If anyone wants an example of why some of us object strongly to the “accommodationist” strategy of downplaying the incompatibility of science and (many types of) religious belief, Jerry Coyne’s blog post will help you out. A bit too much, actually — the more you really think about it, the angrier it will make you feel. No wonder why these atheists are all so strident!
Apparently the National Association of Biology Teachers characterizes used to characterize the theory of evolution in the following way:
The diversity of life on earth is the result of evolution: an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process of temporal descent with genetic modification that is affected by natural selection, chance, historical contingencies and changing environments.
That’s a good description, because it’s true. But some religious thinkers, along with their enablers within the scientific establishment, objected to the parts about “unsupervised” and “impersonal,” because they seemed to exclude the possibility that the process was designed or guided by God. Which they do! Because that’s what the theory of evolution says, and that theory is far and away our best understanding of the data. (Dysteleological physicalism.)
The shocking part of the story is that the objectors won. The National Association of Biology Teachers officially changed their description of evolution, to better accommodate the views of theologians.
This isn’t a brand new story, but I had never heard it before. Jerry seems a lot more calm about it than I am, so you should read his post for more. I’ll just quote one short paragraph from him:
In my classes, however, I still characterize evolution and selection as processes lacking mind, purpose, or supervision. Why? Because, as far as we can see, that’s the truth.
I will be forever grateful that empiricism is not a democratic process. The truth dosn’t change by popular consent. Our understanding of the truth will change over time as we use observable data to disprove old assumptions that were based on less complete observable data.
However 2+2 is always going to equal 4 and God is never going to tinker with his finished artwork.
Saint Augustine himself said that God exists outside of time therefor he is not going to be watching his clock and making select mutations as if he were baking a pie.
If God wants to argue with scientist why don’t you let him make that arguement himself and if he doesn’t, take his silence for what it really means, which is that he agrees with them. {or that he doesn’t exist}
Mike (#50):
Honestly, I think the only good reason to be religious is because of personal spiritual experiences. And I won’t tell you to disbelieve your own experiences. That way lies madness–literally.
But it’s an entirely different thing when you assert, as if it has some relevance, “There is no evidence that God didn’t have some small hand in the evolutionary process.” First, you should know that this is sort of a silly “God-of-the-gaps” argument, reminiscent of the cliched old invisible pink unicorns of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. We shouldn’t design our discourse around all the counterfactuals that could possibly be true, because they are simply infinite in number. If there is really no evidence for God in evolution, we shouldn’t act as if there were.
Moreover, there’s a ton of evidence for a hands-off, purposeless process of evolution. Things like the multiplicity of species and lines that go nowhere, or comparative difference in actual fitness are probably best equated to “intelligent design”–it sure doesn’t LOOK much like chance. More persuasive are the stochastic development of mutations generally, the rather muddied nature of the DNA molecule, for example; I have little doubt I could find many if I wanted.
Moreover, if you really believe that science is a valid way of going about things, and that evolution is basically true, why would you bother to believe that God had “some small hand” in things? Was one of your spiritual experiences a chitchat where God said, “I decided to go with thymine instead of uracil for the last amino acid in DNA because, well, what the hell”? Given that there sure isn’t any semblance of actual divine fiddling in speciation–that any fiddler God sure looks a lot like random chance–why would you construct your beliefs in a way that the two conflict? What sort of experience requires a God that meddles?
Given that evolution has 4 – 5 bilion years to go on planet Earth why would anyone assume that humanity, as it is now, is the “end” of evolution? Who knows what that last entity will be before the sun becomes a red giant and absorbs planet Earth? Who says humans are the forerunners of that being? And, one wonders, why would an omnipotent deity put itself and its creation through all that sturm und drang when it could just as easily create the world and the desired species from nothing at any time? No evolution, no geological timeline; a simple act of creation once and for all…………just asking!
There is absolutely no evidence that Odin didn’t have a small (or large) hand in the evolutionary process; don’t discount Odin from your so-called scientific discussions. How can you scientist be so closed-minded?
Quoting Shapiro again (p. 12):
“Underlying the central dogma and conventional views of genome evolution was the idea that the genome is a stable structure that changes rarely and accidentally by chemical fluctuations or replication errors. This view has had to change with the realization that maintenance of genome stability is an active cellular function and the discovery of numerous dedicated biochemical systems for restructuring DNA molecules. Genetic change is almost always the result of cellular action on the genome. These natural processes are analogous to human genetic engineering, and their activity in genome evolution has been extensively documented.”
It sounds to me like there is some kind of consciousness at work, in the form of a two-way conversation. And what is this conversation about? It is about adapting to environmental changes. You might get away saying such a process would be “unsupervised” – it is more like “self-supervised”. But any supervision is supervision. You might get away saying it is “impersonal”, but then when and where does “personality” emerge out of a sensing system? Is human “personality” simply due to random, impersonal processes? Maybe we only think we have personalities!
So say evolution is “impersonal” and “unsupervised”. Then ignore any possibility of an overarching principle by which evolution would take place, and teach facts of “natural selection” by random mutation. Then you will be “scientific”, is that right?
Here is an interesting article:
http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/45152
“In principle, only electrons with their spin pointing in the “up” direction can pass through the filter, but the currents obtained by the device are never entirely pure, with a significant fraction of the electrons emerging spin “down”.
….
“Now, however, Ron Naaman and colleagues at the Weizmann Institute in Israel and the University of Münster in Germany have found that a 60% spin polarization at room temperature can be achieved by passing free electrons through a gold surface covered with a densely packed layer of DNA strands.”
If DNA manages to outdo a manmade filter (I have to wonder what the “significant fraction” of spin down electrons is – 50%, maybe?), maybe DNA knows something humans don’t about the structure of an electron.
Again from the Shapiro article, I will paraphrase from page 12, in which Shapiro writes that the genome has been considered as a stable structure that changes rarely and accidentally by chemical fluctuations or replication errors. However, it appears that maintenance of genome stability is an active cellular function, and numerous dedicated biochemical systems for restructuring DNA molecules have been discovered. He states that genetic changes is almost always the result of cellular action on the genome, analogous to human genetic engineering.
So I must say that there is at least a two-way process at work, with the result that the cell responds to environmental changes. In other words, the cell “supervises” itself. I do not believe this process can be called “unsupervised”. And a two-way communication indicates some kind of consciousness at work. Maybe you could say it is “impersonal”, but then at what point does “personality” emerge? Is human “personality” the result of a random, “impersonal” process?
So say evolution is “impersonal” and “unsupervised”. Then ignore any possibility of an overarching principle by which evolution would take place, and teach facts of “natural selection” by random mutation. You will be wrong.
Okay, can we continue the conversation without willful misconstruing of each others’ statements? (It’s a lively and interesting thread, bogged down by some minor nastiness…)
(The single most annoying part of the thread has been harping on David’s unfortunate phrasing in post #6: “If we look back at the path of evolution, with ourselves at the current “end” of it…” [emphasis added]. At no point did he claim to think that evolution in general or specific to humans had reached some nadir, he was simply saying “If we look at the whole of evolution up to this point…” Even David seems to have forgotten he wrote that because he never rebutted it.)
Likewise, my 2¢ on the original post, the phasing that included “unsupervised” & “impersonal” is awkward in the definition; I view it as a violation of literacy and clarity, not semantics. Additionally, including them implies that there’s a question as to whether the process is actually supervised and personal, which there is from a philosophical standpoint but not a scientific one, so the words are unnecessary. (I’m quite comfortable in my conclusion that there are no gods and those who believe in any are quite welcome to follow the process under the assumption that one or another started the process rolling.)
Otherwise, I’m having a fine time with this thread 🙂 and coincidentally I’m currently rereading Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on Earth.
@15. Jason Dick,
I’m not sure I understand your statement “That evolution has no purpose whatsoever…”. It’s my understanding that evolution that evolution is entirely purposeful!
The purpose is, of course, to produce adapted organisms. Increase their survival rates, their offspring, their longevity, and so forth. It is not a directed process and it has no logical endpoint. The subtext behind the word ‘purpose’, that of will and intelligence, is missing.
However if there were no purpose at all, then I suspect that evolution itself, and evolution-enabling (or at least permitting) mechanisms (sexual reproduction, DNA mutations) would be powerfully suppressed. If that makes any sense (can evolution select against evolution)?
@57, Brian Too:
You’re making the mistake of thinking of evolution as a “thing,” a phenomenon that takes actions (the technical term is “reifying”). In reality (such as it is), all we have is what you call the mechanisms… the mechanisms of sexual reproduction, mutation, selection and just plain time. Things just happen. But because of the nature of things happening, complexity grows in an open system. We call that “evolution,” but it’s not a thing in and of itself. So we can’t call this a purpose.
@ 56, David George:
Waitaminute. You’re saying because there may be a feedback mechanism in cell behavior, this constitutes consciousness and therefore purpose? Even if we were to concede for the purposes of this debate that the feedback mechanism is the dominant mechanism by which DNA changes result, that’s about a dozen steps removed from any kind of “intent.” It’s pretty easy to develop feedback mechanisms that are complex, yet don’t meet any kind of what we’d call consciousness and purpose. The food chain comes to mind, just off the top of my head. I think Shapiro’s theory is provocative, but in the end more an argument by analogy than anything substantive.
Mike (#5),
I don’t think that the point about “unsupervised” and “impersonal” is to deny the existence of (G/g)od. Indeed, evolution being unsupervised and impersonal does not provide evidence against a divine being, but implies that the process by itself produces the results we see, without it being necessary for someone to tweak things.
We understand how, given the laws of physics, a car works when you start it up. This does not provide
evidence against divinity either. However, it is important to point out that once you accept the laws of physics you do not need to invoke anything else to explain observed results. If we still needed something supernatural, along with scientific principles, the scientific principles would not be very useful. A similar point needs to be made about evolution: once you agree with the tenets of evolution you do not need to invoke any further supernatural intelligent entity to produce the patterns in life that we observe. You might feel that other words may suit this purpose better (there truly may be); or you may feel that this is not necessary since it is obvious but I think it is important to emphasize given the current situation.
#56 Keith Bowden – I see what you mean — I’m simple that way, respond to most recent stimulus, forget the past! A valid point on a “philosophical” doubt — yesterday I wondered whether to insert a suggestion that maybe schools, when “evolution” comes around, need to put science in its proper place as a school of knowledge within a larger school of thought. That might then put the evolution debate in a clearer context. Because, whether we are godfearing or godless, physics does not tell the whole story, and I think a lot of physicists would agree with that.
#57 Brian Too – Another good one — purposeful evolution of purposelessness! (Or is it the other way round?) “Evolution” seems to beg for a definition of “purpose”.
#58 A.J.Kamper – There is a problem with the idea that “things just happen”, yet “complexity grows”. Why should complexity grow? Does it not suggest some purpose-in-process? Once again, purpose is limited by association with “end, goal, aim”, etc. Aha! Here is another word, “intent”.
“. . . feedback mechanisms that are complex, yet don’t meet any kind of what we’d call consciousness and purpose. The food chain comes to mind, just off the top of my head. I think Shapiro’s theory is provocative, but in the end more an argument by analogy than anything substantive.”
I’m not sure where the food chain fits into a feedback mechanism, unless you mean that we eat the worms and then they eat us, and then we eat them, etc. But that is not a feedback mechanism within a single organism. A single organism that talks to itself — I suspect that very mechanism is at the root of “consciousness”. Maybe we cannot imagine a cell having a human-type internal debate, but at its root isn’t our human thought just a process of internal and external signals feeding back on each other? Ours is more complex – or is it? Maybe just a wide-area version with fewer “dedicated” systems, yet growing out of immensely complex interrelated “dedicated” systems. Then with our wide-area brain applied to our complex senses, we make further – internal – sense. At this point, you could say the purpose of evolution is to keep making more sense! If “science” now requires some definition of purpose, I think there is plenty of food for the school of thought, of which knowledge is a class.
@ #60 –David
Because when there is a lower limit to complexity, then TOTALLY random changes will lead to a growth in overall complexity. Take, for example, the statistical model of the Drunkard’s Walk. A simple coin-flipping mechanism will, given enough time, lead to massive growth, even before any selective pressures exist. There is no need to impute purpose to a flipping coin.
This is simply wild speculation–or, more accurately, analogy run rampant. Because two things (human thought and cellular mechanisms) have one category in common (self-feedback) does not make them usefully identical for the purposes of saying that both must, therefore, have a similar meaningful concept of “intent.”
@57, Brian Too:
there is no final purpose in a physical theory up to now. that Aristotelian concept simply has no place. All purposes are initial, causal.
it’s not the purpose of evolution to make a creature more long-lived. it may just so happen that this is a good fit for the environment. and we as humans perceive it as something resembling a final cause.
it is not. and that is really essential.
#61 AJ Kamper – Let’s see — you characterize my assertion as “simply wild speculation – or, more accurately, analogy run rampant.” How would I characterize that? How about “argument by groundless accusation”? Or maybe “argument by assumed superiority”? I am more interested in the content of your assertion than in your argument by wild accusation – or, more accurately, by analogy run rampant.
“. . . when there is a lower limit to complexity, then TOTALLY random changes will lead to a growth in overall complexity. Take, for example, the statistical model of the Drunkard’s Walk. A simple coin-flipping mechanism will, given enough time, lead to massive growth, even before any selective pressures exist. There is no need to impute purpose to a flipping coin.”
You appear to be saying that a type of random walk as described in Wikipedia (in which I see no sign of complexity whatsoever, merely a random walk) will lead to “massive growth”. What do you mean by “growth”? (I can supply a definition, if you would like to argue about it.) My first reaction on seeing the kinds of “random walks” described in Wikipedia was that they take place on a pre-existing, and seemingly unchangeable, pattern-board. The “random” choices then produce some kind of outcome on this predefined board. But what if the “random” choices change the board? Is mathematics capable of formulating changes to the board based on the “random” choices, so that each “move” influences a change to the board? Then you might get my attention – because that is what a cell does, and that is what we humans do, when we interact with our environment (including our internal environment). So show me some massive growth in functional complexity, and we can talk. Because “evolution” is not mere structural complexity, it is complexity of process, leading to structural change, leading to functional change, leading to structural change, etc.
So I find that your analogy does not fit. I also wonder what you mean by “a lower limit to complexity”.
I also find your use of the word “analogy” confusing. Are you referring to argument by analogy, or are you arguing that feedback is a case of biological analogy? Quoting from Wikipedia again: “A homologous trait is any characteristic of organisms that is derived from a common ancestor. This is contrasted to analogous traits: similarities between organisms that were not in the last common ancestor of the taxa being considered but rather evolved separately. As defined by Owen (1843), a homology is a “structural correspondence”, whereas an analogy is a “non-correspondent similarity”.”
I do not regard the evolution of the process of intra- and inter-cellular feedback, existing in every cell in our body and each cell in our body having evolved from a common ancestor, into the intra- and inter-cellular feedback existing in our brains, as being in any way disconnected. They are the same. There is no “analogy” here, but (as I understand the above) both a direct structural correspondence, i.e. a homology, and a functional correspondence – which is where I believe the unrecognized overarching principle is found.
I am not a philosopher, hence I hesitated to suggest “philosophy” in schools. Seeing the “philosophy” appear, my hesitance is reinforced. Word salad won’t cut it. “Science”, or knowledge, is a school of thought. It is not the only school of thought. How can it be, when what is “known” is both limited and subject to change? What worries me is that the sociopathic powers pretend to employ “science” for some human “good”, when in fact they employ “scientists” to further their own interests.
Mike, here’s why we threw a bunch of ‘rudeness’ at you: Your arguments are horrible.
David George, I don’t think my construing of the definition of extropy in any way conflicted with what you said.
Mike, let’s turn the argument around:
If your supposed deity exists, prove it.
Isn’t the very fact of biologist saying something in nature is “unsupervised” or “impersonal” making a direct statement that a deity (whether it be the God of the bible or the Flying Spaghetti monster, I care not) did NOT have any affect in it? This to me seems like a very philosophical statement in what should be an area of pure science.
The fact that you link to an article at the end which clearly states science should not try to make philosophical statements and vice-versa is ironic, since you are indeed making one in this very article (albeit indirectly and perhaps without realizing it).
There’s nothing wrong with scientists assuming there is no deity in their observations, there is something very wrong with them claiming such as science.
#64 DG:
By analogy run rampant, I thought I made my argument quite clear: in order to claim that cellular feedback is equivalent to consciousness (as compared to having one similar factor analogous), you need to know a lot more about consciousness. It’s not enough to say that the existence of a feedback mechanism is necessarily indicative of consciousness. The Shapiro paper goes much too far in this aspect, as do you. When you write, “There is no “analogy” here, but (as I understand the above) both a direct structural correspondence, i.e. a homology,” you are simply asserting without proof. Mere faith. It has no place in a scientific discussion.
As for the Drunkard’s Walk, this is explained very well in Stephen Jay Gould’s Full House. What it shows is that you don’t need purpose or intent to create complexity–you don’t need anything “modifying the board” (to use your analogy) to do it. As long as there is a lower limit to complexity (Gould points out that there’s a minimum amount of complexity for something to be self-replicating in the Earth environment), then ever-increasing complexity will result without any intent whatsoever.
Thus–here’s the important part–life’s increasing complexity on their planet does NOT suggest any kind of purpose at all. It’s not a datum in your favor. Could some sort of purpose account for it? Sure–but there ain’t evidence for it.
#69 AJ Kamper – “. . . you are simply asserting without proof. Mere faith. It has no place in a scientific discussion.”
I would say the proof is in the pudding. A cell evolves by inter- and intra-cellular communication. We are evolved communities of cells. This is evidence, not faith. I would say you are simply asserting by ignoring evidence. And I have a feeling this is not a scientific discussion.
“Thus–here’s the important part–life’s increasing complexity on their planet does NOT suggest any kind of purpose at all.”
Since you fail to give any context, perhaps you could explain what you mean by “purpose”. And then, does “purpose” exist?
I have read some of Gould also. I have no faith in Gould.
#71: DJ
If you define cause-and-effect as “communication,” and any multicellular entity as a “community,” and you can define an internal feedback mechanism as “consciousness, then yes, you can define your way all the way to saying that cells are Just Like People! But the rest of us, who have real work to do, will simply ignore you. You’re playing a semantic game, not a useful one–not one that has any predictive value. So you’re right, it’s not a scientific discussion, because you aren’t playing with data, you’re playing with language.
“Since you fail to give any context, perhaps you could explain what you mean by “purpose”. And then, does “purpose” exist?”
Fair question. When we speak of purpose, there are two main quantities. The first is something that has the power to make choices–either free-willed, or at least the illusion thereof. The second is a goal in mind. In my view, real purpose does not exist–what appears to us to be purpose is merely our reflection on our determined brain activity. But even if you broaden the definition of purpose to mean the apparent achievement of a goal, not free will per se, that behavior isn’t exhibited in cells! The individual cell strives merely for survival, not growing complexity; that’s an epiphenomenon. If there is “purpose” there–for example, if we ascribe purpose to the mechanistic attempts of an amoeba to find and devour food–then it still doesn’t correspond to a broader purpose in evolution.
As for your lack of faith in Gould as a way to dismiss arguments that destroy your point, well, I appreciate your signaling that your faith is immovable and that any actual discussion is probably pointless. That tells me a lot.
#71 – AJ Kamper
Don’t let me interrupt your work (unless it involves teaching children). It appears from the evidence that cells are Just Like People! And people are systems of communicating cells. Pretty simple to understand. And (in case you’ve forgotten), language must be a good way to communicate, since humans appear to be wired for it.
So – when you speak of purpose, there are two main quantities. Are those physical quantities?
“…the power to make choices…” Would that be, to choose a path?
“…a goal in mind.” Would that be, to choose a path leading to a specific end?
“real purpose does not exist-” So, according to your own “quantities”, when a human makes a choice with a goal in mind – say, to walk around a pile of dung – that action does not represent “real purpose”, but an illusory reflection on our determined brain activity. Sorry, you lost me there. Could you maybe quantify that?
“But even if you broaden the definition of purpose to mean the apparent achievement of a goal, not free will per se, that behavior isn’t exhibited in cells! The individual cell strives merely for survival, not growing complexity; that’s an epiphenomenon.”
It looks to me like you are playing with language here, but I will try to follow.
From Wikipedia: “An epiphenomenon (plural – epiphenomena) is a secondary phenomenon that occurs alongside or in parallel to a primary phenomenon.” Okay, growing complexity is a “parallel” event in the striving for survival. Sort of like collateral damage?
But you say the individual cell “strives” for survival. Could you define “striving”? Does that include some kind of conscious activity? Or is it more like “blind” striving? Is there some quantifiable physical “striving” property associated with cells?
I would say an individual cell strives for nothing. It simply responds to its internal and external environment, and in this way harmonizes itself with its environment. In other words, it fits itself to its environment. It has no goal in mind; it does not choose some particular path; it merely senses its harmonic state. And by this mechanism of sensing its harmonic state, it does not merely survive, but creates new systems (a process of growth) – or, if its sense fails, it dies. And, strangely, cells operate in such a way as to die – intentionally? – after passing on their operating information to new generations. And they do this entirely without any intention to choose some particular path. And over evolutionary time, all the multitude of living creatures appears, and passes information to new generations.
Where, then, is “purpose”? As I said in an earlier post (this thread is too long for me to find it), we have to look from the current end of the path of evolution toward the beginning of that path. And if we have the imagination power to place ourselves there, and look forward toward the present, we find a path leading to an (illusory) goal, the current end of the path of evolution. There is no choice involved, simply a process of harmonic sense of increasing complexity. (And I should note that humans have a well developed sense for musical harmony, which can be traced to physical harmonic frequency. And we also have a well developed sense for linguistic harmony: we can tell which words “fit” – which make sense -and which do not. So the sociopathic powers have to be very sophisticated to fool us, but they do, given control of the means of mass communication.)
It is in the evolutionary process that we find “real purpose”, not in some foolish set of “quantities” that a “scientist” tells us about. There is a purpose for life in this process, if we care to look at it staring us in the face. Otherwise we can pretend there is no purpose for life, and carry on unconsciously, ignoring the consciousness that nature has provided for us.
I must say I have no faith, either in God, or in Gould, or in any of the current generation of “wise men” who have been shown recently to be utter fools, confirming my youthful idealistic belief that the system within which I toiled was on the utterly wrong path. And here I recall the saying: “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”. Maybe what humans need is the harmonic sense to sense the chaos in the human social systems created by sociopathic powers served by “wise men”, including the sense to sense when we are being fooled.
This is my last post in this thread. I am starting to get irritated by the low quality of the “debate” (and takes too long for my dial-up connection).
@ 72, DG:
Yeah, probably best we let this drop, because I don’t see minds changing any time soon. I guess I feel like you’re making two mistakes:
1) You’re saying that, since cells are like people in ONE aspect, they must be “just like people” for a whole variety of useful aspects. The evidence absolutely does not suggest that. You gotta go a lot further… and in general, WE need to understand a lot more about consciousness before we draw out those analogies. Otherwise, it’s navel-gazing.
2) If you flip a coin enough times, eventually you’ll get a string of a hundred heads in a row. You are looking back from that point and saying, “My goodness, a HUNDRED times in a row! This must be purpose!” I’ve taken a few shots at trying to understand what you mean by purpose, by “striving,” but if you mean no more than the end result of a series of coin flips, then I see no point in attributing that to some cosmic, unprovable, untestable purpose.
It may not seem like it, but I do appreciate your giving us some new ideas to think about. I just don’t think this is science anymore; it’s not testable, it’s not predictive, it’s just a philosophy. Which doesn’t do a lot for understanding evolution.
That original description was just bad. Why would anyone object to changing that into something a bit more succinct and readable, even if for the wrong reasons?