A pertinent question, and one to which Sheldrake's theories are partly directed, concerns whether evidence exists suggesting that aspects of our knowledge, or of the overall knowledge accessible to us, or of the way (including the rate by which) we learn cannot be explained by the "direct experience model," if you will, that Janneman prefers. Sheldrake, among numerous others I've come across, thinks such evidence exists.
If any such evidence does exist, it troubles (confounds, probably) the understanding that knowledge or memory or traces of experience or neuronal patterning (or whatever you want to call that which comprises our brain's contribution to the act of knowing) can be fully accounted for by some form of direct learning of the subject in question. Sheldrake, for instance, thinks evidence exists suggesting that the time a given member of a species requires to learn something is shortened if the thing to be learned has already be learned by other members of the species. Evidence of that type would suggest that knowledge is indeed an "entity" or at least something amounting to something like a field existing independently of---outside---any given brain.
If any such evidence does exist, it troubles (confounds, probably) the understanding that knowledge or memory or traces of experience or neuronal patterning (or whatever you want to call that which comprises our brain's contribution to the act of knowing) can be fully accounted for by some form of direct learning of the subject in question. Sheldrake, for instance, thinks evidence exists suggesting that the time a given member of a species requires to learn something is shortened if the thing to be learned has already be learned by other members of the species. Evidence of that type would suggest that knowledge is indeed an "entity" or at least something amounting to something like a field existing independently of---outside---any given brain.
Hmmm, isn't that the Lamarckian view? That things learned during the lifetime of a single individual, can somehow be fed back into the genetic machine and transported to offspring?
What I have read about that (which is limited, I admit) is that there is *some* evidence that acquired immunity to a virus can sometimes modify your genes so that your offspring is born with some immunity to a virus is hasn't encountered yet.
Does that work with knowledge? I'm extremely sceptical.
Jan Didden
["Lamarck's signature", How Retrogenes are Changing Darwin's Natural Selection Paradigm, by Steele, Lindley & Blanden]
What I have read about that (which is limited, I admit) is that there is *some* evidence that acquired immunity to a virus can sometimes modify your genes so that your offspring is born with some immunity to a virus is hasn't encountered yet.
Does that work with knowledge? I'm extremely sceptical.
Jan Didden
["Lamarck's signature", How Retrogenes are Changing Darwin's Natural Selection Paradigm, by Steele, Lindley & Blanden]
serengetiplains said:
Could that not be explained by the fact that knowledge within a culture is learned by new members because they learn 'shortcuts' so to say from the elders? In other words, to give a mundane example, the fact that we can learn a 'feel' for numbers faster than, say someone 1000 years ago, because we see it around us almost everywhere in modern life?
Jan Didden
janneman said:
Jan,
Quite apart from whether our genes at birth are the same as our genes at death (they aren't) and the question why the difference, and apart from other direct-experience forms of learning to which you refer (whether Lamarkian or culture-shortcut types), the types of evidence to which Sheldrake refers suggests a limitation to direct-experience-learning models. Sheldrake's supposition regarding this evidence is that there exists in the universe something of the nature of an information field, which he calls a morphogenetic field. Such field, speculative and propositional as it is, would account for certain forms and rates of learning not well-explained by direct experience learning hypotheses. Generalise his "information field" a bit and one also might be on track to explaining so-called paranormal phenomena (Randy where art thou?) and even physical realities like non-locality. Re the latter, seems to me non-locality implies either transmission of a signal at speeds greater than the speed of light, or some form of interaction, possibly non-temporal, between matter and an information field, or both. I think Sheldrake would say the brain, like a radio transceiver, receives from and transmits into this field, such as that field may be.
Evolutionarily irrelevant. The reproductive germ cells that actually result in the next generation have the same genes as at birth of the individual, save for the occasional random mutation.serengetiplains said:
Why are you separating the two in the first place?
This is no different from mathematical platonism -- yet another religion. But I already talked about that previously in the thread and don't want to repeat myself.
By the way, you guys seem to have forgotten one more aspect of knowledge -- even if it's not an extramental entity, it is still not completely subjective to an individual because it can be shared among individuals.
I am very disappointed that people here are discussing the brain without having studied modern cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Physics may be the foundation, but it's a different level of abstraction. This is analogous to a bulk silicon manufacturer discussing the finer details of CPU logic design.
BTW, a quick Google search reveals that Sheldrake is generally regarded as a crackpot. Now why am I not surprised? I'm starting to think that a lot of people like to jump on whatever bandwagon appears the most interesting or 'cool', rather than what would be suggested by Ockham's razor and application of scientific method in good faith. It's the same situation regarding Penrose. Wishful thinking is a dangerous thing.
I quoted elsewhere on the forum The Ethics of Belief, but maybe I need to do it here too.
If memory serves, a monetary prize was awarded some years back to someone who constructed a test that proved the morphic resonance theory, at least for the application that was tested. I don't recall the details of the test, but it had something to do with language learning/recognition skills.
You can't prove a theory, only disprove it.
Morphic resonance, eh?
Let's see what the usual reference has to say about it.
http://skepdic.com/morphicres.html
And a very good reference from there:
http://www.csicop.org/si/2000-09/staring.html
Sheldrake's a crackpot, pure and simple. I especially like the comparison to Hubbard in the article.
Morphic resonance, eh?
Let's see what the usual reference has to say about it.
http://skepdic.com/morphicres.html
And a very good reference from there:
http://www.csicop.org/si/2000-09/staring.html
Sheldrake's a crackpot, pure and simple. I especially like the comparison to Hubbard in the article.
Prune said:
Well, the point of the research I quoted (Lamarcks Signature) was that your reproductive germ cells (or at least their genetic code) DO change as a result of events in your life (apart from the random mutations that is). Viral infections, when overcome by the individual, result in feedback to the germ line so that the offspring gets a headstart against that virus.
Jan Didden
geoffkait said:
Yes, the test was won by a Harvard or Yale professor. It was designed around ancient Hebrew words and whether test subjects might show greater affinity for real vs. scrambled Hebrew words. Results showed a greater than statistical correlation.
Prune, your clear-eyed certainty about so many things commendable.
Another Sheldrake experiment also showed statistically significant deviation from chance, yet upon a closer look it turns out to be as much BS as expected: http://www.csicop.org/si/2000-09/staring.html
Post a reference to the experiment you talk about, and let's see how it has stood up to peer review. Making unsupported claims should be left to the AudioAsylum forums.
I have no problem admitting I'm wrong, as I did in my previous post regarding the Lamarckian-like retrotranscription. But, janneman provided evidence -- that's what makes all the difference.
Post a reference to the experiment you talk about, and let's see how it has stood up to peer review. Making unsupported claims should be left to the AudioAsylum forums.
I have no problem admitting I'm wrong, as I did in my previous post regarding the Lamarckian-like retrotranscription. But, janneman provided evidence -- that's what makes all the difference.
Prune said:
Indeed. Lamarck himself went so far to say (IIRC) that if you lost an arm during your life there was a chance that your ofspring would be born minus an arm as well, something that could be quickly verified as unlikely.
But I cannot help thinking now that there at least seems to exist a mechanism to feed back experiences to the germline, we may be up for some surprises. But yes, that's speculation.
Jan Didden
"You can't prove a theory, you can only disprove it"
Of course that is not true and there are a great many examples of theories having been proved by experiment. Notable among them are the proof by Michelson-Morley experiment that speed of light is constant; the explosion of the first atomic bomb proved the many theories involved in making the bomb including E=Mc2. Another example is the experiment in which atomic clocks were carried in jetliners around the world, then compared to stationary clocks on the ground to *prove* the theory of time dilation. The detection and measurement of cosmic background radiation proved the big bang theory.
Of course that is not true and there are a great many examples of theories having been proved by experiment. Notable among them are the proof by Michelson-Morley experiment that speed of light is constant; the explosion of the first atomic bomb proved the many theories involved in making the bomb including E=Mc2. Another example is the experiment in which atomic clocks were carried in jetliners around the world, then compared to stationary clocks on the ground to *prove* the theory of time dilation. The detection and measurement of cosmic background radiation proved the big bang theory.
janneman said:
Sorry, Jan, I've allowed my busy state of mind to intrude upon actually reading certain posts.
There's a new brand of science developing---I mentioned it previously, called biophysics---that bears some promise for shedding light on such mysteries of biology as embryonic development and genetic changes induced by "experience" (life at large). Re embryonic development, a question not well explained by current DNA theory is how does a single fertilized cell develop into an embryo? The development process seems to require a blueprint---some form of picture of the whole organism-to-be---that actively feeds information back to the developing cells. The feedback mechanism would provide instructions to any given individual cell to develop into this or that kind of cell (muscle, bone, brain, etc).
Biophysicians have found evidence that light emitted from cells possibly performs this function. Every cell evidently emits a very small but perceptible amount of light, measured in photons, it's so small. The greatest amount of light is emitted at cell division and cell death. The interesting thing about this light is it seems to be of a connected variety, that is, at a quantum level, is non-locally connected with other sources of light comprising the same or closely related quantum "event." Light from each cell of a given organism, the hypothesis then runs, would combine with light from every other cell, creating an interference pattern---in the same manner, to simplify, as in the two-slit experiment, but a pattern much more complicated of course. The interference pattern would in some manner be the blueprint of overall development for the organism.
Biophysicians also speculate that the light-connectedness of cells possibly allows overall organismic coordination in a manner allowing genetic change in response to environmental pressures and circumstances. Notice Prune's qualification above that genes of reproductive cells do not change "except for small random mutations" or whatever he said. Well, those genes do change, and their change is quite evidently anything but random, given the increasingly ordered nature of things living. Biophysical phenomena possibly point the way to understanding an important element of organismic connectedness to the environment at large.
Connectedness at the quantum level, I might add, seems not to be an either/or phenomenon, but looks to exist by degrees in some sort of association by proximity or by reference to some other form of association. Quantum connectedness might provide a basis for such theories as Sheldrake's, allowing information flows in gradually lessening degrees between cells, organisms, species, ecospheres, etc, allowing overall coordination of the entire ecosystem through a complex feedback mechanism.
You have a lot to learn. It just means the theory has been tested to within some experimental precision. One can always come up with alternative theories compatible with observations. For example, Paul Davies came up with inconstant speed of light theory that does not contradict the experiment you mentioned: http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,54394,00.htmlgeoffkait said:
Wrong again. It merely did not disprove them. Maybe E=Mc2*(1+10^-100), but you can't know as experimental precision is insufficient.
Nope. There is no one theory of time dilation. It merely showed that a specific theory predicted results close enough to measurements to be within the margin of error. Indeed, better measurements may later disprove the theory. Already it is generally accepted that general relativity is just an approximation due to its incompatibility with QM.
Wrong yet again (seeing a pattern here?). The big bang is simply the simplest explanation for the microwave background. Multiple lines of evidence (red shift, distant quazars, helium/hydrogen ratio) have given good reasons for accepting it is a good model, but as cosmology progresses, the theory is refined -- we have inflation and various other theories that deal with how specifically a big bang universe evolved.
Any scientific experiment is done to check whether it can disprove the theory. If it doesn't, the theory passes this specific test, but it doesn't mean that the model won't be disqualified further on -- there is no experiment that can guarantee that. You really need to study some philosophy of science. I find it appalling that you are not familiar with the principle of falsifiability, yet you are making claims on this discussion.
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