Mixed Political Discussion (split from Political Humor)

[StringJunky]

On 7/22/2024 at 12:08 PM, MSC said:

That's a very short sighted view of what it means to be strong. You would think the greatest benefit to future generations would be to not care about the weak, but not so, at least not in human society.

The weak may carry genes that could could help us survive through some future catastrophe.

Sickle anaemia confers some some protection from malaria, for example. A weakness is only one when that condition doesn't help an organism prevail under a particular environmental  condition; which can change. SCA confers a benefit in a malaria-prevalent environment, but is a handicap in a malaria-free one.

[CharonY]

Likewise, group protective behaviour (i.e. regardless if it involves exclusively your offspring) can improve overall reproductive success. And conversely, risking "weaker" (however they might assess it) offspring can backfire dramatically. Though again, that does not make much sense to me in the context of predation as used in earlier posts. After all, even the strongest offspring is unlikely to survive a predator and survival would be more a matter of luck than individual strength (assuming lack of protective behaviour).

[StringJunky]

6 minutes ago, CharonY said:

Likewise, group protective behaviour (i.e. regardless if it involves exclusively your offspring) can improve overall reproductive success. And conversely, risking "weaker" (however they might assess it) offspring can backfire dramatically. Though again, that does not make much sense to me in the context of predation as used in earlier posts. After all, even the strongest offspring is unlikely to survive a predator and survival would be more a matter of luck than individual strength (assuming lack of protective behaviour).

In the predator-prey dynamic, the weak can act as a buffer and keep the predator fed, but those with the environmentally superior genetics can be left to survive a bit longer to reproduce. This benefits the predator as well by ensuring continuity of food supply.

[CharonY]

The issue here is that I don't think that there are any studies out there that really are able to investigate e.g. which genetic factors could lead to prey escape. As you can imagine that would be incredibly difficult to do. What has been studied to my knowledge are specific elements with a genetic basis (e.g. coloration) and detection by predators.

While it makes intuitive sense, I just don't think that we have the data to establish that as fact. And biology has many ways to be really counter-intuitive.

[StringJunky]

29 minutes ago, CharonY said:

The issue here is that I don't think that there are any studies out there that really are able to investigate e.g. which genetic factors could lead to prey escape. As you can imagine that would be incredibly difficult to do. What has been studied to my knowledge are specific elements with a genetic basis (e.g. coloration) and detection by predators.

While it makes intuitive sense, I just don't think that we have the data to establish that as fact. And biology has many ways to be really counter-intuitive.

Absolutely, 'correlation is not causation' has to be kept in mind. 

[MigL]

Again, weak and strong were not a measure of physical strength, but rather a weakness , or a strength, in a particular trait that confers reproductive advantage.
And yes, if you are physically strong enough to survive your predators, you have a chance at reproduction.
If you don't survive your predators, you have no chance.

That is not a complicated argument.
Nor am I advocating for a society without morals; just pointing out that nature works that way.
And other than for dinosaurs and dodo birds, evolution has worked out pretty well ( at least till we go extinct ).

[CharonY]

47 minutes ago, MigL said:

And yes, if you are physically strong enough to survive your predators, you have a chance at reproduction.
If you don't survive your predators, you have no chance.

Again, that is not necessarily true. Predators are not necessarily the key selector in a given species. Many species have virtually no defence against predators, but rely for example on high reproduction rates or life cycles that minimize overlap with predators and many more. I.e. the "strength" here is just being one of the lucky ones to reproduce before predation (or anything else happens). And if you broaden it up to be more accurate in having any traits that helps with reproduction, the argument of taking care of the weak kind of evaporates. For example, some may have large testes and high sperm load increasing likelihood of reproduction. But they might run slower. Parents that take care of that "weaker" one to fertility suddenly gain a higher chance to influence the gene pool. 

It is indeed not a complicated argument. Just not a scientifically accurate one.

[sethoflagos]

3 hours ago, StringJunky said:

Sickle anaemia confers some some protection from malaria, for example. A weakness is only one when that condition doesn't help an organism prevail under a particular environmental  condition; which can change. SCA confers a benefit in a malaria-prevalent environment, but is a handicap in a malaria-free one.

Just a small point. Sickle cell disease is the unfortunate result of inheriting an abnormal B-globin gene from each parent. Having a single sickle cell gene (as in the case of Mrs Seth) confers significant malaria resistance without the symptoms of sickle cell disease, but it does make one a carrier, which is routinely uncovered in blood tests. It's significantly less of a problem now than it used to be.   

[MigL]

2 hours ago, CharonY said:

It is indeed not a complicated argument. Just not a scientifically accurate one.

Because it is only accurate for a large percentage of cases, but not all ?

All those turtles that hatch on the beach, and race to the water to escape predators have the trait of reproducing in large numbers.
Reproduction in smaller numbers has been 'extincted' out of their gene pool.

As a matter of fact, if they could run faster, their chances at reproduction would also improve.

[CharonY]

In other words it is all about reproductive success in whatever form, which would include collaborative behavior, rather than the original notion that suport leads to weakness?

[MigL]

3 hours ago, CharonY said:

In other words it is all about reproductive success in whatever form, which would include collaborative behavior, rather than the original notion that suport leads to weakness?

In some cases yes.
Going back to the wildebeest example, they do encircle their young to try to protect them with the mass of the herd.
But the sick and infirm, not so much, and although elephants do try to protect their injured, they instinctively stay away from diseased members of their group.

Its a jungle out there; if you've ever seen an animal take down its prey and rip out its intestines while it is still alive, I don't think you could make the argument that nature has a moralistic tendency. 

[CharonY]

1 hour ago, MigL said:

Its a jungle out there; if you've ever seen an animal take down its prey and rip out its intestines while it is still alive, I don't think you could make the argument that nature has a moralistic tendency. 

No I am not making an argument about morals. But about efficiency. If saving the weak increases your reproductive success, that is what is going to happen. I.e. there is no prejudgment of what is weak and what not. What survives survives, and it can be alone or in collaboration with others. Protecting the young is a prime example of supporting the weak. Another is the behaviour of buffalos which have repeatedly being observed to try to rescue their members from predation.

Not only species are doing it, but for those that do, it obviously provided benefits. Likewise there is emerging science suggesting that many social animals exhibit some form of empathy, which likely is necessary for social behaviour. In other words, animals (and humans) don't help each other because from some moralistic stance, it is because there are mechanisms in place, biologically, that makes us want to help each others. Otherwise we would be solitary animals. And this behaviour clearly has reproductive benefit. Therefore, using your clarified stance on what you describe as "strength" it means that in many species helping the weak actually promotes strength (aka reproductive success).

Solitary animals or those that do not care for their young are not automatically stronger than those that do not. It has nothing do with morals, it is just a different strategy. And considering that either strategy still exists, it means that they are not better of worse as a whole (though a particular social animal has been very successful so far).

[Night FM]

On 7/21/2024 at 1:27 PM, MigL said:

Evolution is essentially 'survival of the fittest'.
You would do the greatest benefit to future generations by being strong and not caring about the weak; taking care of the weak ensures that specific 'weakness' survives and reproduces.

That's inaccurate. "Fittest" in the context of natural selection doesn't have to do with "strength" or "weakness", but merely the most able to adapt to one's environment. Just as reproduction is primarily about the continuation of the collective, not the individual. (It would generally be more in the individual's immediate self-interest not to reproduce, rather than having to devote time and resources away from its self toward the offspring it produces, or endure the other forms of self-sacrifice that come from having offspring, such as the risk of dying in childbirth).

Your description of it likely has more in common with Nazi German "social Darwinism" than actual biological evolution. And if it was as you say it is, then there would be no reason to believe in evolution to begin with, since there would be nothing beneficial to gain from doing so. Just as how society doesn't value people who "produce the most children" as it does people who provide higher forms of social benefit, such as people who have fewer children, but have accomplishments in sciences and arts. Issac Newton, who never married or had any children would be an example. We value him much more than we would a deadbeat who has 10 children with 10 different partners and is delinquent on their child support.

Likewise, from a biological perspective, the survival of the collective supersedes that of the individual components. Such as how, in the human body, the survival of the human is dependent on the functioning of organs and systems (which are collectives of cells). While individual cells regularly die off and are replaced, and have little utility unless they aid the survival of the organ or system which they comprise.

Quote

Again, weak and strong were not a measure of physical strength, but rather a weakness , or a strength, in a particular trait that confers reproductive advantage.
And yes, if you are physically strong enough to survive your predators, you have a chance at reproduction.
If you don't survive your predators, you have no chance.

 

 

Right, and again human societies are primarily rational rather than "natural". "Survival" is rarely a concern in the developed world, as everyone's basic material needs are met, with most of what humans devote time to having nothing to do with "survival", as opposed to higher tiers of interests on Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

Again, society far more values a person like Issac Netwon (who never had any children) for his scientific accomplishments than it does a deadbeat who sires as many children with as many different women as possible and doesn't support them. Especially coupled with modern concerns of overpopulation (which is another example of humans prioritizing higher social concerns over mere reproduction).

 

 

That is not a complicated argument.
Nor am I advocating for a society without morals; just pointing out that nature works that way.

 

"Your" chance at reproduction doesn't matter as far as your own immediate self-interest is concerned. Reproduction is primarily about the collective interest, namely the continuation of the species. Many species don't even have a notion of paternity, for example. (Such as matriarchal societies like ant colonies, where the male ants are simply left to die off after mating with the queen).

It would be far more in the individual's self-interest to avoid reproduction and simply extend its own life for as long as possible, even if the species as a whole goes extinct.

Edited July 24 by Night FM

[exchemist]

22 hours ago, MigL said:

Again, weak and strong were not a measure of physical strength, but rather a weakness , or a strength, in a particular trait that confers reproductive advantage.
And yes, if you are physically strong enough to survive your predators, you have a chance at reproduction.
If you don't survive your predators, you have no chance.

That is not a complicated argument.
Nor am I advocating for a society without morals; just pointing out that nature works that way.
And other than for dinosaurs and dodo birds, evolution has worked out pretty well ( at least till we go extinct ).

Dinosaurs have done rather well, though. The skies are full of them. 

[MSC]

On 7/23/2024 at 9:39 AM, MigL said:

Your, and I suspect MSC's, point is certainly valid for benefitting society, but benefit of the species has no morals attached to it. It is simply the purpose of life to procreate.
Our species may have morals, but we are still essentially just animals.
The wildebeest have no problem giving up the weak and infirm  for the lion's lunch, because it means disease and weaknesses are not passed on to future generations, making them 'stronger' as a species. The ones that are fast enough to outrun the lion pass on their genes.
Similarly, a monkey with bad eyesight will not catch the next vine or branch, when swinging through the trees, and will fall to its death, never reproducing, and never passing on the 'bad eyesight' genes.
Our morals don't permit that, so we give people eyeglasses ( and surgery ), they reproduce and pass on inherited eye disease.

Even social animals, ants, bees, etc., will sacrifice the diseased or weak to save their colony, although our morals don't really allow for their 'kind of society' ( except maybe in India, where the caste system allows for different value of different people ).

So, as an advanced society, we have the luxury of morals, only because evolutionary environmental forcings don't affect us as much anymore. The eyeglasses I mentioned earlier, and research into curing inherited disease, are some examples.
The fact that we don't need to be fast or strong as protection from predators since we have guns.
We don't need differing skin melanin levels as we don't need to adapt to our environment, rather we adapt our environment to us with glass and steel shelters and heating/air conditioning.

It is not that I'm advocating against morals, yet they do seem to conflict with our nature.
A nature that has served us well for about 65 Million years, and has made mammals, and us humans ( the only ones with morals ), the dominant life form on this planet.

The conversation has covered quite a lot since this comment but you yourself alluded to not focussing purely on physical traits. Psychological traits for example are probably far more impactful than physical ones. For example in prey animals, skittishness is a good trait. 

When you say that humans are the only ones with morals, I do take exception to that and you don't have to watch too much Attenborough to figure out why either. Why do wolves and other pack animals, scold their young? Why do animals other than humans engage in altruistic behaviours? 

Moral philosophy ultimately concerns itself with the study of values and moral psychology studies how humans percieve and think about value, as well as valuing behaviours. It isn't a stretch to delve into comparitive moral psychology from there and I think once somebody is trained to identify the signs of value based cognition, you can't unsee it in almost everything we do. By we, I mean living beings. 

Rounding back to traits relating to a species survival. It's very hard to pinpoint, as others have said luck does come into it, so do numbers and some of worst types of natural disasters are so rare relative to animal lifespans, yet so destructive ( large meteor strikes as an example) that you can be the smartest, strongest and quickest species in a region with nothing that can outwit or overpower you, and still be taken out by a quick natural disaster. 

Our natural ancestor that lived along side the dinosaurs, was similar to a shrew. Small, weak, preyed on by most dinosaurs small enough to even notice it. Yet that burrowing behaviour + numbers saved it, even though there are so many many situations where it's weaknesses would give it no chance to survive. 

What it means to be the fittest animal is context dependent and is a dynamic multiplicity of factors and variables. 

Any trait, physical or psychogical can be a boon in one area of life and not in another. Take aggression and cooperation for example, these two traits together can be found in most pack animals and some herd animals. Take those wildebeest for example; it is a fact that they are hunted and preyed upon by lions, but if you asked me to give you the ratio of how many kills each species has scored on the other, I'd not be able to tell you. Suffice it to say some wildebeest get eaten by lions and some lions get killed by wildebeest. So how do you go about figuring out which is the fitter species?

In regards to India and the Caste system and the claim that it is allowable there. Let me introduce you to the cultural relativists paradox. Lets imagine a country that claims that morality is relative to culture, but that same country also claims that criticising the morality of other cultures, is a part of its culture. This country would look at say Nazi Germany and would be making the argument for... what? For or against the holocaust? I can't tell you because of the cultural relativists paradox. They could argue from the position of cultural relativism that it is okay for the Germans to commit a genocide on the Jews as it is a part of nazi culture so therefore morally correct if that is want to do within their cultural borders, while simultaneously arguing that it is morally abhorrent because it's part of their culture to criticise other cultures. 

India is not equivalent to bee society as caste differences in bees are based on physiological taxonomical differences whereas a Dalit and a Brahmin are essentially the same in terms of their humanity with no where near as much variation between them as the differences between a warrior, worker and queen ant. 

The other problem with cultural relativism is that it assumes there is a consensus within a given culture, over the moral inclinations of that culture and then assumes that the consensus must be the correct position, which sounds a lot like "1 billion people can't be wrong." Even though I could go to India, throw a rock and hit a guy that curses the caste system even though he's Indian. Pretty much every Dalit hates it and you can even find folk from high castes that don't like it even though they benefitted from it. That's without going into all the different langauges, subcultures and ethnicities that exist within india. 1billion people is a lot of cultural difference to pack into a single country. 

Honestly I could go on and on about these subjects if I had the time but this is already pretty long and dinner will be ready soon. I hope MigL my comment makes you think a bit and that you're doing well. 

[MigL]

22 hours ago, Night FM said:

That's inaccurate. "Fittest" in the context of natural selection doesn't have to do with "strength" or "weakness", but merely the most able to adapt to one's environment.

You would do well to read the whole thread, so that you fully understand other's views, before commenting with references to Nazi Germany, as you also did in the Incel thread.
Is that a common theme with amateur psychologists ?

 

21 hours ago, exchemist said:

Dinosaurs have done rather well, though. The skies are full of them. 

Last I checked, an asteroid impact equivalent to 10 000 times the world's nuclear arsenal is not a predator.
But I do agree, the sky is full of them. We call them birds.

Thanks MSC, you seem to be the only one who got the point of our original discussion.
The benefit of society is not necessarily the benefit of the species, and vice versa.  Others are merely choosing to attack the examples I provided of 'not necessarily', which in itself indicates some cases fit and some don't.

You also seem to have recognized how the ( mistaken ) belief that people were benefitting their society, almost caused the extinction of a group of people ( Jews are not a separate race ) in Germany, 90 years ago.
But there are many more such examples.

Edited July 25 by MigL

[MSC]

5 hours ago, MigL said:

Is that a common theme with amateur psychologists ?

No, I think it's to do with being young but also the political climate has people hyper vigilant. I didn't have much issue with your word use and figured out your meanings based on context though they may not always be exactly how some academics in these fields would put it, but then this is a mixed group so it seemed to make sense to me for "Fittest" "weakest" and "strongest" to be synonyms meant to fit a given context. 

5 hours ago, MigL said:

The benefit of society is not necessarily the benefit of the species, and vice versa. 

Absolutely. I mean any society powered by the overconsumption of fossil fuels and the production of greenhouse gases and other harmful emissions, or that has a practically useless placeholder resource as a barrier to all other resources in the needs based economy, is definitely harming it's species more than it is helping it. Makes you wonder what society is even for, to improve peoples lives or keep going? At this rate, it'll fuck up both. 

5 hours ago, MigL said:

You also seem to have recognized how the ( mistaken ) belief that people were benefitting their society, almost caused the extinction of a group of people ( Jews are not a separate race ) in Germany, 90 years ago.
But there are many more such examples.

Many many more. This is why context relativism is far more absolute, clear and informative than cultural relativism. If the given context is animals living on a planet, some shit just isn't going to fly. Does it hurt your planet when you do that? Don't do that! 

[CharonY]

6 hours ago, MigL said:

The benefit of society is not necessarily the benefit of the species, and vice versa.  Others are merely choosing to attack the examples I provided of 'not necessarily', which in itself indicates some cases fit and some don't.

I would argue that this depends on the timeline. If we talk about species, we implicitly project long time lines (such as, until extinction, for example). Conversely societal benefits can be short-term. But if we add sustainability to the mix the timeline for what we consider societal benefit gets extended (i.e. it should not only be good for the current, but also for future generations). At which point what one might consider beneficial would converge. 

 

Edit: I should also add that one should not assume that selective pressure are all to the benefit of the species (as in creating a more successful species as implied by some comments). After all, a lot of species went extinct following highly successful and specific adaptations. It is possible to specialize oneself into a corner, for example.