More bad news for the Religion Haters

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: shira

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
s: Surely you don't believe human evolution has ceased.

M: I think it a widely held belief that human evolution is at an end because we can now direct our own destiny and adapt our environment to us, but I believe that evolution is still happening and recent scientific theories support this.

So I don't really know the level of sophistication of your question.

The highest conceivable level of sophistication, of course.

You know, I assume, that evolution is presumed to work only on isolated pocket populations and not in large groups like humans now live in because all recessive changes to the gene pool will not find great difficulty of expression there. This is another reason to think that modern people are not undergoing evolution.

Additionally, if you are arguing that religion may once have had advantage and does not now, I really don't know. But it is not the religion that is important in my mind, it is the cooperative spirit it confers were I see the adaptive advantage.

Yes, I think the tendency toward religion is becoming increasingly UN-beneficial as we become more and more technological. Witness the major schisms on evolution and cosmology between the religious and scientific communities. At some point, science may dictate one major direction for humanity to follow, whereas religion may dictate a different direction. That could lead to a very, very large "stress" that induces natural selection.

As to your last point: I believe cooperation is a product of perceived shared goals. That might be a common religious goal, or it could be something else. That is, I don't see the human tendency toward religious belief as being the genesis of the human cooperative spirit.

To what then would you attribute it?

 

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: eskimospy

Originally posted by: shira

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
s: Surely you don't believe human evolution has ceased.

M: I think it a widely held belief that human evolution is at an end because we can now direct our own destiny and adapt our environment to us, but I believe that evolution is still happening and recent scientific theories support this.

So I don't really know the level of sophistication of your question.

The highest conceivable level of sophistication, of course.

You know, I assume, that evolution is presumed to work only on isolated pocket populations and not in large groups like humans now live in because all recessive changes to the gene pool will not find great difficulty of expression there. This is another reason to think that modern people are not undergoing evolution.

Additionally, if you are arguing that religion may once have had advantage and does not now, I really don't know. But it is not the religion that is important in my mind, it is the cooperative spirit it confers were I see the adaptive advantage.

Yes, I think the tendency toward religion is becoming increasingly UN-beneficial as we become more and more technological. Witness the major schisms on evolution and cosmology between the religious and scientific communities. At some point, science may dictate one major direction for humanity to follow, whereas religion may dictate a different direction. That could lead to a very, very large "stress" that induces natural selection.

As to your last point: I believe cooperation is a product of perceived shared goals. That might be a common religious goal, or it could be something else. That is, I don't see the human tendency toward religious belief as being the genesis of the human cooperative spirit.

It definitely isn't the genesis of human cooperation. Altruism and the cooperative spirit are seen in quite a few animals such as vampire bats. (I presume they are not particularly religious) I don't think he was mentioning religion as the root or sole cause though, just A cause.

Right, the idea as I recall without checking back was that a capacity for belief without proof, the basis of religions, creates cooperation which is adaptive.

 

[LunarRay]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam

Originally posted by: LunarRay
Would the ultimate, final journey of evolution be Pure Consciousness. An entity of zero rest mass?

Some think the universe is a computational devise. Others think it is a dream of God in which He discovers who He is via reflection. These needn't be mutually exclusive I think.

I think we all would agree that the concept of God necessitates the acceptance of one set of criteria that would express itself as Pure Consciousness. But, I'm not really going in that direction, atm.
I'm tickled by the notion that we can program our genetic contribution to reflect our vision of need or desire or belief. IOW, an entity that does evolve solely for an intended purpose(s).
What got me started is the notion that we accept instinct. And, it evolves, adapts to its environment. It is not random or just alive and doing stuff. It has reason and purpose.

It seems that experience can change gene expression. The number of genes and probably where they are located can alter protein production and all that can be altered by learning and the related environment. A change in the environment can change what the gene does in future generations. So again that seems to suggest that evolution seeks to do something. Something more than to provide the next generation with what ever the cat drug in.

I'm trying to figure out just why the same mind and body in the same environment split into two or more distinctly different entities.

 

[Moonbeam]

LR: You'd agree that all things are made of the same things... simple electrons and neutrons and protons.

M: Yes I think so, and phlogiston, of course.

LR: You'd agree that there is no difference between the bark of a tree and the skin of a human except the two are configured differently.

M: Well, they seem to have a common functionality, I guess.


LR: How they are configured is how the instructions tell each how to use the basic stuff to end up with skin and bark, You'd agree, right?

M: I think so.

LR: Would You say that a tree could pass on its instructions and so on until a totally different form is developed. Adaptation perhaps. Are trees different in their process than humans? Is a tree is a tree is a tree and IF conditions warrant trees will simply become extinct? Are they just like Humans in that regard?

M: I think so if I get this right.

LR: Could a human using that process create over time a fish? Could we devolve if devolving was survival of the fittest? Would we do that?

M: No I do not think so. There is no going back. We could become something that was functionally a fish but it would be entirely different genetically.

LR: What is the mechanism used by human to encode their contribution DNA to reflect change or is it simply error all be it maybe error with purpose?

M: Not sure I understand this. What we encode is half our chromosomes in a germ cell in one of two kinds. It's called miosis as I recall. Errors accumulate in a few different ways. Ones that confer survivability tend to accumulate.

LR: Do trees use the same enzyme process to combine and organize the proteins that form the DNA as humans?

M: I think so, via RNA as you are about to get to

LR: And, does a tree have RNA and is it single stranded and transcribed from DNA and does the RNA in part determine which genes are expressed in both tree and human?

M: I think sort of. I think RNA is designed to read a portion of the DNA, a specific portion.

LR: IF I knew where on each the bits to make hands and branches existed could I end up with an Oak Tree that yields an acorn with different DNA and that DNA creates hands instead of branches on the Tree it creates?

M: Possibly if you were to transfer the genes for arm making from an organism that had arms and work out all the metabolic processes that would be required of an oak to sustain them, an order of complexity I don't think we will see any time soon.

The oak does not have the genetic information to make arms even if arms would survive grafted to wood.

It is not just a matter of what genes get read, but what genes there are present that can be read I think.

 

[LunarRay]

LR: What is the mechanism used by human to encode their contribution DNA to reflect change or is it simply error all be it maybe error with purpose?

M: Not sure I understand this. What we encode is half our chromosomes in a germ cell in one of two kinds. It's called miosis as I recall. Errors accumulate in a few different ways. Ones that confer survivability tend to accumulate.

So you'd say the chance of a mutated DNA in many made daily is remote but those that do mutate know it and also they or something knows they mutated and if they confer survivability and they know that they tend to accumulate by direction.
That would mean, I guess, that the probability of evolution occurring IS NOT as remote as a particular grain of sand finding its way into a particular oyster. It is as intended and the grain of sand meanders on over to its host oyster. ?

It seems to me that we can program our DNA contribution to effect change. Minor perhaps but a reasoned one. I think there is an understanding going on that enables changes related to the the changes in the environment and the expected requirement. But, not only the environment but anything that requires change to adapt.

 

[Moonbeam]

You are two posts ahead of me so let me start with the first

LR: I think we all would agree that the concept of God necessitates the acceptance of one set of criteria that would express itself as Pure Consciousness. But, I'm not really going in that direction, atm.

M: OK, no comment then

LR: I'm tickled by the notion that we can program our genetic contribution to reflect our vision of need or desire or belief. IOW, an entity that does evolve solely for an intended purpose(s).
What got me started is the notion that we accept instinct. And, it evolves, adapts to its environment. It is not random or just alive and doing stuff. It has reason and purpose.

M: I don't understand this. I don't know that we can program our genetic contribution. I don't understand how instinct is alive or if that is what you are saying. Not sure what you mean here.

LR: It seems that experience can change gene expression. The number of genes and probably where they are located can alter protein production and all that can be altered by learning and the related environment. A change in the environment can change what the gene does in future generations. So again that seems to suggest that evolution seeks to do something. Something more than to provide the next generation with what ever the cat drug in.

M: That is not my understanding of things, but I think I have heard rumors of that kind of theory. I am skeptical.

LR: I'm trying to figure out just why the same mind and body in the same environment split into two or more distinctly different entities.

M: An interesting question but I don't see what you said just before so I don't see any relevance between them.

 

[Moonbeam]

LR: So you'd say the chance of a mutated DNA in many made daily is remote but those that do mutate know it and also they or something knows they mutated and if they confer survivability and they know that they tend to accumulate by direction.

M: I don't follow this. I don't know of anything knowing of a mutation.


LR: That would mean, I guess, that the probability of evolution occurring IS NOT as remote as a particular grain of sand finding its way into a particular oyster. It is as intended and the grain of sand meanders on over to its host oyster. ?

M: Evolution occurs, as I see it, when a population with genetic variability undergoes selective pressure.

LR: It seems to me that we can program our DNA contribution to effect change. Minor perhaps but a reasoned one. I think there is an understanding going on that enables changes related to the the changes in the environment and the expected requirement. But, not only the environment but anything that requires change to adapt.

M: I don't know about such understanding.

 

[ericlp]

Originally posted by: miketheidiot

Originally posted by: Fenixgoon

Originally posted by: irishScott
I have no problem with religion, I have huge issues with "stupid".

</thread>

usually it's just the hardcore religious people who are the crazies. 99.999% of religious people are perfectly normal.

i would say about 80%, but w/e

YMMV... I figured it was 60%... But, what do I know?

As for religion hating... I don't hate religion. I actually like it, I just don't study one group but all religions as a whole. I could really care less what they think.

 

[gingermeggs]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
Evolution We All Live in Darwin's World by Karen Wright

"A given religion adapts its members to their local environment, enabling them to achieve by collective action what they cannot achieve alone or even together in the absence of religion,? Wilson writes. ?The primary benefits of religion take place in this world, not the next.? The religious emphasis on otherworldly beliefs evolved, Wilson says, because supernatural explanations seem to motivate human cooperation better than factual ones. From an evolutionary perspective, it does not matter what you believe in, as long as that belief works to give you a selective advantage.

Harnessed to a supernatural dimension, the belief in evolution could itself evolve into a kind of religion. Witness the case of one Michael Dowd, an itinerant minister who calls himself an ?evolutionary evangelist? and preaches the ?holy trajectory? of evolution. ?I thank God for the entire 14-billion-year epic of cosmic, biological, and human emergence,? he notes on his Web site. ?Ironically, evolution gives us a more intimate and personal relationship with God because God is no longer far off, unnatural, and impotent. And it gives us a way of thinking about religion that helps us understand how and why religions are different, and how we can cooperate across ethnic and religious differences to cocreate a thriving world together. Both of these are, to my mind, really Good News.?

In imbuing science with a sense of personal meaning, Dowd resembles Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the Jesuit priest and paleontologist who envisioned humankind and the universe evolving in the direction of a divine, infinitely complex consciousness he called the Omega Point. But the two remain an extremely rare breed: devout believers in science whose teleological claims flout the rigors of scientific verification. Unlike Dowd and Teilhard de Chardin, Wilson espouses a strictly secular enthusiasm. However much they may disagree about the ends, though, these very different Darwinian thinkers agree on the means.

?Organisms evolve, and at the end of the day, we are organisms,? Wilson says. ?You just can?t deny that.?
=============================

Interesting, isn't it, that the one thing the Right really has right is the survival value of religion. No wonder they are going crazy with the secular and and perhaps increasingly anti-religious left. The left is out to make us less fit to survive. That doesn't seem like a good idea to me.

sorry bigtime*fail* this is not news' it's hogwash!
This has already be covered by the scientist george price- its called price's equation and its a mathematical formula for behavioral altruism/self sacrificing in a gene pool (like Jee'zeus's behavior). And it shows why and how humans now live in complex civilizations. Good news is the best is yet to come from human genes.

Moonie! check out George Price-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_equation- the latter part of his life is tragic, also proving genius is close to madness.
Darwin's tree maybe the tree of knowledge! lol
But some have a hard time getting their head around the fact they evolved from primordial slime.
You don't need a stone church or the subjugation of institutionalized religion to get a hit off' loving your fellow man.
A free hug will do more for you! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4 - this will make you cry' and happy at the same time, Moonie!
does juan mann look like jesus or john lennon?
United the people'
we cannot be defeated!

 

[gingermeggs]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam

Originally posted by: cubeless
but if they don't know the reason they do it does that make it invalid as a political system?

it's nice that religion gets a pat on the head from science every now and then...

If you are smart enough to crack a bone to get the marrow, does it matter if you know you're smart?

It matters not if the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice!
The journey of a thousand mile, starts with but one step'

 

[gingermeggs]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam

Originally posted by: eskimospy
I don't see how this is bad news for religion haters. There are plenty of evolutionary mechanisms about us that we don't like and try to change. A tendancy to believe in falsehoods is one of them.

It is not one of them obviously as the belief in what to you is a falsehood is protective. That means the belief is not in a falsehood but in a truth, that if I believe such and such I will be better off. The real question is what makes you perverse, no? Why do you reject the great advantage belief in falsehoods offers. Why not join those who protect the evolution of the species instead of weaken it? Self hate, maybe? Personal advantage at the expense of others?

Maybe he seeks transcendence, not continuum.

 

[Moonbeam]

e: Moonie, not sure why you're doing this, and many of the things you're expressing as certainties are impossible to know and/or simply wrong.

I am doing it because I don't understand how you chose words that sound to me like they can't be used as you are using them and mean what you say they should mean. I am telling you where i have those problems and trying to explain why. It doesn't really matter but I don't seem to see the words you use as being right for the job.

e: You think you need to be sentient to care about survival? For what possible reason?

M: Yes I do because to care requires that there is somebody who cares, who is conscious that they do.

e: Maybe you're using some sort of human style caring, but to have consideration for your survival is an instinct shared by all life.

M: Yes exactly. Caring is one thing, instinctive response is quite another. Instinct doesn't care it is just instinct, autonomic as it were.

e: You're not going to get anywhere with that one.

M: I am not trying to get anywhere with it. I am telling you how I see your language choices. You don't have to agree.

e: You need to be sentient to 'do' something? On what planet? Neither of these words require intelligence of the type that you are describing, and even if they did you lack the knowledge of other animals' thought processes to make the statements you have.

M: I mentioned that higher animals could do things. Maybe you can tell me some things on this planet that are not higher animals that can do things.

e: I'm only anthropomorphizing evolution if I were advancing the wrong arguments that you keep trying to make for me.

M: I am telling you how they sound to me. They sound wrong, like what you describe knew it was doing something, for example. Perhaps for you its a non issue but for me it sounds like you are seeing a will.

e: Since I'm not your sock puppet, I'll stand by my original statement. I used some words for the ease of understanding and you continue to ascribe things that you know I didn't intend to them for some inexplicable reason. Stop it.

M: I think you make the understanding more difficult but maybe easier for yourself. I don't know. I know what you mean when you tell me you don't mean them anthropomorphically even though that's how it sounds like you use them. Why not just not do that. It's not a contest to me. I don't need a sock puppet. Maybe I'm idiosyncratically drawn to tightness and rigor.

 

[fskimospy]

Moon, this really isn't a very entertaining conversation for me because it's basically arguing over the virtues of something I never said. You asked for how something that isn't a higher animal can 'do' things though? The definition of 'do' is 'to bring to pass'; 'to execute'. Any time any being brings something to pass or executes an action they are 'do'ing something. It doesn't require you to be a 'higher animal', or even alive at all. That's what I meant about some of the concepts you were talking about being off.

 

[Moonbeam]

Originally posted by: eskimospy
Moon, this really isn't a very entertaining conversation for me because it's basically arguing over the virtues of something I never said. You asked for how something that isn't a higher animal can 'do' things though? The definition of 'do' is 'to bring to pass'; 'to execute'. Any time any being brings something to pass or executes an action they are 'do'ing something. It doesn't require you to be a 'higher animal', or even alive at all. That's what I meant about some of the concepts you were talking about being off.

Fine, no problem, but we originally started with 'doing' related to 'goals' of evolution I believe. Animals can be said to be doing something when they eat or sleep or mate but they do this without inner thought as a goal or intention. Biological needs impel them to action. Neither the animals or the needs are conscious of the fact. The purpose of life is to live but life doesn't know that. We know it because we look and are aware.

Not saying you disagree or said different. But I hear different when you use evolution with goals and doing. And because the anthropomorphizing of evolution is a problem the comes up I drew attention here.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

Originally posted by: Atreus21

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
?The primary benefits of religion take place in this world, not the next.? The religious emphasis on otherworldly beliefs evolved, Wilson says, because supernatural explanations seem to motivate human cooperation better than factual ones.

This is no surprise. An atheist's explanation of existence must be depressing indeed.

This atheist prefers facts to fairy tales, even if the fairy tales make you feel better.

I would say simply because all will have been for nothing.

Thank you, Captain Non-Sequitur. Now, pay attention: atheism is not materialism, is not physicalism, is not nihilism, is not naturalism, is not reductionism, is not any other kind of -ism which may make claims about the significance of our actions. It is only a characteristic of any belief-set which does not include a belief in a god's existence.

In the end, any good we strive to attain during our lifetime, and indeed during the entire time of humanity's presence, and any other sentient life in existence, will have been nothing but "a senseless contortion upon the idiotic face of infinite matter," to quote CS Lewis.

Quoting a theist as an authority on atheism, eh. That's brilliant. :roll:

There simply is no hope, and no reason.

I have as much hope and reason as I need, and I don't need any gods to give them to me.