Re: Evolution increases the computational ability of organisms.

Arkalen wrote:
On Sep 21, 5:22 am, dkomo <dkomo...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

r norman wrote:

<snip top for brevity>





There is a lot of argument here over misreadings.

1. I agree that there is a natural tendency of evolutionary systems
(i.e. complex adaptive systems capable of some form of evolution) to
exhibit instances of ever greater complexity with time. That is, the
most complex outliers will fall farther and farther out on the fringe.
2. This tendency for the extremum to grow with time can be considered
a "natural law" or "universal principle".

3. This is no way implies that there is a "directed evolution"
towards complexity. It in no way implies that all or most or the mean
or the median will increase in complexity. It only implies that there
will arise some individuals of greater and greater complexity.

4. In the same natural course of things, those more complex (and
eventually more intelligent) individuals will exert a greater and
greater influence over the entire system and appear to be far more
significant in the scheme of things than might be otherwise expected.

5. In the same natural course of things, those most complex and
intelligent individuals will acquire self-awareness and then believe
themselves to be the be-all and the end-all of all creation, the
purpose for which the entire universe was created so that all
evolution was an inexorable move to produce ..... ME!

This is a plausible hypothesis, but there's nothing new in it. It's SOS
(same old ***). The old paradigm. It's classical, hard core, and
strictly by the book. It's the received view.

I wouldn't call it the "received view". A received view is something
people think intuitively, and I suspect more people intuitively see
teleology in evolution than don't.

I ran across the term "received view" in Sterelny's and Griffith's _Sex and Death: An Introduction to Philosophy of Biology_. In fact they title Chapter 2 of their book as "The Received View of Evolution", and go on to list the current dominant ideas about evolution, as well as challenges to those ideas.

I love the term and have been using it for quite some time. I use it to refer to the dominant set of theories, interpretations and unspoken philosophical assumptions in evolutionary theory. The term has a certain irreverence about it. It uses the word "view", as in outlook, or, to me, model or set of models, emphasizing that the current models in evolution are relative outlooks upon the living world, and not to be clung to with too much reverence, such as what I see in this newsgroup. It also uses the word "received", pointing out that these models are passed on from the older generation of biologists to the younger via classroom teaching and textbooks.

In short, "received view" is a great term IMHO. The following definition brings in the idea of a contrasting view to the dominant one. It's a defintion which is appropos to the discussion in this thread:

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

'A "received view" refers to any worldview that is taken for granted or that is assumed to be true without further criticism by the part of the "receiver" - until he or she manages to "unhide" it, e.g. by getting to know another contrasting worldview.'

As for the fact that it's an old paradigm, that doesn't make it false.
You need a bit more evidence than that to prove your point (or the
point of the person who's views you're relaying).


Living things are dynamical systems. They follow deterministic
trajectories through phase space. They are poised at the edge of chaos,
but they are not themselves chaotic. But evolution theory treats living
entities statistically? Complexity is a diffusion process? Something
doesn't add up. There's too big a gap between these points of view. If
I were you, I'd worry about it.


Molecules also follow deterministic paths but can be treated
statistically in large numbers. I don't see your problem.
Try to imagine how life on Earth would be if Evolution had no
teleological component at all.

Where do you get the idea that a dynamical system has a teleological component in it?

Do you think organisms wouldn't get
more complex over time ? (by which I mean of course, that the most
complex organism at any point in time would tend to be more complex
than the most complex organism at a previous point in time)
Why not ?



--dkomo@xxxxxxxx

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