[FRIAM] God

Sun Jun 28 05:07:46 EDT 2020

Nick your article reminds of Elizabeth Culotta. She says in her Science article that anthropomorphism is a natural property of humans that contributed to the rise of religions. She quotes Oxford University psychologist Justin Barrett who argues that "Humans have a tendency to see signs of agents—minds like our own—at work in the world" and Yale University psychologist Paul Bloom who says "We have a tremendous capacity to imbue even inanimate things with beliefs, desires, emotions, and consciousness,... and this is at the core of many religious beliefs".Elizabeth Culotta, On the Origin of Religion, Science (2009) Vol. 326, Issue 5954, 784-787-J.
-------- Original message --------From: Russell Standish <lists at hpcoders.com.au> Date: 6/28/20  10:12  (GMT+01:00) To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam at redfish.com> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] God Hi Nick - finally took a look at your paper. I didn't read it to the nth detail, but from what I understand, your scepticism about "ejective anthropmorphism" (nice term by the way) stands on two legs:1) What exactly is priveleged about introspection?2) That the process of ejective anthropomorphism starts from anidentity between the target behaviour and the observers behaviour,which is structy false. The example being given of a dog scratching ata door to get in.In response, I would say there is plenty of privelege inintrospection. For example, proprioception is entirely priveleged -that information is simply now available to external observers.In terms of the identity of target and observer behaviour, it doesn'tneed to be identical, but it does need to be analogical. The mostimportant application of this skill is prediction of what other humanbeings do. People aren't the same, but they are similar - and humansociety functions because we can predict to some extent what otherpeople are likely to do. I believe this is why self-awareness evovedin the first place. Something similar may have evolved in dogs, whichare social pack animals. We have also evolved the ability to "putourselves in somebody else's skin", taking into account the obviousexternal differences. So we can imagine being a dog, and wanting toget through a door, what would we do. We know we cannot stand up, andturn the door knob, because we don't have hands, so what would we do,given we only have paws. Scratching behaviour does seem a likelybehaviour then. That, then is analogical.So, I'm not exactly convinced :).CheersOn Sun, May 24, 2020 at 04:32:05PM -0600, thompnickson2 at gmail.com wrote:> Sorry Russ.  It was in a hyperlink: > > https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311349078_The_many_perils_of_ejecti> ve_anthropomorphism> > Nicholas Thompson> Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology> Clark University> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/>  > > > -----Original Message-----> From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Russell Standish> Sent: Sunday, May 24, 2020 4:27 PM> To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <friam at redfish.com>> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] God> > On Sat, May 23, 2020 at 09:59:37PM -0600, thompnickson2 at gmail.com wrote:> > Hi Russ,> > > >  > > > > Hawking my wares again.  I am sorry but SOMEBODY has to read this > > crap.  The argument of this paper is that the flow of inference is > > actually in the other direction.  We model our view of ourselves on our> experience with others.> > > > What paper? What argument?> > > -- > > ----------------------------------------------------------------------------> Dr Russell Standish                    Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)> Principal, High Performance Coders     hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au>                       http://www.hpcoders.com.au> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------> > -- --- .-. . .-.. --- -.-. -.- ... -..-. .- .-. . -..-. - .... . -..-. . ...> ... . -. - .. .- .-.. -..-. .-- --- .-. -.- . .-. ...> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam un/subscribe> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > > > -- --- .-. . .-.. --- -.-. -.- ... -..-. .- .-. . -..-. - .... . -..-. . ... ... . -. - .. .- .-.. -..-. .-- --- .-. -.- . .-. ...> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriam> un/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------Dr Russell Standish                    Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)Principal, High Performance Coders     hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au                      http://www.hpcoders.com.au----------------------------------------------------------------------------- .... . -..-. . -. -.. -..-. .. ... -..-. .... . .-. .FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listservZoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6  bit.ly/virtualfriamun/subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.comarchives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ 
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