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ARCH-THEORY  April 1999

ARCH-THEORY April 1999

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Subject:

Re: academic language & sunyata

From:

Chris Lees <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

[log in to unmask]

Date:

Wed, 28 Apr 1999 23:10:19 +0100

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text/plain (97 lines)

Chris wrote :
> > > Surely, the best way to defend science against its critics, is
> > to ensure that it is _not_ arbitrary, superstition-riddled and
> > hypocritical, then its opponents don't have a leg to stand on.

Mike replied : 
> That's a counsel of perfection, and given the numbers of arbitrary,
> superstition-riddled, hypocritical scientists, difficult to achieve. 
> We'd do better to convert the skeptics if we could argue that in 
> the long run, truth wins out over falsehood in science, and that even
> crummy scientists contribute to the process.  And we can do that. 

I don't disagree. 

Mike again :
> Out of curiosity I did a web search on biology+epigenesis, and found
> 2100 seperate references on Alta Vista.  (maybe 1990 of those were
> from Amazon.com, offering to sell books with "+biology+epigenesis"
> in the title).   This isn't a totally ignored subject, in other words.
> Most graduate students in biology will either take or contemplate
> taking a course in developmental biology/embryology at some point
> in their careers; most undergraduates in biology will probably hear
> a professor mention in passing that embryos develop in wombs, which
> are complex enviroments, and that development might proceed differently
> in different wombs.  The people who profess to being shocked by such
> statements as "one reason we aren't more like chimps may be that
> our mothers aren't chimps" tend to be biological laymen-- anthropology
> students, for example.
> 
> To be true, most textbooks on evolutionary theory tend to ignore
> developmental biology (since it doesn't fit well into the popula-
> tion genetics/statistics machinery of conventional genetic analysis), 
> and vice versa (since "natural selection", "genetic drift", and 
> related concepts seem pretty far removed from embryology).  But 
> both groups know the other exists, with some idea of what the other
> is doing.  And some biologists manage to straddle the line and
> keep feet in both camps; expect more with time, next century.

I think maybe I didn't make quite clear the significance of my quotes, and
their context.

C. S. Peirce required that the first and primary obligation of any philosopher 
or scientist is to do nothing that would block inquiry.
A battle began in the 19thC between Darwinians (Science) and Creationists
(Religion). That battle is ongoing. But there was another battle between 
Darwinians and Lamarckians,( and also many other 'sub-battles' ).

The Darwinism versus Lamarckism battle got mixed up with the Capitalism  
versus Communism battle, to the extent that the USSR 'believed' in Lamarckism, 
ignoring all the evidence that it does not work,and 'pretending' that it did. 
( In other words, if you questioned the obvious fact that characteristics produced 
by interaction with the environment, like cutting off a mouse's tail, are not passed 
on to the progeny - i.e. crude Lamarckism,- you were off to the Gulag for a spell )
I'm not shocked by anything that happened under Stalin. What shocks me
is, that when evidence showing that Lamarck was _not _entirely_ wrong
turned up, _Western_ scientists refused to acknowledge that evidence
for _idealogical_ reasons. And still don't....so it seems.

I'm not clear as to where the pressure to suppress this evidence comes from.
Maybe it's partly left over from the Cold War, or maybe it's the 'anti-vitalist
phobia', I mentioned in the quote. That is, neodarwinian atheists think that if
they give an inch of ground, it might be grabbed as a bridgehead by the 
Creationists. But I'm with Peirce on this. To suppress scientific data because
its controversial and inconvenient is unacceptable. It's a corruption of the
scientific project.This data has been known for decades, and it is rather
important, because it makes the evolutionary paradigm look rather different, IMHO.

I should make clear, by 'epigenetic inheritance', I'm don't mean just developmental
biology, I mean there is evidence, that there are indeed Lamarckian mechanisms 
involved in evolution. Why aren't philosophers and scientists aware of this ?
Answer, because it has been suppressed. Why ? I don't know. Must_be_a reason
though. Any suggestions ? 

Chris.
http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~chrislees/tao.index.html

One reference among many :

‘Lamarckian’ mechanisms in darwinian evolution
Eva Jablonka,Marion J. Lamb,Eytan Avital.
Since the Modern Synthesis, evolutionary biologists have assumed that the genetic
system is the sole provider of heritable variation, and that the generation of heritable
variation is largely independent of environmental changes. However, adaptive
mutation, epigenetic inheritance, behavioural inheritance through social learning,
and language-based information transmission have properties that allow the
inheritance of induced or learnt characters. The role of induced heritable variation in
evolution therefore needs to be reconsidered, and the evolution of the systems that
produce induced variation needs to be studied.
Eva Jablonka and Marion Lamb are at the Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of
Science and Ideas, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv 69978, Israel;
Eytan Avital is at the Dept of Natural Sciences, David Yelin Teachers College,
POB 3578, Jerusalem, Israel;



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