Spirits (was RE: [extropy-chat] Qualia Bet.)

[The Avantguardian]

--- gts <gts_2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> I wonder why you seem to think this is not an
> example of nature or  
> nurture. Humans tend to organize into hierarchies
> probably to avoid the  
> "too many chiefs, not enough indians" syndrome.

I am simply suggesting that there are personality
differences between individuals that cannot be
explained simply by genetic or environmental
differences. I used twins that live together to
control for genetics and environment. Dominance was
just an example of one such personality trait. There
are many more that differ between identical twins. To
me this demonstrates (albeit in an anecdotal fashion
as I have only ever known 3 pairs of identical twins)
the existense of qualia. Two twins, raised in the same
environment, can recieve the same stimulus yet have
two different experiences. 


 
> Also I wonder why you are defending elan vital.

Probably because somebody worthy of disagreeing with
is attacking it. ;) Plus it truly hasn't been
disproven, it has only lost popularity. 

> The pan-vitalism you  
> described to me in the qualia thread is not elan
> vital. In fact I wonder  
> why you consider it vitalism.

Well it's mostly just semantics. I don't necessarily
believe in elan vital per-se, although entangled
bosons might fulfill a similar role. I do consider
myself a neo-vitalist because my studies of biology
have made it clear is that there is a lot more going
on in the process of living than the text books can
explain. There is a certain unusual coherence to and
coupling of the chemical reactions of life that cannot
be reproduced in vitro. For a thorough explanation of
what I mean by this, I refer you to "The Rainbow and
the Worm" by Mae-Wan Ho. In regards to the
relationship of classical vitalism to my pan-vitalism
hypothesis, there really isn't one at least not
directly. It was mostly just the language I chose to
use. I could have just as easily called it
panbiogenesis which would probably have been more
accurate but I was inspired by your frequent use of
"pan-psychism" to call it that.     


> You described a theory
> of life's origins  
> entirely consistent with ordinary science, but in
> which biological life  
> must have originated elsewhere at an earlier time. I
> don't see that you  
> need anything like elan vital to defend your theory.

I don't. However a key point that you seem to miss is
that I am proposing that "life began EVERYWHERE at an
earlier time because back then the entire universe had
certain chemical and thermodynamic properties that are
now only found in living organisms". Specifically the
observed coherent coupling of chemical reactions that
I mentioned earlier that might or might not be
explainable by entangled bosons.
 


The Avantguardian 
is 
Stuart LaForge
alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu

"If you fear death, you are not living right; if you don't want to live forever, you are not living well." - a sparrow outside my window.


	
		
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