Does the lack of extra terrestrial communication/contact

[Gibsons]

Originally posted by: Gannon

Originally posted by: Gibsons
The idea of competition is a human construct? Science is also a human construct, right? Does that invalidate science?

Competition is real, as far as we can tell. Is there any evidence it's not real?

Is there any evidence that competition is a coherent concept outside of biology?

Are you serious? Of course. Text Text

Does a ball lose the 'competition' with gravity when it falls to the earth?

Most concepts of competition involve two or more things which, well, compete for some other thing.

Does the sun 'compete' with other stars for matter and energy?

Yes, it can be viewed that way, but other stars are too far away for it to be meaningful.

It's total anthropomorphizing of geometric objects and their interactions,

It's an accurate description of some observed phenoma. You can label it as anthropomorphizing if you like...

we imbue the world with our intents, it doesn't mean the star is actually competing for anything, all it means is that given x amount of matter and energy, the geometry of such matter and energy will be x,y,z over a given period.

Competition doesn't have to involve emotions or self awareness. The sun, though its gravity, competes with other objects of mass for bits of dust and hydrogen or whatever might in between them. The winner is determined by the strength of the competing fields at the location and maybe the momentum of the particle, maybe a few other variables. Who the "winner" is in this competition is completely arbitrary, (and no, the sun isn't "trying" to win the competition), but the competition is there. We can assign the label of winner to the one that most successfully attracts the particle.

Just because humans think of the world in terms of competition, doesn't mean the concept objectively exists outside of human thinking.

We are limited by our language, but you are free to come up with a better word that describes what we see.

Try to represent the concept of competition as a series of points and lines in terms of geometry and it makes no fucking sense, all it means is a given configuration of matter an energy configured and copied itself or it stopped. Human beings can call this competition if they want to but I prefer to call it geometric transformation since although the human/animal/etc, died the matter and energy are still there. All that is gone is a particular geometric configuration of matter.{/q]
To phrase it another way: it's a competition between "geometric configurations" to see which accumulates the most copies of itself.

Paraphrasing Stephen Weinberg: "reality is what you have to account for."
An immortal organism is not something any scientific theory has to account for as it remains unobserved.

Molecules were once unobserved, this doesn't make them any less real scientifically, did electrons not exist 5000 years ago? My point exactly.

Molecules were observed, we just didn't know what they were - same with electrons. There was certainly plenty of evidence that they existed, but it took awhile to interpret that evidence the way we do now, which is hopefully mostly correct.

Evolution might have a hard time explaining an immortal organism, just like thermodynamics might have a problem explaining flubber. But...

It's impossible to prove that something doesn't exist. Therefore, the burden of proof is on those who claim something exists. Immortal organisms would be an example as would the blue unicorn on the dark side of the moon, the flying spaghetti monster - should scientific theory account for these as well?

To look at another problem, gravitons have not been observed yet (afaik), but there's real evidence that they might.

Just because something goes unobserved by 'science' (i.e. human beings given a level of social and cognitive development), doesn't mean anything, humans can't even think straight (and science has lots of evidence that this is the case! and the foundation of science is the human mind, which is ... not very good, so if the minds it sits upon aren't good, we can and should ignore them because science says so! 🙂 )

But the human mind is about all we've got at present. Also your criticism applies just as well to itself (it's a product of a human brain), which renders the argument circular and meaningless... unless you're just saying humans are fallible, but we're always known that.

In any case - gravity, cancer, microRNA and a million other things - are things we know to exist and we don't understand any of them as well as we'd like. I think that's enough to keep us busy for now, we can wait on trying to explain immortal organisms or the invisible blue unicorn on the other side of the moon or flubber until there's at least the slightest bit of evidence or any logical reason at all to believe they actually exist.

Next there are problems with a strict competitive view of evolution, for instance how does evolution describe apoptosis? There are many unanswered questions for a strict 'competitive' view of evolution, it is not the whole story by a long shot.

Probably a lot more sequencing needs to be done to get the whole story, and we might not ever know every exact detail of the historical events.

Biologists always have an escape hatch for data they don't particularly like.

[/quote][/quote]

I don't understand. What's the data I don't particularly like, could you point it out? Please be specific.

For instance we are about to develop the technology to intervene in our own development. The mechanism by which human development occurs (mere genetic recombination) will be altered significantly, i.e. it will no longer be darwinian, since we are consciously able to gut, redesign the molecules themselves and tell them what to do. So the mechanism of evolution can change from a competition to something else entirely by our intervention.

Or, maybe it doesn't.

It does because the MECHANISM changes. The whole of evolutionary theory resides upon the current mechanism, as soon was we intervene, it is no longer the blind mechanism. We're injecting new information into the system and can erase the old information that we inherited.

But you don't know what the nature of changes (if any) in the mechanism might be, and you're then saying, with great certitude, what the effects of those unknown changes will be.

But I'll play along: If people are choosing what genes should or shouldn't be in the next batch of humans, those genes are still competing to be in the next batch. It's a different level or field of competition, but it's still a competition. I predict that the alleles for big boobs will do real well.

A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. (Max Planck, 1920)

Great quote, but certainly not a universal truth.

 

[RideFree]

Apparently, competition exists at all biological levels. Even bacteria can be observed duking it out,
interspecially, that is. 😀😀😀

 

[KrzyGlue]

Originally posted by: Paratus
I think what you guys are looking at is Fermi's paradox

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

The apparent size and age of the universe suggest that many technologically advanced extraterrestrial civilizations ought to exist.
However, this hypothesis seems inconsistent with the lack of observational evidence to support it.

+1

 

[Gannon]

Originally posted by: Gibsons

Originally posted by: Gannon

Is there any evidence that competition is a coherent concept outside of biology?

Are you serious? Of course. Text Text

These all are conceptually empty uses of the term 'competition', they can easily be replaced using more accurate and neutral concepts and are simply referring to oscillating states (think something in a state of flux that finally settles one way or another)

Does a ball lose the 'competition' with gravity when it falls to the earth?

Most concepts of competition involve two or more things which, well, compete for some other thing.

The universe is holistic, so the competition is an illusion of our senses, the 'objects' are not truly seperate.

"Time and space and gravitation have no separate existence from matter. ...
Physical objects are not in space, but these objects are spatially extended. In this way the concept 'empty space' loses its meaning. ... Since the theory of general relativity implies the representation of physical reality by a continuous field, the concept of particles or material points cannot play a fundamental part, ... and can only appear as a limited region in space where the field strength / energy density are particularly high. (Albert Einstein, 1950)"

It's total anthropomorphizing of geometric objects and their interactions,

It's an accurate description of some observed phenoma. You can label it as anthropomorphizing if you like...

It is an anthropomorphizing, i.e. einsteins remark that reality is a continuous. Either reality is all connected, all the time, or it isn't.

Competition doesn't have to involve emotions or self awareness. The sun, though its gravity, competes with other objects of mass for bits of dust and hydrogen or whatever might in between them. The winner is determined by the strength of the competing fields at the location and maybe the momentum of the particle, maybe a few other variables.

Your whole argument is invalid, because it rests on the fallacy that the 'objects' you speak about are seperate.

David bohm: "The notion that all these fragments is separately existent is evidently an illusion, and this illusion cannot do other than lead to endless conflict and confusion. Indeed, the attempt to live according to the notion that the fragments are really separate is, in essence, what has led to the growing series of extremely urgent crises that is confronting us today. Thus, as is now well known, this way of life has brought about pollution, destruction of the balance of nature, over-population, world-wide economic and political disorder and the creation of an overall environment that is neither physically nor mentally healthy for most of the people who live in it. Individually there has developed a widespread feeling of helplessness and despair, in the face of what seems to be an overwhelming mass of disparate social forces, going beyond the control and even the comprehension of the human beings who are caught up in it. (David Bohm, Wholeness and the Implicate Order, 1980)"

In any case - gravity, cancer, microRNA and a million other things - are things we know to exist and we don't understand any of them as well as we'd like.(emphasis mine)

And this is my point, we assume we understand what it is we're looking at and that these 'objects' are seperate, according to physics seperateness is an illusion, many physicists have commented on this.

Einstein: "A human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty? The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which they have obtained liberation from the self. ? We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if humanity is to survive. (Albert Einstein, 1954)"

Biologists always have an escape hatch for data they don't particularly like.

I don't understand. What's the data I don't particularly like, could you point it out? Please be specific.

It's not that you don't understand the data per se, it's that you're trying to force and frame the evidence in a paritcular way with what you were taught. For instance we could frame something like this:

The man is messy and he is lazy becomes "He is an artist of messyness, and a genius of leisure". The way in which we frame data, can seriously affect our interpretation of it.

It is in how one frames the evidence that ends up how we interpret it whether we like it or not. Consider horizontal gene tranfer for instance: "Horizontal gene transfer (HGT), also Lateral gene transfer (LGT), is any process in which an organism incorporates genetic material from another organism without being the offspring of that organism.(emphasis mine)"

Now check out how we can frame horizontal gene transfer:

Bacteria exploit and parasitize other organisms genetic material
Bacteria co-operate and share other organisms genetic material

The framing determines how we view the data in significant ways.

A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. (Max Planck, 1920)

Great quote, but certainly not a universal truth.

It is actually a universal truth, it merely has periodic activity over time (i.e. if what you believe is true it simply means it doesn't apply to you). i.e. "One size doesn't fit all, but it's sure to fit some". We can find many scientists in history that fit the bill and there will be many more into the future, it's merely a matter of time and context.

 

[Gibsons]

Originally posted by: Gannon

Originally posted by: Gibsons

Originally posted by: Gannon

Is there any evidence that competition is a coherent concept outside of biology?

Are you serious? Of course. Text Text

These all are conceptually empty uses of the term 'competition', they can easily be replaced using more accurate and neutral concepts and are simply referring to oscillating states (think something in a state of flux that finally settles one way or another)

It conveys a specific meaning thus it's not empty. Write the authors and editors and tell them they shouldn't use that word because the universe is holistic.

Does a ball lose the 'competition' with gravity when it falls to the earth?

Most concepts of competition involve two or more things which, well, compete for some other thing.

The universe is holistic, so the competition is an illusion of our senses, the 'objects' are not truly seperate.

[/quote][/quote]

It doesn't matter if they're 'truly' separate in this context or not.

"Time and space and gravitation have no separate existence from matter. ...
Physical objects are not in space, but these objects are spatially extended. In this way the concept 'empty space' loses its meaning. ... Since the theory of general relativity implies the representation of physical reality by a continuous field, the concept of particles or material points cannot play a fundamental part, ... and can only appear as a limited region in space where the field strength / energy density are particularly high. (Albert Einstein, 1950)"

I don't see how this is relevant at all. Continuous field or not, connected or not, things within it can be described as competing.

In some reactions, different DNA sequences on the same molecule, in the same reaction, will compete with each other. They are as connected as they could possibly be, but they still compete. That's what the reaction is defined as.

There's a vast difference between competitive and non-competitive inhibition. It's how the reactions are defined and it accurately describes the nature of inhibition.

How should these things be described if we aren't allowed to use the "c word?"

I don't see how anyone could have a problem with it, but you apparently do. I think you'll just have to deal with it if you want to read the literature. Write a letter to the editors of the journals explaining that the universe is holistic if you'd like. Fill us in on any reaction you might get.

It's total anthropomorphizing of geometric objects and their interactions,

It's an accurate description of some observed phenomena. You can label it as anthropomorphizing if you like...

It is an anthropomorphizing, i.e. einsteins remark that reality is a continuous. Either reality is all connected, all the time, or it isn't.

[/quote]
It's accurate and meaningful, regardless of whether the universe is continuous or not. I don't care if you define it as anthropomorphic or not - that doesn't necessarily mean it's right or wrong to use the term.

There's an ongoing debate whether black holes are "hairy" or not. Certainly this would qualify as an anthropomorphic term? But it's an accepted term with specific meaning in this context and so it's used. Here's another set of authors and editors for you to educate.

Competition doesn't have to involve emotions or self awareness. The sun, though its gravity, competes with other objects of mass for bits of dust and hydrogen or whatever might in between them. The winner is determined by the strength of the competing fields at the location and maybe the momentum of the particle, maybe a few other variables.

Your whole argument is invalid, because it rests on the fallacy that the 'objects' you speak about are seperate.

[/quote]
Whether they are connected by space time or quantum fields and are really and truly not separate or not, they can still be described as competing.

David bohm: "The notion that all these fragments is separately existent is evidently an illusion, and this illusion cannot do other than lead to endless conflict and confusion. Indeed, the attempt to live according to the notion that the fragments are really separate is, in essence, what has led to the growing series of extremely urgent crises that is confronting us today. Thus, as is now well known, this way of life has brought about pollution, destruction of the balance of nature, over-population, world-wide economic and political disorder and the creation of an overall environment that is neither physically nor mentally healthy for most of the people who live in it. Individually there has developed a widespread feeling of helplessness and despair, in the face of what seems to be an overwhelming mass of disparate social forces, going beyond the control and even the comprehension of the human beings who are caught up in it. (David Bohm, Wholeness and the Implicate Order, 1980)"

??? That reads like a new age political manifesto. I'm not sure if there's much meaning in the entire quote. But it does acknowledge the existence of conflict, which I think directly implies competition.

In any case - gravity, cancer, microRNA and a million other things - are things we know to exist and we don't understand any of them as well as we'd like.(emphasis mine)

And this is my point, we assume we understand what it is we're looking at and that these 'objects' are seperate, according to physics seperateness is an illusion, many physicists have commented on this.

I thought your point was something about unobserved and unsupported phenomena being the same as unknown explanations.

Two microRNAs might not be separate in the context of the holistic universe, but they aren't the same. They're different and they might even compete with each other. You can say "but the universe is holistic" all you want, we're still looking at molecules in a defined competition; winner determined by homology/affinity and/or copy number or maybe something else. Kludging up the vocabulary with verbiage like "oscillating fluxes of different hybridization states" doesn't help anything or anyone. "Competition" is an accepted, accurate and meaningful way to describe the system. Again, it seems you have a beef with several editorial boards and authors.

Biologists always have an escape hatch for data they don't particularly like.

I don't understand. What's the data I don't particularly like, could you point it out? Please be specific.

It's not that you don't understand the data per se, it's that you're trying to force and frame the evidence in a paritcular way with what you were taught.

What data am I trying to force and frame? Could you point it out? Please be specific.

Now check out how we can frame horizontal gene transfer:

Bacteria exploit and parasitize other organisms genetic material
Bacteria co-operate and share other organisms genetic material

The framing determines how we view the data in significant ways.

I think both interpretations here are misleading, if not outright incorrect.

I've yet to be convinced that interpretations invoking competition are necessarily misleading. Certainly they can be, but not necessarily.

A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. (Max Planck, 1920)

Great quote, but certainly not a universal truth.

It is actually a universal truth, it merely has periodic activity over time (i.e. if what you believe is true it simply means it doesn't apply to you). i.e. "One size doesn't fit all, but it's sure to fit some". We can find many scientists in history that fit the bill and there will be many more into the future, it's merely a matter of time and context.

[/quote]
Planck himself would be an exception, thus demonstrating it's not universal.

He was initially opposed to the idea of light as quanta and objected pretty strenuously. But he was eventually convinced; you could say he uh.... "saw the light."