[MD] on the radio

[ian glendinning]

Ah, David (and Horse mentioned) ... Engineers - literally "ingenious
people" - the archetypal problem solving pragmatists.

I would say that, I am one of course ;-) and that is probably part of
the reason I prefer Dennett to Dawkins, he is one of those pursuing an
"Engineering" paradigm to explain more aspects of evolution. Clearly
Darwin can never be the final word, all science is contingent.

I still think "selection" is the atomic process that occurs; the
feedback needs to be captured somewhere in order to be fed forward
into future generations, so it's still about encoding of information.
Dupre emphasied that identifying the right "individual" atom subject
to selection is the tricky bit. The engineering systems view (and
Hofstadter) says there are may ways and levels to encode that beyond
explicit sequences of "atomic" genes. (I thought it was telling that
Dawkins and Dupre fell out over the word "programmed" ... Information
theory has a lot to offer here ... I think you know "quantum
information", "quantum computing" and "quantum genetics" are also on
my agenda.)

And oh yes ... inadequate variety you say ... "requisite variety" -
someone who should be better known is Stafford Beer. The engineering
systems view of emergent behaviour. I've barely scratched the surface
there. (By the way, Horse is an expert here I believe.)

I'm pretty sure this stuff is explicable and tractable. What Pirsig
brings to this is the emphasis on the levels and the dynamism, and
effectively warns against reification - treating "objects" that
inhabit your current level as necessarily the most significant
realities to worry about when you're looking to understand cause and
effect - the qualitative, zen, recursive interplay of "emergent
arising" (Paul, where are you ?). For me Dawkins is too sure of the
objectivity of his selfish genes. Nature has much more complex
"memory" than that as a basis for "selecting" individuals.

The orthodoxy you refer to is the objectivity of scientific method -
SoMism for short.
You got me started, but there are a lot of threads to weave here.
Ian
BTW, if we're going to allow "intelligent design" to creep in to the
conversation, we'll need to be clear about the way we are NOT using
those words.

On 11/28/06, David M <davidint at blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> Hi Ian
>
> I was glad John  brought up the new
> interest in the ability to alter the genome
> via gene switches which may introduce
> some feed back from experience into evolution
> other than mere elimination which has always
> struck me as a process incapable of building
> anything, much like an infinite number of monkeys
> trying to type Hamlet and someone helping out
> by removing the monkeys that are least near to
> typing out Hamlet, problem is you are appealing
> to an infinity that is not available and such an availability
> of variety (Darwin's unjustified elephant) could only
> give you chaos. He used dog breeding as an example,
> and recently it has been shown that dogs have exceptional
> variety in their gene pool that is not found elsewhere
> which points out a general problem of inadequate
> variety to support the theory and also to explain why
> dogs are so exceptional.
>
> Ask an engineer who understands the complexity
> of living organisms if they are convinced by selected
> variety as explaining evolution. I find engineers are
> more skeptical than average as using design
> is far from the easy option.
>
> NB obviously evolution is a fact but is Darwin the final word?
> Say yes and sign up to to dogmatism and a life of secular faith.
>
> I don't suggest nature is pre-designed, but is there more quality
> recognising intelligence involved than orthodoxy allows?
> At least the MOQ could explore this whilst SOM could not.
>
> Over to you Ian.
>
> David M
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "ian glendinning" <psybertron at gmail.com>
> To: <moq_discuss at moqtalk.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2006 9:22 PM
> Subject: Re: [MD] on the radio
>
>
> > For those interested in the selfish / slefless "altruism" debate, I
> > can endorse David M's recommendation.
> >
> > Just listened to it. Excellent.
> >
> > Interesting that the subtle differences between Dupre and Dawkins are
> > effectively just word-games in the end, and that it's the social
> > (cultural) vs individual distinction that merits most debate.
> >
> > Also interesting that Bragg refers to religion as "the elephant in the
> > room" and introduces it as something "to be discussed, before putting
> > it to one side".
> >
> > Ian
> >
> > On 11/25/06, David M <davidint at blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> >> this was quite good if you missed it:
> >>
> >> http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/inourtime.shtml
> >>
> >> on altruism with Dawkins, and the vey good John Dupre
> >>
> >> David M
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> moq_discuss mailing list
> >> Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
> >> http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
> >> Archives:
> >> http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
> >> http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
> >>
> > moq_discuss mailing list
> > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
> > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
> > Archives:
> > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
> > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
> >
>
> moq_discuss mailing list
> Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
> http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
> Archives:
> http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
> http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
>