The evolutionary algorithm is a powerful thing, but it doesn't apply everywhere.

This sounds like a different song you are singing now as opposed to what our previous discussion was about the EA.

I haven't gotten a chance to look at your response to my genetic fallacy accusation. I've been torn in several directions this past day and a half.

Are you familiar with Hempel's covering law model?

How might an evolutionary algorithm be falsified by Hempel's model?

Thanks

I think Dennett tries to explain religion historically in Darwinian terms or evolutionary psychological terms.
And his meme theory in viral terms with analogies from parasitism in the natural world.
So I think it is more than Interbane says, merely enlarging it to fashions,music etc as well as ideas.

Dennett like Dawkins tries to understand things outside of biological change in the natural world in Darwinian terms.
So this is really an extrapolation of a theory into areas to which it does not naturally apply.
Dennett would say that atheism is a meme but not of course of the parasitic kind. That would be religious belief!

Flann 5 wrote:I think Dennett tries to explain religion historically in Darwinian terms or evolutionary psychological terms.
And his meme theory in viral terms with analogies from parasitism in the natural world.
So I think it is more than Interbane says, merely enlarging it to fashions,music etc as well as ideas.

Dennett like Dawkins tries to understand things outside of biological change in the natural world in Darwinian terms.
So this is really an extrapolation of a theory into areas to which it does not naturally apply.
Dennett would say that atheism is a meme but not of course of the parasitic kind. That would be religious belief!

This is a very good point and one that has historical examples of when worldviews formed and shaped analogies of Nature.
The current Darwinian (paradigm?) worldview has been extrapolated to explain the universe as one among many that "evolve" with only the "fittest" capable of sustaining life.

Excellent point, Flann!!

I suppose Carrier's thinking is not motivated? He talks about method.

Everyone is motivated. At least anyone that feels (e)motion. The difference is some follow emotion in spite of contrary reason. Others follow reason against their emotion. At times at least. It all depends on how much you value method. The more you value method, the more likely you are to abandon your beliefs if method shows they are wrong. To do this, you need to hold all of your reasoning accountable to all method. Remember a few weeks ago when I kept pointing out logical fallacies, but you kept pushing forward, ignoring them or not recognizing them or not believing me? That is the difference I'm talking about. Any man of method would have paused and reconsidered that specific belief.

There are plenty of good reasons for belief in God.

There might be value laden reasons, but no truth laden reasons. Perhaps the belief in god is a psychological palliative. But I've never seen good reasons in the sense of truthful reasoning. Give me the number one strongest "good" reason you have. Or don't, we've been over it all before.

How might an evolutionary algorithm be falsified by Hempel's model?

Why would an algorithm be falsified? What are you talking about? Should we rename the theory of evolution or cultural evolution? Or is it that you deny them operating in an algorithmic fashion? Do these mechanisms operate outside of the math-centric laws of our universe? I'm really not sure what you're trying to say.

So I think it is more than Interbane says, merely enlarging it to fashions,music etc as well as ideas.

I've already explained how the concept is no different from common understanding. Ideas go viral. Ideas are believed for reasons that don't translate to truthfulness. Ideas are held against all reason. Nothing new is being proposed. There are ideas that it is more than justified to compare to viruses. Religion has many of the same propagatory characteristics. You may not like it, but it's plainly true. I've never said Dennet wasn't justified in that regard. My point was that he's right even if you reject the idea of the meme. All the same understanding applies. We could say that there are ideas that have the characteristics of viruses, and the meaning and evidence would all still be there. It's just that the term "meme" is a more effective referent.

With that said, there are places where I think Dawkins goes too far. He tries to pull over a bit too much of the organic evolutionary terminology. I'm not saying he's wrong, but in many cases, the term-swapping is forced. We already have precise labels for many of the things he tries to apply other labels to.

This is a very good point and one that has historical examples of when worldviews formed and shaped analogies of Nature.

Since we humans are a part of nature, such references turn out to be accurate and useful, wouldn't you say?

Why would an algorithm be falsified? What are you talking about? Should we rename the theory of evolution or cultural evolution?

As extrapolated by you applicable to the entire universe.

That's what I meant

EDITED:

Do you know what I'm talking about re Hempel's law?

As extrapolated by you applicable to the entire universe.

That's what I meant

This doesn't clarify it for me at all. "The entire universe obeys an algorithm" is something I proposed that you want to falsify? Uh huh.

Do you know what I'm talking about re Hempel's law?

I read most of the entry on the guy after you mentioned him. I didn't see what you're talking about.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hempe ... rBetTheLaw

Hi Interbane,
Yes ideas can be influential,true or false or propaganda using psychological techniques. And we clearly believe all sorts of things which conflict with the views of others in many areas. Also the question of why we believe things is important.

Dawkins Dennet and Carrier are using a model. So memes (ideas) replicate,compete for survival,mutate,invade "hosts" and "hijack" their brains destroying their hosts in a self perpetuation and reproduction quest as genes are said to.
So it's more than an metaphor for Dawkins and co and it fails on those terms. Carrier's statements about religion are not justifiable in the language of religious memes. I mentioned Antony Flew just as a single example to show that the "virus" language can not explain religious belief. Viruses invade our bodies without our consent or even knowledge.Ideas pass through our minds and we accept or reject them for reasons that may be good or bad. Meme theory has been well critiqued and it fails in many ways not least in understanding human thinking in relation to ideas.
It's true that often we believe in the cultural traditions we are raised in so the Arab World has many Muslims for instance.
At the same times in countries where atheism was culturally indoctrinated like China, Christianity is increasing.
So historically we often see shifts in beliefs away from cultural traditions.
Atheism could be explained also in the same kinds of ways Carrier does for belief in God,but that would be an equally false explanation. So the world is full of all kinds of different beliefs.I don't find Carrier's explanations for his beliefs in "memes" multiverse and mythicism plausible on the grounds of good methodology but rather as rationalisations in relation to God and Christianity for psychological reasons.
We can agree that deception,false beliefs and ideologies are harmful in many ways but meme theory is an extrapolation from virology and genetics that can not be consistently applied and though there are some metaphorical similarities these are well covered by regular studies in relevant fields.

Flann wrote:So memes (ideas) replicate,compete for survival,mutate,invade "hosts" and "hijack" their brains destroying their hosts in a self perpetuation and reproduction quest as genes are said to.

All of these processes apply to information, yes. But the terminology is not what I would use. The one part I would disagree with is that ideas destroy their hosts. Some ideas are destructive, absolutely. But they are extreme cases, such as suicide cults. Even then, you can't say the idea destroys the person in a quest, because there is no perpetuation if the host dies. You can't also say the idea destroys the host in a quest, because that implies the concept that ideas have agency, which is an absurd notion. Ideas do not go on quests.

Viruses invade our bodies without our consent or even knowledge.

Drawing attention to differences between viruses and ideas does not mean they do not also share common characteristics. There are many similarities, in spite of the differences. An analogy holds true in spite of differences, because the intent of an analogy is a comparison of what's shared, rather than showing the two as perfectly identical.

I don't find Carrier's explanations for his beliefs in "memes" multiverse and mythicism plausible on the grounds of good methodology but rather as rationalisations in relation to God and Christianity for psychological reasons.

This is interesting. You're saying you can point to where Carrier deviates from proper method? Please do. I saw no break from method throughout his book.

If you're instead saying he's motivated, then you're right, but that does not cast a shadow on his conclusions. There is no person on Earth lacking motive in the sense you mean. What matters is method, not motive. If proper method is followed, then all is well, regardless of motive. Motivated reasoning cannot turn a falsehood into the truth, method will not allow it. This assumes we have a party with a critical enough eye to spot flaws of method. If you're saying you're that guy regarding Carrier, I'd like to see your notes. It's been shown that his work with Bayesian statistics is flawed, and that's a great example. Show the same for the conclusions in his book, and I'l believe you. Otherwise, there's zero justification for your dismissal, especially after having discussed the book.

Don't share your notes in this thread though. Let's stick to memes here.

though there are some metaphorical similarities these are well covered by regular studies in relevant fields.

I completely agree with you on this point. But notice that this doesn't mean the meme model is wrong. It is simply imprecise in points, and a duplication of existing vernacular. But not wrong.

Interbane wrote:All of these processes apply to information, yes. But the terminology is not what I would use. The one part I would disagree with is that ideas destroy their hosts. Some ideas are destructive, absolutely. But they are extreme cases, such as suicide cults. Even then, you can't say the idea destroys the person in a quest, because there is no perpetuation if the host dies. You can't also say the idea destroys the host in a quest, because that implies the concept that ideas have agency, which is an absurd notion. Ideas do not go on quests.

It's refreshing Interbane to see that you disagree with Dawkins and Dennett since they are the ones implying agency to memes in their use of Darwinian imagery of competing, surviving and having a programmed "purpose" to replicate themselves.

It's interesting too that in actual viral invasion,the killing of the cell and hijacking of it's apparatus to replicate itself and destroy the body the whole thing looks so purposeful and clever both from the attack strategies of the viruses and the bodies defense mechanisms counter strategies.
One could say it looks very intelligently designed!
Dennett uses the analogy of the cuckoo laying it's egg in another bird's nest and this monstrous creature once hatched proceeds to dump the bona fide eggs out of the nest and weary the smaller deceived "parents" with unceasing demands for food.
So there's the idea of infiltration by deception and destruction of the true and genuine by the usurper.
As a matter of curiosity how do you think the bird brained Cuckoo came up with this surprising strategy? Maybe Richard Dawkins knows as he studies these things.
If I remember right the cuckoos egg is a dead ringer in colour and pattern to the eggs of the other bird. How does the cuckoo put these two things together the audacious plan and the right colour and pattern for the egg?
You may say, it just happened to work so they survived but I think there is something more to it than that, and the natural world is full of such things.
Then there's the virus analogy. Invasion,hijacking of the cells replication system and destruction of the cell and maybe body.
How would you say these correspond to how ideas work in society and individuals minds?
I think in both analogies proper account is not taken of how we process information. The suggestion is that it simply bypasses our minds.
I would say the extreme complexity and coordination of activity in the battle of virus and body points to intelligence. You would say that proper method says that neo -Darwinism explains it. I question this theory. But even if conceded how a purposeless unguided process could produce this doesn't make sense to me.
Personally I don't think there is a one size fits all answer to the question of why people believe in a God,many gods or no God or for all the many other things people believe or disagree on.

Flann 5 wrote:Dawkins Dennet and Carrier are using a model. So memes (ideas) replicate,compete for survival,mutate,invade "hosts" and "hijack" their brains destroying their hosts in a self perpetuation and reproduction quest as genes are said to.
So it's more than an metaphor for Dawkins and co and it fails on those terms

Hi Flann, I'm always surprised at the resistance to the idea of memes. There are clearly similarities between the way ideas are propagated and spread through our culture and the way biological information is passed down via our genes. In the end it's is an interesting way of looking at ideas and how they spread. I think the similarities are much more than just analogous, but actually Dawkins makes it pretty clear that he is talking about memes as analagous to genes as this passage from THE SELFISH GENE shows.

Cultural transmission is analogous to genetic transmission in that, although basically conservative, it can give rise to a form of evolution. Geoffrey Chaucer could not hold a conversation with a modern Englishman, even though they are linked to each other by an unbroken chain of some twenty generations of Englishmen, each of whom could speak to his immediate neighbours in the chain as a son speaks to his father. Language seems to `evolve' by non-genetic means, and at a rate which is orders of magnitude faster than genetic evolution.

The entire Ch. 11 of Dawkins’ book can be found here:

http://www.rubinghscience.org/memetics/ ... memes.html

Carrier's analysis of the religious meme is still largely a comparison to a virus, noting its similiarities. I'd say if it bothers you enough, ignore Carrier's comments about religion and think instead about the viral quality or sticky quality of political ideas or the way language evolves over time. Language when separated by geography or time drifts in a way that is uncannily similar to genetic drift as this peer-reviewed published paper explores.

http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/ ... 9.full.pdf

Here’s the abstract:

Scientists studying how languages change over time often make an analogy between biological and
cultural evolution, with words or grammars behaving like traits subject to natural selection. Recent
work has exploited this analogy by using models of biological evolution to explain the properties of
languages and other cultural artefacts. However, the mechanisms of biological and cultural evolution are
very different: biological traits are passed between generations by genes, while languages and concepts
are transmitted through learning. Here we show that these different mechanisms can have the same results,
demonstrating that the transmission of frequency distributions over variants of linguistic forms by Bayesian
learners is equivalent to the Wright–Fisher model of genetic drift. This simple learning mechanism thus
provides a justification for the use of models of genetic drift in studying language evolution. In addition
to providing an explicit connection between biological and cultural evolution, this allows us to define a
‘neutral’ model that indicates how languages can change in the absence of selection at the level of linguistic
variants. We demonstrate that this neutral model can account for three phenomena: the s-shaped curve of
language change, the distribution of word frequencies, and the relationship between word frequencies and
extinction rates.