From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!sequent!muncher.sequent.com!bfish Mon Aug 24 15:41:03 EDT 1992
Article 6638 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: bfish@sequent.com (Brett Fishburne)
Subject: Re: what is consciousness for?
Message-ID: <1992Aug18.181021.14352@sequent.com>
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References: <1992Aug17.171723.5599@spss.com> <Bt6K1u.Iyr@watdragon.uwaterloo.ca> <1992Aug18.161151.12316@mp.cs.niu.edu>
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 92 18:10:21 GMT
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In article <1992Aug18.161151.12316@mp.cs.niu.edu> rickert@mp.cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert) writes:
>In article <Bt6K1u.Iyr@watdragon.uwaterloo.ca> cpshelle@logos.uwaterloo.ca (cameron shelley) writes:
>>
>>This reminds me of a theory of culture I learned in anthropology as an
>>undergrad.  One explanation of the function of culture is that it
>>allows for adaptation to environment on a more rapid basis than
>>genetic change.
>
>>What does this have to do with consciousness?  Consciousness seems
>>necessary to make culture work.  (In some sense, culture and genetics
>
>While I agree with this assessment of culture, I would hesitate to say
>that it can be used as an explanation of consciousness.  Certainly you
                                                          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>need consciousness for culture to work.  
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I'm not sure if that is true.  Would ants be considered to have culture or
am I confusing culture with society?

>But in my view, consciousness
>of some degree exists in many other animals (perhaps all mammals, for
>example), and culture has little significance to most of these.  It
>stretches credulity to suggest that the blind mechanisms of evolution
>had so much forsight as to create something for purposes that would
>eventually show up with the appearance of homo sapiens.

I have been ruffled by these arguments to the "forsight" of evolution.  Is
it possible that conscious evolved and had no immediate effect (neither good
or bad) so it was kept around (sort of like the appendix these days) and it
turned out to have an effect as culture developed so that those with
consciousness survived and those without didn't?  My point is that I'm not
willing to believe that evolution needed "forsight" for things to work.

A side issue on the evolution argument.  Isn't it reasonable to believe that
some things which are considered essential for modern intellectual development
could have "evolved" at a time when they were not actually useful, been
discarded, and the "re-evolved" in a time when they were an advantage.  Does
the fossil record support this hypothesis?  Just curious, maybe I should
try this type of question on one of the biology news groups, but I figured that
it had come up here so I'd give this group a shot first.

-- Brett
bfish@sequent.com


