Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit on NDT philosophy

Out of all of this, I think Milky Way said it best on succinct statement, all other hubris aside. There is no clinical, emprical, or experimental evidence to support the theory(ies) of NDT, so far.

And Corgi, it is not upon us to prove Behan wrong. It is he who challenges the body of established work so it is upon him to prove his summations correct which, sadly enough, cannot be accomplished by "word salad," as was so eloquenty described. Side note, and I am probably an $%^ for mentioning it but "word salad" is a colloquialism that psychiatrists would use to describe the seemingly disjointed sentences of paranoid schizophrenics. Actually, there is a pattern in word salad, you just have to listen to it. The patient is trying to communicate, they are just following a semantic key that is not readily apparent.

Anywho, from the quoted statement of Margulis, she sounds like a staunch socialist, judging by her comment about Darwin, et al, being "capitalist" by means of the theory of survival of the fittest. Ergo, she is political. And her politics inform her "scientific" thinking. Therefore, I cannot set much weight by her words. They are infected with politics, which is often interfused with religious feeling. And socialism is a form of fascism, i.e., belief that the govt should, would, could take care of all, to gurantee everyone champagne wishes and caviar dreams. If she had even the slightest clue about the history of the 20th century, highlighted rather effectively by Jonah Goldberg in "Liberal Fascism" (a term coined by author H. G. Welles, by the way), she would know that Darwin was not particularly capitalist and, in fact, the idea of "darwinian social evolution" was a pet theory of presidents Wilson and FDR. In fact, Wilson was the first 20th century fascist dictator and FDR was something of a Wilson-copy. But I digress. Is Margulis really the "hill" that you want to die on, to borrow a military parlance? Margulis very own statement is informed by her politics, rather than an objective view of the science. Disqualified .... buzzer sounds.

I do not get my dog to quit mouthing or jumping on people by giving him something else to engage that behavior on. I do it by making not doing it even more rewarding. Granted, I do not think we change or eradicate a behavior in a dog. Much of it is something of an FAP, per the clade and thanks to Milky Way for introducing genetics into this. A refreshing breath of actual science. But we do sublimate it.

 I control my dog's resource guarding by using it to my desire. He wants a bit of meat from my plate. The cat gets too close for his comfort. He chases the cat. I call him off and he breaks off and comes back to me. Because the whole point, all along, is the meat. So, his guarding of resources requires breaking off the chase to get the resource. That is, he can guard his resource by breaking off the chase initiated by resource guarding. I haven't change what it means to be dog. I am working with what it is to be dog.

My dog doesn't have to do multi-variable differential calculus out to the 4th derivative to be a reasoning creature capable of ToM. I could do that stuff but it doesn't make me smarter than him. Nor more fit in evolution. There is no rhyme or reason to evolution and it seems at times that NDT is still trying to enforce a "guiding" principle where there is none.

Oh, what the heck, it's time for dinner. More later.

 

@ron2 talk about word salad? margulis's politics, and your other insightful musings in that post have nothing, absolutely nothing to do with the point.

she is a respected scientist. she doesn't believe in random mutations.

these, i repeat, are the only points i brought up. not that she is right or wrong or what her politics entail. those are as relevant to my point as her love or hatred of water color painting.

i posted numerous quotes and resources that support what kbehan stated in regard to a lecture given by margulis.

furthermore, why is it so difficult to grasp the concept that i'm not asking anyone on this forum to prove/disprove kbehan. i am only asking @themilkyway to clarify his position that kbehan is a liar, in regard to the statement mentioned above.

the confusion on this point baffles me.

@burl, i'll take a stab at your question when i have a bit more time.

ron2

Actually, this statement shows a misunderstanding of the conservation principle in physics and some slippery math. You might want to stay away from the physics thingy.

 

 

 

Ron2 .. that is funny. Some times i am so ROTFL with the so called "science" that i just know that i shouldn't answer. It will come out all Darwinsist... surivivial of how the hell did that idea ever get of the bottom of the chook shed :)

 

 

Burl

 I asked Kevin to summarize 5 concepts of NDT that are novel to what is now out there in dog training theory.  Results were rough.

Could you summarize the top 3 things that Kevin wants us all to understand about dogs that we currently don't?

If to draw a clearer picture you feel the need to offer 5 or more points, no problem.

Since the theory might be a hell of a bother lets put up a couple of dogs and behavourial issues up for grabs. I am comfortable doing two or three and all of them would incorporate a Pankseepian view with a behavourist underpinning. I have to warn you that as a trainer i am more a**e than class...

What do others think??

 

 In regards to the principle of conservation, and the two affective systems that the second lecturer on the video actually acted out, (A) if the animal enraged drives the object of its fear away, or (B) if the baby calling for its mother fails to find her, and then these systems wind down as the scientist says they do and as we all have observed to be the case, and given that Panskepp and colleague said no intention is involved in the "communication" ---what therefore has happened to the organism as a behavioral system? In other words, has it returned to stasis and thus is unchanged?

 So your position is that there is no distinction between emotion and instinct?

 We continue with the discussion because the affective systems triggered demand it. Why then do they demand it? 

 Are you saying that higher order brain functions account for the domestic dog's adaptability to the novelties of human civilization, given that the instinctive component of emotion (if there is one) couldn't possibly have prepared them for?

FWIW Kevin, I have made some minor replies below:


***Are you saying that higher order brain functions account for the domestic dog's adaptability to the novelties of human civilization, given that the instinctive component of emotion (if there is one) couldn't possibly have prepared them for?

Yes to the bit of animal cognition’s purpose being to adapt in novel ways to its world (to live better).  Cognition can act in modifying affective behaviors.



***We continue with the discussion because the affective systems triggered demand it. Why then do they demand it?

We are seeking!



***So your position is that there is no distinction between emotion and instinct?

That is my takeaway from animal emotion researchers.



***In regards to the principle of conservation, and the two affective systems that the second lecturer on the video actually acted out, (A) if the animal enraged drives the object of its fear away, or (B) if the baby calling for its mother fails to find her, and then these systems wind down as the scientist says they do and as we all have observed to be the case, and given that Panskepp and colleague said no intention is involved in the "communication" ---what therefore has happened to the organism as a behavioral system? In other words, has it returned to stasis and thus is unchanged?

I am not sure what you’re getting at, but certainly an organism that goes to sleep each night might look as though nothing happened in the intervening 24 hours, but of course many subjective experiences have been logged in during that passage of time.

corgidog

you are just making semantic arguments.

Corgi, you really don't know what you are talking about.  ALL IS ALL. 

ALL MUTATIONS ARE NOT DELETERIOUS..  Too bad you really don't know enough about genetics to realize he was wrong the moment you read his foolish claim. Please read for comprehension; and do the Math.    "99.9 percent of the mutations are deleterious."  The abstract you quoted does not support the claim that Behan is making about Margulis.

 

kbehan is providing an alternative interpretation to the same data set. for instance, http://naturaldogtraining.com/articles/do-dogs-have-a-sense-of-fairness/ argues from the same data but draws different conclusions.

Actually, what he is doing is creating a whole reality in which all we've learned about physics, biology, chemistry  no longer applies. 

On this I invoke Hume's Maxim.

"That no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish."

So, I ask myself, which is the lesser miracle? Behan is right and everything we've learned about the sciences is wrong. Or Behan is wrong.

 

. however, a lack of ndt specific accumulated data at the moment doesn't refute the logic being put forward by kbehan, either. 

As I've pointed out repeatedly, Behan's logic does not exist.

The reason that radial adaptation fell out of favor with many scientists is lack of evidence and causal link showing that a creature evolved something out of a need in the environment. It is one of perspective.That is, it would seem that canid evolved resource guarding as a response to the environment but there is no causal proof of this. It is more accurate to say that canids that developed this FAP survived long enough to reproduce better than ones that didn't. Non-radial adaptation.Margulis has expressed that there are no "random" mutations. Convenient enough until you remember that we humans still an appendix, tail root (simian), and wisdom teeth that we no longer need. If mutation were not random, we would not still have those. That is assuming that evolution is some efficiency driven operation. It is not. It is random and that scares a lot of people who need some "narrative" of how things came to be. Which is a religious affectation, not necessarily borne by science. Too many people read too much into "survival of the fittest." Fitness is not images of gyms and athletes, endomoorphic females and mesomorphic males. Fitness is a match of subject to it's survivability in an environment. In fact, I would say that the olympic variety athlete is less suited to survive in the wild than the redneck that knows how to hunt deer and fish. Biologically, fitness is the ability of a subject to survive the environment and this is random. What happens is, the subject that does survive the environment lives long enough to reproduce and that genetic mutation is passed on.

I knew I would offend some people with science but, that happens, now and then.

 

corgidog

she is a respected scientist. she doesn't believe in random mutations.

 

That too is wrong.  She asserts that random spontaneous mutations are not  the principal singular force driving speciation. More importantly her work has focused on single-cell lifeforms. 

Kevin Behan

 In regards to the principle of conservation, and the two affective systems that the second lecturer on the video actually acted out, (A) if the animal enraged drives the object of its fear away, or (B) if the baby calling for its mother fails to find her, and then these systems wind down as the scientist says they do and as we all have observed to be the case, and given that Panskepp and colleague said no intention is involved in the "communication" ---what therefore has happened to the organism as a behavioral system? In other words, has it returned to stasis and thus is unchanged?

Allow me to blow apart your semantic song and dance.

Cats present their sides and arch their backs to appear bigger in a confrontation. Dogs present their sides to avoid confrontation, to say, in so many words,  "we're cool and I'm comfortable enough to show you my side." Well, my cat, wanting to play fight, will present side and arch, dancing back and forth to appear bigger. My dog, in response, will yawn and lay down. So, the "fear" or "aggression" expressed by the cat is getting totally lost in the translation. But is what my cat was expressing "fear?" For her, it's actually play and another cat would understand and likewise play but not kill. Last night, as DW lay dozing on the couch, Shadow, the dog, lay next to her. He wanted DW time. Jade, the cat, also wanted DW time. So, she got on DW's lap and started cleaning Shadow's left ear. And he lay there, getting his do done. But it didn't make him go away. So, Jade was trying to bite him. But she also gives love bites, so she may not have been trying to make him go away or maybe she was. He wouldn't move. Point being that communication doesn't always happen across species nor can we guess that it is evolved out of fear, necessarily. Yet, Shadow can arise and bark at a dog on tv and Jade skedaddles off. And it's not necessarily fear. It's just that cats that learned to bug out in the presence of large, unpredictable movement tend to live longer. That is, what looked like fear might be a FAP that is awarded with survival enough times that the genetic mutation that produces that behavior or chain is "rewarded" by being present in the reproduction. It is not actually rewarded and you can still have a litter of kittens where one does not have the "instinct' to get out the way. Not fear, not bravery, not aggression, simply not having the reactionary impulse to get out of the way.

The crying baby is still interacting with the environment. The fact that baby becomes quiet is an adaptation. It does not mean that the baby is no longer human or communicating. It is conserving energy, I think.

You are still not understanding the principle of conservation. From classical physics, conservation of mass and energy. In a nutshell, energy and mass are not destroyed, they just change forms. It is why you get heat from a burning log. You are not even "releasing" heat from the log. You are simply enjoying the translation effect. It is most easily described by the equation E = mc^2 though the equation is a bit misleading. Energy does not equal mass unless you go into QM (still unproven), atom bomb aside. In fact, the equation is really just Newton's kinetic energy equation solved for the oscillation of an atom. Sorry to get all physics-y on you but you keep insisting on using that word and I feel it fair that others who don't have as much study in science and physics as I do not be mislead by your use of the word. Once again, this has been an argument of semantics, not empirical evidence. Problem is, you brought a knife to a gun fight.

 

That too is wrong. She asserts that random spontaneous mutations are not the principal singular force driving speciation. More importantly her work has focused on single-cell lifeforms.

So you agree with me but are unable to admit it.

it's certainly within the realm of possibility that margulis made such a statement,that all mutations are deleterious, at a lecture, as that was kbehan's assertion. do you also take kbehan's statement to mean that mutations don't happen? he's saying that random mutations aren't the "driver" behind evolution. i know you disagree with this statement. however, margulis would not.

and the fact you took my statement to mean that i'm suggesting 99.9 = 100 %, only reveals your poor reading comprehension skills.

i said it was in the "realm of possibility" that margulis could have indeed made such a claim at a lecture. in this context 99.9 ~= vast majority ~= all.

As I've pointed out repeatedly, Behan's logic does not exist

you have done no such thing. you have made semantic arguments trying to derail any meaningful discussion. you also have made inconsistent statements that you must backpedal from when asked to explain.

 Ron, Ron, Ron

 

Are you telling us that our mammal kin behave similarly to us?  Where would you ever get such an idea...wait, you just told us!