Morality/ethics: instinct vs ideology

[fromderinside]

Sometime deep in the future, when we have a far greater understanding of how brains function in total, we may have a physiological explanation of our thinking process, but that is not now. Genetics and epigenetics cannot account for how we think, though in some cases, we get clues to how it may cause mental dysfunction. What I am trying to say here is that there really is no way to escape some kind of reasoning in favor of some kind of automatic response that is built into us. This idea is the seed of social disorder because that common referent may well be the limbic system, which essentially is irrational and more an alarm system than a planning structure.

Organisms, particularly social organisms that must mate, must first solve a problem. Is that which is coming suitable for mating or is it suitable for fighting. There are others fight or flight, seek or avoid, but, the bottom line one for social animals is distinguishing between mate or foe and then behaving in ways to accomplish those those. The literature is awash with the genetics of arousal, flight, flight, mating, etc and there is always arbitration among using those chemicals most needed for each or both.

Recent political, psychological and genetic history is filled with the study and the genetics of acceptance and exclusion and their roles in culture, war, progress, and social system. This, to me, is just an extension of a fighting fish working out whether to allow another fighting fish access to her nest or to go out and kill that damn intruder. The fighting fish issue has been resolved in favor of evolutionary genetics. Fighting fish are public in that males fight for the honor of mating and females and for maintenance of their bubble nests. When when seeing a winner the female is much more likely to chose the winner, approach him and endure the waggle dance ritual that comes from conflicting impulses to mate or fight. (see for instance: Public Information: From Nosy Neighbors toCultural Evolution http://www.edanchin.fr/plugins/fckeditor/userfiles/file/Danchin et al Science 2004.pdf )

In fact the article proposes a model that could apply to humans.

By the way there's a lot of pathways between the limbic system to visual, auditory, association and language cortex suggesting the machines of the limbic system are probably significantly refined.

 

[arkirk]

Organisms, particularly social organisms that must mate, must first solve a problem. Is that which is coming suitable for mating or is it suitable for fighting. There are others fight or flight, seek or avoid, but, the bottom line one for social animals is distinguishing between mate or foe and then behaving in ways to accomplish those those. The literature is awash with the genetics of arousal, flight, flight, mating, etc and there is always arbitration among using those chemicals most needed for each or both.

Recent political, psychological and genetic history is filled with the study and the genetics of acceptance and exclusion and their roles in culture, war, progress, and social system. This, to me, is just an extension of a fighting fish working out whether to allow another fighting fish access to her nest or to go out and kill that damn intruder. The fighting fish issue has been resolved in favor of evolutionary genetics. Fighting fish are public in that males fight for the honor of mating and females and for maintenance of their bubble nests. When when seeing a winner the female is much more likely to chose the winner, approach him and endure the waggle dance ritual that comes from conflicting impulses to mate or fight. (see for instance: Public Information: From Nosy Neighbors toCultural Evolution http://www.edanchin.fr/plugins/fckeditor/userfiles/file/Danchin et al Science 2004.pdf )

In fact the article proposes a model that could apply to humans.

By the way there's a lot of pathways between the limbic system to visual, auditory, association and language cortex suggesting the machines of the limbic system are probably significantly refined.

I find the article amusing and very lacking in discrimination between rational functions and limbic functions, jumping from basic fight/flight responses to rational thinking and then back to knee jerk characterization language. One of the examples is a bird that watches another bird bury something, then waits for the opportunity to steal the buried material. This is taken as "learning" and social adaptation. It is a simple explanation of a complicated problem. In the food cache stealing bird example we find the bird has learned that "there is food to be taken there." Empathy and community is lacking in this example. It would be fair to say that other adaptations of this species of bird are sufficiently successful for the species to survive despite this lack of empathy.

Human rationality is so much more complex and their social relationships are such a tangled accumulation of communications, a mix of reactive limbic response and rationality, it cannot be explained and simply called "instinct." We are much more dangerous to each other than the birds. The good news is that we can actually formulate a system of justice that benefits the entire race.

The amygdala does not discriminate and analyze how it has come to receive its signal. When the amygdala is kept in a hyperactive state for too long a period of time, too many of these fight/flight, pain/pleasure, signals overwhelm the rational processes and they, in the haste caused by the flood of signals tend toward error. Advertisers are very conscious of this phenomenon and rely on it to sell everything from new cars to wars.

It remains, I feel for us to sort out our own relationship with our environment and each other on a basis of human empathy and mutuality and not place too much stock in some kind of inherited morality. If we look back into our history with its wars, its religious repressions, its environmental errors, it is clear that much of it was the result of rational errors due to confusion and misinterpretation of the output of our alarm systems. Because we are capable of communication, we are able to amplify our fears and implant these fears and other false beliefs in others on a large scale. Humanitarian concepts become more and more important the more complex our society becomes. We appear to be living in a time when these less motivating ideas seem to be declining. It is funny, but natural selection can also select out of existence species that fail to adapt to their environment. It is an open question just where humanity fits into this. All we can do is our best and hope for the best.

 

[fromderinside]

I find the article amusing and very lacking in discrimination between rational functions and limbic functions, jumping from basic fight/flight responses to rational thinking and then back to knee jerk characterization language. One of the examples is a bird that watches another bird bury something, then waits for the opportunity to steal the buried material. This is taken as "learning" and social adaptation. It is a simple explanation of a complicated problem. In the food cache stealing bird example we find the bird has learned that "there is food to be taken there." Empathy and community is lacking in this example. It would be fair to say that other adaptations of this species of bird are sufficiently successful for the species to survive despite this lack of empathy.

Human rationality is so much more complex and their social relationships are such a tangled accumulation of communications, a mix of reactive limbic response and rationality, it cannot be explained and simply called "instinct." We are much more dangerous to each other than the birds. The good news is that we can actually formulate a system of justice that benefits the entire race.

The amygdala does not discriminate and analyze how it has come to receive its signal. When the amygdala is kept in a hyperactive state for too long a period of time, too many of these fight/flight, pain/pleasure, signals overwhelm the rational processes and they, in the haste caused by the flood of signals tend toward error. Advertisers are very conscious of this phenomenon and rely on it to sell everything from new cars to wars.

It remains, I feel for us to sort out our own relationship with our environment and each other on a basis of human empathy and mutuality and not place too much stock in some kind of inherited morality. If we look back into our history with its wars, its religious repressions, its environmental errors, it is clear that much of it was the result of rational errors due to confusion and misinterpretation of the output of our alarm systems. Because we are capable of communication, we are able to amplify our fears and implant these fears and other false beliefs in others on a large scale. Humanitarian concepts become more and more important the more complex our society becomes. We appear to be living in a time when these less motivating ideas seem to be declining. It is funny, but natural selection can also select out of existence species that fail to adapt to their environment. It is an open question just where humanity fits into this. All we can do is our best and hope for the best.

My post and the reference were not about an inherited evolved morality. It is about evidence for progenators of what humans have to use to construct and operate whatever morality they build as a social species that exists in a rich environment of public information and multiple internal information processing systems.

If you use keywords amygdala and mirror cells or mirror systems and do a scholar search you'll come yo with pages of scholarly articles. This article specifically presents evidence for mirror systems in emotion focusing on Amygdala: "Evidence for mirror systems in emotions" (http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/364/1528/2391.full.html) the idea thwat evolved systems opportunistically link genator with moderator is not new and the people who wrote the article understand that. The simplicity of presentation is probably due to the audience considerations.

 

[arkirk]

My post and the reference were not about an inherited evolved morality. It is about evidence for progenators of what humans have to use to construct and operate whatever morality they build as a social species that exists in a rich environment of public information and multiple internal information processing systems.

If you use keywords amygdala and mirror cells or mirror systems and do a scholar search you'll come yo with pages of scholarly articles. This article specifically presents evidence for mirror systems in emotion focusing on Amygdala: "Evidence for mirror systems in emotions" (http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/364/1528/2391.full.html) the idea thwat evolved systems opportunistically link genator with moderator is not new and the people who wrote the article understand that. The simplicity of presentation is probably due to the audience considerations.

I don't doubt the existence of these neural systems. What I do question is the efficacy of using them to explain the much more involved question of what we do with ourselves in this world. We have known about mirror neural systems and their effects on emotions and indeed on actions of humans and other creatures. What I am saying is that knowing about them does not mean that they provide us with the best evidence for deducing the nature and effect of our behavior. We need to be mindful of these systems rather than rely on them for guidance. Rational analysis can supercede these automatic signals our system gives us... sometimes and sometimes support them, but without the rational process, we become more and more like worker bees, driven by unexamined motives....ie. mirroring.

Let me be more explicit. Every post here in this forum is the result of a complex rational operation that converts or reduces our experience to expression in terms of language our attempts to describe our mental operations amount to painting a picture in words of things that are otherwise inexpressible. We are always left with the rational function and that too is subject to various social conventions. The very idea of moral principles implies the application of reason and framing. Limbic functions in the brain due to stress or fear or revulsion can interfere with the framing of issues, rendering all reasoning relative to the issues at hand impervious to reason. If you don't believe me, try discussing any of this with a fervent born again Christian fundamentalist who regards the Evangelical framing of reality absolute.

 

[fromderinside]

I don't doubt the existence of these neural systems. What I do question is the efficacy of using them to explain the much more involved question of what we do with ourselves in this world. We have known about mirror neural systems and their effects on emotions and indeed on actions of humans and other creatures. What I am saying is that knowing about them does not mean that they provide us with the best evidence for deducing the nature and effect of our behavior. We need to be mindful of these systems rather than rely on them for guidance. Rational analysis can supercede these automatic signals our system gives us... sometimes and sometimes support them, but without the rational process, we become more and more like worker bees, driven by unexamined motives....ie. mirroring.

Let me be more explicit. Every post here in this forum is the result of a complex rational operation that converts or reduces our experience to expression in terms of language our attempts to describe our mental operations amount to painting a picture in words of things that are otherwise inexpressible. We are always left with the rational function and that too is subject to various social conventions. The very idea of moral principles implies the application of reason and framing. Limbic functions in the brain due to stress or fear or revulsion can interfere with the framing of issues, rendering all reasoning relative to the issues at hand impervious to reason. If you don't believe me, try discussing any of this with a fervent born again Christian fundamentalist who regards the Evangelical framing of reality absolute.

We must disagree.

Objective empirical understanding of the processes used, in concert with concomitant objective empirical evidence of our behavior, does provide us with the best evidence of our nature.

Moral principles are generally ad hoc cultural guides, beliefs which are constructs used in place actual understanding, for social practice. Probably necessary, but, not really anything one should use in understanding human behavior beyond an objective understanding of what they are and how and why we take such shortcuts.

 

[arkirk]

I don't doubt the existence of these neural systems. What I do question is the efficacy of using them to explain the much more involved question of what we do with ourselves in this world. We have known about mirror neural systems and their effects on emotions and indeed on actions of humans and other creatures. What I am saying is that knowing about them does not mean that they provide us with the best evidence for deducing the nature and effect of our behavior. We need to be mindful of these systems rather than rely on them for guidance. Rational analysis can supercede these automatic signals our system gives us... sometimes and sometimes support them, but without the rational process, we become more and more like worker bees, driven by unexamined motives....ie. mirroring.

Let me be more explicit. Every post here in this forum is the result of a complex rational operation that converts or reduces our experience to expression in terms of language our attempts to describe our mental operations amount to painting a picture in words of things that are otherwise inexpressible. We are always left with the rational function and that too is subject to various social conventions. The very idea of moral principles implies the application of reason and framing. Limbic functions in the brain due to stress or fear or revulsion can interfere with the framing of issues, rendering all reasoning relative to the issues at hand impervious to reason. If you don't believe me, try discussing any of this with a fervent born again Christian fundamentalist who regards the Evangelical framing of reality absolute.

We must disagree.

Objective empirical understanding of the processes used, in concert with concomitant objective empirical evidence of our behavior, does provide us with the best evidence of our nature.

Moral principles are generally ad hoc cultural guides, beliefs which are constructs used in place actual understanding, for social practice. Probably necessary, but, not really anything one should use in understanding human behavior beyond an objective understanding of what they are and how and why we take such shortcuts.

I am the last person you would expect to poo poo scientific investigation of how our brains work, but they do not work in a vacuum and are extremely complex. I clearly am not saying no to the understandings we get from brain science. Human interactions however are not just within a model brain however and we live in a social world, where communication, various forms of cooperation and conflict are the basis of our interaction. There is a place for considering these interactions on a macro level. It is true that the science gives us some understanding of how some things get framed, but we must utilize our common language before we even begin to talk about our knowledge of the inner workings of the brain.

That is what linguistics is all about...analyzing our symbolic representation of information. It is closely allied with brain science and relies on it frequently. It is on the basis of our language that we communicate with each other, regardless of problems and limitations of our brains. Our agreements and disagreements, our interpretations of our preferences and tendencies are important and need to be communicated in the common language and analyzed thus, so I think THAT TOO IS AN IMPORTANT ADJUNCT OF HUMAN LIFE. I suspect you do too. You have stated you must disagree with me. Frankly, I don't know why, when you have already said social and moral codes are probably necessary. That means you probably agree with me.

 

[fromderinside]

Like I said. We must disagree. Most of our interpretations are based on ad hoc conclusions formed without actual observation and empirical examination.

For instance, witches are discovered and accused out of hearsay and fear through practices based on prejudice, opportunity, and presumption. Had one taken a moment one would never have presumed one could fly having never ever seen anyone fly. Still women were accused of such, of reaching into bodies and extracting hearts without there ever being an instance of such taking place. What is the basis for a morality that would serve such actions, accusations, and extreme behaviors?

If we were to actually think things through we wouldn't devise systems that punish those who have little because they ask for some. Rather we would come to an agreement where work was freely given in exchange for one's necessities which would otherwise rot in storage. Yet rules about being poor were constructed considering being poor bad. Punishment for that status took away what little the poor had and lost hands that could have provided to help us all.

I see no way where an internal analysis of language can provide clues about what we should do. All that one can get from such is what one has done without connections to why the were so done. Rational analysis without observation and experiment and confirmation is useless.

 

[arkirk]

]Like I said. We must disagree. Most of our interpretations are based on ad hoc conclusions formed without actual observation and empirical examination. [/COLOR]For instance, witches are discovered and accused out of hearsay and fear through practices based on prejudice, opportunity, and presumption. Had one taken a moment one would never have presumed one could fly having never ever seen anyone fly. Still women were accused of such, of reaching into bodies and extracting hearts without there ever being an instance of such taking place. What is the basis for a morality that would serve such actions, accusations, and extreme behaviors?

If we were to actually think things through we wouldn't devise systems that punish those who have little because they ask for some. Rather we would come to an agreement where work was freely given in exchange for one's necessities which would otherwise rot in storage. Yet rules about being poor were constructed considering being poor bad. Punishment for that status took away what little the poor had and lost hands that could have provided to help us all.

I see no way where an internal analysis of language can provide clues about what we should do. All that one can get from such is what one has done without connections to why the were so done. Rational analysis without observation and experiment and confirmation is useless.

That's mighty disagreeable of you. Is the highlighted statement in you last post an example of ad hoc conclusions formed without actual observation and empirical examination? I might also suggest you be very careful using the word "we" and talking about witch burnings. "We" didn't burn any wictches. Is you want to use the word "I" that is okay with me, then I can agree to disagree with you.

 

[arkirk]

Fromderinside: Stop and think a second where you get the idea there is such a thing as empiricism. I know there is such a concept and do not count that concept as "just an ad hoc idea. It is the result of rational consideration of the source of the information we use for any purpose at all. For this concept to become useful in any sense, including a moral sense, it must temper our communications with the very standards you and I both recommend...observation, experimentation, etc, to determine its veracity and reliability. It is a voluntary discipline and your examples (witch burning and commie persecuting, and other erroneous human behaviors) are the result of departing from that discipline.

The fact is that this concept...empiricism...is the result of noting errors in past supposed understandings or lack of consideration of actual human experience. Much of this misunderstanding is linguistic and based on the type of ad hoc conclusions you so loudly decry. You cannot abandon rational examination of the language we use to communicate our ideas. It has a direct bearing on whether or not humans understand each other.

 

[fromderinside]

<mostly duplicate>

 

[fromderinside]

Fromderinside: Stop and think a second where you get the idea there is such a thing as empiricism. I know there is such a concept and do not count that concept as "just an ad hoc idea. It is the result of rational consideration of the source of the information we use for any purpose at all. For this concept to become useful in any sense, including a moral sense, it must temper our communications with the very standards you and I both recommend...observation, experimentation, etc, to determine its veracity and reliability. It is a voluntary discipline and your examples (witch burning and commie persecuting, and other erroneous human behaviors) are the result of departing from that discipline.

The fact is that this concept...empiricism...is the result of noting errors in past supposed understandings or lack of consideration of actual human experience. Much of this misunderstanding is linguistic and based on the type of ad hoc conclusions you so loudly decry. You cannot abandon rational examination of the language we use to communicate our ideas. It has a direct bearing on whether or not humans understand each other.

I distinguish rationalism from scientific method by the fact that rationalism is a component of the scientific method and not the method itself.

So when you write "It is the result of rational consideration of the source of the information we use for any purpose at all. For this concept to become useful in any sense, including a moral sense, it must temper our communications with the very standards you and I both recommend", you are setting up a straw man.

When you attach observation and experimentation as I did to determine veracity and reliability of information you are cloaking rationalism as a valid approach to the study and determination of morality. Such in an obvious expansion of the meaning of rationalism. Rationalists took what was being done and rationally produced a philosophy of empiricism. Come on. Such philosophical intuition is fraudulent. The exercise of scientific method came before the intuition of empiricism so wrapping empiricism under the umbrella of ratinalism and thereby inferring the scientific method is a rationalist's invention is just plain false.

Suggesting that empiricism has any bearing on what I wrote is just bad form on your part. Rationalism is not a verified information based form of reasoning. By its classical structure rationalism is post hoc hearsay dominated form or idea management. Do not try to incorporate the work of those who invented metal weapons, agriculture, built the pyramids, etc as coming forth subsumed under the Greek enlightened notion of rational reasoning. JOhn had a problem. He had to make a shelter that was useful and easy to build. He sat down by a stream where there were reeds and fronds, took them, manipulated them, ultimately coming up with a tent-like structure. No self evident truths no this and this then that.

So what I preach as the result of using and exploring morality from the view of verifiability and utility has little in common with rationalism. I specifically reject hearsay from consideration beyond the point of such being a starting point for investigation and verification. Whereas moral reasoners using rational method produced justifications for murder, degradation, hatred, deceit all under the umbrella of rationalism. Please. Don't broach that barrier again. There are just too many instances where what I describe as subject to rationalism is true in the morality arena. Belief is not, language is not, valid tools for investigation nor determination of moral principles beyond being a historic tacker of what the hell went wrong with morality in various periods of history.

As for your final attempt to wrap scientific study of language under some rational cover you blow it when you use ad hoc experience, phenomena, to support your view that such study of linguistics can yield verifiable and useful result. There is no way actual ad hoc experience is verifiable since it is from the individual, self reported, phenomenal. Trying to claim there are scientific rationales is doing so using language analysis is just as rotten a scientific fruit as are first hand reports since they are bound by belief, hearsay, prejudice and self interest.

 

[arkirk]

Fromderinside: Stop and think a second where you get the idea there is such a thing as empiricism. I know there is such a concept and do not count that concept as "just an ad hoc idea. It is the result of rational consideration of the source of the information we use for any purpose at all. For this concept to become useful in any sense, including a moral sense, it must temper our communications with the very standards you and I both recommend...observation, experimentation, etc, to determine its veracity and reliability. It is a voluntary discipline and your examples (witch burning and commie persecuting, and other erroneous human behaviors) are the result of departing from that discipline.

The fact is that this concept...empiricism...is the result of noting errors in past supposed understandings or lack of consideration of actual human experience. Much of this misunderstanding is linguistic and based on the type of ad hoc conclusions you so loudly decry. You cannot abandon rational examination of the language we use to communicate our ideas. It has a direct bearing on whether or not humans understand each other.

I distinguish rationalism from scientific method by the fact that rationalism is a component of the scientific method and not the method itself.

So when you write "It is the result of rational consideration of the source of the information we use for any purpose at all. For this concept to become useful in any sense, including a moral sense, it must temper our communications with the very standards you and I both recommend", you are setting up a straw man.

When you attach observation and experimentation as I did to determine veracity and reliability of information you are cloaking rationalism as a valid approach to the study and determination of morality. Such in an obvious expansion of the meaning of rationalism. Rationalists took what was being done and rationally produced a philosophy of empiricism. Come on. Such philosophical intuition is fraudulent. The exercise of scientific method came before the intuition of empiricism so wrapping empiricism under the umbrella of ratinalism and thereby inferring the scientific method is a rationalist's invention is just plain false.

Suggesting that empiricism has any bearing on what I wrote is just bad form on your part. Rationalism is not a verified information based form of reasoning. By its classical structure rationalism is post hoc hearsay dominated form or idea management. Do not try to incorporate the work of those who invented metal weapons, agriculture, built the pyramids, etc as coming forth subsumed under the Greek enlightened notion of rational reasoning. JOhn had a problem. He had to make a shelter that was useful and easy to build. He sat down by a stream where there were reeds and fronds, took them, manipulated them, ultimately coming up with a tent-like structure. No self evident truths no this and this then that.

So what I preach as the result of using and exploring morality from the view of verifiability and utility has little in common with rationalism. I specifically reject hearsay from consideration beyond the point of such being a starting point for investigation and verification. Whereas moral reasoners using rational method produced justifications for murder, degradation, hatred, deceit all under the umbrella of rationalism. Please. Don't broach that barrier again. There are just too many instances where what I describe as subject to rationalism is true in the morality arena. Belief is not, language is not, valid tools for investigation nor determination of moral principles beyond being a historic tacker of what the hell went wrong with morality in various periods of history.

As for your final attempt to wrap scientific study of language under some rational cover you blow it when you use ad hoc experience, phenomena, to support your view that such study of linguistics can yield verifiable and useful result. There is no way actual ad hoc experience is verifiable since it is from the individual, self reported, phenomenal. Trying to claim there are scientific rationales is doing so using language analysis is just as rotten a scientific fruit as are first hand reports since they are bound by belief, hearsay, prejudice and self interest.

You omit the fact that the scientific method itself is a result of reason and not just some ad hoc notion generated in a focus group. The rigor you would apply is the result of rational coaching and cannot exist without it. For instance your experiment must have sufficient control or your observations may be erroneous. How do you decide you have an error...repeatability. Who said that? Someone who used his rational processes and not his momentary feelings...someone who demanded honesty and not absolute truth.

Rationality is necessary if there is to be any method at all. Now moral issues are a matter of preferences and there is a dictum that appears to be universally applicable in these matters. A moral statement is one that can neither be proven true or false. These types of problems come from somewhere and you touched on it when you characterized linguistics as "bound by belief, hearsay, prejudice and self interest." The scientific community is completely populated by those with some sort of self interest. It indeed can interfere with our interpretation of results. I don't know why you think I am trying to sell you snake oil. Science is always a hunt for the truth. As this proves over and over to us (repeatably and observably so) that our knowledge can never be complete and absolute, we cannot even begin to find application with some reason for being.
This I feel brings us full circle back to rationalism. That's where it started and that is where it shall remain because there is no such thing as absolute knowledge of truth.

That part of science that finds application in our lives is that part that is operable in repeated experiments and can be applied to some preference one may have. Scientific notions are always subject to revision based on continued observation, so there really is a reason to find a common human ethic that allows scientific opinion to change over time based on those observations. Be aware that most experiments are based on proving or disproving a theory, connecting ideas...all rational processes. These theories are projections based on past results.

I feel you are applying a double standard to the science of linguistics, possibly on the basis of your own self interest and don't realize that science declares itself not absolute...and never final....something it seems to share with moral statements.

 

[fromderinside]

You omit the fact that the scientific method itself is a result of reason and not just some ad hoc notion generated in a focus group. The rigor you would apply is the result of rational coaching and cannot exist without it. For instance your experiment must have sufficient control or your observations may be erroneous. How do you decide you have an error...repeatability. Who said that? Someone who used his rational processes and not his momentary feelings...someone who demanded honesty and not absolute truth.

Rationality is necessary if there is to be any method at all. Now moral issues are a matter of preferences and there is a dictum that appears to be universally applicable in these matters. A moral statement is one that can neither be proven true or false. These types of problems come from somewhere and you touched on it when you characterized linguistics as "bound by belief, hearsay, prejudice and self interest." The scientific community is completely populated by those with some sort of self interest. It indeed can interfere with our interpretation of results. I don't know why you think I am trying to sell you snake oil. Science is always a hunt for the truth. As this proves over and over to us (repeatably and observably so) that our knowledge can never be complete and absolute, we cannot even begin to find application with some reason for being.
This I feel brings us full circle back to rationalism. That's where it started and that is where it shall remain because there is no such thing as absolute knowledge of truth.

That part of science that finds application in our lives is that part that is operable in repeated experiments and can be applied to some preference one may have. Scientific notions are always subject to revision based on continued observation, so there really is a reason to find a common human ethic that allows scientific opinion to change over time based on those observations. Be aware that most experiments are based on proving or disproving a theory, connecting ideas...all rational processes. These theories are projections based on past results.

I feel you are applying a double standard to the science of linguistics, possibly on the basis of your own self interest and don't realize that science declares itself not absolute...and never final....something it seems to share with moral statements.

There you go again. This time trying to subsume thinking as the invention of rationalists. Why do you continue to do this? Could it be that the only way for you to prevail is to take what others have done and patch it into Rationalism. Egyptians were operating on brains before Greece was even a glimmer in history's eye. I give you a real life scenario that included observation, manipulation (experiment) and replication all under the watch of others as a pre-civilization example of application of the scientific method and you shine it on. The point there, and now, is that such thinking (reasoning) predates invention of Socratic-Platonic method.

All the reasons you recite are covered by that example, yet, you want to claim it took philosophers to bless them. Worse still you continue to insist rationalism is necessary for such conventions to be realized. Obviously these things were not realized with the Greeks, but, perhaps they were gathered together ornamented and blessed by those who were in power when stuff of that sort was being jotted down.

Another complication is that greeks were open to science, but, such was squashed after the Romans by narrow thinkers needing control, thus leaving us with a dirty rationalism that resulted in the disgusting reasonings therefrom from the dark ages.

I don't need to pound you into dirt. You just need to know that scientific thinking and methods have been with humans from the time of the first tool maker from over 2 million years ago. Equations were the first stuff written down in Damascus around 6500 BCE and rationalism came about 5000 years later. Attempts to divest that history gets me excited. It also messes up any clear understanding of relations between instincts and ideology, witch, as it happens, is the subject of this thread.

 

[arkirk]

Fromderinside: It all depends on just what you mean by instinct. That earliest example you give in 6500 BCE was an example of symbolic logic, not instinct. I have felt all along in this exchange that you are missing my point. It appears we have different ideas regarding just what we can call "instinct." It is my contention that you are playing word games with me and have failed to clarify what you are calling "instinct." Our language and indeed our mathematics are rational processes based on symbolic language. They are disciplines based on mutually agreed upon rules. While it is possible that the nature of our composition and evolution have allowed us to reason, that reasoning was the product of the social milieu in which it occurred and not something. Without social milieu and recognition of the need for agreement in meaning for words and numbers, there is NO COMMUNICATION AT ALL. It is not something we are born with. It is a learning experience and what you learn depends very much on the environment in which it occurs.

Many human beings live entire lives without LEARNING HOW TO READ AND WRITE. Social projects to extend reading skills to these people actually work. Mathematics is a discipline based on communication and entirely a rational process. In most cases where persons cannot either read or perform basic math operations, it is due to non exposure to the discipline. Individuals must communicate. If it were some sort of built in instinctual thing, we would all be capable of doing it successfully. Our difficulties here due to that very problem.

If it is some kind of contest between rationalism and instinct, you have not even made it clear just what you mean by instinct...is that what you think made or destroyed the Roman civilization? Societies settle on practices based on their interest in rational approaches to living that are codified. If there are errors in that codification and interpretation of that codification, societies run afoul of natural limitations and can destroy themselves. There always will be ideology...and it will always be imperfect, but without it we will not have civilization. So perhaps it would be good to examine these ideologies in detail, including history.

Today's widespread ideologies are unfortunately narrowing because exigencies caused by failures in interpretation and indeed substance of these ideologies go unexamined. Words like inctinct just confuse the issue..

 

[fromderinside]

arkirk: Its important that we agree on what mean when talking about something before we talk about it. My view with on rationalism as used by you is that you attribute everything to it. It is just one philosophical thread. One that depends on logic and reason informed by intuition and introspection. I find that approach fatally flawed. What I've done for the last several posts is point out where scientific method and rationalism diverge, where the limits are on rationalism with respect to the scientific method, and why rationalism or rationalistic reasoning is an improper approach for discovering the differences among idealistic and instinctive activity.

Rationalistic approaches are not suitable because they take every input as valid as long as it is written or said. Any discussion of the relationship between ideological and instinctive behaviors need discard the unverifiable.

Now to what I posted recently posted. the point of putting the birth of ciphering and the birth of rationalism was to demonstrate a computational methodology was already in existence some 5000 years before the greeks happened upon rationalism. Further that train was employed because it is clear that hominids have used observational, empirical, and public, methods for gaining understanding for over 2 million years as evidenced by progress in tool making and use. In no way do I consider ciphering as produced in Damascus around 6500 BCE as instinctive.

The use of number in humans, even our ape relatives, does appear to be instinctive. At an early age babies group things, preferring three to five over one or two. They do this without training before they can walk. Language also appears to be instinctive. Here is a video illustrating the point:



Note the coordination and complexity of the child's gestures far exceed its use of spoken sounds.

Now on to ideology with respect instinctive behavior. Since gestures must be considered with respect to communication among humans it is probably not the case that vocalized ideology is instinctive so examining speech would serve very little purpose in understanding the genesis of ideology. At least that wouldn't be the way I'd approach understanding any instinctive relation between man and ideology.

I'd start with tendencies to group and select, to be fearful and to be aggressive and I might look at gestural underpinnings between ideology such as salutes, gestural signalling and the like even gestural mating rituals like back rubbing, petting, etc, before I considered venturing into the human phenomenal world of interpreting spoken messaging.

I'm fairly confident we'll find instinctive elements in ideological practices among humans in war, acceptance and rejection, fear, aggression, love making, seeking and withdrawing, even with gesturing in any of the above areas. As for finding instinctive element with ideology from the genetic analysis of language. Naw.

yes I know you are committed to some variant of Chomsky's approach to linguistics. But, like his with failed understanding of the relation between genetics and behavior - he holds group selection in high esteem - his approach to finding what we are from how and what we speak is just not viable. Its just not in the language genes because there are no functional language genes, genes that express articulated coding, so parsing speech just won't be revealing.

 

[Underseer]

Just for the record, ape social groups will engage in violence with other groups of apes for territory/food, so there may very well be a biological basis for war.

 

[arkirk]

Fromderinside: What does the video have to do with what we are discussing here? What the video shows is that the young child must use gestures as its mastery of language is incomplete. Nobody's language is skills absolutely master language, so adults retain some gestures and recall some of the gestures of childhood. That has nothing to do with whether it is instinctive or not and you still have not told me what you mean by instinct. When I talk about rationality, I am not talking about some specific school that dubs itself rationality (That would make it as you say, an ideology which would be of limited scope.) We have been criticizing each other's thinking when our differences are largely linguistic...how we have come to define these words with an emotional cast that renders them semantic roadblocks to mutual understanding. We have to ask ourselves what we are doing in a forum such as this one and what we intend to see as values and policies we adhere to or reject.

That involves referencing our experiences in terms of actions taken and results following from those actions. You seem to think I am advocating reason in a vacuum of experience. This thread raises the issue of instinct. That word can have a meaning that borders on magical thinking. It suffers from the same definition problems as rationalism. Rationality on the other hand just implies a strong tendency to avoid the in the moment (ad hoc emotionality) out more primitive genetic past has left us. Our brains may be wonderful but they are not infallible nor guided by some sort of magic bullet called instinct. The more intelligent and experienced a person is, the less of his thinking is devoted to emotional responses to problems. Virtually every human activity on this earth is open to analysis. That includes language.

 

[fromderinside]

1. The child is displaying very informative gestures, very coordinated, very advanced. I suggest such suggests gestural communication probably predates aural communication. My point is vocal articulations are second hand, not first principle, and therefore probably not a good source for genetic analysis of any sort. Just a typical scientific intuition D). Gestural communication can be traced to related species, some of them occurring when babies are quite dependent and young. Hmmnnnn.

2. "Instinct..... bordering on magical thinking" There you go demonstrating what I inferred about your use of rationality. "Throw up dirt and, 'walla' it looks like dust" is not something that will get one to something contingent, repeatable, scientific.

Most of your aprophisms smack of wisdom of intuition, common sense, and, like them are usually demonstrably objective wrong.

3. Sure, most anything is subject to analysis. That's not what I'm trying to get you to comprehend. The particular analysis I'm interested in is public, repeatable, objective, in method. The one that leads to accretions in our understanding of the world, is demonstrable, repeatable, generating singular outcomes and is demonstrably materially useful.

4. Instinct. the natural, unreasoning, impulse by which an animal is guided to the performance of any action, without of improvement in the method. The resemblance between what originally was a habit, and an instinct becomes so close as not to be distinguished. (Darwin) - This is good enough for the present conversation.

 

[arkirk]

1. The child is displaying very informative gestures, very coordinated, very advanced. I suggest such suggests gestural communication probably predates aural communication. My point is vocal articulations are second hand, not first principle, and therefore probably not a good source for genetic analysis of any sort. Just a typical scientific intuition D). Gestural communication can be traced to related species, some of them occurring when babies are quite dependent and young. Hmmnnnn.

2. "Instinct..... bordering on magical thinking" There you go demonstrating what I inferred about your use of rationality. "Throw up dirt and, 'walla' it looks like dust" is not something that will get one to something contingent, repeatable, scientific.

Most of your aprophisms smack of wisdom of intuition, common sense, and, like them are usually demonstrably objective wrong.

3. Sure, most anything is subject to analysis. That's not what I'm trying to get you to comprehend. The particular analysis I'm interested in is public, repeatable, objective, in method. The one that leads to accretions in our understanding of the world, is demonstrable, repeatable, generating singular outcomes and is demonstrably materially useful.

4. Instinct. the natural, unreasoning, impulse by which an animal is guided to the performance of any action, without of improvement in the method. The resemblance between what originally was a habit, and an instinct becomes so close as not to be distinguished. (Darwin) - This is good enough for the present conversation.

And do you know when another person is acting on impulse? I find your explanation of instinct as a driving force for human behavior to be unreasoning. I think habit fits most of the situations that are called instinct. If you perform an action and it seems to quiet your anxiety, you are apt to perform a similar action the next time you are anxious. Is drug addiction instinctive? Where are you trying to take your argument? What would you have ME conclude? Cannot rationality be aimed at improvement of method? Once method is improved due to rational analysis is there not a better chance that an action will be more appropriate to the situation and more useful to the individual and society?

It appears to me you are claiming some sort of superior status for unreasoning impulse. Is that what you are saying. It appears you are rejecting the notion that rational thought is worth the effort and a good natural tantrum is better than a well considered response to ethical questions. What do you say to that? If instinct is almost indistinguishable from habit, then maybe it is just a habit. At best, the baby in the clip is experimenting with gesture trying to get some kind of result.
Gestures are learned in much the same way language is learned. There really is not a strong argument for the notion of in-built automatic and unconsidered responses dealing with anything but very simple communications.

The moment we consider some act that is not immediately present, gesture and instinct lose their effectiveness as they are always merely reflective of the organism's momentary condition. You really cannot weight unconsidered responses against rationally determined ones.

 

[fromderinside]

Artirk: a habit develops through a process of association. Instinct appears to be a behavior independent of association.

Try again.

I'm saying none of what you suggest.

Rationalism fails because it doesn't exclude hearsay. Scientific method fails because it requires verification by others.

We're going back to Hume and Kant here you know.