Re: Lottery tickets

From: Perplexed in Peoria (jimmenegay_at_sbcglobal.net)
Date: 02/21/05 

Date: Mon, 21 Feb 2005 00:48:40 -0500 (EST)

"Jim McGinn" <jimmcginn@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:cvb068$ref$1@darwin.ediacara.org...
>
> Perplexed in Peoria wrote:
> > Are winning lottery tickets different from lottery
> > tickets that don't win in terms of their causative
> > properties? Yes, No.
>
> Yes.

To be honest, you surprised me. I thought you would say
"No".

> > If they are different in terms of their causative
> > properties what is the PROXIMATE mechanism by which
> > they produce this difference is causative properties?
>
> It is their numbers on the ticket and the arrangement
> thereof that cause lottery officials to deposit large
> sums in the holder's bank account when the ticket is
> presented to the them.
>
> > I mean, do tickets somehow know whether or not they are
> > winning and act accordingly? How do they know this?
>
> The ticket does not know but the holder can know
> by listening to the media to see if the numbers
> match.

And this is excellent reasoning in support of your "No"
answer to the first question. The winning tickets differ
from the non-winning tickets in terms of their information
content. That information is causitive (in conjunction
with the information-processing capabilities of a lottery
official who exert the proximate causation in paying
out the prize.

> > If they are not different in terms of their causative
> > properties then why even bother to distinguish between
> > them?
>
> Not applicable.
>
> > (Genes that are IBD differ from non-IBD genes in an
> > odd way. They happen to **receive** more altruism
> > under kin selection than do the non-IBD genes. Or,
> > rather, they inhabit Dawkins vehicles that receive
> > more altruism. Though they do nothing to "cause"
> > this good luck.)
>
> I think your thinking is flawed unless you can
> answer how it is that the other non-IBD genes
> that are contained in the same organism, the
> same Dawkinsian vehicle, are excluded from the
> benefits of this good luck?

No one would claim that the non-IBD genes in the same
organism are excluded. Only non-IBD genes in the bodies
of those unfortunate individuals who are not related to
the altruist are excluded. And those bodies only have
non-IBD genes. All of the IBD genes in the population
live in the altruist's relatives.

> (Note that I actually answered your questions.
> Yourself, Joe, William, JE, and many others have
> failed to answer my questions.)

And I thank you for answering. Now I can answer your
questions in a way I had not anticipated.

> > 1) All other things being the same, are genes that
> > are IBD different from genes that are not IBD in
> > terms of their causative properties? Yes, No?

Yes. If you consider "formal cause" (i.e. information
content) as a kind of causation. And also if you accept
statistical causation as true causation. Statistical
causation (A "causes" B) exists if the presence of A
increases the probability that B will occur.

> > 2) If they are different in terms of their causative
> > properties what is the PROXIMATE mechanism by which
> > they produce this difference in causative properties?

When present in an organism, they cause the organism to
receive altruism. They do so by means of the information
that they represent, by residing in one organism's body
rather than another. The donor organism dispenses his
altruism preferentially to organisms that bear IDB genes.
In fact, he dispenses the altruism to a group of organisms
whose average ratio of IBD genes to all genes is "r".
But if he had chosen a randomly selected group of organisms
to receive his altruism, the ratio of IBG genes to all
genes would be near zero (assuming the population size
is much larger than the donor's count of close relatives).

> > I mean, do genes somehow know whether or not they are
> > IBD and act accordingly? Yes, No? How do they know
> > this?

The genes don't know, but the donor organism "processes"
the information that the IBD gene represents. That information
says, in effect, "Hey dufus! I'm family. Be nice!".

> > 3) If they are not different in terms of their
> > causative properties then why even bother to
> > distinguish between them?

I have a sneaking suspicion that you are not going to accept
the above answers. Perhaps you will even quote from the
first chapter of a t***b**k on statistical inference at me.
"Correlation is not causation". Hmmm. Am I treating
correlation as causation in the above? Perhaps I am.

So, let me change my answer to the first question to "No",
which was my original intention. But let me reemphasize
that it is the presence of IBD genes in the recipient of the
altruism (NOT the donor!) that is important.

Ok. Now for the answer to the third question. "Why even
bother to distinguish them?" Answer: We distinguish them
so that we can count them. And we count them so that we
can calculate a correlation. And we calculate a correlation
because it is required by the math. And you are, so far,
refusing to pay any attention to the math.

You (and Edser too) have a warped picture of what Hamilton's
rule is all about. There is no new mechanism involved.
It is just good, old fashioned Darwinian natural selection
at the organism level. Hamilton's rule uses some fairly
difficult math to address a moderately difficult question
and provides a deceptively simple answer. The question is:

 "IF an organism happens to practice altruism and happens
 to target (directly, or due to "viscosity") that altruism
 at relatives, under what circumstances will that organism's
 genes (including the ones causing the altruism) increase in
 frequency in the population?"

The answer is that the genes (i.e. the donors alleles at each
and every locus) will tend to increase in frequency if the
altruistic behavior satisfies the inequality rb>c.

Why do we even bother talking about IBD genes? Well,
we are talking about altruism toward relatives here, so we
need some kind of measurement of how close a relative is.
IBD happens to be one natural metric which already existed
in the literature in 1964. Why use it as our metric, instead
of some other natural metric of relatedness from the literature?

BECAUSE THE MATH WORKS!

Because when you work through the population genetics of the
question, using that particular metric of closeness of relation,
it yields the simple answer "frequency increases if and only if
rb>c". Using some other metric of closeness of relation would
force us to use a much more complicated rule to determine
whether the genes increase in frequency.

Edser believes that the math is correct as math, but it is
wrong as biology because it assumes a biological mechanism -
gene level selection - which Edser disapproves of. Edser is
wrong. Hamilton's rule (1964 version, at least) does not
depend in any way on gene level selection. It is good old
fashioned Darwinian natural selection at the organism level.
Edser would realize this if he actually followed the math,
rather than excusing himself on the grounds that good math
does not equate to good biology.

You (McGinn) seem to believe that anything based on purely
organism level selection must be wrong, because you see
selection happening at many levels. Well, that may be the
case, but that doesn't explain your opposition to Hamilton.
After all, the typical multi-level selectionist should
simply say the Hamilton's rule correctly describes some
features of selection at the organism level, but there is
much more going on. You are not saying that. You are claiming
that Hamilton's rule is wrong. No, more than that, you are
saying (like Wolfgang Pauli) that it is "not even wrong".
That it is an illusion. That it is vaporware. You seem to
think that NO ONE can follow the math. (You are definitely
wrong on this last point. Even you could probably follow it,
if you just gave it a try. But you refuse.)

Why the opposition? I notice that you seem to have some scheme
for your own theory of Darwinian evolution which is quite
different from the "modern synthesis". The slogan of the
modern synthesis is that "Genes mutate, organisms are selected,
species evolve". I'm guessing that your slogan might be,
"Morphologies mutate, all levels are selected, the biosphere
evolves". Well, lotsa luck. I hope you continue to present
your ideas toward this theory in this NG. Maybe you have
a better idea. But I don't see why you have to trash
Hamilton model to create "lebensraum" for your theory. So
that can't be the reason for your hostility either.

I know that you are going to respond that "The reason I say
it is vapor, is because it IS vapor. And the proof that it
is vapor is that defenders of Hamilton can't explain it to
my satisfaction in this NG." Well, if that is the criterion
that you think should apply, then perhaps you should not bother
trying to post your own ideas regarding "cumulative existence"
(and the like) to this NG. I doubt that you will be able to
explain it to the satisfaction of any of the people who have
been burned by your scorched earth tactics.