I voted your reply up from zero as it didn’t seem low quality, and on this post you shouldn’t be penalized for defending your case however it might seem to others.
I admit nature isn’t actually cruel, it doesn’t feel anything for us at all. I’ll go with the Dawkins line you quote in your essay instead: neither cruel nor kind, but simply callous—indifferent to all suffering, lacking all purpose.
Your essay is full of language like “nature tries its best to make sure that...”, “Nature is interested in...”, “Nature loves...”, “nature actively works towards...”, “nature goes to considerable lengths to...”
I agree that a lot of good and beauty has come out of evolution, but it didn’t do it on purpose!
About a million times I’ve been told not to use anthropomorphic language when discussing biology. And about a million times I’ve replied that such language is used ubiquitously by biologists—and that it is useful and good.
Biologists ubiquitously talk about “selfish genes”, “genetic wisdom”, genes prefering this, genes wanting that—and so on and so forth. Such terminology is unambiguous. The interpretation that biologists think genes are like tiny little people, or that we are visualising nature as some kind of wise old man is so silly that it is totally ridiculous.
Anthropomorphic and teleological language is fine (IMHO) as long as it doesn’t lead into teleological reasoning. It seems to me that your essay is crossing that line, while also cherry-picking the ways evolution tends to eliminate pain over the ways it tends to increase it.
If you do accept nature is indifferent to all suffering and lacking all purpose, why would you want to make it’s purpose your own?
Life isn’t “about” suffering. Happiness and pain are the carrot and the stick which nature uses. I am typically more concerned with what organisms do than I am with how they feel.
I embrace nature’s purposes because it built me to do that. I seem to be relatively resistant to religions—and other memetic infections that would hijack my goal system—presumably in part because my ancestors also exhibited such resistance.
It seems odd that you should mention the downward force but ignore the corresponding equal-and-opposite upward one.
FWIW, I sometimes council not resisting gravity using muscular force—but instead aligning oneself vertically—so that the force can be taken by skeletal structures. It is a similar idea: don’t fight against nature, instead align yourself with it. This is a common theme in Taoism.
The only thing that matters is whether you want something (in a sufficiently reflective sense of “want”, which is still an unsolved problem). The evolution’s “preferences” are screened off by human preferences, so you should bring the evolution into discussion only where it helps to understand the human preferences deeper, as is the case with, for example, evolutionary psychology.
In case of Japan, there might be another heuristic at work: “the place is overpopulated, high population means low resources, low resources means less healthy offspring, therefore it might be a good idea to hold off reproduction until I find a less populated place.”—I vaguely remember reading something along these lines about mice, but can’t cite the source.
(Of course I’m not talking about restricting reproduction to conserve resources ‘for the group’).
If you are interested in the topic, there’s a fairly detailed analysis of the origin of the “demographic transition” in the book “Not by Genes Alone”. They mostly finger human culture.
Questions conditional on counterfactuals are usually not worth addressing.
Nature isn’t “cruel” - see: http://alife.co.uk/essays/evolution_is_good/
It isn’t “slavery” if you want to do it.
I voted your reply up from zero as it didn’t seem low quality, and on this post you shouldn’t be penalized for defending your case however it might seem to others.
I admit nature isn’t actually cruel, it doesn’t feel anything for us at all. I’ll go with the Dawkins line you quote in your essay instead: neither cruel nor kind, but simply callous—indifferent to all suffering, lacking all purpose.
Your essay is full of language like “nature tries its best to make sure that...”, “Nature is interested in...”, “Nature loves...”, “nature actively works towards...”, “nature goes to considerable lengths to...”
I agree that a lot of good and beauty has come out of evolution, but it didn’t do it on purpose!
About a million times I’ve been told not to use anthropomorphic language when discussing biology. And about a million times I’ve replied that such language is used ubiquitously by biologists—and that it is useful and good.
Biologists ubiquitously talk about “selfish genes”, “genetic wisdom”, genes prefering this, genes wanting that—and so on and so forth. Such terminology is unambiguous. The interpretation that biologists think genes are like tiny little people, or that we are visualising nature as some kind of wise old man is so silly that it is totally ridiculous.
Anthropomorphic and teleological language is fine (IMHO) as long as it doesn’t lead into teleological reasoning. It seems to me that your essay is crossing that line, while also cherry-picking the ways evolution tends to eliminate pain over the ways it tends to increase it.
If you do accept nature is indifferent to all suffering and lacking all purpose, why would you want to make it’s purpose your own?
Life isn’t “about” suffering. Happiness and pain are the carrot and the stick which nature uses. I am typically more concerned with what organisms do than I am with how they feel.
I embrace nature’s purposes because it built me to do that. I seem to be relatively resistant to religions—and other memetic infections that would hijack my goal system—presumably in part because my ancestors also exhibited such resistance.
Odd. Nature built me to denigrate it on the internet whenever it does something I don’t agree with. Which of us is the mutant?
Judging by gravity, Nature wants me down. Should I undertake a journey to the center of the Earth?
It seems odd that you should mention the downward force but ignore the corresponding equal-and-opposite upward one.
FWIW, I sometimes council not resisting gravity using muscular force—but instead aligning oneself vertically—so that the force can be taken by skeletal structures. It is a similar idea: don’t fight against nature, instead align yourself with it. This is a common theme in Taoism.
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2007/11/adaptation-exec.html
The only thing that matters is whether you want something (in a sufficiently reflective sense of “want”, which is still an unsolved problem). The evolution’s “preferences” are screened off by human preferences, so you should bring the evolution into discussion only where it helps to understand the human preferences deeper, as is the case with, for example, evolutionary psychology.
Maybe I should not be surprised to encounter people that have had their biological goal systems hijacked by memes. History is full of such people.
My impression is that advanced, meme-rich countries—such as Japan—have naturally low birth rates due to such effects.
It appears to me that the smartest and best-educated people are the ones who are the most vulnerable to infection.
In case of Japan, there might be another heuristic at work: “the place is overpopulated, high population means low resources, low resources means less healthy offspring, therefore it might be a good idea to hold off reproduction until I find a less populated place.”—I vaguely remember reading something along these lines about mice, but can’t cite the source.
(Of course I’m not talking about restricting reproduction to conserve resources ‘for the group’).
If you are interested in the topic, there’s a fairly detailed analysis of the origin of the “demographic transition” in the book “Not by Genes Alone”. They mostly finger human culture.