ROG RESPONDS to PAT and PLATT
Platt wrote:
I find "emergence" and "self-organization" entirely bereft of scientific
explanation because both concepts fail to identify deterministic causes
or "mechanisms" for the phenomena in question.
ROG:
I will be sure to pass on your findings to the Santa Fe Institute. I am sure
some of they will want to know how misguided they've been. Just joking...
Seriously though, I have no idea why I defend EMERGENCE and you shift the
argument to CONSCIOUSNESS. If you have an argument with that particular
theory of emergence, please feel free to attack it. That says nothing in
regards to the general concept though, does it?
PAT:
This taken as an example of the concept 'emergence', it's nothing but a
change in FORM. It's an abstraction of 'the Quality
event' of water and it's wetness into pure SQ: the DQ-part is totally gone.
But, I don't think my argument on form as a kind of Platonic,
mathematical world, applied to the concept 'emergent', is therefor flawed: I
think
that our scientific models of life are in essence just this: form,
abstractions, static, platonic. A word like 'emergent' is aptly applied
to capture some insight of the 'form' of ant-populations, tornado's,
societies and cities, but to explain our feelings of purpose and meaning with
it... no.
ROG:
I basically agree with your "abstractions" argument. Clouds are large-scale
emergent patterns comprised of countless particles in moisture. Despite what
Mr Holden states, science is pretty confident on how these particles interact
together and with their environment to form higher level identifiable
patterns of various clouds.
Science COULD theoretically explain fog and thunderstorms and cumulous clouds
with a reductionist molecular argument. However, the best level of
explanation and abstraction to explain higher level patterns is at the larger
scale level. And science's explanatory quality is as you allude based upon
its quality from a human perspective.
> 3) Finally, one key complex experience or adaptation is that of
> establishing
> goals and purposes. Complex animals have developed this quality.
> Purpose is
> therefore not the cause of evolution, it is an emergent complex
> quality
> arising out of evolution.
PAT:
A different reply now: If I stick with my 'form'-argument, I think
purpose doesn't exist in the theory of evolution as such. You can
program computers as neural nets or automata that adapt to some
'environment', like in the game Life, or by using principles of game
theory or something like that, but ... it remains form. And who! the
automata can get quite 'complex' after some runs... but complexity as
such doesn't matter for the computer, what's really there are 1's and
0's, ore more precisely collections of some abstract two ingredients
'this state' or 'that state'. Yes, also traffic jams, composed out of
molecules in some very 'complex' dynamics, can be viewed as such by a
strict interpretation of what science's models are in it's essence.
ROG:
TEETH and WINGS aren't explicit in the theory of evolution either. Their
development and emergence are explained by it though. I could give a recap if
necessary. BTW, your argument seems to be that complexity doesn't always lead
to goal-oriented behavior or something. I would strongly agree, but this
point of course doesn't even begin to address the explanation that complex
lower level interactions shaped by evolution CAN lead to goals and purposes.
PAT:
Anyhow, to cut things short; the concept of 'purpose' is per definition
non-scientific. Yes?
ROG:
I don't see why it should be non-scientific. If biology can't explain where
goal-directed behavior exhibited by life comes from, then it wouldn't be much
of a theory, would it?
> A classic example of emergence is in the ant colony example that I
> gave above
> (though traffic patterns and your example of flock behavior are also
> commonly
> used). In studying ants, they find that the critters follow very
> simple
> patterns of behavior based upon their immediate environment and odors.
>
> However, when you aggregate the net effects of thousands of simple
> ants
> acting in simple ways, you get much more complex colony behavior in
> terms of
> scouting, food gathering and storage, defense, waste removal and even
> formation of ant graveyards. To say that such examples "explain
> nothing"
> doesn't make any sense to me.
PAT:
'Explanation' could be interpeted as illuminating the simple and complex
CAUSES of phenomena. In this sense I agree with you -of course!- that
you can have valueable insights in the dynamics of ant populations and
what kind of phenomena (ant-graveyards?!) they exhibit. But these
phenomena take a subjective (by lack of a better word) perspective, that
is: OUR perspective.
ROG:
What other perspective of explanation would one recommend? Which perspective
do you think I am argueing for?
PAT:
Do ants have purpose?: Do they plan things, do they strive for an
orderly ant-society? Well, I do believe they have an experience of value
that is necessary for the type of behaviors they exhibit, and I also
believe that science has no place for these experiences of value, but I
don't think they plan to do the things they do.
Maybe it's fair to say
that there is a strong mechanistic (evolutionary) component that indeed
explains their behavior... Ants are tiny bits of
agents having these occasions of experience, and they are made of other
occasions of experience, (Pirsig's 'patterns of value'?) but it takes
our capacity to be able to have the occasions of experience to view that
so-called purpose-full behavior. It happens to resemble purposeful
behavior as it seems to be well planned and performed, in the way that
we humans truly plan and perform certain 'projects'. But we are
conscious of it. Ants are not.
ROG:
No argument with me here. I completely agree that colonies exhibit goal
directed behavior with no need to add in any mystic ant-colony consciousness.
I would be interested in hearing how Platt explains it though.
PAT:
Pss. I do believe life is 'good', and better than death as meaning
'Nothing whatsoever'. But it's a one-sided view. I'll never know how to
appreciate life and death from the perspective of death!
ROG:
Again, who needs a transcendental, all perspectives view (the BIG assumption
being that there is such a view)? What WE need is a view that serves OUR
needs... ie the views of living beings.
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