Comments on: Learning Evolved, Part I: Darwinism-Cognitivism

By: tdaxp

tdaxp — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:19:17 +0000

As Marco is engaging in a monologue, refusing to defend his assertions while raising new topics, his most recent comment has been deleted. He is welcome to resume his dialog at any time.

By: tdaxp

tdaxp — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 13:48:35 +0000

There is no petitio principi in my remarks.

Rather, you had said that “Science is not determined by quantification, but by its object.” In which case, any study of an object that is always studied by science is therefore science. Thus, astrology, anism, etc., are science, in the same way that Marxism, Freudianism, and so on are.

If you disagree, you can state why you disagree.

Please keep in mind this blog’s policy on trolls [1]. You are welcome to a dialog here, but not a monolog.

[1] http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2008/06/22/trolls.html

By: marco mauas

marco mauas — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 11:31:08 +0000

Please, could you kindly answer one question:

Ponzi schemes, are advantageous from a neo-Darwinist psychology perspective?
thank you,

By: marco mauas

marco mauas — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 07:36:00 +0000

1- You plead that the names you call me–proof: you write them with capital letters, and “isms”–are absurd.
This is a petitio principii. I dont agree with it, and I continue in my assertion that you use “bad names”, even as “insults”, so to feel free from those “bad things”. This may be auto-reinforcing, Ego-trip autohypnosis. It does not answer any of the points in discussion.
2- Any attempt to define “life” will arrive into the “soul problem”. Even Shrodinger recognized that.
3- “Object” as defined by Althusser, is a non-phenomenic object. It must be a clear theoretical object, something arising from our pencils. Our pencils must be capable of writing something more free of prejudices than accusing the others of being “not scientific enough”. This smells to science as religion, Lissenko. besides, who said that science is the ultimate value? Does science teach you how to make love with your partner?

By: tdaxp

tdaxp — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 21:21:52 +0000

Marco,

You insist in adjectives, that taste too much calling by names for me. If every time you use the “the other is animist” as an argument, well, you are unfalsifiable. You win.

There’s nothing name-calling in reductio ad absurdum. It’s a legitimate logical attack on your position. If you dispute it, do so. Otherwise, don’t engage in special pleading.

You say that science is defined by its object. In which case, all studies of life (Freudianism, Marxism, astrology, animism) are science. This is an absurd position.

By: marco mauas

marco mauas — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 15:48:21 +0000

My name is Marco, not “Macro”.
You insist in adjectives, that taste too much calling by names for me. If every time you use the “the other is animist” as an argument, well, you are unfalsifiable. You win.
I am not astrologist, nor animist. On the contrary, I say that Darwinism today–not Darwin himself, who was a pretty interesting researcher and writer– Darwinism today is finalist: “everything is calculated in genes so that is the most advantageous solution.”
It is possible to justify anything in this spirit. Even the capitalist market, including the financial crisis, even Ponzi schemes.
I guess that the logical form Marx gave to these events–the dissociation between credit money and cash money–has nothing animist or astrology like. If I go to the bank, the bank favors credit cards over checks, and many people have reach the point in their lives where they had to sell their homes because of the credit industry–what we know as Ponzi in our modern, Darwinist era.
Is this survival of the fit? I doubt it. I agree with Chomsky and with others–Nobel Prize Paul Krugman for example–that granting bails to the rich and powerful only gives more time.
Is capitalist system Darwin-justified? I doubt it is eternal. It may be another religion. I prefer common religion.
Communism , true, has not been so much better. But also true, people who visited Cuba experiment a sort of relief from the global sell all-buy all –because it is Coca-Cola and we are happy.
Freud also disbelieved that universal utopias can give universal solutions.
I read Darwin with great pleasure, but I dont agree with the qualifications you give me. Mildly said, it is argumentum ad hominem. Not so mildly, it sounds that you take Darwin as your personal religion. I dare to not agree with it. So what?

By: tdaxp

tdaxp — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 14:56:43 +0000

Marco,

Biology would be the study of life

This is true, if you are describing biology instead of definition it, or are definiting it broadly enough to include animism, astrology, and so on.

I am sure one can read Marx as being relevant to what happens today, in the same way that one can read the astrology column. Of course, neither are scientific, falsifiable, or so on.

The rest of your comment is incomprehensible.

By: marco mauas

marco mauas — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 06:29:48 +0000

Biology would be the study of life. What is life?
The best thing written about was not by a biologist, but by Schrodinger.
Popper discarded Freud and Marx. Now , Marx, though “not scientific”, is very much closer to what happens today with crises, and with false remedies such as bailing to banks. See Noam Chomsky last article about this.
Darwinism is plagued with finality reasoning–specially those of Darwinist psychology: “everything is calculated such that…”
Let’s take for example what we call in psychoanalysis–and in life, by the way–”desire”.
What is desire according to Darwin?–
A mechanism of survival.
In Lacan, human species is not fit for survival, but for jouissance.
Do you know what Lacan calls “jouissance”? That which takes us to do unuseful things.
For example this conversation.
One more and last thing. When we dont understand something, this is what is called an “reading effect”. We read what we dont understand.
So, I am glad if there were really points “hard to follow”. One more problem with Darwinist psy is that it is so easy to follow. It is like reading “Superman”. You know where to go, all the time.
Thank you.

By: tdaxp

tdaxp — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 04:05:06 +0000

Marco,

Popper’s assertions are well known. Less known are Bertrand Russell’s. who said that who does not understand the scientific value of psychoanalysis, does’nt understand science.

Russell’s assertion is a clear example of special pleading. As such, it is a logical fallacy that can be disgarded. We are thus left with Popper’s assertion, which you can argue are wrong, if you disagree with them.

We have also Althusser’s punctuations. Science is not determined by quantification, but by its object.

This would seem to be a false dichotomy in the first place. In the second place, however, its clearly wrong. The study of plants is the study of an object in the natural world. Biology is the scientific study of plants. Anism, however, is not science, even if we’re talking about a stream of anism that is focused on plants.

contrary to cognitive psychology, which is not a science, because it dos not have an object

No idea what you mean by this.

Thank you for the dialogue, though I find your comment hard to follow.

By: marco mauas

marco mauas — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 20:26:54 +0000

Popper’s assertions are well known. Less known are Bertrand Russell’s. who said that who does not understand the scientific value of psychoanalysis, does’nt understand science.
We have also Althusser’s punctuations. Science is not determined by quantification, but by its object. And psychoanalysis has an object: Unconscious.
How useful they are–Lacan’s comments? Well we have a new opening in XXI century, with psychoanalysis being a non-authoritative approach to mental disease–contrary to cognitive psychology, which is not a science, because it dos not have an object, but it defines itself by its influence on its subjects, as hypnosis.
Secondly, only try to give a chance to Superego in your “social” explanations. Every social order must reach the subject by identification: propaganda for example. Superego is a residue of the most important identifications.
You dont answer about Sade. Sade was less “sadist” than many “moral” subjects. How many Bishops are suspected of pedophilia in USA? If Bishops or Church people are interesting in this case, it is because they are social Superego–more perverse than those who declare who are “clean” and “examine” other’s morality.
See for example what Arthur Miller wrote about Clinton’s impeachement. Arhtur Miller knew something about what is the social superego. He wrote that Clinton’s accusers were witch burners. This is what Freud discovered. It has a value beyond any Popperian assertion.
See Russels “The impact of science in society”. You will find there a description, non-popperian, of how Bentham supposition that men search tue most useful goes astray when it is perfectly clear what Freud discovered as Death Instinct: sometimes people search the evil for themselves. NOt always the subject wants its own good.
This is Superego. read please, not Lacan yet. Read “Civilization and its discontents” chapter 7.
Thank you for this dialogue.