A Fruit of Evolver

The man who cannot invent will never discover. The imagination often gets a glimpse of the law itself long before it is or can be ascertained to be a law.

—George MacDonald

As a testament to Evolver's invaluable utility and potential, Lion and I have chosen to keep a log of our conversations somewhere on the site.

We'll begin here. This is his real-time outline of our talk the other day, edited by me.

=====Saturday July 3rd (or was it Monday the 5th?), 2010.=====

WHO SHOULD BE TELLING THE STORY OF THE WORLD?

-- Scientists should be the storytellers, because
1. they have the evidence, the technologies, the machines.
2. science has popped the balloons of past superstitions, falsehoods, dogma.

- science contains the philosophical, metaphysical premises which govern our thinking and our culture.

- science does NOT say, "We have found indeed there is no purpose"

- but... you can't ask a microbiologist to speak of these things.
- it is the role of philosopher-scientists.

So,

CAN SCIENCE SPEAK OF PURPOSE?

-- evolution is intentional? http://self-dis-covery.blogspot.com/2010/06/self-aware-science-first.htm...
- as a naturalistic theory, including will
- defining the organism as what? Reproductor? Grower? Consumer? Perceiver? Intender?

-- as science, what should we say Evolution is?

- what is "evolution"? Where does the word come from (etymologically/esoterically)? --Unrolling, opening, unfolding.
- one definition of intelligence is "high adaptability"--ability to adapt

- "a Jungle is Nature's way of Thinking"--Lion

- "Man is but a thought of God." --George MacDonald
- "...the offspring of his imagination."
- "The outward, commonly called the material, is informed by, or has form in virtue of, the inward or immaterial--in a word, the thought."--Macdonald.

-- the "Growth of intelligence"?
- Does it have some finality, or direction?
- Development/evolution; atoms developed, maybe not "evolved".
- Rocks are not "intelligent"--but we need those rocks!
- Development of the Universe towards "what is alive, what is good".
- "adaptation of mind" towards what? What is adaptation? What for?
- Development of Interiority, encephalization.

-- Lion: lets not stick with "intelligence"; it's like trying to get excited about the development of computers (sophisticated calculators)
- "spirit" after intelligence? Growth into visionary/imagination/spirit?
- "calibration of consciousness"?

--we must be calibrating towards SOMETHING.

WHAT KIND OF PURPOSE SHOULD SCIENCE SPEAK OF?
or, THE ROLE AND IMPORT OF THE IMAGINATION
or, IS THERE AN END-POINT?

-- Parable of the Sower as evolution. Matthew 13:1-23 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew%2013:1-23&version=NL...

-- The True Vine.

"I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more."--John 15:1-2

-- Can we make a scientific case that this is more than just poetry, metaphor?

- Bringing the metaphor to the science, the science to the metaphor.

- Bridging the gap, marrying them.

-- Yes.

"I have said these things to you in figures of speech. The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures of speech but will tell you plainly about the Father."--John 16:25

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john%2016:25&version=ESV

--Furthermore, we agree: Genesis is about conscience/self-awareness.
- But, how are consciousness, conscience, awareness, self-awareness all related?

>>> Science should be taxonomizing here.

* so, conscience/intelligence/imagination/(what!) as the engine of evolution?

-- George MacDonald: the Imagination is the source of all our social creations.
- It is "that faculty in man which is likest to the prime operation of the power of God, and has, therefore, been called the creative faculty, and its exercise creation." http://www.george-macdonald.com/etexts/nonfiction/the_imagination.html

CONCLUSIONS

-- science will talk about internal experience

- but it needs the concepts & terminology laid out to do it
-- this is science in a mixed mode, of philosophy/metaphysics/esoterics
-- interiority & technicality,

ex: "conscience" as a fleshed out concept

-- problem: science is "dumb", its can't say anything that has "intelligence" to it; it is like a computer. ex: science can't say anything about how to make and run a company.
- G. MacDonald: "Science may pull the snowdrop to shreds, but cannot find out the idea of suffering hope and pale confident submission, for the sake of which that darling of the spring looks out of heaven, namely, God's heart, upon us his wiser and more sinful children..."

-- Which is a SHAME... because when we say "Life is meaningless"--there is no scientific finding that says that!
- those are all social pre-conceptions

-- yet the scientists now have to remove from physicalism (consciousness as illusion)
- because it is untenable, it doesn't make sense.
- "if consciousness has no bearing, how come it does?"
- epiphenomenalism vs. interactionism
- interactionist monism, feedback loop?

-- another problem: science does not say "I don't know".
- textbooks: "here is what we have baked up for you".
- but

where science is not sure of something, it **will not** say it.

-- thus this ambivalence (uncertainty) about consciousness, spirit, intelligence, imagination is what holds science back.
- this is where our attention needs to be.

-- "yet when it does, that is where all that searching, all that hypothesizing, that digging deeper that we are doing comes out into the realm of scientific certainty."

=====

And we will continue this with Lion's question, "Yes, and what else?"