"Up your game"

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

Mmmm yes ... but there is no software separate from the physical. So it is a worthless analogy. Not meaning to be blunt but that's what it is. A failed and useless analogy is not worth using just because it is 'the only one we have'.

The great majority of what goes in in the brain can be explained in terms of information processing, so the computer analogy is generally adequate. The thing we cannot explain about the brain is that it generates consciousness, the awareness thing we all share. There is no obvious need for it, as the brain is perfectly capable of controlling all other response functions, so why would it generate this awareness thing? As a kind of sideshow? The materialist monist position (which is your position, if you mean what you said above) is exactly that, consciousness is merely an epiphenomenon, meaning it has no function, it is a by product of neural activity.

Piliger wrote: »

But it is useless to study the brain without also studying the complex chemical processes that cause those effects... Yes, But it is also essentially controlled and influenced by the chemical cocktail that we produce. However we don't understand yet how these complex process and feedback loops cause us to develop belief systems, relationships, function in a complex society and environment, become influenced by false beliefs and manage to live with irrational contradictions such as religion.

The chemicals that cause these effects are generated by the brain, not the other way round. There is only one family of chemicals that matter in the brain, neurotransmitters, and these are produced by neurons. Neurons use neurotransmitters to communicate with other neurons, if they want to pass on a signal they squirt one into the synapse between neurons, and if it has the correct ID the message gets transmitted. There are three main types of neurons, and 40 types of neurotransmitters, but all are generated by the neurons.

You simply cannot state "irrational contradictions such as religion", when religion evolved and has been selected within humans for thousands of years, is entirely rational for billions of humans today, and the great majority of humans for thousands of years. Literally every human culture in history has had a religion. The brain that claims that religious belief is irrational is subject to the same fallible human tools as the one being claimed to be irrational.

Piliger wrote: »

Well you have certainly succeeded in moving that one forward ... not.

Then I am all out of ammo on that one.. pop quiz, who said that?

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

It is a valid subject for debate in philosophy, as are myths and legends and fairy tales. But not the realm of reality. A 'truth' is only an apparent truth until it is proven.

Philosophy is the search for truth. Philosophers are well aware of what is myth and legend and fairy tale, their task is to take all knowledge from all sources and try and build a logical model from it.

Piliger wrote: »

In my opinion we are in a very different place, and I also believe that religion stems from our struggle to understand our environment rather than any philosophical wonderings, and it's exploitation as a power tool in power structures. Personally I don't think people ever sat around the fire wondering why we are here and what's it all about.

I agree religion is an attempt to understand our environment, which prior to the scientific method was a subject within philosophy. Science emerged as a subset of philosophy.

We obviously can't get inside their heads, but we can study the artifacts they left behind. Everything they have left behind suggests they did a lot of such thinking. The first extensively documented religion is Hindu, where do you think it came from?

Piliger wrote: »

Are you suggesting that there was no creativity in the stone ages ?

No. Just that we would have stayed there without creativity.

Piliger wrote: »

I don't believe there has been any randomness involved at all. Invention comes from necessity. Cause and effect. The history of human development is litered with massive changes in environment, changes in resource availability etc. These have been and continue to be the drivers of innovation and creativity. Many other species are also creative. Man has used that creativity in 'bursts' when faced with crisis and adversity.

I don't believe it is random either, it just appears random to us. There is literally nothing to support what you say above, other than the statement that organisms are driven to survive by mechanisms that we poorly understand. In modern times, Einstein was under no pressure to discover the general theory of relativity, nor the great majority of innovators. We truly have no cause and effect for genius, it just appears.

Piliger wrote: »

..if that is the case, then where is Islam mired ...... :rolleyes:

Islam is a western religion, and is the second of the two religions I referenced.

smacl

Piliger wrote: »

Nope. Wrong again. Putting a capital letter doesn't make it a proper noun per se. It's just a capital letter. And certainly doesn't change it's meaning.

So which of these applies to capitalising atheist?

smacl

Piliger wrote: »

Invention comes from necessity. Cause and effect. The history of human development is litered with massive changes in environment, changes in resource availability etc. These have been and continue to be the drivers of innovation and creativity. Many other species are also creative.

Invention comes from inventors. Sometimes this is driven by necessity, often not. Look at the many inventions of Leonardo da Vinci for example, many which were purely experimental and/or impractical. I doubt he came up with the viola organista because he had a pressing life or death concert coming up.

Creativity, encompassing the arts, science, literature, mathematics, etc.. is driven by many things. I would suggest that a sense of wonder and a vivid imagination play a larger part than mere necessity.

nozzferrahhtoo

nagirrac wrote: »

Far be it for me to offer advice, but I have always found the target of near zero alcohol consumption to be a false dawn, and have demonstrated this frequently enough to myself to now regard it as fact. If one enjoys alcohol, moderation and avoidance of binge are the key. Easier said than done, but preferable to denying oneself of one of life's great pleasures.

Not sure what the advice is you are offering really. I merely have made the choice that alcohol is not something I want in my life, often or in great quantities. Not sure what "false dawn" even means or how it applies to my choice.

nagirrac wrote: »

Not at all, I am merely disagreeing with you.

If only, but as I pointed out you appear more keen to disagreeing with things I have not actually said or espoused, while avoiding saying much or espousing much of your own. You are disagreeing, for sure, but it does not seem to be with me or much of what I have said.

nagirrac wrote: »

You will of course accuse me of dodging and deflection again

Given that is what you have just done..... of the vast majority of my entire post..... you would be right to expect me to point it out. That was quite a vast quantity of my post you have simply edited out, ignored, dodged and skipped over.

nagirrac wrote: »

You have made several references to metaphysical "woo". Perhaps you can clarify whether you regard all metaphysical enquiry as "woo" or just the specific bits you object to.

The problem with skipping over so much of my post in order to dodge it is that you miss when I clarify things and then you go and ask me to clarify them again.

As I said in the post you clearly just did not bother to read I do not find any "enquiry" to be woo. I am all for enquiry, inquiry, research, study and learning.

It is the unsubstantiated conclusions you bandy about as fact that I consider to be "woo". As I pointed out in the previous post you do not offer substantiated for many of these conclusions but instead point to the fact that research is being conducted.... drop a few names of people doing it..... then run away.

You appear to think research looking for evidence is almost evidence in and of itself. As if the fact research is being conducted AT ALL somehow lends credence to the nonsense you espouse like reincarnation and the like.

nagirrac wrote: »

The question is, in the context of material monism, how can a brain that is damaged produce a cognitive experience so outside normal experience and of such incredible capability

That is: An open question. An interesting one indeed and I too enjoy reading lots of works on people who are learning about the brain by comparing "damaged" versions to "normal version" and by examining the differences between them coming to conclusions about how the brain works.

But as with your spectacular failure to substantiate reincarnation you appear to almost present open questions as if they lend credence to the particular world view you have decided to subscribe to. I simply do not operate that way. When one finds oneself offering open questions as evidence or credence to a pet theory then one has done little but highlight ones own biases and hopes.

It is an interesting open question but the fact remains still that all the evidence we currently have available to us links consciousness wholly and inextricably to the brain. So whatever the answers actually are to your interesting open questions here: We currently have ZERO reason to expect them to lie anywhere BUT in the brain. And not in fantasy magic woo woo land of consciousness somehow existing separate to it.

And putting together any kind of fantasy construct simply to reconcile open questions is not a useful methodology I fear.

For example one of the pet theories out there, and you even seem to err in that direction sometimes in some ways, is that our consciousness has a completely external source. And that consciousness is much "purer" (whatever the hell that is meant to mean) and capable of much more than we know in terms of mental abilities.

The pet theory suggests that our brain acts as a filter for this consciousness.... broadcast from location unknown..... into our body. Almost like when we speak into an analogue phone we use a large vocal spectrum but our voice at the other end sounds different because the broadcast channel and receiver only work on a smaller spectrum and much of the sound is therefore lost.

So the pet theory presumes to answer your little conundrum by saying that when the brain is damaged.... the filter is damaged..... and less of this "pure" and powerful consciousness is filtered and passes through.... therefore conferring increased ability and mental curiosities on the receiver such as the ones you describe.

All very pretty, concise and provides a framework that answers pretty much ALL of your open questions quickly and effectively.

But it remains not just slightly but ENTIRELY unsubstantiated tosh nonsense.

gaynorvader

nagirrac wrote: »

The great majority of what goes in in the brain can be explained in terms of information processing, so the computer analogy is generally adequate. The thing we cannot explain about the brain is that it generates consciousness, the awareness thing we all share. There is no obvious need for it, as the brain is perfectly capable of controlling all other response functions, so why would it generate this awareness thing? As a kind of sideshow? The materialist monist position (which is your position, if you mean what you said above) is exactly that, consciousness is merely an epiphenomenon, meaning it has no function, it is a by product of neural activity.

{...}

Just to be clear from the outset, I am assuming that by conciousness, you mean self-awareness, sentience, much like animals have (not insects/plants as far as we know).

It is an interesting question. In evolutionary terms, an animal is much more likely to pass on its seed if it survives and is much more likely to survive if it puts survival above everything. Plants and certain insects have come at this problem a different way, by either spreading their seed over a large area, using animals as carriers or by creating drones to defend the "seed spreader".

To get into the more complex levels of consciousness we humans have (perhaps shared by a few other animals, it's hard to tell), I believe that arises because of the advantage being able to predict the outcome of a situation gives. If we are encountered with a brand new experience, we can use our "conciousness" to theorise about what is the best way to survive it.

As for how it works, it seems to be a combination of a neural net (something they've more or less mapped in AI programming) and the chemicals sloshing around our brain (our emotions).

I think it's a bit hasty to dismiss our conciousness as mere happen-stance or as an epiphenomenon.

Piliger

I feel it important to say that I acknowledge that we agree on MANY things and tend only to respond to areas where we may have differing views and theories - making it look sometimes as if there is more of an argument than there actually is. That's how I see it anyway.

nagirrac wrote: »

Philosophy is the search for truth. Philosophers are well aware of what is myth and legend and fairy tale, their task is to take all knowledge from all sources and try and build a logical model from it.

Your positive spin on philosophy is only one view. I would differ, coming from a core scientific background.

We obviously can't get inside their heads, but we can study the artifacts they left behind. Everything they have left behind suggests they did a lot of such thinking. The first extensively documented religion is Hindu, where do you think it came from?

This is a valid hypothesis, but in my personal view it is prone to extreme subjectivity. There is a strong tendency to project our current views on neutral evidence. In the timeline of the topic we are discussing, this Hindu thinking came very very recently.

I don't believe it is random either, it just appears random to us. There is literally nothing to support what you say above, other than the statement that organisms are driven to survive by mechanisms that we poorly understand. In modern times, Einstein was under no pressure to discover the general theory of relativity, nor the great majority of innovators. We truly have no cause and effect for genius, it just appears.

There is a big difference between overal population innovation\inventiveness and the occasional appearance of genius. I would suggest that Einstein and Leonardo are examples of the latter and that it is indeed changes in environment, changes in resource availability that drive our overall innovation\inventiveness.

Islam is a western religion, and is the second of the two religions I referenced.

That confuses me as I would have thought that Catholicism has, despite my abhorrence of it, moved on from the middle ages at least somewhat, while Islam is still firmly and comprehensively rooted in those dark dark times....

nagirrac

gaynorvader wrote: »

Just to be clear from the outset, I am assuming that by conciousness, you mean self-awareness, sentience, much like animals have (not insects/plants as far as we know).

For the purpose of this conversation, I would define human consciousness as the broad expanse of human mental experiences. I don't mean it in terms of what an animal experiences, I think it was Thomas Nagle who said that you can't speak about animal consciousness, unless you know there is "something that it is like to be that animal". As far as I am aware only a very limited subset of animals are thought to be self aware, these are our ape relatives, dolphins, and elephants. I think I read somewhere that a few species of birds might also be self aware, crows and magpies. I am somewhat skeptical about testing animals for self awareness, as perhaps the testing in itself is training a behavior that just looks like they are self-aware.. either that or self awareness is common in the animal kingdom, and they look on our testing mirrors with distain.

gaynorvader wrote: »

To get into the more complex levels of consciousness we humans have (perhaps shared by a few other animals, it's hard to tell), I believe that arises because of the advantage being able to predict the outcome of a situation gives. If we are encountered with a brand new experience, we can use our "conciousness" to theorise about what is the best way to survive it.

That sounds plausible. It would seem to make sense that our survival skills, including cognitive functions, evolved or were selected in response to the great variety of environments humans found themselves in as they migrated across the globe. We are pretty unique in that sense in that we have reproduced in every kind of environment, from small island populations where inbreeding must have been at hugely significant levels, to mating with other hominids like Neanderthals. How all this resulted in an organism with the mental capabilities that humans have (and again I mean the full breath of human mental experiences and capabilities) is still quite mysterious.

gaynorvader wrote: »

As for how it works, it seems to be a combination of a neural net (something they've more or less mapped in AI programming) and the chemicals sloshing around our brain (our emotions).

I don't know a whole lot about AI, but have no doubt we will reproduce much of what goes on in animal brains in terms of computational power, pattern recognition, etc. Its the higher levels of human conscious thought that may be elusive, mainly due to the plasticity of the brain. If the brain were totally hardwired during development, you would imagine with future advances in nanotechnology we would be able to copy it. The problem is only some parts of the brain are hardwired, and much of what's involved with higher level learning and conscious experience is extremely plastic. Its this ability to rewire itself based on its environment that will imo remain a huge obstacle to developing a conscious robot, until we are much further along in understanding developmental biology.

gaynorvader wrote: »

I think it's a bit hasty to dismiss our conciousness as mere happen-stance or as an epiphenomenon.

I agree, but many modern neuroscientists say exactly that. There is evidence to support it, like the Libet experiments, although of course we might be interpreting it wrong, and there is much disagreement on the interpretations of the experiments. The basic question is do we have conscious will over our thoughts and actions, and there are arguments on both sides.

nagirrac

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Not sure what the advice is you are offering really. I merely have made the choice that alcohol is not something I want in my life, often or in great quantities. Not sure what "false dawn" even means or how it applies to my choice.

I was referencing alcohol in my life, not yours. A bit of self directed humor is all it was, don't sweat it.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

It is the unsubstantiated conclusions you bandy about as fact that I consider to be "woo". As I pointed out in the previous post you do not offer substantiated for many of these conclusions but instead point to the fact that research is being conducted.... drop a few names of people doing it..... then run away.

You appear to have a challenging time understanding metaphysical enquiry. I have never presented anything on this forum as fact, never once. At best I present a metaphysical theory that mostly combines the work of others into a kind of coherent model. Give me one example where I have claimed something you regard as "woo" to be fact.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

You appear to think research looking for evidence is almost evidence in and of itself. As if the fact research is being conducted AT ALL somehow lends credence to the nonsense you espouse like reincarnation and the like.

Email Sam Harris and ask him if he would agree with you that the concept of reincarnation is nonsense.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

That is: An open question. An interesting one indeed and I too enjoy reading lots of works on people who are learning about the brain by comparing "damaged" versions to "normal version" and by examining the differences between them coming to conclusions about how the brain works.

Except these outliers are the key to understanding the mind-brain problem. There is a reason many neuroscientists exclude these kind of cases, because not alone do they not fit their model, they falsify it. The model of a materialist reductionist theory of mind falls apart completely when faced with anomalies like savants.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

The pet theory suggests that our brain acts as a filter for this consciousness.... broadcast from location unknown..... into our body. Almost like when we speak into an analogue phone we use a large vocal spectrum but our voice at the other end sounds different because the broadcast channel and receiver only work on a smaller spectrum and much of the sound is therefore lost.

All very pretty, concise and provides a framework that answers pretty much ALL of your open questions quickly and effectively.

Could you try reading what I post? You are describing dualism. I have already said I do not subscribe to dualist thinking, so why you feel the need to expound on dualist thinking for a few paragraphs is only known to you.

Let me define the modern neutral monist position for you, as it seems to have escaped you somehow.

The neutral monist model is there is no separate matter and mind, so dualism is false. There is one underlying "substance", and in modern language this is described best as information. Everything we experience, whether mental or what we experience as matter, stems from the same information source.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

But it remains not just slightly but ENTIRELY unsubstantiated tosh nonsense.

As I said earlier, you should really take what Sam Harris says to heart, as I know you value his opinion. If you haven't done the research yourself, or not had the experience yourself, you should really withhold judgment.,

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

I feel it important to say that I acknowledge that we agree on MANY things and tend only to respond to areas where we may have differing views and theories - making it look sometimes as if there is more of an argument than there actually is. That's how I see it anyway.

Agreed, by and large we probably see things the same, but express our views differently. I am as opposed to dogmatic religious belief as most on this forum are, I just think we need to carefully navigate our way through the maze that we find ourselves in.

Piliger wrote: »

Your positive spin on philosophy is only one view. I would differ, coming from a core scientific background.

I come from a scientific background as well, but philosophy and science are different subjects. The unique thing about being human is we can
empirically measure aspects of our surroundings through science, and also ponder existence itself. Science was a branch of philosophy up to a few centuries ago, and while it is absolutely the only means of studying what we can measure, our ability to think creatively should not be underestimated.

Piliger wrote: »

This is a valid hypothesis, but in my personal view it is prone to extreme subjectivity. There is a strong tendency to project our current views on neutral evidence. In the timeline of the topic we are discussing, this Hindu thinking came very very recently.

Everything is subjective though. Hindu is the first documented religion, and documented in great detail. One has to think it reflected what came before it in terms of oral tradition. The history of shamanic religions are well documented by anthropologists, across a multitude of cultures that had no contact.

Piliger wrote: »

There is a big difference between overal population innovation\inventiveness and the occasional appearance of genius. I would suggest that Einstein and Leonardo are examples of the latter and that it is indeed changes in environment, changes in resource availability that drive our overall innovation\inventiveness.

All we have though is the written record, and here the evidence would appear to support that human progress, like much of evolution, proceeds in sudden leaps. Creativity and genius seems to be ubiquitous in nature.

Piliger wrote: »

That confuses me as I would have thought that Catholicism has, despite my abhorrence of it, moved on from the middle ages at least somewhat, while Islam is still firmly and comprehensively rooted in those dark dark times....

I was referring to Christianity and Islam as the two western religions. While it is true that some Protestant churches have modernized, and some have significantly modernized, Catholicism in terms of its hierarchy is still middle ages. Islam to me seems rooted in fear of what our materialist culture could do to them.

nozzferrahhtoo

nagirrac wrote: »

There is no obvious need for it, as the brain is perfectly capable of controlling all other response functions, so why would it generate this awareness thing?

I could think of a few reasons. But one common lay evolution error that is also worth mentioning is the assumption that anything that evolved did so for a good reasons. That there was some requirement or drive. It does not have to be so. Many things are byproducts that simply arise as a consequence of other things having arisen. And when it happens evolution often latches on to it and just rolls with it.

As such the answer to your "Why would it" question could just as easily be "No reason at all."

nagirrac wrote: »

I was referencing alcohol in my life, not yours. A bit of self directed humor is all it was, don't sweat it.

Then good luck in any future struggles you may have on the issue.

nagirrac wrote: »

You appear to have a challenging time understanding metaphysical enquiry.

Not agreeing with things you are saying does not equate to me having trouble understanding them. That is something I have explained to you on quite a number of occasions now yet you still feel compelled to play this card in order to beef up the bolster and hot air in your otherwise vacuous statements.

I understand the subject matter just fine thank you. Which is why I can see, and point out, and explain at great lengths, the massive and glaring holes in your posts.

nagirrac wrote: »

Email Sam Harris and ask him if he would agree with you that the concept of reincarnation is nonsense.

Actually personally and through Atheist Ireland I have had a number of conversations with the man. I will however not put words in his mouth and if he feels compelled to join this thread he is more than welcome to do so.

I am talking with you here, not Sam Harris, so stop deflecting. The concept of reincarnation is nonsense to me because it is not just slightly but ENTIRELY unsubstantiated in any way. Your own flapping attempts to substantiate it came down to nothing but a single embarrassingly awful paper riddled with methodological flaws before you simply dropped the subject and ran away.

Now the best you can do to support it is to essentially tell me to go talk to someone else. If you think there are arguments, from Sam Harris or anyone else, that substantiates the existence of reincarnation then I am all ears. If however the best you can do is name drop people you simply want to pretend agree with you when they likely do not.... then I am not all ears.

nagirrac wrote: »

The model of a materialist reductionist theory of mind falls apart completely when faced with anomalies like savants.

No. It does not. And pretending it does to feed your agenda does not an argument make. Damaged brains act in unpredictable ways. That falsifies nothing. It is merely an open question. "How and Why does brain X do Y?" is a question, and interesting one, one we are researching. But it falsifies absolutely nothing at all. Pretending otherwise is just sheer desperation on your part.

nagirrac wrote: »

Could you try reading what I post?

As I have pointed out numerous times I have read every single post on this thread, including yours, and answered them at length. YOU are the only one here skipping, dodging, ignoring posts around here. Your lack of reading other peoples post has been blatantly demonstrated in glaring errors you have made because of it.

There is a thing called "Projection" which we are aware of in psychiatry. This is where someone with some fault or faults ignore them in themselves but falsely accuse all and sundry around them of having those self same faults. This seems to be the case here. You accuse at random everyone else of engaging in something that really you are the sole participant of.

nagirrac wrote: »

I have already said I do not subscribe to dualist thinking, so why you feel the need to expound on dualist thinking for a few paragraphs is only known to you.

Your error here appears to be in thinking that the world evolves around you. Could you try reading what I post? It was an example. You appear to have trouble with examples so let me explain. I was NOT talking about you or what you believe or what you have written. No. I was talking about the practice IN GENERAL of creating fantasy constructs to explain away open questions and I THEN gave one example of this.

Get it now?

So why you feel the need to rant at my example is only known to you.

nagirrac wrote: »

Let me define the modern neutral monist position for you, as it seems to have escaped you somehow.

Please re-read an earlier paragraph in this post RE: How me not agreeing with you is not the same as things having "escaped me".

nagirrac wrote: »

As I said earlier, you should really take what Sam Harris says to heart, as I know you value his opinion.

Please pocket the Argument from authority as it is totally unimpressive. I do not value anyones opinions. I value them giving their opinion and supporting it. There is no person alive, least of all Sam Harris, that I value and put stock in every single thing that comes out of their mouth. If I value anything Harris or anyone else says, and I do as you have noted, then it is because he has not only said it but explained in compelling detail the substantiation for his claim(s).

So better would be to present the arguments and what you feel supports the argument, rather than simply going back to your earlier highlighted tactic of name dropping.

Piliger

Evolution generally happens for the benefit of survival of the species. It is not at all hard to see advantages in the development of consciousness. It enables a far superior ability to plan in the short and long term; to adapt behaviour on a much more complex and respknsive way to the environment.
It really is the greatest achievemtbof evolution among the higher species on the planet and what enabled humans to conquer every predator and every environment.

nagirrac

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

I could think of a few reasons. But one common lay evolution error that is also worth mentioning is the assumption that anything that evolved did so for a good reasons. That there was some requirement or drive. It does not have to be so. Many things are byproducts that simply arise as a consequence of other things having arisen. And when it happens evolution often latches on to it and just rolls with it.

While it is certainly true that consciousness could have evolved as a byproduct of other adaptive features, the view within science is that consciousness is an adaptive feature i.e. emerged through evolution by natural selection. This is supported by a mountain of evidence, the fact we can look at animals and the levels of conscious behavior they exhibit, but more importantly at the increasingly higher levels of consciousness that homo sapiens has developed over the millions of years since we diverged from our common ancestor, through the study of the fossil record, and artifacts that early man left behind, such as their art. The claim that consciousness evolved as a byproduct of evolution is speculation, and although I have heard it from philosophers, I have never seen this claim based on evidence based science.

Perhaps you can point me to a paper that proposes this, as apparently you have a "non layperson" perspective on evolution, whatever that is, or however you have acquired it. What I have seen proposed is that certain mental attributes, such as belief in God or religion for example, evolved as by products, and while this is plausible, I have never seen any compelling evidence for it either.

In summary, if we assume that consciousness evolved, I would say all the existing scientific evidence points to it evolving through adaption and none to it as a by product. As you value evidence, perhaps you can point to even weak evidence for the byproduct hypothesis.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

As such the answer to your "Why would it" question could just as easily be "No reason at all."

Not in this case. Either consciousness is present in some sense in all living systems, or it emerged at some point along the timeline of life on earth. Now I actually lean towards the former, but at the very least the more we study other life forms, the evidence mounts that certain aspects of what we experience as consciousness also exists in other species. Testing has suggested for example that at least a few non human species are self aware. While we cannot ask a dog what it feels like to be a dog, we can study behavior, language, etc. and learn how much animals have in common with us. Are we to suppose that consciousness, even a very basic animal consciousness, evolved "for no reason" in multiple species that evolved millions of years apart? Seems a bit unlikely, even from a layperson's view of evolution.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Not agreeing with things you are saying does not equate to me having trouble understanding them. That is something I have explained to you on quite a number of occasions now yet you still feel compelled to play this card in order to beef up the bolster and hot air in your otherwise vacuous statements. I understand the subject matter just fine thank you. Which is why I can see, and point out, and explain at great lengths, the massive and glaring holes in your posts.

Then discuss what I am proposing. I have proposed neutral monism as a valid metaphysical position, given what is known and unknown about the universe and our experience of it.

Do you find neutral monism a valid metaphysical position? If you don't want to discuss it that's fine by me, lets stop wasting our respective valuable time.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

I am talking with you here, not Sam Harris, so stop deflecting. The concept of reincarnation is nonsense to me because it is not just slightly but ENTIRELY unsubstantiated in any way. Your own flapping attempts to substantiate it came down to nothing but a single embarrassingly awful paper riddled with methodological flaws before you simply dropped the subject and ran away.

My reference to Sam Harris is not an argument to authority. If it were I would be claiming (incorrectly) that Sam believes in reincarnation so you should consider his opinion. Just so we are clear, the exact quote I directed you to is as follows: "I have not spent any time attempting to authenticate the data put forth in books like Dean Radin's The Conscious Universe or Ian Stevenson's 20 Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation... Still, I find these books interesting and I cannot categorically dismiss their contents in the way that I can dismiss the claims of religious dogmatists".

Sam Harris is not an authority at all on reincarnation, or paranormal research in general, a point he freely makes. If I were appealing to Sam Harris on the topic of reincarnation, it would be an appeal to a non-authority. My point is that Sam has actually read these books, and reaches a neutral position on their claims. It is not an area of research he has undertaken himself, but he is not so arrogant as to dismiss it out of hand. Dismissing claims because they do not fit with your worldview is an all too common human mistake, and I believe this is what Sam is referencing. As for name-dropping, you have brought Sam into plenty of your arguments, so less of the high horse.

As an example of the above, you made the claim earlier that human consciousness could be a by product of evolution and a valid answer to the question why it exists is "no reason at all". Now, given there is no evidence whatsoever to support this view, I could quite easily describe it as nonsense. However, I don't do that as I cannot categorically dismiss this idea. That is seems completely implausible to me does not mean it lacks all credibility.

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

No. It does not. And pretending it does to feed your agenda does not an argument make. Damaged brains act in unpredictable ways. That falsifies nothing. It is merely an open question. "How and Why does brain X do Y?" is a question, and interesting one, one we are researching. But it falsifies absolutely nothing at all. Pretending otherwise is just sheer desperation on your part.

If one believes in, and makes a claim for, a materialist reductionist view of the brain, that all conscious experience and capability stems from brain activity i.e. is causal and not just correlated to, this is falsified by the evidence from savants. Saying it is an "open question" is just a dodge, and evidence of confirmation bias, as in "I will only look at evidence that supports my worldview, and dismiss everything else".

I am ignoring the rest of your post, as once again it is a rant directed at the poster rather than the post.
Hint: Your attempts at psychoanalyzing my "faults" are not welcome.

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

Evolution generally happens for the benefit of survival of the species. It is not at all hard to see advantages in the development of consciousness. It enables a far superior ability to plan in the short and long term; to adapt behaviour on a much more complex and respknsive way to the environment.
It really is the greatest achievemtbof evolution among the higher species on the planet and what enabled humans to conquer every predator and every environment.

All the evidence we have supports this view, and we have no evidence that consciousness emerged as some kind of by product of evolution. It is not a case imo of the majority supporting the adaptive view, and a minority supporting the byproduct view. I have never seen any evidence or reasoned argument for the latter view.

The debate really is whether consciousness evolved at some point in the timeline of living systems, or whether consciousness is a fundamental aspect of all living systems. I would say that modern research increasingly points to the view that at least a primitive awareness is present in all living systems.

smacl

nagirrac wrote: »

If one believes in, and makes a claim for, a materialist reductionist view of the brain, that all conscious experience and capability stems from brain activity i.e. is causal and not just correlated to, this is falsified by the evidence from savants. Saying it is an "open question" is just a dodge, and evidence of confirmation bias, as in "I will only look at evidence that supports my worldview, and dismiss everything else".

Why so? Given we understand neither the capacity of the brain, nor how it operates at any level of detail, how can we tell what it is capable of? If the brain is adaptive and can specialize, how are we able to determine the limits of what a mind that is hosted on a brain are?

My own background includes a substantial amount of algorthmics, which regularly shows that for a given amount of raw computer power, we can improve processing performance in terms of problem solving by orders of magnitude simply by changing how we approach a problem.

How most people approach given problems, e.g. to multiply two numbers together, comes from their education, which is essentially a canon of knowledge which we as a society teach our children as being the right way of solving that problem. I suspect the savant mind uses radically different approaches, e.g. visualising mathematical problems rather than considering them numerically, and as such can achieve results that seem quite incredible. To me it seems reasonable that this is well within the capability of the brain, and doesn't demand any external resources as would conceivably be available from a neutral monist standpoint.

No more or less wonderful, but the material rather than neutral monist position seems more probable to my mind.

nozzferrahhtoo

Piliger wrote: »

Evolution generally happens for the benefit of survival of the species. It is not at all hard to see advantages in the development of consciousness. It enables a far superior ability to plan in the short and long term; to adapt behaviour on a much more complex and respknsive way to the environment.

+ 1. Indeed and it also allows things to be passed on, skills and knowledge, in ways other than simple "instinct" in animals.

The point I would make however is that we are also in danger of putting the cart before the horse. Evolution does not generate things like consciousness because they are advantageous. This would imply foresight, planning, or design which are not attributes of evolution.

Rather what evolution does is latch on to things when they develop of their own accord and selects them. So when someone asks "Why would evolution produce X" they are simply making a lay man error to the subject. There is no reason why ANYTHING in evolution is produced or arises. It just does, and then evolution and Natural Selection either run with it, or destroy it.

Piliger wrote: »

It really is the greatest achievemtbof evolution among the higher species on the planet and what enabled humans to conquer every predator and every environment.

Or at least brought us to the position where we like, in our own hubris, to think we have conquered every predator and every environment. Alas the reality is a little different to that. We are still slaves to, and at the complete mercy of, the single cellular and viral world. We live and exist at their behest and we could easily die at their whim.

I have heard it said that The influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 killed more people than the Great War. The right bacteria or virus at the right time could all but wipe out our species.

We like to think ourselves at the top of the chains, but in reality we are probably on a par with most of the life around us, or even worse, and our survivability is likely a lot more tenuous and delicate than much of that life around us.

nozzferrahhtoo

nagirrac wrote: »

While it is certainly true that consciousness could have evolved as a byproduct of other adaptive features, the view within science is that consciousness is an adaptive feature i.e. emerged through evolution by natural selection.

As I said above things do not really emerge as a result of natural selection, rather they emerge for other reasons and are then selected from by natural selection. Natural selection has no foresight, design or intelligent planning.

So you asking "Why would it" type questions are simply missing the point. The correct question is, when an attribute HAS emerged, why does Natural Selection select for or against it. The question of why it might evolve in the first place misses the point somewhat. It evolved and emerged due to a long and incremental series of steps before it, each of which were likely selected for their own reasons.

In short the purpose of the comment and example is simply to show that leaping instantly to the "Why would this arise" style of questioning is often a mistake. The answer, as I said, could be simply "No reason at all. It just did".

nagirrac wrote: »

The claim that consciousness evolved as a byproduct of evolution is speculation

It was not speculation. It was an example of one of the possibilities that are out there. Once again you appear to have massive difficulty with example used in discourse. I am not sure what this mental block you have with regards examples actually is, but it leads time and time again to me having to take your words out of my mouth as I explain the original intent of the example.

nagirrac wrote: »

What I have seen proposed is that certain mental attributes, such as belief in God or religion for example, evolved as by products, and while this is plausible, I have never seen any compelling evidence for it either.

There are good Natural Selection arguments to be made on the subject indeed. Such as the concept of hyper active agency detection. The argument there is simple enough for any lay person to understand so I will present it to you again. If an entity receives a visual or other stimulus and presumes it to be benign and is wrong, it will end up quite dead. If said entity receives such a stimulus and presumes it to have intent, and is wrong, it will simply end up looking silly.

So Natural Selection by default and by definition is going to select for the survivability of the latter over the former. Very strongly so. As such we have evolved a tendency to see intention and design behind all and sundry around us. Our instinct is to look at everything around us and evaluate its intention towards us, its intent, its designs and plans, its purpose.

So it is quite natural for humans to look at the world and universe around us and ask what it wants, what its intention towards or for us is, and whats its purpose or our purpose is. So it is quite obvious a byproduct of this is going to be a natural tendency towards religious thought or a natural susceptibility to religious memetic infections.

In summary, if we assume that consciousness evolved, I would say all the existing scientific evidence points to it evolving through adaption and none to it as a by product. As you value evidence, perhaps you can point to even weak evidence for the byproduct hypothesis.

nagirrac wrote: »

Then discuss what I am proposing.

I have been discussing what you have been proposing at some length for some time now. As I keep pointing out however you simply have leapt over and entirely dodged/ignored whole posts and whole sections of other posts.

And what I keep pointing out for example is that all the evidence we have links consciousness to the brain. No evidence we have suggests any kind of divide. So when you pop in to a thread with fluff and guff about things that require a divide.... like reincarnation..... you place a massive onus of evidence and substantiation on yourself. And onus which you have met with... well.... nothing at all. Square one waiting for step one is where we sit in this regard.

nagirrac wrote: »

My reference to Sam Harris is not an argument to authority.

Except that it is. And a dodge to boot. Rather than substantiate the claims you make about reincarnation you are simply saying "Go talk to Sam and ask whether he thinks reincarnation happens".

No. I will talk to him in my own time. I am asking YOU not him on this thread for substantiation of these claims. So stop dodging and deflecting by asking me to have the conversation with someone else.

nagirrac wrote: »

My point is that Sam has actually read these books, and reaches a neutral position on their claims.

And it would be a false assumption on your part, were you to make it, that I have not read such books. I am aware of nothing in them which substantiates reincarnation. If you are... by all means point to the parts you feel I missed. I hope they are better than that mockery of a paper you presented me with before.

nagirrac wrote: »

Dismissing claims because they do not fit with your worldview is an all too common human mistake

Thankfully it is not a mistake I am making therefore. I am dismissing the claims because they are ubsubstantiated, much less so by you, not because of any emotional investment you want to pretend I have in a world view.

nagirrac wrote: »

As for name-dropping, you have brought Sam into plenty of your arguments, so less of the high horse.

The only equine fancier here is you. I do not just drop names. I explain what the claims made were and on what basis. This is massively different. You however simply drop names. Reference as prime example an earlier post in this thread not so long back where instead of presenting the data supporting a particular set of claims.... you merely listed the names of people currently involved in research on the subjects. As if simply indicating the existence of research into a claim X is enough to validate or lend credence to claim X.

As such I am not even convinced you know what I mean by my denigration of name dropping.

nagirrac wrote: »

As an example of the above, you made the claim

Again, as explained earlier, no I did not. At all. Once again: Giving an example of one possible conclusion is not the same as subscribing to that conclusion. It is merely an indication of the existence of equally valid conclusions that are potentially out there. Which is what my point was.

You really do seem to have issue with differentiating example from hypothesis. A weakness that in your position I would by quick to try and rectify.

nagirrac wrote: »

If one believes in, and makes a claim for, a materialist reductionist view of the brain, that all conscious experience and capability stems from brain activity i.e. is causal and not just correlated to, this is falsified by the evidence from savants. Saying it is an "open question" is just a dodge

Repetition of your nonsense does not make it not nonsense. Again how and why certain brains perform certain uncommon functions is an open question. That is not a dodge, it is a fact.

The dodge is in you, a common mmodus operandi for you, presenting an open question as if it is evidence. Open questions are not evidence. Much as you like to pretend they are (for example your use of an open question in the reincarnation debate to lend credibility to reincarnation: That being how person X could speak language Y).

We do not know how certain brains are able to perform certain uncommon functions. It is an open question. Our lack of explanation for this does not lend credence to answers you simply want to pull out of thin air to explain it however. You still have to substantiate that idea. Yet you consistently fail/refuse to do so. You appear instead to think that a pretty answer that pleases you merely has to be congruent to what is observed in order to be "job done".

nagirrac wrote: »

I am ignoring the rest of your post

Nothing new there then, huh?

Piliger

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

The point I would make however is that we are also in danger of putting the cart before the horse. Evolution does not generate things like consciousness because they are advantageous. This would imply foresight, planning, or design which are not attributes of evolution.

I agree 100% hence my wording.

The pattern of development of evolutionary characteristics that do benefit a species is very easily 'mistaken' for being a conscious choice by people who do not understand the principles of evolution. Once a positive characteristic does appear, it spreads and is often further developed, over time in such a beneficial way that it 'mimics' conscious choice.

Even in scientific writings and articles, many scientists slip into this mistaken mindset. It is quite shocking how subtly it happens.

Piliger

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

As I said above things do not really emerge as a result of natural selection, rather they emerge for other reasons and are then selected from by natural selection. Natural selection has no foresight, design or intelligent planning.

As you, correctly, consistently seek the use of accurate language I would suggest some 'tweeking' of the language in this part of the discussion.

These characteristics, such as 'consciousness' or longer fingers .. arise, or appear, as a result of purely random mutations or random shuffling of genes and/or the other genetic factors recently discovered and discussed in this thread.

These characteristics then spread as a result of reproduction. Such characteristics can range from extremely negative, through neutral, to extremely positive for the survival of the species and it is this metric that influences whether the new characteristic(s) spread throughout the species and then become the basis for even more selective adaptation. While saying that, it is certain that although we know a lot about this process there are major gaps in our knowledge about how and why such development takes place.

So you asking "Why would it" type questions are simply missing the point. The correct question is, when an attribute HAS emerged, why does Natural Selection select for or against it. The question of why it might evolve in the first place misses the point somewhat. It evolved and emerged due to a long and incremental series of steps before it, each of which were likely selected for their own reasons.

In short the purpose of the comment and example is simply to show that leaping instantly to the "Why would this arise" style of questioning is often a mistake. The answer, as I said, could be simply "No reason at all. It just did"

My unhappiness is with this word 'arise' and it's confusion with the word 'develop'. These characteristics arose purely from chance. They developed and spread based on coplex issues wrt th survival and adaptation of the species.

There are good Natural Selection arguments to be made on the subject [why we seem to have a genetic tendency toward theism] indeed. Such as the concept of hyper active agency detection. The argument there is simple enough for any lay person to understand so I will present it to you again. If an entity receives a visual or other stimulus and presumes it to be benign and is wrong, it will end up quite dead. If said entity receives such a stimulus and presumes it to have intent, and is wrong, it will simply end up looking silly.

So Natural Selection by default and by definition is going to select for the survivability of the latter over the former. Very strongly so. As such we have evolved a tendency to see intention and design behind all and sundry around us. Our instinct is to look at everything around us and evaluate its intention towards us, its intent, its designs and plans, its purpose.

So it is quite natural for humans to look at the world and universe around us and ask what it wants, what its intention towards or for us is, and whats its purpose or our purpose is. So it is quite obvious a byproduct of this is going to be a natural tendency towards religious thought or a natural susceptibility to religious memetic infections.

In summary, if we assume that consciousness evolved, I would say all the existing scientific evidence points to it evolving through adaption and none to it as a by product. As you value evidence, perhaps you can point to even weak evidence for the byproduct hypothesis.

Very well explained. I would just comment that we need to differentiate between physical evidence and logic/argument. Both are extremely important. In this case we cannot claim physical evidence, but argument and logic ... derived from our study of the physical evidence.
I would also echo my earlier slight disagreement in saying that the evidence is that we seek, broadly, 'an agent behind what we observe'. I would be cautious about extending that too far toward the idea of design and why we are here etc.

nagirrac

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

There are good Natural Selection arguments to be made on the subject indeed. Such as the concept of hyper active agency detection. The argument there is simple enough for any lay person to understand so I will present it to you again. If an entity receives a visual or other stimulus and presumes it to be benign and is wrong, it will end up quite dead. If said entity receives such a stimulus and presumes it to have intent, and is wrong, it will simply end up looking silly.

So Natural Selection by default and by definition is going to select for the survivability of the latter over the former. Very strongly so. As such we have evolved a tendency to see intention and design behind all and sundry around us. Our instinct is to look at everything around us and evaluate its intention towards us, its intent, its designs and plans, its purpose.

I have cautioned you in the past regarding the use of this condescending "layperson" reference, but it appears you cannot contain yourself. As of this response, you are going back on ignore, this time permanently.

I am well aware of the concept of Hyper Active Agency Detection, and well aware of the research of Justin Barrett who suggested it. Interestingly, Barrett is a devout Christian who believes God (the Christian God presumably) designed our brains such that we would naturally love him and others, that HAAD among other aspects of the human mind were designed with this is mind. I am not sure even I would use him or his claims as a reference.

The salient point for this conversation is there are two camps of evolutionary psychologists when it comes to religion, one group who suggest religious belief is adaptive and one group suggest it is a by product. As with much of evolutionary psychology the evidence is highly inconclusive with opinions all over the map. As one example, there are hundreds of studies done that link religion to well being and longevity, and this is strong evidence to support the adaptive case (Koenig and Cohen who found that 80% of 100 studies demonstrated a positive link), but it is not hard to find psychologists who disagree that there is such a link.

Based on my study of the phenomena of world religions, I tend to favor the adaptive argument, given how ubiquitous religion is across human cultures. Hard arguments in favor of something like HADD are inappropriate in my opinion, given the tenuous nature of the link to religion and speculative nature of the argument, in particular given the motivations of this particular researcher making the claim.

robindch

nagirrac wrote: »

Seems a bit unlikely, even from a layperson's view of evolution.

nagirrac wrote: »

I have cautioned you in the past regarding the use of this condescending "layperson" reference, but it appears you cannot contain yourself. As of this response, you are going back on ignore, this time permanently..

I can't immediately find any instance of either "lay person" or "layperson" in this thread which I feel is intended in a condescending fashion and, unless I'm missing something, it seems that nozz is simply using a term that you've used yourself to indicate the same thing.

That said, if you feel the term "layperson" is inappropriate, then perhaps posters could use the term "non-professional" or something like that instead?

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

The pattern of development of evolutionary characteristics that do benefit a species is very easily 'mistaken' for being a conscious choice by people who do not understand the principles of evolution. Once a positive characteristic does appear, it spreads and is often further developed, over time in such a beneficial way that it 'mimics' conscious choice.

Even in scientific writings and articles, many scientists slip into this mistaken mindset. It is quite shocking how subtly it happens.

It is a problem simply of language and interpretation imo. Even Dawkins talks about the "appearance" of design. It is simply impossibly to study nature without being overwhelmed by the "appearance" of design, for example how species are adapted to their environment. The important point to remember (and teach) is there is no evidence in the science of evolution for design.

It is also important to distinguish between natural selection as the "driving force" of evolution, and the cellular mechanisms that underlie variation in organisms. Without variation, however it occurs, there would be no evolution as there is nothing to select from. In fact, without the highly intricate shuffling of genes through independent assortment and recombination, we would just have blended inheritance and over time no variation within species at all. The genetic and cellular mechanisms involved in variation are incredibly complex and our knowledge level of these mechanism is still in its infancy. What is unquestionable however is that once a variation appears in a population, if it confers a survival, development or reproductive advantage, over time it will be selected for.

The concept of evolution is quite simple, the mechanisms behind variation within populations are incredibly complex.

nagirrac

robindch wrote: »

I can't immediately find any instance of either "lay person" or "layperson" in this thread which I feel is intended in a condescending fashion and, unless I'm missing something, it seems that nozz is simply using a term that you've used yourself to indicate the same thing.

That said, if you feel the term "layperson" is inappropriate, then perhaps posters could use the term "non-professional" or something like that instead?

I have no problem with the use of the term "layperson" robin, I have a problem when it is directed at me in a condescending manner. For context, nozz has a history of using the term specifically directed at me personally. This is something I have had issues with him on another forum (Christianity), so it is not an isolated incident.

I understand what occurs on another forum is largely irrelevant to moderation here, but just wanted to add context.

robindch

nagirrac wrote: »

I understand what occurs on another forum is largely irrelevant to moderation here, but just wanted to add context.

I haven't seen the posts in the other forum, so I can't comment upon them. If there's an issue there, then I suggest you take it up with the mods over the fence. What's here in A+A really is within forum guidelines.

nagirrac

smacl wrote: »

Why so? Given we understand neither the capacity of the brain, nor how it operates at any level of detail, how can we tell what it is capable of? If the brain is adaptive and can specialize, how are we able to determine the limits of what a mind that is hosted on a brain are?

I would broadly agree with this, but there is a huge distinction between what we know about the brain and what we know about the mind. We can study the brain directly, via third party investigation. There has been tremendous invasive research done on animal brains and to a lesser extent human brains, and modern tools like fMRI and other scanning techniques allow us study brain processes in great detail. Admittedly we are still scratching the surface in many respects, but we know a lot about brain processes, conscious and unconscious.

The problem with the mind is the evidence is almost all based on first person testimony, so its subjective. Much of what is reported in empirical psychological studies is reasonably consistent, in terms of the experiences of being a human, but its these outliers like savants that give us great insight into what is possible.

smacl wrote: »

How most people approach given problems, e.g. to multiply two numbers together, comes from their education, which is essentially a canon of knowledge which we as a society teach our children as being the right way of solving that problem. I suspect the savant mind uses radically different approaches, e.g. visualising mathematical problems rather than considering them numerically, and as such can achieve results that seem quite incredible. To me it seems reasonable that this is well within the capability of the brain, and doesn't demand any external resources as would conceivably be available from a neutral monist standpoint.

Its certainly radical given the speed of the processing involved:)

The neutral monist position does not imply any "external resources". As I explained to nozz, it is not a dualist position, as there is no Descartes like concept of matter as one "substance" and mind being a different "substance". The concept is that there is an underlying fundamental "substance" which has both a matter attribute and a mind attribute. If I were to state categorically what I mean personally by this "mind attribute", I would describe it as information. In the sense (as an analogy) that all fundamental particles in particle physics, with the exception of a photon, contain a mass value and an information value (spin and the oddly named "color charge"). Whether these particles (quarks and electrons in terms of our observed natural universe) are fundamental, or there is something even below them is of course the subject of much research. I am inclined towards the view that the photon is fundamental as its rest mass is zero, unlike anything lese we currently know of, so perhaps everything else we know of as matter comes from interactions between photons.

I agree though the brain is far more complex than we can currently imagine.

smacl wrote: »

No more or less wonderful, but the material rather than neutral monist position seems more probable to my mind.

Intuitively I feel the same way, the materialist monist position "makes sense". The problem though is that "making sense" is a poor predictor of what actually is, for example QM which makes no sense intuitively, compared to classical mechanics that makes perfect sense, but QM appears from all experimental evidence to be the world we live in.

Piliger

nagirrac wrote: »

I have cautioned you in the past regarding the use of this condescending "layperson" reference, but it appears you cannot contain yourself. As of this response, you are going back on ignore, this time permanently.

:rolleyes:

I am well aware of the concept of Hyper Active Agency Detection, and well aware of the research of Justin Barrett who suggested it.

A fiction. He did not suggest it and his theries are crackpot nonsense.

Interestingly, Barrett is a devout Christian who believes God (the Christian God presumably) designed our brains such that we would naturally love him and others, that HAAD among other aspects of the human mind were designed with this is mind. I am not sure even I would use him or his claims as a reference.

Hardly surprising considering the BS he filled his book with.

Piliger

robindch wrote: »

I can't immediately find any instance of either "lay person" or "layperson" in this thread which I feel is intended in a condescending fashion and, unless I'm missing something, it seems that nozz is simply using a term that you've used yourself to indicate the same thing.

That said, if you feel the term "layperson" is inappropriate, then perhaps posters could use the term "non-professional" or something like that instead?

Amateur seems like a very appropriate term, if lay person smacks too much of religion .. :P

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

A fiction. He did not suggest it and his theries are crackpot nonsense. Hardly surprising considering the BS he filled his book with.

Where are you getting that he did not coin the term? The attached article outlines how Barrett defined HAAD, and is in exact alignment with nozz's description. Provide a source if you are claiming he did not coin the term.

Barrett's religious views are another matter entirely.


http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/hyperactive-agency-detection/

Piliger

nagirrac wrote: »

Where are you getting that he did not coin the term? The attached article outlines how Barrett defined HAAD, and is in exact alignment with nozz's description. Provide a source if you are claiming he did not coin the term.

Barrett's religious views are another matter entirely.


http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/hyperactive-agency-detection/

Firstly it's HADD and not HAAD. Barrett coined this particular term but the concept and idea was already a very well established one before he write about it.

And the context in which he wrote about it is also a pile of utter drivel and very different to the concept we discussed above. Did you read what he actually wrote ?

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

Firstly it's HADD and not HAAD. Barrett coined this particular term but the concept and idea was already a very well established one before he write about it.

And the context in which he wrote about it is also a pile of utter drivel and very different to the concept we discussed above. Did you read what he actually wrote ?

The term "hyperactive agency detection" was coined by Barrett, this was the term used by nozz and his description of it is in perfect alignment with Barrett's. Yes, there was similar work done by others, but Barrett coined the term and described it exactly as it has been described above by nozz, in relation to how this proposed theory purports to explain belief in God / religious ideas of humans. As with all the theories people have currently about how religion emerged, it is highly speculative anyway.

What you are arguing against, which is a completely different argument, is where Barrett went in interpreting this theory. It's the distinction between what the science appears to suggest, and Barrett's interpretation of what the science suggests that you seem to have an issue with, which is fair enough.

For the record I don't agree with Barrett on either front.

Piliger

I propose we leave it at that then :-)

smacl

nagirrac wrote: »

I would broadly agree with this, but there is a huge distinction between what we know about the brain and what we know about the mind.... ....The problem with the mind is the evidence is almost all based on first person testimony, so its subjective.

Agreed entirely, which also illustrates that studying the brain is of limited value when studying the mind, which in turn is why we learn so much about the mind via study of subjective experience and behaviour.

Its certainly radical given the speed of the processing involved:)

Smiley face aside, we have no idea how much processing is required to solve any problem until we know how we are solving that problem. The study of complexity in algorithmics is important here, which devotes much time to figuring out how to solve problems much faster with the same processing power. New models, such as quantum algorithms, for approaching certain classes of problem are being developed all the time, and it is a field os study that in many ways is still in its infancy.

The neutral monist position does not imply any "external resources".

External resources was bad use of language on my part, which could be interpreted as dualist. From a monist point of view "shared resources external to the physical brain" would possibly be better. The point being simply that we can't say that what is achieved by the savant mind is unreasonable given the resources of a single human brain without knowing how the mind works and what the limits of the brain as a computational resource are.

Intuitively I feel the same way, the materialist monist position "makes sense". The problem though is that "making sense" is a poor predictor of what actually is, for example QM which makes no sense intuitively, compared to classical mechanics that makes perfect sense, but QM appears from all experimental evidence to be the world we live in.

Which is why it is reasonable to keep an open mind, and accept that our understanding of the physical universe is prone to ongoing change. I'm simply plumping for the position that seems to me most probable at this point in time, accepting this could change radically as our understanding moves forward.

nozzferrahhtoo

Piliger wrote: »

Even in scientific writings and articles, many scientists slip into this mistaken mindset. It is quite shocking how subtly it happens.

Indeed. We are a species so steeped in the ideas of agency and design that are language is also similarly built. It is near impossible for even the most hardened and veteran Evolutionary Scientist to avoid using the linguistics of design, choice, desire and intent when discussing evolution. We speak about how the Genes "want" to get into the next generation and what characteristics are "for". We really are a slave to our language at times, and this in turn has an impact on people that are entirely lay to the subject of Evolution because they then pick up meanings in words that we use that were never intended by their use.

Even if I pedantically pick over my own posts.... and I always aim to re-read and re-edit my posts at least twice before I ever post..... I can still fall prey to this myself as you have noted.

nozzferrahhtoo

nagirrac wrote: »

I have cautioned you in the past regarding the use of this condescending "layperson" reference, but it appears you cannot contain yourself. As of this response, you are going back on ignore, this time permanently.

You are misconstruing the meaning of that sentence.... quite willfully.... in order to pretend to have an excuse to ONCE AGAIN dodge my posts and run away from them. But if you want to pretend I am on ignore when I am not, like you did before, before forgetting I am meant to be on ignore and then replying to me again... then go for it. You really have studied at the philologos school of forum posting.

nagirrac wrote: »

The salient point for this conversation is there are two camps of evolutionary psychologists when it comes to religion, one group who suggest religious belief is adaptive and one group suggest it is a by product.

I personally suggest it to be both. The common cold is the example I used in the past and I use it here again. The Common Cold itself is adaptive. It evolves and adapts. (Yes an over simplification here but pedantry will not add to the basic point of the analogy).

Our ability to contract it however is a by product.

I think the same is true of memetic infection by things like religion. Our susceptibility to the meme is a by product of things like Agency Detection and the Intentional Stance and much more.

But the meme of religion itself is adaptive. It speciates (as we can see in the well over 33,000+ branches of Christianity with variances and often irreconcilable differences. Let alone the different species of religion outside of Christianity), and the most virulent infections kill themselves off (any disease that kills its host too quickly or efficiently will itself die off very quickly. So for example the 10 commandments of god sect who locked themselves and their families in huts and burned themselves to death is likely an infection meme that will not survive selection) and adapts to the environment.

But no amount of adaption in infection will work if we were not susceptible TO that infection. Yet we do not evolve susceptibility to infection. Rather we evolve other things which LEAVE us susceptible to infection. So for that reason I think adapation AND By Product arguments are applicable to the study of religion as a natural phenomenon.

nagirrac wrote: »

but we know a lot about brain processes, conscious and unconscious.

"A lot" is relative however. I too agree we know "a lot" but my feeling is that compared to how much there is yet to learn we do not know "a lot" at all, but very little.

The point I am making however, which you falsely misconstrued as being some kind of appeal to majority, is that while we do not know all that much.... everything we do know links consciousness to the brain. Nothing we do know suggests any kind of divide between the two.

So in that light it remains a mystery to me why you pretend to subscribe to notions that are very much based on assuming such a divide. An assumption upon which you have no basis or justification to make.

Your pet project of reincarnation which you have not substantiated in any way remains the purest and most relevant example of this.

robindch wrote: »

That said, if you feel the term "layperson" is inappropriate, then perhaps posters could use the term "non-professional" or something like that instead?

Perhaps a good way to look at it. But another way to look at this is whether it is wise to attempt to implement a forum wide language change in response to a single users..... possibly contrived and willful and intentionally manufactured.... hypersensitivity to a single word?

I never find the word "layperson" to be insulting or offensive. I am a Layperson in many things. The word definition simply means: "a person without professional or specialized knowledge in a particular subject.".

I am, for example, a layperson in Law and Politics and Irish History. They are three subjects I simply refuse to post about except in the most cursory fashion because I know very little about them. I generally only post on such subjects when people are pretending to have specialised knowledge or training or experience in those subjects when they clearly do not. One of our atheist posters springs to mind as someone who portrays himself as having specialised knowledge on Law when he has anything but.

If someone pointed out my lay status on those subjects I certainly would not pout, tantrum, and put people on ignore. At least not unless I was specifically looking for an excuse to dodge their posts and get away with loss of face.

So while I recognize the good hearted intent behind your suggestion, it likely is as unworkable in reality as it is not actually required.

smacl

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

But no amount of adaption in infection will work if we were not susceptible TO that infection. Yet we do not evolve susceptibility to infection. Rather we evolve other things which LEAVE us susceptible to infection. So for that reason I think adapation AND By Product arguments are applicable to the study of religion as a natural phenomenon.

If that were the case, a disease such as bird flu would not pose a threat to mankind, as we are not currently susceptible to it in its current form and we are unlikely to change to become susceptible to it in its current form. Yet while current strains are still poorly adapted to infect humans, this disease is adapting to infect new hosts such as mammals including humans. An example of a mechanism for how infection can adapt to new hosts is described here.

That said, I think the analogy between biological infection and spread of religion is tenuous, much the same way that just because a social phenomenon may spread virally doesn't imply the phenomenon has other attributes in common with a virus.

nozzferrahhtoo

smacl wrote: »

If that were the case, a disease such as bird flu would not pose a threat to mankind

Nothing I said would indicate that no, I think you have misunderstood something I have said along the way. Unfortunately I am unable to identify what at this time and so can not rectify your error.

smacl wrote: »

That said, I think the analogy between biological infection and spread of religion is tenuous, much the same way that just because a social phenomenon may spread virally doesn't imply the phenomenon has other attributes in common with a virus.

When making an analogy, not all attributes have to be the same to carry the analogy. One is enough. A few is even better. I am not making a 1:1 comparison between viruses and memes, but that does not mean many comparisons can not be made.

After all a virus is little more than a piece of information that commandeers things about us... things that evolved for other reasons but leave us susceptible to infection by such viruses...... to perpetuate itself.

So is religion. It is an unsubstantiated and baseless piece of information that uses things about us..... things that evolved for other reasons such as Agency Detection and the Intentional Stance....... to perpetuate itself. And it adapts and evolves to the environment as changes in that environment that might otherwise destroy it fail to do so due to that adaption.

So many parallels can be drawn. Daniel Dennett goes even further in some talks about other parallels that can be draw, and even further again in his book "Breaking the Spell". I clearly do not have enough space to reproduce all of them here, but the above gives you an idea.

But important to repeat, I am by no means making any kind of 1:1 comparison on all levels. But that does not mean many parallels and analogies can not be drawn. They can, and quite usefully too.

smacl

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

I never find the word "layperson" to be insulting or offensive. I am a Layperson in many things. The word definition simply means: "a person without professional or specialized knowledge in a particular subject."

I wouldn't find the word layperson offensive either, but in the context of an atheist forum where much discussion revolves around religion, I'd tend to think first of someone who is not a member of the clergy. A term such as amateur might be better as it lacks the religious overtones.

smacl

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Nothing I said would indicate that no, I think you have misunderstood something I have said along the way. Unfortunately I am unable to identify what at this time and so can not rectify your error.

Let me help you. You said

no amount of adaption in infection will work if we were not susceptible TO that infection. Yet we do not evolve susceptibility to infection. Rather we evolve other things which LEAVE us susceptible to infection.

This is wrong and infections do in fact adapt to new hosts that were not previously susceptible. I simply used bird flu as an illustrative example of your error, which I think stems from your weak analogy between disease (i.e. the common cold) and religion.

When making an analogy, not all attributes have to be the same to carry the analogy.

No, but the attributes that you use later, such as adaptation of infection, obviously do.

nozzferrahhtoo

Strangely until today I was not even aware the word had religious over tones. I grew up with a great-uncle who had lots of books called "Law for the lay man" and "Calculus for the layman" and so on. He even had a book called "Philisophy for everyman". So throughout my entire life I have used the word "layman" in the context I described above.

I certainly can not see anything in my use of that word that would have anyone think I was using it in the religious context or a religious context. I think my use of it and my meaning using it has been abundantly clear. At least to me. If anyone genuinely is reading my use of it in the religion sense.... I would certainly be agog to hear how they reached that conclusion.

nozzferrahhtoo

smacl wrote: »

This is wrong and infections do in fact adapt to new hosts....

Then you have not "helped me" at all here as the stuff you have put after "do in fact" are the things I am already saying. So you are not correcting anything I have said.... so much as you are simply repeating it.

We do not evolve susceptibility. We evolve other things that leave us susceptible. And Viruses and other infections evolve and adapt to those. So if Bird Flu adapts in such a way as that it can affect a new host then it has adapted to that host, that host has not adapted to it.

That is what I mean, so I still can not find the "error" you appear to imagine I have made.

smacl

Your statement 'no amount of adaption in infection will work if we were not susceptible TO that infection' is clearly wrong. It simply requires the infection to adapt to an alternative susceptibility, which of course it does as you mention in the adaptive nature of the common cold.

nozzferrahhtoo

smacl wrote: »

Your statement 'no amount of adaption in infection will work if we were not susceptible TO that infection' is clearly wrong.

It is not wrong, I think you are just misunderstanding it. But at least now the locus of the failure is clearer and I can better rectify it this time. We appear to be entirely in agreement as the things you are saying are the same things I am, just in a different way. So the whole focus of the break down in communication here is that you think I am saying things I am not.

What I am saying here is that no amount of adaption is going to make a difference if there was nothing to adapt TO. If you have a wall with no hole in it, then it does not matter what shape you have in your hand, or how much you change the shape, there is no hole to fit it through. If there is a hole however, you CAN adapt the shape to fit.

If there was not a susceptibility for the infection to adapt to, then no amount of adaption will allow that infection to infect us. But we HAVE evolved things, genuinely useful things, that infections can adapt to and utilize. For example the reproductive method of our cells has evolved for obvious reasons. Viruses adapt to that and they commandeer it in order to trick the tell into reproducing on the viruses behalf rather than the cell's.

So the core of my point is that we have never evolved a susceptibility to infection directly. We have evolved things for entirely other reasons that have themselves left us susceptible to infection. Similarly I do put stock in the by product theory of religion in that I think entirely unrelated things have evolved and religion as a meme is a prime candidate for infecting that.

So now re-parse the sentence you just quoted through that filter and you will see what I really mean by it. If it helps, and it may, you can drop the last "That" in my sentence. While it will not change my intended meaning in ANY way.... I suspect it might assist in you seeing that intended meaning.

smacl

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

What I am saying here is that no amount of adaption is going to make a difference if there was nothing to adapt TO. If you have a wall with no hole in it, then it does not matter what shape you have in your hand, or how much you change the shape, there is no hole to fit it through. If there is a hole however, you CAN adapt the shape to fit.

If there was not a susceptibility for the infection to adapt to, then no amount of adaption will allow that infection to infect us.

To me that reads more simply as 'if we are impervious to ALL infection, we won't get infected', which is something of a tautology.

So the core of my point is that we have never evolved a susceptibility to infection directly. We have evolved things for entirely other reasons that have themselves left us susceptible to infection.

Seems reasonable. Infections evolve to take advantage of susceptibilities in their hosts.

Similarly I do put stock in the by product theory of religion in that I think entirely unrelated things have evolved and religion as a meme is a prime candidate for infecting that.

I'm not much into memetics outside of reading some Dawkins many years back. As good a theory as any I guess, but IMHO not exactly definitive at this point in time.

nozzferrahhtoo

smacl wrote: »

To me that reads more simply as 'if we are impervious to ALL infection, we won't get infected', which is something of a tautology.

No that would be stating the obvious. I am more showing how things can be a by product and an adaption at the same time. Viruses adapt to the things in us that leave us susceptible to them. However the things that leave us susceptible to them are themselves a byproduct.

The core intent of the point is to explain why I do not come down on EITHER side of the "Religion is an adaption/byproduct" argument. I come down on BOTH sides. Those trying to come down on one side are simply looking at Religion as an attribute of us and not as a distinct thing (meme) in and of itself as well.

roosh wrote: »

I'm not much into memetics outside of reading some Dawkins many years back. As good a theory as any I guess, but IMHO not exactly definitive at this point in time.

It has been extended a lot by a lot of people since he wrote on it. Susan Blackmore and Daniel Dennett have the the more accessible books to the layman who might be interested but who do not want to go trawling the Peer Reviewed Literature on the subject.

Memetics is a useful way to look at things as both attributes of us AND as things in and of themselves too. Language is a good example of this. While clearly a human attribute, languages themselves can be observed to evolve, adapt, modify, speciate and more.

I find it all compelling and interesting. Then again I am just that type of guy :-) I am not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing.

Piliger

No virus or bacteria will 'adapt' to infect us.

Viruses and bacteria undergo random mutations. Some experience more regular or faster changing mutations than others. If a random mutation happens to cause damage to our organs etc then it will 'infect' us. THAT is the sum total of the situation.

This is all about random mutations and nothing else. A bird flu that does not infect us now, does not do so because it's mechanism of duplication and outer shell chemistry does not overlap with any of our human biological functions (there are prob better words for that). But like all viruses it undergoes regular random mutations and it always possible that one of those mutations will randomly match the chemistry of human biological functions of one of our mechanisms.

Humans spending large amounts of time around birds increases the chances of this happening purely because the mutations that occur randomly will, because they will interact with human bodies more often, be tested against our biological functions more often and the chance of a match is heightened.

nagirrac

smacl wrote: »

Agreed entirely, which also illustrates that studying the brain is of limited value when studying the mind, which in turn is why we learn so much about the mind via study of subjective experience and behaviour.

There's a bigger issue here though, which is the conclusions that leading neuroscientists, evolutionary psychologists, and in particular philosophers are coming to based on very tentative correlations between brain states and conscious experience. The "illusion" of consciousness as argued by Dennett and others, and in particular the concept of memes, is in my very humble opinion completely unsubstantiated pseudoscientific babble.

I find it amusingly ironic that some of the shrillest voices railing against the delusions of religion, and scoff at studies into the paranormal, latch onto ideas like memes as if they were established science. They are nothing of the sort, there is about the same level of evidence to support "memes" as there is to support the existence of ghosts. In the words of John Gray "memetic theory is nonsense and comparable with intelligent design in terms of its value to science". But sure if it fits well with a worldview, it must be true, right?

The ideas of Dennett, Blackmore, et. al. are now completely out of date and need to be consigned to the dustbin of history. They are based on a model of a hardwired brain that is essentially completely wired by early childhood, infected with all kinds of cultural "meme" baggage, that result in this illusion we have of consciousness. In this view, humans are just lumbering meat robots, controlled by not just their genes, but these "magical" memes that have no biological foundation whatsoever (where is the DNA code for a meme?).

It is utterly nonsensical to believe in this fairytale, and just as dangerous to society as the most dogmatic religions, as it leads to moronic decision making in areas like education and psychology/psychiatry, where it is now assumed that we are hardwired the way we are from early childhood and infected with "memes", and we need to band aid everything from young children who lack attention or concentration, to teenagers struggling with normal issues that teenagers struggle with, with the latest and greatest pharmaceuticals, very often forming a life long addiction.

When a theory has been falsified it should be abandoned. Neural plasticity falsifies these idiotic ideas of hardwired brains, illusions of consciousness, and being a prisoner to memes. That's why Dennett and others never address this subject, because it doesn't fit with their nonsense. While I have no issue whatsoever with anyone proposing a hypothesis to try and explain what is poorly understood (or not understood at all in the case of consciousness), the problem arises when ideas backed by tentative or in this case no causal experimental data formulate public policy, and are used to enable a drug industry whose primary motivation is profit making.

We are not prisoners of our brains. This has been proven over and over in cases ranging from recovery from stroke, brain injuries, personality disorders, addictions, etc. While there are obvious tragic biologically exceptions due to mutation, by and large everything that is culturally programmed in our DNA like behavior, learning ability, language ability, basically any cognitive function, is completely malleable and responsive to mental training. The potential we have to evolve mental capabilities are essentially unlimited, given we don't know what the boundaries of capability the brain has, if any. This is what we should be focused on as a society, instead of instilling ideas into formative minds that we are lumbering meat robots.

smacl wrote: »

External resources was bad use of language on my part, which could be interpreted as dualist. From a monist point of view "shared resources external to the physical brain" would possibly be better. The point being simply that we can't say that what is achieved by the savant mind is unreasonable given the resources of a single human brain without knowing how the mind works and what the limits of the brain as a computational resource are.

Nothing in neutral monism thought, although admittedly there are many flavors, assumes "external to the brain". The key aspect to the theory is that at the most fundamental level, everything has a physical or "matter" aspect and a mental "informational" aspect (say the mass and spin of subatomic particle as an analogy). In this context there is no "mind separate from brain", there is mind-brain which combines the physical aspects of the staggeringly complex "matter" of not just the brain, but the rest of the biological organism, and the environment it is in contact with, with the equally staggering complexity of information combined in all of this "matter". That in my opinion is how mind emerges, it is a "dance" involving living organisms and their environment.

smacl wrote: »

Which is why it is reasonable to keep an open mind, and accept that our understanding of the physical universe is prone to ongoing change. I'm simply plumping for the position that seems to me most probable at this point in time, accepting this could change radically as our understanding moves forward.

Fully agree. Any metaphysical theory such as material or neutral monism could be completely wrong, and the universe may be something we haven't thought about at all yet. What we shouldn't do though in formulating such theories is making hard statements on what is known or unknown, based on speculation that is claimed to be science. Unless it can be empirically measured and an experimental link made between cause and effect, it simply is not science.

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

No virus or bacteria will 'adapt' to infect us. Viruses and bacteria undergo random mutations. Some experience more regular or faster changing mutations than others. If a random mutation happens to cause damage to our organs etc then it will 'infect' us. THAT is the sum total of the situation.

Except they do all the time, and not just to infect us but to survive in some of the most hostile environments imaginable. They do this though a process called horizontal gene transfer, which has nothing to do with mutation. HGT involves swapping whole sections of DNA from one bacteria to another, without any normal reproduction going on. In that sense it is more like endosymbiosis, as described first by Lynn Margulis, two species of bacteria merging to form a new organism.

Bacteria developing resistance to antibiotics is now thought to be largely due to HGT, which spreads the resistance through a population of bacteria incredibly quickly relative to traditional evolutionary reproductive means.

There is a reason why they have been around for 3.5B years and have survived all kinds of events which have wiped out most of the other life forms on earth. It's because they are highly adaptive and utilize a wide range of cellular mechanisms to change from one phenotypic form to another, and develop resistance to things like extreme temperatures, pressures, chemicals, etc. None of this is meant to imply any of this is designed, but it is absolutely not just due to random mutation.

Piliger wrote: »

Humans spending large amounts of time around birds increases the chances of this happening purely because the mutations that occur randomly will, because they will interact with human bodies more often, be tested against our biological functions more often and the chance of a match is heightened.

This is certainly true, and largely due to poor sanitary practices. The greatest invention to increase human life span was not antibiotics, it was soap.

Piliger

nagirrac wrote: »

Except they do all the time, and not just to infect us but to survive in some of the most hostile environments imaginable. They do this though a process called horizontal gene transfer, which has nothing to do with mutation. HGT involves swapping whole sections of DNA from one bacteria to another, without any normal reproduction going on.

No. The genes you are talking about are genes resulting from random mutations that just happen to have a given effect and then the gene in question is the subject of this HGT.
My post stands ... "No virus or bacteria will 'adapt' to infect us. Viruses and bacteria undergo random mutations. Some experience more regular or faster changing mutations than others. If a random mutation happens to cause damage to our organs etc then it will 'infect' us. THAT is the sum total of the situation."

nagirrac

Piliger wrote: »

THAT is the sum total of the situation.

Whenever someone utters those words, I am reminded of all those that said the same or similar, the fact that we now look back on them as quaint historical curiosities, but forget that we are just as susceptible to overstating our "current" knowledge. Within the genetics field there is an increasingly hot debate around the word "random", as it applies to the mechanisms giving rise to evolution. There is simply no single thing like random mutation that gives rise to genetic diversity.

The consistent thing about scientific enquiry is that nothing ever turns out to be as it seems, but rather we have an innate desire to fall into the potholes of what makes sense to us currently.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23281172

The NIH isn't noted for publishing pseudoscience. This research was published in 2013, and attracted the usual cacophony of noise from the old guard who insist that because "we" decided (based on evidence collected before DNA was even discovered) that all mutations are random, it has thus been written in stone and should never be questioned. Will we ever outgrow this aspect of our arrogant primate nature?

Piliger

nagirrac wrote: »

Whenever someone utters those words, I am reminded of all those that said the same or similar, the fact that we now look back on them as quaint historical curiosities, but forget that we are just as susceptible to overstating our "current" knowledge. Within the genetics field there is an increasingly hot debate around the word "random", as it applies to the mechanisms giving rise to evolution. There is simply no single thing like random mutation that gives rise to genetic diversity.

The consistent thing about scientific enquiry is that nothing ever turns out to be as it seems, but rather we have an innate desire to fall into the potholes of what makes sense to us currently.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23281172

The NIH isn't noted for publishing pseudoscience. This research was published in 2013, and attracted the usual cacophony of noise from the old guard who insist that because "we" decided (based on evidence collected before DNA was even discovered) that all mutations are random, it has thus been written in stone and should never be questioned. Will we ever outgrow this aspect of our arrogant primate nature?

I see you had fun there, with hyper interpretation of what I said. But the link is interesting, and further strengthens the mutation issue