Einstein and world peace

Back from a long break with a quick discussion on what Albert Einstein meant to Reason.  I’d be very interested to do the research (here’s a promise, I will report back when this is done) on when Natural Philosophers became scientists, and Philosophers turned their backs on science. Somewhere in the 18th or 19th centuries, science became too real, I suppose. But, in my ignorance of philosophy after that point, I’m unaware what effect Einstein had on philosophers.  And, that seems unfortunate because Einstein made an amazing leap for philosophy as well as for science when he introduced his theory of relativity.

The epiphany is this:  Einstein showed that even without an absolute point of reference, we can still make sense of the world.  And we do it by measurement.  We may not be able to agree that what I see is what you see, but we can agree that we both see a foot as 12 inches.  Without measurement, philosophers get free rein; they can create whatever reality they choose by picking the appropriate point of reference.  But the more we can measure, the less we need to assume.

I always wonder why Darwin is challenged by fundamentalists when Einstein seems to get a free pass.  Certainly the mechanisms of natural selection are more easily measurable than the effects of special relativity. After all it took many years after Einstein’s thought experiments before there was any verifiable record of relativistic effects while Darwin based is theories on masses of observations that can’t be explained in any other way.

In living our life day to day, we should also strive to eliminate a fixed point of reference. If we believe Einstein, then we must believe that there is no absolute good defined in relationship to ourselves, only relative good as defined by our common perceptions.  But Einstein did not eliminate right or wrong; Einstein showed us that we cannot assume we know right from wrong unless we can measure it.  And that’s where the work in the process is.

Modern society has created measurement tools of right and wrong via the process of law, via the technologies of medicine and psychology. Interestingly enough, although most societies agree that on the basics of law, and certainly physicians agree on the basics of medicines, and any number of other codified bodies of knowledge have global consensus, we as a species have not set Standards that can be independently verified –supranationally.

Why not?

Spontaneous Creation

I’m writing today in response to Phillip Johnson’s book, “Darwin on Trial”. Mr. Johnson is a leading opponent of evolution, who seeks to show that evolution is a fraud by logical means as opposed to strict declarations of faith.  Like all anti-evolutionists, he proposes an uneven playing field; in his contest those who believe in God are allowed to argue that faith is a proof, but those who believe in evolution are required to have proofs of mathematical quality.

As a proponent of Reason, one might assume that I would automatically assume that evolution is gospel, but that’s not true. I find that Johnson raises good points in bringing up Popper’s methods of falsification as a test for true science; it’s an argument I’ve seen committed evolutionist use as well.  Johnson’s point is that if we apply this test rigorously to evolutionary theory, then we can falsify some of the primary precepts of evolution.  For the most part, his arguments aren’t very convincing, but two stand out:

1. The fossil records (particularly of ancient times) do not show the kind of gradualism that Darwin predicts.


2. That certain morphological constructs of animals (eyes, wings) could not have come into being as a whole part, and yet, without their completeness, they would not function as required.

I agree with Johnson that evolution must deal with these issues if it is to be considered a workable solution.  But … I’m not giving in that easily. A scientist makes no claim that any scientific theory is the final statement; the claim is that the theory is the best available solution.  And the hole in any alternative argument is the parent-child relationship.  The key concept in evolution, and yet one that I never see stated explicitly, is that every living thing had at least one parent. Ultimately the so-called tautology of survival of the fittest becomes meaningful only as a description of one of the consequences of the parent-child law.

Therefore any alternate theory for the origin of species must posit something like this:
A breeding pair (at a minimum) of every new species appeared out of thin air and was inserted into an existing world, or by some form of genetic engineering, at least one breeding pair of new species was produced in the womb of  unlike animals, and then induced to breed.  For a rational person, the genetic engineering concept may not seem that farfetched; after all humans can approximate something like this today; merging genes from simple organisms to create new forms.  If that is the hypothesis that intelligent design puts forward, then that theory should be submitted to the same tests of falsification that evolution is; ie we should reserve credence until we have found a fossil of a bat with a whale in its womb.

So far, while intelligent design has thrown doubt on evolutionary theory, the only alternative hypothesis is biblical creation. That myth is no challenge to evolutionary theory on any grounds but pure faith. But let’s look more closely at the 2 objections above.

If we start from the parent-child assumption,  in the evolutionary case, in order for speciation to occur, a major mutation would have to occur, give rise to a live, fertile offspring, and then this offspring would have to be able to breed with the non-mutated contemporaries.  I predict that if the mutation is capable of producing offspring; they will, by cross-breeding with non-mutated animals, inject an instability into the genome. In other words, the mutation may combine with other genotypes in the genome in unpredictable (chaotic not random) ways.  This would lead to a multi-generational period of differing phenotypes, but of very short duration compared to the stable period when no mutation is active.  This scenario would clearly lead to the co-existence of ancestors and descendants, presumably for as long as the environment was stable. Then at some point, the environment will change, and the less adapted  phenotype would become extinct. Note that there are many different potential changes to the environment, including climactic, geological, territorial encroachment by new species, and over-population of successful species.

As to the second major objection, which holds that miraculous organs such as the eye are too complex to have come about spontaneously, I have an observation rather than a refutation. This argument is really probabilistic; that is, that the chances of something as complex as an eye evolving  randomly,  are so large as to be prohibitive.  However, I’ve never seen actual calculations depending on the genes involved, only analogies which, as Mr. Johnson warns us himself, are fraught with problems.  I don’t want to calculate the odds, but in fact to qualitatively lower them.  I believe that the forces that drive evolution are not random, but in fact are chaotic.  The difference is that chaos envelopes a limited subset of options, where random chance is in essence infinite.  We know that DNA substrates are limited in number, that there only a limited number of amino acids, that only certain combinations of amino acids make viable proteins, and I wildly fantasize that similar limitations are present all the way up the complexity ladder to the level of morphological details.  In particular, there are only so many ways that cells can be told to grow, and while they are many, they are far from infinite.  We’ve seen that the human genome is much smaller than thought at one time; I propose that this is because there are only so many ways to build a hominid.

So, overall, Mr. Johnson, good try – but not convincing to me.

Mutation and Religion

I’m fortunate that I’m not a scientist, so that I can make unsupported claims in a blithe manner that would give any scientist hives.  Today, I’m speculating that one or two gene mutations (a very small number) caused religion.

More than that, I am going to guess that at least one of them was the FOXP2 gene which is one of two that differs from chimpanzees in an area that seems to control some of the functions required for speech. The other one was VMAT2 which has been linked to the ability to experience transcendental experiences. I fantasize that the mechanism by which these mutations interoperated, somewhere in  Africa around 50,000 years ago, caused human beings to become the perfect culture for creating and propagating Memes.

I come by this fantasy thusly – starting from Man today who is certainly riddled with Memes. Comparing Man to other animals shows that other animals are not. Although dogs and other pack animals certainly communicate with each other, and while animals can learn from one another, an animal cannot inherit a behavior from another animal they have never met.  But by the miracles of speech, humans may be more familiar with humans who died long before their birth than they are with their own family. In fact, many humans would rather spend time with fictional animals than their own species.
My contention is that Memes can spread much more rapidly than example-based learning.

FOXP2 enabled humans to have more sophisticated communication modes than their chimp-like predecessors, but that would not have been sufficient to let humans dominate the globe.  VMAT2 provided the other necessary capability, the capability for humans to sacrifice themselves for ideas – in other words, religion.  My hypothesis supposes that FOXP2 mutated first, but that while the FOXP2 hominids had an evolutionary advantage, it didn’t drive the hominids to destroy the non-FOXP2 hominid neighbors.  However once FOXP2 and VMAT2 came into the same population, we had apes who could not only speak to each other, but who could visualize something greater than themselves. It shouldn’t surprise us, based on recent history that they visualized a world free of their rivals.  And due to the transcendent nature of the religious experience, the visualizers were able to convince their tribe that they should risk their own lives to kill others.

Since their rivals would never endanger themselves when they weren’t engaged in direct survival (they would hunt dangerous animals, and fight a rival for a mate, but not organize to kill other groups), they were at a massive disadvantage, even though they might have been stronger and smarter! Neanderthals were stockier and had larger brain cages than homo sapiens, and we know that they cared for the wounded and buried their dead.  But in a very short time, the Meme-carriers flew out of Africa and killed off the Neanderthals.

And the Cro-Magnon man of that time is the first time we see signs of devotional behavior, cave paintings being the most outstanding. Neanderthal may have had some ideas of an after-life, but if they couldn’t host Memes, they couldn’t be controlled by their religion to sacrifice themselves.  That is, there is a vast difference between believing that something happens to your conscience after you die, and that you should look forward (or fear) death because of the Paradise that awaits.
(More later … )

al Qaeda = Ku Klux Klan

I am reading “Long Shadows” by Erna Paris, a book about how people in the 90’s dealt with their countries’ shames of the 20th century. The section on the US covers the South’s memories of the Ku Klux Klan era.  That brought to my mind an analogy that may be helpful in understanding the Islamic community today.

Al-Qaeda and the Ku Klux Klan represent the same phenomenon to me.  They are both violent terroristic groups who embody the extremist views of their society.  They are both reactions to changes in a way of life they accept as proper, but which the world has rejected.  Many Southerners who disagreed with the methods of the Ku Klux Klan may have been in sympathy with their beliefs, and many Southerners who disagreed with the beliefs (and, to their credit, many Southerners did, just as many in the North were silently sympathetic) kept quiet about their views.  

I contend that in the Islamic community today the same holds true.  Very few support al-Qaeda’s methods, but a good percentage hold sympathy with their views.  An even larger group of Muslims are intimidated by the violence of these criminals, and eager to avoid unpleasantness with their neighbors.  

The difference is that when the freedom marchers and federal marshals came into the South to fight Jim Crow, they were from the same country, not foreign invaders. Imagine if Canada had sent troops into Alabama to forcibly desegregate Montgomery.  Our whole country, South and North, would have united to oppose this invasion.

There are many other differences as well, but the bottom-line remains; many people who think of themselves as good people will support violent criminals if their society reinforces this belief. And unfortunately, human societies, being made up of humans, aren’t always brave and logical; they can be intimidated into believing the big lie by a small group of completely committed fanatics.

I believe that things are better in the South than they once were. The US has an African-American in the highest ranks of our leadership; this would have been unthinkable a mere 40 years ago.  Can the US use the techniques used to reduce the power of the Ku Klux Klan against al-Qaeda?  Probably not so much, as stated above, the US doesn’t have the high ground in other countries that it did at home. If there were much of an al-Qaeda in the US, these techniques would certainly work, but that’s insignificant. Ultimately, the refusal of African-Americans to be terrorized is the best weapon against the Ku Klux Klan, and the best we can do against al-Qaeda is to refuse to be terrorized by their murderous attacks.

Bush Tax Cut

I read an editorial on the web that credited the Bush tax cuts with raising the tax revenues.  Now, this is eminently possible; in fact, it’s a reasonably reliable way to get a short-term stimulus for the economy.  And in fact, the fiscal 2004 revenue numbers were up over the preceding year.  You can easily get the information yourself; one of the benefits of being an open society is that there is no way the IRS can hide how much money it takes in, go here.

Here are the total tax revenues in billions:
1987     886290
     945614
     1024718
     1066600
     1099746
1992     1134195
     1190673
     1290246
     1390048
     1500351
1997     1637157
     1782997
     1917643
2000     2112755
2001     2144654
2002     2033661
2003     1969648
2004     2035472
As you can see, it won’t be until this year that Bush revenues will match back up with Clinton’s final year. The federal government uses an October fiscal year, so fiscal year 2001 went from October 2000 to September 2001. Bush’s tax cuts took effect in fiscal 2002, when as you can see, there was the first shortfall in revenue in 15 years.  Throughout Bush I and Clinton’s terms, tax revenue increased every year; in fact pretty consistently.  The average annual increase in revenues during Clinton’s term was 126307.38 billion . If Bush II had kept up with Clinton, tax revenues in 2005 should have been about 2.65 trillion, about 500 billion more than they will end up.

That 500 billion number is ~100 billion more than the current deficit of $365 billion (I’m using the government’s numbers for all calculations.  Now, to be fair, Clinton’s numbers were inflated by the excellent economy during Bill’s terms. As much as I might like to, I can’t completely blame Bush for the economy taking in his first term.  So let’s look at the average increase during Bush I’s term. The average increase in revenues during Bush I was 47.1 billion; if Bush was the man his father is, revenues in 2005 would have been 2.3 trillion, about 200 million more than fact.  Doesn’t quite balance the budget, but it keeps it at a more manageable level.

Tax decreases can increase revenues; ie stimulate the economy enough to make up for the lower percentage of income received, but that’s not what’s happened here.  What in fact has happened is that Bush and his cronies have borrowed so massively that they have created a short-term uptick that disguises how poorly they have managed our economy.

A Brief Respite

Lighter fare today …  I signed up to be a micropatron for my favorite Internet film reviewer, MaryAnn Johanson,  so here is my list of my favorite films.  Note that for the most part I don’t think these are the best films; they are just the ones that I watch over and over whenever they play on the movie channels.

1. Spinal Tap – “but it goes to 11 …” – ‘nuff said.


2. The Godfather and the Godfather II  - critics say that “Citizen Kane” is the best movie, sorry I hold out for these.  I love the use of chiaroscuro that highlights the actors so subtly and yet so realistically.  It reminds me of Rembrandt. Every scene stands on its own, both as drama and as opera. So what happened with Godfather III?


3. Get Shorty – I’m a Elmore Leonard fan, and this film caught his style in a way many others (including the sequel, “Be Cool”) did not.  I’m no John Travolta fan; I hated him when he was Vinny Babarino, but he was perfect in this film.


4. Woodstock – When I was 14, this movie made me want to be a hippie.  And they show the whole song, nothing pisses me off more than a music movie that cuts away from the song to put in a talking head. As far as moviemaking – ehhh – as far as glorifying the hippie culture in a way that doesn’t seem incredibly dated today – OK!


5. Apocalypse Now – I guess I’m a Coppola fan, but he’s made many a movie that didn’t grab me in the least.  AN is Salvador Dali’s take on the 70’s.  Using ”Heart of Darkness” as the source was brilliant as well; the indictment of our involvement in Vietnam as madness is the most insightful I care to view.


6. It’s a Gift – How could I hold my head up among true film fans if I didn’t have one BW film?  Now this is funny! BTW, for those who don’t remember, this film from 1935 or 6 stars WC Fields. It has many classic scenes that one can watch today and get perfectly. Ageless humor.


7. M*A*S*H – another 70’s movie, perhaps that’s when I had my formative years ? Could be.  When I was in my early teens, the shower scene was the epitome of “hot”; nowadays, I think the “Suicide is Painless” scene is my favorite.


8. Goodfellas – A little violent for me, but the gangster epic is such a classic of American cinema – this eliminates the myth and makes the gangsters seem like real, if unpleasant, people.  Today, the Sopranos has taken this levels beyond where GoodFellas could go in 2+ hours, but as good as the Sopranos are, they still haven’t bested GoodFellas.


9. The Big Lebowski – Just at the right skew from reality.  Much later in life than Woodstock, this film made me want to be a bum. John Goodman and Jeff Bridges are perfect.


10. Psycho, The 6th Sense – these movies really scared me; they didn’t gross me out; they got into my head.  I have to admit the twists at the end of both movies absolutely shocked me.


11. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen – To me, as big a Python fan as I am, you can only watch the Python movies twice before they get old.  But this honorary Python movie, set as it is in the times that I study, I can watch again and again. Not to laugh, but to be amazed. This is what imagination looks like on-screen.

If you knew me, you would say that the most unusual thing about this list is that there are no sci-fi or fantasy films on this list.  While I enjoyed the first Star Wars series or the Lord of the Rings as much as the next person, I have had little desire to see the movies again.  Perhaps sci-fi and fantasy is guilty of taking itself too seriously, the original sin in my view.  Perhaps no film yet can truly inspire my imagination the way a good book can.

To Be Different

A belief that individuals are all different underlies the politics of  Reason.  We share many similarities; after all, if 96% of our DNA is the same as a chimpanzee, surely 99.9% is shared with other humans; but in the long run, our differences define our identities.  Morally and ethically, however, we have an obligation to treat all humans the same.  When Thomas Jefferson said that all men are created equal, he didn’t mean that mini-Me is as tall as Yao Ming; he meant that any legitimate government must treat all its citizens the same. And when Jesus Christ said,” Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself”, he meant all our neighbors despite their differences.

Ok fine … we can all promise that we will live up to our ideals, but, in practice, how can we offer equality to people who were born different?  On the one hand, there are those who would cut everyone down to the least common denominator; on the other, there are those who would make no effort at all to provide a level playing field, but work to exacerbate our differences.  The rational approach is to find clusters of differences  within the continuum of differences and attempt to address inequities based on these groups.

What does this line of gibberish mean?  Looking at height as an example, we expect that our differences are evenly distributed in a normal distribution (many more in the middle than at either end).  But we still group people into tall, medium and short.  The actual boundaries between tall and medium  or medium and short may be fluid, but we know a tall person from a short person.  I contend that for any other single human attribute, we can create an equally valid set of groups, and that certain groups of attributes, clusters, tend to occur more frequently than randomly.

If one size doesn’t fit all, how many sizes does it take?  I answer that it depends on how close a fit you need.  If you are getting measured for a wet suit, it should fit very closely to your actual size; if you’re looking for a blanket to keep warm, one size will fit most.

In politics, at least in America, the pundits try to fit everybody into one of two sizes, call them Red and Blue.  As a Purple, I feel insulted that my individuality is not recognized, and you, no matter what your color, should feel the same.  While there are undoubtedly clusters of political beliefs, with so many different interests of differing importance to each of us; I don’t believe for a minute that only two groups represent us as well as we need.  And, modern political manipulators have abused the two-party system to the point that only the interests of the party elites (and their major contributors) are being met.

As the Red party (Communists?) self-destructs, should we be replacing them with the Blue?  I answer no – defiantly! As the younger generations, raised on modern communications, come into their own, I beg them to exult in their differences. Now that we can create clusters in minutes on the Web, there is no reason to place your faith in a party designed for the days when it took weeks for a single message to get from one end of the country to the other.  There is no reason to place your future in the hands of organizations that have proven time and time again that their only motivation is self-preservation.  Unfortunately, American culture places so great an emphasis on winning that our parties have sacrificed all their potential and purpose to victory, transforming the people they purport to serve from their raison d’etre into a mob to be exploited.

Any 3d party candidate risks ridicule because their chances of “winning” are less than those of the established cabals.  But in the information-rich world of today, we don’t need a party to tell us how to vote.  We can supply our own context. So I ask anybody who has read this far to consider the individual not the party, and most of all, to glorify our differences.