Earlier:

I think the phrase 'for fear of reinforcing the idea of human exceptionalism put forward in religious doctrines' is actually a key driver for a lot of what is being argued in this thread, and I think I know why. — Wayfarer

Later:

Finally I argue that the modern insistence that 'we are no different from animals', is based on a subconsious longing for return to one-ness. We want to see ourselves as part of nature, and believe that evolutionary biology shows that we are. Hence any suggestion of human exceptionalism is violently rejected, as it calls this belief into question. — Wayfarer

Do you see how you keep making my point?

Is anyone in this thread "violently" rejecting human exceptionalism, or are people simply expressing various nuanced views?

Nonsense. I don’t see myself as ‘special’. I have presented a specific argument based on a number of sources in this thread.. I understand the argument I’m pursuing is a difficult one to both articulate and understand, especially in the kind of fragmented format that forum conversations tend to assume. I don’t see any indication that you (and for that matter other participants) have understood the gist of the argument. It is not because I’m ‘special’, it has nothing whatever to do with it. Your statements here are ad hominem, how about you try and respond the actual specifics of what I’ve been arguing for, if you want to take issue with them. — Wayfarer

What you call an argument amounted to your naive psychologizing regarding the thinking of lots of people. I'm not going to bother to detail the fallaciousness of all that.

Anyway, I suggest that if you want to avoid your psychology being under consideration, avoiding making such naive claims about the psychology of others might be a good idea.

Thank you, I do try to be civil and avoid coming off as condescending. I think we all need a sense of being special and having something of value to offer. To me, this isn't a bad thing compared to sitting at home and doing nothing and making no effort to think or engage others. Overeating in a futile effort to end the feeling of hunger caused by unmet emotional needs. So I hope people do continue to do their best and feel that s/he is making a valued contribution. Making the effort is better than not making the effort, right? But it ain't easy. — Athena

I don't disagree, and what you quoted wasn't directed at you.

Meerkats actually post sentries who do not join in the feeding, but keep watch and raise the alarm when an intruder turns up. The other meerkats keep some food for the sentry, who feeds when all the others have finished. New members of the group are not permitted to act as sentries for a while. Eventually, they are allowed to stand sentry, but at first, when they raise the alarm, the others check it out before everyone rushes to their burrows underground. Eventually, when the sentry has been proved reliable, they are not checked out.
Is that not critical thinking? Or maybe critical thinking is less advanced than you think? — Ludwig V

That's very interesting to think about. It suggests to me that not only pattern recognition, but pattern seeking plays an important part in meerkat rationality. I.e. that being attentive to the pattern of behavior consistent with a junior sentry having attained sentry expertise (or lack thereof) plays an important role in meerkat behavior.

I don't know how we might test if logic is much involved on the part of the meerkat. Perhaps some so strongly associate critical thinking with logic, (and not without good reason) that they wouldn't grant that this suggests critical thinking on the part of meerkats. However, I'm inclined to think this points to meerkats having at least some aspects of what could be considered criitical thinking.

Thank you.

Wow! I am very impressed, both with ChatGPT o1's, ability to 'explain' its process, and your ability to lead ChatGPT o1 to elucidate something close to your way of thinking about the subject.

I'm providing here a link to the first part of my first discussion with ChatGPT o1-preview. — Pierre-Normand

I'm sad to say, the link only allowed me to see a tiny bit of ChatGPT o1's response without signing in.

Am I right to think that we are somewhere near the old-fashioned concept of a Gestalt? I think there is a lot to be said for it — Ludwig V

Absolutely, and I think it is probably reasonable to think of much animal rationality as a matter of gestalts, without animals having as much capacity for analyzing mutually contradictory gestalts for consistency, as we have with our linguistic capabilities.

Believing what scientists say about what their scientific studies have determined about the world (including perception) is rational. — Michael

I would add, that an indepth understanding of the science behind perception brings perspective about our ability to work around the limits of our perceptual capabilities. A result of such understanding for me, is that time spent arguing over direct or indirect realism seems like time that might be better spent developing an understanding of the relevant science, and humanity's ability to work around our perceptual limitations.

But then I'm inclined to say things like, "I looked at it on the [oscillo]scope and saw that the amplifier was clipping.", with confidence that the person I would say that too wouldn't have much trouble understanding what I mean. So perhaps I speak nonsense?

It sounds to me like you are projecting your own fears. In any case, you are demonstrating a lack of insight into the perspectives of others.
— wonderer1

Thanks! and to you also. — Wayfarer

The thing is, quite apropos to this topic, I've brought up the subject of pattern recognition a lot on the forum. It's a quite useful concept in understanding the way people think.

There are patterns that can be recognized in the thinking of people. One such pattern I've unintentionally developed a strong recognition of is narcissism. (Grandiose and covert/vulnerable types primarily, there are other labels for types of narcissism and the characteristics associated with those particular types that I'm not very familiar with.)

This is a pattern I can't unsee.

A result of such pattern recognition is some understanding on my part, of your need to see yourself as particularly special, and how that influences the thinking that goes into your posts. This need to see yourself as particularly special isn't something I think you have made a free willed choice to have, and not something I see you as to blame for. In fact I appreciate your skill at keeping keeping your rage covert. And of course, we are all narcissistic to some extent.

So getting back to the thread topic, I'd say there is an extremely good scientific case for animals having very strong pattern recognition in certain regards, and in many cases pattern recognition that is not available to us for various physiological reasons. And such pattern recognition is foundational to rationality. Human language/logic is kind of icing on the cake, on one hand. On the other hand, it allows humanity to do things way beyond the capabilities of any other species on Earth.

Perhaps relevant topics for this thread are, "What role does having language play, in the development of narcissism in humans?" and, "Is there any evidence for narcissism in animals?"

In my book, opening doors and gates is rational thinking. Battering them down would not be, unless it was preceded by trying to open them. I can't assume that everyone will agree. — Ludwig V

Elephants seem like they might be well justified in disagreeing. Why waste time trying to figure out how to open a gate, if knocking the gate down is a trivial matter?

Is "overthinking" things rational?

Competing notions of "thought" and "rational thought" can be assessed by how well they 'fit' into what we know to be true, as well as their inherent ability or lack thereof to explain things(explanatory power). Evolutionary progression is paramount here. There are all sort of philosophical positions which must reject the idea of language less thought/belief, on pains of coherency alone.

On my view, that is prima facie evidence that they've gotten some things very wrong. — creativesoul

:up: :up:

Non-linguistic thought seems near impossible for us to communicate about in any detailed and rigorous way. As you say, "how well they fit into what we know to be true" plays a crucial role in one person recognizing the sort of thing another is talking about, when trying to communicate about non-linguistic thought.

Add to that, the fact that many people's thinking is much more language 'focused' than the thinking of others, and many seem to think 'non-linguistic thought' is a nonsensical phrase.

Are you aware of the rather huge amount of energy consumed by present day AIs?

What role, if any, does energy consumption (and the potential for competition for available energy) play in your vision of the future?

I think the phrase 'for fear of reinforcing the idea of human exceptionalism put forward in religious doctrines' is actually a key driver for a lot of what is being argued in this thread, and I think I know why. — Wayfarer

It sounds to me like you are projecting your own fears. In any case, you are demonstrating a lack of insight into the perspectives of others.

Now we've got to start over this whole thread now that we learn you don't need eyes or a brain to see. — Hanover

Those of us who are plants?

They can start their own thread.

See Aristotle's Revenge, Edward Feser. — Wayfarer

Nice to see an appropriately disparaging review of Feser. :up:

If the resistance is infinite, there is no voltage, or potential. — frank

I'd say something more like "infinite resistance" is kind of meaningless in absolute terms, and in practical terms "infinite resistance" is used to indicate something along the lines of "such a high resistance that I can ignore it".

I wouldn't say there is no voltage between the terminals though. The voltage differential between the terminals of a battery is there regardless of whether there is any current flow from the positive terminal to the negative terminal. To say otherwise would be analogous to saying there is no gravity well, unless something is falling into it. I'm not seeing any good reason to look at things that way.

That's one way to address the problem. There are others. — frank

What is your favorite?

Say you have a 12V battery with infinite resistance across the terminals. What's the current? If you say zero, then Ohms Law (which relates potential to kinetic) will tell you that you've multiplied zero times infinity and ended up with 12. — frank

Perhaps better to think of it as "Ohm's rule of thumb". It is not a fundamental physical law, but more of a useful way of looking at emergent properties in some cases.

Well, the concept of potential is used all the time in practical matters, e.g. the counterfactual analysis that makes up a great bulk of the work done in the sciences, engineering problems, "potential energy," potential growth in economics, attracting "potential mates" in biology, etc. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'd say the word "potential" used in such cases is useful way of talking about emergent properties, but drops out when looking at the subvenient details. For example, the potential energy of a bowling ball on a shelf...

PEgrav = m • g • h

...doesnt have a potency term, and adding a potency term would seem like a matter of unneeded overdetermination.

It's really more in the realm of metaphysics or something like the amorphous "metaphysics of science" that the prohibition on talking about potentialities seems to hold. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'd think it is because (regardless of the usefulness of "potential" when discussing things in terms of emergent properties) there is no need for "potency" when things are considered at more fundamental levels.

being good modern empiricists, we have no need for potency. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Perhaps the "have no need" is the key factor rathet than observability?

I'm no mathmatician, but it seems to me that in a practical sense we need at least the mathematical ideas of infinity and continuums. I'm not seeing a similar need for potency.

Scientists so far are unable to reproduce experimentally how this occurred however I’m not basing my argument around this non-reproducibility... — kindred

Scientists don't have labs the size of the universe or grants lasting billions of years. In any case, supposing scientists did find a highly detailed and plausible account by which abiognesis might have occurred on Earth, I don't know how it could be shown that such an account is the correct account.

I’m making the rather bold claim that intelligence is an inherent part of nature whether this is existed just post big bang is debatable and that in fact it has existed before. — kindred

Do you think intelligence can exist sans an infomation processing substrate for intelligence to supervene upon? (E.g. a brain.)

If so, why?

If not, what would have served as such an information processing substrate before the big bang? (BTW, it is questionable whether "before the big bang" meaningfully refers to anything. It may well be similar to "north of the North pole.")

...it must have always been around not just because life and intelligence is special but because the step from inanimate matter to organic life is just to big to have happened by chance alone and would imply a pre-existing intelligence. — kindred

Have you ever studied the evidence for biological evolution, and the rather Rube Goldberg like mechanism that have often resulted from biological evolution? (Consider the perception thread for an example of the consequences of such Rube Goldberg like 'design'.)

In any case, do you have an argument against abiogenesis that amounts to more than an argument from incredulity? Can you show your math as to how you have calculated the probability of abiogenesis occurring anywhere in the universe?

I can't follow any of this ... — 180 Proof

Here's an article on pseudoprofundity that might be more worthwhile.

The is a question of a species needing color because, from the perspective of color fictionalism, color is a fiction. I’m just not sure why a species would adapt to a fictional view of its surroundings. — NOS4A2

I'd think it would make more sense to be dubious towards the color fictionalism theory one has in mind.

Light comes in a spectrum of wavelengths. Objects reflect some of those wavelengths more completely than other wavelengths. Our visual systems are able to capture some of the detail of how white light interacts with objects, and it provides an adaptive advantage that our visual systems do so. However, we might say that our visual systems do so crudely.

We might imagine a species with 'superior' color vision, in which each photoreceptive cell in the retina is a spectrophotometer, and can transmit to the brain lots of high accuracy data about the intensity of each spectral component of the light landing on each photoreceptor. There would be an information overload problem though. Such a species would need much thicker optic nerves than we have, in order to transmit such highly detailed visual information to the brain. Furthermore, the brain of this imagined species would need to be much bigger than ours, in order to make use of all the highly detailed data coming in via those thick optic nerves. Brain is metabolically expensive (and in the case of humans, already verging on too big to pass through a birth canal) so although we can imagine such a species it isn't a plausible outcome of biological evolution.

Instead we have visual systems that allow us to gather a useful amount of data about the optical environment while retaining the ability to run away from things that want to eat our brains.

Why would a species need color? — NOS4A2

There are plenty of species that don't need vision at all. Why is there a question of a species needing color?

There are species that have color vision because for those species it was adaptive to have color vision, and via biological evolution such sensory capacities evolved.

I'm not sure if you read the paper I attached — cherryorchard

My device is wonky about downloading pdfs, so I tried, but gave up. I tried again, and I've had a chance to read it now. Interesting!

A dog cannot know calculus. Can he?! — cherryorchard

More realistic sounding to me is that dogs (and people) use a gaze heuristic..

Instead of thinking of the subject as being passively subjected to a world of activity, therefore producing an effect from that causation, it is much better to think of the agent as actively causing the world, as perceived. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not seeing how the latter is better. It sounds solipsistic to me.

I'd think it better to recognize that neither of those options is very realistic, or the only options.

:up:

Those who see red and green as grey ARE picking between the same apples. — creativesoul

I'm not sure what you are saying here. I'm picturing a scenario where there are multiple different fruit, some of which would be seen as green (unripe) and others as red (ripe), by people with normal color vision. Unripe fruit aren't the same as ripe fruit, so I don't know what you mean by "the same" here.

As an aside, I decided to look up the spectral sensitivity of rod cells (which would be the only functional photoreceptive cells for someone with complete achromatopsia).



Because rod cells have little to no sensitivity to the red part of the spectrum, a red fruit would appear much darker shade of grey than a green fruit, to someone with complete achromatopsia.

Achromatopsia tends to come with other visual problems, so generally probably no.

Although if someone had complete achromatopsia without other visual problems, I suppose there would be special cases where there might be some advantage to achromatopsia. However, there's a lot of visual detail available to those with normal color vision that would not be available to someone with achromatopsia.

For example, is the grey of a ripe tomato distinguishable from the grey of an unripe tomato? I don't know, but it would surely be more difficult than distinguishing a red tomato from a green tomato.

I don't even know what a colourless visual sensation could be, and so I think without colour sensations you'd just be blind. — Michael

People with complete achromatopsia are not blind.

Sadly, there is nothing to prevent a scientist being a bad scientist and even a racist scientist. — Ludwig V

In US academia these days there are internal review boards which proposed research on human subjects must be approved by. My first wife was the the administrator for such a human subjects IRB, so I got to learn a lot about how they work.

The IRB that my wife was administrator for had members from outside academia, including a couple of local clergy. I don't know as much about nonacademic human research subjects review, but I doubt there is as little oversight as you suggest in most scientific research.

You didn't answer my question. Do you want to hear my best guess at what the answer is?

Did ye ken aboot kennings? — Amity

wonderer

Kenning-comprehender

:wink:

I took a Tolkien class in college, and one of the things discussed was Tolkien's work on Beowulf. I can't say I remembered the word "kenning", but I was familiar with such use of language in Old English poetry, and such.

To that end, he [Shannon] ignored the inconsistent variable analog... — Gnomon

Gnonsense. Shannon worked on analog computers before essentially inventing digital logic. His communication theory was very much about communicating uncorrupted digital data through the noisy analog world. So no, he didn't ignore the analog.

What is with your obsessive need to propagate misinformation?

I think the word 'mate' can grate, just like the word 'friend' can offend. Or 'pal' can appal. It's like, man, people trying too hard to be part of a crowd, man. — Amity

:smile:

I think that the notion of causality fails to allow for complex system-wide inputs leading to a particular output. — Tarskian

The notion of causality or simplistic thinking about causality?

To argue that because positions change and therefore psychiatry does not hold knowledge seems to be like the religious fundamentalists who say that science is bunk because science changes its paradigms over time.

Anyway, I'm going to leave this one here since there is no end to a debate like this and it's not really my role to defend psychiatry, which is an imperfect and evolving profession - and I am no expert. I simply know from decades of personal experince that psychiatrists can work scrupulously to provide extremely helpful life saving interventions for people. The profession is generally demonized and poorly understood. Which was my original observation. — Tom Storm

:up:

It makes no difference if you know the molecular analysis of the balls - the causal relation has no more to it than "if and when p, then q will follow". — Ludwig V

Well, I'd think it could only seem so from an awfully 'high level' view, where a lot of the causal detail is coarse grained out of consideration. The causality involved in anything I'm apt to find interesting is a lot more complex than "if and when p, then q will follow". In digital logic terms, that can be implemented with a wire 'from p to q'.

It's pretty deeply engrained into my way of thinking, to see causality as a lot more complex than that.