Stephen - I'm not going to agree with many of your points. 1) First - I think you should define what you mean by 'pragmatism' . You say that it means an 'organism defining the things that matter'. But this is so vague as to be without meaning. How does an organism know ..to define...'the things that matter'?
2) I'm against the genocentric view of evolution, i.e., that the only mechanisms for adaptation and evolution are solely within the DNA and any changes to this DNA are purely random accidents. I think that evolution and adaption are far more complex and less random and include informational networking of the organism with its envt. But I'm not against the genocentric view of the genes as a major site for the storage of knowledge. The knowledge of 'how to be that species' - both in the morphological FORM of the organism and its PROPERTIES of behaviour - are stored in the DNA. This provides continuity of type. I think the properties of the DNA are readily proven in experimentation - that a certain gene produces a certain result. Therefore, I think it is acceptable that a certain amount of knowledge is genetic. These are both non-instincts, such as the 'knowledge required by the physico-biological properties of cells to form a hand, to form a brain, to form eyes etc..for the embryonic child'. And there are instincts - such as the instinct to grasp with that hand, to explore with that brain. To learn a language with that brain. [You need more than a tongue to learn a language]. 3) I disagree that a newborn is entering a 'scary unknown'. The awareness of 'otherness' and that this other is frightening - is an instinct of differentiation. And I don't think that the mother focuses only on 'vulnerability' - but this emotional bond is itself an instinct of relationship. I don't accept the 'narrative' of feral children raised by wolves. Most of these found children have basic cognitive disabilities. 4) Yes, our species has a socializing instinct. To say that such an instinct is merely a 'manifestion of the need to know how to be' is empty, for you haven't explained WHY there is such a 'need to know how to be'. That need - is dealt with by, in our species, socialization. That's because our knowledge base is primarily not genetic but social. We have to learn how to live. The basis of socialization is - relationships. Our species is thus instinctively 'hardwired' to bond with others. First, with the family (mother) - and that is an instinctual action, that action of bonding. If it's missing - and it certainly can be in a damaged family - then, the child is socially damaged. Edwina ----- Original Message ----- From: Stephen Jarosek To: 'Edwina Taborsky' ; 'Thomas' ; 'Stephen C. Rose' Cc: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu ; biosemiot...@lists.ut.ee Sent: Monday, July 20, 2015 5:33 AM Subject: RE: [PEIRCE-L] Instinct and emotion List, Many of us seem to be persisting with the narrative that instincts are programmed into the DNA. Edwina, you make reference to a socializing instinct. Might it be that this socializing instinct is not an instinct at all, but a manifestation of knowing how to be (relates to pragmatism)? Allow me to explain. At least as far as higher level organisms are concerned, a newborn entering the world is entering a scary unknown. Mothers of all kinds across all species pick up on this vulnerability (it never ceases to amaze me the affection that mothers of all kinds lavish upon their offspring). The newborn’s mother provides a known familiarity with which the youngster assimilates and becomes comfortable with. Under the mother’s nurturance and care, the scary unknown into which it first enters quickly becomes the familiar known that informs how it should be... and that’s why, if you want such a critter as a pet, it has to interact with humans from an early age in order to become domesticated. Consider the phenomenon of feral children, like the famous “wild boy of Aveyron.” An abandoned infant that is taken into the care of a matriarchal wolf has to contend with a scary, alien world that its adoptive mother makes comfortable and familiar. This ensures its survival, but the things that come to matter to it, as a wolf-child, are going to make it impossible for it to assimilate to a human society, should it ever venture there again. Thus my thesis is that “instincts” (for want of a better word) subscribe fully to the principles of pragmatism and the three categories, but that they occur at deeper levels. For example, in the narrative of chaos theory, associations made before birth and shortly after birth provide the “initial conditions” onto which all subsequent associations (experiences) accrue. Also, the organism’s physiology provides the predispositions for making choices... a critter with hands is predisposed to grasping things, a critter with a tongue and vocal chords is predisposed to vocalizing things. Neither the impulse to grasp nor the impulse to vocalize is an instinct. The impulse to grasp and the impulse to vocalize are just what you do when you have a body built to do these things, and you have a bucket of plastic neurons in your skull that organise themselves to accommodate the choices you make. The idea of instinct as somehow hardwired into the DNA is a red herring that is not falsifiable... to be blunt, it’s nonsense and the genocentrists peddling this nonsense need to lift their game. ALL thought, whether impulsive or directed, must necessarily subscribe to exactly the same Peircean categories and in accordance with the principles of pragmatism. Heck, even the mother’s “instinct” to nurture subscribes to the same Peircean principles... it’s not an instinct, maybe it’s just what it seems to be... an awareness that her little one is vulnerable and helpless. Perhaps it tugs at something in her own memory, back when she was a newborn first entering a scary unknown. The bottom line... a socializing “instinct” is just a manifestation of the need to know how to be. Infinity is scary, and socialization provides us with the fixations of belief to which we can anchor our identities... this applies to all organisms, not just humans. There is no such thing as an “instinct” hardwired into the genetic code... such a belief allows us to be led down a merry garden path that doesn’t take us anywhere. Of course if anyone does believe that instincts are coded into the DNA, I’m open to revising my stance if they can provide hard, falsifiable evidence to support their claim. The existing “instinct” narrative is not properly accounted for, and defaulting to it as a given closes our minds to considering other possibilities (like DNA entanglement). Copying to biosemiotics... this unfalsifiable instinct fiction is a serious problem that needs to get ironed out. sj PS. I continue to be somewhat confused about the different contexts in which the word pragmatism is applied. I use it in the context of an organism “defining the things that matter.” But Peirce and his pragmatic maxim seem to relate to methodology in experimentation and research. Is there an agreed-upon terminology that eliminates this ambiguity? From: Edwina Taborsky [mailto:tabor...@primus.ca] Sent: Monday, 20 July 2015 2:56 AM To: Thomas; Stephen C. Rose Cc: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Instinct and emotion Tom - see my replies below: ----- Original Message ----- From: Thomas To: Stephen C. Rose Cc: Edwina Taborsky ; <peirce-l@list.iupui.edu> Sent: Sunday, July 19, 2015 8:02 PM Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Instinct and emotion Stephen, Edwina, List ~ I agree that instinct leads to physical activity (though sometimes inside the body where it can't be seen). But it is triggered by environmental changes. That is the standard definition of instinct. It is not so much an "inclination" as "who you are" in a certain environment. But you may never encounter that environment, so you would never know. I do believe we have a socializing instinct, because we were part of someone else before birth and closely tended to for several years after birth, often in the presence of siblings. We therefore perceive living with others as the norm. EDWINA: We have a socializing instinct, not simply because we were part of someone else before birth - and that IS valid, but because our knowledge base is almost entirely learned. Therefore, as a species, we MUST be social or we are unable to live. That is, without language, without learning how-to-get-food; how to build shelter etc...we would not survive as a species. So this instance raises the possibility that instincts are gene-based *except in one case: where the mother (i.e., a loving, attentive mother) is involved. Then, genes and baby/infant emotions both originate from the same source -- so their effects (in the child) are blended and confound analysis. In that case I don't have a firm opinion. My *guess: we have socialization instincts (genes) AND socialization habits learned during infancy AND emotional feelings related to other people (community) shaped by the infant experience (with mother+father). EDWINA: The socialization instinct is genetic; the socialization habits are learned - because our species alone of all species, has the capacity to change its technological attributes by which it interacts with the environment. Emotion is a basic requirement for developing and using socialized habits/knowledge. Officially, though, instincts are hard-wired into us (DNA), and do not have a community trigger -- unless the community alters the environment. Individuals isolated from their communities have the same instincts: drop a young bird from a tree that never met another bird, and it will flap its wings and fly. Regards, Tom Wyrick On Jul 19, 2015, at 3:19 PM, Stephen C. Rose <stever...@gmail.com> wrote: I wonder what controls instincts which I see as somewhat like inclinations which suggest movement and power. I am inclined to think it is the interplay within a community though not always in ways that can be understood. I wonder of Peirce with his seemingly default inclining toward the community as a sort of teleological destiny and his sense of the porousness of the individual ultimately felt that instincts have something like consciousness? Books http://buff.ly/15GfdqU Art: http://buff.ly/1wXAxbl Gifts: http://buff.ly/1wXADj3 On Sun, Jul 19, 2015 at 4:05 PM, Ozzie <ozzie...@gmail.com> wrote: Edwina ~ My notes on habit and evolution are more wide-ranging (random?) than your comments/questions. These are my interpretation of the science, but of course I can be wrong. 1- Is instinct a property only of the more complex realms? That depends on how one interprets "instinct." If we define instinct as behavioral feature shared by all members of a "species," then protons and electrons DO have an instinct to spend time with each other, when the opportunity presents itself. The +/- attraction characterizes all protons and electrons, and they always exhibit the expected behavior in a neutral environment. I consider that an instinct. Other subatomic particles don't (necessarily) possess it. Some may label this a "characteristic" of protons and electron, instead of an instinct, which is fine with me -- if it is understood this characteristic describes behavior, not physical attributes. 2- Those protons and electrons can change into altered versions of their original states if placed in a different environment. However, I don't consider that evolution. It is a reaction to the environment. The +/- characteristics of atomic particles don't change physically or alter their behavior without something happening in the neighborhood/environment where they reside. Chemists change their environment, but so do other things (e.g., heat in stars, electromagnetic radiation from the earth's core, nearby atoms). If evolution occurred, then we could not reverse the process and break materials down into the original atoms. 3- Evolution modifies living things (over time) to add physical features to them that incorporate regular/everyday life activities into the physical body of species members. Then, behavior originally attributed to volition become instinctual. Theoretically, nature "decides" that a one-time investment of resources (so to speak) reduces physical and cognitive effort that would otherwise be required throughout the lifetimes of the species members. Following evolution, the individual can devote effort and cognitive attention to more pressing matters that occur less frequently but have greater survival value, such as an attack by predators. All of this is captured by your statement that evolution "is a basic form of knowledge." I agree. I see it as nature's knowledge embodied into a living thing. 4- When evolution provides "instincts" that are efficient substitutes for cognitive activity, an external observer may perceive cognition when none actually occurs. (Observers may not be able to see something, and abduct some phenomenon that doesn't exist.) 5- Creatures do not simply evolve the "ability to think" or "ability to move" in some generic way, but evolved the ability to process information and move in a manner that supports efficient outcomes. Thus human brains are created as logical organs, with abduction/induction/deduction shaping (being reflected in) the physical structure of the mechanism just as our digestive tracts are structured efficiently to perform that function. Brain cells (neurons) are in the stomach to detect toxins and trigger a rapid response. 6- Living things do, as you say, have a clear advantage over abiotic bodies when it comes to evolution. However, abiotic bodies comprise the things that evolve, so they are along for the evolutionary journey. A light photon traveling from the sun is abiotic, but a plant captures and processes it to produce sugar and oxygen. Then animals eat the sugar and breathe the oxygen. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Biological life is comprised of abiotic material, and that's what it eventually becomes when life ends. 7- For an atom (anything) to "evolve" in nature, it appears a mechanism would have to exist involving birth, death, reproduction, the concept of more fit vs. less fit, etc. I am not aware of anyone describing such a mechanism for atomic particles. It is possible that some atoms can be described as "evolving" into metals or certain compounds independent of environmental conditions, but I am unaware of any such mechanism. 8- I watched a video last night from the iTunes Store about Darwin which illustrated the example provided in your final sentences. The same bird evolved different beaks on each of the Galápagos Islands, corresponding to the food found on each. A series of birds collected by Darwin were laid next to each other; on one end was a tiny beak, while on the other the beak was very large. The birds evolved, not the beaks, via the "survival of the fittest" mechanism. (This is #7.) Other genetic changes occurred in the birds while their beaks were evolving, so they became distinct species and lost the ability to reproduce with each other. Regards, Tom Wyrick On Jul 19, 2015, at 8:44 AM, Edwina Taborsky <tabor...@primus.ca> wrote: Tom - I like your outline of the nature of instinct, as a property triggered by an external stimuli. This further suggests that instinct is a property found not merely in the individual unit - i.e., an entity with distinct boundaries (which could be a chemical molecule or a bacterium) but further, only in an entity that has the capacity, as that individual, to act and react (which could take place both within the bacterium and the molecule). So do both the biotic and abiotic realm function within instinct? Or is instinct a property only of the more complex realms? That is, instinct is seemingly removed, as a form of knowledge, from the normative habits or rules-of-formation of abiotic matter. Certainly, a chemical molecule can, in interaction with another molecule, transform itself into a more complex molecule. But are the habits, the chemical rules-of-formation on the same operational level as instinct? Can these habits continuously adapt and evolve in the abiotic realm? That is, is instinct a specific form of innate knowledge that gives the biotic realm an existential advantage? I'd suggest that it is a basic form of knowledge that activates the organism to adapt and evolve in the face of environmental stimuli. If the environment changes such that a property is missing in the environment (water, food, security, other members of the species) - then, instinct will activate the individual to move to a site where such properties do exist. One could also suggest that if the environment changes such that food seeds have tougher shells, instinct, stimulated by the deprivation of food, would activate the current individuals in that area to develop a tougher beak. Edwina ----- Original Message ----- From: Ozzie To: Benjamin Udell Cc: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu Sent: Friday, July 17, 2015 11:53 AM Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Instinct and emotion Ben, list - Thanks for your interesting comments. I will spend more time thinking about them later today. Let me briefly address one sentence from your comments: "I'd say that instincts can also be triggered _inside_ the body, e.g., by prolonged emptiness of the stomach." According to the common definition (interpretant) instincts are triggered by things in the external world. Before birth, food is ALWAYS available to the baby. After birth, and assuming an attentive mother (caregiver), food continues to be available without any effort or reciprocation on the baby's behalf. This goes on daily for many years, so not feeling hunger pains becomes the norm, the expectation. Against that backdrop, when food is withheld (by the external environment), one's sensation of hunger (-) is a disturbance to the status quo (0), which summons the instinct to do something (+) to make that "pain" go away. When something from the environment is eaten (+), the sensation (-) disappears (0). It is in this sense hunger pains and their elimination are related to (triggered by) the individual's contact with the external world. If the individual eats a full meal AND THEN feels hungry, I agree that particular sensation has an *internal trigger (likely emotions or a physical disability). Regards, Tom Wyrick On Jul 17, 2015, at 8:04 AM, Benjamin Udell <bud...@nyc.rr.com> wrote: Regarding some of your comments, I'd say that instincts can also be triggered _inside_ the body, e.g., by prolonged emptiness of the stomach. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ----------------------------- PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the BODY of the message. 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