Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature Is Almost Certainly False

[tonyrey]

What did you have in mind? Darwin was a product of his culture, remember,as are we all.

You seemed to be implying that Darwin’s theory is an adequate explanation of the emergence of human beings.

 

[cornbread_r2]

Ad hominem which does not refute his reasoning.

An ad hominem (Latin for “to the man”), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or unrelated belief of the person supporting it.

If the reviewers had written that Nagel was wrong because he’s a low-down, no good so and so, you’d have a point, but since they wrote that he was wrong because he failed to demonstrate that Neo-Darwinism is almost certainly false, it would seem that you don’t.

 

[ThinkingSapien]

Second, we’ve all known that Darwin’s theory is obviously wrong about some things. (It is crucial to Darwin’s theory that a) infant mortality is always high

It wasn’t a necessity that infant mortality rates are high. Though it was observed that there are organisms that produce more offspring than make it into adulthood.

 

[cornbread_r2]

A couple things here. First, Nagel not only is a philosopher, and a good one; to suggest he is writing for people with no serious philosophic interests is a non-starter. Second, we’ve all known that Darwin’s theory is obviously wrong about some things. (It is crucial to Darwin’s theory that a) infant mortality is always high and b) all organisms leave behind as many offspring as possible. Both of these claims–necessary to Darwin’s theory–are false about human beings. Out and out false.) But to the bigger thing—how people evolved who can put forward a theory such as Darwin’s and discuss it rationally–is something scientific naturalism cannot even HOPE to explain because the only way a person—such as yourself, for example–can believe a theory based upon evidence and reasoning is for Darwinism to be FALSE. (If your thoughts are wholly determined, there is no reason to think any of them true. On Darwin’s materialistic view, truth CANNOT influence ANYTHING because it is immaterial.)

So, because we cannot yet explain how immaterial things like logic and reasoning can emerge from material things like brains, they must arise from something else which is also immaterial? Is that the gist of the argument?

No one would ever mistake me for a philosopher, but how is that not just an argument from ignorance?

 

[tonyrey]

*An ad hominem (Latin for “to the man”), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or unrelated belief of the person supporting it.*If the reviewers had written that Nagel was wrong because he’s a low-down, no good so and so, you’d have a point, but since they wrote that he was wrong because he failed to demonstrate that Neo-Darwinism is almost certainly false, it would seem that you don’t.

Nagel, by his own admission, relies only on popular science writing and brings to bear idiosyncratic and often outdated views about a whole host of issues, from the objectivity of moral truth to the nature of explanation. No one could possibly think he has shown that a massively successful scientific research program like the one inspired by Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection “is almost certainly false.”** The subtitle seems intended to market the book to evolution deniers, intelligent-design acolytes, religious fanatics and others who are not really interested in the substantive scientific and philosophical issues.**

These are undoubtedly attempts to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or unrelated belief of the person supporting it.

Motives have nothing whatsoever to do with the validity of arguments.

 

[cornbread_r2]

These are undoubtedly attempts to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or unrelated belief of the person supporting it.

Motives have nothing whatsoever to do with the validity of arguments.

I failed miserably in my first post to emphasize that the reviewers comments that I quoted were regarding the choice of subtitle for Nagel’s book. In that regard, speculating about the possible motives for choosing a highly misleading subtitle – because, in the reviewers’ opinions, Nagel had failed to demonstrate that the ToE is “almost certainly false” – would seem entirely appropriate.

 

[markeverett49]

They have already crticised him harshly!

I find it ironic that Nagel is slammed for not being an expert scientist by many people who were not troubled that Dawkins and Daniel Dennet (-a philosopher) wrote about religion without knowing much about it. Nagel is enough of a philosopher to know that there are problems with fundamental tenets of scientific materialism. PHILOSOPHIC problems. Further, he appreciates (-as many Darwinians do not) that materialism CANNOT explain how an IDEA can change a mind. Dawkins used the metaphor of “memes” in “The Selfish Gene” (-1976, if memory serves) and now acts as if memes are not only real but scientifically established without a shred of evidence for them. Talk about taking something on blind faith!

 

[ThinkingSapien]

So, because we cannot yet explain how immaterial things like logic and reasoning can emerge from material things like brains, they must arise from something else which is also immaterial?

There are other works that are working through that question. One of my favorite is Where Math Comes From…. It’s not the only one though.

 

[markeverett49]

I’m not a philosopher but human evolution was my main field of study and this is not correct…

I didn’t say it was correct but that it was crucial to Darwin’s theory. Darwin considered both of these ideas central to his theory. They are both false when it comes to humans. (They may be false for dogs and hummingbirds too, but they are KNOWN to be false for human beings.) It was necessary for his theory to get off the ground that a) all species have as many offspring as possible and b) their food supply (-the environment) soon to be overwhelmed, which prompted the struggle for survival that lead to the “fittest” members of each species surviving to reproduce. But this is not how it is for human beings. (It may not be this way for gorillas either. How many gorillas starve to death? How many elephants?)

 

[markeverett49]

So, because we cannot yet explain how immaterial things like logic and reasoning can emerge from material things like brains, they must arise from something else which is also immaterial? Is that the gist of the argument?

No one would ever mistake me for a philosopher, but how is that not just an argument from ignorance?

No, it is not just an argument from ignorance. We cannot explain how to turn straw into gold but this is not because we are ignorant but because we know straw cannot be spun into gold.

As for your first question, on the materialistic view there are no immaterial things, so logic and reasoning are NOT immaterial things. They are, if they exist, material in the same way that other things are and they can only influence brains in a physical way, like a blow to the head might, or a shock, or the touch of a loved one’s hand.

The best way to see this, I think, is to realize that for a materialist to be consistent, he must claim he cannot help but think what he thinks and has no reason to think it is true. You might say—crudeness alert!—that thoughts are just the burps and farts of the brain and have no meaning beyond that.

It has long puzzled me that materialists, who argue the mind is just the brain, period, tend to give themselves lots of credit for holding this view. Conversely, they fault theists for holding theistic views. Yet if materialism is true, the materialist is no more to credit than the theist is to blame–both parties are determined to think what they think and there’s no reason to think any thought true. (Truth is not the sort of thing that COULD impress a brain.)

And that’s a problem. The ancients—who were often wrong—had one thing going for them. They thought a worldview should at least explain what they knew to be true. The modern materialistic view is that only material explanations count as explanations and what they cannot explain cannot be happening. But we know this to be false because, well, materialists make arguments and present them to people hoping to change their minds. If materialism were true, this wouldn’t be happening. But it is happening. We know this. People think, they have ideas, those ideas influence their lives, but these are not material things at all. Thus the idea that only material causes are possible is known to be false.

 

[Julia_Mae]

You seemed to be implying that Darwin’s theory is an adequate explanation of the emergence of human beings.

Evolution by natural selection is an adequate explanation for the emergence of all biological species. “Human beings,” if we define that on this forum as a species imbued with a spiritual soul, cannot emerge only from biological processes. You’ll save time if you just present your specific issue in the first place.

 

[markeverett49]

It wasn’t a necessity that infant mortality rates are high. Though it was observed that there are organisms that produce more offspring than make it into adulthood.

It was for Darwin. This is no small matter but crucial to his theory. For Darwin, a population ‘at equilibrium’ meant that the population was eating all available food. (This is an odd definition of equilibrium, but it was Darwin’s.) Darwin thought that for all organisms, only a small percentage of those born mature long enough to reproduce.

For humans, we know this is false. (It may be false for other species as well, but since we know it is false for humans, that is sufficient to indicate something fundamental is wrong with this theory.) Human infant mortality is not always high and humans do not leave behind as many offspring as possible. For Darwin, both things were necessary to his theory. If those things are not true, then the “struggle for existence” loses its stature as evolution’s driving force.

 

[tonyrey]

Evolution by natural selection is an adequate explanation for the emergence of all biological species. “Human beings,” if we define that on this forum as a species imbued with a spiritual soul, cannot emerge only from biological processes. You’ll save time if you just present your specific issue in the first place.

…
Your statement:

Darwin, to the extreme irritation of those who would like to be the smartest paleoanthropologist in the room, was pretty much completely correct as far as he could explain the derivation of species without genetics.

did not exclude the human species from evolution by natural selection and implies that the entire process was undirected by God… unless genetics is a product of Design. What precisely do you believe?

 

[Julia_Mae]

I didn’t say it was correct but that it was crucial to Darwin’s theory.

Which is what I said was incorrect, you don’t understand Darwin’s theory if you believe your own statement.

Darwin considered both of these ideas central to his theory.

I assure you he did not at any time say this.

They are both false when it comes to humans.

Which is irrelevant as Darwin never said this. Darwin was one of the most brilliant scientific minds ever to grace the earth. You really think he didn’t know that large primates have fewer and more altricial young than opossums and frogs?

It was necessary for his theory to get off the ground that a) all species have as many offspring as possible …

Oh, I see. This wasn’t what you said. You said this:

Originally Posted by markeverett49
(It is crucial to Darwin’s theory that a) infant mortality is always high and b) all organisms leave behind as many offspring as possible.

An organism is an individual member of a species. You are confusing something Malthusian with something Darwinian, but as Darwin used Malthus as a reference for his theory, that makes sense. Malthus noted that all species reproduce far more than necessary to replace themselves. If left unchecked, we would overwhelm the earth in a very short time. It was essentially a mathematical calculation.

The passion between the sexes has appeared in every age to be so nearly the same that it may always be considered, in algebraic language, as a given quantity. The great law of necessity which prevents population from increasing in any country beyond the food which it can either produce or acquire, is a law so open to our view…that we cannot for a moment doubt it. The different modes which nature takes to prevent or repress a redundant population do not appear, indeed, to us so certain and regular, but though we cannot always predict the mode we may with certainty predict the fact.
—Malthus, 1798, Chapter IV. Essay on the Principle of Population

… and b) their food supply (-the environment) soon to be overwhelmed, which prompted the struggle for survival that lead to the “fittest” members of each species surviving to reproduce.

Now, why doesn’t a species overwhelm the earth? Something keeps them in check, these checks and balances in nature weren’t an original idea of Darwin’s, what he did was synthesize a lot of thinking and realize that it drove change in populations and that Malthus wasn’t just relative to humanity. It isn’t just food that is in short supply, of course, but also space.

It isn’t that every species must have the maximum possible number of offspring, but that reproduction outstrips rate of mortality. So, there is pressure: everything is jockeying for position with everything else (see: Red Queen hypothesis) which is the driving force behind the change in a population over time. Today we’d say a change in the genetic frequency of a population over time.

But this is not how it is for human beings. (It may not be this way for gorillas either. How many gorillas starve to death? How many elephants?)

It’s exactly how it is for our species and for elephants (who starve to death during drought in wholesale lots) and gorillas who might starve but their numbers are kept scarily low by poachers so they never stress their environments. Of course, their environments are rapidly disappearing which is the same as overpopulating an environment.

BTW, 25,000 people a day starve to death or die of conditions related to malnutrition.

 

[Julia_Mae]

It was for Darwin. This is no small matter but crucial to his theory. For Darwin, a population ‘at equilibrium’ meant that the population was eating all available food. (.

Srsly, you need to find this in anything Darwin wrote and quote it. Because he didn’t say this.

 

[Julia_Mae]

…
Your statement:
did not exclude the human species from evolution by natural selection and implies that the entire process was undirected by God… unless genetics is a product of Design. What precisely do you believe?

What I believe is irrelevant to the thread topic. My field was paleoanthropology: the evolution of Homo sapiens sapiens. Now, if you want to discuss this is terms of religion, you can try and start a thread, but I don’t think they allow that here.

BTW, the fact that you infer something from a statement, does not mean anyone necessarily implied anything. I certainly didn’t. Neither, afaik, did Darwin.

 

[markeverett49]

Evolution by natural selection is an adequate explanation for the emergence of all biological species. “Human beings,” if we define that on this forum as a species imbued with a spiritual soul, cannot emerge only from biological processes. You’ll save time if you just present your specific issue in the first place.

Couple curious things here.

First, despite the title of his book, Darwin doesn’t explain the origin of species. In fact, as several philosophers have pointed out, if all the animals who ever lived were to suddenly re-appear, there would be no species at all, just a gradation of individual to individual. (If you’re an anti-essentialist, it’s hard to have a robust theory of species.)

Second, Darwin was clear that the thinking of human beings differed only in degree, not in kind, from that of the higher primates. I think he was wrong about this. Other animals do not bind time the way we do or associate politically as we do. They do not pass on culture as humans do either. (Gorillas have no use for cultural anthropology, or poetry, or history, and certainly no use for evolutionary theories!)

 

[Julia_Mae]

Couple curious things here.

First, despite the title of his book, Darwin doesn’t explain the origin of species.

On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life

In fact, as several philosophers have pointed out, if all the animals who ever lived were to suddenly re-appear, there would be no species at all, just a gradation of individual to individual.

I don’t usually get my science form philosophers. However, “species” has always been a slippery word and an imprecise designation. Genetics is making it more precise. And if you could line up all the individuals ever extant, of course it would be a series of gradations with radiations, pretty much.

Second, Darwin was clear that the thinking of human beings differed only in degree, not in kind, from that of the higher primates. I think he was wrong about this. Other animals do not bind time the way we do or associate politically as we do. They do not pass on culture as humans do either.

I don’t know what you mean by “bind time” in this context, but I assure you other species do, indeed, associate politically and pass on culture and not just primates. The use tools, make wars, mourn the dead, decorate themselves, and do what we do, in different manner and degree. How does this relate to the premise of the book?

 

[ThinkingSapien]

As for your first question, on the materialistic view there are no immaterial things, so logic and reasoning are NOT immaterial things. They are, if they exist, material in the same way that other things are and they can only influence brains in a physical way, like a blow to the head might, or a shock, or the touch of a loved one’s hand.

They would be conceptual. This isn’t something on the material/non-material dichotomy, but a different classification.

 

[cornbread_r2]

No, it is not just an argument from ignorance. We cannot explain how to turn straw into gold but this is not because we are ignorant but because we know straw cannot be spun into gold.

Your denial that this is an argument from ignorance seems to work great for your analogy, but I’m not convinced it works so well for the question I asked.

As for your first question, on the materialistic view there are no immaterial things, so logic and reasoning are NOT immaterial things. They are, if they exist, material in the same way that other things are and they can only influence brains in a physical way, like a blow to the head might, or a shock, or the touch of a loved one’s hand.

…]

Since I’m not an expert on the materialistic view, I’d like to see a reference that all materialists hold that there are no immaterial things. I can see how some people might hold that reason and logic are products of a materialistic electro-chemical process, but I don’t see that those same people must also necessarily hold that reason and logic are material things in and of themselves.