible to clearly define. I suppose we all have some intuitive sense of what it is—essentially choice. I suspect that everyone believes they have at least some, even atheists who assert that we’re merely products of a directionless evolution in a pitiless and indifferent universe of blind (deterministic and/or random) physical forces and genetic replication.

Assuming it’s more than just an illusion, then I’d say it’s Ledoux’s cognitive “downward causation.” But then of course there’s always the question as to whether our subcortical bottom-up motivation is really all that’s driving us to strive for “downward causation.” It’s all so circular.

TomJrzk February 2nd, 2006 01:53 PM

Re: Free will
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Fred H.
I suspect that everyone believes they have at least some

Hi Fred,

At the risk of having you call my post a joke again, I happen to be one of those true determinists. Any idea of free will that goes beyond physics is not something that I'm convinced of, yet. The illusion of free will is a good thing in most respects but I have seen no evidence that it is any more than the result of the current chemistry in our brains reacting with our imprinted memories and instincts. I don't think the uncertainty principle even has any effect when so many molecules are involved.

Keep up the interesting posts!
Tom (not Jones)

Margaret McGhee February 2nd, 2006 07:59 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hi Fred, Tom, Alexandra,

Just to add some grist to the free-will mill,

. . when someone talks of free-will, I think they often use that term to mean a spiritual-self, some self beyond the chemicals and neurons, that has the ability to observe our life as we live it and make judgements if not decisions on our body's behalf. Free-will is considered a noble concept in philosophical discussions. Speaking of God and spirituality often doesn't command the same respect. (It does from me.)

For some, the idea that consciousness could just happen from some arrangement of those chemicals and neurons, is uncomfortable because their life feels so powerfully immediate and significant (and spiritual) to them that relegating its destiny and direction to those chemicals and neurons is degrading.

However, if I accept that that may be the case, I can still see free-will as the freedom for my particular arrangement of neurons to express their selfish will. On a more experiential level that means that I am free to make decisions that optimize my emotional outcome. Every decision I make is made to follow my best guess as to what will make me the happiest, from all the alternatives I'm aware of. (This could get tautological now.)

But that sounds like enough free-will to make any organism happy. I can't imagine that evolution would design an organism any other way.

I guess I am one of those " . . who assert that we’re merely products of a directionless evolution in a pitiless and indifferent universe of blind (deterministic and/or random) physical forces and genetic replication . . " but so far I'm enjoying that ride.

Others may prefer to take off on what they see as a more spiritual wave and ride that. More power to them - but when I tried that in the past, no doubt because of my particular arrangement of chemicals and neurons I found that wave to be mostly backwash.

I figure we each get to ride the wave that most appeals to us - as long as we don't run over anybody else. If that's not free-will I don't know what is.

PS - I think it's very cool that the internet allows us to share the output of our neurons and chemicals like this. I find it difficult to express these ideas in person or to find others who like to think and talk about these topics. :cool:

Margaret

alexandra_k February 2nd, 2006 08:28 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
genes + environment -> beliefs + desires (and other mental states though the traditional focus has been on these two) -> behavior

the -> is supposed to signify a causal relationship (where genes and environment together determine beliefs and desires in a determined world, or where they determine the probability of various beliefs and desires in an irreducibly indeterministic world).

so our beliefs and desires are caused by our genes and our environment, and our beliefs and desires go on to cause our behaviour.

now the problem is just where 'free will' is supposed to fit into this picture...

(ps. 'rft history' is short for 'reinforcement history'. behaviourists consider that our present responses are determined by our past reinforcement history. we do not have to be consciously aware of our reinforcement history in order for it to play a causal role in determining our behaviour and just how much conscious awareness is able to modify the causal process from rft history to behaviour is interesting to me...)

i guess... this is fairly much what i am into.

the relationship between neurological (physical) explanation; cognitive (design) explanation; psychological (intentional) explanation (where we talk of 'beliefs' 'desires' 'hopes' 'fears' 'memories' 'emotions' and 'preferences' etc; and... the thought that the mind is modular (Jerry Fodor started this idea off...) and that the different cognitive modules have evolved for various reasons / functions...

and applying all that to explain things like... belief formation / maintenence.
and emotions etc. fairly wide area. i guess i see the role of philosophy as being integrative (to integrate the findings from the various areas) and also to come up with a general coherant theory of the nature / structure / function of mind...

alexandra_k February 2nd, 2006 09:10 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Hmm. We have a nervous system. The lowest kinds of responses are reflexes. The information travels up the peripheral nerves and gets to the spinal chord and then a message is relayed back to the peripheral nerves (this is the knee kick reflex). Then there are higher kinds of responses which are still fairly relexive. Information can make it to some of the lower brain structures (but not conscious awareness) and a response is produced. Some emotional responses are like that (they can be produced from subliminally presented stimuli). Other information... Gets to go round and round the cortex a bit (put fairly crudely). This seems to be... Conscious thought. Conscious thought... I think that is more integrative so that we can take various factors into account and come to a 'all things rationally considered' kind of decision. Instead of 'reacting' to the situation (perhaps in a very short sighted hedonistic manner) we can think about the consequences and the options etc with a view to the long term and respond from there. I guess... That is how I see it.

Emotions are more significant for 'rational' decisions than was previously thought.

> In some cases, like when we have great fear, the strong emotions of the urgency of the situation will cause us to execute a limbic decision before our slower intellect has a chance to provide its input.

Yeah. There is stuff on a 'high road' and a 'low road' to emotional responses. The low road only makes it to the lower brain structures before a response is sent to the motor production areas... the high road gets to go round and round the cortex a bit...

some people are more controlled by their emotional responses than others... some people have very reactive nervous systems. Linehan talks about borderline personality disorder where she considers that people with this disorder have very reactive nervous systems, very intense emotional responses, and a slow return to emotional baseline. I'm fairly interested in that and in our ability / or possibly inability to overcome a reactive nervous system via conscious thought and via imagining and via alteration of rft contingencies...

> Our conscious mind is largely unaware of our emotions.

there are unconscious emotions?

> I'm sure my notions of the brain will seem naive to the real scientists around here.

Hmm. I'm not a scientist either. I don't want to run experiments and I can't tolerate much experiment reading... I'm more interested in the bigger picture. Regarding that... I sometimes think it is a case of 'he who bullshits best wins'

;-)

Margaret McGhee February 2nd, 2006 11:42 PM

Re: Intelligent Design and Why Not
 
Alexandra, Take a look at this:

http://www.psycheducation.org/emotion/hippocampus.htm

About 2/3 of the way down the page there are two photos of synapses in the hippocampus. The assertion is that exposure to estrogen increases the synapse density in the hippocampus (limbic system). Does that impact your interest area at all?

******************************

You said: Emotions are more significant for 'rational' decisions than was previously thought.

Yes. That's what I've been saying. Not only is it more significant, I have proposed a model where emotions are the currency in the decision-making process in (all) mammals. I'm suggesting that the actual decision mechanism is an emotional summing device. Since other mammals can't think much if at all that has to be what they use.

I'm suggesting that we use the same thing. Our intellect gets to participate by adding its emotional vote - an emotion proportional to the confidence it has in the solution it has created.

If that emotion is stronger than those opposing emotions from instincts, dispositions, beliefs, etc. - then it gets to have its solution executed.

If it doesn't have much confidence or if those other emotions are stronger, they could take precedence.

Example: We're sitting at a red light that hasn't changed for 5 minutes. There's no traffic. Should we go?

Emotional scale: Absolute No = -10 Absolute Yes = +10 0 = undecided (No)

Emotional balance:

Instinct/disposition: We're late, screw it. (+3)
Belief: It's wrong to run a red light and I'll probabaly get a ticket. (-6)
Intellect: I can't see anybody for miles. It's probably OK to go. But I'm not sure. There could be one of those intersection cameras around here. (+2)

Result (-1) We wait.

Three more minutes go by:

New emotional balance:

Instinct/disposition: Now we're really late, I hate this and feel stupid sitting here at this intersection with no-one near waiting for a light that's probably broken. (+5) I can visualize Elaine Benis saying this to herself.) ;)
Belief: It's wrong to run a red light.(-6)
Intellect: I still can't see anybody for miles. It's probably OK to go but where did they hide that camera? (+2)

Result (+1)

We take one more look for traffic and cautiously proceed.

See how according to this model intellect participates using the strength of it's conviction, which in this case was not too high? I'm not saying that I believe for sure this is how it works (she says showing low confidence in her intellectual solution). Just that it makes an interesting straw-man.


Margaret


All times are GMT -4. The time now is 08:29 AM.

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.
Copyright © 1995-2023 Liviant Internet LLC. All rights reserved.