Comments by "Taxtro" (@MrCmon113) on "The Institute of Art and Ideas" channel.

  1.  @edgarrenenartatez1932  That tells you nothing about what lead to current organisms and how they will change in the future.
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  2. There's lots of other planets, plus ours isn't going anywhere, plus an advanced civilization doesn't need planets, but can live in space habitats.
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  3. You don't know "with complete certainty" that YOU were conscious a second ago or will be in one second. Don't have to go to rabbits for that.
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  4. When I cut onions I know what women feel like.
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  5.  @khos8343  You literally just made up the word "gender instinct".
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  6. "Holistic" is just code for hokus pokus that doesn't mean anything at all. Dennis seems to think that a gene centric view of evolution entails that sequencing genomes must cure a certain amount of diseases sufficiently quickly. That's not at all what the "gene's eye view" is. Evolution simply doesn't make sense other than from the perspective of the replicator.
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  7. This guy doesn't have a clue what he's talking about. A "gene centric" view of evolution doesn't mean that knowing genes will automatically cure disease. No it means that evolution itself only makes sense from the perspective of gene survival.
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  8. I think we can avoid all of the controvery about gender and trans people by simply defining women as people, who are weak, cry a lot and are bad at driving cars. This way the biological notion of a female is intact and properly distinguished from womanhood, which is equally open to males.
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  9.  @MyMy-tv7fd  People don't write books for cognitively disabled and dogmatic people only. The Selfish Gene has taught more people a correct understanding of evolution than any other work.
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  10. No such thing as "good for the species".
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  11. Thing is that you then have people think and talk about consciousness by pure coincidence.
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  12.  @mycount64  There's no evidence of consciousness outside my own.
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  13.  @MonisticIdealism  Both of those are wrong. Both of you have to argue why giving consciousness a specific scope is more plausible.
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  14.  @mattstumblovski  No, to the contrary most religions force that consciousness not be a "fundamental entity".
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  15. If we had kept sterilizing violent criminals the world would certainly be better now.
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  16.  @oneoflokis  That question is nonsense. Given any state of established affairs you can ask: why is this so? That doesn't mean all questions are nonsense.
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  17. When I'm really weak after exercise I know how women feel. Or when I'm unmotivated and sad. Or when I cut onions and cry. Many ways to feel like women feel.
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  18. Yeah, but not the generation afterwards. If you kick a mother in the stomach, that changes the baby. So what? That doesn't explain the emergence of species and the adaptations in nature.
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  19. Well that's completely untrue. Genes get translated to RNA and then to proteins. Not the other way around. You're blabbering about "myriad feedback loops" and that gets you exactly nowhere. Genes are what actually lasts from generation to generation and that's why their perspective explains evolution and not the perspective of proteins.
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  20. Different forms of consciousness would still be emergent under panpsychism.
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  21. There is no looming. The only reason I think consciousness exists is that I am conscious. I only believe that other things are conscious to the degree to which they resemble my body. Be that other humans, animals, atomic particles or spaciotemporal phenomena in general.
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  22. Yeah, they're contemplating how to get rid of this absolute moron in the most polite way possibe.
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  23. Everyone is aware of that humbug.
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  24. >While observation and consciousness are responsable for reactions later on. I don't know what you think consciousness is, but what you can and do observe depends on your genes.
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  25. No. There isn't really a replacement. But people should use a greater diversity of drugs. Most of the problems with alcohol are just the result of people having to use alcohol where it's inappropriate, because other drugs are illegal. E.g. it makes very little sense to me to drink alcohol when you're alone at your house.
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  26. I'd rather be sterilized than imprisoned and the state can already imprison me for the rest of my life. Random couples can already decide who lives. Why should they have arbitrary say over another being and the future of the world?
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  27.  @alexappleby8677  All of your talk about "deterministic" is total hogwash. The language in the Selfish Gene is always about certain genes being MORE LIKELY to lead to certain phenotypes which then make it MORE LIKELY for the organism to reproduce more often which then over time makes it more likely for the gene to become more prevalent in a population.
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  28.  @marmotian4287  >many organismal or cellular or intelligent processes could guide it, somewhat in a top-down way Guide what where? I think you're missing the point. The question is what leads to adaptation. Of course cellular processes are necessary for gametes to be formed and to come together. But they don't explain adaptation to the environment. >does an intelligent entity (as in cell, NOT god) write its own blueprint A cell doesn't plan for the future of cell-kind. What accounts for adaptation is the differential survival of different similar cells.
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  29.  @HarryNicNicholas  I disagree. There's nothing that could feel like or seem like "free will". If anything free will is a de-lusion. Maybe something like "agency" could be an illusion.
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  30. Your conceptualization of "genuinely" understanding is completely wrong. Understanding and consciousness are totally different things. I can be conscious without understanding anything and a robot - if panpsychism is wrong - can be unconscious and yet understand a lot.
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  31. What explanation could possibly draw some line between a system that does and one that doesn't produce consciousness?
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  32.  @JBSCORNERL8  Dunno what you think panpsychism is, but it's 100% compatible with "materialism".
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  33.  @edenrosest  The situation is that basically no one thinks quantum mechanics has anything to do with consciousness. It's basically Many Worlds VS various theories that violate locality.
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  34. Maybe you should actually read some books from Dawkins to understand evolution.
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  35. That's already been proven impossible. Also if it was possible, you'd know it, because we would be getting messages from the future.
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  36. It's completely trivial in theory (unless you're religious or have some other hangups), but the first person experience of non-dual awareness is profound and very instable for most people.
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  37. Proof is for courts or mathematicians. You're completely out of your depth.
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  38. There is no "top down" at all. There is no amino acids that accumulate and then get written into RNA and then DNA. That's just not how evolution works. >to predict with such fanfare that they would "solve" all problems and diseases within decades I have no clue what you're talking about, but The Selfish Gene doesn't include any such predictions. >is so much more complex than anyone expected No. Everything that remains of an organism is the gamete. That's why taking the replicator's perspective is the only thing that makes sense of evolution.
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  39.  @agapeten  >the genes we improve might not be the genese needed in the next stage of mankind Lol, what are you doing to maintain all possible genes? This is completely insincere concern trolling.
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  40. No, what's self evident is that impressions exist. It's not clear at all that qualia reflect anything.
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  41. No, that doesn't follow at all. It's plausible that consciousness has effects, but it might also be that some circumstance always causes consciousness and a special kind of memory, thoughtpattern, speech as well.
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  42. Firstly you should ask yourself whether you would want to be in the position of the child. If not, then it's already pretty clear that the child shouldn't be born). Then it's about how much you can optimize at what cost: Optimize both in the sense of personal happiness and usefulness for others. For example I'm not sure ppl with Down Syndrome are necessarily a net negative. Perhaps they tend to be more happy, then it would be more moral to bring people with Down Syndrome into the world than people without (as long as the number doesn't affect technological progress).
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  43. It would already be great just to sterilize violent criminals and to give MDMA to smart people.
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  44. You don't seem to have the tiniest idea of what you're talking about. The gene's eye view of evolution is not "we should focus on genes alone in medical research". It's that evolution itself only makes sense from the perspective of genes. Also all research is "reductionist". If you don't reduce stuff down to fewer facts, you're not actually doing research. You're just amassing observations. Reducing is the very essence of science. "Holistic" is easy. We already have human organisms. Here they are. In their whole. Nothing more to find out "holistically".
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  45. You've completely missed the point.
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  46.  @johnnastrom9400  There's all of the evidence that the brain produces consciousness and panpsychists don't deny that either. They just say that the parts of the brain are also conscious in addition.
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  47. None of what you said means anything and the complexity of a kind of organism doesn't matter as to whether evolution describes the changes in it's population.
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  48. I have no idea what genetic determinism is supposed to be. It certainly doesn't have anything to do with the gene's eye view of evolution as explained by Dawkins.
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  49. And why should parents decide that? We have child protective services and laws on the environment, but you can bring into the world/kill individuals as you please?
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  50. That doesn't make any sense.
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