Has Natural Selection Met Its Match?

[HollyElise]

Originally posted by TomSawyer
As for the cat-situation, I can prove you wrong just by simply putting cameras by the window and showing to the viewer that the cat only arrives when the owner does.

You might be able to prove that particular cat theory wrong with a video camera, but there are still many other possibilities.

It has seemed in several of your examples with animals that you are assuming they have the same sensory perceptions and reactions as humans, which is clearly untrue.

The timing thing that Scabby or Andy proposed i think is one possible explanation. My cat always knows when it's 10 p.m. because that is when i feed him. Guests come to my house and they comment to me frequently, "Your cat can tell time!" ...because every night at 10 like clockwork he asks for his supper. I don't really think from this he can read the clock, however. Perhaps cats are just more aware of their biorhythms than humans, and they do seem to be more sensitive to subtle changes in natural light.

I used to have a dog that could clearly distinguish between the sounds of different cars and would go wild with excitement before a friend of ours would arrive (every time) a minute before we knew she was arriving. But it was the car my dog recognized. If someone else drove it, she would still go wild. Cats, like dogs, have far more acute hearing than humans. It is also possible they can distinguish vibrations. All of these possibilities and more must be proven false, and even still it could not prove paranormality, only that those other possibilites were false.

As for the birds taking off in flight seemingly in unison, i think Andy and Scabby addressed that pretty well but i would like to add that what seems nearly instantaneous to us as humans may be quite a different experience to an animal. Our vision actually happens by frames, much like in movie film, and we do not have very many frames per second compared to many other animals. In addition, our reflexes are quite slow compared to a great many birds, fish, insects and even some animals.

All of the animal suggestions you have offered use human observation, but unfortunately humans do not have the sensory accuity to hear the full range of sounds animals hear, see all that they see, or sense all that they sense. Better instruments of observation are needed before ruling out other than paranormal means.

Allegorical arguments can be insightful, but they are rarely conclusive... probably only in cases where they refute an absolute.

[HollyElise]

Originally posted by TomSawyer

But you omitted the fact that Scabby said that, in the first place. And whether you know him or Andy is really besides the point, because you still joined them in 'attacking' me. That's why I left this place, to begin with: because every time I 'disagreed' with someone, I would have dozens of people to contend with. Scotland.com is jut a handicap match for certain members.

So what in particular is your objection to Scabby's comment:

"Sooo..... yeaaahhhhh..." (ScabbyDouglas) ????




You get dozens of people objecting to some of your opinions, Tom, just because people don't agree with them. That's nothing personal.

But you get scathing remarks because you usually poke at them first and also come off as terribly arrogant and that annoys people.

[ScabbyDouglas]

Tom...

I see that the 'gang' mentality of Scotland.com has resurfaced. First Scabby, then Andy, now you: all aimed at me, at the same time. And why? Because I suggested two books which challenge Natural Selection. Doesn't make much sense.

Tom - I have no objection to you making a challenge on Natural Selection. But if you do so, in a discussion forum, then you must be prepared for people to want to discuss it. If you don't want people to discuss or dispute what you have said , or even what you say other people have said, then simply don't post.

Futhermore: when you accuse me of having used the Ad Hominem fallacy in my discussion of your points, it almost beggars belief. When you dismiss the points made against your notions because you allege they arise out of some gang mentality ( that exists only in your own head ), you are committing the self-same fallacy.

Also, you made a *big* deal about having originally posted "apologetically". But I note that the original post you made now has a sentence added to it. Added more than a day later. Dated and timed *after* my response.

Nice one, though... nice trick, .. and one to which I will not stoop.

Anyway - I take it that you haven't bothered to follow up my hints on flocking behaviour.

And until you install "Cat-cam", I think you have to allow us to remain sceptical about the cat's behaviour.

You also haven't bothered to answer any of the questions I asked regarding: shark intelligence vs rabbit intelligence, which, although posed facetiously, were in fact valid questions;
Or why you suggest that a predator needs less intelligence than "prey" needs.
Or argue for me, if you will, what is pro-survival about poetry or art.

Hmm?

[ScabbyDouglas]

Of course if answering any of this would risk you exposing any of your valuable "personal thoughts" on the "silly Internet" , where "anybody can steal them", then I quite understand. A "proper writer" obviously wouldn't waste his time on a paltry discussion forum.

If you decide to "send your work to a publisher", though, you will let us know who the publisher is, won't you?

[ScabbyDouglas]

1. I did not respond to your arguments because I had not read them yet. I thought that replies would always go on the second page, as with other forums, but apparently replies can be found on the first page.

Tom, with all due respect (and take that any way you like) you've been posting on scotland.com for long enough to know that replies go right in amongst the rest of the stuff. The "second page" is created when the first page is full.

Flocking: Did you even bother to pursue the considerable body of academic work on flocking behaviour which is freely available on the Internet and elsewhere regarding "emergent behaviour"? Evidently not. So you were watching the birds and they rose and flew away. Flocking behaviour does not preclude individual action within a flock, but it does explain how one individual flock members minor action may induce the rest of the flock to act very quickly en masse.

"Ignoramus" is a loaded term. Yes, it has a technical meaning, as does "fool". However when you employ it against another person during the course of a discussion you breach the normal etiquette and customs that make it possible to argue without generating feelings of animosity. There are any number of words that have the same effect -I should have thought that I wouldn't have to explain that to you, . Brazen behaviour? No, more like arrogance. And I did not accuse you of employing that fallacy in the "ignoramus" remark. Once more I ask you to read what I said. I said that by by dismissing Andy, and Holly and myself as acting with a "gang mentality" (which still does not exist) you were making an Ad Hominem attack to avoid dealing with what was said.

Personally, I would be grateful if a person came to me and said, 'I think you should read this.' Learning is my game.

I did exactly that. Please, don't mention it. You're welcome.


When skeptics like you say, 'go for the logical explanation first' you are really saying 'go for the materialistic explanation first.' But how is materialism any truer, a priori, then parapyschology?

The material world is where I live. And despite what he may have imagined, it was where Bishop Berkeley lived too. The world/universe of matter is not restricted to tangibles, it includes electromagnetic phenomena, it includes gravity, it includes light and time, chemistry and much more. There is much that we don't understand yet about the material world. I do not dismiss parapsychology as a whole because it somehow upsets my world-view. I object to sloppy thinking that takes poor observation, half-baked hypotheses, ignores demonstrable truths and concocts flights of fancy to explain things that are much more easily explainable. Occams's razor. Really useful.

Animals are psychic, and this is plain for all to see if one looks at the evidence.

Now, let me tell you what I think is wrong with this... just for an example.let's take this sentence.
See, if you had said: There is a lot of evidence to suggest that animals may be sensitive to stimuli that humans are unable to perceive, leading to suggestions that they may be "psychic"
That I would have no problem with.

But it is not "plain" for all to see, particularly when the evidence you refer to is almost always anecdotal, and no experimental scientific (yes, there is that word again) repeatable demonstrations of this psychic ability exist. So my scepticism leads me to prefer simpler explanations.


On the subject of publishing our own ideas in the forum:Yet you'd have me believe everyone is safe on a forum of hundreds of strangers. It's not worth the risk, even if the risk were a small one.
Tom, I don't suggest that the Internet is a "safe" place. I'd like to believe that I had more than a couple of ideas in my head. I also don't assume that I'm the only person ever to think up any of this stuff, so if I seem unconcerned at the thought of "my" ideas being stolen, it's just that I am. Unconcerned, that is. Could not care less. I am not diminished by someone using "my" ideas. I make a living doing other things than touting my intellectual back-scratching.

As you say, Darwin doesn't have any way of explaining the Arts. The Arts, have, as you say, nothing to do with physical survival. Darwin's concerned only with physical survival. Again however, you suggest that "nature" has a bias for intelligence. In what way? If you are suggesting that intelligent species are more "successful" than unintelligent ones, what measures of "success" are you employing?

Here are some of the criteria that seem useful candidates for determining "success".

* Species survival - how long this species has survived
* Species numbers - how many individuals of this species exist
* Species dominance - position in the "food chain"

Now if your suggestion that nature is "biased" towards intelligence is not to do with "success", then I'm eager to hear what you mean.

but it would be more reasonable to say that Nature, herself, IS intelligent: hence Theism.

Why? why would that be more "reasonable"? I can see the "reasoning" that gets to that point, and (I think) it goes something like:
* Humans are the pinnacle of evolution.
* Humans are intelligent, and that intelligence has been crucial in the success of humankind.
* The process of evolution has been a long slow climb to achieve the levels of intelligence displayed by humankind.
* "Nature" is doing the selection, so there must be some guiding principles that make it important to be intelligent.
* Intelligence must be important
* What we do with the intelligence is therefore intrinsically significant.


BUT.

If Humankind is not the most successful species, if species longevity or sheer weight of species numbers are actually more important than where we are in the food chain right at this moment, then the argument falls.

We know that some species can become TOO successful. A predator can over-hunt a habitat, a herbivore can over-graze. This automatically limits the numbers, and may lead to localised extinctions.

What if the intelligence that humankind displays is actually "excess intelligence"? As a species we are in the process of destroying our own environment - over-hunting and over-grazing, if you like. It is our ability to think, plan, communicate and act co-operatively that has allowed us to reach this point. So maybe we are just an evolutionary spur that hasn't yet died out. Yet.

Believe me when I say that I understand how much of a blow it can be to think that what we do is not only ephemeral, but absolutely meaningless. All of this stuff I am writing or educational assignments you have thought about, all of Vincent van Gogh's artistic outpourings have no point to them. No more point to them than a grizzly bear scratching its back on a tree stump.
You will, I expect, disagree.

In the end, it is because I am fairly, but not completely, convinced that these intellectual exercises are just the mental equivalent of twenty press-ups ( and are just about as important) that I can remain dispassionate. It allows me to consider the possibility that we are no more significant as a species than the dust on my shoe. And in the end, I still live, love my family, and enjoy my life. All the more, actually, because I regard it as ephemeral, and amazing. Isn't it incredible that something as ultimately pointless can be so much fun?

Like this thread.

[ANDY-J2]

Originally posted by TomSawyer

This brings me to sharks. As we know, sharks often eat whatever they can, just like bears. And just like bears, sharks are very aggressive. Yet, some sharks go to the bottom of the reef and 'wait' for certain kinds of fish to swarm them. What the fish do is clean the shark. They come and they go, and shark never attacks them. How did all these sharks discover that these fish would do this to them? Again, there seems to be an 'agreement' between shark and the other fish. Admittedly, this does not, necessarily, undermine Darwin. Darwin might say that sharks, individually, figured out that the fish can do a service for them, and therefore they ought not to kill them, lest the services go away. That is a good answer, but isn't it also possible that there is an immediate and sensed 'understanding' between the two groups on even a psychic level? What would inspire a fish to approach a shark? How would it 'know' that the shark would let it clean it? And why, morevoer, would a fish even want to clean a shark? Unless, it knew, ahead of time, that it would not be considered as prey, any longer, to the shark, on account of it having helped the shark. Darwin would be scratching his head.

These two examples make me question Darwin. I agree that a Darwinist might be able to answer them, first by saying that bears just aren't interested in gulls. But I am inclinded to think something else may be going on.

I don't believe Darwin would be scratching his head when considering the symbiotic relationship which exists between certain species because as far as I'm aware he never actually speculated on such matters.There are countless examples in nature of similar reationships and one should remember that these behaviour patterns have developed over many hundreds of generations.Sharks are not the unpredictable,vicious predators which people sometimes imagine-many species,the whale shark for example,are very docile and eat nothing more than plankton.Even those predatory species of shark are only aroused into a feeding frenzy when certain stimulii provoke them,for example if they scent blood in the water or sense a fish in distress.It is conceivable to me that at some point in the distant past reefer fish discovered sharks to be a good source of food while sharks in turn benefitted from having potentially harmful parasites removed from their bodies and through time these behaviour patterns became more established.Young fish instictively imitate the behaviour of their parents and in turn their offspring will imitate their behaviour until after many generations a symbiotic and mutually beneficial relationship is established between the two species.Examples of similar relationships can be found throughout the natural world for example the tick bird and hippopotamus or certain species of ants and aphids.I don't believe however that they really provide any sound evidence against natural selection-they in fact show how animals can adapt to their environment and develop behaviour patterns which enhance their chances of survival and these behaviour patterns are then passed on to succesive generations.That these behaviour patterns also often prove beneficial to other species is only a matter of chance which is exactly what Darwin realised-the evolution of species depends on chance and circumstance rather than the influence of some benign deity.

[CreepingJesus]

Ok, heres how it works....

Scavengers.....

Millions of years ago........

There are wee scavenger fish which, because of their habitat perhaps don't provide a big prey opportunity for sharks, and which don't play any other part in the shark's life.

Along comes a shark.

It has fed recently and isn't particularly interested in tiny fish which would need more energy to catch than they'd provide as a meal, and which can disappear into some dangerously jaggy coral before you can blink.

The shark is plagued with skin parasites and rotting detritus in its mouth. The shark doesn't know this. It only knows an itch or whatever signals its nervous system generates.

The sites of infection leak pus or blood releasing chemicals in the water which say "food" to the scavenger fish, some of which go and have a wee pick at the stuff.

The shark may well kill and eat a few of them. Some will survive for a variety of reasons, perhaps down to their particular colours or scent making them difficult for the shark to detect and catch, or by ingesting enough of the shark's discarded skin particles and associated parasites they avoid recognition as a potential food item by emitting similar chemicals to the shark itself - in effect they smell like a shark.

Some of the ones that survive pass on the traits that enable them to do this to their offspring.

Bear in mind that not all of the scavenger fish will go for this. A population will continue feeding the way they did before the sharks appeared, but the ones who adapt will continue to do this down the generations until they have evolved enough to be a completely different species. Darwin's famous Galapagos finches are a prime example of this kind of evolution.

You fill whatever niche give your genes the best chance to survive, and if that means exploiting a brand new food opportunity where others can't, you're hitting the ground running in evolutionary terms.

To go back to the sharks themselves, animals which are full of parasites are going to be at a disadvantage in the feeding and breeding stakes.

The ones which develop a trait which allows scavenger fish to work on them are the ones which ultimately will survive and the habit will become normal behaviour for that kind of shark and that species of scavenger.

As the symbiosis develops, competition between individuals will encourage the development of more traits to aid the efficiency of both partners.

For example some modern sharks regularly visit reefs which are populated by particular varieties of cleaner fish, perhaps with specialist mouthparts, or colours or scents which provide a stronger stimulus to the shark's recognition of the service being provided.

Notice I am in no way suggesting that this is a conscious decision on the part of the shark. Such behaviour is survival-driven.

It's a mechanism.

No psychic messages required.

None.

Zilch.