[FRIAM] God

Sun Jun 28 07:15:08 EDT 2020

Hi, russ,

Thanks for that careful reading.  There is no greater kindness than to take the time to read  colleague’s work.  

I will think carefully about what you say.  

Nick 

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> 

https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Jochen Fromm
Sent: Sunday, June 28, 2020 3:08 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] God

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 <mailto: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 <mailto: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 an
identity between the target behaviour and the observers behaviour,
which is structy false. The example being given of a dog scratching at
a door to get in.

In response, I would say there is plenty of privelege in
introspection. 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't
need to be identical, but it does need to be analogical. The most
important application of this skill is prediction of what other human
beings do. People aren't the same, but they are similar - and human
society functions because we can predict to some extent what other
people are likely to do. I believe this is why self-awareness evoved
in the first place. Something similar may have evolved in dogs, which
are social pack animals. We have also evolved the ability to "put
ourselves in somebody else's skin", taking into account the obvious
external differences. So we can imagine being a dog, and wanting to
get through a door, what would we do. We know we cannot stand up, and
turn the door knob, because we don't have hands, so what would we do,
given we only have paws. Scratching behaviour does seem a likely
behaviour then. That, then is analogical.

So, I'm not exactly convinced :).

Cheers

On Sun, May 24, 2020 at 04:32:05PM -0600, thompnickson2 at gmail.com <mailto: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 <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com> 
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>  
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com <mailto: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 <mailto:friam at redfish.com> >
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] God
> 
> On Sat, May 23, 2020 at 09:59:37PM -0600, thompnickson2 at gmail.com <mailto: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 <mailto:hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au> 
>                       http://www.hpcoders.com.au
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Principal, High Performance Coders     hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au <mailto:hpcoder at hpcoders.com.au> 
                      http://www.hpcoders.com.au
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