Comment by yesco
3 days ago
I suspect there could be a misalignment in semantics here, and not necessarily a disagreement. When a biologist says "evolutionary pressure" perhaps they have a different way of modeling what that means to them?
To me evolutionary pressure isn't an on/off thing, it's like a signal in the noise. It's a vector with a direction and magnitude, facing varying levels of environmental resistance.
To be more specific, if there was enough "magnitude", evolution could potentially arrive at a perfect CRC. But the "resistance" requires a "magnitude" higher than evolution is willing to pay to reach that perfection. Likely in part due to the implicit complexity slope. Considering the systemic malfunction mutation can cause, one might assume this magnitude would be higher than it currently is. However, this is entirely speculation, and not falsifiable.
So when I think of evolutionary pressure I'm considering it as a component of the final vector, where a biologist might more pragmatically consider the total sum of vectors instead. This way of thinking is likely more productive for what they are doing.
As for evolution always selecting for the individual over the group, I'm surprised this is controversial when it's so obviously happening? If that was true how could multicellular organisms even exist? I'm very much not an expert on any of this, but this sounds like perhaps an over focus on DNA itself and not evolution as a whole, but maybe I'm misunderstanding something?
> This way of thinking is likely more productive for what they are doing.
Which is… attempting a rigorous understanding of evolutionary biology, rather than idly ruminating.
I hate to use a dork-ism like “update your priors”, but this is actually maybe a situation where it applies? If you’re serious about a subject it’s more interesting to really incorporate the likelihood that you’re wrong than it is to wave it away as semantics or point of view.
I find evolution interesting because I like algorithms, so I view it through that lens. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this perspective. Clarifying my mental model is by no means simple hand waving.
Tell me this, which is more productive in an open discussion? My idle rumination? Or the lazy dismissal that lacks any substantive contribution to the ongoing discussion? I can't help but agree with your distaste for "dorkisms".