Reply
Wed 9 Mar, 2005 09:21 am
Evolution has produced man. Man has produced the notion that he is separate from evolution. As a result we are surprised when we discover evolution in the very fibre of our existence. We do not see it for what it is. We see causality and time, the will of god and the devils work. We see grand designs and purpose that originates everywhere, even within us. And still we don't see the true force behind the wonders.
Even when we thought up the immortal phrase "cogitas ergo sum" we failed to realize that our precious revelation was in fact much bigger. We should have kept going: "I think ergo I am, ergo I must have begun". True if we at this point can agree that man has history, and that the forming of this history was evolution, wich is still going on, as history is continously being written. In light of this I think it is safe to say that; "my beginning was evolution, ergo my continuiance is evolution, ergo the contents of my being is evolution."
But we didn't realize that these thoughts had an origin, just as we ourselves had an origin in the murky waters of pre-historic earth. Though evolution had endowed us with the ability to acknowledge our own excistence, we have long since forgotten that it was a gift. So we ponder the origin of our ideas. "Do my impressions and ideas stem from external physical influence?" We consider this to be an inadequate explanation. We want to believe, to know, that the existence of everything is dependent on our experiencing it.
"Esse est percipi", has been said. "To be is to be subjected to perception"? How blinded by pride we have become. We don't even have the decency to concede that, in the very least, this dependence has to be mutual. We say we are, because we think, and that the world is because we see it. Do we not know deep inside that we are because nature is? That if there was no air there would be no lung to breathe it? If there was no world, there would be no eye to see it.
Herein lies the paradox. We do not realize that these thoughts are no more than futile attempts to negate the fact that our existence is bound by the same force that binds the existence of everything else. That our every thought, be it a concious desicion to eat something, or the solving of mathematical equations, is the push of evolution. The drive. The idea that pops into our heads, seemingly from out of nowhere, is a result of activity in the brain that we ourselves are not aware of. We call it our intelligence, and we think that it is an ability when it is more an availability. Intelligence is nothing more than evolution looking in a mirror. And now we begin to guess evolution's motive in giving man his gifts. Not to separate him from it, but to elevate him over itself, and so, by taking residence in man's intelligence, evolution also elevated itself to a new level. To awareness.
For ages hydrogen and oxygen have mixed to create water. Other substances have merged to form new matter, and this seemingly unorderly synergy is what we have labled evolution. Now, as this interplay between the many forms of matter and all the energies has gone on for a long time, it has finally created a being with the capacity to acknowledge it's existence. In this being thoughts mix and merge to create ideas. Through this being's capacity for action these ideas are given manifestations in the world around it, and this in turn affects everything it comes into contact with. But it is still evolution. One thing that obscures this realization is the concept of free will. It is a widely misunderstood concept, and this misunderstanding is what creates the veil of obscurity. The general idea is that free will negates the possibility of fate. The argument is that if you are destined for something, you do not have a real choice. By this argument free will is proven an illution, since everyone is destined to die one day. But all humans know they will die, and still most of us retain the notion of choice. The cold fact of it is that we do have choices, and we have them because we have a destiny.
In the struggle for survival evolution is destined for many things much greater than awareness. At this moment, evolution is but a babe in toy land.
Though, I must disagree that the concept of fate negates that of free will and vice versa in their entirety. Your usage of fate, such as that of death, negating free will is quite broad. Especially considering the more recent works relative to life extension and age reduction sciences. Take a look at the book 'Fantastic Voyage : Live Long Enough to Live Forever' by Ray Kurzweil, Terry Grossman. These works certainly compliment your idea of evolution personified through man as the struggle of survival through adaptation to one's environment or circumstances.
As such, humankind's current circumstance certainly dictates that death should come, though it is evolution's gift to man that death does not have to come should man evolve sufficiently through adaptation to the environment as well as adaptation of the environment itself.
Fate is the compliment of free will and free will the same of fate. As it is fate to be destined with no other choice than to have a choice and the abilities to make one. Thus your most penultimate fate is to have free will. They are symbiotic in nature.
You're arguing my point on free will versus fate. Did you misread me?
Re: Evolution in man
Evolution is a biologic process. Occasional mutations that, in a few cases, create individuals more able to deal with their environment and, because of that, more able to procreate and pass on future generations that "good" mutation.
Evolution, in my point of view, is "blind".
Today we have a complete domination over the environment. Biological evolution is not possible, unless we want it. But since evolution must be "blind" I don't see how it could happen now.
What could happen is artificial evolution.
And here I must ask you this: do you think we are able to predict long term consequences of genetical interference?
To your last question, val: I think we're able to predict with a varying degree of accuracy.
I do not agree that evolution is a stictly biologic process, though I understand what you mean when you say its blind.
The occasional mutations you mention are evolution, but it doesn't stop there. Look at religions and ideologies. They're all mutations of some prior set of beliefs.
Science. Modern theories are mutants of older theories, evolved in pace with our capacity, our will to, and our availability to study science.
Evolution is causality, and everything in the universe is subjected to causality.
Wether the cause is a dam breaking or an idea forming in your head, and wether the effect is a flood or a war, it is still evolution.
And it's still blind, because we have no way whatsoever to predict what's going to happen next. All we have is anticipation.
Re: Evolution in man
val wrote:
Today we have a complete domination over the environment. Biological evolution is not possible, unless we want it. But since evolution must be "blind" I don't see how it could happen now.
I disagree, in the sense that our environment is our environment. That we have the ability to alter it is besides the point.
People often see humanity and the rest of earth as two seperate things. For example, we have a lot of people in my country who hate cats because of the destruction to native fauna, that cats have no right to be here. The unspoken implication is that every human should be aware of every consequence (including the biological hangers-on) of humanities effect on what they call "nature". The way I see it, cats have adapted brilliantly as a co-dependant species on humanity and have as much right as any other animal to compete for domination of the world. People, buildings and roads are just as much "nature" as anything else on the planet.
I've drifted a bit to make my point clearer which is: individuals better adapted to surviving the Bronx will survive longer and produce more offspring than those who are not. Evolution continues.
The ability to alter genes directly will mean that those with access to the technology will probably have an edge. Just as those with access to AIDS treatment are more likely to live longer today. People who are naturally resistant to AIDS however, will more likely develop in areas with LESS access to treatment. Which raises another interesting point I've been thinking about for a long time....
Is medicine the enemy of the race? In the sense that it strives to encourage bad genes to persist in the population?
Re: Evolution in man
Eorl
Do you mean that those who survive in the Bronx are the result of a biological evolution? That is, in my point of view, not only false but also very dangerous: when we start to apply evolution - that has to do with genes - to social situations, we are not far from the nazism (I don't mean that was your intention).
If a man survives in the Bronx by becoming a great drug dealer and another man is killed because he fights the drug traffic, would you say the first one is more adapted?
And do you think that the children of the drug dealer will become, due to genetic inheritance, drug dealers too?
American indians where almost exterminated by the whites, because of evolution? The survival of the strongest?
val, I think I may have oversimplified my point.
If you assume city life is to continue for another 20 000 years in New York (a big assumption) then you might gradually see signs of changes in the overall population that are favourable to city living.
My point is just that our environment is what is, whether it be brick and steel or trees and lakes, and members of the population better adapted to survive in any given environment are more likely to dominate the population eventually. I don't think "controlling the environment" will stop the evolution of the race.
Nazism seems to come up a lot here and lets be clear - I detest racism of all kinds, especially nazism. They were trying to keep their "blood" pure, because they thought there was something special about being German. It's no different from any other attempt at "ethnic cleansing". It's just plain murder, and nothing can justify it.
Social situations are very much an important aspect of evolution. In fact, it's the basic reasoning FOR human social relations. People who cannot tolerate people, or try to hurt people, generally don't get much of opportunity to reproduce, so over time such people become more and more rare.
As for American Indian near-extermination...I'm gonna open a hellava can of worms here, but it could be argued that Europeans had an amazing and sudden advancement in the tools they used to win conflicts, and they used this to dominate the entire world at the time, including natives of many countries including mine and yours.
The USA is doing a similar thing right now. Yep, it's all about survival of the fittest.
Can I just make a point here, that people who understand how evolution works are not people who think it is either a good or a bad thing....it just is.
To accuse those who understand the process of having some involvement or commintment to the process is just silly.
It's like saying I'm a murderer for watching CSI.
...seems less like a can of worms and more like an empty tunell............hello!...........anyone.....................
eorl
Sorry for the delay.
I still disagree with the transposition of a biological/genetic theory to a sociological level. I think the mechanisms of social and historical interaction are completely different from the biological ones.
You see, must of the great genius of mankind didn't even have children: Newton, Kant, Beethoven, Goethe ... and those who had, their children were vulgar and showed no special gift ...
Their influence on mankind was cultural, not biological.
Social adaptation has nothing to do with genetic mutation.
And in the case of american indians, I don't see what has genetic evolution to do with their situation. They were very well adapted to their environment. The problem was technological.
How could Cortez and a small army destroy an empire?
How could little countries like Portugal, Holland or Spain have huge colonies around the world?
How was it possible that a country like England controlled China?
The explanation is in the technology.
The portuguese, for instance, established domination in India because they had the most efficient ships of the time and canons. Later, with England it was the same.
But there is a point in what you said. We can ask: but why did those european people have that superior technology?
I think it was a consequence of a very aggressive competition between west european countries. For centuries they were involved in wars. Portugal made war to arabs, then, after wining, was in situations of war or at least competition with Spain the next 500 years. And see the case of England versus France and Spain, Holland versus Spain ...
In Africa and America, the natives lived in less competitive societies, were changes were very slow. The stability of their cultures, the perfect adaptation to the environment, didn't force them to make dramatic changes.
When europeans arrived, they just had not any capacity of fighting back those invaders.
But even here, it is not a matter of genetic evolution. Only social conditions, with their cultural, economical, scientific specificity.
val, I see what you are saying, but what you refer to as "genetic evolution" is not quite right.
It makes more sense to think about "survival of the fittest" in any given environment.
You can't really look at any individuals, they are of no consequence.
Lets say you've got dogs of all different colours...makes no difference to survival what colour they are...but as they run out of room, they slowly move north into the snow....the black ones are more likely to get eaten by polar bears, the white ones less often....oven a long period of time, the genetics of the POPULATION (not of individuals) has changed so that the gene for black fur dissappears. Meanwhile genetic mutations have been accuring in all dogs for a long time so that some dogs have thicker fur than others....same story...the thinner fur dogs are not found in the far north. And this is exactly what you find in dog breeds.
Human evolution is exactly the same, and ANYTHING that gives you a survival advantage over others will help your gene type to more likely to be found in future generations than less...including social advantages.
This is why I say social relations amoung people is the RESULT of evolution, because anti-social tribes dropped off the list eons ago.
Those most well able to survive the longest will.
American indians were not well adapted to their environment at all ....because thier environment included losts of men with guns who wanted thier land. (Before the white men arrived they were adapted rather well)
Superior technology is absolutely a survival advantage.
Am I making any sense?
yes but it always starts with an individual.
you mean like the first white dog that happens by mutation?
in your case that youve laid out , NO because there were already white dogs in the mix. If all dogs were brown and it started snowing all of a sudden , all the dogs get predated upon because they stand out. One day a momma dog has some pups, and one is white. In the snowy environmnet, this white dog has an advantage as all the other dogs are eaten. The white dog passes its white trait on and more white dogs are born. As the environment stays white fior a long time, the white dogs then become more and more abundant.
The trait begins with an individual, which passes this beneficial trait on to its population. You have to ask, where did the first white dog enter the population
farmerman wrote:in your case that youve laid out , NO because there were already white dogs in the mix. If all dogs were brown and it started snowing all of a sudden , all the dogs get predated upon because they stand out. One day a momma dog has some pups, and one is white. In the snowy environmnet, this white dog has an advantage as all the other dogs are eaten. The white dog passes its white trait on and more white dogs are born. As the environment stays white fior a long time, the white dogs then become more and more abundant.
The trait begins with an individual, which passes this beneficial trait on to its population. You have to ask, where did the first white dog enter the population
It would be a much slower adaptation, as in dogs with fewer spots/darkness would be less likely to be preyed upon, whereas darker dogs would be preyed upon more frequently. Over a period of time, the environmental pressure would result in the genetic adaptation toward a lighter color to be more prevalent, because more of them would live passing on their genetic makeup.
Until summer, where more mottled or varied coats would be more preferential. Thereby, offsetting the less colored whiter coats. Which ultimately, the specialization would result in a sort of messy compromise.
Perfection being an ideal, and reality being a set of approximations.
time is of no concern to the stew
Yep, can't disagree with any of that...but have we answered val's questions ?
What do you think val?
Stumble It!
Tweet This
Bookmark on Delicious
Share on Facebook
Share on MySpace