You may be interested in my latest piece of writing, attached. As ever, I simply found myself writing this experimentally to see what might emerge from the implications of a particular idea, in this case, 'making allowances'. I also wanted to write something that brought out the 'natural inclusion' ideas that were already present in a different guise in my book 'Degrees of Freedom - Living in Dynamic Boundaries' (Imperial College Press, 1997) and that might find a hole in the wall of orthodox evolutionary biology that would allow these ideas to be introduced and amplified rather than thoughtlessly dismissed. This is how the focus on 'creativity', 'autocatalysis' and 'induced fitting' (not 'fit' but 'fitting', where the latter term implies dynamic relationship) emerged as concepts orthodox theorists could recognise and relate to and be led to reflect more deeply on their inclusional meaning.
Warmest
Alan
Making Allowances for Evolutionary Creativity.doc 77K Download
The problem statement - the too narrow interpretation of neo-Darwinian evolution, too easily objectifying the "competitors" etc .. is good.
Your term "opportunity space" is not one I had heard, but is very much the incubator or "nurture" space protected from the competition of "nature". I think the necessity for this is well established part of evolutionary mechanisms - certainly Dennett refers to examples of his and others - Wilson and Gould and more amongst them. Just think of "gestation" and a "family". In fact the space is often literally physical space - a secluded valley with mountainous boundaries to keep the predators out (long enough), or a remote island of some kind. The history of evolution is full of these examples. Idividual things have to be protected from destructive competition long enough for a "species" to form and reproduce - a population of one mutant is never going to win a competition with a whole species.
On the too discrete / concrete / atomistic view of genes - again also an argument I have frequently used. In fact genes are not really as well bounded as popular (ie vulgar, thanks Ted) science would have the populace believe anyway - they are just short-hand. I constantly have this argument when I'm on my "memetic" hobby-horse. Of course memes are not so discrete, concrete, well-bounded either - the maincriticism I have of memetic arguments is that they are too "reductive" - but I say only if you choose to read them that way. They are massively interconnected (inclusive) things - memeplexes. Referring to comples ideas as memes is just linguistic short-hand, just like memes. The snappy terms con us into treating them as "snappy" things.
BTW "as if" is a concept I have recorded before too ... must come back to that. I'll read on to a conclusion.
Regards Ian
On 7/1/08, Alan Rayner (BU) <a.d.m.ray...@bath.ac.uk> wrote:
> You may be interested in my latest piece of writing, attached. As ever, I > simply found myself writing this experimentally to see what might emerge > from the implications of a particular idea, in this case, 'making > allowances'. I also wanted to write something that brought out the 'natural > inclusion' ideas that were already present in a different guise in my book > 'Degrees of Freedom - Living in Dynamic Boundaries' (Imperial College Press, > 1997) and that might find a hole in the wall of orthodox evolutionary > biology that would allow these ideas to be introduced and amplified rather > than thoughtlessly dismissed. This is how the focus on 'creativity', > 'autocatalysis' and 'induced fitting' (not 'fit' but 'fitting', where the > latter term implies dynamic relationship) emerged as concepts orthodox > theorists could recognise and relate to and be led to reflect more deeply on > their inclusional meaning.
Yes, the theme of a 'need for nurture in nature' by way of 'dynamic niche as a cradle of complexity' (I actually used this phrase) where new possibilities are given space to come into being and differentiate and integrate was very much a theme of 'Degrees of Freedom'. I also talked about 'artificial selection' in these terms and pointed to the irony of how 'freedom from competition' under human influence was replaced by harsh competition in 'natural selection', as well as how 'sexual selection' could be thoought of as an example of 'selection vacuum'. Nowadays, with my understanding of inclusionality as 'the inclusion of the inductive influence of receptive space in natural fluidity', I have moved on further to regarding notions of 'competition' and 'co-operation' themselves as 'artefacts of definition imposed onto continuous flow, which isolate individuals and genes as if they are at least initially independent entities'. I therefore prefer to speak in terms of variable resistance and permissiveness in a continually evolving energy flow of 'place-time'.
----- Original Message ----- From: Ian Glendinning To: inclusional-research@googlegroups.com Sent: Wednesday, July 02, 2008 5:14 PM Subject: Re: Making Allowances
I like this Alan.
The problem statement - the too narrow interpretation of neo-Darwinian evolution, too easily objectifying the "competitors" etc .. is good.
Your term "opportunity space" is not one I had heard, but is very much the incubator or "nurture" space protected from the competition of "nature". I think the necessity for this is well established part of evolutionary mechanisms - certainly Dennett refers to examples of his and others - Wilson and Gould and more amongst them. Just think of "gestation" and a "family". In fact the space is often literally physical space - a secluded valley with mountainous boundaries to keep the predators out (long enough), or a remote island of some kind. The history of evolution is full of these examples. Idividual things have to be protected from destructive competition long enough for a "species" to form and reproduce - a population of one mutant is never going to win a competition with a whole species.
On the too discrete / concrete / atomistic view of genes - again also an argument I have frequently used. In fact genes are not really as well bounded as popular (ie vulgar, thanks Ted) science would have the populace believe anyway - they are just short-hand. I constantly have this argument when I'm on my "memetic" hobby-horse. Of course memes are not so discrete, concrete, well-bounded either - the maincriticism I have of memetic arguments is that they are too "reductive" - but I say only if you choose to read them that way. They are massively interconnected (inclusive) things - memeplexes. Referring to comples ideas as memes is just linguistic short-hand, just like memes. The snappy terms con us into treating them as "snappy" things.
BTW "as if" is a concept I have recorded before too ... must come back to that. I'll read on to a conclusion.
Regards Ian
On 7/1/08, Alan Rayner (BU) <a.d.m.ray...@bath.ac.uk> wrote: Dear All,
You may be interested in my latest piece of writing, attached. As ever, I simply found myself writing this experimentally to see what might emerge from the implications of a particular idea, in this case, 'making allowances'. I also wanted to write something that brought out the 'natural inclusion' ideas that were already present in a different guise in my book 'Degrees of Freedom - Living in Dynamic Boundaries' (Imperial College Press, 1997) and that might find a hole in the wall of orthodox evolutionary biology that would allow these ideas to be introduced and amplified rather than thoughtlessly dismissed. This is how the focus on 'creativity', 'autocatalysis' and 'induced fitting' (not 'fit' but 'fitting', where the latter term implies dynamic relationship) emerged as concepts orthodox theorists could recognise and relate to and be led to reflect more deeply on their inclusional meaning.
