On 18 Sep 2014, at 17:33, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Wed, Sep 17, 2014 at 7:30 PM, John Clark <[email protected]>
wrote:
On Wed, Sep 17, 2014 at 9:01 AM, Bruno Marchal <[email protected]>
wrote:
> There might be non relationship between consciousness and smartness.
If there is not a relationship between consciousness and smartness
then Darwin was wrong,
Darwin and consciousness are only related if you assume at that
start that consciousness emerges from complexity. I'm not sure
Darwin ever said such a thing.
but there is no evidence that Darwin was wrong and there is a
avalanche of evidence supporting Darwin's idea,
Agreed, but this is a straw man for the above reason.
Suppose, for example, that everything is conscious. Darwinism
explains neatly how mater organised into complex things like human
beings. Nothing is lost on the darwinist side of things by saying
that consciousness and smartness are unrelated in this scenario.
Insisting that the emergence of consciousness from complexity is the
only scientific explanation is just dogma. We have no way to measure
or detect consciousness, so it just lays outside the scope of
science (for the moment, of course). Even neural correlates are
bullshit, because they are just based on an assumption, like you do
in the beginning.
Saying that something is outside the scope of science is becoming a
taboo.
Nice to hear that! All my life I was told (by half the local
scientists) that mind, consciousness, god, or even "understanding the
quantum weirdness" was all out of the scope of science.
Given that I almost define science by modesty (even the Löbian one) I
believe indeed that nothing is out of the scope of science, and that
those who pretend that, are those who want keep their pseudo-religious
certainties, and want to avoid questions and questioning.
This is a very unscientific attitude. The correct scientific stance
is to admit our ignorance when appropriate.
I agree. I would even say that it is appropriate in almost all
circumstances. Science is only beliefs. For knowledge you need first
person experiences, and none are justifiable as such.
If theology is done with the scientific attitude, it does not entail
any ontological commitments, just axiomatic definitions, theories, and
comparison with facts, corrections, etc.
Bruno
Telmo.
an idea that has been called the best single thought any human being
has ever had. In science there is always a possibility that you're
mistaken, and there have certainly been refinements in the 150 years
since Darwin's book was published, but I think you'd need scientific
notation to express the probability that any of the important
fundamental concepts in that old book (like natural selection and
random mutation) were wrong.
John K Clark
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