• Harry Hindu
    4.9k
    First, nothing happens randomly, or by chance. There are reasons things happen, if not then logic would be useless, and our understanding of the universe would impoverished to the degree that we would probably die before we reached the age of 1 week old.

    The monkeys typing Shakespeare is impossible, not probable, because monkeys don't live for an infinite period of time. Probabilities are only probable when you don't incorporate all the facts.

    Meaning is the relationship between some effect and some cause(s). When you read a post (the effect), you're able to get at the causes via meaning. The cause is the idea in someone's head and their intent to communicate it on a forum. So in reading words, you are getting at the idea in someone's head.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    Actual monkeys and typewriters aren't needed for the thought experiment. Mechanistic probabilitarians are imagining random character generation which can continue indefinitely.

    Meaning, in this context, is a metaphysical property. The improbability of DNA ocurring by chance raises the question: does its ocurrence have cosmic meaning?
  • Harry Hindu
    4.9k
    Actual monkeys and typewriters aren't needed for the thought experiment. Mechanistic probabilitarians are imagining random character generation which can continue indefinitely.

    Meaning, in this context, is a metaphysical property. The improbability of DNA ocurring by chance raises the question: does its ocurrence have cosmic meaning?
    Chris Hughes
    How do you distinguish a thought experiment from imagination?

    There is a difference between random character generation, and processes that can only build on what it has in the present. "Random" characters generated are random precisely because they aren't taking into account the present conditions, or state-of-affairs, that exists and that natural selection has to work with. Natural selection doesn't just add another two legs to an organism. It can only filter or promote conditions that exist in the present, into the next generation. Mutations can only happen to existing DNA structures, not make up completely new ones out of thin air.

    Meaning, in this context, is that effects are about their causes, and not randomly generated. If they were, there would be no such thing as meaning, even for us human beings.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    How do you distinguish a thought experiment from imagination?
    The thought experiment is: imagine a device producing random characters indefinitely. Probablity maths says it'll reproduce the works of Shakespeare.
  • Harry Hindu
    4.9k
    The thought experiment is: imagine a device producing random characters indefinitely. Probablity maths says it'll reproduce the works of Shakespeare.Chris Hughes
    Which has nothing to do with how the universe works from existing states to new states. The universe does not consist of new states coming about completely on their own without any prior cause, or present state-of-affairs, shaping what comes next.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    The thought experiment is: imagine a device producing random characters indefinitely. Probablity maths says it'll reproduce the works of Shakespeare. — Me
    Which has nothing to do with how the universe works from existing states to new states — You
    It's similar to how you get from primeval soup to DNA. Until the ocurrence of DNA there was no evolution, so how did that amazingly complex molecule come to exist?

    Random chemical interactions took place over a very long time (like the imagined random character generator). Some may have resulted in proto-DNA structures, but without evolution (and without the benefit of the thought experiment's infinity), how would the huge number of exact steps needed go arrive at self-replicating life-forms have ocurred?
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    Meaning, in this context, is that effects are about their causes, and not randomly generated.
    Exactly - and my metaphysical question is: if the effect was DNA, and it was not randomly generated, was its cause cosmic meaning?
  • Chris Hughes
    180
    That's another way of saying "design". Design doesn't need a designer. Look at evolution. It only needs a process. In this hypothesis, one not yet understood.
  • Harry Hindu
    4.9k
    It's similar to how you get from primeval soup to DNA. Until the ocurrence of DNA there was no evolution, so how did that amazingly complex molecule come to exist?Chris Hughes
    Energy put into the a stable system.

    Think of natural selection as an environmental feedback mechanism where the current state-of-affairs of the environment influences the development of the individual things within that environment. Predators are individuals in an environment, but are part of the environment and influence the evolution of prey, and are themselves evolving based on how the prey evolves. You cannot have change in one without the influence of the other.

    Random chemical interactions took place over a very long time (like the imagined random character generator). Some may have resulted in proto-DNA structures, but without evolution (and without the benefit of the thought experiment's infinity), how would the huge number of exact steps needed go arrive at self-replicating life-forms have ocurred?Chris Hughes
    They weren't random. They were based on existing conditions.

    Exactly - and my metaphysical question is: if the effect is DNA, and it was not randomly generated, what's its cause?Chris Hughes
    The pre-existing conditions of slightly less complex molecules coming together to form more complex ones thanks to the stable energy and environment that existed at that time.
  • Chris Hughes
    180
    Well, you've done better than anyone else - come up with the explanation for the origin of DNA.
  • ssu
    7.9k
    my metaphysical question is: if the effect was DNA, and it was not randomly generated, was its cause cosmic meaning? - That's another way of saying "design". Design doesn't need a designer. Look at evolution. It only needs a process. In this hypothesis, one not yet understood.Chris Hughes
    Yet once you have life it isn't at all simply random. Mutations can be random, but what life forms adapt and prosper and what become extinct isn't at all random. The Darwinian aspect of evolution isn't at all random. You might say that an asteroid hitting the Earth 66 million years ago was a random event, but that small animals survived the extinction event and large animals couldn't cope with the dramatic changes isn't something random.

    I would say life itself creates predictability and meaning. And as you pointed out, it doesn't necessarily need a designer.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    If we assume that life isn't unique to humans, then the probability of it arising isn't infinitesimally small.
  • Banno
    23.1k
    Any meaning in DNA is there because of what we do with that DNA.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    Any meaning in DNA is there because of what we do with that DNA.
    I hope you mean evolution, not genetic modification. Either way, I'm asking about what meaning DNA's improbable ocurrence might have.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    ... life itself creates predictability and meaning
    Yes - DNA is life, which evolves meaningfully. Was the evolution of humans, able to think about this, predictable?
  • Banno
    23.1k
    Neither. Don't look to meaning, look to use.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    ... look to use
    What do you mean?
  • Banno
    23.1k
    That your OP stands on a misconstrual of meaning. Meanign is constructed by people; DNA has no meaning.

    You might be able to build a similar argument using information instead, but you will still have to avoid the further objection of teleology. Causation does not work backwards; The desirability of a certain outcome does not bring that outcome about.
  • Chris Hughes
    180
    Perhaps a design-like process, a super-blind-watchmaker, is at work - and the universe is "evolving" (in inverted commas out of respect for the brilliant and unique selfish gene).
  • ssu
    7.9k
    Was the evolution of humans, able to think about this, predictable?Chris Hughes
    Once an animal species gets the ability to use complex language and furthermore use written language, then it's quite predictable that we will have these discussions in some way.
  • Banno
    23.1k
    Perhaps the Universe was sneezed out of the Great Green Arkleseizure's nose.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    Thats just silly. :wink:
  • Chris Hughes
    180


    Was it predictable that a life form would get the ability to use complex language?
  • R3DNAX3LA9
    1
    Not enough. There's no possible way in which we can exist. I don't believe in God. I just don't believe that we exist. And if we do we cannot comprehend it. But we should always try.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    If we assume that life isn't unique to humans, then the probability of it arising isn't infinitesimally small.
    If you mean we should assume there's separate DNA life elsewhere in the universe, then yes, the ocurrence of DNA is less improbable. That's kind of circular, though
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    ... we cannot comprehend it. But we should always try.
    Yes, we should - and we are. And we can help each other.
  • creativesoul
    11.4k
    I don't see the problem here.Chris Hughes

    The problem was that statement about the meaning of Shakespeare's works being in his head. That's just not the case, and we know that beyond a reasonable doubt. So...


    The works of Shakespeare (the product of his mind) are the subject of the monkeys/typewriters thought experiment, which is used by many scientists to defend the idea that DNA code could arise by chance, given a very long time.

    Oh, I get it now... you're a true believer... That makes sense. The argument about monkeys and typewriters has the exact same ground as any and all arguments for God. Logical possibility.
  • Chris Hughes
    180

    ... you're a true believer
    No, I'm not - I'm an agnostic. I'm speculating that, given the improbability of the ocurrence of DNA, there may be a design-like process analagous to evolution at work in the universe.
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