tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post3483012796731993676..comments2024-03-14T11:09:32.759-05:00Comments on Falkenblog: Nonscientists Naive about ScienceEric Falkensteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07243687157322033496noreply@blogger.comBlogger131125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-81709630940733704412009-09-29T15:08:38.706-05:002009-09-29T15:08:38.706-05:00The above is not quite accurate The algorithms ci...The above is not quite accurate The algorithms cited by Dennett served a purpose in nature but were not purposeful from the particular organism's point of view - in the sense that the strategies I'm concerned with serve the purposes of the organisms themselves.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-4414882833867222172009-09-28T15:01:58.099-05:002009-09-28T15:01:58.099-05:00Has Jon Fairchild actually read Darwin's Dange...Has Jon Fairchild actually read Darwin's Dangerous Idea as he has claimed? Dennett wrote, "what Darwin discovered was not really one algorithm but, rather, a large class of related algorithms that he had no clear way to distinguish. We can now reformulate his fundamental idea as follows: Life on Earth has been generated over billions of tears in a single branching tree-the Tree of Life-by one algorithmic process or another."<br />I'd say the E-man snookered Jon by substituting strategy for algorithm and Jon didn't catch the connection.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-28806845430642323002009-09-27T14:47:13.437-05:002009-09-27T14:47:13.437-05:00Must be a joke. Assumes facts not in evidence. O...Must be a joke. Assumes facts not in evidence. Or evidence not in fact?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-48613855193013283132009-09-26T17:16:08.376-05:002009-09-26T17:16:08.376-05:00Jon Richfield hasn't had much luck with his ow...Jon Richfield hasn't had much luck with his own papers, but I hear the next one will reference the selection mechanism first discovered in Persia and will be a doozy - it's working title is Ali Baba and the Forty Sieves.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-82562622078972988262009-09-26T15:31:04.977-05:002009-09-26T15:31:04.977-05:00And, dear boy, after all was said and done, Domini...And, dear boy, after all was said and done, Dominic was no Percy.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-17863042665989968382009-09-26T13:38:30.148-05:002009-09-26T13:38:30.148-05:00RBH, Ooh and here I had thought you at least could...RBH, Ooh and here I had thought you at least could take a joke - assuming it's one you could get of course.<br />At least you're smart enough not to use your real name for a meltdown.<br /><br />By the way, are those sieves made out of tinfoil?elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-90103858841743002212009-09-26T13:24:16.666-05:002009-09-26T13:24:16.666-05:00LOL! And e-man's descent into supercilious cr...LOL! And e-man's descent into supercilious crankhood is complete.RBHhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13562135000111792590noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-14273007122362045832009-09-26T13:00:44.841-05:002009-09-26T13:00:44.841-05:00Jon Richfield,
My alleged pleas for support were ...Jon Richfield, <br />My alleged pleas for support were the voices in your head that prompted your pleas to be let in on the secret. Which simply is that the higher levels of abstraction are an incomprehensible surreality to those of you forever stuck on the next lower. We call it reversing the sieve thermodynamically so that it becomes our floor and your roof. We can reach down to where you can't reach up from.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-10713292123945455982009-09-26T07:31:10.547-05:002009-09-26T07:31:10.547-05:00Eman,
Ooooohhhh! Zat vos a choke, jaaaa?
You sh...Eman,<br /><br />Ooooohhhh! Zat vos a choke, jaaaa? <br /><br />You should have explained it to the lesser intellects, the slow of perception. The ones who responded to your pleas for support. <br /><br />Well, now is your chance to make good the lacunae in our perception. When you have finished laughing at it yourself, explain your witticism carefully and in great detail. I then will pass it round the Stalag so the rest if us will know when to laugh too when dealing with your sense of errr... wossname in future. <br /><br />"Sweetheart, in all your girlish charm you are,<br />Like laughter in a West End cinema.<br />When lightning wisecracks flash and spurt and throng,<br />Too loud my love, too late, and far too long." D.B.W.L.<br /><br />Meanwhile I'll leave you to hold the Fort!<br /><br />JonJon Richfieldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14166113190940745522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-70232182894614402902009-09-26T03:23:13.520-05:002009-09-26T03:23:13.520-05:00I see Jon, having given me a dose of his ridicule,...I see Jon, having given me a dose of his ridicule, couldn't take a bit of the jocular in return (didn't bother RBH all that much, but Jon may be a bit less secure with his self-image). Conspiracy to develop a prototypical algorithm? To use against my thesis?<br />Hey, rest easy, Jon, it wouldn't have been about your paranoia, <br />And yes, you got me - there wasn't any thesis - just having a little fun with the faux scientists here. Takes one to know one, right?elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-8652165267251165202009-09-26T02:51:32.385-05:002009-09-26T02:51:32.385-05:00I leave all and sundry here with this quote from B...I leave all and sundry here with this quote from Biochemist Gerald Hazelbaue of the University of Missouri in Columbia, who says that, “Experience shows that if one can think of a possible mechanism for a particular biological process, no matter how strange or unusual, there is probably a biological system or organism that utilizes that mechanism.”elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-30998780627301396092009-09-26T02:43:17.405-05:002009-09-26T02:43:17.405-05:00Hi elephantman
>Jon, that was good - now I can...Hi elephantman <br />>Jon, that was good - now I can predict a bit more as to potential objections to my thesis from a slightly more philosophical stance than RBH and clones can muster up.<<br />I don't know why you are so shrill with RBH, and some others. The points he raises are reasonable, and if your thesis is to be worthy of discussion, that will be on the merits of its theme and logic, not the stridency of the author. <br />Since I wrote the above (I actually am busy and have neglected commitments to gratify your wheedlings) I see you have added a few Parthian shots with Parthian courtesy to match. Do you have the faintest idea of the standard of ethics, never mind civility, corresponding to: "I suspect Jon and RBH have gone off together to try to arrange a variety of sieves in a series that will function as a prototypical algorithm. Also poking about in random fashion to find a niche to fit it to"? Do you imagine that guttersniping at professional competents whom you have importuned to help you in your incoherence of terminology and thought, is any substitute for either cogency or coherency? Gratuitous ascription of conspiracy against the integrity of your "thesis" is contemptible enough, without revealing your inability to tell from what we said that RBH and I had not the slightest need of recourse to each other for support in anything as trivial as this. <br />You say: "My work in progress is meant for public consumption in any case, not for an academic journal, or for the running of the per reviewers' gauntlet. They hate heresy even more than science blog aficionados, or than professional skeptics." The perennial whine of the Forteans; their substitute for dignity. Heresy is for doctrine, not science. What you are describing is noise. Scepticism is something you had better steer clear of; you patently are incapable of understanding it; it is strong meat for tyros. RBH and I have independently tried to get you to say something, anything, substantial, and in a week or so, not a nibble! The best you can do is... "Also if I revealed my core thesis it would have added to the clarity of the peripheral issues raised. But no could safely do." Trust me on one thing, eman: you could hardly have been safer. Patently you still haven't learnt to distinguish between coffee tables and elephants. <br />"I got a lot more out of the exchange than you did" -- yes, you got that right. What you did not get was any glimpse of insight into your own logical and technical bankruptcy. Bad luck! In case you do happen to look in again, then here is a closing request: Do let us know when your "thesis" for the public dawns on an astounded establishment. Since you never gave any intimation of any substance, I find myself curious to know just what you think it takes to aspire even to the cheap dignity of "heresy". <br />Good luck,<br />JonJon Richfieldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14166113190940745522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-78618473983032724982009-09-25T18:55:25.449-05:002009-09-25T18:55:25.449-05:00I guess I'm done then too, with this last rema...I guess I'm done then too, with this last remark: Clarity and length are not synonyms.RBHhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13562135000111792590noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-26889888146146381172009-09-25T18:52:11.331-05:002009-09-25T18:52:11.331-05:00RBH, the format of such a blog requires an idea to...RBH, the format of such a blog requires an idea to be condensed as a matter of space and reader interest.<br />I hate long posts and suspect others find them suspect as well - length is not commensurate with persuasiveness in my view. But persuasion is seldom achieved in these forums where the emphasis is more likely to be on preaching to the crowd. You are not necessarily of the crowd that will be receptive to my version of heresy in any case. You have missed a lot of the meaning in the references accordingly. Go to Google Books and read the suggested book chapter on choice making functions - it's right there on line.<br />Also my style is admittedly to test for reactions among the faithful. So I got a lot more out of the exchange than you did. Also if I revealed my core thesis it would have added to the clarity of the peripheral issues raised. But no could safely do.<br />My work in progress is meant for public consumption in any case, not for an academic journal, or for the running of the per reviewers' gauntlet. They hate heresy even more than science blog aficionados, or than professional skeptics.<br />Anyway thanks for your help, but I think I'm done here.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-14545859064975724722009-09-25T17:49:04.639-05:002009-09-25T17:49:04.639-05:00Well, I do have other things in life.
e-man, I re...Well, I do have other things in life.<br /><br />e-man, I really have tried to understand what you're arguing. I've read your references, and have thought about it. And I simply don't understand what you're trying to say. And I don't think it's my problem. Your way of expressing yourself in writing is opaquely allusive, you use words in non-standard ways, and it's very hard to figure out what you're trying to say. I suggest you work on your expository style if you hope to have any influence among informed readers.RBHhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13562135000111792590noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-7432127416218626622009-09-25T15:34:26.920-05:002009-09-25T15:34:26.920-05:00Lots of other good stuff to cite, but I'll wai...Lots of other good stuff to cite, but I'll wait to see if anybody's here to read it. I suspect Jon and RBH have gone off together to try to arrange a variety of sieves in a series that will function as a prototypical algorithm. Also poking about in random fashion to find a niche to fit it to.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-76551748541589641012009-09-25T04:57:09.504-05:002009-09-25T04:57:09.504-05:00The Choice Making Function of All Living Organisms...The Choice Making Function of All Living Organisms<br /><br />http://books.google.com/books?id=QCGxxB85xDMC&pg=PA107&lpg=PA107&dq=daniel+koshland+prokaryotes+discrimination+memory&source=bl&ots=DKxOH3_7TG&sig=Dy8CheX87TuwD5XWFudJmZ-gcpc&hl=en&ei=_fxPSsmJLJGIswOJkOmqDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-8981077958490503532009-09-24T22:31:07.645-05:002009-09-24T22:31:07.645-05:00Also I didn't think this was available for dow...Also I didn't think this was available for download, but here's the site:<br />Modeling the Evolution of Motivation (1996) <br />by John Batali , William Noble Grundy<br />Evolutionary Computation<br /><br />http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.37.5106<br /><br />The authors state: "We refer to the mechanism by which an animal evaluates the fitness consequences of its actions as a "motivation system," and argue<br />that such a system must evolve along with the behaviors it evaluates."<br /><br />Assess and choose mechanism? One example of many?elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-69939407630429495852009-09-24T19:30:18.345-05:002009-09-24T19:30:18.345-05:00By the way, some of you might benefit from a read ...By the way, some of you might benefit from a read of Philosophy in the Flesh, Lakoff and Johnson. See in particular Chapter 5, The Anatomy of Complex Metaphor.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-73321790564019369582009-09-24T16:35:19.687-05:002009-09-24T16:35:19.687-05:00Jon, that was good - now I can predict a bit more ...Jon, that was good - now I can predict a bit more as to potential objections to my thesis from a slightly more philosophical stance than RBH and clones can muster up.<br />First off, strategies aren't metaphorical, but the terms we must use to describe them will necessarily be metaphorical in the sense that we are limited to anthropocentric terminology for the most part when describing them.<br /> No they are not just any particular functional adaptation, etc. They are the means by which all organisms have "learned" to take advantage of "opportunity" (your metaphor, as cellular algorithms are not opportunistic as much as they are expectant or anticipatory). And of course you won't know what I'm talking about until I specify what some of them are, which I'm just not going to do here.<br />Was I rough on RBH? Not really, but I needed to get him to speak up as a representative of the old school ideation. Of which you may well be another, and that's all to my good.<br />Of course selection in evolution is not conscious choice. But yes, it IS dependent on a choice making process, which is what strategic systems are all about - they ASSESS situations and CHOOSE options.<br /><br />But the way you and RBH seem to be using the term "evolutionary strategy" infers that the process itself has a strategy. It doesn't. It has resulted from differing individual strategies that have a common core. They don't however have a common goal overall. And spare me your little homily about elementary application of the fundamental ideas of information, a rationalization paradigm to obscure the fact that concepts like the archetypical sieve have none but the simplest powers of discernment.<br /><br />If I haven't supported choice directed strategies to your satisfaction, it may because I shouldn't have to. You object to "goal seeking" while at the same time lecturing that strategies ARE about choice?<br />Think perhaps about goal as a metaphor for something you will be happy to find by accident. That's the essence of trial and error efficacy, no?<br />And choice is the essence of trial and error functionality, n'est-ce pas? (Man, I think I'm on a roll here.)<br /><br />And really, do you think water is out on a trial and error search for a goal? Not unless it's the agent for some teleological chooser, I'd reckon. What is the difference between choice and obey, you ponder? Well one difference being that the term is usually not a reference to obeying your own choices, which water likely cannot do.<br />And as to selective environment, just another "labeling" mechanism at work, pretending it covers a function in ways that will brook no further explanation. They make their own obedient choices and that's all the final causer wants us to know - right?<br />Wrong. The environment activates the biological mechanism, which in turn will select its options, one of which s always to attempt to alter that very environment. Selections can be prompted by environment, not made. Unless you like fuzzy logic, always helpful a pinch, not as helpful for<br />testing out a theory.<br /><br />As to my multiple resistance problem, I confess I didn't know I had one, but then I do accept that nobody's perfect.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-60660179364309838422009-09-24T14:36:39.379-05:002009-09-24T14:36:39.379-05:00Elephantman,
I have looked briefly at your little ...Elephantman,<br />I have looked briefly at your little barney with RBH, and I am getting puzzled about what you are writing an article about and whether it is a professional work or not. I have no idea about the article, but some of your statements in this forum are confusing to say the least. First you speak of evolutionary strategies as if you not only are familiar with the concept, but also as if you regard them as fundamental and in the normal evolutionary sense as metaphorical (no chess-master thinking things out, just any particular functional adaptation to a given niche or evolutionarily adaptive opportunity). Now you and RBH are in a shouting match that looks as if you regard selection in evolution as "real, literal selection", "conscious choice", or something like that. You will have a helluva selling job with that, and rightly, imo. <br />If I understood your intention there correctly, it makes no sense to me that you could accept evolutionary strategies, but not accept "evolutionary choices" as being necessarily anything but what happens in an evolutionary strategy. Strategy is about choice. Your choices comprise your strategy if any, whether in a literal strategy or an evolutionary strategy. In the evolutionary strategy, your evolutionary choices are just an elementary application of the fundamental ideas of information. Do you have a more fundamental definition of information than: "material (aspects of) states that distinguish alternative possibilities"? In that light evolutionary strategies are direct analogies to conscious strategies, and evolutionary choices to conscious choices, and both are similarly subject to all the thermodynamic or formal aspects of information theory. <br />But it leaves you mercilessly lumbered with that sieve you were girding at. What do you have against sieves? They seem simple enough to me. So far I see nothing in what you have said (Including in Baldwin effects) to support anything like "choice directed strategies ... biological - goal seeking ", whether in some sense conscious or not. And: "Water does not choose, by the way, it obeys. The use of the word choice in the field is one form of the metaphor, the use in theoretical biology takes quite another form." Those nasty biologists been fooling me long time, no? What is the difference between choice and "obedience" in such senses? One thing I can guarantee is that your elucidation of that metaphor had better be pretty cogent! <br />And why for the love of mike do you have problems with selective environments? "They have a devil of a time with choices and predictions..." Zees ees a choke ja? What on earth are you thinking? <br />If after this you remain interested, I'll try to get onto your multiple resistance problem, which strikes me as much of a non-problem.<br /><br />Meanwhile, go well,<br /><br />JonJon Richfieldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14166113190940745522noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-84665108602103146802009-09-24T13:46:57.544-05:002009-09-24T13:46:57.544-05:00I should add that my work is not about some adjunc...I should add that my work is not about some adjunct to the Baldwin Effect. It's about biological strategies and the effects and ramifications of/from their heritability.<br />The Baldwin Effect illustrates, at least theoretically, how the mechanism for such heritability can operate.<br />Where the writings on the subject make reference to the strategies themselves, they tend to get it very wrong,IMHO.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-5115030342149228782009-09-24T04:08:37.978-05:002009-09-24T04:08:37.978-05:00RBH writes: 'There's no "choice"...RBH writes: 'There's no "choice" there in any sense that carries the connotational baggage of planning, foresight, strategies anticipating the future, or any similar notion.' <br />Of course not. I've already written here that these are choice directed biological strategies - short term goal seeking through an incremental trial and error process. with no conception needed of the longer term ultimacy of such a process.<br /><br />Here's a part of what it means operationally, found in the very paper we are now both referencing, Evolution, Learning, and Instinct: 100 Years of the Baldwin Effect, which you clearly didn't read, except to look for quotes you could take out of context.<br /><br />"In biological organisms, learning can be driven by pleasure and pain. Turing (1950) argued that artificial intelligence researchers would be wise to build a pain-pleasure mechanism into their software. Most research in reinforcement learning examines how to learn from a reinforcement signal, but does not consider the origin of the signal. Batali and Grundy (this issue) call the pain-pleasure mechanism the "motivation system" and they investigate how motivation systems might evolve. Batali and Grundy show that interaction between a learning system and a motivation system can be much more complex and interesting than one might assume. The motivation system can evolve to encode regularities in the individual's evolutionary environment, which can simplify the learning task. On reflection, we can see that the motivation systems of biological organisms have a kind of "wisdom", which we tend to overlook."<br /><br />Hardly consistent with your extrapolation from the carefully selected passages. Nor is it consistent with the re-eaximanation of the process done by Papineau, reflecting this has been an evolving concept since you first came across it.<br /><br />And look ma, no sieves!.elephantmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-91135627135405039562009-09-24T01:14:47.353-05:002009-09-24T01:14:47.353-05:00e-man wrote
But I see the dilemma. You have to re...e-man wrote<br /><br /><i>But I see the dilemma. You have to refrain from even contesting the Baldwin Effect hypothesis, because to do so would require the concession that it's exactly all about biological choice. </i><br /><br />That reflects a profound ignorance of what the Baldwin effect is. Let me try to explain it, using the words of <i>your</i> references. As it happens, I've known about and understood it since the late 1960s, having done my undergraduate and graduate work then.<br /><br />First, the notion of "phenotypic plasticity," defined in the "100 years" paper you provided:<br /><br /><i>In the context of this debate, James Mark Baldwin (1896) proposed "a new factor in evolution", whereby acquired characteristics could be indirectly inherited. Morgan (1896) and Osborn (1896) independently proposed similar ideas. The "new factor" was phenotypic plasticity: the ability of an organism to adapt to its environment during its lifetime. The ability to learn is the most obvious example of phenotypic plasticity, but other examples are the ability to tan with exposure to sun, to form a callus with exposure to abrasion, or to increase muscle strength with exercise. </i><br /><br />No mention of "choice," no necessary assumption of "choosing." Just a population of organisms that display phenotypic plasticity (different from heritable variability). Note that none of the examples, including learning, implicate any choice at all. <br /><br />Then continuing from the same paper:<br /><br /><i>The Baldwin effect works in two steps. First, phenotypic plasticity allows an individual to adapt to a partially successful mutation, which might otherwise be useless to the individual. If this mutation increases inclusive fitness, it will tend to proliferate in the population. However, phenotypic plasticity is typically costly for an individual. For example, learning requires energy and time, and it sometimes involves dangerous mistakes. Therefore there is a second step: given sufficient time, evolution may find a rigid mechanism that can replace the plastic mechanism. Thus a behavior that was once learned (the first step) may eventually become instinctive (the second step)</i><br /><br />If the phenotypic variant has some selective -- reproductive -- advantage, and if mutations that support it occur and are therefore selected via differential reproductive success, then the trait or behavior may become based in the biology -- the genes -- rather than depending on social learning or adventitious phenotypic plasticity. The initially non-genetic variant becomes a genetically-based variant.<br /><br />There's no "choice" there in any sense that carries the connotational baggage of planning, foresight, strategies anticipating the future, or any similar notion. If I have missed it in your references, please provide specific quotations -- where in those papers do we read about "biological choice," and <i>specifically</i> -- operationally -- what does "biological choice" mean in the context of the description of the Baldwin effect in your own reference.RBHhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13562135000111792590noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-11324961129652963672009-09-24T00:35:44.445-05:002009-09-24T00:35:44.445-05:00RBH, you're ducking the question with all that...RBH, you're ducking the question with all that bobbing and weaving as to whether you've heard of the biological choice making concept - which you must know is the basis for the Baldwin Effect controversy.<br /><br />You write: 'Natural selection, whether plain old NS or NS operating to generate a heritable biological basis for learned behavioral traits that persist through generations, makes "choices" in exactly the same sense that a sieve makes choices.'<br /><br />Classic. A sieve makes choices. Is this a sieve with assessment capabilities or a sorting mechanism? Can you identify any such sieve's location in or out of a particular organism? <br /><br />Papineau wrote "-socially learned behaviour functions as an environmental niche that selects for its own innateness." <br />Papineau would say that's choice directed selection, but then what would a guy like that know who can't recognize a sieve when he sees it?<br /><br />And your idea of a technical discussion of selective mechanisms is to propose a sieve? Give us a break.<br /><br />Admit that you've heard about biological choice so you can at least tell us what's wrong with the concept. The tactic of denying there is such a concept isn't cutting it. <br />But I see the dilemma. You have to refrain from even contesting the Baldwin Effect hypothesis, because to do so would require the concession that it's exactly all about biological choice.elephantmannoreply@blogger.com