james_davis_nicoll (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
james_davis_nicoll) wrote2013-11-24 08:54 pm
james_davis_nicoll) wrote2013-11-24 08:54 pm
I had no idea
As pointed out in email, JEP on evolution.
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Choosing to forsake empathy makes you an idiot. It's evil that makes you stupid, in other words.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2010/04/30/empathy-and-epistemic-closure/
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2010/04/30/empathy-and-epistemic-closure/
Fascinating, thank you for that link!
Scientific crackpots usually try to attack founding figures and historical experiments, as if that would cause the edifice of a science to crumble, rather than critiquing contemporary science in any coherent way. The anti-relativity people are always going on about mistakes in Einstein's arguments and flaws in the Michelson-Morley experiment, as if that would accomplish anything at this point.
If leftists were in favor of "intelligent design" Pournelle would be mocking them for evolution. It's not an intrinsic facet of his right wing politics, its that he's picking up a cause leftists are opposed to and championing the other side.
Yeah, anyone who uses the term "Darwinism" doesn't understand it.
Two centuries; Paley in 1802, in that formulation. Of course, in the more generalized form of the argument from design, its been around since before Thomas Aquinas.
Amusingly, population genetics is one of the most mathematical parts of biology. It's not often biologists get to use complex analysis to prove important theorems.
Yup.
Also, one of the things refuted with great thoroughness by Darwin in Origin and the refutation is one of the parts of Origin that's held up.
You're not talking about assembling a watch out of random parts; you're talking about an existing, ongoing, assemblage of parts gradually accumulating the characteristics of a watch. (Which has been simulated, and which happens in surprisingly few generations, if we postulate reproducing springs...)
Also, one of the things refuted with great thoroughness by Darwin in Origin and the refutation is one of the parts of Origin that's held up.
You're not talking about assembling a watch out of random parts; you're talking about an existing, ongoing, assemblage of parts gradually accumulating the characteristics of a watch. (Which has been simulated, and which happens in surprisingly few generations, if we postulate reproducing springs...)
I had an uncle who would do the same with anyone he knew after he had a few beers. It didn't matter what the topic was, he would take the other side. I think he even argued against views he privately held just for the entertainment.
The argument from design, when used seriously these days, tends to be closely related to the Anthropic Principle and focusses on things like the fine-tuning of basic physical constants.
In biology, there's been so much work done both conceptually on local advantages accruing to minor improvements and in finding concrete evidence of intermediate forms that examples like the eye (having emerged several times in different contexts) are now better arguments for the operation of natural selection than for the presence of design.
In biology, there's been so much work done both conceptually on local advantages accruing to minor improvements and in finding concrete evidence of intermediate forms that examples like the eye (having emerged several times in different contexts) are now better arguments for the operation of natural selection than for the presence of design.
Rarely has a single human being so efficiently encapsulated the Dunning-Kruger effect.
Pournelle describes how his broken bullshit detector works in the first sentence of that section:
It seems unlikely that he's going to change his method in the final years of his life. Rather, one should expect him to get even odder and more gullible as the inevitable processes of aging (and the damage caused by earlier decades of drinking) take their toll on his capacity for critical thinking, which was never terribly strong. It's why conmen prey on the elderly; it's the FOX News business model.
I don’t agree with Fred on everything, but he raises a number of really interesting questions, he’s right a lot of the time, and he doesn’t swallow fads.It's the hallmark of someone who evaluates ideas by rhetorical style and political intent, a style of thinking Pournelle has used for the last sixty years.
It seems unlikely that he's going to change his method in the final years of his life. Rather, one should expect him to get even odder and more gullible as the inevitable processes of aging (and the damage caused by earlier decades of drinking) take their toll on his capacity for critical thinking, which was never terribly strong. It's why conmen prey on the elderly; it's the FOX News business model.
Nick Bostrom's book on anthropic bias is available for free online:
http://www.anthropic-principle.com/?q=book/table_of_contents
I very much like Bostrom's research agenda. It involves many issues science fiction authors try to address (usually much more hamfistedly.)
http://www.anthropic-principle.com/?q=book/table_of_contents
I very much like Bostrom's research agenda. It involves many issues science fiction authors try to address (usually much more hamfistedly.)
If a person wanted to attack biological science, evolution isn't where I suggest they start. Instead, origin of life (that is, getting from simple molecules to something sufficiently functional to undergo evolution by natural selection) is a much easier target. There's not yet a satisfactory theory of how this complexity barrier could be surmounted. The simplest known living cells (obtained by stripping down existing cells as much as possible so they still can live) contain about 4 billion atoms and hundreds of genes.
(Of course this doesn't mean OoL required supernatural intervention, only that science hasn't demonstrated a good solution to the problem.)
(Of course this doesn't mean OoL required supernatural intervention, only that science hasn't demonstrated a good solution to the problem.)
I'm now curious to know how many radical authoritarians like Pournelle are in the fact-denying end of Christianity.
I cannot parse this sentence. Care to explain what you are trying to say?
I cannot parse this sentence. Care to explain what you are trying to say?
Ah, yes, good old "try using the on-off switch, Jerry". (Those Byte columns ... )
My father always argued with whoever was seated to his left. Hilariously, he was unaware of this pattern until it was pointed out.
TV Tropes uses "filibuster freefall."
If I'm interpreting it correctly it may be clearer if you replace "end" by something like "section", i.e.
"I'm now curious to know how many radical authoritarians like Pournelle are in the section of Christianity that denies facts."
-- Paul Clarke
"I'm now curious to know how many radical authoritarians like Pournelle are in the section of Christianity that denies facts."
-- Paul Clarke
It's also, at least in humans, one of the best arguments against design since it contains a number of design flaws that would get any engineering student flunked. I mean, who would ever design a camera with wiring hanging between the lens and the film?
I had to give up at that point... gosh, Darwin's theory might have some holes in it? NO! I'd better take another look at Lord Kelvin's thoughts on the age of the Earth too in that case. Surely nothing has changed since the 1850s?
The brain tumour surely won't have helped will it?
I still think, to borrow a phrase from upthread, deep time and LOTS of chemical sorting could account for that.
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