What’s Wrong with the World

I'm not offended by poetic descriptions of science, but he puts a little too much flourish on it. In some places it was similar to New Ager talk of universal consciousness and expression, like whoa dude. Just because organism are "more meaningful" there is still a hierarchy of significance. Unless you want to suppose that roses and bee colonies, two of his meaningful examples, have a right to be free from intervention and cultivation. In my unlearned opinion, the major problems with the mechanical model are that it is static, which is largely necessary for the sake of analysis (Talbott points out the problem but not the reason for it), and it has an unnatural focus on the individual, when in fact most all living creatures get some benefit from communal activities and their individual behaviors often make better sense in that context.

I don't get it. Is he arguing against naturalism, dysteleology, and/or reductionism?

Here's some of the most recent material relevant to debates around here:

The tale of evolution is, in one sense or another, the tale of a single, overwhelmingly dominant, stable heritable substance slowly changing over time and explaining the organism. This heritable substance is DNA.

The misdirection in this dogma lies in the fact that it posits DNA as a clearly definable and static thing, a single substance that can be analyzed out of an almost infinitely complex, functioning whole and treated in this disconnected state as if it held the decisive causal explanation for the canonical form and character of that whole. In reality the organism is a living agent whose life as a whole is a pursuit of its own ends and meanings. Its significant bequest to future generations consists of an elaborately chosen projection of its own life — not some single “controlling” molecular element — into a nascent life that is never less than a complete organism. This organism, as a physical entity, is without a beginning in any absolute sense. Its life is a continuation and transformation of the developmental and purposive existence of its progenitors.

[. . .] [I]t makes no sense to say that the numerous divergent pathways from the zygote to the various cell types of the body are explained by the one thing in the cells that remains more or less the same, namely, the bare DNA sequence, unstructured by the organism’s developmental processes. There is no foundational explanatory power offered by some fixed structure to which molecular nuts and bolts, gears and levers — or informational “particles” — can be neatly added, subtracted, or substituted for each other in isolation from larger processes. Yet every lineage of cells proceeds along its path in a perfectly coherent, well-organized way, with transformations occurring in a proper, adaptable, and fluent order.

The zygote’s transformation along the pathway from single, fertilized cell to mature organism is an activity, a story, of the entire cell and entire organism. Life scientists, from molecular biologists to naturalists, routinely do describe the organism’s life in narrative terms (see “The Unbearable Wholeness of Beings”), and it is the character of the narrative that must change in a coherent manner from generation to generation if evolution is to occur. It must change in the only way an integral narrative context can change, through a continual mutual adjustment of directed activities.

The one-celled zygote is the heritable substance. And it is absurd to imagine it developing into an organism under the autocratic control of just one of the contents it effectively coordinates; it already is the whole organism. [. . .] With the demise of the gene as the single, decisive heritable substance, the core logic of received evolutionary theory is shown to be an empty shell, disconnected from living activity.

Sorry for the off-topic but this is scary!
http://govtslaves.info/leaked-pentagon-video-flu-vaccine-used-to-modify-human-behavior/
(skip ahead to the actual video)

I admire Talbott's writings but the biologists are already aware of epigenetics. So what Talbott recommends apart from a general re-orientation away from reductionist world view?.

It is more the popular genetics that is ignorant but even the scientists, though they know better, keep falling to the reductionist world view. It is the same way as physicists, though their fundamental quantum mechanics clearly points towards non-reductionist view, ignore the non-mechanism in practice.

It works for physicists for the mechanism works very well for most things and only at the quantum level, non-mechanistic effects appear subtly.

With the demise of the gene as the single, decisive heritable substance, the core logic of received evolutionary theory is shown to be an empty shell, disconnected from living activity.

If you want to see an empty shell find a zygote without DNA. Evolutionary theory is always open to modification since it is about explaining the sources of biological adaptation, wherever they originate.

Daniel, I’m afraid the bad news is that flu vaccines were last year’s delivery system. They’ve been upgraded to nanobots that can be dropped from any drone. The worse news is that the government monitors all visitors of conspiracy websites because they want to keep tabs on subversives. The worst news is that you’ve probably already been infected by the nanobots which can use your own enzymes to change your biochemistry. However, I do have some good news. First, the nanobots take a few days to alter all your enzymes. Second, I know somebody with a briefcase, and he assures me a tin foil hat can reverse the programming and return you to your natural state.

The one-celled zygote is the heritable substance

Scientific facts are just pertinent details. It is possible that experiments on heredity were performed under the conditions that rendered epigenetic effects irrelevant--it this could happen under a constant environment.

Now, mankind itself currently is undergoing a rapid environmental shift--I refer to dietary patterns, lifestyle changes, revolutionary changes in the social and family life etc, And I find that the genetic research that is linking specific genes to human health disorders is very much misguided and in fact a great deal of rebellion against the accepted medical wisdom has arisen, particularly in America--the paleo and high-fat dietary theories.

So, if all the people have shifted to an unsuitable diet, say rich in sugar and vegetable oils and then suffered various diseases, then it is probably misguided to research and look for genes that allegedly predispose one to particular diseases. And this misguided effort was only due to the dominant genetic paradigm that virtually everyone in the biological establishment shares.

Now, mankind itself currently is undergoing a rapid environmental shift--I refer to dietary patterns, lifestyle changes, revolutionary changes in the social and family life etc, And I find that the genetic research that is linking specific genes to human health disorders is very much misguided and in fact a great deal of rebellion against the accepted medical wisdom has arisen, particularly in America--the paleo and high-fat dietary theories.

So, if all the people have shifted to an unsuitable diet, say rich in sugar and vegetable oils and then suffered various diseases, then it is probably misguided to research and look for genes that allegedly predispose one to particular diseases. And this misguided effort was only due to the dominant genetic paradigm that virtually everyone in the biological establishment shares.

No one with some competence in genetics would believe that environment has no effect on phenotype, even if the phenotype in question is highly heritable. Heritability in this context does not mean "genetically determined" but is defined as the ratio of genetic variance contributing to the overall phenotypic variance of the trait of a given population. Heritability is strictly context dependent as it depends on the population being described and its environmental exposures. Certainly, an obesigenic environment of energy-dense highly palatable food that would be considered an aberration from our ancestral, evolutionary milieu where food was scare and difficult to ascertain contributes to the epidemiology of obesity. But genetic differences among individuals in this environment render some individuals more vulnerable than others in becoming obesity. In order to understand the pathogenesis of obesity, it must not be thought in terms of a failure of free will, but a metabolic and endocrine disorder acting in concert with an insalubrious environment, and undoubtedly genetic variation does exert some influence over metabolic and endocrine regulation. However, studying the genetic variants relevant to obesity may provide some novel insights or corroborate the current models of obesity. For instance, this study demonstrates that the genetic loci associated with obesity (which collectively exert a minute effect as the ten loci in that study only account for .85% of the phenotypic variance) are disproportionately highly expressed in the brain or hypothalamus. The hypothalamus integrates a multitude of endocrine signals, such as leptin and insulin, to determine the "energy balance" of the body and regulate metabolic rate and generate feelings of satiety and hunger.

Indeed, it is probably more fruitful to focus on other aspects of the pathology of obesity besides genetic variants (even though its heritability is estimated to be between .40-.70). One can investigate the metabolic and endocrine processes involved in obesity without referencing putative genetic variants. Also other factors are also relevant: socioeconomic status as people with low socioeconomic status are more likely to be obese and psychological factors such as how mood and prefrontal executive control affect food consumption.

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I believe the primary factor in determining one's weight is caloric intake with basal metabolic and calorie expenditure through physical activity being rather less malleable ancillary factors. Macronutrient composition of food has little direct effect on body mass composition, but it might affect the hedonic and satiating properties of food which can cause weak and delayed satiation signals relative to the calories consumed. But still, I would not consume high glycemic carbohydrates (since I do not want to overwhelm my pancreas with an influx of glucose) and saturated fat. Consider the modern food environment being laden with food designed for maximum hedonic value and palatability with little alimentary substance.

Daniel Smith, kindly refrain from linking to lunatic conspiracy sites here. Thank you.

Gian, I'd say "a general re-orientation away from reductionist world view" is a solid summary of Talbott's project; but contrary to Step2's assurances, for a great many scientistic thinkers, there is one aspect in which evolutionary theory is NOT "always open to modification," and that is its presuppositions concerning materialism, reductionism, and mechanism. Thus I expect Talbott's project will be first facilely dismissed and then fiercely resisted.

I have been told that there is something of a split between those who

a) insist that Darwinisn *was never* intrinsically materialistic or reductionist and heap scorn on those who criticize it on those grounds, confident that it can be fully retained and simply (re)interpreted in non-materialistic and/or teleological terms

and those who

b) criticize materialism and reductionism as disconfirmed by the evidence and are willing to let the chips fall where they may as far as the impact this might have upon the acceptance of Darwinian theory, perhaps even going so far as to admit that it always has been presented as a strictly non-directed and materialistic process.

I'm not entirely sure which of these categories Talbott falls into, not having read enough of his work to say.

I still do not fully comprehend his thesis.

I believe that while it is challenging to describe and understand life itself in purely mechanistic and reductionist terms, there is no compelling reason to abandon that conventional paradigm. Genetics concerns itself with the study of the relationship of genotype and phenotype and the transmission of genetic traits to offspring. While I was a student in high school, one of the first lessons that we were taught in introductory biology was the fundamental link between genotype and phenotype. This is before we were introduced to evolutionary biology concepts (such as natural selection, Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, and speciation) and the key events of the evolution of the metazoan (animal) kingdom. Typically, at this rudimentary level, the examples adduced to support this foundational lesson are genetic diseases with large phenotypic effect such as chromosomal aberrations and Mendelian single loci diseases. Some exoteric examples includes Down syndrome, Turner syndrome, cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, phenylketonuria, Tay-Sachs disease, and Huntington's disease. As freshman students, we had to do a brief written report on a genetic disease, a poster, and a presentation to the classroom (mine was on Klinefelter syndrome). Of course, those are exceptional cases and do not represent more "mundane" biological processes. Furthermore, we are also taught the basic molecular procession from genotype to phenotype, involving transcription of the DNA into an mRNA and then translation of the genetic information in the mRNA into a protein.

Moreover the reductionist approach has been quite successful. For example, not only has it been determined that the cystic fibrosis is a monogenic disease (as it etiology depends on one loci), but this approach has discovered the actual loci on the genome. First, correlative genetic markers, which were restriction fragment length polymorphisms (RFLPs), had to be found that were associated with the disease phenotype. (Again, these are markers as they are in "linkage disequilibrium" with the causative locus and the haplotype of the marker and the causative locus are likely to transmitter together to the progeny.) Then, the information from the RFLPs was used to locate the causative gene by sequencing the nucleotides in the vicinity of the genetic markers by chromosome "walking" and "jumping" until a coded protein is encountered. (Chromosome walking and jumping were needed before the human genome was mapped as the geography of the genome was unknown then). The coded protein was discovered in 1989 and identified to be ATP-binding cassette chloride channel currently named the "cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator" (CFTR). The affected individuals had two genes that coded for unstable, dysfunctional CFTR. The most common disabling mutation was the deletion of phenylalanine 508 and it prevents proper folding of the protein and causes its subsequent degradation. Since no functional CFTR is expressed, the cell membrane become impermeable to chloride ions.

This research is not explicitly dependent on any metaphysical assumptions of reductionism; just the reasonable expectation among the investigators that genetic markers, not directly causative but nonetheless associated the putative casual loci, exist in the human genome. No prior knowledge about the molecular mechanism of cystic fibrosis or the precise function of the gene was even needed to help discover the gene, just the association between the genetic markers and the phenotype.

It would seen my affinity for biochemistry and preference for detailed molecular explanations for biology phenomenon has bequeathed with a reductionist philosophical orientation, as opposed to an ecological biologist who thinks in terms of environment and organisms, not in terms of free energy, molecules, and thermodynamics.

In reality the organism is a living agent whose life as a whole is a pursuit of its own ends and meanings

Perhaps this crystallizes the relevant substance in his thesis and gives me something palpable to assail. From the perspective of an evolutionary biologist, there is no sense of "teleology" (or own ends and meanings); organisms do not have their own explicit "end" except to transmit their own hereditary material to their progeny and so on. The dynamic environment of the organism, including interactions with members of its own and other species, "dictate" the properties of the organism and influence its adaptation into its unique ecological niche. Evolution acts upon the genetic variation in heritable traits that are associated with reproductive fitness, with the most fit organisms (or alleles to be more reductionistic) having a selective advantage in transmitting its genetic information to the next generation. Like the house advantage of a casino, small selective advantages probablistically accrue and the favorable allele eventually becomes "fixed" in the gene pool. Mathematically, this is expressed by (Ronald) Fisher's Fundamental Theorem of Natural Selection: "The rate of increase in the mean fitness of any organism at any time ascribable to natural selection acting through changes in gene frequencies is exactly equal to its genetic variance in fitness at that time". Populations evolve in perpetuity due to a changing fitness landscape and the introduction of novel genetic variation (which can introduce alleles affecting fitness) via mutation and gene flow.

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except to transmit their own hereditary material to their progeny and so on.

That's something, though, isn't it?

But I must admit myself that, while I think it interesting and epistemically suggestive that teleological language is so ubiquitous in biology (in other words, I think it's evidence of something), I do think the language of the organism itself doing things "for a purpose" needs to be admitted to be something of a metaphor. Taken at absolute face value it would seem to mean that the organism thinks and chooses and that its biological functions are a result of its own thinking and choosing, which I'm sure is not what Talbott means. Even within humans (who do think and choose) there is a distinction between, say, the involuntary muscles of the heart and the voluntary muscles of the hand. It would seem that Talbott's extremely widespread use of language implying deliberation could be used to say that I "pursue my own ends and meanings" by making my own heart beat.

I do think that there are still _very_ interesting teleological points that can be made about the heart--e.g., it's very difficult _not_ to talk about it as beating "so that" the organism gets blood and so forth. But I don't know whether Talbott himself would be comfortable going in the direction that I would go with those teleological arguments.

Black_Rose, I would recommend that you begin by reading that material carefully. Here's the essay to begin with: http://natureinstitute.org/txt/st/mqual/genome_4.htm

Paul J Cella:

Daniel Smith, kindly refrain from linking to lunatic conspiracy sites here. Thank you.

Sometimes you people amaze me. Did you watch the video Paul? (not the weird introduction but the actual video) Or did you prejudge it as "lunatic conspiracy" simply because of the web address (or some other factor)?

The actual video showed a man making a pitch for a drug (I presume his comapany's) that would "repress religious fundamentalism" based on research that showed a specific gene associated with such behavior. He is making this pitch to the Pentagon. This is scary. If you have evidence that this is 'made up' and not a real video - share it please.

. . . I do think the language of the organism itself doing things "for a purpose" needs to be admitted to be something of a metaphor. Taken at absolute face value it would seem to mean that the organism thinks and chooses and that its biological functions are a result of its own thinking and choosing, which I'm sure is not what Talbott means. Even within humans (who do think and choose) there is a distinction between, say, the involuntary muscles of the heart and the voluntary muscles of the hand. It would seem that Talbott's extremely widespread use of language implying deliberation could be used to say that I "pursue my own ends and meanings" by making my own heart beat.

I don't know what Talbott means either, but I think humans and higher (if not many lower) animals have organized systems that display qualities at various levels in comparison to the whole person or animal. So that when only looking at the level of a particular system we might use metaphors that imply deliberation, but they wouldn't be the deliberation of the person. My immune system attacks a virus involuntarily compared to myself displaying self-preservation are not at the same level of deliberation. The former maybe not be at all, the latter at least somewhat, neither rising to the level we'd see in choosing a place to scuba-dive. So I don't have a problem with use or overuse of metaphor, even with a knowing wink as with our tools (a few years ago my ABS brakes "thought" I was skidding and released themselves in front of a truck), because my view of the degree of autonomy or deliberation depends on a distinction resting not on who or what is initiating an act, and why, but on complex organism such as ourselves being a complex of ordered systems, desires, and purposes. It is a federal system, and an overall correct view of how the system is managed is more important that to what degree we rely on metaphor to characterize the actions of the lower level systems.

BTW, I don't actually think it is a metaphor to say the body "knows" things. Everything from using a mouse to physical acts of all sort rely on habits that are at a very low level of rationality if at all. Dallas Willard says there is knowledge proper to our bodies. But if someone wanted to say "No, knowledge is pure metaphor here" for this or that reason I wouldn't argue it as long at the view didn't corrupt what I think are the other parts of a proper anthropology. At the highest level it is governed by myself in varying degrees of control according to the level of rationality involved. More rational systems or faculties governed more directly than those less so, and finally the lowest levels being governed involuntarily according to a logic built into the other systems or complexes of them.

Well, Mark, if I may show my hand a little bit here (something I'm all too good at doing, probably), the problem seems to me to be that if you allow yourself too generous a use of a metaphor like "the bacterium knows how to modify its own physical processes" (or whatever, I'm just making up that example), and if you never admit that it is a metaphor, then you can very conveniently not ask some really tough questions: "Since it really does appear that there is a logic and a purpose built into the bacterium, where did it come from? Since we know the bacterium doesn't _really_, literally, direct its own physical processes, but since the physical entity which is the bacterium does modify itself in what appears for all the world to be a teleological fashion, whose purposes are these, really? Who did the means-end directing here?"

This sort of "teleology without a personal agent" talk is especially convenient for writers (like, I fear, Talbott) who want to admit teleology but are extremely chary of admitting that the teleology *came from anyone*. They want to talk about purpose but want it all to be so mysteriously immanent that we can just dodge indefinitely the issue of whose purpose (or Whose). Nature is made to seem capable of explaining itself, because "teleology is everywhere" or "it's meaning all the way down" or other such (I'm sorry) rather vague locutions.

In other words, I think he takes his metaphors too literally, and this allows him to refuse to make any sort of inference to a creator or maker or intender of the teleology and purposiveness in living organisms.

Daniel Smith: there are only so many hours in the day, not nearly enough for perusing a website touting its September 11th and Sandy Hook (!) cover-up angles, both of which are sufficient to discredit their source completely. And your description of this anti-religion drug sounds like the meanest quackery, but again, I am wholly disinclined to waste my time investigating.

So, let me get this straight, even if our government is entertaining the idea of fighting religious fundamentalism (like the "right-wing fundamentalism" that so endangers our country right now) with drugs (the "salesman" mentioned mixing the drugs in with a flu vaccine), even if that's true, you are still wholly disinclined to waste your time investigating?

That's interesting. Be sure to get the flu vaccine this year!

Oh, and Paul, the video probably takes all of about 10 minutes to watch. Just sayin'

This threadjack is OVER, Daniel Smith.