Critique of TSW Part 24c The Mind-Brain Muddle

Blog 20141126 

Bill has trouble with truth, knowledge, information and the differences between reasoning via analogy, disparity, deduction, and induction.

I am ever so grateful to Bill Westmiller, whose comments are marked "BW: ". The quotes marked "TSW: " are from "The Scientific Worldview" and my comments are marked "[GB: ".

The Mind-Brain Muddle (Part 3 of 7)

TSW:  "In practice, truth is the relation between the microcosm of knowledge, and the macrocosm of information. Thus the 'truth' varies from person to person."

BW: This is the "subjective reality" view, but I wouldn't call it "truth", even as an aphorism. It puts hallucinations on a par with validated, logical assertions based on objective evidence. For the mystic, the Bible contains information about supreme beings, never warranted by any evidence or logic, so they assert it as 'true'. That assertion is mitigated by everything we know "for certain" about reality.

[GB: I stand by the quote. “Truth” is necessarily a subjective term. It is true that water runs downhill, but neither the water, nor the hill care whether that claim is true or false. Thus the appellation “true” or “false” is not a characteristic of the external world without perceptive beings. As you can see from Wikipedia, the subject of truth is infinitely complicated and a fundamental part of the philosophical struggle:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth

I prefer my dialectic between knowledge and information. It fits the univironmental concept and explains a lot about why folks have such great disagreements about the truth. Each person necessarily has limited knowledge and limited information about the world. Characteristically, you cherry-pick what you call “evidence” in asserting what you call your “unmitigated” “for certain” knowledge about reality. You deny the priest his bible as evidence for his “truth” claims, but accept your own claims for free will without any evidence at all. Of course, I otherwise agree with you that truth is the closest correspondence between what we think of reality and what it actually is. Obviously, in science, we discover truth via observation and experiment, with the best theory (“what we think of reality”) being the one that predicts the results of the next observation or experiment.]

TSW:  "The mere addition of another book to the shelf may increase one’s store of information, but without an interaction with the human microcosm, the information in the book never becomes knowledge."

BW: This strikes me as an error of definition. The book couldn't exist if the author had no knowledge of the topic. That the mode of communication is a physical object (book) doesn't make it simple "matter". Of course, if no other person ever reads the book, then it is fruitless as a means of communicating knowledge, whether it contains objectively factual information or not.

[GB: Huh? I think you just argued yourself out of that one. Knowledge involves the process of knowing, which involves the motions of electrons within the brain. The book does not have that no matter how it got here. The book may be infinitely complicated matter, but it is still matter. As we say, it is an “instrument” (i.e., a “thing”) of communication.]

TSW:  "We may speculate that disparate facts, like other kinds of matter, eventually produce chemical reactions within the brain that we experience as mental conflict."

BW: The brain mechanism may be chemical, but the "disparity" is a matter of logic, which may mitigate the truth of any assertion. The "mental conflict" isn't a chemical necessity, since the chemicals (or neurons) have no means of determining whether any abstract assertion is true or false. It is only the *process* of logical analysis that recognizes inconsistencies between two alleged facts ... or a discontinuity with objective evidence.

[GB: And what is “the *process* of logical analysis”? You seem to be implying that somehow, this process does not occur in the brain—sort of like your “free will” that apparently is matterless motion floating around in the air. Sorry, but all logical analysis occurs inside the brain as an infinitely complicated physical/chemical process. We will never completely understand how this works, but recent work has been taking the first baby steps in that direction, and none of it involves any processes outside the brain.]

TSW:  "... new combinations - ideas - result when the contradictions between facts or theories are reconciled."

BW: Again, trying to squeeze a process into a dialectic analysis, which is flimsy, subjective, and unenlightening. New ideas don't result from contradictions, but from concurrences. That is, we observe patterns of events that share common characteristics with patterns we already know, suggesting a similar cause ... not a contradiction. The previous example of a falling ball and a falling brick apply. A recent invention is another good example: a young student [Andraka] who was concurrently studying antibodies and nanotubes realized that the properties of one could affect the properties of the other, inventing a cheap, fast, highly accurate cancer detector. See his TEDx presentation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r55a0FapF2M

[GB: Remember that we think in two fundamentally different ways: 1) by analogy and 2) by disparity. In science we do this all the time, of course, as you just did by stressing analogy, which is the way in which much of “ordinary” science is done a la Kuhn. The greatest breakthroughs involving “revolutionary” science, however, often come about when we discover disparities, contradictions that are not solved via the smooth processes you described. My toughest scientific problems tend to be of this nature. They present a big headache, often keeping me awake at night continually rehearsing the conflicting data. Being somewhat persistent, however, I tend to keep at it, going outside the field in the attempt to discover new information. My little brain finally settles down only after I find the reasons for the contradiction at hand.]  

TSW:  "There are two basic approaches to problem solving: the microcosmic (deductive) and the macrocosmic (inductive)."

BW: There's nothing "micro or macro" about the two. Both are pattern recognition techniques, which have different characteristics. Deduction takes two or more assumptions about reality, applies sequential logic, and arrives at a conclusion. Generally speaking, it doesn't "solve problems" or "create new ideas", it just describes the logical consequence of the premises. Induction takes the same assumptions and identifies logical relationships between one or more of their properties, which can identify novel causes or produce new effects. The two techniques aren't opposites and are usually applied in series to discover new facts or create new effects. Without induction, Andraka would never have consolidated the properties of antibodies, nanotubes, and electrical resistance. Without deduction, he couldn't have found an effective means of combining them to produce a useful result.

[GB: You missed half of it. You are right about deduction being micro, a logical consequence of the information at hand. What you consider induction is really deduction, which “takes the same assumptions and identifies logical relationships between one or more of their properties.” Deduction occurs in a closed system (that is why I call it microcosmic); induction obtains information from outside the system (that is why I call it macrocosmic). You implied this yourself when you mentioned how Andraka brought information about antibodes, nanotubes and electrical resistance to the problem at hand. Induction always requires convergence from outside the microcosm. You recognized this with your word “consolidated.” Once brought to the table, the data, theories, or ideas can be used to discover their logical consequences. After all, that is how we get new ideas. We combine old idea A with old idea B to form new idea C. That is why those with experience in many disciplines and those who travel widely come up with so many innovations. That is why the solution to many a puzzle involves induction (macrocosmic thinking). We often need to “think outside the box” or travel far to bring back the missing piece that will complete the puzzle.]

TSW:  "With macrocosmic thinking (induction), we search for materials normally not considered within the confines of the microcosm of the problem. This approach, although often inefficient, is potentially the most creative."

BW: I agree, but there's nothing macroscopic about it. Here's an interesting article on analytical induction and deduction, titled "Predicting the Future is Hard":

http://reason.com/archives/2013/02/27/predicting-the-future-is-hard/print

[GB: Huh? The word is “macrocosmic.” It has little in common with the word “macroscopic.” Macrocosmic things are outside the microcosm (any particular xyz portion of the universe, large or small). Sorry, but neither induction nor deduction was in the article. Of course, Bayesian reasoning, which was mentioned, requires sporadic induction in the form of updated information from outside the analysis at hand. This is in contrast to frequentist reasoning, a deductive approach that does not.]

TSW:  "We also may speculate that new ideas appear as new brain states - actual physicochemical combinations or material interconnections that have never occurred before."

BW: Everything we commit to memory is a "new physio-chemical combination" in the brain. Every fact we acquire from reality, or the communication of other peoples observations, forms a novel connection in our brain. However, it isn't necessarily the case that those material configurations of neurons have "never occurred before". Abstract concepts, whether new or not, probably are the same in every individual that acquires them. It's called learning and is the foundation of language.

[GB: Sorry, you missed the point: “new ideas” require “new brain states.” That is why, unless we already have the old ideas and thus their correlative old brain states, we neither understand the new ideas or formulate the new brain states. You are right that all memories are new physio-chemical combinations. And like other microcosms, these combinations may be similar in some respects and dissimilar in others, per relativism.

TSW:  "It is only through success in predicting the future that the brain, knowledge, information, and ideas are of any use."

BW: Rather vague. Knowledge identifies truthful assertions about causes and effects, which are just as true in the past - before the evidence was acquired - as it will be in the future. Nor are valid ideas necessarily good predictors of what will happen in the future. For example, Darwin's theory didn't predict *what* changes would occur in future species evolution, only *how* those changes would occur and had occurred in the past. Moreover, as you noted earlier, knowledge is contextual. When contexts change, the knowledge fails to predict ... even if it was absolutely true in another context. That water boils at 212°F is a fact, but only at sea level, not on a mountain.

PS: An engaging article on "causal completeness" that you might find interesting:

On The Causal Completeness Of Physics, Part I

Massimo Pigliucci

“I could quit here and declare victory over Weinberg: the CCP that he invoked does not do the work that he thinks he does (specifically, eliminating the possibility of emergent properties), although it does do the job we both want it to do (eliminate dualism, vitalism and supernaturalism).” -Pigiucci

http://www.science20.com/rationally_speaking/causal_completeness_physics_part_i-105118

[GB: Thanks Bill. I also declare victory over Weinberg (and Pigliucci). The article shows that both of them are still stuck in their belief in finite causality, with the implication that most scientists are no different. Weinberg is completely wrong in supporting classical mechanics at this late date. That remains a clear violation of the Second Assumption of Science, causality (All effects have an infinite number of material causes). Pigliucci is correct that the indeterminist’s finite causality could never produce emergent properties. In fact, if classical mechanics were absolutely true, the universe would not even exist. On the other hand, Pigliucci has his own problems (see  https://newhumanist.org.uk/2843/science-needs-philosophy). You may remember that in "The Scientific Worldview" I mentioned that in all of science we are always necessarily working with reductions (e.g., neomechanics) or expansions (e.g., univironmental determinism). Pigliucci, like the religious folks, has taken it upon himself to claim that reductions, no matter how successful, inevitably miss the stuff that philosophers and humanists like himself can supply. He claims that “humanism is about taking seriously the complexity of the human condition and the limits of human knowledge.” If you do not grant this opening afforded by the Eighth Assumption of Science, infinity (The universe is infinite, both in the microcosmic and macrocosmic directions) and the Second Assumption of Science, causality (All effects have an infinite number of material causes), he will slander you with the epithet called “scientism.” Like other indeterminists, he cannot get over “the idea that science is the ultimate arbiter of any question, or indeed even of what counts as a meaningful question.” Like the religious folks, he is implying that there are other ways of knowing that do not involve logic and the interpretation of evidence. A pox on both their houses!]

  

Next: Ethics (Part 4 of 7)

cotsw 052

Critique of TSW Part 24b The Mind-Brain Muddle

Blog 20141119

Bill gets mired in the skeptic-dogmatist muddle and tries to figure out the difference between information and knowledge.

I am ever so grateful to Bill Westmiller, whose comments are marked "BW: ". The quotes marked TSW are from "The Scientific Worldview" and my comments are marked "[GB: ".

The Mind-Brain Muddle (Part 2 of 7)

TSW:  "The skeptics have learned correctly that there is no a priori  ... but that doesn't mean that knowledge is therefore impossible. The dogmatists ... err in denying the necessity and tentativeness of the assumptions ..."

BW: You've bundled a lot of ideas into a dualistic "muddle", making it less clear. Skeptics believe that all knowledge is presumptive and therefore false. Dogmatists believe that knowledge is self-evident and therefore true.

[GB: I thought that the quoted statement summed it up nicely. You saw it as a “muddle,” because, as an indeterminist who believes in finity, you would have liked the universe to present us with black and white answers. This is never possible in a universe guided by the Second Assumption of Science, causality (All effects have an infinite number of material causes). That is why all our measurements have a plus or minus. We can never discover a single effect that has a finite number of causes.

If you consider yourself a skeptic, then your addition of the words “and therefore false” betrays your demand for a finite universe that you can never have. No one can perform science (or anything else) without first presuming and without accepting less than perfection in the result. You will never be able to determine a finite set of causes that would satisfy your demand for “truth.” You will always have to accept something less. Too bad, that is the way the universe is.

If you consider yourself a dogmatist, then you will have to at least admit that “some” knowledge is not self-evident and indeed might not be true. The only way we can determine what is true, is by interacting with the external world. The “truth” that we discover is nonetheless conditional. It is never rigid, finite, and as wonderfully perfect as the skeptic might demand and the dogmatist proclaim.]

TSW:  "It is only common sense that, on the average, those individuals and groups who did know survived longer than those who did not. If power is the ability to act, and if survival requires acting, then the knowledge of how to act to survive is indeed evolutionary."

BW: Yes and no. Knowledge of means to survival is critical and knowledge itself evolves, but individuals don't evolve in the Darwinian sense. For a species or other biologic group, it isn't sufficient to merely survive, but also to procreate. Of course, a person with the genetic capacity to acquire and use knowledge is more likely to survive and procreate. But, her knowledge doesn't get transferred to her offspring, as Lamarck would insist. The only thing that gets transferred is the *potential* of the brain structure that facilitates the acquisition or application of knowledge. It is true that the wise procreators will nurture that potential and motivate the acquisition of knowledge in their children. But, it isn't the knowledge per-se that is inherited, so the wise act itself is not biologically "evolutionary".

[GB: You still don’t get it. Every action in the infinite universe is evolutionary. Your statement that “individuals don't evolve in the Darwinian sense” might be true “in the Darwinian sense,” but it is not true in the sense portrayed by univironmental determinism. Existence for even one more microsecond is evolutionary. That is why I submit that neo-Darwinism definitely is not the mechanism of evolution, as proclaimed by the over-specialized in biology. Procreation, for instance, involves much more than just genes. Aunts, uncles, grandparents, and soldiers are part of procreation. All acts are evolutionary. That is why knowledge is so important for survival.]

TSW:  "... the first step ... is to assume for a moment that knowledge is matter and that knowing is the motion of that matter."

BW: Seems upside-down to me. Knowledge is the condition of knowing some fact. The fact is more proximate to the "things" (matter) that exists in reality, while knowledge is more proximate to the mental effort of storage and retrieval (motion). However, both the condition and the known are a *result* (effect) of the learning *process* (cause) which modifies the brain. To have knowledge is to have the ability to retrieve learned facts. To know is to acquire valid facts from reality and abstract them for storage in the brain. So, they are two different processes, not different aspects of the same thing.

[GB: Again, I stand by the quote. Knowledge is not the condition of knowing some fact. Knowledge is information stored in the brain. Thus, to have knowledge is not the ability to retrieve learned facts. The ability to retrieve has little to do with what is to be retrieved. You should know that from your study of the computer you use every day. Your hard drive contains information, which amounts to a kind of “knowledge” for the computer. Retrieving that information is a process that has little to do with the information contained therein. Thus, many of us know a lot of stuff, but we get poorer at retrieving it as we age. The smartest person stores a lot of information quickly and retrieves it quickly. What is so hard about that?]

TSW:  "From the deterministic viewpoint, information is matter outside the biological microcosm, while knowledge is matter inside the biological microcosm."

BW: This proposition doesn't follow from the knowledge=matter and knowing=motion premise stated earlier. Obviously, both relate to information, but information is not simply facts about matter; it is also facts about motion. Certainly, we can have information about matter and motion "inside" our biological construct, just as much as outside it. To speak of knowledge as being only "inside" our brain makes no sense. There can be knowledge in books or computers (external, material objects), learned by others from reality, which facilitate retrieval and learning by the reader. Piling one dualism on top of another doesn't clarify or inform, it just rattles the brain.

[GB: I stand by the definitions above. Of course, both knowledge and information concern both matter and motion. Sorry, but the stuff in books is information, not knowledge. Sorry that your brain has been rattled by knowledge and information.]

TSW: "From the neomechanistic viewpoint, information, like all other things or processes, is either matter or the motion of matter. Clearly, information is matter."

BW: Self-contradictory. If information is "like all other ... processes", then it is matter in motion. Saying that information is only matter discards the most important things to know: how the matter is uniquely configured as a distinct "thing" and how it moves or changes in response to other "things". Information isn't a material object; it is an observed fact, acquired from reality and expressed in human abstracts, that can be stored in our brains and communicated to others.

[GB: Not contradictory at all. Information is not motion. Even when we observe motion, we are forced to objectify it. By doing so, we are forced to consider motion (e.g., time) as a thing. You had to do it yourself when you wrote about “the most important things (my italics) to know” and “how the matter is uniquely configured as a distinct "thing".” The representations of these “things” we consider information can only be stored in the brain as “things” even though the process involving the storing involves motion. I have no idea what you mean by: “Information isn't a material object; it is an observed fact, acquired from reality and expressed in human abstracts, that can be stored in our brains and communicated to others.” The universe consists only of matter in motion. It seems that you are trying to come up with something other than matter in motion, which you then consider to be the mysterious “fact” or the “human abstracts,” which nonetheless can be “stored in our brains” like the matter it really is.]    

TSW:  "... the brain, being matter, can only store knowledge in a finite form. The brain is forced to abstract from the infinite detail of the natural object."

BW: Yes and no. The brain is not merely matter: a dead brain stores nothing. The human is a processing device, with specific capabilities, such as abstraction (which may not exist in non-sapient brains). However, the human brain per-se (as an organic device) isn't "forced" to abstract; it can evade abstracting information from nature by simply ignoring it. Nevertheless, it is true that any "device" is finite, so acquiring and storing information is always a selective process. No entity - including God - can possibly know everything there is to know about the universe: brains aren't infinite and can't "contain" the universe.

[GB: Sorry, but the brain is merely matter; it cannot be any “thing” (xyz, remember?) else. So it is like a computer, which is definitely a thing and can only store finite quantities of data. I stand by the quote, just as you did when you recognized that brains, like computers must abstract in order to process information because there is an infinite amount of information to abstract from. Thus, “non-sapient brains,” like all brains, must abstract in order operate at all.]

TSW:  "Any writer knows that it takes a lot more energy to think up words and type them than to type gibberish."

BW: I think the average human consumes 20% of its energy in brain processing. Sometimes, I think that writers consume 80% of their energy thinking about the next word in a coherent sentence.

TSW:  "... because information gathering and processing is a human activity, this gives, in [the indeterminist's] view, a mystical, supernatural quality to humans, too."

BW: I'm not sure that's an "indeterminist" view, just a mystical view of cause and effect: whatever the mystic can't explain is caused by something "unseen" and therefore "supernatural". Note my prior comments on "breath=spirit".

TSW:  Deutsch: "knowledge is a physical process, or rather a particular configuration of physical processes... information can be defined as a patterned distribution, or a patterned relationship between events."

"Appealing as this may be to the conjurors of matterless motion, it brings with it obvious problems. For instance, it would forbid our everyday treatment of information as matter."

BW: I agree with Deutsch, but I don't think he's advocating "matterless motion" at all, since a process is just a particular kind of directed motion of matter. It seems to me that abstraction is essentially pattern recognition, which is a capacity of the human brain. For example: observing that balls "fall" and bricks "fall" suggests a pattern of motion that is abstracted as a process called "gravity". (BTW: I disagree with Deutsch's devotion to "models" of human behavior.)

[GB: My specific objection to Deutsch was his implication that there could be “a particular configuration of physical processes.” Processes are motions and motions do not have configurations, only matter does. Clear thinking always requires distinctions between matter and motion, guided by the Fourth Assumption of Science, inseparability (Just as there is no motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion). This is difficult, and like so many others, Deutsch fell into the trap set by separability. Any patterns we observe are patterns produced by matter, not by motion.]

TSW:  "Facts, like all other things, must be viewed in context ..."

BW: Agreed. This is almost an endorsement of my sense of facts as "unmitigated truths". An assertion about reality can be considered *absolutely true* in the absence of contrary evidence. Humans *need* that kind of certainty in order to make any progress in comprehending nature. Absent that kind of rational certainty, we would be perpetually disputing the question of whether existence exists.

[GB: Sorry, but we don’t need no certainty. We can (and do) make assumptions instead. Per the First Assumption of Science, materialism (The universe displays only two basic phenomena: matter and the motion of matter), we assume existence. Similarly, per the Second Assumption of Science, causality (All effects have an infinite number of material causes), we assume that there is no free will—that there are material causes for our every action.] 

Next: The Mind-Brain Muddle (Part 3 of 7)

cotsw 051

Critique of TSW Part 24a The Mind-Brain Muddle

Blog 20141112

Bill’s belief in finity and quest for definition prevents him from considering the interaction between brain (matter) and mind (motion).

I am ever so grateful to Bill Westmiller, whose comments are marked "BW: ". The quotes marked TSW are from "The Scientific Worldview" and my comments are marked "[GB: ".

The Mind-Brain Muddle (Part 1 of 7)

TSW:  "The mystery can be intensified by stressing the dissimilarities between animals and humans, thereby cutting the evolution of consciousness from its origins."

BW: Not all animals are conscious, but all vertebrates are ... from anglerfish to humans. So, the first requirement for an analysis of "mind" is to distinguish among animals, vertebrates, and humans. It isn't a matter of "cutting the evolution of consciousness from its origins", but recognizing essential characteristics. Presumably, animals are evolved from plants, so we can further make a distinction between fixed and mobile living things. Failing to do that will cripple any argument.

[GB: All so correct, but beside the point. The question being discussed was the evolution of consciousness, which I claimed could not be discovered by stressing dissimilarities, as you just did. Evolution, by definition, is the change of one thing into another. In particular, tiny changes in quantity eventually become large changes in quality.]  

TSW:  D’Holbach: "It is the height of folly to deny intellectual capacities to animals; they feel, think, judge and compare ..."

BW: Which is why it's so important to find a clear, fundamental distinction between consciousness and sapience. Humans are called "Homo Sapiens" for a reason and it's important to define the difference between humans and other conscious animals: we are sapient.

[GB: Sapience only means “wisdom” or “sagacity.” I have seen a lot of game animals that had a lot more of it than I did (unfortunately). Good luck with drawing another of your finite lines…]

TSW:  "Our modern, sophisticated indeterminist is a systems philosopher who typically links the advent of consciousness with free will and neovitalism..."

BW: Most "system philosophers" reject neovitalism and deny free will. The term "free will" is usually associated with humans (sapients), not all conscious animals.

TSW:  "Until the terms mind and brain are defined, the mind-brain question is meaningless."

BW: Agreed. I don't think you do that.

TSW:  "The air could not be seen, but when it moved, it moved other things that could be seen. Logically, spirit was possessed by anything that moved ..."

BW: The second sentence doesn't follow from the first. It wasn't that spirit and *motion* were equated, but that energetic motion that *could not be seen* was considered "spirit". In ancient Hebrew, the word for "breath" and "spirit" are identical. The human breath (which could not be seen) was considered an immaterial "spirit". When a person died, their spirit ("breath") ceased and "left them". That's the foundation of all things spiritual.

[GB: Sorry, but motion, whether “energetic” of not, and spirit always have been associated. Thus, “school spirit” is demonstrated by students jumping around at sports events, etc. “Spiritualism” hangs on the idea that there is more to the universe than plane old dead matter. Indeed there is, and it is described by matter in motion.]

TSW:  "Hegel recognized that minds were not parts of nature, because they were not found situated in space."

BW: The word "recognized" implies that Hegel's view was true. I don't think you really want to endorse the idea of mind being separate from nature.

[GB: Right, this is described in the Fourth Assumption of Science, inseparability (Just as there is no motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion). Motion is never separate from matter. Matter takes up xyz space, but motion does not. Hegel was right: motion is not “part” of nature. It is what the various parts do. Sorry you are having so much trouble with this—you are not the only one.]

TSW:  "Mechanists have insisted correctly that: All that really exists is the material particles of the substance of the nervous system."

BW: So, now you're a mechanist? This seems at odds with your immediately prior endorsement of Hegel's assertion that mind is not a part of nature.

[GB: What? Have you been sleeping? Neomechanics was an entire chapter in “The Scientific Worldview.” The entire book is predicated on the assumption that the universe consists of matter (microcosms) in motion. What makes this so difficult, I guess, is for folks to realize that motion (and time) is not a thing, but what things do. I can put (frog) legs in my pocket, but not their jumping, etc., as I have mentioned repeatedly. Things always have xyz dimensions, being parts of the universe. Motion is not a thing and is not “part” of the universe, although all motion occurs within the universe. Thus, Hegel was correct, mind is motion and is not “part” of nature. Remember, Hegel was responsible for the Fourth Assumption of Science, inseparability (Just as there is no motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion). Not understanding motion seems to be a prerequisite for indeterminism. After all, that is where people get their ideas about ghosts, spirits, spirituality, minds divorced from brains, and other concoctions involving the indeterministic concept of matterless motion.]    

TSW:  "Thinking is what the brain does, just as running is what the legs do."
         
BW: Correct: it is a process, not an object. One of those Westmiller Things, rather than a Borchardt Thing. Nevertheless, all distinct processes require *particular configurations* of matter in motion, with distinct means for achieving the effects. The brain (animal or human) has the means of producing conscious acts.

[GB: Then, I guess that “Westmiller Things” include matterless motion. What a concept!]

BW: However, I don't think you've "circumvented" the muddle, since you still haven't defined your terms. You say "mind" is the motion of matter, without saying what material construct produces the conscious effect. Obviously, it's somewhere in the brain, but you haven't distinguished between the consciousness of animals and human sapience. Assuming there is a distinction, you haven't explained the correlation between "mind" and "knowledge". You just jump ahead to a discussion of human intelligence, which is NOT characteristic of other conscious animals.

[GB: The point of that discussion was to emphasize that mind is motion and brain is matter: end of discussion. Indeterminists love to complain about lack of knowledge we have of the location within the brain the motion called mind occurs. As I am not an expert in that, it would be pointless for me to speculate. Nonetheless, your predictable demand for me to produce some special distinction “between the consciousness of animals and human sapience” is not what I am about. As a brain evolves in size and complexity, it obviously can perform increasingly complex interactions with its macrocosm. The evolution from one kind of consciousness to another is gradual and of no particular concern to me.

I thought that I had defined knowledge and information properly. Knowledge is inside the brain; information outside the brain. Both are stored physical representations. Thus, if you excised a portion of the brain that stored knowledge, that knowledge would disappear in the same way you would lose the information on your hard drive if you put a magnet to it. I appreciate your wanting to know more about this subject, but like I mentioned, I am not your best adviser on the details.]

TSW:  "Knowledge, power, science, revolution, life, global competition, survival - the interconnections are profound ..."

BW: True, but those attributes are not all characteristics of conscious vertebrates, they are characteristics of sapients.

TSW:  "If knowledge is the result of the interaction of real humans with the real world, then whether we classify it as 'science' or 'religion' ... makes no difference - it is still knowledge."

BW: It seems to me that you're conceding that religious "knowledge" is a consequence of "interaction" with the real world and therefore just as valid as scientific facts about reality. Clearly, it isn't. Again, the problem is that you still haven't defined "knowledge". Clearly, non-human animals *know* something about reality, even if they never interact with humans.

[GB: Boy, you missed that one. Knowledge is what is inside; information is what is outside. An interaction with the external world says nothing about whether it is valid or not. You are right that religious “knowledge” is not valid. Nonetheless, it is knowledge when it appears in the brain even if it is based on nothing but lies or imaginings.]

TSW:  "Both the scientists and the priests behave in fundamentally scientific ways: they accept sensory data, compare it with stored data, and then act on the macrocosm according to their conclusions."

BW: Now you've gone a step further, suggesting that priests follow some scientific method. They don't: they simply assume facts that they don't know and jump to conclusions, with no regard for evidence or logic. It seems to me that you're perverting the idea of scientific knowledge, simply because you've failed to define either term. Saying that it all comes under the category of epistemology says nothing about the content of the two kinds of claims.

[GB: Remember how I started this whole project. My claim was that determinism and indeterminism were distinguished by opposed assumptions. Your claim that priests are illogical is false. They appear to be illogical to you and I only because they use opposed assumptions. Nevertheless, given those indeterministic assumptions, the logic follows nicely—only problem: the original assumptions are incorrect and thus the whole line of reasoning is incorrect and makes no sense to us. Note, again, how all this leads back to original assumptions, which I must continue to emphasize.]  

 Next: The Mind-Brain Muddle (Part 2 of 7)

cotsw 050   

Critique of TSW Part 23b Heredity-Environment Muddle

Blog 20141105 

Bill’s belief in finity and quest for definition prevents him from considering the interaction between heredity and environment as a unity.

I am ever so grateful to Bill Westmiller, whose comments are marked "BW: ". The quotes marked TSW are from "The Scientific Worldview" and my comments are marked "[GB: ".

Heredity-Environment Muddle (Part 2 of 2)

TSW:  "Lysenko believed in a simplistic form of Lamarckism ..."

BW: So did Spencer. It might have been useful at this point to explain why Lamarck's theory was simply false, instead of trying to establish a dialectic dualism. Instead, you jump into the political responses to his theory. It was insane to ban the study of genetics in the Soviet Union, simply because Lamarck, Spencer, or Lysenko didn't understand the scientific facts about the genetic evolutionary process or the critical characteristics of homo
sapiens.

[GB: Sorry, I assumed that my readers would know that Lamarckism was the theory that acquired characteristics could be inherited. Although eventually falsified, it was one of the few explanations for the progressive changes that were being observed in paleontology and biology. This was five decades before Darwin’s “Origin” and almost a century before genetics became popular. You are correct that the politicians in the Soviet Union should have known better—another example of the damage a macrocosmic mistake can do.]  

TSW:  "... leftists were forced to dredge up tired arguments against reduction per se and in favor of free will and the development of culture independent of evolution."

BW: Granted, they conflated evolution with Lamarckianism and racism, but simply characterizing their arguments as "tired" doesn't demonstrate why they're wrong. Leftists were simply stuck with a conflict between the dialectical materialism of "genetics" and the dialectical materialism of social evolution. For some reason, they imagined that free will didn't exist in the former, but did exist in the latter. I find it rather odd that "determinists" would resort to free will to defend the Marxist (r)evolution, which they considered inevitable.

[GB: Again, the leftists should have known better, but did not. This is not so unusual, what with most of us being brought up with the free will trope. Early on, I criticized Engels for his championing of free will, without which I guess he thought the revolution would never occur. On the other hand, to err on the macrocosmic side of the debate probably made sense to those who wanted to manipulate the culture in a radical way.]

TSW:  "From the scientific point of view, neither the hereditarian nor the environmentalist can be correct. It is a false dichotomy."

BW: It may be a false dichotomy, but both nature (genetics) and nurture (environment) can be true. From a scientific view, you can accept genetics (not Lamarckianism) AND environment (culture) as significant factors in the development of any individual human being ... all of them to different degrees. No dualism is required or useful. There is no need to invoke the dualism of micro/macro as a criteria for deciding which emphasis is correct; even worse to invoke Baer's formula to demonstrate some universal "balance" of generic influences.

[GB: Well, to each his own. It is a false dichotomy because it is not possible to have a microcosm without a macrocosm. My point is that nature and nurture are equally important, just like the length and width of a rectangle are equally important for determining its area. Baer’s equation was wrong because it implied that heredity and environment were independent factors.]

TSW:  "Even Barash could see that no organism exists in the absence of an environment."

BW: Perhaps, but that blanket assertion doesn't answer the question of *which* influences dominate which human characteristics. For that, you need scientific evidence about particular causes and effects ... which may suggest human norms ... but averages say nothing about the influence of any of those factors on any particular individual.

TSW:  "... ultraconservative biologist Garrett Hardin ..."

BW: Ultraconservative??!! He was a flaming leftist who should be a prime example of "overemphasizing the macrocosm". His question: ‘How do heredity and environment act together to produce the effect observed?’ may be a valid rejection of simplistic dualism, but it incorrectly assumes that all human effects are necessarily caused by both. That's practically Lamarckianism, assuming that nurture affects genetics, which is false. Nobody's skin color is affected by their cultural milieu; that's determined only by their parent's genes. Some effects are 99-1 "microcosmic" nature and some are 99-1 "macrocosmic" nurture. Finding the *cause* for distinct effects is what science is all about.

[GB: Gee whiz! I never heard of Hardin being called a “flaming leftist.” Maybe you should actually read some of his stuff. This was the one time I agreed with him. At least your analysis is consistently myopic. Nurture always affects genetics because genes cannot exist without an environment. Remember that little disagreement about Newton’s First Law of Motion? My point was that, for the law to work, the absence of matter (absolute space) was just as important as the presence of matter (in the inertial object).]

TSW:  "If the heredity-environment muddle is so much a transgression of scientific method, as it certainly is ..."

BW: It will remain an unscientific muddle as long as philosophers pretend there is some "dichotomy", or that the causes of ALL effects are equally a result of both Nature AND Nurture. They aren't.

TSW:  "Intelligence is a community project. If we spend our lives in a community that fosters intelligence, we become intelligent; if we spend our lives in a community that harbors ignorance, we remain ignorant."

BW: I agree with most of your commentary on intelligence, but I think this contradicts your proposition. In essence, it suggests that Nurture (culture) is 100% of intelligence and Nature (DNA) is zero. It also implies Lamarkianism, which claims that acquired traits are hereditary. As with other topics, your discussion falters on the lack of definitions for the terms you use.

[GB: Huh? How did you ever get that idea? Zero times something is still zero. Intelligence is a great example of univironmental determinism at work. One inherits a brain that is either fast or slow at storing and retrieving information; one inherits an environment that either provides sufficient information or does not. The result of all that is simply survival for one more microsecond.]

BW: Intelligence has two basic aspects:

1a(1): the ability to learn or understand or to deal with new or trying situations : reason; also : the skilled use of reason

1a(2): the ability to apply knowledge to manipulate one's environment or to think abstractly as measured by objective criteria (as tests)

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/intelligence

In the first case, it is a human talent: the degree of ability to use reason. It isn't the degree of knowledge, nor the degree of physical ability, nor the degree of ability in any particular field of endeavor. In that sense, it is almost entirely genetic: a matter of brain functionality. Of course, all human beings have the ability (capacity) to use reason (abstract analysis), which is the "sapien" in Homo Sapien. However, I think it is well-established that it isn't equal in every individual. In the extreme, mental retardation and child prodigies are a consequence of physical characteristics in the brain, not purely qualities of their environment.

In the second case, it is an ability to apply knowledge, which is heavily influenced by environment, culture, and access to information. In this sense, it isn't just an inherent trait or talent, but the environmental opportunity to apply whatever knowledge (even meager) has been gained by instruction and investigation. That might be considered a "community project", but more often than not it's a "family project". Parents who value reason and knowledge will encourage it in their children.

However, the fundamental error in your characterization is contextual. For example, the most intelligent (by IQ tests) group of people in the world are Jewish Germans of the Ashkenazic region. That appears to be a consequence of both inherited diseases (DNA) and the peculiar economic situation of medieval Europe:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_Jewish_intelligence

Whatever the initial causative factors, the "community project" wasn't entirely ethnic, it was also biologic: the most successful Ashkenazi had the most children. So, over many generations, the average intelligence in that population group exceeded worldwide norms (at least, that's the claim). That's fairly straightforward evolutionary selection. The most intelligent were the most successful and the most "prolific" (likely to produce offspring). So, it isn't purely a matter of culture, but a concurrent effect of both evolution and nurture.

I'm going to break this chapter into a third part, to deal with consciousness and sapience.

Next: The Mind-Brain Muddle

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