Does Evolution Beg the Question on Survival of the Fittest? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

Wandering the information superhighway, he came upon the last refuge of civilization, PoFo, the only forum on the internet ...

Pollution, global warming, urbanisation etc.
Forum rules: No one line posts please.
#14820574
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2 ... 191044.htm

Apparently, it's not as true as we thought it was.

Evolution is not necessarily a process that amounts to the fittest organisms in an ecosystem surviving. Over the short-term, parasitic organisms can thrive due to chaotic diversity which sabotages long-term fitness. In order for the paradigm to continue to make sense, multiple ecosystems must be compared against each other where parasites exist or not in order for parasites to be squashed over the long-run.

If multiple ecosystems are not exposed to each other though, then parasites simply kill themselves off which creates self-destruction within the ecosystem. The fittest organisms disappear, but those who create their disappearance disappear themselves shortly thereafter. Left unto themselves in a controlled ecosystem, the fittest organisms would survive and thrive.
#14832674
Dubayoo wrote:https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110327191044.htm

Apparently, it's not as true as we thought it was.

Evolution is not necessarily a process that amounts to the fittest organisms in an ecosystem surviving. Over the short-term, parasitic organisms can thrive due to chaotic diversity which sabotages long-term fitness. In order for the paradigm to continue to make sense, multiple ecosystems must be compared against each other where parasites exist or not in order for parasites to be squashed over the long-run.

If multiple ecosystems are not exposed to each other though, then parasites simply kill themselves off which creates self-destruction within the ecosystem. The fittest organisms disappear, but those who create their disappearance disappear themselves shortly thereafter. Left unto themselves in a controlled ecosystem, the fittest organisms would survive and thrive.
Yes, this is why social Darwinism and Darwin's idea of natural selection/survival of the fittest may be obsolete. Humans can intelligently guide ecosystems, thus we have the ability to transcend natural selection. Ideology can distort biological happening, this is why so many human tribes try to construct economic systems that favor their tribe or ideology. Technology, first in the form of thought/idea- will manifest in the environment and restructure time-space relations. See, economic theory/practice is really an operating system set-up for the ecology of 'being,' it is a medium that channels the energy of biological organisms. If you change the medium (the operating system) you change the message (field information). Humans can intellectually manipulate/guide biological information. Survival of the fittest is a myth, used by predators and parasites to justify their unjust economic system. Of course, predators and parasites will tell you that their unjust economic system is a byproduct of logical necessity because they feel as if they are not responsible for the masses. In other-words, why educate your food/resource? Globalism integrates many sources of food...

parasites simply kill themselves off which creates self-destruction within the ecosystem
Hence- blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Actually, the latest Planet of the Apes movie used the biblical 'revelation of mercy' to illustrate the effect of perpetual war. The humans (clinging to the notion- survival of the fittest) sought to wipe out the apes, but in the end they wiped out their humanity. Caesar, through the revelation of mercy, spared the life of Woody Harrelson's character, because Woody Harrelson's character would eventually self-destruct/commit suicide. See, Caesar didn't need to seek revenge, because predators and parasites destroy themselves.
#14832781
Image
Figure 2: The maintenance of the fittest and the flattest is not a simple mutation–selection equilibrium.
The maintenance of the fittest and the flattest is not a simple mutation-selection equilibrium.
A single type (number 25) seeded a clonal population subject to rate-yield and rate-affinity trade-offs that diverged into two lineages of quasispecies of efficient and inefficient generalists.

How is diversity maintained? Environmental heterogeneity is considered to be important1, yet diversity in seemingly homogeneous environments is nonetheless observed2. This, it is assumed, must either be owing to weak selection, mutational input or a fitness advantage to genotypes when rare1. Here we demonstrate the possibility of a new general mechanism of stable diversity maintenance, one that stems from metabolic and physiological trade-offs3. The model requires that such trade-offs translate into a fitness landscape in which the most fit has unfit near-mutational neighbours, and a lower fitness peak also exists that is more mutationally robust. The ‘survival of the fittest’ applies at low mutation rates, giving way to ‘survival of the flattest’4, 5, 6 at high mutation rates. However, as a consequence of quasispecies-level negative frequency-dependent selection and differences in mutational robustness we observe a transition zone in which both fittest and flattest coexist. Although diversity maintenance is possible for simple organisms in simple environments, the more trade-offs there are, the wider the maintenance zone becomes. The principle may be applied to lineages within a species or species within a community, potentially explaining why competitive exclusion need not be observed in homogeneous environments. This principle predicts the enigmatic richness of metabolic strategies in clonal bacteria7 and questions the safety of lethal mutagenesis8, 9 as an antimicrobial treatment.
https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v ... 09905.html


It was Herbert Spencer who invented the term "survival of the fittest" to justify imperialism and racism in the late 19th century. Darwin had never endorsed social Darwinism advocated by the likes of Herbert Spencer, who came up with the idea after reading Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species.
#14832846
ThirdTerm wrote:It was Herbert Spencer who invented the term "survival of the fittest" to justify imperialism and racism in the late 19th century. Darwin had never endorsed social Darwinism advocated by the likes of Herbert Spencer, who came up with the idea after reading Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species.
Excellent post/point. :up:
#14836029
ThirdTerm wrote:It was Herbert Spencer who invented the term "survival of the fittest" to justify imperialism and racism in the late 19th century. Darwin had never endorsed social Darwinism advocated by the likes of Herbert Spencer, who came up with the idea after reading Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species.

Thank you for your post, outstanding...

May I go a bit back in history, regarding social Darwinism, which undoubtedly fuelled unprecedented atrocities in times to follow?
I would say, that the idea and term came up before.
Malthus 1) made this posit earlier by claiming the "survival of the richest".
He examined, backgrounded by early Manchester Capitalism, evolutionary structures of economy.
Darwin, as I try to understand, applied that idea to biological evolution.
So neither Darwin, nor Spencer, had that very perception first. 2)


1) http://www.allaboutscience.org/malthus-faq.htm
2) http://www.econ.canterbury.ac.nz/resear ... _Clark.pdf
#14836096
Malthus 1) made this posit earlier by claiming the "survival of the richest".
He examined, backgrounded by early Manchester Capitalism, evolutionary structures of economy.
Darwin, as I try to understand, applied that idea to biological evolution.
So neither Darwin, nor Spencer, had that very perception first.

Evolutionary ideas were very much 'in the air' in early 19th century Britain. This was probably linked to the sudden, huge and irreversible changes which were occurring in British society at the time, due to the rise of industrial capitalism and the massive development of infrastructure. If society could change and 'progress' in this way, then why not the natural world too...? In fact, it is this social and intellectual environment which made Darwin's breakthrough possible at all. Darwin's breakthrough was to postulate a possible mechanism for evolutionary change in species - natural selection of inherited characteristics. Other thinkers throughout history had even suggested that species could morph into other species and that the natural world was dynamic rather than static - there's even a long passage in the 3rd century BC Chinese Book of Zhuangzi which describes something which looks startlingly like a theory of evolution. But it lacks a mechanism for that evolutionary process, and so remained nothing more than an abstract philosophical speculation.
#14836170
MistyTiger wrote:I have always thought of evolution in terms of changing to adapt to one's environment. And survival depends on how hard we try to successfully cope with all the obstacles and harsh conditions that arise in our lives. So I think that evolution begs the question, how much do we want to adapt to our environment?
Evolution is an involuntary process. The question is- how do you wish to evolve? Will you go with the flow, or will you intellectually role-play through technology? Right now you're influencing (y)our genetic composition.

In fact, it is this social and intellectual environment which made Darwin's breakthrough possible at all.
If invention/discovery is born out of necessity, wouldn't necessity be a response to the space-time information loop as we interface within the NOW? Is human necessity a side-effect of today being enfolded inside one cosmic teleological unfolding? viewtopic.php?f=53&t=170814

That is why the human organism we call Darwin is a bio-chemical combustion lost in space-time, each organism is a side-effect of something else, and individuality is an abstraction.
#14836211
Even something like "fittest" can be relative, so if you insert a frog that predators are allergic to or something into an environment it might wreck many lifeforms there but the frog might suck at everything else. So in order to have a concept of what is "fittest" we need either a time frame that conceives of an end goal, or else to define the "fittest" as being whatever happens to succeed, which may not mesh with what we would normally consider to be fit :eek:

I think then, another way to look at Darwinism is that it actually meshes philosophically with the (perhaps more protestant than Catholic) Christian presumption of linear history towards a positive final day because it assumes that evolution is headed towards a goal. Perhaps evolution really just goes through cycles, which would be more in line with other philosophies.

If multiple ecosystems are not exposed to each other though, then parasites simply kill themselves off which creates self-destruction within the ecosystem. The fittest organisms disappear, but those who create their disappearance disappear themselves shortly thereafter. Left unto themselves in a controlled ecosystem, the fittest organisms would survive and thrive.

This is what liberals are doing in the west today. They broke the traditions, now they aren't reproducing and will be gone in a few more generations. If there are (estimated) 30 million SJWs in America and 3,000 KKK members, each KKK member would have to justify and support the existence of 10,000 SJWs for these people to succeed by most metrics.
#14836307
Hong Wu wrote:Even something like "fittest" can be relative, so if you insert a frog that predators are allergic to or something into an environment it might wreck many lifeforms there but the frog might suck at everything else. So in order to have a concept of what is "fittest" we need either a time frame that conceives of an end goal, or else to define the "fittest" as being whatever happens to succeed, which may not mesh with what we would normally consider to be fit :eek:

I think then, another way to look at Darwinism is that it actually meshes philosophically with the (perhaps more protestant than Catholic) Christian presumption of linear history towards a positive final day because it assumes that evolution is headed towards a goal. Perhaps evolution really just goes through cycles, which would be more in line with other philosophies.

However, the Darwin theory of evolution, according to atheists, is a mindless process without a goal. It is a bumbling process made of accidental mutations with no real plan or goal in mind.

From the Christian point of view, any change in animals or humans by breeding is determined, in part by accident, but mainly, by a controlled process designed and created by God. The DNA, of course, contains God's program designed to prevent too much variation by accidents (mutations), which result in degeneration from the original. Forced changes by man through selective breeding can't change that process. It only speeds it up.

Man have selectively bread dogs to make them more suited for a purpose. Certain characteristics are enhanced while reducing others. But, even then, there are limits.
#14836400
Hong Wu wrote:Even something like "fittest" can be relative, so if you insert a frog that predators are allergic to or something into an environment it might wreck many lifeforms there but the frog might suck at everything else. So in order to have a concept of what is "fittest" we need either a time frame that conceives of an end goal, or else to define the "fittest" as being whatever happens to succeed, which may not mesh with what we would normally consider to be fit :eek:
:roll: What is this, 8th grade biology class.?

I think then, another way to look at Darwinism is that it actually meshes philosophically with the (perhaps more protestant than Catholic) Christian presumption of linear history towards a positive final day because it assumes that evolution is headed towards a goal.
The idea of progress is a linear concept because we're entangled inside the space-time continuum. The transhumanist perspective assumes that evolution is headed toward a technological singularity (funny thing being- life itself is one information singularity in formation). See, any form of energy in motion will define its trajectory as 'progress' because we're designed to think therefore believe in our existence.

I'm not sure if we can label any direction the right or wrong direction, because 'direction' breaks down once you start deconstructing phenomena. Necessity would be the interpretation of relativity. However, relativity is only relative to living phenomena, because living things actively exist in a state of perpetual interplay with the WHOLE of BEING. Therefore, our definition of the right direction would be a human direction limited by dimensional entanglement.

Perhaps evolution really just goes through cycles, which would be more in line with other philosophies.
Evolution may be described as the internal dialogue of an eternal-present. We appear to be compart-mentalized past-tense combatants because we're born classified, enfolded in the unfolding-ing-ing-ing... We instinctively obey our who-what-when-where-why-how filter as the five-fold-inception forces the humanoid brain to mind its own business and flirt with flames of fortune. Indubitably, The book of life is a curious cumbustion. The gestalt of it all is the inner-play of the outer-face created by the Sol sound singing ouroboros season-air-lungs-right-wrong-good-bad-people-pests-plants-ants-#breaktheinternet-#shatterreality-mammalian-reptilian-planets-billion-zillion-empty-full-nothing-everything-egg-web-ebbs-roguescholar-royalcollar-teoctlailpse-82117-wedding-hate-love-marriage-opposites-push-pull-equals-I-we-parts-wholes, whilst the present (p)age or experience forces you to rite the right ritual, as 'being' becomes episteme-sense (holo-hallucination be thy-aim, I am) and metamorphic-phenomenology passes through euphoreka peaks&valleys ~~~~~~~~~ Intuitive Indian, high&mighty thought squatter squirts expression (in)orgy(de)scribe I-oracle many-morrows-mourn poor chlorophyll trying to move mountains during photo-sin-thesis to 3e re3orn. It's a S~l~o~word spell ripening&rippling, once you're on the same page/wave with the other end of intelligence, you finally get a chance to (th)ink each other's reality. Thank you for allowing me to write an infinite moment in your finite lifetime.

This is what liberals are doing in the west today. They broke the traditions, now they aren't reproducing and will be gone in a few more generations. If there are (estimated) 30 million SJWs in America and 3,000 KKK members, each KKK member would have to justify and support the existence of 10,000 SJWs for these people to succeed by most metrics.
Stupid political conjecture. Stop confusing dead ideology with biological happening... Unless you want to talk about 'thoughts' as a subtle form of matter influencing biological evolution.
Last edited by RhetoricThug on 23 Aug 2017 17:07, edited 1 time in total.
#14836404
Dubayoo wrote:https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110327191044.htm

Apparently, it's not as true as we thought it was.

Evolution is not necessarily a process that amounts to the fittest organisms in an ecosystem surviving. Over the short-term, parasitic organisms can thrive due to chaotic diversity which sabotages long-term fitness. In order for the paradigm to continue to make sense, multiple ecosystems must be compared against each other where parasites exist or not in order for parasites to be squashed over the long-run.

If multiple ecosystems are not exposed to each other though, then parasites simply kill themselves off which creates self-destruction within the ecosystem. The fittest organisms disappear, but those who create their disappearance disappear themselves shortly thereafter. Left unto themselves in a controlled ecosystem, the fittest organisms would survive and thrive.


Parasite host interactions are well understood and modeled, as well as disruptive environmental factors (which is just a special case of environmental interactions). Parasite host interactions are actually very similar to predator prey interactions when you model them mathematically.

I think fundamentally this is a confusion about what fitness means in biology. It's about survival and reproduction, and can involve trade offs between survival and reproduction of the same organism. You see the same thing in many viruses where the virulence of the virus causes death but also increases transmission rates. The longer the host lives the better transmission rates are and there is an equilibrium between virulence and time the host stays alive that maximizes overall transmission rate.

Also, relevant to this research, it's actually well understood that organisms will segregate into different feeding strategies in order to minimize competition. This is essentially what happened with darwins finches. When finches first reached the islands their population exploded until they were competing with each other. Starvation ensued which created a selection pressure. Finches that could more easily eat seeds managed to get most of the seeds, finches that could easily get bugs got most of the bugs, etc. based on random variation in beak size and shape. Over the generations the selection pressure reinforced these traits and you get a spontaneous segregation of finches using different feeding strategies.

This is not an example of a single finch type becoming the perfect finch but several finch types evolving using different feeding strategies. Diversity resulted from a single species.

Also this study displays another well understood concept, trade offs. A trait will always have a trade off with something else. In the case of the study it was a trade off between efficient energy usage and mutation rates. One species could expoit the medium better but had a higher mutation rate which resulted in less viable cells being produced (lower reproductive rate). These cells had higher survival but lower reproduction while the mutation resilient cells had lower survival but higher reproduction. Both are reproductive strategies we see all the time at all levels in life.

Ultimately I found this study hardly surprising at all.
#14836408
mikema63 wrote:Parasite host interactions are well understood and modeled, as well as disruptive environmental factors (which is just a special case of environmental interactions). Parasite host interactions are actually very similar to predator prey interactions when you model them mathematically.

I think fundamentally this is a confusion about what fitness means in biology. It's about survival and reproduction, and can involve trade offs between survival and reproduction of the same organism. You see the same thing in many viruses where the virulence of the virus causes death but also increases transmission rates. The longer the host lives the better transmission rates are and there is an equilibrium between virulence and time the host stays alive that maximizes overall transmission rate.

Also, relevant to this research, it's actually well understood that organisms will segregate into different feeding strategies in order to minimize competition. This is essentially what happened with darwins finches. When finches first reached the islands their population exploded until they were competing with each other. Starvation ensued which created a selection pressure. Finches that could more easily eat seeds managed to get most of the seeds, finches that could easily get bugs got most of the bugs, etc. based on random variation in beak size and shape. Over the generations the selection pressure reinforced these traits and you get a spontaneous segregation of finches using different feeding strategies.

This is not an example of a single finch type becoming the perfect finch but several finch types evolving using different feeding strategies. Diversity resulted from a single species.

Also this study displays another well understood concept, trade offs. A trait will always have a trade off with something else. In the case of the study it was a trade off between efficient energy usage and mutation rates. One species could expoit the medium better but had a higher mutation rate which resulted in less viable cells being produced (lower reproductive rate). These cells had higher survival but lower reproduction while the mutation resilient cells had lower survival but higher reproduction. Both are reproductive strategies we see all the time at all levels in life.

Ultimately I found this study hardly surprising at all.
That's nice, Mikema... Tell me, how does technology as an extension of the biological organism work in your 19th century field manual? Could you explain the hidden forces (formal cause, efficient cause) motivating physical phenomena? Quantum evolution will overlap Darwin's model. Archaic models of evolution which focus on physical expressions and surface symptoms/tension will not explain the ecology of 'being.'
Last edited by RhetoricThug on 23 Aug 2017 20:16, edited 2 times in total.
#14836417
mikema63 wrote:Sorry, I don't study evolution woo.

Said the clergyman to Darwin. :lol: See, physics will always be the study of physical phenomena, thus evolution (field dynamics) is one sub-genre of physics (and physics a sub-genre of consciousness). Why be a cyclops scientist (specialist), are you doing it for the economic benefits? I'm asking you to think, not regurgitate something you absorbed, I want you to create new cognitive patterns and explore reality. Why is that so diffi(cult)? Again, how does technology as an extension of the biological organism work in our theory of evolution? Lastly, if quanta appear as physical building blocks, does biological evolution express multi-dimensional 'happening,' or is our observation limited by human experience/experiment?

Classic science embraced 'decoherence' in a mechanical/physical/linear sense, because it wanted to understand the localized dialectic of 1 and 0 as one form of sequential causality. Most scientists like to study individual ripples(figures) in the water(ground), ignoring the water (medium) and the 'thing' (formal and efficient cause) that caused the ripples. That's classic/textbook science- Professionally trained somnambulism. :lol: Hate is a strong word, but I strongly dislike their ignorance. Stop fragmenting phenomena, the time-space movement is a singularity of information. You can study the symptoms of the universe through scientific compartmentalization, but you'll never understand the formal cause or process behind manifestation.

There's no shame in being a simple minded instrument, Mike. We appreciate the songs you've learned how to play. Now, let's tune into a new soundscape. :music:
Last edited by RhetoricThug on 23 Aug 2017 21:48, edited 2 times in total.
#14836457
Some people should be forbidden by law from reading popular books on quantum mechanics. I'm thinking something along the lines of ten lashes for a first offence, and escalating it from there. :eh:
#14836470
Potemkin wrote:Hi, I'm incapable of engaging Rhetoricthug so I will post something stupid (my comrades will like my post)
:roll: I'm developing my own unified field theory, but I did enjoy Wojciech Żurek's work.

Quantum Darwinism
http://public.lanl.gov/whz/images/qd.pdf

For me, quantum information can be described as the 'deep design' of nature. The form/structure of living 'things' which humans observe must be a dense manifestation/representation of quantum information operating under classical laws of physics (because human observation is limited by its perspective inside space-time). Basically- Organisms appear as relatively independent sub-totalities of entangled information and humans abstract individual entities/properties from the whole of 'being.' We separate and isolate pieces of the unified field (along with its infinite possibilities) in order to survive and shape the material universe in our image.

All things are in an information loop with time-space, and each living organism has the potential to influence the evolution of an entire system of genetic information. When I say potential, think about quantum potentiality. The formal cause, or emanation of living phenomena is constantly consuming itself, and humans attempt to intellectually suspend themselves above the biological happening as everything collides with everything and shapes the experience humans experience. Ultimately, if you want to study biology on several levels, you must include human technologies as an extension of our biological flesh shell. When we discover (invent purpose) a new pattern (mode of perception involved in the 5-fold sensory inception) of time-space organization through the intelligent manipulation of chemical elements, we're essentially creating new 'organisms' that change the whole structure of our biological environment. The epi-genetic consequence of technology is one field of study that biologists tend to ignore/neglect. Nonetheless, it would seem self-evident (to me anyway) that when you study history and trace social-biological evolution, technologies play a major role in guiding our evolutionary trajectory.

viewtopic.php?f=92&t=170622&p=14831125#p14831125

I'm not impressed by your insecure remarks, Potemkin.
Pofo can do better. :tired:
#14836483
I'm not sure what RT was referring to when he invoked "quantum evolution," but this phrase was originally used by paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson. Simpson is still respected, and played a major part in the development of modern evolutionary synthesis. Simpson's concept had nothing to do with quantum woo, however. It was a perhaps unfortunate term, but he was describing a real idea: multi-tempo evolution. Simpson's phrase was eventually subsumed into ideas about punctuated evolution.

I don't really know how much sense it makes to talk about the "deep design" of nature or quantum information, however. Computational or information approaches to evolution are fine, as long as they are solidly grounded in biology and lead to mathematically consistent and testable hypotheses. This means "physical expressions and surface symptoms/tension" will continue to play the central role in science, because...well, science.
#14836491
quetzalcoatl wrote:I'm not sure what RT was referring to when he invoked "quantum evolution"
I'm simply saying evolution 'begins' at the quantum level (tomorrow it will begin somewhere else, because we are always evolving/obsolescing old ideas) and what we observe is a side-effect of consciousness. Our knowledge of evolution may be limited by our human experience and the only way we can investigate evolution is through technological extensions of the human condition.

It was a perhaps unfortunate term, but he was describing a real idea
One thing tho, tell me, what is a 'real idea' :lol: One mustn't have too many unreal ideas. Thing is, sometimes unreal ideas end up being very real.

I don't really know how much sense it makes to talk about the "deep design" of nature or quantum information, however. Computational or information approaches to evolution are fine, as long as they are solidly grounded in biology and lead to mathematically consistent and testable hypotheses. This means "physical expressions and surface symptoms/tension" will continue to play the central role in science, because...well, science.
Sure, but science is about reverse engineering 'reality' so we can build our own reality. That's why we collide particles. We're always investigating the 'source' of 'things.' Furthermore, I shall reiterate- Kaleidoscopic awareness is the art of intentionally giving attention to all levels of dimensional entanglement through our mind/matter interface. Kaleidoscopic awareness is a state of mind/perception which tries to grasp and give definition to the simultaneity of every-thing occurring right NOW so mankind can develop a systems theory of consciousness/being as it unfolds through time-space. Theoretically, quantum computers (remember, technology=biological extension of the organism) and true artificial intelligence may help us construct a mathematical systems theory for consciousness/being, because quantum computers simulate the one and zero simultaneously, and therefore quantum computers can build cognitive dialectics and map out the ecology of 'being.' Hopefully, the hidden 'potential' within each thing-in-itself (as energy, hidden variable theory, past-present-future) will be extracted from time-space, giving us direct access to the wave function and its properties (everything above and below it)...
#14836504
RT, guess I'll have to plead nolo contendre. Kaleidoscopic awareness will forever remain outside my grasp. I think I reached my limit failing to understand David Bohm's Implicate Order. But it's okay, I really love surface detail, it's the basis of poetry.

You are a supporter of the genocide against the P[…]

@skinster well, you've been accusing Israel of t[…]

Before he was elected he had a charity that he wo[…]

Candace Owens

... Too bad it's not as powerful as it once was. […]