08.31.10
Posted in Fourth Edition, The Axial Age, World History and The Eonic Effect at 3:32 pm by nemo
A passage from an email to a new reader of WHEE. For the online text, starting up, go to history-and-evolution.com
The theory is more in evidence in the third edition, while the fourth uses only what I call an ‘evolution formalism’ which is just to one side next to a world history, starting in Chapter Four.
The eonic model is deep and elegant and shows a direct correlation to a Kantian idea, but I have never met anyone who understood it!
So I replaced it with a simplified ‘evolution formalism’, which is simply a variant of the punctuated equilibrium macro/micro distinction, which was invented but not understood by S.J. Gould. We can use this to optionally connect the old model to the evolution formalism. But this is not ‘theory’, but a device to describe the remarkable set of punctuations and the semi-equilibrium bewteen them, in world history.
The eonic effect is (descriptively) a remarkable case of ‘punctuated equilibrium’, inthe dictionary sense of the words. The terms should have been used for this from the start.
To get the idea of the old model: ‘Evolution in quotation marks’ appears as the intermittent macro sequence, while the historical component appears Janus-faced as ‘History’ in the micro stream. It is a unique and beguiling variant of a type of dynamical alternation model, which can be expressed as an ‘evolution of freedom’.
To see the strange reality of this relationship of ‘system’ and ‘agents’ I often give the example of a ship and the passengers, and a distinction the Action of a System (the boat, the macro) and the ‘Actions of the Individuals’ (inside the boat, the micro). This relation of a ‘system action’ and the ‘free activity’ of people related to that system is actually an idea we have in our repetory, but the minute you explain it to the centipede he gets confused and can’t walk.
Armed with these concepts we can unravel the mysteries of, e.g. the Axial Age, which as you saw Karen Armstrong couldn’t get straight.
We don’t understand what we are seeing world history.
Don’t worry if this isn’t clear at first. Just follow the logic of the outline of world history, and its embedded transitions.
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Posted in The Eonic Effect at 2:01 pm by nemo
The Post-Modern Ear
By Roger Scruton
This article is interesting, although I don’t buy the title’s use of ‘post-modern’.
But the mystery of modern music resists easy analysis.
I recommend a look at the eonic effect, and its clear demonstration that classical music shows strong correlation with the ‘modern transition’, 1500 to 1800+ , promptly tapering off within a century thereafter. Note the climax near the ‘great divide’, plus/minus a generation around 1800. The pattern is clearly non-random, and makes sense in the context of the eonic effect.
Most students will resist the idea but the evidence is overwhelming that classical musis is an ‘eonic effect’, with an exact correlation to the eonic sequence. It is almost spooky. That the classical tradition would seem to peter out as if exhausted, while I cannot reject the idea out of hand, seems contrary to what happened, which is that as soon as the eonic ‘determination’ factor waned and fell away musicians began to deviate in their creativity.
That may be wrong, but it is clear that the climactic phase of the great rush of classical music from Monteverdi to the Mozart/Beethoven peak, and then the brief continuation into the century beyond (to the time of Wagner and/or Puccini, say) is something deeper than individual genius: it is stimulated by the historical matrix/force of the eonic sequence.
That doesn’t really answer the question of atonal music, and the reason for its sudden appearance at the exact point of the eonic fall off. It merely shows the exact correlation.
Time to study the eonic effect, which is full of these correlations. The world is a lot stranger than you suspect, mon ami (or ‘mon vieux’, or ‘mon semblable, mon frere’, or, well, it gets bad from here on)
The material in WHEE on this will appear soon in the fourth edition version.
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Posted in Kant, Philosophy at 12:42 pm by nemo
Freedom Evolves
This issue is the classic snafu created by causal science. You would think that scientists with so many resources at their disposal would be able to snap out of it and at least read the history of this question.
What I find remarkable is the way that ‘scientific’ publics are unaware of the entire history of this issue, especially as it emerges in Kant. Everyone is kept locked in a box so that the work of people like Kant will not disturb the minds of the brainwashed science cadres.
When you are confronted with the way that a figure like Dennett will convince more than Kant (who is never even mentioned), you know with some sadness that science has failed culturally, and you can also realize why religion is making a comeback. Scientists seem to prefer that alternative, to the approach of Kant who was a friend of science and a critic of religion.
Scientists can’t seem to grapple with the issue. But Kant analyzed that psychology well, with his analysis of the ‘basic antinomies’ of reason.
Scientists are stuck in a mode of thought where their successes produce failure here.
But the options are clear. If you create a culture based on disbelief in free will, you will start in motion something ugly, if not impossible (e.g. the abolition of court law assuming criminal responsibility, etc). It is not a real option.
Kant tried patiently to deal with this issue in the context of science, apparently in vain. Complete idiots like Dennett get the name of philosopher, and we live in that especial case of philosophy in decline where mediocrities like Rorty (and Dennett) can claim to have refuted Kant.
You don’t even need to agree with Kant: simply follow the course of his analysis, and get beyond the willed nescience created by bad science education (indoctrination).
The real answer lies beyond even Kant, perhaps, (and Schopenhauer embraced the same framework as Kant, without agreeing on free will) in a realization that we simply don’t understand the universe. Physics may have confused us with a deceptive universalism of laws. Don’t quote me, however.
But Kant’s formulation clearly states the issues and proposes a way out.
In WHEE, btw, I have a tricky set of hybrids based on ‘self-consciousness’ which is the ‘donkey’ of free will and changes gears with higher and lower degrees of freedom.
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Posted in Evolution at 12:08 pm by nemo
Did freedom evolve?
We have exposed Dennett nonse on ‘freedom evolving’ here already, and in WHEE, there is a passage on this, scroll down the ‘Evolution and Ethics’ page: http://history-and-evolution.com/whee4th/chap2_1_2.htm
Coyne here is at least consistent, and his next stop is Kantstudien.
In our discussions of free will, and my continuing puzzlement about how it could really exist, several commenters recommended that I read Dan Dennett’s Freedom Evolves. There, they said, I’d find a solution to the problem about how free will could exist in a deterministic universe. So I read it. And while I enjoyed it a lot, in the end I wasn’t convinced that he’d solved the problem—at least not in a way that was satisfying.
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Posted in Evolution at 11:59 am by nemo
Giraffe’s Neck
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Posted in Evolution at 11:44 am by nemo
Carnivore Species Shrank During Global Warming Event
ScienceDaily (Aug. 31, 2010) — A new University of Florida study indicates extinct carnivorous mammals shrank in size during a global warming event that occurred 55 million years ago.
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Posted in Evolution at 11:43 am by nemo
Impact Hypothesis Loses Its Sparkle: Shock-Synthesized Diamonds Said to Prove Catastrophic Impact Killed Off N. American Megafauna Can’t Be Found
ScienceDaily (Aug. 30, 2010) — About 12,900 years ago, a sudden cold snap interrupted the gradual warming that had followed the last Ice Age. The cold lasted for the 1,300-year interval known as the Younger Dryas (YD) before the climate began to warm again.
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Posted in Evolution at 11:41 am by nemo
First Clear Evidence of Organized Feasting by Early Humans
ScienceDaily (Aug. 30, 2010) — Community feasting is one of the most universal and important social behaviors found among humans. Now, scientists have found the earliest clear evidence of organized feasting, from a burial site dated about 12,000 years ago. These remains represent the first archaeological verification that human feasting began before the advent of agriculture.
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Posted in Evolution at 11:40 am by nemo
‘Stocky Dragon’ Dinosaur, Relative of Velociraptor, Terrorized Late Cretaceous Europe
ScienceDaily (Aug. 30, 2010) — By describing a new double-clawed and highly-unusual relative of Velociraptor, paleontologists have answered a long-standing question: what did the Late Cretaceous predatory dinosaurs in Europe look like? Balaur bondoc, described in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is the first reasonably complete skeleton of a meat-eating dinosaur from the final 60 million years of the Age of Dinosaurs in Europe and provides insight into an ecosystem very different from that of today. Europe at the end of the Cretaceous was awash in higher seas and was an island archipelago dominated by animals smaller and more primitive than their relatives living on larger landmasses.
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Posted in General at 11:36 am by nemo
Published on Tuesday, August 31, 2010 by CommonDreams.org
Spengler for Dummies
by Linh Dinh
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Posted in General at 11:33 am by nemo
A Grisly Form of Stability
What is the US Legacy in Iraq?
By PATRICK COCKBURN
A few days after the US announced that it had withdrawn its last combat brigade from Iraq, the local branch of al-Qa’ida staged a show of strength, killing or wounding 300 people in attacks across the country.
Its suicide bombers drove vehicles packed with explosives into police stations or military convoys from Mosul in the north to Basra in the south.
The continuing ferocious violence in Iraq, where most days more people die by bomb and bullet than in Afghanistan, is leading to questions about its stability once US forces finally withdraw by the end of next year.
American politicians, soldiers and think tankers blithely recommend American troops staying longer, though at their most numerous US troops signally failed to stop the bombers.
The unfortunate truth may be that Iraq has already achieved a grisly form of stability, though it comes with a persistently high level of violence and a semi-dysfunctional state. Bad though the present situation is in the country, there may not be sufficient reasons for it to change.
Politically, Iraq may look increasingly like Lebanon with each ethnic or sectarian community vying for a share of power and resources. But if Iraq is becoming like Lebanon, it is a Lebanon with money. Dysfunctional the state machine may be, but it still has $60bn in annual oil revenues to spend, mostly on the salaries of the security forces and the civilian bureaucracy. One former Iraqi minister says that the one time he had seen the new Iraqi political elite “in a state of real panic was when the price of oil fell below $50 a barrel a couple of years ago”.
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:29 am by nemo
A critique of “inclusive fitness” theories, which claim that altruism
is based on a calculation of whether more of your genes would be
passed along by helping your own offspring or those of a relative:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/31/science/31social.html?ref=science
My inclination is to side with this new critique, being dubious of
“selfish gene” theories (and those who’ve read Dawkins thoroughly –
I’ve only skimmed him, and rely mostly on Eldredge’s criticisms of him
– should weigh in).
In any case, we can look forward to more rounded, multifactorial
theories to replace those based solely or primarily on genetic
determinants of social behavior. From the end of the article:
“Dr. Hunt hopes to move the debate toward a resolution with a meeting
he is to run in October at the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center
in Durham, N.C. He will be bringing together scientists who build
models of all the potential factors that drive the evolution of
societies, from their kinship to their ecology. Ultimately, the
scientists hope to build a model that can take into account all of
these factors at once.”
mxmail
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:26 am by nemo
Robert Naiman | ‘Palestinian Gandhi’ Convicted for Protesting; U.S. Silent
http://act.commondreams.org/go/2087?akid=152.96588.TKzEB7&t=22
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:25 am by nemo
Jerry Lanson | When Will We All Need to Carry Identity Papers?
http://act.commondreams.org/go/2086?akid=152.96588.TKzEB7&t=20
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:24 am by nemo
Economists Agree: Stimulus Created Nearly 3 Million Jobs
http://act.commondreams.org/go/2083?akid=152.96588.TKzEB7&t=14
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:23 am by nemo
Rights Groups File Challenge to Targeted Killing by US
http://act.commondreams.org/go/2080?akid=152.96588.TKzEB7&t=8
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:22 am by nemo
Funnyman Harry Shearer Gets Serious with Katrina Documentary ‘The Big Uneasy’
http://act.commondreams.org/go/2079?akid=152.96588.TKzEB7&t=6
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:22 am by nemo
Can US Education System ‘Run on Duncan?’
http://act.commondreams.org/go/2077?akid=152.96588.TKzEB7&t=2
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Posted in you've got mail at 11:17 am by nemo
RG mail
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/29/opinion/29abunimah.html?_r=3&ref=opinion
New York Times
August 28, 2010Op-Ed Contributor Hamas, the I.R.A. and Us By ALI ABUNIMAH
GEORGE J. MITCHELL, the United States Middle East envoy, tried to counter
low expectations for renewed Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations by
harking back to his experience as a mediator in Northern Ireland.
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08.30.10
Posted in Fourth Edition, World History and The Eonic Effect at 4:38 pm by nemo
The issue of a non-profit book on evolution is important.
Books on evolution always compromise, even if they are critical of Darwinism.
It helps to get out of that racket, and look at the issues without the built in bias.
I have put the first two chapters of World History And The Eonic Effect, Fourth Edition online at history-and-evolution.com: Scroll down to the section #2 box for the menu image of the Chapters to the book.
The links work for the Introduction, Chapter 1, the Appendix and the first section of subsequent chapters, to make the links all work on the menus.
I will put the rest up as time goes on, i.e. soon, (it is a huge job to get all the links to work right), along with a guide to the exit, which seems formidable to some, but which is a lot simpler in this edition.
The eonic effect shows us that the riddle of (human) evolution can be solved by looking at world history. This can seem counterintuitive at first, but only because Darwinian propaganda has confused the issue.
In this edition,theory has gone into the background, and you can simply follow the short world history and outline as an ‘idea for a universal history’.
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Posted in Evolution at 1:29 pm by nemo
Barr vs Behe
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Posted in Evolution at 1:16 pm by nemo
Octopus Mimics Flatfish and Flaunts It
ScienceDaily (Aug. 30, 2010) — Paul the Octopus — the eight-legged oracle who made international headlines with his amazingly accurate football forecasting — isn’t the only talented cephalopod in the sea. The Indonesian mimic octopus, which can impersonate flatfish and sea snakes to dupe potential predators, may well give Paul a run for his money when it comes to “see-worthy” skills.
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Posted in Evolution at 1:15 pm by nemo
Wonder of the Natural World: Key to Christmas Island’s Red Crab Migration Discovered
ScienceDaily (Aug. 27, 2010) — One of the most spectacular migrations on Earth is that of the Christmas Island red crab (Gecarcoidea natalis). Acknowledged as one of the wonders of the natural world, every year millions of the crabs simultaneously embark on a five-kilometre breeding migration. Now, scientists have discovered the key to their remarkable athletic feat.
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