Nature, the god that determined our arrival.

This subject became a necessary debate due to the question being raised in another thread. Can we assume that nature intended to create us as it's ultimate achievement? Can nature with no obvious sentient understanding have a desire to achieve and what was its intentions? Can we assume there is no other form consciousness beyond our understanding? Is it possible we are the conscious ability nature desired?

The way we commonly and scientifically use the word 'nature' in the 21st century is not about something which has any intentions. Intentions are what more evolved sorts of animals have, including us of course.Absract ideas such as nature dont have intentions or make plans.
There was formerly a fashion among Romantically poetic persons for according Nature a capital letter as if she were a goddess sort of a thing who did intend this or that.
It does not follow that because nature produced us who can reflect upon nature that nature had any intention of producing us. We are not random effects though: we are products of evolutionary forces which designed us without any final cause.

The way we commonly and scientifically use the word 'nature' in the 21st century is not about something which has any intentions. Intentions are what more evolved sorts of animals have, including us of course.Absract ideas such as nature dont have intentions or make plans.
There was formerly a fashion among Romantically poetic persons for according Nature a capital letter as if she were a goddess sort of a thing who did intend this or that.
It does not follow that because nature produced us who can reflect upon nature that nature had any intention of producing us. We are not random effects though: we are products of evolutionary forces which designed us without any final cause.

Is that statement of fact or faith Belinda? You can not deny the result or the determination so why doubt the intentions.

Xris wrote,


“Can we assume that nature intended to create us as it's ultimate achievement?”


We may assume it. Yet, we may also, at least prima facie, assume nature did not intend it. If we wish to begin from the beginning, so to speak, we must ask what is meant by “intended” in order to differentiate between relevant positions that may hold similar assumptions along these lines. We may say that intention here means something like “naturally determined” to bring about. We may say, then, that given the strict causal nature of the universe, all that is was meant to be in the broadest possible sense of “meant.” Let’s assume this sort of meaning, what of it? Well, we might say that everything that is was produced by some ‘natural’ force that was inevitable. Hence, we are the “inevitable” products of the universe, nature or what have you. Obviously, such a view need not involve sentience-only a very hard deterministic view of cosmology.


For argument sake let’s say that we buy this sort of hard determinism for the moment. Let’s say that we even go so far as to speak of ‘nature’ desiring in some non-humanly equivalent sense to bring about the effects that we see all around us. We are faced with two problems: (a) how would this position significantly differ from some physicalist materialist view? Perhaps, a (PM)—physicalist materialist—would not wish to use anthropomorphic terms to describe the process, but they might agree that the universe could not, after the laws formed, have been otherwise. It would seem, given all this, then that we possess no clear distinction between a (PM) view and a view seemingly posited here, even if the position posited a more literal view of the universe’s “conscious” goals. (b) Even so, why would we think that we are the ultimate goal and not some other thing? We may accept that we are a grand achievement-but what other achievement may exist that is the exemplar of natural conscious work? Maybe we’re only a step to something much larger that the universe wishes to reveal! Perhaps, we are only part of the process-but neither the end nor even the primary goal.


So, even if we accept all that is assumed here, we still cannot be certain as to the point. In basic, such pondering is interesting-but it is consistent with BOTH a version of the (PM) position as well as a (NS)—natural spiritualist position. It is obvious that these positions are not compatible! Yet, given what we have here, we have NO way of telling which one is the more accurate way of putting the point. Therefore, if we answer Xris’s questions in the affirmative, then we really have neither a new view of the universe nor any way to differentiate between two incompatible views that may hold key assumptions similarly.


Xris asked,


“Can nature with no obvious sentient understanding have a desire to achieve and what was its intentions?”


One might respond to the above with answering in the affirmative on these questions: that the universe possesses desire to achieve in the literal sense-or something analogous to this, and its intention was/is to create us or achieve some high-level mark of conscious realization. This would most certainly NOT be the (PM) position. What of the (NS) position? (a) We may do this but doing this would have the odd result of arguing that identification of anything that produces causes, presumably causation is but part and parcel of the cosmos, is equivalent to some ‘intention” “desire” or what have you. In such cases we couldn’t compare this view to vitalism: a doctrine that maintains that life and the functions of a living organism depend on a nonmaterial force or principle separate from physical and chemical processes. Apparently, this view states that even physical processes, even the whole of the physical universe, is an intentional force. This would oddly mean that the natural causal force that compels a rock through a window by way of a wind storm is along the same purpose-goal directed activity as one ‘choosing’ to help an elderly woman cross the street. In other words, the way that we normally differentiate between natural, accidental, deliberate causes etc. are really all of the same goal directed force since nothing could happen without some intention-desire or whatever. In other words, if everything is of the same causal force, we’re all but part and parcel of the same intentionality. This leads to an interesting problem: if it is so, then we have no way to affirm it or deny it!


In basic, part of this position is an intentional ‘hard determinism’ that was meant to bring us all about or something of grand achievement. Nothing is accidental, since we and our whole being is but part of the causal series. So, those that affirm such things- or the (NS) position are in some sense intended do so. Yet, those that do not-are equally intended to so. It may be the point of one to eventually win the dialectical day over the other, but even so, this is also “intended.” This would mean that ‘truth’ and ‘falsity’ are not part of the deciphering process of what is so from what is not so, but part of the ongoing causal Zeist Geist! This issue, just as that more Hegelian position had done prior, eventually relativizes all issues not as part of a human-Socratic dialectic ‘to know thyself,’ but rather as a dialectic of social- realization. Ultimately, no position is really different from the other in those ultimate terms. In other words, from a logical and ethically concerned point of view, we cannot decipher which position is correct or more morally suitable for human flourishing. Gandhi is as relevant to the self-actualizing nature of the universe as Adolf Hitler. This view may be right or it may be wrong-but either way, if we give an affirmative posture to these questions, we not only have no way of knowing if it is so, it would be irrelevant even if it were.

Such a view may be so, but we would, in the end, need some reason to think it so even if we do not succumb to these given consequences of the position.


There are other problems answering in the affirmative as well, but these will do for now,

Eric D.

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quote="Belinda"]The way we commonly and scientifically use the word 'nature' in the 21st century is not about something which has any intentions. Intentions are what more evolved sorts of animals have, including us of course.Absract ideas such as nature dont have intentions or make plans.
There was formerly a fashion among Romantically poetic persons for according Nature a capital letter as if she were a goddess sort of a thing who did intend this or that.
It does not follow that because nature produced us who can reflect upon nature that nature had any intention of producing us. We are not random effects though: we are products of evolutionary forces which designed us without any final cause.

Xris wrote:

Is that statement of fact or faith Belinda? You can not deny the result or the determination so why doubt the intentions

.

I doubt the intentions because I believe what I believe based upon what my culture dictates is reasonable belief. My culture is modern, i.e. based on Enlightenment science. I am not a person from or much influenced by the Age of Faith and its religious doctrines who believes that Nature or God or something intended this or that to happen at some time in the future.

Thanks Eric and thanks Belinda. We have to ask could the outcome have been any different than what it is? As you ask Eric, was it inevitable considering the circumstances. Nature is certainly determined and I believe it was determined to obtain perfection. Perfection has the best chance of survival. The only real question was it predetermined, that might indicate a determined effort from an intelligent perspective. That intelligence if admitted does not show itself, in nature, in a way we could understand or comprehend but does that exclude the possibility?

Predetermination is indicated by the fact that life must be formulated and by that formula create and evolve in a measured and constructive manner. Given very similar circumstances on another planet it must be inevitable that life would evolve and deliver the same result. If we have a formula for successful life how do we explain such a phenomena without believing in predetermination? What does predetermination indicate? It indicates intelligent determination. What does intelligence indicate? It indicates that we do not have enough knowledge to fully understand Nature.

Xris wrote,


“As you ask Eric, was it inevitable considering the circumstances. Nature is certainly determined and I believe it was determined to obtain perfection. Perfection has the best chance of survival. The only real question was it predetermined, that might indicate a determined effort from an intelligent perspective. That intelligence if admitted does not show itself, in nature, in a way we could understand or comprehend but does that exclude the possibility?”


Hello Xris! As to perfection and the survival descriptive of, say, evolution then I would have to humbly disagree. Everything we know about evolution by natural selection indicates innumerable trial and errors. By this, I mean continual environmental pressures maximizing the fitness values of a population. These values, however, change all of the time--and most of the time, and over the long haul of biological history, most organisms fail. Moreover, most of the genetic mutations that occur have no impact on the population-it isn’t until the environment pushes on various populations—more like members of those populations—that we have alterations, and IF those members happen to be in the fortunate group of highly adaptive populations, they move on-or their genetic inheritance does. Most species go extinct—well, all do eventually. I’m wholly uncertain what “perfection” could mean given this uncertain arrangement. Moreover, since fitness values are not a fixed calculation, it would be impossible to determine what the “ultimate” adaptive value would be of any given member of a population—let alone the entire population-or species. I would even say it is impossible due to the number of variables involved. Sometimes the inferior or the more “imperfect” thing wins out depending on a whole set of environmental and genetic variables. I could only know, from this, the so-called formula—natural selection—but not know the results! Since conditions could change in a moment and the, say, more inferior survivor ‘wins’ out, we would have to severely alter any notion of what we may mean by perfection in order to make that concept applicable in such circumstances. In fact, it would be meaningless since the concept would have to apply to a whole range of cases that would not be either genetically or adaptively uniform. In fact, it is this unstable disunity of adaptive traits-abilities etc. that make any such predictions impossible! Therefore, I may know what drives the formation of living things —which happen to include the living systems themselves -- without arguing that a species or taxonomy will be determined in some way. Just because we all agree that gravity works-we need not also be committed to the odd idea that we know what particular things WILL fall or even HOW they will fall. Something as mighty as a T-Rex dies out-while a frail and poor reproductive organism (like many species of bacteria) live on!


The process is determined—I won’t disagree; however, this doesn’t mean that specific organism’s evolutionary course is inevitable! How species evolve is one thing-what evolutionary direction they will take is another. For example, species X possesses numerous possibilities for radiating populations and their members-the process of natural selection will work in accordance to environmental pressures—but specie members may make “choices” that influence their fitness values….this, of course, is contingent on a series of further considerations. So, since organisms can alter their own course, they have the ability to be causal influences themselves! This makes their future somewhat evitable-not inevitable. The only way it could be otherwise is to show HOW no specie member could have done differently than what they did: That no specie or its members are causal influences. This doesn’t seem likely! If we are also part of the causal ‘adaptive’ output of events influencing the world, then we are BOTH influenced by and influence OUR world. This version of compatibilism appears to fit what we know about causality AND our place in it.


I would say that the scenario you’ve provided is a metaphysical possibility-indeed! However, if so, I would refer one to my previous post above that presents the problems for that position even if that position were true—not damnable problems, but severe challenges nevertheless. Another would be that it would be odd to posit a concept of perfection through evolutionary processes. After all, if we, and all things, are but mindless creations and robots of causality, then what is to be made of a concept like “perfection” at all? We do not praise trees for performing their functioning-or insects for being faithful to the hive. It would be odd to say that the goal is perfection via fixed causal processes since that concept is often associated to values and notions of completeness. Hitler is as causally necessary as Martin Luther King Jr. in such a causally determined world. This simply seems wrong even if we had no explicit reason to doubt the position.


On the whole, though, we ought to search out whatever may be mystically possible and find what we may and attempt to explore it in the more responsible way that I think you (Xris) have attempted to do here! At least the inquiry is an open one and a ‘possible’ one whether I happen to agree with your particular version of it or not.


Eric D.

Thanks Eric. May I make a few observations. You can not judge nature by it's failures they are a necessary function for nature in it's quest for the most perfect outcome. Evolution had to explore and experiment, without this arduous path we would not have evolved. We may not be as perfect as our imagination would wish us to be but we have the potential to be so. We as a species have made considerable advances with our human ability to improve the moral reasoning and medical responses. We can not deny that nature gave us this determination to improve. Can we actually deny that we are natures perfect as perfect can be? I gamble that no one could equal our invention. It may have it's minor problems but nature has supplied us with the intelligence to eventually overcome any we encounter. The crucial question is, was it predetermined? Thanks xris

"Can we assume that nature intended to create us as it's ultimate achievement?"

Assumption is not inference. You can 'assume' anything you like, but you will end up 'knowing' very little. I would also highly doubt that humanity is the apex of biological evolution. In fact I would be very disappointed if that were the case. Humans are remarkable only in our cognitive abilities; there is nothing else about us that isn't inferior to at least one species on this planet. The human eye for example, is taken to be an example of intelligeant design. This is absurd, my eyes have blind spots, have an astigmatic defect and I even need glasses in order to see more than a meter away because I'm short sighted, all of which are genetic traits i.e. part of how I evolved. Comparred to the eyes of an octopus, my eyes are a cruel joke. Even our cognitive abilities could be better. Our brains are way more advanced than computers, and yet even computers can do some things better than our brains can, namely remember things. Save a file on a computer and as long as the computer exists, the file will to, whereas human brains tend to forget pieces of information. So there are clearly ways in which humans could be more evolved.

"Can nature with no obvious sentient understanding have a desire to achieve and what was its intentions?"

What do you mean by 'obvious'? If it is sentient, then it has the ability to feel, perceive or be conscious, or to have subjective experiences, all of which are neccesary to have goals and intensions, and all of which nature would need for our evolution to be in any way deliberate. Feeling can be discounted immediately, because emotion is understood as a biological phenomenon first and foremost, and nature is not an organism it is an environment. In other words nature does not 'care about us', organisms care about other organisms, environments don't. Perception, maybe, although sensation definately not because again, senses (sight, smell, hearing etc) are biological traits limited to animal organisms. Consciousness, again maybe, but only because we don't really understand what consciousness is. Also IF our evolution was deliberate, then whoever planned it was a moron. 'Intelligeant' design is most definately non-existent because our biology is mostly unintelligible, and very poorly put togethar. The mere fact that we can build robots that have supierior capabilities shows that we are more intelligent than nature because we only needed a few years of technological advancement, nature needed millions of years of natural selection and mutation.

"Can we assume there is no other form consciousness beyond our understanding?"

I would imagine there most certainly are forms of consciousness beyond our understanding, and I hope one day we find a way to either augment our brains to reach them, or simply evolve better brains naturally. However, the latter is dependant on our environment. If intelligeance is unneccesary for our survival long enough to create offspring then there is no reason for our species to evolve better brains. This is the interesting thing about civilisation, it is itself a massive influence on our evolution. If you want to know what our species will evolve into, you need to look at who is reproducing...which in today's society is pretty much everyone...ergo, we will probably stay the same. BUT, and this is a big but, with the onset of genetic engineering, we now have the technology to remove evolution from the equation entirely and create our own intelligeant design---this of course comes with a lot of ethical dilemas.

"Is it possible we are the conscious ability nature desired?"

No for all the above reasons.

Simon. If you can design a humanoid better than what we are go ahead. You do not have to actually construct it just explain what it would look like. I said it was perfect as perfect as can be.

I think you will have to read my post again, I never said it was sentient.

Who said nature cares for us? It only desires perfection, perfect enough to survive and evolve into the most perfect creature it can secure. We may be able to engineer simple robotic machines but if you notice they mimic the human ability and they fail dismally to even perform the simplest tasks

I have no idea what intelligence, if any, lies behind natures determination. It is question not an act of worship. Sorry but your conclusions are far from proven.

I await with interest your design for a better creature to replace natures invention.xris

Xris wrote,


“You can not judge nature by it's failures they are a necessary function for nature in it's quest for the most perfect outcome.”


I fundamentally agree with you in that to judge nature for “failing” is odd from a pure objective-analytic point of view. However, if we “intentionalize” nature as possessing a desire or something very close to this, then pointing out failures of design-or having such failures to determine outcomes of some desired end is a logically appropriate thing to do. If nature intends a determined end-and those ends mostly fail and produce lots of what we would normally consider engineering deficiencies, then it would seem hard to argue that ‘nature’ intended anything or if it did, its notions of perfection are about as good as our own.

Also, the most perfect outcome isn’t clear here either. As pointed out above, bacteria and their fitness value appear to be the most apt survivors. In fact, we may just as well assume that nature invented the plethora of living things it had to better develop the most apt survivors and best evolving bio-machines. Yet, one could point out that there’s more than merely surviving. That would be true, but the problem is knowing which, from nature alone, is the most valued in evolutionary terms. You may emphasize our inventiveness and our proclivities for aesthetic life-values, but this seems like cheating the game: we value it-so nature MUST have intended it—nature must have intended this outcome because we value such an outcome! This is circular argumentation-or so it seems.


You might argue that we are nature valuing itself. This is more plausible-but it also suggests that we are causal agents doing the valuing and not some ethereal-like thing called “nature” producing us only.


Xris wrote,


“We can not deny that nature gave us this determination to improve.”


Yes, nature did. However, it did so as well with all the rest that went extinct. We have made it-but we are, by all accounts, a very new species. Keep in mind that most species went extinct regardless of their best efforts and they were around a lot longer than we. Our history has hardly been written. If by “determination’ you mean nature endowed us with the desire for moral reasoning and rational capacity, then we can deny this as there is no logical necessity in thinking that nature HAD to a priori. Obviously, any such case for this position will have to made by empirical efforts. However, once we go down this path, we have more than one empirical option open to us on how to consider human ontology. Even if we don’t wish to go down this path, we certainly had something to do with our own evolutionary development. We are nature a-work in time. Given this reality, we appear to be directing our own course as we are also influenced by the broader natural world. To say ‘nature’ designed or made us etc. is to imply that we are somehow separate products of nature—associated with it-but not an essential causal part of it. Yet, this doesn’t seem right. Living organisms make ‘choices’- move and effect their environments and change (actually “invent”) all bio-ecologies. These cognitive and instinctual drives are as much a part of how nature works as is gravity. We are creatures causally transforming our world—we are the world thinking of itself! You cannot remove the human or biological behaviors from the equation.


In part, this comes down to seeing nature as a unity of volitional intentions or seeing nature as a complex environment-made up of numerous active living systems as well as other physical systems. The latter seems simple enough to see-the former would require something above these systems or unifying these systems. Indeed, that would be a daunting task if one wished to justify that position. There’s little problem with the latter-but the former requires more than mere scientific or a physicalist reflection on natural processes.


Xris wrote,

“Can we actually deny that we are natures perfect as perfect can be?”


Well, I can certainly imagine a better “perfection” (since we seem to be using that term broadly here) even from an imperfect natural set of processes. I might wonder that if I can envisage a better -natural (albeit not a wholly perfect) world than nature- the creator of us all, then I’m inclined to doubt nature as having created us as perfect as perfect can be. At the very least, I’m entitled to that doubt.


If it was predetermined, then we still are faced with the above problems stated in the initial post.


I’m more open to a view like this if we were to posit-not a conscious universe that is the causally determining drive-for a view of karmic compatiblism: the view that once we see that all things interconnect-and they do so causally-that while there may not be a volitional drive to nature-there is a law-like causal drive that pushes all things according to preconditions. If we have the budding beginnings of cognitive processes, then we might say that karmic law will direct some living things to ever greater complex realization and moral refinement. Hence, morality and consciousness are a part of our universe as a real causal force. Though, I think this may differ from your view significantly. Not sure.


Anyway, thanks for the lively discussion,


Thanks all,


Eric D.

Xris wrote:

Can we actually deny that we are natures perfect as perfect can be? I gamble that no one could equal our invention.

I can and do. No human beings can move through the soil and churn it up as perfectly as earth worms. No human being can make music as perfectly as a blackbird does. As for our inventions, it remains to be seen how the sum total of our inventions will lead to perfection.

Xris wrote:

Can we actually deny that we are natures perfect as perfect can be? I gamble that no one could equal our invention.

I can and do. No human beings can move through the soil and churn it up as perfectly as earth worms. No human being can make music as perfectly as a blackbird does. As for our inventions, it remains to be seen how the sum total of our inventions will lead to perfection.

But a blackbird can not churn the earth up like a worm and a worm can not sing like a blackbird. Versatility, can you imagine a more versatile creature with the ability to dig the soil and mimic bird song. Climb a tree but can also swim in the ocean. We are masters for one simple reason, we are the most perfect of natures invention. I defy anyone to improve the human example without sacrificing another crucial ability. If we examine the path of evolution our eventual form had to be it's intention. No other form could outwit, outrun or defeat our ability. Science fiction has attempted to create a superior creature but it fails every time. We can not simply say it was an accident or ignore the determination that nature shows. It's the most powerful force we can ever imagine but we treat life as if it was simple chance, an accidental occurrence of the universe. To me the idea that life created by nature is one big accident is beyond my comprehension. So simple in concept but capable of such varied and amazing life can not be so easily dismissed.

Xris, I did post something here but on reflection decided to delete it. It was a primitive argument for us responding to our societal pressures in such a way as to force a slide backward on the evolutionary scale if it were to continue over a prolonged period. Instead, I'll simply say that evolution is blind, as is nature, and sometimes things do slide back on the scale in response to the environment, as not all environmental pressures come from nature; some are man made. For this reason, nature is sometimes not as perfect as perfect can be.

Xris, I did post something here but on reflection decided to delete it. It was a primitive argument for us responding to our societal pressures in such a way as to force a slide backward on the evolutionary scale if it were to continue over a prolonged period. Instead, I'll simply say that evolution is blind, as is nature, and sometimes things do slide back on the scale in response to the environment, as not all environmental pressures come from nature; some are man made. For this reason, nature is sometimes not as perfect as perfect can be.

So what is perfection? If we are in a position to even recognise what it might be then nature has given us the opportunity to attain it.