Posted on 06/02/2003 1:46:54 PM PDT by Heartlander
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Blinded by Science |
| Nature via Nurture: Genes, Experience, & What Makes Us Human, by Matt Ridley HarperCollins, 336 pp., $25.95) This is a very strange book, and I am not quite sure what the author is attempting to achieve. At the very least it appears that he wants to shore up genetic determinism as the key factor in understanding human nature and individual behavior. Genetic determinism is rational materialism's substitute for the religious notion of predestination; taking the place of God as puppet master are the genes, whose actions and interactions control who we are, what we think, and how we act. This reductionist view received a body blow recently when the mappers of the human genome found that we have only about 30,000 genes. Because of their understanding of human complexity, the scientists were expecting at least 100,000 -- and that means there are probably too few genes for strict genetic determinism to be true. Ridley, a science writer and former U.S. editor of The Economist, tries to ride to the rescue. In doing so, he adds a twist that he hopes will overcome our apparent genetic paucity: Yes, he says, our genes decide who we are, what we do and think, and even with whom we fall in love. But, he posits, our molecular masters are not rigidly preset when we are born. Rather, they change continually in reaction to our biological and emotional experiences. Hence, 30,000 are more than enough for a soft genetic determinism to be true -- which means that the battle between those who believe we are the product of our biology (nature) versus those who believe we are the result of our environment (nurture) can now end in a truce in which both sides win. We are indeed controlled by our genes, but they in turn are influenced by our experiences. Ridley says that the mapping of the genome "has indeed changed everything, not by closing the argument or winning the [nature versus nurture] battle for one side or the other, but by enriching it from both ends till they meet in the middle." To Ridley, the core of our true selves isn't soul, mind, or even body in the macro sense; we are, in essence, merely the expression of our genes at any given moment. If this is true, then my perception of Nature via Nurture as so much nonsense was the only reaction I could have had, given my original genetic programming, as later modified by my every experience and emotion from my conception, through the womb, childhood, high school, college, practicing law, the death of my father, indeed up to and including the reading of this book. If that is so – if I was forced by my gene expression of the moment to perceive this book as I have -- what have we really learned that can be of any benefit to humankind? We are all slaves to chemistry and there is no escape. Even aside from such broader issues, Ridley does not make a persuasive case. Maybe it is my legal training, but I found his evidence very thin. He doesn't present proofs so much as resort to wild leaps of logic predicated on questionably relevant social science and facile analogies based on a few animal studies. These are simply not strong enough to be the sturdy weight-supporting pillars that his thesis requires to be credible. Let's look at just one example. He cites studies of monogamous prairie voles to suggest that humans only think they fall in love, when, in reality, what we call love is merely the expression of genes resulting in the release of the chemicals oxytocin and vasopressin. Claiming that he is not going to "start extrapolating anthropomorphically from pair-bonding in voles to love in people," he proceeds to do just that. Citing the vole studies and Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream -- in which a love potion makes Titania fall in love with a man with a donkey's head – Ridley writes: Who would now wager against me that I could not do something like this to a modern Titania? Admittedly, a drop on the eyelids would not suffice. I would have to give her a general anesthetic while I cannulated her medial amygdala and injected oxytocin into it. I doubt even then that I could make her love a donkey. But I might stand a fair chance of making her feel attracted to the first man she sees upon waking. Would you bet against me? But shouldn't it take far more than measuring the physical effects of oxytocin on prairie voles to prove that something as complex, maddening, unpredictable, and wonderfully and uniquely human as romantic love can, in reality, be reduced to the mere expression of genes leading to chemical secretions? Not, apparently, to Ridley. "Blindly, automatically, and untaught, we bond with whoever is standing nearest when oxytocin receptors in the medial amygdala get tingled." Gee, if he'd known that, Bill Clinton could have purchased fewer copies of Leaves of Grass. The most fascinating thing about this book is that Ridley inadvertently makes a splendid argument for intelligent design. At this point, I am sure Ridley's "I am utterly appalled" genes are expressing wildly. He is, after all, a scientific materialist in good standing. Yet, throughout the book, in order to make his arguments understandable, he resorts explicitly to the imagery of the guiding hand. He even gives it a name: the "Genome Organizing Device," or "G.O.D." Ridley claims that the G.O.D is "a skillful chef, whose job is to build a souffle," consisting of the various parts of us and all other life on the planet. Note the language of intentionality in his description of the evolution of the human brain: To build a brain with instinctive abilities, the Genome Organizing Device lays down separate circuits with suitable internal patterns that allow them to carry out suitable computations, then links them with appropriate inputs from the senses. . . . In the case of the human mind, almost all such instinctive modules are designed to be modified by experience. Some adapt continuously throughout life, some change rapidly with experience then set like cement. A few just develop to their own timetable. But according to my lay understanding, this violates the theory and philosophy of evolution. The hypothesis of natural selection holds that species origination and change are promoted by genetic mutations. Those mutations that change the organism to make it more likely than its unchanged peers to survive long enough to reproduce are likely to be passed down the generations. Eventually, these genetic alterations spread among the entire species and become universal within its genome. It is through this dynamic evolutionary process of modification, the theory holds, that life fills all available niches in nature. It is also the process, although the details are not known, by which the primates now known as homo sapiens became conscious. The philosophy of Darwinism posits that this evolutionary process is aimless, unintentional, purposeless, and without rhyme or reason. This means it has no biological goal: It just is. Hence, G.O.D. would not want to "build a brain," develop nature via nurture in species, or do any other thing. Yet, throughout the book, Ridley seems able only to describe what he thinks is going on using the language of intention. Could this be because Ridley's theories would require interactions that are so complex and unlikely that they would seem laughable if described as having come together haphazardly, by mere chance? So what are we to learn from his insights? In terms of how we live our lives, not much beyond what common sense already tells us: Parents matter and should engage with their children; human teenagers enjoy doing what they are good at, and dislike doing what they are bad at; and so on. That much is harmless; but Ridley's deeper point is subversive of human freedom and individual accountability. He denies the existence of free will: Our actions are not causes but effects, "prespecified by, and run by, genes." Indeed, he claims unequivocally, "There is no 'me' inside my brain, there is only an ever-changing set of brain states, a distillation of history, emotion, instinct, experience, and the influence of other people -- not to mention chance." Ridley asserts this as if it would be a good thing to learn that the complexity and richness of human experience could accurately be reduced to merely the acts of so many slaves obeying the lash of chemical overseers acting under the direction of our experience-influenced gene owners. "Nature versus nurture is dead," Ridley concludes triumphantly. "Long live nature via nurture." Sorry. Maybe it's my genes, but I just don't buy it. |
In biological evolution, success equals reproduction. Humans have a unique perspective on this. We have much more complex definitions of success, but given a thousand years or so, biology levels out most of our aspirations and leaves reproduction as our legacy (at least for the overwhelming majority of us).
I hope to come back later and say more about this, but I don't have time now.
I'm agreeing with your analysis and there is much I'd like to say about why these issues are so important - but my computers are up/down today so I have to be brief.
I suspect what we are seeing is the influence of information theory on the field of evolution biology. Scientists like Yockey, Patten and Rocha are pointing to the requirement - within evolution biology theory - of the organism to have autonomous self-organizing complexity, including symbolization. My observation is that the lack of any of these in the genetic code leaves the mechanism empty to explain the rise of functional complexity.
Moreover, even if all of these were discovered - it would nevertheless require a bootstrap on the front end to initiate the process. And the existence of such a bootstrap, if algorithmic, would point directly to intelligent design.
IMHO, the randomness pillar of evolution theory is in deep peril due to these contributions from mathematics.
If it happens in the future, the we are living in the past. Nothing in our lives happens in the past or the future. The future and the past consists of everything that could and did ever happen and to us, and when it happens, it happens now.
"Dealing" with it means taking action that has some probability of having a desirable consequense. We do not know consequenses with certainty, but we try. We judge the complexity and intelligence of both people and animals by how well they anticipate outcomes.
We do all that now.
Right, so Socrates understood it in the Symposium and the Phaedo and recognized that that success is the continuity of existence. This reveals the drive toward immortality and the identification of the animate and inanimate with the underlying "forces" of evolution.
I don't have any definitive answer for you because I'm not quoting from any authority but myself. For me, the present is strongly influenced by my expectations for the future, so in that limited sense, I am living in the past. This is more of a poetic view than a fully reasoned position, so forgive me if I ask for a bit of license.
When I look around, I see all living things anticipating outcomes, to the best of their ability. For some, the ability to anticapate is embodied in tropisms -- simple chemical reactions. For creatures with brains, there is an ability for the individual to learn about consequenses. But in all cases, behavior is anticapatory.
For me, this is a working definition of life, the key quality that divides animate from inanimate.
Ok, where the fact is the value. Where 9/11 as fit and adequate as 9/10. That kind of science is not even half a science. It's ol' time Greek religion fit for a Bedouin.
But when is it ex-post? If a continuity is sought that proceeds through past to future, both post and ante are less relevant.
The core requirement for biological bootstrapping is a sufficiently coherent state machine context and a "finite control function" that executes at a pace somewhat greater than the context decoheres. Now, the entire molecular world is a state machine, but either doesn't contain sufficiently coherent context or does not have a usable control function that executes at sufficient speed.
There are some natural chemical systems on the planet (notably hydrothermal systems) where coherent molecular state machines can both spontaneously form and function in volume. You don't need any design here; the requirements for a state machine are really low as far as Kolmogorov complexity goes and can be easily realized by accident. However, to bootstrap from there to a usable biological system you need to increase the intrinsic Kolmogorov complexity of the initial molecular machine by quite a bit. For organic systems that usually means chain polymerization, which isn't a particularly rare or complex issue either in the right natural environment. At that point, you have all the machinery you need from an information theoretic point.
At this point, I would just mumble. The information theoretic machinery isn't the hard part, but the assembly of the ancilliary molecular hardware isn't really understood. It is interesting to note that many components (e.g. cell wall analogs) of very primitive single-celled organisms do spontaneously occur in nature (in the same natural environment we find spontaneously assembling state machines), but the precise conditions of how the original organism (an analog of which may not currently exist in nature) assembled is unknown. We have the information theoretic machine required, and it is easy to see how these could get trapped in side the odd molecular "cell walls" that are formed under certain naturally catalytic environments, but it would still require a number of other things happening to bootstrap to the organisms we have now.
We see enough of the pieces of a simple cellular organism(chemically speaking) occurring nature that bootstrapping to what we see now isn't infeasible, though certain not a common event either. A point that is important but which never seems to get mentioned is that, in all likelihood, the intermediate proto-organisms that were even simpler than the simplest organisms now in existence are long gone. Kolmogorov complexity of the state machine confers a survival advantage, and the original organisms would have a very tiny one indeed, not good for long term survival.
It's true that Darwin didn't solve every problem for us. No one claims otherwise. I don't see how that undercuts the value of what he actually did accomplish, however. I agree that much more work needs to be done so that we can better understand the functioning of man's mind. But we won't gain any scientific understanding if we stop behaving like scientists. And without scientific understanding, we won't make any progress in curing mental problems and possibly even improving the quality of our minds.
If this is true, then what does material nature or selfish genes (which seem to lack conciousness, or at least the higher consciousness of moral -- willing, choosing -- thinking agents) have to do with working toward a goal of "fitness" or any other kind of goal? How did material nature or the gene get sufficient "mind" and "will" to work toward that "fitness" of species that is the supposed purpose of the evolutionary process? "Random" and "fit" are quite antithetical ideas. So how can the achievement of "fitness" be squared with a random process, which supposedly produces it?
"survival of the fittest" is usually misinterpreted to mean that evolution is a ladder towards increasing complexity and progress; and that fittest means that only the superior should survive and prosper. Natural selection is really about differential reproductive success only and has absolutely nothing to do with progress or even individual survival.
As described in Dawkins' "Selfish Gene", replicators like genes shouldn't be thought of as having purpose or intent or part of some design. Replicators aren't trying to replicate or do anything for that matter. The only difference between a replicator and a non-replicator is that a replicator happens to replicate and a non-replicator doesn't. What replicates and what traits lead to higher replication rates are determined by the environment. There's no inherent superior trait that will automatically have high replication rates. A trait that has high reproductive success in one environment could fail in a different environment. Stephen J. Gould is fond of describing bacteria as the most reproductively "fit" of all organisms. Natural selection doesn't select for increasing complexity, but complexity can certainly develop just as long as reproduction still continues. Good enough is the bottom line. The most undesirable traits imaginable would dominate the gene pool if they out-reproduced others. Traits in a gene pool with the highest reproductive rates are only the best of what's appeared so far. New traits can only appear randomly, not due to necessity. The mutations happen to happen.
Leibnitz, Pascal and
Newton -- to name three quickly --
were able to "gain"
some "scientific
understanding," but today
these three would be (are!)
called "mystics" and held
as being smart "in spite of
themselves." These three guys
achieved a whole lot.
"Behaving like scientists" --
in today's meaning! --
would not have ranked high
on any one of their lists
of priorities.
But isn't the question of what passes for "good enough" precisely the problem of our age, snow? (I mean in terms of both "fact" and "value?")
The reason that bacteria may qualify, in Gould's view, as "the most reproductively 'fit' of all organisms" is because "they" make war on organisms at the cellular, not the individual, level. They don't have to consciously target victims. They just have to be around susceptible cells to do their dirty work. And their work usually is dirty -- at least from the human standpoint.
Bacteria are, in other words, quintessentially efficient, because they are "no respecters of persons."
Now if efficiency and utility are to be held as standards of truth and value, then I think the bacterium is due to be promoted to the Judgment Seat soon, probably to great public acclaim. (Of course, you can't call it by its real name. Dress it up, trick it out, to persuade.)
Another way to put it that may resonate with the ideas of progressive socialism: Bacteria attack "anonymously," indifferently. Man is not man, he is just a vast pool of cells. From the imaginary standpoint of a bacterium, there are no boundaries or distinctions between one man and any other man or group of men. All for good eating.
RM&NS is all that is required for the diversity of life we now see and logically comprehend. There is no target for evolution and we are just lucky to realize our own luck. We are just the byproducts of a blind, mindless, and unguided process that never had us in mind. The proof for this? All the biological diversity in this robust ecosystem can be traced back to a single organism that fortunately 'appeared'.
Is it truly, “he who dies with the most offspring wins?”
Anyway, Darwin observed some bird beaks, took the current naturalistic scientific theories of his day, and tried to unify them with blind and undirected chance to rid science of the theistic stranglehold that he (and others) loathed. The Universities were founded on Christian principles and naturalists were not paid well or considered prestigious. (How the times have changed)
Did he accomplish his goal? Did people really start to believe that life’s origin leading to mankind was mindless, unguided, and without purpose or goal? Let’s look:
The National Association of Biology Teachers [NABT] in their 1995 Official Statement on Teaching Evolution stated the following:
"The diversity of life [all life] on earth is the outcome of evolution: an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process of temporal descent with genetic modification that is affected by natural selection, chance, historical contingencies and changing environments."
Anyway, let's look at a college textbook and see what it has to say on the subject:
According to Douglas Futuyama’s widely used college textbook Evolutionary Biology(1998), Darwin’s “theory of random, purposeless variations acted on by blind, purposeless natural selection provided a revolutionary new answer to almost all questions that begin with ‘Why?’” Darwin “made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superfluous,” and thereby “provided a crucial plank to the platform of mechanism and materialism” that is now “the stage of most Western thought.”
Well, we can't use this because it is a religious statement. I guess we should look at a required/recommended reading book for college biology:
"Paley's argument is made with passionate sincerity and is informed by the best biological scholarship of his day, but it is wrong, gloriously and utterly wrong. The analogy between . . . watch and living organism, is false. All appearances to the contrary, the only watchmaker in nature is the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special way. A true watchmaker has foresight: he designs his cogs and springs, and plans their interconnections, with a future purpose in the mind's eye. Natural selection, the blind, unconscious, automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparent purposeful form of all life, has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no mind's eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. If it can be said to play the role of watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker.
The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design (p. 5)
-Richard Dawkins
Another religious statement? Hmmm… The National Association of Biology Teacher's, college textbooks, and required/recommended reading material.
Maybe it's just 'human' nature...
If things that people detest exist in religion i.e. dogmatism, conceit, mockery, intolerance, and power-obsession, why would we not expect to see it in science as well? Especially when science becomes religion.
betty boop: If this is true, then what does material nature or selfish genes (which seem to lack conciousness, or at least the higher consciousness of moral -- willing, choosing -- thinking agents) have to do with working toward a goal of "fitness" or any other kind of goal? How did material nature or the gene get sufficient "mind" and "will" to work toward that "fitness" of species that is the supposed purpose of the evolutionary process? "Random" and "fit" are quite antithetical ideas. So how can the achievement of "fitness" be squared with a random process, which supposedly produces it? More dumb Luck?
The relationship of aspects of the life form to its environment is critical to all life studies, to place it in an reasonably educated context and holistic perspective (and to any of the theories of evolution). Come! Study well! All should be very welcome to look at the aspets of a life and induce what relationships with that which is other exist, by which that life is definitively functional its various ecologies. In this study, especially in the study of overall human development to the present (and past the present into the future by the trajectory of our behavior patterns and relationships with all that is environment) one finds Jesus Christ, whose revelation of God explains why we have the full set of characteristics which we see in ourselves.
It's funny that this should need explaining to educated people.
Are you sure it really does?
js1138, PH, where are your Evolutionist friends here? Come, let's study life (especially man) by his full set of measurable functions.
If anyone would come up with a scientific explanation of how this "is," it might be worth paying attention to. But since there isn't one, it is only reasonable not to adopt the tunnel vision necessary to believe this dogma.
Sometimes, bb, if not most times, your insights are just breathtaking. If I sound like a fan it's because I am.
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