Our intelligence might not directly exempt us from any laws of nature, but I would say it allows us many "freedoms" we normally wouldn't have without our intelligence. By understanding how "time unfolds" (physics/logic...) we can indirectly arrange large scale structures by causing small well designed changes.
I agree that we are just animals, definitely not unnatural or capable of such, whatever unnatural might mean. Humans might even be totally deterministic machines - pieces of the grand play already played in some sence.
For some reason you do not accept the concept of "controlling" nature (or my usage of it). Perhaps you think of it somehow too strongly, I never ment by the word control more than locally large changes initiated by small choises of a human. That is... they are changes only from our perspective only and occur naturally the only way they can if the universe and humans are though as deterministic machines, but that was not the point or atleast I never ment it to or argued it.
We can build nuclear bombs that can destroy the ecosystem of this planet (atleast in local time frames), perhaps we can also redesign the ecosystem to some extent on the genetic level and cause locally large desired changes in it. Naturally on large scale time frames our attempts are probably mostly futile, but that doesn't matter.
I must object to your way of using the word untrue as if anyone could really know anything universally objective about the truth. Humans can only have local data that gives them local information and it has been logically proven that no truths can be learned from data without assumptions that can never be proven universally right or wrong.
Based on the previous those assumptions in H-W or any other model for that matter will forever be imperfect atleast to some extent, but I guess that's the "nature" of science. It always remains a bit unelegant, but gets more accurate (atleast locally)....so far atleast we can build the damn car.
BTW...I'm not native english speaker so I haven't analyzed every word exactly, I'm physics student in college and we have - possibly local cultural - way of unoficially using the "-mark to notify unexact or lose way of using a word...just to let you know;)
I'm not suggesting we know or understand the natural selection NOW. I'm just suggesting that we CAN understand and our current fears shoudn't prevent us from studying alltogether.
The point was that if we understood the nature we could perhaps increase the speed of evolution to our liking and help the prosess as part of evolution itself as I discussed elsewhere.
You spoke of a trouble, but perhaps that risk was acceptable then and although mistakes were made we gained important knowledge.
We were not extinct then and perhaps we will not be extinct now whatever the experts will deside.
Nature is complex, but nothing I believe is infinitely complex. We will eventually learn and hopefully it won't be too late (in one way or another).
We should always consider both sides of the coin. By not doing anything can also be as great a risk as doing something. The exact risks are to be evaluated by the experts to the best of their knowledge, but I guess that's the scientists that are working with the issues now who are most competent to do so. Perhaps they should also be the ones to make the desition, not the politicians.
> We cannot hinder natural selection. Whatever happens is natural selection.
While to my understanding you are correct and it's ok. You might have taken me too seriously. I think it might also be ok to help evolution with science and consider this help as evolutional process itself. I was only suggesting that some qualities have become less important respect to evolution while their value has remained to us humans.
I'm not suggesting that there would be immediate knowledge about dangerous genes, I'm just suggesting that some day the ablity and knowledge of mankind might be greater that plain ablities of nature such as it is today. So we should not rule out the possibility that one day we might understand and control nature. Anyway I'd like to consider that being our ultimate goal....and perhaps mistakes are allowed by man since nature allowes then as such.
I'll have to take a look at HW sometime.
> And how long can we breed the "best" children before the best become so far ahead of the worst, that the worst no longer have any "value" to society at all?
Perhaps those "best" are then so far ahead to respect the "worst" for their historical significanse and can arrange sufficient or even superior quality of life to those left with the bad genes without any significant losses to society of that day, anyway after few generations there won't be anyone with bad genes left anyway.
Perhaps it's as easy for the superior to arrange our lives as it is easy for us to arrange a good life for animals. So the "worst" don't necessarily need to have much productive value for society anyway.
> The majority is not always right. In fact, the tyranny of the majority is one thing we should be consider when talking about experiments such as this. What happens when the majority decide that you are needed in some experiment?
The majority is not always right, but usually it is very probable that they are right (as scientific community) and individuals are wrong (statistically). Anyway, what does this matter, mistakes are allowed and will always be made and eventually things will be learned. That's the way it works.
When majority decides that I'm needed for some experiment then they will obviously experiment with me (regardless of what I think about it). That might be justified and ok on the greater scale.
I accept that individuals sometimes need to be sacrified in order to save large number of people. I might scream in pain, but hopefully that won't be in vain.
Although I think this has nothing to do with the original topic. I neither consider embryos nor stem cells conscious in any comparable way to full grown humans.
I believe that's also the opinion of the respected science community and there no reason to think othervice. Any rational desition is anyway based on available facts and since there are no other facts available I see no reason to make any irrational desitions (such as not to proceed with the experiments).
Sexual reproduction as a method of survival (considering evolution) has in my opinion become obsolete. Weak individuals are allowed to survice and by helping them we are seriously hindering evolution and making things worse. So I disagree, technology is definitely needed to help evolution since we are currently hindering the natural process.
To be perfectly selfless some people should also consider NOT TO REPRODUCE or atleast not to reproduce naturally in order to strengten the next generation. Some carry dangerous genes that might lead to extinction of human race if allowed to pass over to the next generation.
I believe science can help. You might consider it next level of evolution.
Do you have any references on the fact that tubes would have better transient response?
I was under the impression that only cheap low power unregulated transistor based amplifiers (a flaw in the powersupply design) had this problem when driven to the max and pro (transistor based) ones would have a lot better transient responce than tube ones.
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Our intelligence might not directly exempt us from any laws of nature, but I would say it allows us many "freedoms" we normally wouldn't have without our intelligence. By understanding how "time unfolds" (physics/logic...) we can indirectly arrange large scale structures by causing small well designed changes.
...so far atleast we can build the damn car.
;)
I agree that we are just animals, definitely not unnatural or capable of such, whatever unnatural might mean. Humans might even be totally deterministic machines - pieces of the grand play already played in some sence.
For some reason you do not accept the concept of "controlling" nature (or my usage of it). Perhaps you think of it somehow too strongly, I never ment by the word control more than locally large changes initiated by small choises of a human. That is... they are changes only from our perspective only and occur naturally the only way they can if the universe and humans are though as deterministic machines, but that was not the point or atleast I never ment it to or argued it.
We can build nuclear bombs that can destroy the ecosystem of this planet (atleast in local time frames), perhaps we can also redesign the ecosystem to some extent on the genetic level and cause locally large desired changes in it. Naturally on large scale time frames our attempts are probably mostly futile, but that doesn't matter.
I must object to your way of using the word untrue as if anyone could really know anything universally objective about the truth. Humans can only have local data that gives them local information and it has been logically proven that no truths can be learned from data without assumptions that can never be proven universally right or wrong.
Based on the previous those assumptions in H-W or any other model for that matter will forever be imperfect atleast to some extent, but I guess that's the "nature" of science. It always remains a bit unelegant, but gets more accurate (atleast locally).
BTW...I'm not native english speaker so I haven't analyzed every word exactly, I'm physics student in college and we have - possibly local cultural - way of unoficially using the "-mark to notify unexact or lose way of using a word...just to let you know
I'm not suggesting we know or understand the natural selection NOW. I'm just suggesting that we CAN understand and our current fears shoudn't prevent us from studying alltogether.
The point was that if we understood the nature we could perhaps increase the speed of evolution to our liking and help the prosess as part of evolution itself as I discussed elsewhere.
You spoke of a trouble, but perhaps that risk was acceptable then and although mistakes were made we gained important knowledge.
We were not extinct then and perhaps we will not be extinct now whatever the experts will deside.
Nature is complex, but nothing I believe is infinitely complex. We will eventually learn and hopefully it won't be too late (in one way or another).
We should always consider both sides of the coin. By not doing anything can also be as great a risk as doing something. The exact risks are to be evaluated by the experts to the best of their knowledge, but I guess that's the scientists that are working with the issues now who are most competent to do so. Perhaps they should also be the ones to make the desition, not the politicians.
> We cannot hinder natural selection. Whatever happens is natural selection. While to my understanding you are correct and it's ok. You might have taken me too seriously. I think it might also be ok to help evolution with science and consider this help as evolutional process itself. I was only suggesting that some qualities have become less important respect to evolution while their value has remained to us humans. I'm not suggesting that there would be immediate knowledge about dangerous genes, I'm just suggesting that some day the ablity and knowledge of mankind might be greater that plain ablities of nature such as it is today. So we should not rule out the possibility that one day we might understand and control nature. Anyway I'd like to consider that being our ultimate goal. ...and perhaps mistakes are allowed by man since nature allowes then as such.
I'll have to take a look at HW sometime.
> And how long can we breed the "best" children before the best become so far ahead of the worst, that the worst no longer have any "value" to society at all? Perhaps those "best" are then so far ahead to respect the "worst" for their historical significanse and can arrange sufficient or even superior quality of life to those left with the bad genes without any significant losses to society of that day, anyway after few generations there won't be anyone with bad genes left anyway. Perhaps it's as easy for the superior to arrange our lives as it is easy for us to arrange a good life for animals. So the "worst" don't necessarily need to have much productive value for society anyway.
> The majority is not always right. In fact, the tyranny of the majority is one thing we should be consider when talking about experiments such as this. What happens when the majority decide that you are needed in some experiment?
The majority is not always right, but usually it is very probable that they are right (as scientific community) and individuals are wrong (statistically). Anyway, what does this matter, mistakes are allowed and will always be made and eventually things will be learned. That's the way it works.
When majority decides that I'm needed for some experiment then they will obviously experiment with me (regardless of what I think about it). That might be justified and ok on the greater scale.
I accept that individuals sometimes need to be sacrified in order to save large number of people. I might scream in pain, but hopefully that won't be in vain.
Although I think this has nothing to do with the original topic. I neither consider embryos nor stem cells conscious in any comparable way to full grown humans.
I believe that's also the opinion of the respected science community and there no reason to think othervice. Any rational desition is anyway based on available facts and since there are no other facts available I see no reason to make any irrational desitions (such as not to proceed with the experiments).
Sexual reproduction as a method of survival (considering evolution) has in my opinion become obsolete. Weak individuals are allowed to survice and by helping them we are seriously hindering evolution and making things worse. So I disagree, technology is definitely needed to help evolution since we are currently hindering the natural process.
To be perfectly selfless some people should also consider NOT TO REPRODUCE or atleast not to reproduce naturally in order to strengten the next generation. Some carry dangerous genes that might lead to extinction of human race if allowed to pass over to the next generation.
I believe science can help. You might consider it next level of evolution.
Do you have any references on the fact that tubes would have better transient response?
I was under the impression that only cheap low power unregulated transistor based amplifiers (a flaw in the powersupply design) had this problem when driven to the max and pro (transistor based) ones would have a lot better transient responce than tube ones.