sanio@netmbx.UUCP (Erhard Sanio) (05/27/90)
I just read a critique about a book of Rupert Sheldrake, "The Memory of Nature" (Title of the German edition, retranslated). The author postulates that struc- tures of living and other nature are determined by "morphic fields" rather than or in addition to genetic information or laws of nature. The critique cited was a bit annoying, as Sheldrake's hypotheses were abused for one of the well-known New-Ageian attacks on "established science". Anyway, I would be interested whether Sheldrake gives some evidence (or not) for his hypotheses (from that critique, I learnt that he did some word recog- nition tests, which can easily explained otherwise and even forced poor wave function into his services - which makes me suspect for a quack case). Further on, I would appreciate some expert comments on his theory (I'll treat them with the same skepsis as Sheldrake's theory, btw). Thanx in ahead. regards, es
firth@sei.cmu.edu (Robert Firth) (05/28/90)
In article <697@netmbx.UUCP> sanio@netmbx.UUCP (Erhard Sanio) writes: >I just read a critique about a book of Rupert Sheldrake, "The Memory of Nature" Sheldrake's "M-field" theories are discussed and criticised in one chapter of Martin Gardner's "The New Age - notes of a fringe watcher". This is a collection of essays on various New Age subjects; they first appeared mostly in the Skeptical Enquirer, which should give you a good idea of the author's perspective.
Murray_R_Pearce@cup.portal.com (05/29/90)
Martin Gardner has an article about Rupert Sheldrake in his recent book, The New Age - Notes of a Fringe Watcher. I gather the article originally appeared in The Skeptical Inquirer. Gardner discusses Sheldrake's book A New Science of Life in which "morphogenetic fields" are discussed.
inc@tc.fluke.COM (Gary Benson) (06/01/90)
In article <30291@cup.portal.com> Murray_R_Pearce@cup.portal.com writes: > Martin Gardner has an article about Rupert Sheldrake in his recent book, > The New Age - Notes of a Fringe Watcher. I gather the article originally > appeared in The Skeptical Inquirer. Gardner discusses Sheldrake's book > A New Science of Life in which "morphogenetic fields" are discussed. Do tell. I've been trying to learn more about morphogenetic field theory for a long time. Ira Flato did a piece back about 10 years ago when he was Science Correspondent for National Public Radio doing a regular piece on "All Things Considered". This is an absolutely fascinating theory, and I thank you for providing us references to books by the theory's architect as well as by one of his skeptics. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that the theory takes issue with the standard explanation for the answers to questions like "why do all squirrels look the same when there are so many vast differences in thef appearance of humans?" Sheldrake does not believe it can all be explained by current genetics, DNA and all that. Instead, he says that each time (for example) a squirrel is born, it sends out a field not unlike an electromagnetic field, and that other squirrels-in-gestation are receptive to this field and use the information it contains to control the genetic process. The human morphogenetic field is much more complext, I presume, and contains much more information, ergo, the likelihood that any given embryo will decode the same parts of the field as some other embryo are remote. At the time Ira Flato was interviewing him, he claimed to have had some experimental results that were promising - I am really fuzzy on the details, but it involved the growth of crystals, which he presented as being somehow a "life-analogue" if you will. I can hardly wait to check out the two books mentioned in this posting -- the whole concept just seems so absurd on the surface, but what if he's right? How would wars affect the human mg field? Violent highway accidents at one per minute? What are abortions doing? Or in vitro fertilization? No flames please from the crypto-skeptics. I am just as unbelieving as anyone about all this, but if you just automatically discount something you *personally* do not believe, you may be shutting your mind to a world of possibilities. As the bumper sticker says, "Minds are like parachutes. They only work when they are open".
alwin@cs.umn.edu ('Gonzo Bob' Alwin) (06/02/90)
In article <1990Jun1.051632.5542@tc.fluke.COM> inc@tc.fluke.COM (Gary Benson) writes: >In article <30291@cup.portal.com> Murray_R_Pearce@cup.portal.com writes: >> appeared in The Skeptical Inquirer. Gardner discusses Sheldrake's book >> A New Science of Life in which "morphogenetic fields" are discussed. > >Do tell. I've been trying to learn more about morphogenetic field theory for >Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that the theory takes issue >with the standard explanation for the answers to questions like "why do all >squirrels look the same when there are so many vast differences in thef >appearance of humans?" Perhaps if we interacted with with squirrels as much as we do with other humans, we would not say that they all look the same. Recognition is a skill that is learned.
binkley@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Jon Binkley) (06/02/90)
In article <1990Jun1.051632.5542@tc.fluke.COM> inc@tc.fluke.COM (Gary Benson) writes: >Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that the theory takes issue >with the standard explanation for the answers to questions like "why do all >squirrels look the same when there are so many vast differences in the >appearance of humans?" I don't know what the standard explanation is, but my explanation is that Rupert Sheldrake is doing the looking, and he is human. If you were to ask a squirrel, I imagine you'd get the converse observation. >No flames please from the crypto-skeptics. I am just as unbelieving as >anyone about all this, but if you just automatically discount something you >*personally* do not believe, you may be shutting your mind to a world of >possibilities. As the bumper sticker says, "Minds are like parachutes. They >only work when they are open". Yes, but neither work very well when they're full of holes. -jon
weeks@ssbell.IMD.Sterling.COM (John Weeks) (06/05/90)
In article <1990Jun1.051632.5542@tc.fluke.COM> inc@tc.fluke.COM (Gary Benson) writes: #In article <30291@cup.portal.com# Murray_R_Pearce@cup.portal.com writes: # ## Martin Gardner has an article about Rupert Sheldrake in his recent book, ## The New Age - Notes of a Fringe Watcher. I gather the article originally ## appeared in The Skeptical Inquirer. Gardner discusses Sheldrake's book ## A New Science of Life in which "morphogenetic fields" are discussed. # ... #Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that the theory takes issue #with the standard explanation for the answers to questions like "why do all #squirrels look the same when there are so many vast differences in thef #appearance of humans?" Sheldrake does not believe it can all be explained by *Do* all squirls look the same? To other squirls? To squirl experts? My understanding is that naturalists conducting long term observations of groups of animals initially have a difficult time telling them apart, but after weeks of observation their appearance become as varied as people. -jw-
dweingar@ic.sunysb.edu (David Weingart) (06/05/90)
As a side note to all this "squirrel appearance" talk... They only DRESS alike! ]) /\ \/ [- -- David Weingart dweingar@ic.sunysb.edu "Portions of this person have been pre-recorded before a studio audience"
frazier@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Greg Frazier) (06/27/90)
In article <truesdel.646339531@sun418> truesdel@sun418.nas.nasa.gov (David A. Truesdell) writes: +jackson@ttidca.TTI.COM (Dick Jackson) writes: +>Dogs are social animals too, but as someone said, they have been hopeless +>mucked up by ours truly. Consider wolves however, although I have not done +>the proposed objective study, it seems clear to me that within a wolf type +>individuals are very much alike (same hair color, eye color, etc). + +You seem to be changing the subject here willy-nilly. First, you attribute the +variations among the various types of dogs, to human meddling. Then you turn +around and claim that "within a wolf type individuals are very much alike". +Why not compare the variations of a single "dog type" (say dobermans) to +a single "wolf type", instead. Or, the variations across all dog types to the +variations across all wolf types. If you're going to make statements like this +at least be consistent. (Or would that weaken your argument.) His argument gets even weaker when you consider that many taxonomists currently consider wolves and dogs to be the same specie, and that wolves themselves have an incredible degree of variation and specialization. In addition to varying hair color, eye color, size, shape, etc., wolves also display behavior specialization as in tracker, leader, etc. This info is mostly from a recent article in "The Atlantic" (I know, a major journal in the biological sciences!), but even I, having seen very few wolves in my lifetime, know that there is a lot of variety w/in particular species. -- "They thought to use and shame me but I win out by nature, because a true freak cannot be made. A true freak must be born." K. Dunn, _Geek_Love_ Greg Frazier frazier@CS.UCLA.EDU !{ucbvax,rutgers}!ucla-cs!frazier
manderse@orion.oac.uci.edu (Mark Andersen) (06/27/90)
In article <36514@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU> frazier@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Greg Frazier) writes: >In article <truesdel.646339531@sun418> truesdel@sun418.nas.nasa.gov (David A. Truesdell) writes: >+jackson@ttidca.TTI.COM (Dick Jackson) writes: >+>Dogs are social animals too, but as someone said, they have been hopeless >His argument gets even weaker when you consider that many >taxonomists currently consider wolves and dogs to be the >same specie, and that wolves themselves have an incredible ^^^^^^ I've seen this mis-use a couple of times in the past couple of days. I'm not sure who the other perpetrator was. However, since this IS sci.bio after all, I feel obliged to remind non-biologists who read this group that "species" is BOTH singular AND plural. Thus, one should say "Wolves and dogs are thought to be the same species." Specie is money. >Greg Frazier frazier@CS.UCLA.EDU !{ucbvax,rutgers}!ucla-cs!frazier Mark Andersen manderse@orion.oac.uci.edu Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology UC Irvine, Irvine, CA, 92717
dhinds@portia.Stanford.EDU (David Hinds) (07/02/90)
In article <18066@ttidca.TTI.COM> jackson@ttidca.TTI.COM (Dick Jackson) writes: > >As I implied, I am not an expert, but an objective scale for visual >appearance differentiation could be constructed using the follwing types >of parameters: > > Hair color > Nose shape > Nose size > Eye color > Ratio of eye separation to head size > and on, and on. > >You would have a large number of these items. You could measure the >variability of each one for each species and come up with a grand score. >As I said, I believe that something like this has been done. > >The fact that man is a social animal and "altruistic" in the ethological >sense is one reason adduced for human variability. I won't spell it out. >Dogs are social animals too, but as someone said, they have been hopeless >mucked up by ours truly. Consider wolves however, although I have not done >the proposed objective study, it seems clear to me that within a wolf type >individuals are very much alike (same hair color, eye color, etc). > It seems that the only truly fair measure of individual differences would have to be the MOST subjective: ask whether creatures of the species being considered have more/less trouble telling EACHOTHER apart, rather than whether WE can tell them apart. It seems to me that in lots of these species in which individuals are "very much alike", individuals have no difficulty distinguishing mates/siblings/offspring from others. One might use genetic diversity as an objective measure, but I fear that humans would lose on that count as well. Does anyone have any data on this? -David Hinds dhinds@popserver.stanford.edu
al@gtx.com (Alan Filipski) (07/03/90)
In article <18066@ttidca.TTI.COM> jackson@ttidca.TTI.COM (Dick Jackson) writes: > >The fact that man is a social animal and "altruistic" in the ethological >sense is one reason adduced for human variability. I won't spell it out. >Dogs are social animals too, but as someone said, they have been hopeless >mucked up by ours truly. Consider wolves however, although I have not done >the proposed objective study, it seems clear to me that within a wolf type >individuals are very much alike (same hair color, eye color, etc). The obvious human bias here is the emphasis on visual appearance. Wolves depend much more on smell, a sense that (relatively speaking) is practically non-existent in us. There is a small hole in the wooden fence that runs around our yard. If you or I wanted to investigate what was going on on the other side of the fence, we would probably put our eye up to the hole. My dog prefers to stick his nose through it. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ( Alan Filipski, GTX Corp, 8836 N. 23rd Avenue, Phoenix, Arizona 85021, USA ) ( {decvax,hplabs,uunet!amdahl,nsc}!sun!sunburn!gtx!al (602)870-1696 ) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~