Comments by Steve Zara

Comment #287029 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 4:20 pm

Comment #287021 by Bonzai

Amazon says "thank you".

Comment #287025 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 4:14 pm

Comment #287016 by Janus

If your goal is to explain reality, you're only allowed to say that something can't be explained when you've reached the fundamental level of reality.

You are just not understanding. Explanation means: to find some principle within the laws at a certain level that gives a reason for behaviour at a higher level.

This is just not the situation with chaotic systems, and it is not the case for cellular automata, and it is not the case for life.

No amount of examining carbon atoms will allow you to explain the evolution the mammalian eye. There simply is not sufficient information there.

That they can't be predicted doesn't mean they can't be explained. Prediction comes before an observation, explanation comes after.

No. Even after you have run the cellular automata systems, you still can't go back to the rules, and from them, get an explanation. All you can do is say "I ran the system and this is what I got".

Think of it like this. Some explanations are short (like the proof of the infinitude of primes), and some are long (like the proof of Fermat's Last Theorem). Some explanations are so long that they are effectively the same as the system they try to explain. When they get to that length, "explanation" and "running the system" become the same thing.

So stop with the "magic" nonsense, OK.

1653. God enough

Comment #287014 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 4:00 pm

Comment #287011 by Bonzai

There is an interesting connection with some of the work of Ian Stewart which shows how what appear to be complex biological structures or behaviours can come from very simple origins combined with certain patterns and symmetry. Examples are ways that animals walk, and patterns of colouration.

1654. God enough

Comment #286996 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 3:25 pm

Janus-

strong emergentism, but ultimately they boil down to the same belief: There's something in reality that is beyond explanation, i.e. that is magical.

What ARE you talking about?

Kauffman isn't saying that things are beyond explanation, just that they are beyond explanation at the smallest scales, where we use physics. There is not the slightest thing controversial about that. As I have pointed out, there are cellular automata systems which cannot be explained in terms of the rules they behave. No amount of staring at the rules will predict the behaviour of the system. You need to run it. That is what Kauffman is saying about biology. To call that "magical" is absurd. Your attempt to smear him as a supernaturalist is bizarre.

1655. God enough

Comment #286984 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 3:03 pm

axelg-

It is all to do with there sometimes being no simpler description of something than the thing itself.

You could predict in advance what the universe would do by running a total universe simulation faster than the universe. But where would you run it? :)

Quantum mechanics add another factor, but even without it we would still have prediction problems, and emergence.

1656. God enough

Comment #286974 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 2:52 pm

Comment #286968 by axelg

1) If its fully deterministic, would that mean that it is predictable in principle, even if it isn't in practice?

2) More generally, if one knew all there is to know about the physical universe, could not one predict exactly what was going to occur in any situation?

I take "predict" to mean "determine before the event". For systems with emergent properties (such as weather) you can't do that in anything but the broadest terms.

1657. God enough

Comment #286973 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 2:49 pm

Comment #286959 by Janus

Sorry, but you are talking nonsense.

You are trying to smear Kauffman as a supernaturalist because he doesn't follow the reductionist "pure faith". This is a good example of what Bonzai is talking about.

1658. God enough

Comment #286946 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 2:27 pm

Caudi-

That was cool - but there's no way to "explain" the behavior or no way to "predict" the behavior?

Either. You can't look at the rules and say at which point the ant's behaviour changes. The only way to predict is to run the thing.

This does not mean it isn't fully deterministic, just not predictable at any level below actually following the thing happening.

Is this anything like Wolfram's "A New Science?" (What ever happened with that anyway?)

I don't think so. Wolfram was claiming an awful lot for cellular automata. His ideas seem to have faded into insignificance.

1659. God enough

Comment #286937 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 2:21 pm

Comment #286933 by beelzebub

What he means by "lawless" is perfectly clear. It is that Natural Selection has few constraints and no direction.

Comment #286934 by Bonzai

*more applause*

1660. God enough

Comment #286927 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 2:10 pm

Comment #286924 by Caudimordax

Emergence is very common. Do a Google search for "Langston's Ant". It is a cellular automata system that has behaviour that can only be "predicted" by running the simulation. There is no way to explain the behaviour using the underlying rules.

1661. God enough

Comment #286919 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:59 pm

Comment #286916 by Bonzai

*applause*

1662. God enough

Comment #286913 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:45 pm

Comment #286911 by beanson

He is a physicalist. He is certainly not implying that the mind is anything other than the brain. He is going along with Roger Penrose, and bringing in quantum stuff. It is wrong, but nothing non-physical about what he is talking about.

1663. God enough

Comment #286912 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:42 pm

Comment #286908 by decius

I think "LOL" is the appropriate response here.

Considering his age, Kauffman is probably a McCain-style maverick.

1664. God enough

Comment #286910 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:40 pm

Comment #286900 by Elemental79

Maybe I just have an unrealistic expectation of how people should be clear when treading into the realm of meaning and value when discussing science.

Perhaps :) Not everyone can be Dawkins, though.

1665. God enough

Comment #286902 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:35 pm

Comment #286899 by Bonzai

Thanks. I find the "piling on" to someone with unconventional view rather unseemly. This guy is a hard rationalist, but just a rather naive attitude to attracting the religious.

Anyone who has played with cellular automata or chaotic systems will know that his ideas of emergence are not wild at all.

1666. God enough

Comment #286893 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:20 pm

Comment #286890 by decius

Isn't your demand somewhat hyper-reductionist?

Yes.

Not that I disagree entirely with what you say, but I cringe whenever someone uses the word "sacred" in a naturalistic context, as Kaufmann does, no matter how diluted

Me too.

What I am doing here is trying to explain Kauffman's view, not my own. I find the accusations of supernaturalism and dualism a bit strange.

I think Kauffman's views on evolution are useful because they give us a different perspective. I am not sure they are right.

1667. God enough

Comment #286891 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:17 pm

Comment #286888 by beanson

Yes. I agree he is. But that does not mean he is a supernaturalist.

1668. God enough

Comment #286889 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:16 pm

Comment #286887 by phil rimmer

It sounds to me like a sort of wishful thinking. A bit like me attempting to redefine vegetarianism so I can eat fish.

1669. God enough

Comment #286886 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:14 pm

Comment #286880 by decius

But organic chemistry, biochemistry and neurochemistry do a good job at it, don't they?

Not really, no. They can explain how a dinosaur "works", but none of them will help you predict that evolution will give you dinosaurs.

Comment #286882 by Border Collie

I completely agree. I think Kauffman is mistaken in his attempt to redefine "God".

1670. God enough

Comment #286883 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:12 pm

Comment #286879 by beanson

Baiting? I think it is called "disagreeing with the approach of". That is supposed to be part of rational debate. There is no need to try and press the "troll" button for Kauffman.

1671. God enough

Comment #286877 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:08 pm

Comment #286875 by beanson

Fine, be annoyed. But don't make stuff up, such as implying that Kauffman has any supernatural beliefs.

1672. God enough

Comment #286874 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:04 pm

Comment #286872 by beanson

Oh- he's just stipulated that by fiat. Thanks mate, I guess we can all go home now, it means theres a god or like something else out there man

No, it doesn't.

All it means is that you can get intent, agency and meaning once you get brains.

1673. God enough

Comment #286873 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 1:02 pm

Comment #286868 by Elemental79

Do you interpret this to mean our understanding of physics is inadequate to predict evolution

I would express this as "our understanding of physics is inadequence to predict the course of evolution.

This does not mean that you need anything more than physics in our universe. It just means that the only way to predict the course of evolution is to let the universe run and see what happens. There is nothing in the equations of physics that can be used to predict, say, dinosaurs.

1674. God enough

Comment #286869 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:59 pm

Comment #286866 by j.mills

I agree.

1675. God enough

Comment #286863 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:56 pm

Comment #286861 by j.mills

I don't know if aquilcaine's right, but our brains aren't intended.

Kauffman isn't saying that. What he is saying is that once brains appear, you have the possibility of intent - our thinking!

1676. God enough

Comment #286862 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:55 pm

Comment #286859 by beanson

Is this man saying anything other than 'the universe is awe-inspiring'? if he isn't then I'm happy to agree with him.

Indeed. I have followed what he has been saying for a while now. He is not saying anything more than that.

What is (clumsily, I think) saying is that if we label our awe and amazement about the universe as "sacred" then scientific rationalism can be a substitute for religion for those who need that kind of thing.

1677. God enough

Comment #286855 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:47 pm

Comment #286854 by aquilacane

What chaos? Our brains aren't chaotic. They are ordered, and have agency.

1678. God enough

Comment #286852 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:39 pm

Comment #286849 by Not the Messiah

I still find his concept of "agency" as a significant force which can't be explained by physical interactions at a lower level to be a problem, considering the progress in neuroscience and related fields

The problem is with the term "explained by".

What happens at all levels is fully determined by physical interactions. But that does not help us explain what is going on. You do get agency when you you examine what does on in our brains neural networks, but it makes no sense at lower levels.

There is a huge difference between "is a result of" and "is explained by".

We see this kind of difference of levels in physics. Collections of atoms have properties like entropy and temperature, but what is the temperature of an individual atom?

What Kauffman is suggesting is that there are emergent principles in biology above the level of natural selection: the evolutionary equivalents of entropy and temperature, where natural selection is equivalent to the interaction between atoms.

This is an exciting idea, I think.

Where he falls down is regarding his poor understanding of the philosophy of consciousness.

1679. God enough

Comment #286850 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:35 pm

Comment #286846 by Elemental79

I hate statements worded like this. It makes the person writing it look insane. I wonder how he knows this with such certainty.

It is a perfectly respectable statement. So, call me insane if you like.

No amount of examining the Schrodinger Wave Equation or Newtonian Mechanics will allow you to predict what happens at the level of biological systems.

1680. God enough

Comment #286848 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:33 pm

Comment #286776 by Caudimordax

Kauffman is right to say there is consciousness in the universe. Ours!

1681. God enough

Comment #286841 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:17 pm

Comment #286839 by Not the Messiah

It makes it sound like he's arguing against materialism, and saying that there's some kind of supernatural force of purpose underlying the universe, manifested most clearly in human consciousness.

No, he certainly isn't arguing that.

1682. God enough

Comment #286838 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 12:10 pm

Comment #286828 by Janus

Kauffman is not a supernaturalist, and his ideas are thoroughly scientific. What he is suggesting is that there are emergent properties in complex systems (life included) that cannot be explained at a lower level, even these properties are fully determined by interactions at that lower level. There is nothing wrong with that idea at all. Kauffman suggests that there are are principles regarding the evolution of life in addition to natural selection, and that features such as eyes or wings or brains will always appear in certain circumstance. His scientific ideas are exciting, even though I find his attempts to re-label "sacred" to cover purely rational principles seems a bit naive to me.

1683. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286680 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 6:26 am

Comment #286676 by decius

The "supernatural" is not a coherent concept. It makes no sense to say that something is like or, or not like it.

"Supernatural" is just a term created by religious people to put something forever beyond any rules that we discover.

1684. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286671 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 5:58 am

Comment #286668 by decius

If some being attempts to demonstrate lack of conservation of energy, how would you know you weren't being fooled?

Just think about the capabilities of a Derren Brown from a million years in the future.

1685. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286661 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 5:44 am

Comment #286651 by decius

I don't see how there can be a test for theistic supernaturalism, as the concept doesn't make sense.

There is nothing that we observe that can lead us to it. Even prayer-answering could be explained by us being in a simulation.

1686. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286647 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 5:12 am

Comment #286645 by Tyler Durden

Can you think of a hypothetical example that, if were presented to you, would cause you to either believe in the existence of "God", or seriously entertain the possibility that "God" exists? Not Einstein's use of "God", but any of the other 1,950 known to humanity.

No, not for me. I don't believe the supernatural is even the kind of think that can exist.

A question that could be asked of the theists is... is there anything that they label as an act of god (even including universe creation) that could not be performed by a sufficiently advanced civilization. I say there isn't.

1687. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286644 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 5:07 am

Comment #286642 by paulb

Coward. You come here and sneer at things you don't understand then run away when confronted.

Comment #286643 by decius

It was a little touch of self-parody. I was thinking far, far worse.

1688. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286641 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 5:04 am

Comment #286636 by Philip1978

Apologies Philip, but you must admit it is a bit irritating for someone to make vague and condescending accusations like that the Bling Watchmaker "leaves much to be desired in its assumptions and prejudices.". I mean, what a plonker.

And as for wanting to reject all philosophy of the past 700 years.... that is ludicrous. However, I can understand why. It is rejecting the Enlightenment.

The combination of deliberate ignorance and arrogance definitely deserves the "twit" label, I think.

1689. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286635 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 4:54 am

paulb-

Actually, I don't think much useful philosophy has been learned since the 13th century.

Then there is little to say except you are a complete twit.

1690. Interview with John Lennox

Comment #286633 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 4:51 am

Comment #286625 by paulb

What exactly about our clear rebuttals of teleological arguments don't you understand?

It really is simple. If you understand that structures with order like snowflakes don't need to be hand-made, then neither do universes. This was explaned by Hume long before Darwin.

Once you have been shown one example of order appearing without a creator, you are in no position to invoke a creator if you see other examples of structure and order.

There is nothing more to it than than, no matter how much some theologians try and dress things up.

So what about this eludes you?

Do you not believe that order can appear spontaneously (as in the snowflake)?
Do you not accept that a creator's mind must be complex?
Do you not accept the fundamentals of propability which mean that we should choose simple explanations rather than very complex ones?

Which of these do you reject?

1691. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286616 by Steve Zara on November 19, 2008 at 4:13 am

Comment #286613 by flying goose

‘Placebo effect’ often is used in a dismissive way, but shouldn’t we be researching how its effect might be harnessed? Or would that be disadvantageous to the drug companies who fund a lot of research?

The Placebo effect has been the subject of considerable research for decades.

1692. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286418 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:45 pm

Comment #286417 by Titania

I wish I knew more languages. I can just about get by in French, a language I love.

1693. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286411 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:40 pm

Puedo utilizar el babelfish

1694. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286402 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:35 pm

Tengo gusto de las sandalias y de los pescados

1695. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286385 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:13 pm

Comment #286379 by NMcC

Where you only kidding about being a vegetarian, except for the ducks and chickens and fish?

Unfortunately not. Hey, consistency is for wimps.

1696. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286383 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:11 pm

Comment #286380 by Goldy

Hmmm, am I then as evil as Brian? :-D

No. Somehow, I feel that Brian both wishes, and deserves to be, the Most High Evil of this site.

1697. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286381 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:09 pm

Comment #286378 by Brian English

Flipping heck. Is that yet another book I am going to have to buy as a result of this site?

1698. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286376 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:06 pm

Comment #286373 by Brian English

I must be evil.

Please define "evil". Or are you using terms that are meaningless?

1699. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286371 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:04 pm

Comment #286366 by Goldy

Thanks mate. I had wondered when I should attempt pure vegetarianism. The recent discovery of a parasitic worm in some smoked fish steaks nearly did it, however you have truly inspired me.

1700. Puncturing the Acupuncture Myth

Comment #286365 by Steve Zara on November 18, 2008 at 2:00 pm

Comment #286360 by Frankus1122

It sounded more convincing than "they are both next to each other on Chinese Take-Away menus"

Comment #286363 by Laurie Fraser

Yes, Laurie, you are right. I apologise. I did not want to seem like I was just promoting one brand. I have never come across a Linda McCartney vegetarian product I have not found somewhere between vaguely tolerable and awful.