Thread: Evolution

Originally Posted by DrB0b

If we were to find out that Einstein was a child molester or that Heisenberg was a cannibal would that invalidate physics as a science?

I bet no stone has been left unturned to discover anything that could be used to slander Einstein, apart from being a brilliant scientist, he was also an anti-nationalist, pacifist atheist and as such a thorn in many a thigh.

Originally Posted by sabang

Such as how Conscious Life came into being. Natural Selection does not explain consciousness.

Originally Posted by sabang

Then there is the Big Question of how Being arose from Nothingness. Big Bang? What sparked the Big Bang?
More esoterically, the question of the human soul, and of Belief.

Consciousness might have been there from the beginning, as part of what is, just like enegy and matter, and slowly evolving from stones to plants, animals, humans and further into an all-embracing consciousness, which will ultimately lead to the universe to cease to exist, as nothing will be there to be conscious of but consciousness itself, until nothingness awakens from its sleep and a new cycle begins.

There is no beginning nor end.

Just thought I throw this in, based on Buddhist cosmology.

Sure Stroller. But that is a Theory/Philosophy that is neither proven nor disproven. And it certainly does not clash with the Theory of Evolution, but it neither proves nor disproves that either.

It does not only not contradict science, but science's latest finding fit quite neatly with it. Astonishing that ancient scholars more or less described the big bang and further back.

But no, it's not science, it's 'philosophy'.

Originally Posted by stroller

It does not only not contradict science, but science's latest finding fit quite neatly with it. Astonishing that ancient scholars more or less described the big bang and further back.

But no, it's not science, it's 'philosophy'.

Which findings? Sounds very interesting.

Something you posted about the big bang not being the beginning, but 'events' before then can be calculated now, for example.
I'd have to look for info on the net, I got this from books and articles I read years ago.

A certain similarity between the representation and number of 'codes' of the I-Ching with chromosone codes (straight lines and broken lines) is a debatable, yet puzzling discovery, for example.
Parallels between the origin of the universe are to be found as well, though Buddhist texts obviously use a different language, but 'energy', 'expansion', description of physical and chemical/biological events are present, often in allegories.

Originally Posted by stroller

Originally Posted by DrB0b

If we were to find out that Einstein was a child molester or that Heisenberg was a cannibal would that invalidate physics as a science?

I bet no stone has been left unturned to discover anything that could be used to slander Einstein, apart from being a brilliant scientist, he was also an anti-nationalist, pacifist atheist and as such a thorn in many a thigh.

He was also a horny old bugger in his Princeton years! Good on him.

Originally Posted by stroller

Something you posted about the big bang not being the beginning, but 'events' before then can be calculated now, for example.
I'd have to look for info on the net, I got this from books and articles I read years ago.

A certain similarity between the representation and number of 'codes' of the I-Ching with chromosone codes (straight lines and broken lines) is a debatable, yet puzzling discovery, for example.
Parallels between the origin of the universe are to be found as well, though Buddhist texts obviously use a different language, but 'energy', 'expansion', description of physical and chemical/biological events are present, often in allegories.

Interesting stuff and something, apart from the physics, I'd more or less forgotten about over the last few years. I use the I-Ching and tarot cards regularly (been spending some time teaching tarot and a bit of Western ceremonial magic to some monks at the BiL's temple in return for some lessons in Thai occultism) and your post has given me a bt of an urge to read up some more on the connections between science, and, err not sure about an appropriate term but I guess you know what I mean.

I Ching Genetic Code HyperDiamond Physics

A classic: "The Tao of Physics" by F. Capra
Shambhala - The Tao of Physics

Buddhism and science:

Bertrand Russell, another Nobel Prize winner, discovered a superior scientific method—one that reconciled the speculative and the rational while investigating the ultimate questions of life:

Buddhism is a combination of both speculative and scientific philosophy. It advocates the scientific method and pursues that to a finality that may be called Rationalistic. In it are to be found answers to such questions of interest as: 'What is mind and matter? Of them, which is of greater importance? Is the universe moving towards a goal? What is man's position? Is there living that is noble?' It takes up where science cannot lead because of the limitations of the latter's instruments. Its conquests are those of the mind.

Buddhism and science - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Here I feel that a close collaboration between modern science and the contemplative traditions, such as Buddhism, could prove beneficial. Buddhism has a long history of investigation into the nature of the mind and its various aspects—this is effectively what Buddhist meditation and its critical analysis constitute. Unlike that of modern science, Buddhism’s approach has been primarily from first-person experience. The contemplative method, as developed by Buddhism, is an empirical use of introspection, sustained by rigorous training in technique and robust testing of the reliability of experience. All meditatively valid subjective experiences must be verifiable both through repetition by the same practitioner and through other individuals being able to attain the same state by the same practice. If they are thus verified, such states may be taken to be universal, at any rate for human beings.

Seed: What Buddhism Offers Science

Hindu cosmology has eery similarities to Quantum physics too.

Originally Posted by sabang

Hindu cosmology has eery similarities to Quantum physics too.

I think there's truth in all these symbol systems, the labels change but the fundamentals don't. I'm interested in any system that offers to expand our knowledge and understanding, it's the restrictive ones I despise. In many cases science and religion are describing the same things but in different terms, stripped of their guild terminologies and approached with minimal prejudice there are many similarities between (some) religions and science. I like Buddhism because it openly embraces both the scientific and spiritual approaches and offers a holistic system I find refreshing and inspiring, shame that that's not reflected in the great mass of its followers but that's a truism for most belief systems and at least Buddhism openly states that people should think for themselves and not blindly follow any belief system.

Originally Posted by DrB0b

Originally Posted by floorpotato

Jean-Baptiste Lamarck was a forefather of intelligent design, believing that a creature could inherit traits acquired by its parents. He's been ridiculed ever since

Wasn't Lamrckism the official evolutionary doctrine of the Sovet Union? Darwinism being deemed too capitalist in nature while Lamarck's theory fitted nicely into the dialectic.

The discourse has moved elsewhere, but 'Dialactic Materialism' was their catchword.
In fairness, the USSR produced some fine science, and some bullshit.

^Darwinism may very well be to corporate capitalism what dialectical materialism was to the Soviets. Reductionism, survival of the fittest, relegating the spiritual to the margins of reality all fit in nicely with a materialist, profit-driven corporate culture. I'm not arguing Darwin's merits in this post (he was a brilliant pioneer), just thinking out loud about why the corporate media seem to be so unquestioning about his theories.

Originally Posted by sabang

Originally Posted by DrB0b

Originally Posted by floorpotato

Jean-Baptiste Lamarck was a forefather of intelligent design, believing that a creature could inherit traits acquired by its parents. He's been ridiculed ever since

Wasn't Lamrckism the official evolutionary doctrine of the Sovet Union? Darwinism being deemed too capitalist in nature while Lamarck's theory fitted nicely into the dialectic.

The discourse has moved elsewhere, but 'Dialactic Materialism' was their catchword.
In fairness, the USSR produced some fine science, and some bullshit.

Umm yes, dialectic materialism was based on the movements of the historical dialectic, a technique for understanding everything through the actions of the dialectic. Hegel by way of Marx and Engels wasn't it? Always struck me as a Yin and Yang type of thing. Engels describing the dialectic in "The Dialectic of nature":

"It is an eternal cycle in which matter moves, a cycle that certainly only completes its orbit in periods of time for which our terrestrial year is no adequate measure, a cycle in which the time of highest development, the time of organic life and still more that of the life of being conscious of nature and of themselves, is just as narrowly restricted as the space in which life and self-consciousness come into operation. A cycle in which every finite mode of existence of matter, whether it be sun or nebular vapour, single animal or genus of animals, chemical combination or dissociation, is equally transient, and wherein nothing is eternal but eternally changing, eternally moving matter and the laws according to which it moves and changes."

It appears that most leaders of the USSR genuinely believed this and even Stalin was known to stop in the middle of a purge or a genocide to ask himself what the Dialectic would have him do. It always struck me as strange that this obvious mysticism was the very bedrock of one of the most hard-nosed atheist regimes the world has ever known. The Dialectic is the moving force behind history, Materalism is its manifestation - as capitalism, communism, socialism, und so weiter. Lamarckism fitted nicely into the Dialectic whereas Darwinism didn't and so Darwinism was unacceptable both politically and philosphically to the idealogues of the party. While I don't believe in Lamarckism I do think that Lysenko was unfairly ridiculed for his support of it.

Here's an excellent comment by John Maynard Smith on Lysenko and Lamarckism and why it was eventually one of the main reasons for him leaving the Communist Party:

"The Lysenko case is very revealing because, firstly, it promised a quick fix in that if acquired characteristics could be inherited you could change society much faster, and I think the Communists wanted to believe there was a quick fix for society, but more than that, Marxist philosophy is dialectical and so it is deeply hostile to the notion that a gene can affect development but development can not affect the gene. So Lamarckism is a natural for Marxism. For me it was an intellectual puzzle - I couldn’t have things both ways. But it took a year or two to reach that conclusion, and I even spent six months trying to do a Lamarckian experiment to demonstrate inheritance of an acquired kind, but of course it failed. It was the beginning of a process of questioning which ultimately would lead me to leave the Communist Party"
British Humanist Association

Originally Posted by stroller

^
Good point.
The unjustified popular application of Darwinism to social and political issues tends to irritate me a great deal.

Often applied by those whose combined IQ/EQ predetermines themselves to become obsolete in the evolutionary chain next.

Agreed, Social Darwinism is a pseudo-scientific offshoot of the pseudo-science Eugenics (which probably makes it a pseudo-science^2) and has no foundation in reality.

Originally Posted by floorpotato

^Darwinism may very well be to corporate capitalism what dialectical materialism was to the Soviets. Reductionism, survival of the fittest, relegating the spiritual to the margins of reality all fit in nicely with a materialist, profit-driven corporate culture. I'm not arguing Darwin's merits in this post (he was a brilliant pioneer), just thinking out loud about why the corporate media seem to be so unquestioning about his theories.

Probably because the media is directed at the masses and, as a means to profit, reinforces their prejudices rather than attempts to educate them and cozens them into believing that they are knowledgable and wise and that anybody who says different is a pointy-headed pedant who should be the butt of ridicule The mass media is reactionary in the sense that it reacts to what it thinks its public wants. A more charitable viewpoint would be that most people just don't have the time or the inclination to keep up with their education after leaving school and rather than admitting ignorance (face is not just an Asian thing) will cling tenaciously to what they learned 10, 20, or 50 years ago.

Originally Posted by floorpotato

After all that, we probably don't disagree in substance so much at all. I admire Darwin as a pioneer, but I just think his theories (and Neo-Darwinist as well) are incomplete. By 'incomplete', I don't mean that we just need to find a few more fossils. But there appears to be something fundamentally missing from strict evolution theory. The main difference between our views is where we think the arrogance lies. Certainly the creationists are the most arrogant and won't even listen to anything besides their literal Bible nonsense. But from my experience, Darwinists can be extremely arrogant and intellectually intolerant to those who question some of their premises. People like Dembski and Behe don't strike me as arrogant at all. In fact Dembski welcomes all criticism and enjoys responding to it. Thanks for the previous posts, lots of useful and interesting stuff.

Yes, I think we do agree. Intellectual arrogance is annoying and self-defeating. Sometimes I think it's frustration talking "But it's soooo obvious!!!!" but it's often coming from an unjustified sense of superiority. We used to call some of the senior researchers at Uni "The High Priests, Guardians of the Sacred Mysteries" as they acted as though the rest of the world was unworthy even to touch the hems of their labcoats. Most of them vanished into well-deserved obscurity in the cellars of academia. At least one of them, however, makes a fortune from talking-head appearances on TV where he'll happily disagree with anybody about anything as long as enough money is shovelled his way. Nice work if you can get it

PS - Dawkins' earlier book, Climbing Mount Improbable, is brilliant on the evolution of the eye.

Originally Posted by benbaaa

Floorpotato, I'm just finishing Richard Dawkins' The Ancestor's Tale, in which he journeys backwards in time from humans to the common ancestors we share with apes, through the age of dinosaurs, to fish and then worm-type things, right back to bacteria and the first single-celled organisms. Heavy going in places, but well worth the effort if you really want to get to grips with how (most of us) evolved from the slime.

If you read "Uncommon Dissent - Intellectuals Who Find Darwin Unconvincing", edited by William Dembski, I'll give Richard Dawkins a try.