Humans - our part in development

@maxdancona,

I also agree with you, the only question is if they could do otherwise ...

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@yovav,

We are animals. And we are greatly influenced by instinct, just like any other animal.

Humans do have higher cognitive skills that allow us to make decision. Our cognitive skills are far more powerful than any other animal.

That being said, other animals can learn new behaviors beyond their genetics. Animals change themselves either to solve their own problems, or as the result of what they learn from their societies.

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@livinglava,

"So would you say that a human being is evil when they are capable of acting for reason instead of instinct but they shirk the responsibility to do so"

I would not say evil, but I think that in the natural system, there is no creature that can and should improve his inner self, but rather we

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@yovav,

I disagree--both because animals can choose to change, and because this world is full of human vermin who won't change, or can't.

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@livinglava,

Just on the 'Dog-sacrifice' statement.

A dog will, as a 'pack-member', Protect its 'Pack' To Death - Whatever variety of species its pack, happens to consist of.

A dogs' 'pack' IS the 'dog' - Ultimately it is defending itself (Entire Pack).

That's why dogs are so beautiful.
Have a Lovely Day

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@yovav,

Mankind (Can I say that? Nowadays) needs no 'correction'. It's 'participants' are no Less Natural than anything else.
Not secondary to, above/beyond, on the fringe of or in any way, whatsoever, detached from 'Natures' Design'.

Nature Encompasseth All.
All Encompasseth Nature.

Have a Lovely Day

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@mark noble,

I agree with you that we are part of nature but disagree with you about the correction that we humans should do.

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@maxdancona,

If we are just like the animals, why do we ask questions about the essence of life (unlike them).

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@yovav,

yovav wrote:

If we are just like the animals, why do we ask questions about the essence of life (unlike them).

It is just what humans do. Birds fly. Fish swim. Millipedes have freaky amounts of legs. Humans ask questions about the essence life.

Each animal is unique.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

yovav wrote:

If we are just like the animals, why do we ask questions about the essence of life (unlike them).

It is just what humans do. Birds fly. Fish swim. Millipedes have freaky amounts of legs. Humans ask questions about the essence life.

Each animal is unique.

The relative uniqueness of a trait is not an explanation for why it occurs or what its purpose is.

E.g. you can note that birds fly, but that doesn't explain how they evolved to fly or what purpose it serves for them to fly.

You just say that different species have different traits as if that explains anything. That's like teaching math by saying 1 and 7 consist only of straight lines while 2 and 5 have curved lines and 6 and 9 have closed loops. It's true, but it explains nothing about math.

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@livinglava,

You missed the point. You should be directing this at yovav.

He is claiming that humans are unique because we "ask questions about the essence of life". I am pointing out that humans are not any "more unique" than any other animal. (The term "relative uniqueness" made me chuckle.) I am merely refuting the claim that humans are "special" compared to the other animals.

Animals have different traits. There doesn't need to be a reason. It is just the way reality works.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

You missed the point. You should be directing this at yovav.

Even when we respond to each others' posts, it is ultimately in response to yovav's post, is it not?

Quote:

He is claiming that humans are unique because we "ask questions about the essence of life". I am pointing out that humans are not any "more unique" than any other animal. (The term "relative uniqueness" made me chuckle.) I am merely refuting the claim that humans are "special" compared to the other animals.

Animals have different traits. There doesn't need to be a reason. It is just the way reality works.

You are right that different species have different traits, but it all does have reason.

Birds fly because that gives them certain niche advantages. So it follows logically that humans think in ways that give us niche advantages.

So then we can think about what kinds of advantages we get from different kinds of thinking.

Reason, cause, and effect is how reality works. Nothing is random. Even a coin flip that seems random by our standards is caused to flip at a certain rate, rise and fall at a certain rate, bounce a certain number of times, etc.

What you analyze at one level to be random is determined by a specific and complex web of causation at another level.

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@livinglava,

1. It is a unique human quirk to come up with "reasons" for things. No bird every said "I fly because it gives me niche advantages". That is only something that only exists in the human mind.

2. The word "random" needs to be defined mathematically. There is advanced mathematics defining this means. I suspect you are going to have a problem with this. It doesn't need to be a mathematical definition... but if for your claims to make any sense, you are going to have to explain what you mean that flipping a coin isn't random.

How would a random coin flip be different from a normal coin flip? How would you test this?

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

1. It is a unique human quirk to come up with "reasons" for things. No bird every said "I fly because it gives me niche advantages". That is only something that only exists in the human mind.

It's not a quirk to be aware of reasons. Birds and everything else has reasons that things happen in various ways, but being unconscious of the reason is another state of being.

There is a reason humans developed the capacity to be aware of various reasons for things and to keep expanding such awareness. It is how we have evolved and continue to evolve culturally.

Quote:

2. The word "random" needs to be defined mathematically. There is advanced mathematics defining this means. I suspect you are going to have a problem with this. It doesn't need to be a mathematical definition... but if for your claims to make any sense, you are going to have to explain what you mean that flipping a coin isn't random.

If you only define randomness by counting and extrapolating probability ratios from the counts, you will say that coin-flipping is random because it comes out about 50/50 heads and tails.

The coin can only fall 50/50 heads/tails, however, because of its shape. If it was more asymmetrical, it might have a different probability of landing on one side as another. The shape of the 'coin' or 'dice' isn't the only factor that determined how it falls, however. There is also how hard you toss and/or flip it, how it falls/bounces, etc. In each case, if you analyzed it in enough detail, you would find factors that determine its motion and if you could control all those parameters, you could predict exactly how many times the coin goes around and where it lands, how it bounces from landing that way, and each subsequent path of flipping and bouncing it takes before finally falling flat on one side or the other.

Quote:

How would a random coin flip be different from a normal coin flip? How would you test this?

Randomness just happens at the level of counting and probability. At the level of physical forces and mechanics causing all the events that happen in the course of the coin-toss, there are no random factors.

Now, you can start arguing quantum physics concepts, but I doubt those are random, either; it's just we don't have the ability to examine causation at the scales that determine what appears to us as random at that level.

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@livinglava,

You still haven't defined "random" in a way that distinguishes a random event (or coin flip) from a non-random one. You started to say that a coin flip would be random if it were truly 50/50 balanced, but then you backed away from it.

Without a definition that will allow me to test whether an event is "random" or "non-random", the word "random" has no meaning. It can't distinguish between one thing and another.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

You still haven't defined "random" in a way that distinguishes a random event (or coin flip) from a non-random one. You started to say that a coin flip would be random if it were truly 50/50 balanced, but then you backed away from it.

I don't know if you really read what I write before thinking you understand it.

I told you that the coin-flip only appears to be random at the level of counting a probability. At the level of the physical forces and mechanics that govern how the coin moves through the air as it spins, how it bounces, and how it ultimately lands, there is no randomness.

Quote:

Without a definition that will allow me to test whether an event is "random" or "non-random", the word "random" has no meaning. It can't distinguish between one thing and another.

The word, 'random' means that if all you're considering is whether a coin lands on heads or tails, there's always a 50/50 probability, i.e. because the coin is symmetrical.

That doesn't mean there aren't definite forces and mechanics that cause the coin to flip through the air exactly as many times as it does before hitting something, bouncing and flipping again, etc. before finally landing.

Why are you shifting the thread toward discussion of randomness when the discussion was about the purpose and function of human thinking and other evolutionary adaptations?

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@livinglava,

Ok. So by your definition a coin flip would be random if the coin were perfectly symmetrical.

That is not even close to any mathematical definition of which I am aware, but it is the type of definite definition I asked for.

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@livinglava,

Randomicity, and the mathematics around it, is a topic that interests me. I use the mathematics professionally (it is important for a software engineer to be able to tell how random her set of random numbers is). And the question of randomness is fun to think about.

I think you brought the topic into the discussion because of evolution. The topic interests me, so I bit.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

Ok. So by your definition a coin flip would be random if the coin were perfectly symmetrical.

Your conflating randomness of outcome with randomness of causation.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

Randomicity, and the mathematics around it, is a topic that interests me. I use the mathematics professionally (it is important for a software engineer to be able to tell how random her set of random numbers is). And the question of randomness is fun to think about.

I think you brought the topic into the discussion because of evolution. The topic interests me, so I bit.

So start a different thread on it.

You responded to the coin flip example I gave of nothing being random, in reference to species traits not being random.
https://able2know.org/topic/548211-2#post-7008265

You thus avoided responding to my criticism of your post at that time.

1 Reply

Humans - our part in development

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