Intelligent Evolution?

[cyborg]

What in the universe is a "self-selecting object"?

Given two objects A and B I can ask A and B to select amoungst themselves.

For example: A and B play Rock Paper Scissors against each other. They can select a winner. That is self-selection.

 

[hammegk]

True, er, well, unless you think free will doesn't exist. Too bad it has nothing to do with this discussion.

 

[cyborg]

Evolution is a game. It has everything to do with the discussion.

 

[hammegk]

Only if you prefer to ignore environment.

 

[cyborg]

Yes. I prefer to ignore the chess board when playing chess. Only the pieces in and of themselves matter.

And I do happen to deny the existence of what most people call "free will" as you well should know.

 

[hammegk]

Sorry. The chess pieces don't move themselves.

 

[cyborg]

Neither does my arm.

 

[Southwind17]

But replication of DNA is not done by the DNA itself. The information uses enzymes, cells, and yes, intelligence, to get itself replicated. That's why the "self-" part is no more relevant than the "intelligence" argument.

I believe the distinction is between integral to and external to the replicating entity per se, but I could be mistaken. Hopefully jimbob will enlighten us, notwithstanding that he's omitted/failed to explain the distinction and relevance so far.

 

[jimbob]

I believe the the phrase closer to your intent here is "the ghost in the machine." "Deus Ex Machina" as your sig defines is a literary device where something that isn't integral to the story line or character development appears to save the day.

But I see the point you are trying to make with it. A metaphysical inteligence is not integral to Human behavior.

There isn't a ghost, and there isn't a machine. There is dynamic process.

Now I don't think that Jimbob believes in a metaphysical mind or soul, just because he has pointed out some differences in the way information is processed in Human activity in contrast to animal activity at large. (this is still a someone black and white distincton though. Humans may be more clever, but they don't have the monopoly on clever solutions to situations.)
It's his all or nothing approach that dismisses the Analogy entirely that makes it seem he's much closer to the ID camp. As the ID advocate, he seems to have a little difficulty seeing Human behavior as an evolutionary process.
Or maybe he just doesn't like the attempted polemic of the Analogy for it's supposed target audience of Creationists. But whatever, I haven't seen him advocate the Designer with the big D.

But I should let him declare himself and make his own qualifications.

This has turned into a long answer, so I will break it into two parts (hidden for clarity

Intelligence

What intelligence is, is notoriously hard to define, hence the discussion about the turing test. However it is nothing magical; it arose as a result of evolutionary pressures, and must be a result of sufficiently complex feedback in the brain.

You are right to argue that there are shades of grey, I am arguing that there is no intelligence in evolution; intelligence has arisen as a consequence of evloution.


I still would argue that it makes sense to talk about "intent" and "goals" of intelligent agencies, as given a set of circumstances, and a "desire" (again that arose as a result of evolution), animals can solve problems to achieve their "desires", which are ultimately a result of evolutionarily beneficial behaviours.

This is very noticable in higher primates, a seminal work about this is "Chimpanzee Politics" by Franz der Waal, where he documented how behavioural patterns and traits amongst the male chimps led to fluctuations in their status. They certainly seemed to demonstrate a "theory of mind" (for example, one had been injured, and was limping, so his "coalition partner" was doing more work. The fieldworkers noticed that the limp seemed to worsen whenever his ally was visible...). The fieldworkers noticed that one low ranking female (bonobo?) was always generous with any food that she found, whilst another was stingy. Guess which female got offered food by the others?

Also look up some of the "rape coalitions" in bottlenose dolphins. Because of the three-dimensional nature of the medium, male bottlenoze dolphins often form alliances of alliences (two pairs of close allies temporarily co-operating with, and sometimes cheating on each other).

Both these groups of social animals seem to know how different individuals in their social circle are likely to behave, and demonstrate aspects of a theory of mind.

Then there is the amusing example of a female bonobo(?) being presented with a mirror, and after realising that it was her refelction she put a bunch of grapes on her head, and looked in the mirror again.

Technical Development

I am also arguing that there is intelligence in technological development, even if it is merely defining the goals of the evolutionary algorithms.

If you are talking about technological development in general, and throughout history, I would argue that the process has not been akin to an evolutionary allgorithm, let alone evolution, because there was directed change, which does not occur in evolution.

Whether you could achieve the same just by using an evolutionary algorithm is not really the point, because it was directed change. Early spitfires had machine guns, and after reports that they lacked firepower, cannons were added to later versions (with several attempts to fix the problems). There was a directed alteration of the factor that had been identified as a problem, in the direction of solving the problem. In an evolutionary approach there would have been unrelated alterations, and those which fared better would have been selected. Evolution is not trial and error, it is more profound than that.

I believe the distinction is between integral to and external to the replicating entity per se, but I could be mistaken. Hopefully jimbob will enlighten us, notwithstanding that he's omitted/failed to explain the distinction and relevance so far.

A cell is a self-replicating system, it responds to its environment with traits that have evolved and tend to optimise reproductive success, this could include avoidance of harsh environments,

(c.f. magnetic bacteria, where the alignment constrains the "drunkards walk" of the bacteria, and means that more will mofve out of harsh environments, even if 50% are just as likely to move into such an environment (IIRC, the bacteria align themselves, but still move randomly, it is just better for 50%, please correct me if I am wrong). They also speed up their movement in a harsh environment.)

, avoidance of predators, acquisition or manufacture of food, etc.

In a suitable environment, I would define a self-replicating system that doesn't need any alteration of the environment to create a copy of itself. A trigger when the environment is suitable is still part of the environment that the system evolved in.

I would say that a virus self-replicates, because if a suitable cell appears it will copy itself.

I wold say that it isn't a proper self-replicationg system if something else performs the copying, and thus selects from a set of selection criteria. In the car showroom analogy, there wasn't any particular reason, apart from commercial success for selecting those cars which sold. To make the system work in reality, you would need to cull out the "failures". If there was a self-replicating system, the successes would select themselves. The failures would be those which failed to self-replicate within their "lifetime". There would be a lifetime, as a self-replicating system needs to acquire its own rresources, and not to loose them to "predation" for example.

Does that answer/begin to answer your question?
Derail

I would use the virus as a counter-example to those who said that evolution is towards complexity. A virus can only replicate within a "proper" living organism. Because of this, viruses could not have started evolving before unicellular life arose, so they must have arisen afterwards. (Is there any evidence that they evolved from DNA/RNA in "proper" organisms)?

 

[cyborg]

You are right to argue that there are shades of grey, I am arguing that there is no intelligence in evolution; intelligence has arisen as a consequence of evloution.

Uh no one is arguing anything different.

The argument is that there is no "intelligence" in intelligence either - certainly not of the conventional kind that people naively envisage.

I would say that a virus self-replicates, because if a suitable cell appears it will copy itself.

I do wish you'd stop being inconsistent.

Make up your mind - define your self-replication criterion and live with the consequences of your definition or simply admit that the "self" part can be relaxed because it is only the "replication" part that leads to consequences.

In the car showroom analogy, there wasn't any particular reason, apart from commercial success for selecting those cars which sold.

And so it is in the market in the real world.

To make the system work in reality, you would need to cull out the "failures".

You mean, like, not buying things that don't sell from your suppliers?

This is how it works in reality jimbob. This is the way our marketplaces work FFS!

 

[Belz...]

I still would argue that it makes sense to talk about "intent" and "goals" of intelligent agencies, as given a set of circumstances, and a "desire" (again that arose as a result of evolution), animals can solve problems to achieve their "desires", which are ultimately a result of evolutionarily beneficial behaviours.

Does it make sense to talk about "intent" and "goals" of enzymes when copying DNA ?

If you are talking about technological development in general, and throughout history, I would argue that the process has not been akin to an evolutionary allgorithm, let alone evolution, because there was directed change, which does not occur in evolution.

Huh ? Of course it occurs. It's called natural selection.

A cell is a self-replicating system

To what extend does the "self" operate ? The cell needs to gather food in order to replicate, and the DNA needs the cell. In a human being, the cell isn't much of a "self-replicating" system without the rest of the body.

In a suitable environment, I would define a self-replicating system that doesn't need any alteration of the environment to create a copy of itself.

How would you define these "alterations" ?

I would say that a virus self-replicates, because if a suitable cell appears it will copy itself.

I would say that a drawing self-replicates, because if a suitable human appears it will copy itself. That's the analogy, by the way.

I wold say that it isn't a proper self-replicationg system if something else performs the copying

But something else DOES perform the copying in the case of cells. It's not a closed system. And the cell is a tool for the DNA to replicate. The analogy is about information. The cell is the tool, not the information.

 

[jimbob]

Belz, to clarify,

Quote:
If you are talking about technological development in general, and throughout history, I would argue that the process has not been akin to an evolutionary allgorithm, let alone evolution, because there was directed change, which does not occur in evolution.

Huh ? Of course it occurs. It's called natural selection.

In technologcal development there is a process akin to "directed mutation". That doesn't occur in evolution, it doesn't need to because the direction is supplied by the selection.

If a particular design parameter is causeing a problem, (ladder too short) it can be altered in a way that is not akin to evolution. There is no selection of longer ladders compared to shorter ones, a longer ladder can be designed due to the results of intelligent analysis.

 

[Apathia]

Jimbob said:

If you are talking about technological development in general, and throughout history, I would argue that the process has not been akin to an evolutionary allgorithm, let alone evolution, because there was directed change, which does not occur in evolution.

I get your ponts that the process of Human cultural development is in detail different from the Natural Selection of Biological Evolution.
I see the role of what we conventionally call "intelligence" with a lower case "I." This in contrast to the metaphysically laden "Intelligence" of the upper case that our Wester Culture unconsciously assumes. (I lived 15 years in Asia, and found these heavy duty Platonic abstractions far less prevelant.)
I see that you are not so burdened with this, but what I want to say is that technological development as integral with Human culturall behavior is evolutionary, and that it's perfectly sensible to highlight this as Southwind17 and others have so done here. Sure sometimes you need to point out the peculiarities of Human activity and the way our concepts interplay with our behavior including our somewhat unique subjective top down experience.
But I say that the underlying essence is bottom up.

Perhaps it helps, perhaps it Muddies the water, to give the example of Free Will. My position is that there is no metaphysical Free Will. There is still, though our relative concept that we have free will (lower case) based on the experience that our decisions interplay with our environment, and we don't feel any power is restraining our volition. This realtive sense of freedom is integral to our cultural activity. In that sense, I don't see it necessary to deny the conventional usage of the word "intelligence."
True the Sun doesn't really set. So the British Empire Empire still spans the globe? "Intelligence" with a lower case "i" is meaninful, relatively and in context.
But one of the cultural goals of evolutionary science is encouaging a process way of thinking rather than an absolutist one with fantasy ultimate realities.

I see just what Cyborg means (or I think I do.) when he says, "There is no Intelligence in intelligence" and agree.

I think it's a mistake to restrict the evolutionary paradigm to biological natural selection. So I support Sothwind17's approach as perspective expanding.

I also don't see any reason to try to argue that evolution in the Human cultural conext is exactly in process the same as in Bilological Evolution.
It's an analog, by gum.

But I'm saying all this from the Humanities department when the foundation we want from Science is to explicate the process. It has to be founded on the empirical, not the philosophical

 

[Belz...]

In technologcal development there is a process akin to "directed mutation". That doesn't occur in evolution, it doesn't need to because the direction is supplied by the selection.

I know that, but the point is it doesn't matter HOW the variation is introduced, Jimbob. It doesn't matter HOW it comes to be, just that it DOES.

Variation + Selection = Evolution

Self-replication, randomness, intelligence, etc. are just tools, a means to the same end and the same process.

If a particular design parameter is causeing a problem, (ladder too short) it can be altered in a way that is not akin to evolution.

How so ? Again, let me repeat that intelligence is like a hand, a heart or a certain chemical: a tool for information to get itself copied. So, how is it NOT akin to evolution ?

 

[President Bush]

I think it's a mistake to restrict the evolutionary paradigm to biological natural selection. So I support Sothwind17's approach as perspective expanding.

I also don't see any reason to try to argue that evolution in the Human cultural conext is exactly in process the same as in Bilological Evolution.
It's an analog, by gum.

But I'm saying all this from the Humanities department when the foundation we want from Science is to explicate the process. It has to be founded on the empirical, not the philosophical

As the word "intelligence" now exists in both standard and capitalized versions here... how long before the word "empirical" follows suit?

 

[Apathia]

As the word "intelligence" now exists in both standard and capitalized versions here... how long before the word "empirical" follows suit?

When you hear the sound of one invisible hand clapping!

 

[President Bush]

When you hear the sound of one invisible hand clapping!

Like Claude Rains just slapped me in the face?

It's been my impression that the analogy has argued against empirical evidence ie consequences observable by the senses provided by jimbob, mijopaalmc, and others.

The purely deductive perspective offered by cyborg is opposed to such empiricism.

 

[Apathia]

Like Claude Rains just slapped me in the face?

It's been my impression that the analogy has argued against empirical evidence ie consequences observable by the senses provided by jimbob, mijopaalmc, and others.

The purely deductive perspective offered by cyborg is opposed to such empiricism.

You know, I can't entirely speak for Cyborg. I have my own interpretation of how someone could say "there is no intelligence in intelligence," and be making perfect sense.

Since this is a thread of analogies, I'll give another to illustrate where I'm coming from.
Imtelligence is like a rainbow.
You're taking a Sunday afternoon stoll at Crawford Ranch, and Jenna says, "Oh look a rainbow!" And indeed it's a glorious double rainbow.
Jenna wants to drag you to the end of that rainbow for the pot of gold.
How are you going to answer her? Are you going to scare the notion out of her with a warning about terrorist leprechauns? Are you going to give her a sciennce lesson? (Nah, not Bush.) Well, suppose you said something, but didn't elborate.
"Sorry Jenna, but rainbows don't exist, so we can't go to the end of one."
Jenna would reply, "Are you serious? Look there's one right there!"
Jenna would be making a healthy assertion of her sense perception.

But the elaboration is that what we are calling a rainbow isn't over/out there, but is in the eye of the beholder. It's appreance and existance depend upon the observer.

Of course you know the process, light refracted by water droplets and the observing eyes at just at the right location in relation to the light source, the Sun.

The way we popularly descibe our creative relationship to, and moreso with, our environment uses the conceptual abstraction we call, "intelligence," but it is of no more substance than a rainbow and that fantasy of gold.

What is real is the process.

You can, of couse get a different kind of rainbow, but in scientific essence the same, buy using a prism. The Quantum Electrodynamics is the same for both.

However, suppose someone told you that a rainbow was just like a mirror.
There is a similarity. What you see in a mirror isn't really out there.
But reflection is a different process than refraction. The process isn't altogether the same.

As I see it, Mijopaalmic, Jimbob, et al, have correctly pointed out that the process of Humans in realtion to their cultural activities isn't the same as Natural Selection at large. But they go on to insist that the term evolution has no meaning in regard to the Human culture building and shouldn't be used.

Let's talk about rainbows and mirrors again. Yes, the process is not altogether the same, and you get a different result, but if what you are after is the common theory they both result from. then both are Q.E.D.
Q.E.D. embraces both with the very same mathematics of probability distribution.

Southwind17 is looking ahead for the day we understand the underlying evolutionary process that not only evolved what we call "intelligence," but is the process behind the subjective experience.
The there will be just one Theory of Evolution, and we will see the natural selection in Human creativity.

But I suspect there will still be people walking miles out of any sensible way for that pot of gold or fleeing from those terrorist leprechauns.

W,
Some advice:
It's not the hand of Claude Rains that's going to be slapping you, but that of Adam Smith, if you don't abandon this silly "Stimulus Package" idea right now!

 

[President Bush]

You're taking a Sunday afternoon stoll at Crawford Ranch, and Jenna says, "Oh look a rainbow!" And indeed it's a glorious double rainbow.
Jenna wants to drag you to the end of that rainbow for the pot of gold.
How are you going to answer her? Are you going to scare the notion out of her with a warning about terrorist leprechauns? Are you going to give her a sciennce lesson? (Nah, not Bush.) Well, suppose you said something, but didn't elborate.
"Sorry Jenna, but rainbows don't exist, so we can't go to the end of one."
Jenna would reply, "Are you serious? Look there's one right there!"
Jenna would be making a healthy assertion of her sense perception.

From my evolutionary perspective we got to git shed of unscientifically labeled referents within systems of sequential connections among related events ordered within a cycle. Like Sunday. Or Tuesday following the first Monday of November, especially every four years or so. Don't need that one comin' up.

Got to git shed of narrow colored bands isolated by monological prejudice yonder from the Planck length held down by Okie leprechauns, too.

Crawford itself will no longer be so priviledged by linguistic illusion as to be thought of as separate from the rest of the three-dimensional realm in which all material objects are located. We still call that Texas.

Speaking of Jenna from an evolutionary perspective... why should I bother to differentiate between Laura's personal trainer's kids?

 

[Apathia]

From my evolutionary perspective we got to git shed of unscientifically labeled referents within systems of sequential connections among related events ordered within a cycle. Like Sunday. Or Tuesday following the first Monday of November, especially every four years or so. Don't need that one comin' up.

Got to git shed of narrow colored bands isolated by monological prejudice yonder from the Planck length held down by Okie leprechauns, too.

Crawford itself will no longer be so priviledged by linguistic illusion as to be thought of as separate from the rest of the three-dimensional realm in which all material objects are located. We still call that Texas.

Speaking of Jenna from an evolutionary perspective... why should I bother to differentiate between Laura's personal trainer's kids?

Yep, put away all them prejudices and run away with Condi Rice!