Questions for compatibilists

October 24, 2013 • 9:08 am

A long time ago, everyone thought bachelors were unmarried and that it was wrong for a married man, but not a bachelor, to have sex with multiple people.  Then a philosopher got the bright idea of redefining “bachelor” to include “those married men who didn’t have much sex with their wives.”  That redefinition allowed some married men to think of themselves as free to pursue other women. They were happier.

Although it’s a stretch, something like this seems to me to parallel what has happened with the rise of “compatibilism.” That is the notion that although the universe may be deterministic in a physical way—so that our actions and thoughts are not only determined by the laws of physics, but also predictable if we had enough foreknowledge—we nevertheless have “free will.”  What philosophers did was redefine the meaning of “free will” away from its historical and religious sense, so that “free”, instead of meaning “independent of the strictures of your bodily makeup and environmental influences”, now meant a variety of other things, like, “your decision isn’t being made with a gun to your head.”

There is no one form of compatibilism: various philosophers have suggested various tweaks that allow us to say we have “free will.”

To me, the important aspect of this debate came not from philosophy but from science: we realized that our brains, like all physical objects, are subject to the laws of physics, and there was no way that some nonmaterial spook in one’s head could make “free decisions”. That was something new.

The idea of a deterministic universe, we all agree, was an important one, and so we can conceive of humans as immensely complicated and evolved machines.  That does not mean, of course, that we know exactly how they will behave, for determinism does not equal predictability—unless we have perfect knowledge.

So determinism, and its view that the mind is what the brain does, was a tremendous advance in science. And it completely dispelled the notion of dualistic free will. Here are the questions, then, that I have for compatibilists.

What kind of comparable advance was achieved by redefining “free will” so that the only thing “free” about it was its freedom to accept determinism?

Has compatibilism had an important (or might have a potentially important) influence on humanity or its behavior?

Is compatibilism anything more than a semantic gesture?

How has compatibilism helped us understand the human brain or human behavior?

I see compatibilism as a branch of philosophy, and determinism as something that is largely scientific but has philosophical implications. And—I won’t pull any punches here—I don’t think compatibilism is of any importance to humanity.

Now when I say that “compatibilism was confected to allow humans to have free will and avoid the notion that we’re automatons,” I’m pretty serious. In response, people tell me that “compatibilism has a long and distinguished history,” and was not a response to determinism.

I’m not convinced about that, because determinism itself has a long and distinguished history.  Here are two examples:

Spinoza (in Ethics): ″the infant believes that it is by free will that it seeks the breast; the angry boy believes that by free will he wishes vengeance; the timid man thinks it is with free will he seeks flight; the drunkard believes that by a free command of his mind he speaks the things which when sober he wishes he had left unsaid. … All believe that they speak by a free command of the mind, whilst, in truth, they have no power to restrain the impulse which they have to speak.″

Laplace: “We ought to regard the present state of the universe as the effect of its antecedent state and as the cause of the state that is to follow. An intelligence knowing all the forces acting in nature at a given instant, as well as the momentary positions of all things in the universe, would be able to comprehend in one single formula the motions of the largest bodies as well as the lightest atoms in the world, provided that its intellect were sufficiently powerful to subject all data to analysis; to it nothing would be uncertain, the future as well as the past would be present to its eyes. The perfection that the human mind has been able to give to astronomy affords but a feeble outline of such an intelligence.”

Since determinism has been around for a long time, it’s not inconceivable that compatibilism did arise to counteract determinism, and make us feel that we really did have free agency.

But, ignoring that, I still want to know why compatibilism is considered a serious achievement in philosophy. Contrary to determinism, which does have serious implications for how we live our lives and run our societies, compatibilism is an arcane backwater of philosophy. It is not a philosophical achievement on the order of, say, Singer’s arguments for animal rights, which have real practical consequences, or Rawls’s musings on justice, which makes us rethink how we conceive of fairness and people’s rights.  I see no practical consequences of compatibilism save soothing the distress of people who, upon finally grasping determinism, get distressed that they are puppets on the strings of physical laws.

Which is pretty much how it is.

The first venomous crustacean is found

October 24, 2013 • 5:37 am

The phylum Arthropoda contains four major living groups, usually considered subphyla: Hexapoda (insects and a few other groups like springtails), Myriapoda (mostly centipedes and millipedes), Chelicerata (spiders, scorpions, horseshoe crabs, mites, etc.) and Crustacea (crabs, lobsters, barnacles, shrimp, etc.). Trilobites, which are extinct, are classed as another subphylum.

The first three of these living groups all contain species that have venom, which, biologically, are toxins injected into a prey with a bite or sting (delivery via those methods distinguishes venoms from, say “poisons,” as found in some frogs that are toxic to predators). Up to now, though, no crustaceans had been known to have venom.

This has changed with the publication of a new paper in Molecular Biology and Evolution (advance online manuscript; free), by Björn von Reumont et al. The authors show—not definitively, but suggestively—that some remipedes—rare, blind crustaceans that live in marine underwater caves—have venom that they inject into their prey.

Remipedes were discovered only in 1981, and there are only 17 known species. They constitute a class in the subphylum Crustacea. Here is an individual from the University of California’s Museum of Paleontology. Remipedes are about 10-40 mm long: about half an inch to 1.5 inches:

speleon_b

Previous work had suggested that these species could be venomous, as they have biting mouthparts, but this wasn’t investigated. In fact, the going wisdom was that they fed on suspended particles.  But morphological analysis of one species from the Yucatan in Mexico showed a “highly adapted venom delivery apparatus” as well as mouthparts that could deliver venom, and lab studies showed that captive individuals of the species, Speleonectes tulumensis, could indeed capture and kill small prey.  Here are the venom glands and the paper’s caption:

Picture 2
Figure 1 – 3D reconstructions of Speleonectes tulumensis (Crustacea: Remipedia)
from high resolution SR-!CT data.
A) Ventral and B) lateral view showing the course of the venom delivery system
(VDS), (purple) and its position inside the body. C) Anterior and D) posterior view
focused on the maxillule and the muscle equipment related to the VDS.
Abbreviations: 4 seg, 4th segment; 5-7 seg, 5-7th segment; ab, abductors; ad,
adductors; am, anterior apodemal muscle; br, brain; cep, cephalon; dc, ductus; gl,
gland; mxu, maxillule; phx, pharynx; rv, reservoir; t, tentorium; vm, ventral apodemal
muscle; vnc, ventral nerve cord. Images not to scale to each other, mouthparts and
other structures are not shown.

How did they find the venom? They used “transcriptomics,” a newish way of finding the DNA (and protein) sequences of genes that are actually expressed in organisms, that is, whose DNA is converted into RNA. (Remember that a lot of DNA is “junk” that never does anything.)

The authors extracted RNA from the venom glands, sequenced those RNAs by converting them to DNAs and sequencing the latter, and then translated those DNA sequences into protein sequences (the messenger RNA’s are read into proteins). They then looked in databases for proteins corresponding to known classes of venoms.

And they found at least three types of putative venoms, with 108 different forms of those venoms. The three classes are peptidases, enzymes that dissolve protein, chitinases, which do the same for that material, found in exoskeletons, and neurotoxins.  While the authors didn’t actually isolate the venom itself, they did this indirectly by finding sequences that correspond to things known to be venoms.  It remains to be demonstrated that there actually are venoms in these species that kill prey, but the evidence is pretty strong. And the venom proteins seem most closely related to proteins found in spiders.

Here’s the species that was studied:

_70643741_70643631

While the results need confirmation (are those venoms actually used to kill?), the authors suggest that “remipedes can feed in an arachnoid manner, sucking the prey’s liquefying tissue out of its cuticle.”

So there’s your fact for the day, and be sure to drop it at the next cocktail party. “Say, did you know they found the first venomous crustacean?” is sure to bring gasps of wonder and admiration over a round of martinis.

h/t: James

______________

Björn M. von Reumont, Alexander Blanke, Sandy Richter, Fernando Alvarez, Christoph Bleidorn, and Ronald A. Jenner 2013. The first venomous crustacean revealed by transcriptomics and functional morphology: remipede venom glands express a unique toxin cocktail dominated by enzymes and a neurotoxin. Mol. Biol. Evol.: mst199v1-mst199.

Thursday: Hili Dialogue

October 24, 2013 • 3:26 am

Hili seems to be getting more philosophical as she ages:

Hili: As I, too, eliminate entities which are beyond necessity, what is the difference between me and Occam’s razor?

A: Ockham suggested more economical thinking and you are more ruthless in action.

Hili: Oh well, I’m a cat.
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In Polish:
Hili: Jeśli ja też eliminuję zbędne byty to jaka jest różnica między mną z brzytwą Ockhama?
Ja: Ockham sugerował bardziej ekonomiczne myślenie, a ty jesteś bezwzględna w działaniu.
Hili: No tak, ale ja jestem kotem.

Readers’ cats: Purruru

October 23, 2013 • 2:46 pm

After the mortality must come a felid. Reader Steve Obrebski sent a picture of his cat Purruru:

Purruru is allegedly a Flame Point Siamese, a breed having  bright, reddish-gold points and brilliant blue eyes, creamy-white, short coats, and look like Siamese cats.  Elsewhere these cats are also called Red Point Siamese or Color Point Shorthairs.  We got him from a Japanese friend who had to move back to Japan.  He is very snuggly with me and my wife, but also likes the laps of visiting ladies. and likes to dash outside (we keep most of our cats indoors) so we have to use a can of special aromatic cat food to entice him indoors.  We have had him for 12 years and he is doing fine.  He was probably 3 when we got him.  We never checked but maybe Purruru is a Japanese word pertaining to cats.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Steve that they have 6 totally indoor cats, one who lives indoors in winter, and one feral outdoor cat that has adopted them. He also reports that two decades ago they had 23 cats, which is probably a record for readers here.

Again? Phil Zuckerman wins debate with Christian, church refuses to post video

October 23, 2013 • 12:32 pm

Sound familiar? Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology at Pitzer College in Claremont, CA, who studies the geography and sociology of atheism (he wrote Faith No More: Why People Reject Religion, Atheism and Secularity, and Society Without God), is asked to debate Christian author David Marshall at Adventure Christian Church in Sacramento.

The topic: “What provides a better foundation for civil society, Christianity or Secular Humanism?” Zuckerman, of course, took the secularist stand.

The preparation was arduous: months of work for everyone. And, as Zuckerman reports at PuffHo, everything was in order. They had agreed to film the debate and post it on Vimeo, and even provided the speakers with nice noms.

But then the unexpected happened: Zuckerman won.

You can imagine what happened next. As he reports:

And so we had the debate. And I won. Now, that’s not my opinion — its the opinion of Adventure Christian church, because they now refuse to post the video on-line.

Instead, what they’ve done is post a series of rebuttals to the debate — refutations and criticisms. But they won’t post the actual debate. And they’ve disabled my ability to even comment on their posted refutations.

When I called pastor Bryan, and asked him why they are refusing to post the video — even after repeated promises of doing so — he replied, “It just didn’t go the way we wanted it to go. We were not represented well.”

Shades of John Haught! Except his excuse was that he didn’t want to subject the viewers to the odious spectacle of me saying bad things about Catholicism.  And, like me in the Kentucky affair, Zuckerman was blindsided:

I was actually quite stunned by Adventure Church’s not keeping their word and being so cowardly. And I shared my dismay with my friends, family and students. But then, yesterday, one of my students came up to me and said, “I’m stunned that you’re so stunned.”

“What do you mean?” I replied. “They were such nice people. And they repeatedly assured me that the debate would be put up on vimeo. Now they won’t do it.”

“Clearly you don’t know a lot of Evangelicals,” she replied. “Sure, they’re very nice. But if you say anything that goes against their party line, you’re out. They can’t handle debate, they can’t handle real dialogue. It doesn’t surprise me at all that they won’t show the video.”

This is why this form of Christianity is inimical to democracy. I can’t imagine Zuckerman, myself, or any other debating atheist refusing to allow the debate to be aired—no matter how bad our performance was.

Imagine what these Christians would do if they turned America into the theocracy they want!

They are indeed afraid to air the underling truth of my position: that no civil society can thrive if it does not exist upon a bedrock of democracy, and democracy is not a Christian value — it is not articulated anywhere in the Gospels, nor is it promulgated, in any way, by Jesus or Paul. Rather, democracy is a secular humanist ideal — something dreamed up and established by and for people.

Over at his website, Christ the Tao, Marshall gives his own interpretation. While admitting that the church agreed to post the debate, he disputes Zuckerman’s interpretation, and even claims that he (Marshall) had the better argument. Note as well that he uses the Haught Evasion: maybe the video was deep-sixed because Zuckerman was too nasty to faith!

[Zuckerman; And so we had the debate. And I won. Now, that’s not my opinion — its the opinion of Adventure Christian church, because they now refuse to post the video on-line.]

[Marshall]: First, I’m not sure that’s the correct explanation for their peculiar actions.  It may be that they didn’t feel I supported their theological views as well as they expected.  It may also be that while both sides offered some good arguments — as both sides did, though I think I had the better ones — the pastors felt that something Phil said might somehow undercut the faith of some listening.  Which seems kind of lame to me, especially since the next morning I preached on boldly and fearlessly engaging with the world.  (“Step out of the boat!”)

But even if the senior pastor thought Phil had the better of the argument, of course it would not make it so.  There are people who always see their own side as winning, and even vote for, say, Alex Rosenberg over William Lane Craig, or think Romney did well in his second debate.  But there are also people in whose eyes opposing arguments loom large, and there are lots of other people who just aren’t qualified to judge.

Honestly, I don’t think anyone who believed Phil wiped up the floor with me in terms of arguments, understood what was going on.  Phil didn’t even attempt to answer most of my main arguments.  And they weren’t exercises in trivia.

Let’s hope the unadventurous Adventure Church finally gets some guts and posts the debate. For right now they’re looking pretty stupid—and pusillanimous.