To Roger and Nick,
That idea has been on the backburner of Biology for 5 decades or more. The greatest problem in the 70’s and later was Statistics which tended to dismiss anything outside of a curve. It started after the second war when an unusual coincidence of scientific minds started talking. Soviets and Americans when strange Tick-Borne plagues started emerging in the middle east, Russia, Crimea and parts of Africa. I was just a kid doing my first MSc when I met Harry Hoogstraal at an Acarology Workshop at OSU. What did I know, nothing. What the hell. He was Jimmy Carter’s science advisor, I was told later . And the de facto head of the NAMRU facility outside Cairo. Anyway he was checking on students in the lab one night I was the only nightowl and we chatted over microscopes. He asked me what I thought happened to all the parasites of the Woolly Rhino when it died out, it was a big source of blood in an Arctic Landscape? ( I was working on Moose Ticks at the time) What he was after was an answer to the stream of life question, did they die or simply find new real estate? I returned to Canada and only brought it up a few times usually when very drunk, spoiling for a fight or a real argument. Bits and pieces accumulated over time spared from the statisticians. Then totally ignored during all the subsequent eras of utter confusion and money grubbing. Mostly entomologists were the first to notice something did not fit the consensus narrative. Then microbiologists who were asked to help out and they saw the same principals with better tools. Evo-Devo made a great set of contributions not mentioned directly in the paper. This is a disturbing topic when examined carefully. Philosophers rarely examine parasites on carcasses of the dead, let alone count them. They see only what they expect. They were always averse to the smell of science. So my answer is No not usually. Since it stinks. The bias appears to originate in our simple minds that can not cope with more than 3 dimensions . A living system need not be so limited for that matter neither is mathematics (see Snarks http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snark_(graph_theory ). Darwin is now a relic fought over by fools. I count Dawkins among the fools, he started out well but soon degenerated into a strange demented warrior against Theists. I love the discussions and even though I can not always respond I look forward to reading. vib From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Nick Thompson Sent: October-25-14 12:21 AM To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Does philosophy have a heuristic value Nice paper, roger. I posted it to the thread. Any chance I will see you next Friday? N Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ From: Friam [mailto:friam-boun...@redfish.com] On Behalf Of Roger Critchlow Sent: Friday, October 24, 2014 11:48 AM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Does philosophy have a heuristic value http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=ptb;view=text;rgn=main;idno=6959004.0001.003 Most biologists are philosophically and biologically incoherent on this subject. -- rec -- On Fri, Oct 24, 2014 at 9:38 AM, Nick Thompson <nickthomp...@earthlink.net> wrote: Dear Friammers, Often in FRIAM I have been called upon to defend philosophy as an important part of the scientific enterprise Recently, on research gate, somebody posed the following question: * Has the philosophical analysis contributed to solve any biological conceptual problems? Of course the first question would be how many conceptual/empirical problems, of philosophy's interest the biology has? How many of those problems has been solved? Just in case of any extremist response, what would you say to a biology scientists who thinks that the philosophy cannot solve anything? The discussion (such as it is) can be found at : https://www.researchgate.net/post/Has_the_philosophical_analysis_contributed_to_solve_any_biological_conceptual_problems#544a6a0ad685cc4d678b4654 It seemed only to confirm the questioner’s fears that philosophers of science are neither the generals who set the battle nor the diplomats that make the peace, but are merely the scavengers that bicker over the spoils of war. . . N I think we can do better. See you next week. Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
