[~ot] why is programming so fun?

[Fawzi Mohamed]

On 2008-06-04 10:44:56 +0200, Aarti_pl <aarti at interia.pl> said:

> Gregor Richards pisze:
>> Evolution is based on overwhelming amounts of evidence, and yes, I'll 
>> say it: Anyone who does not believe in evolution when presented with 
>> the evidence is irreparably incompetent.
> 
> Did you read this?:
> http://www.forbiddenarcheology.com/
> 
> I found also movie:
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opX5s57MKIk
> 
> Although I don't support author's religion world view, his book is 
> strong position *against* evolutionary view of humans origins. It's not 
> just sweet "bla bla" it's scientific monumental work, which definitely 
> should be seriously taken into consideration.
> 
> A good question is why still so many scientists don't want to think 
> about alternatives to theory of evolution? In my case when I got older 
> I lost my naive point of view that everyone just tries to discover the 
> truth. Also scientists have their presumptions, emotions, careers, 
> religions (including atheism ;-) ) and it influences heavily their 
> work,   way of thinking and conclusions they make. Especially in areas 
> of knowledge which from definition are not as repeatable as simple 
> physical experiments.
> 
> Best Regards
> Marcin Kuszczak
> www.zapytajmnie.com

I find very difficult not to believe in some form of evolution once you 
understand how it works.

1) there are some sort of things that we identify as individuals.

2) these individuals can in some way reproduce themselves, and produce 
other individuals

3) the offspring of the individuals are similar to those that have 
generated them, but not identical, some small variations can enter 
(hereditariness and mutation)

4) individuals can die

that's it, if you accept these things then you have some sort of evolution:
individuals that are better adapted to the environment are more likely 
to have more offsprings and live longer, so slowly you have evolution.
Those are extremely weak assumptions, and this is an argument that is 
quite difficult to discard... and in fact there is also plenty of 
evidence and experiments done today that shows that this happens in 
reality.

What the anti-darwinists normally do in this case is to say that the 
variability has to be only limited to a small parameter set (what they 
call micro evolution), or that some things are exempt from evolution.
Depending on who you ask you get different answers with respect to what 
is fixed (maybe the species, which is a concept that doesn't apply so 
well to everything).
But actually there is no need for artificial bounds on what can be 
changed, the only thing that happens if there are no bounds is that 
sometime some modification gives you a flawed individual that cannot 
form/grow/or dies early... which happens....

Can I show that there are no bounds (other than the physical laws) on 
the modifications that the evolution can do? Obviously not, but I never 
saw anything like them and it is much more economical to think that 
there none if it fits the observation (occam razor).

Once one accepts this kind of evolution one can begin to look at the 
details of how it works, and how it can explain what we see.

For example it is clear that isolation (physical, due to food source, 
behavioral,...) makes for a statistical higher probability of having a 
smaller part of the population that has mean characteristic that are 
different from the "normal" and can magnify special characteristics and 
branch away the population.

What is normally misperceived about evolution is how the population 
evolves, do the stronger individuals survive? the more selfish? the 
better ones? not necessarily, it depends on the environment, as strong 
selfish individual might be less adapt than a group that collaborates 
with themselves. Any kind of simple definition that is not circular 
(those that survive are those that survive) is fallacious, even the 
"better" individuals might have costs (energetic,...) that do not 
offset their usefulness...

One thing that the evolution has is the strong preference for small 
improvements (that are more likely) over big changes, so to really 
understand how a big change can happen one should find a "path" of 
small changes (that give and advantage).
There are signs of this (for example birds have the same basic skeletal 
structure as ourselves, only highly deformed), still there are some 
things for which no clear way is known, and some hypothesis on how  it 
could have happened are discussed in the book I had cited (The Major 
Transitions in Evolution).

And God?
Well this doesn't rule out the existence of God, neither it does 
demonstrate it.
I know very good people both religious and not, and have respect for 
them. For some people believing in God gives them energy to act well.
Personally I am very suspicious of absolute truths, especially when one 
thinks that he has to convince  others of his idea at all costs, 
respecting the others and being tolerant is one of the most important 
things in my opinion, intolerance is the thing I tolerate less :).
I define myself agnostic: I think that one cannot really answer that 
question one way or another, and actually it isn't the most relevant 
question.
More important is how one lives and what he does.
I think that if God exists than he should also care more about that, 
and if he doesn't, and cares more if one worships him or not, then it 
isn't a God that I want to worship ;).

Definitely OT, I will try restrain myself next time ;)