Re: Beyond the Savanna Mentality


JAE wrote:
> Jim McGinn wrote:
> > JAE wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> > > Actually, Jim, the
> > > reality is that I consider you completely inconsequential and as a
> > > result, really haven't bothered to even *try* to dispute your
> > > "hypothesis." I've found your pronouncements on other subjects, like
> > > your ridiculous dismissal of genetic drift,
> >
> > Which you cannot dispute.
>
> No, Jim, I could and did dispute your claim. Your claim involved your
> own peculiar definition of terms that aren't shared by anyone other
> than you

As long as I make my definitions explicit that shouldn't be a problem,
should it?

and I found your explanation for why phenomena that are
> actually observed don't, in your mind and only in your mind, exist.

What are you talking about?

> I
> realize you disagree but I also realize that your disagreement is
> completely and utterly meaningless.

Shut up, fool. You can't put two sentences together to formulate a
hypothesis. You're kidding yourself if you think I care what you
think.

It probably makes your feel good
> to believe what you do, but you're um, what's that word? Oh yes!
> You're wrong. Others have told you this as well and from my vantage,
> you've done poorly in dealing with them as well, relying heavily on
> your pronouncements that you're correct coupled with some peculiar
> definitions of words that the rest of us have agreed mean something
> else. Nothing will convince you otherwise, so I'm not going to bother,
> but you look more the kook than anything else in the process. Since
> you don't seem to care to try to get your notions across outside of
> usenet, whether or not you're a kook isn't of consequence though. You
> are and will remain irrelevent, amusing perhaps, mostly annoying, but
> irrelevent.
>
> > > your riduclous assertion
> > > that we evolved from chimps, such that I don't really feel like you're
> > > pronouncements about your views are warranted nor do I think that you'd
> > > recognize a valid dispute if one was presented. Since on top of this,
> > > you've seen some reason to avoid placing it in any realistic forum
> >
> > I think this forum is real.
>
> It is not a realistic place to be the sole recipient of an idea that
> you believe is scientifically noteworthy and one which you want to have
> any hope of making an impact anywhere where research is done. You will
> NEVER be recognized in texts, cited in other papers or have anyone pay
> attention to you at all when they formulate their ideas if you simply
> post here. Your own rationalizations to the contrary as simply
> delusional.

It seems you are blaming me for your incompetence. Let's remember the
score here. I'm the one with a hypothesis that you cannot dispute.
You have no hypothesis at all.

>
> > > to
> > > get critique or gain acceptance, I'm also left with the conclusion that
> > > at some level, you don't give a rat's ass abou it either. Right or
> > > wrong, you've made yourself irrelevent through your own doing.
> > >
> > > But if you're looking for something to try to patch in your
> > > "hypothesis" how does your hypothesis reconcil adaptive fitness in the
> > > individual with behaviors that are manifest only at the population
> > > level
> >
> > Give me an example.
>
> This is where YOU are supposed to give an example. One of the major
> detractions against group selection is that there is nothing guarding
> against the "less fit" members of a community passing on their genes as
> well.

Yes, obviously. And I dealt with this issue in my hypothesis.

> Organic evolution involves the change of allele frequencies in a
> population over time.

That's one way of defining it. But not the only way.

> This is accomplished by differential survival
> and reproduction between those with and without particular alleles.

Okay, I'm following your argument. Let's see if you actually have a
point in all this.


> If
> the population is selected, by what means do alleles within the
> population change in frequency?

Come on, Jason. Use your head. You are making the common mistake of
assuming the population and the selected group are one and the same.
They are not. I'll give you some theoretical numbers that should
clarify the situation for you. Population size = 500,000. Average
group size = 500.

I think you can figure it out from here without me having to spell it
out for you.


> Or are the behaviors and traits you're
> referring to not under genetic regulation? If they are, you have to
> account for how they spread in a population, what mechanisms prevent
> "cheaters" from prospering disproportionately (cheaters being those who
> benefit from the behaviors of the group but do not similarly
> participate and thus do not equally share the costs--this is a classic
> problem, perhaps not insurmountable, but certainly one that has been
> exceptionally difficult to reconcile with group selection models).

I agree (and I'm a little surprised that you are even sophisticated
enough to bring up this issue). This is the issue that Richard
Alexander had such a difficult time with and it eventually caused him
to give up the fight (* See below). He lacked the benefits of my
paleoclimatological and biogeographical knowledge. As explained in my
hypothesis, it was the emergence of the monsoon climate and the ensuing
predatory massacres of the dry season that solved this issue. Because
of these factors the fate of any member of a community was largely or
completely tied to the fate of the community as a whole.

http://tinyurl.com/d5cgw

(*) Alexander correctly surmised that in order for an
autocatalytic process to be actualized there had to have been some
means by
which the "losers or insipient losers" of any such socially oriented
selective scenario couldn't just walk away without losing even bigger.
In
other words, Alexander realized that a necessary component of any such
socially oriented, autocatalytic, selective process had to have
involved the
participants having little choice but to participate, with the only
alternative being sure and certain death.

> If
> these behaviors are not result of some genetic regulation,

How could they not be?

> what you are
> proposing is a cultural selection model (and this not at all a novel
> idea of yours) and is independent of organic evolution.

Cultural selection is mumbo jumbo nonsense. Only anthropologists talk
this way.

> Honestly, your
> treatise or hypothesis or whatever you're calling it didn't adequately
> address this.

Address what? Be clear.

> It wasn't a scientific model. It was a rambling bit
> that wasn't completely off base and had interesting grains within in,
> but wasn't anything close to being "indisputable."

Well, then where's your dispute. Surely you must be aware of some
piece of evidence that disputes it. No? Gee, that's too bad.

>
> > > and don't appear to assist others with biological relationships
> > > (and consequently, similar genetic makeup) over those with whom no
> > > close ties are shared? It's all well and good to say that you're a
> > > group selectionist, but your model doesn't actually address the
> > > mechanisms in any detail with which to address this.
> >
> > Mechanism? For group selection you have to have groups. This may seem
> > obvious but it's really not. Geographic factors--in the context of the
> > monsoon forest habitat--delineated the first human groups. I'm sure
> > you remember from having read my hypothesis: town-sized, city-sized
> > patches of remaining forest habitat, islands in a sea of most treeless
> > and large-mammal dominated habitat.
>
> You are not describing a mechanism of organic evolution, the change in
> the genetic makeup of a population over time. What makes the allele
> frequencies change?

Differential survival, as indicated in my hypothesis. Obviously the
groups that avoid the predatory massacres are the ones that pass on
their genes. It's not like you couldn't have figured this part out on
your own.

>
> [snip the rest. It's irrelevant beyond this point.]

Jim

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Beyond the Savanna Mentality
    ... >> Jim McGinn wrote: ... >> No, Jim, I could and did dispute your claim. ... That is the definition of organic evolution that biologists today use. ... >> exceptionally difficult to reconcile with group selection models). ...
    (sci.anthropology.paleo)
  • Re: just cleaning because of a difference let alone the clinic is too coming for Yosri to chat it
    ... note the orientations. ... terminate from time to time Latif when the striped quotas suggest ... Why will we proclaim after Jim catchs the reduced villa's husband? ... coherent selection newly. ...
    (sci.crypt)
  • Re: Pasting pictures from Excel to Word (2000)
    ... Jim, thanks for your suggestion. ... The code didn't know which selection to paste to, so I was able to fix that. ... Private Sub Print_BL_Click ... Dim WordApp As Word.Application, BlankBL As Word.Document ...
    (microsoft.public.excel.programming)
  • Re: selected range has different cell formatting
    ... Hi Jim, thank you very much for your reply. ... the help file is worth reading first. ... MsgBox "The number format for all cells in the selection must be General. ... Exit Sub ...
    (microsoft.public.excel.programming)
  • Re: Hamiltons rule in small population
    ... The above is just rhetorical and therefore meaningless until Jim actually ... The difference between individual selection ... It attempts to define organism groups ... >> (reduce their own organism fitness). ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)
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