penguinoid's Journal: 10 evolutionary commandments

So, what are the 10 commandments as evolution would have them?
1) I am the gene your God, who brought you out of the land of non-existance
2) Thou shalt have no other gods besides me.
3) Thou shalt not swear falsely in my name. (root word for testify is testicle)
4) Remember that your genes run in many things, to keep them alive.
5) Honour thy father and thy mother (for they share half your genes) that thy days may be long upon the land which the gene thy God giveth thee.
6) Thou shalt not use birth control
7) Thou shalt not commit adultery, unless you can get away with it.
8) Thou shalt not steal, unless you can get away with it.
9) Thou shalt not not bear false witness, unless you are bribed or it is advantageous to do so
10) Thou shalt not covet thy neighbours stuff. See rules 7 and 8.

Anyone care to improve on this?

Improvement

[Eli Gottlieb]

Chuck out all the moral commandments and add "Thou shalt commit adultery, for it mixes the Holy Gene Pool."

Re:Improvement

[Dread_ed]

Also add in: Thou shalt kill anyone of obvious genetic defects before they have a chance to procreate.

Also: Thou shalt procreate with partners of obvious genetic superiority regardless of their preference.

Also: Thou shalt enforce mandatory procreation in those of superior genetic stock.

Evolution is merely a method of extending the life of a certain species until it becomes fully obsolete or non-competetive.

Humans have the ability to do so much more than this rudimentary process does. How about ensuring t

Re:Improvement

[penguinoid]

Also: Thou shalt enforce mandatory procreation in those of superior genetic stock.

Careful there. Whose genes is this propagating? Of course, if you feel someone else has superior genes to yours, feel free to give yourself a Darwin Award for your philantropic contribution to improving the gene pool.

Humans have the ability to do so much more than this rudimentary process does.

Well, for one thing, we could begin intelligently designing ourselves. I wonder if that could result in a technological/biological s

meaningless question

[Mr. Slippery]

The question is as meaningless as "What are the Ten Commandments as Newtonian Mechanics would have them?" or "What are the Ten Commandments as superstring theory would have them?"

Re:meaningless question

[penguinoid]

Is it? Suppose that we were designed: say we were made by a genetic algorithm. Then we are designed to optimize the fitness parameters of the genetic algorithm. That would mean that our purpose in life is to reproduce. Now remove the designer. Do we still have a purpose? Will it not be the same one?

Now Newtonian or superstring theory have nothing to say about the Bible. But evolution does. Despite what some might say, you can't fit evolution, the statement 'God created man', and Occam's Razor togeth

Re:meaningless question

[Mr. Slippery]

say we were made by a genetic algorithm. Then we are designed to optimize the fitness parameters of the genetic algorithm.

No, then we are not "designed" at all.

Now Newtonian or superstring theory have nothing to say about the Bible. But evolution does.

Well, Newtonian mechanics does put the lie to many of the miracle stories in the bible; you can't beleive in Newtonian physics and a world where the sun stands still in the sky to suit some generals battle plan.

Despite what some might say, you ca

Re:meaningless question

[penguinoid]

No, then we are not "designed" at all.

I'm sure many computer scientists would take issue with that. Genetic algorithm's take some work to get right, not least of which is determining the perpose of the code, and how to determine fitness.

Well, Newtonian mechanics does put the lie to many of the miracle stories in the bible; you can't beleive in Newtonian physics and a world where the sun stands still in the sky to suit some generals battle plan.

Miracles with a scientific explanation, are just that much more

Re:meaningless question

[Lifewish]

I'm sure many computer scientists would take issue with that. Genetic algorithm's take some work to get right, not least of which is determining the perpose of the code, and how to determine fitness.

But "design" implies a designer. There is no designer here - the critters around us are completely tailored to the environment rather than the environment in any way being tailored to them. There is no goal inherent in the system. It just is.

Given this, it's completely meaningless to say what our purpose is

Re:meaningless question

[penguinoid]

But "design" implies a designer. There is no designer here - the critters around us are completely tailored to the environment rather than the environment in any way being tailored to them. There is no goal inherent in the system. It just is.

That's exactly what I said. OK, we're made by a genetic algerithm. Insert designer. Find purpose. Remove designer. Nothing changed, so if we had a purpose when there was a designer, then we still have a purpose, and it would be the same one -- even if we weren't de

Re:meaningless question

[Dylan Zimmerman]

I love how you ignore his point about Occam's Razor, and then go on to throw in more arbitrary complexity into everything. "a specially shaped cloud could refract the sun's light" my foot. The vastly simpler explanation is that the writers of the Bible exaggerated things. Keep in mind that this is the same volume that says that a wall fell on 27,000 people after that army had already lost 100,000 people. Which is more likely, that 127,000 people were killed in a single day or that the writers were just

Re:meaningless question

[penguinoid]

You seem to have missed plenty of context. I made the point that you can't fit evolution, the statement 'God created man', and Occam's Razor together.

As to the convoluted specially shaped cloud, it was an answer to
Well, Newtonian mechanics does put the lie to many of the miracle stories in the bible; you can't beleive in Newtonian physics and a world where the sun stands still in the sky to suit some generals battle plan.
Note that the example, while convoluted, does not violate Newtonian mechanics.

My big p

Re:meaningless question

[Mr. Slippery]

Whoever says the universe always existed, hasn't heard of the Big Bang.

Whoever raises an objection like that has never heard of the bubble universe [flash.net] or cyclic universe [edge.org] theories. Our universe's (more properly, our Hubble volume's) "Big Bang" could be just one in a "string of firecrackers" that goes on forever, or Bangs could alternate with Crunches forever. Neither of these, of course, is currently a testable hypothesis, and it may be that we will never have enough data to know. (It may also be that the q

Re:meaningless question

[Dylan Zimmerman]

I saw all of that context, and you're still evading my question. How is adding God to any of this making it any simpler? "God created life from dust!" is far from simple and is demonstrably more complex than the theory of evolution. If you propose discarding Occam's Razor entirely, then I would like to hear a rational explanation as to why.

good sentiment, bad interpretation

[penguin-collective]

Your list seems to be a reductio ad absurdum argument, but your argument doesn't work. Deliberately reducing reproductive rates and prohibitions against adultery, theft, and murder have plausible (and in part experimentally verified) explanations in terms of evolution.

The real question to ask is: if ethics is reducible to simple evolutionary fitness, and it looks like it is, don't philosophical ethics and religious ethics become pointless and vacuous exercises? What need is there to invoke higher powers o

Re:good sentiment, bad interpretation

[penguinoid]

The real question to ask is: if ethics is reducible to simple evolutionary fitness, and it looks like it is, don't philosophical ethics and religious ethics become pointless and vacuous exercises? What need is there to invoke higher powers or even a special status for man when actually his behavior is simply natural self-interest?

That's pretty much the point of my sig. Very few people are happy with all the consequences of evolution. Though I did focus on the "selfish gene" aspect, I am quite aware of the

Re:good sentiment, bad interpretation

[firewrought]

Very few people are happy with all the [ethical] consequences of evolution.

Evolution tells us about chemicals and cells and organisms; ethics tells us about behaviors and individuals and societies. Evolution [and creationism for that matter--they are not necessarily incompatible] tells us about how we got here; ethics is about where we want to go. You seem to have unnecessarily coupled the two to argue against evolution.

The unspoken hingepin of your argument is the presence or absence of god, but it doe

hmmmm. What?

[maxume]

I don't really see the point you are trying to make. Are you saying that if evolution furthers the explanation of our existence that there can be no morality?

As far as the Ten commandments as evolution would have them they are something like:

1. Survive.
2. Propagate.

The rest were gotten rid of over time as they were found to be of less value than those that remain. I do find it strange to talk about the description of a process as having moral values though. That is all evolution is by the way, a description

Re:hmmmm. What?

[bestiarosa]

Answering your last question/s. Maybe something really simple and explainable. Only we do not know. An alternative answer might be that, where energy and matter are relative, so is time, therefore it would not make sense to speak about a "before".

The ten commandments?

[Dylan Zimmerman]

I love this stuff. Let's take a nice, clear one. Here's an easy example.

Exodus 20:13-Thou shalt not kill

Note that it doesn't say "Thou shalt not kill unless thou feelest like it" or "Thou shalt not kill him who has not wronged thee" or even "Thou shalt not kill, except he who is about to kill thee". It is fairly unequivocal and clear. Read on.

Exodus 21:15-And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death

Exodus 21:16-And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found