Re: [evol-psych] That Old Magic - Evolutionary Psychology, Part I

Ian Pitchford wrote:
>
> June 01, 2005
>
> That Old Magic - Evolutionary Psychology, Part I
> Bonnie Alba
>
<snipped>
>
> This is the giant question left open: Are we just matter, dust,
> water and chemicals; materialistic mammals with well-developed
> animal brains? Or are we also endowed with an extra something,
> the mind-soul? Those who hold only to physicalism must still
> live in the real world of their own self-aware consciousness.
> Who has not experienced the knowledge of free will, ability to
> know and choose right and wrong, good and evil, morality and
> immorality, life and death. This is not an evolving mechanism
> and remains outside of the construct of material science.
>

As I read her, Bonnie Alba has three STATED objections to the
theory of natural selection:

1. The Ontological Objection
The theory of natural selection necessitates that there
are no minds, egos, souls, thoughts, feelings, etc., at
least not as these terms are traditionally construed as
referring to non-physical features of nature.
2. The Free Will Objection
The theory of natural selection necessitates that there
is no free will.
3. The Ethics Objection
The theory of natural selection necessitates that there
is no right or wrong.


THE ETHICS OBJECTION

I believe I've pretty much
demolished the ethics objection, not by some convoluted line
of argument that morality is somehow adaptive (it isn't), but
rather in terms of a theory of rationality that employs the
theory of natural selection as its springboard. This theory
is based on the premise that 'feelings of worthlessness' are a
maladaptive by-product of the evolution of rationality. For
those who missed it, here is a repeat of some of it which I
include here as a rebuttal to Alba's ethics objection:


Observation: The species in which rationality is most developed
is also the one in which individuals have the greatest
difficulty in maintaining an adequate sense of self-worth,
often going to extraordinary lengths in doing so (e.g., Evel
Knievel, celibate monks, 9/11 terrorists, etc.).

Hypothesis: Rationality is antagonistic to psycho centric
stability (i.e., maintaining an "adequate" sense of self-
worth).

Explanation #1: In much the manner reasoning allows for the
subordination of lower emotional concerns and values (pain,
fear, anger, sex, etc.) to more global concerns (concern
for the self as a whole), so too, these more global concerns
and values can themselves become reevaluated and subordinated
to other more global, MORE OBJECTIVE considerations. And if
this is so, and assuming that emotional disorder emanates from
a deficiency in self-worth resulting from precisely this sort
of experientially based reevaluation, then it can reasonably
be construed as a natural malfunction resulting from one's
rational faculties functioning a tad too well.

Explanation #2: Being the blind arational process that she is,
mother nature instills in all her creatures a sense of their
own importance (or of the importance of their needs) that
is rationally inordinate. And, as a species reaches a certain
stage in its rational/cultural/memetic development, its
members increasingly come to question this inordinancy, and
increasingly come to require reasons (justification) for
maintaining it (needs for love, acceptance, moral integrity,
religion, autonomy, justice, purpose, meaning, status,
wealth, etc.).

Ethics: Since, according to this explanation, more rational equates
with more valuatively objective, the valuative objectivity
inherent in the moral maxim, 'Love (intrinsically value) your
neighbor as you love (intrinsically value) yourself' would be
construed as an implicit theory of rationality we humans have
been subconsciously entertaining for the past several thousand
years. It would also mean that the author of Genesis got it
right in referring to the emergence of an awareness of right
and wrong as a form of knowledge. The emotive force of
moral argument apparently arises from the fact that viewing
ourselves as rational is a crucial determinant in assessing
self-worth which, in a species that accomplishes its survival
from a conscious intention to do so (long range planning)
rather than as a cumulative effect of blindly responding to
stimuli, is just another way of talking about "the will to
survive".

Incompleteness:
Of course, no human is likely to measure up to this very
high standard of loving others as they love themself, but
then another one of the myriads of implications of this
new scientific theory of rationality is that no person,
belief, objective, theory, etc. is likely to be rational
in any but a relative sense of the term (the empirical
analogue of Godel's logical discovery that mathematical
rationality can never be found in its entirety within
a formal system).



THE FREE WILL OBJECTION

If 'feelings of worthlessness' are indeed a maladaptive by-product
of the evolution of rationality, as I maintain, then it seems to
me we are entitled to a number of interesting conclusions regarding
the nature of free will as well:


Indeterminism: "Free will" and the incessant activity presumed
to emanate from it is simply the insatiable appetite members
of our species have for self-significating/self-worth
enhancing experience (juxtaposed with the need to avoid the
pain of 'feelings of worthlessness') which, in turn, is simply
nature's way of attempting to counter the objectifying
influences of our rational faculties. As such, although "free
will" itself (the self-worth complex) is constrained within
parameters determined by natural selection (the maximizing of
self-worth), its presence in us, manifested in the need to
expend significant amounts of effort and energy on maintaining
emotional well-being (keeping up with the Joneses, climbing Mt.
Everest, posting to newsgroups, etc.) would, according to this
perspective, be construed as evidence that members of nature's
most rational species have become TOO VALUATIVELY OJECTIVE
(requiring remedial adaptation) and, as such, LESS VALUATIVELY/
CONATIVELY DETERMINED by natural selection than members of
less rational more emotionally stable species. In this view,
indeterminism is manifested, not in the ability to change one's
mind about what to have for breakfast, but rather in a species
whose members appear less concerned with staying alive (e.g.,
daily suicide bombings in the Middle East) than with nurturing
REASONS (justification) for staying alive (needs for love,
acceptance, moral integrity, religion, autonomy, justice,
dignity, purpose, meaning, fame, status, wealth, power, etc.).


'Terrorism is the result of poverty. Not a poverty of
material things, but rather a poverty of dignity'
(Egyptian philosopher on recent TV documentary on
terrorism).



THE ONTOLOGICAL OBJECTION

In my humble opinion, this is not so much an objection to the
theory of natural selection, as an objection to those who have
mistakenly assumed that success in the physical sciences
entitles us to sweeping conclusions about ancient metaphysical
mysteries, e.g., that the mind/body problem has been resolved
in favor of the body. In a previous post I suggested this
was based on a faulty syllogism:


Premise: 'Physical science has proceeded at the speed of
light while psychology has remained a basket
case.'
Conclusion: 'Mechanistic materialism is "true"'.


A considerably less extravagant and certainly more potentially
productive syllogism would be:


Premise: 'Physical science has proceeded at the speed of
light while psychology has remained a basket
case.'
Conclusion: 'Psychical science is harder to do, initially at
least (e.g. the individualization problem).


Rather than deluding ourselves that we now have answers to
questions where we haven't even scratched the surface (e.g.,
the mind/body problem), I would suggest that the
best way to address Alba's ontological objection is to get on
with the business of doing psychical science in earnest. And in
this regard, I would suggest a pretty good place to start
would be with attempting to address a non-physical theoretical
anomaly ('feelings of worthlessness'), as I have suggested in
my stated objective in proposing my hypothesis in the first
place:


Objective: To account for self-worth related emotion (i.e., needs for
love, acceptance, moral integrity, recognition, achievement,
purpose, meaning, etc.) and emotional disorder (e.g., depression,
suicide, etc.) within the context of an evolutionary scenario; i.e., to
synthesize natural science and the humanities; i.e., to answer the
question: 'Why is there a species of naturally selected organism
expending huge quantities of effort and energy on the survivalistically
bizarre non-physical objective of maximizing self-worth?'





PR













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