Re: Engineering Environment

From: Kevin Aylward (salesEXTRACT_at_anasoft.co.uk)
Date: 09/15/04 

Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 21:02:38 GMT

Joerg wrote:
> Hi Kevin,
>
>>> I strongly believe
>>> that such conversions can happen, and they do all the time.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Indeed that can. Unfortunately those that don't take the trouble to
>> understand Evolution have no idea on what it explains. Genes don't
>> hard code all of human behaviour in the slightest. This is trivially
>> naive view. Have a read on my papers, especially,
>> http://www.anasoft.co.uk/replicators/emotions.html. It will explain
>> how morals (memes) program emotions (genes) allowing for, in
>> principle, any behaviour.
>>
>>
> In that paper you write, for example, that emotions must be selfish
> and love is a recognition that someone has something to aid your
> interests.

Yep. They have to be. Emotions are physical gene traits that have been
well replicated and selected over millions of generations, so under the
theory, they must be selfish. Its not debatable. Genes satisfy the
axioms, therefore they must satisfy the conclusions that are
mathematically derived for *any* trait.

>
> Sorry, Kevin, but that is just one example where I respectfully
> disagree.

You may disagree, but you would be wrong. If you had actually read the
paper and understood it, you will see why what I say is correct. Its
very simple and not debatable, so long as the human satisfies the
abstract mathematical definitions, but of course they do, we know
experimentally that humans satisfy, replication, selection and
generation properties.

>How, then, do you explain acts of love where people clearly
> expect nothing in return?

No problem at all.

>Such as spending countless hours with a
> lonely dying person until he or she passes away. Such as giving in
> complete anonymity. Such as volunteering in wild animal rescue. I
> could go on and on. Some might do that to lift their self-respect but
> most don't need that. They simply give.

Oh dear... You obviously didn't understand the papers, as this is
explicitly addressed. Look dude, this is all explainable in the
approach, if you care to spend a little time on it.

>
> You can see the same thing in engineering. When someone helps a fellow
> engineer who got stuck, after hours, without even expecting as much
> as a free beer in the pub.

But he usually expects a return in the long run. For example, suppose
there is a group of you, meeting down the pub once a week. Now, bob
goes, fancy a pint Jim. Sure... Now suppose its six months later, and
Jim has *never* returned the favour, to anyone in the group. Do I really
have to explain the sort of thing that happens to such a free loader?

Have a look at http://www.anasoft.co.uk/replicators/altruism.html
Then give me an argument, why the argument is false.

But you really need to understand the structure of the theory, to see
just why it is a good theory.

>Happens all the time. A perfect example is
> this forum. It got many folks out of a pickle because the others
> freely helped them.

You are simply looking at this, again, with all due respect, from an
incredible elementary an naive view. You need to do reading on the
papers to see how this is addressed. There is a lot more going on
underneath that you are giving credit for. You need to look much more
deeply at "people freely helping others". Again,
http://www.anasoft.co.uk/replicators/altruism.html is a reasonable
start.

There's no point in me addressing why you are wrong until you have at
least a basic understanding of how this is actually addressed, within
Darwinian Evolution theory. The questions you pose here are 101, and
easily explainable. You are under the impression that a brief, general
overall statement contains the full content of the theory. One has to
walk before one can run.

I dont think you yet understand the power of the approach. Its outlined
on the main page.
1 Simple definitions and some very simple assumptions are made
concerning the theory.

2 A simple mathematical argument is then made from the assumptions.

3 Traits such as emotions, morals and fashions are defined and
identified as satisfying the assumptions of the mathematics.

4 Behavior is than deduced from the mathematical results.

You need to take each bit at a time and show where there is an *actual*
error in logic to have any hope of showing the approach is invalid, as
it does indeed, account for all phenomena.

Kevin Aylward
salesEXTRACT@anasoft.co.uk
http://www.anasoft.co.uk
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