4 ms·

I suspect that as we come to better understand genetics, we (as a society) are going to be more and more uncomfortable with the findings that we uncover. Physic

I suspect that as we come to better understand genetics, we (as a society) are going to be more and more uncomfortable with the findings that we uncover. Physics and mathematics have made it long since clear that the universe is deterministic, that all the answers lie in the genes and atoms and equations we are made up of. The implications of this are dire - our society is built on exactly the opposite foundations; law and order assumes the criminals are acting of free will, education assumes all students are equal, and societal success rests on the notion that all men are equal. None of this is true. All of the implications can be twisted to serve our worst, or our best instincts. Some will take this study to mean Homosexuality is a disease, to be cured. Others will reject it, to say the science is not yet "in", the study needs replications, meta-studies are needed to verify and corroborate it. We should embrace it, and say that it is good we are not a monoculture, embrace mutation and variation. To be human is to be different.

chongli 9y ago
Call me naïve, but I'm optimistic. All of those assumptions you ascribe to society fall under the umbrella of the just world fallacy. The sooner that thing dies, the better.
ProAm 9y ago
> Physics and mathematics have made it long since clear that the universe is deterministic Except none of them have any idea whats really going on...
- ISL 9y ago
  We know a lot of things. We simply focus all of our effort on the things we do not yet understand.
  - 8bitsrule 9y ago
    Not according to Thomas Kuhn, we don't.
    - dwaltrip 9y ago
      That's a misreading of Kuhn. He believed in scientific progress -- he says so explicitly.
      - 8bitsrule 9y ago
        I was responding to the statement that "We simply focus all of our effort on the things we do not yet understand." Kuhn (short summary) pointed out that paradigms arise which, after a time, cause scientists that have 'bought in' to resist attempts to modify them. Many scientists get 'stuck' in the current paradigm and pooh-pooh attempts to modify them. The history of science demonstrates this over and over ... EG Wegener, EG Clovis. Yep, Kuhn recognizes progress. His major point is that progress doesn't come from the orthodox establishment.
        dwaltrip 9y ago
        Ah I see. My bad, I assumed you were talking about the first part.
- RoboticWater 9y ago
  Compared to what? Yes, we can rest on the technicality that science is only an ever-expanding and ever-solidifying theory, but can't–by fallibility of perception–ever reach perfect truth. So what though. What else do we have to go on? Regardless, the fact that we've made any strides at all within these fields is proof of determinism. If not 100% determinism, then enough to dispel notions of a "just world."
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
avodonosov 9y ago
> Physics and mathematics have made it long since clear that the universe is deterministic Have they?
- mikekij 9y ago
  At the macro level.
- fasquoika 9y ago
  No
- tclancy 9y ago
  Sure, John Calvin told us so. And then we rejected it. And then it became a sure thing again. And then not . . . and now here we are.
  - itronitron 9y ago
    Can the universe be deterministic if our knowledge of whether the universe is deterministic is not deterministic?
- 8bitsrule 9y ago
  As I recall, the theologists held similarly self-promoting illusions centuries ago. I also recall that early scientists declared that the universe is a clockwork. I also recall that Lord Kelvin, in the late 1800s, declared that physics was all finished except for a few minor details. The physical universe is not a complete mystery. To the extent that certain phenomena can be agreed to procede from other phenomena in a repeatable fashion, there is indeed reason to celebrate. As many wise men have pointed out, however, we are very small and the universe is very great. The extent of that which we do not understand at all is good reason to suspect that we must continue to deliberately blind ourselves if we are to keep patting ourselves on the back.
ethbro 9y ago
The universe can be deterministic and still practically unknowable. Chaos theory: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory
- justinjlynn 9y ago
  Here's a fun one. A transcendental real number which is not computable: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaitin%27s_constant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaitin%27s_constant
gh02t 9y ago
Eh, I don't know if you want to take it quite that far. Your genes might predispose you towards one path or another, but there is still free will involved. Complex sociological events like someone committing a criminal act can't just be reduced to "their genes made them do it." There are other factors involved and they are far more complex than what can be reduced to simple genetics. I think sexual orientation is probably an inherent trait in most people, but to say something like educational success is just a result of genetics and not other factors like teachers, parents etc is simplistic. Not to mention that the universe is hardly deterministic. Chaos theory and quantum physics show quite clearly that randomness and unpredictability are fundamental.
- brucephillips 9y ago
  > Your genes might predispose you towards one path or another, but there is still free will involved. Genetic determinism is not the same as free will. Our genes don't determine everything, but together with our environment, they do.
  - gh02t 9y ago
    They don't determine everything is my point. Environment paired with genetics has a strong (sometimes overwhelming) influence on the decisions you make for sure, and they make many decisions harder or easier, but you still maintain the ability to choose. Free will isn't the ability to make any choice without external influences, it's just that you have a choice at all.
    - brucephillips 9y ago
      What are you calling a choice? Are you simply saying that people act? Then yes, that's of course tautologically true.
      - md224 9y ago
        I think we just have an unbridgeable gap of beliefs here: one of you believes that they are the ultimate author of their own words and actions, that their experience of making decisions should be taken as strong evidence that they are in fact making decisions, and that any theory that denied this fact would be in need of revision. The other believes that the scientific enterprise has conclusively disproven the possibility of actual free will, and therefore agency is merely an illusion. Lately I’ve been siding with the first stance, but I can understand both. It comes down to the strength of your faith that Science understands (for the most part) all of the essential features of reality, and also your trust in your immediate experience. It’s a tough question.
ISL 9y ago
Evolutionary-biologist Will Provine's perspective on free will helped very much to inform my own: https://evolutionnews.org/2015/09/william_provine/ https://evolutionnews.org/2015/09/william_provine/ (Edit: this is apparently an intelligent-design advocacy publication, but it is telling how much his opponents respected him. Provine would have been touched. Here's another link, for context: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/ptb/6959004.0007.003/--william-provine-1942-2015?rgn=main;view=fulltext* https://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/ptb/6959004.0007.003/--william-...) He had a lot of thoughtful and kind things to say, and a lot of courage to back it up. Have a gander at some of his work if it piques your interest. Thanks for your post -- it led me to the news that he had passed away. He had so long surpassed the odds on his specific guaranteed-to-recur cancer that I almost believed him to be invulnerable. Thank you, Will. We lead best by example; yours was superb.
brucephillips 9y ago
> law and order assumes the criminals are acting of free will, education assumes all students are equal, and societal success rests on the notion that all men are equal None of this is true. We would still imprison those who break the law, despite a deterministic universe, for quarantine, if nothing else.
- Borealid 9y ago
  We punish for dissuasion. Some who would break the law in the absence of punishment will "choose" (however one wants to interpret that word in a fully deterministic world) not to do so because of the possibility and cost of punishment. Even punishments such as fines still make sense in a fully deterministic world, and in one where there is no societal desire to be "fair" or give people what they "deserve".
_joe 9y ago
Physics gave up being "deterministic" (in the sense you used the term in) about 120 years ago. And mathematics is just a convenient tool with which we describe reality, no one would seriously think today that our math is deeply inscribed in the essence of reality as Galileo thought. Apart from this, and the fact that the paper shows a very weak statistical significance, I agree fully with your last statement.
- brucephillips 9y ago
  > the paper shows a very weak statistical significance How so? The p values are quite low.
  - tempay 9y ago
    They're not low enough to account for the look elsewhere effect[1] (known by a different name in this field, but the idea is the same). In this case they look at 500,000 measurements so finding p-values of 10⁻⁵/10⁻⁶ is expected. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Look-elsewhere_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Look-elsewhere_effect
- wyager 9y ago
  > no one would seriously think today that our math is deeply inscribed in the essence of reality This is straight up wrong; most physicists I know, regardless of subdiscipline, basically agree on some variation of the idea that reality is somehow underpinned by algebraic structures.
- excalibur 9y ago
  Reality is just a convenient tool with which we can discern mathematics.
pm 9y ago
None of us are dealt an equal hand in life. Having a genetic predisposition that advantages or disadvantages someone does not absolve them of the responsibility of their actions. If we were unchanging machines, that may not be the case, but it's much more complex than we give it credit for, and the debate is unlikely to be resolved anytime soon.
nikolay 9y ago
Here's what I don't get: we glorify the Theory of Evolution and science in general, but at the same time we let politics and activism get involved. So, which of these is true, at the end, when we remove politics from our decision: homosexuality is a) "nature (not a disorder)", b) "nature (disorder)", or c) "nurture"? In addition to removing politics, let's remove emotions before answering. Science doesn't and shouldn't care if its conclusions are easy to digest or what we expect.
curun1r 9y ago
Not just genetics, but also our gut microbiome. The studies linking depression and other thinking to our gut bacteria raise some profound moral implications. I've had really interesting conversations with some of the gay people I know where I've urged them to at least start thinking about what would happen if science found a biological or genetic basis for homosexuality. If human sexuality can be altered with a probiotic, targeted antibiotic or gene therapy, the LGBT community should be prepared for the renewed attack on their way of life that would bring. Just because they intuitively consider it part of their identity doesn't mean that it is biologically so. Science isn't going to avoid investigating or finding these kinds of things, no matter how much opinion shifts towards acceptance of non-majority sexual preferences. I can also envision a world in which increased understanding of the mechanics of our sexuality poses some interesting moral questions and scenarios. What if all sexual preferences are governed by these mechanics, not just gender? Even straight people have a wide variety of preferences when it comes to race, body type and other physical characteristics. Could surreptitiously trying to alter someone's preferences be considered rape in much the same way that using GHB to bypass consent currently is? Could we have a world where gene therapies to increase compatibility become part of marital counseling? Might 23andme.com become the world's best online dating site? Might people in cultures with arranged marriages start forming the arrangements pre-birth and then selecting embryos for IVF based on the compatibility of their offspring? This field of study offers so many really interesting /r/WritingPrompts for near-future science fiction writers. So many of our institutions, customs and culture revolve around the propagation of the species that demystifying it could really turn society on its head in some interesting ways.
red75prime 9y ago
> law and order assumes the criminals are acting of free will It doesn't really matter if there's no "free will", while a behavior of an individual can be approximated as a behavior of rational agent who properly reacts to an expectation of positive or negative consequences. If a person can react rationally, then it is rational to disincentivize them. If they can't, then it is rational to move them to a psychiatric hospital, where they'll have better chances at fixing the problem knowing exact genetical causes. The same as now. > To be human is to be different. Within Overton window. No one is going to embrace pedophiles anytime soon.

chongli 9y ago

Call me naïve, but I'm optimistic. All of those assumptions you ascribe to society fall under the umbrella of the just world fallacy. The sooner that thing dies, the better.

ProAm 9y ago

> Physics and mathematics have made it long since clear that the universe is deterministic Except none of them have any idea whats really going on...

ISL 9y ago
We know a lot of things. We simply focus all of our effort on the things we do not yet understand.
- 8bitsrule 9y ago
  Not according to Thomas Kuhn, we don't.
  - dwaltrip 9y ago
    That's a misreading of Kuhn. He believed in scientific progress -- he says so explicitly.
    - 8bitsrule 9y ago
      I was responding to the statement that "We simply focus all of our effort on the things we do not yet understand." Kuhn (short summary) pointed out that paradigms arise which, after a time, cause scientists that have 'bought in' to resist attempts to modify them. Many scientists get 'stuck' in the current paradigm and pooh-pooh attempts to modify them. The history of science demonstrates this over and over ... EG Wegener, EG Clovis. Yep, Kuhn recognizes progress. His major point is that progress doesn't come from the orthodox establishment.
      - dwaltrip 9y ago
        Ah I see. My bad, I assumed you were talking about the first part.
RoboticWater 9y ago
Compared to what? Yes, we can rest on the technicality that science is only an ever-expanding and ever-solidifying theory, but can't–by fallibility of perception–ever reach perfect truth. So what though. What else do we have to go on? Regardless, the fact that we've made any strides at all within these fields is proof of determinism. If not 100% determinism, then enough to dispel notions of a "just world."

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

avodonosov 9y ago

> Physics and mathematics have made it long since clear that the universe is deterministic Have they?

mikekij 9y ago
At the macro level.
fasquoika 9y ago
No
tclancy 9y ago
Sure, John Calvin told us so. And then we rejected it. And then it became a sure thing again. And then not . . . and now here we are.
- itronitron 9y ago
  Can the universe be deterministic if our knowledge of whether the universe is deterministic is not deterministic?
8bitsrule 9y ago
As I recall, the theologists held similarly self-promoting illusions centuries ago. I also recall that early scientists declared that the universe is a clockwork. I also recall that Lord Kelvin, in the late 1800s, declared that physics was all finished except for a few minor details. The physical universe is not a complete mystery. To the extent that certain phenomena can be agreed to procede from other phenomena in a repeatable fashion, there is indeed reason to celebrate. As many wise men have pointed out, however, we are very small and the universe is very great. The extent of that which we do not understand at all is good reason to suspect that we must continue to deliberately blind ourselves if we are to keep patting ourselves on the back.

ethbro 9y ago

The universe can be deterministic and still practically unknowable. Chaos theory: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory

justinjlynn 9y ago
Here's a fun one. A transcendental real number which is not computable: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaitin%27s_constant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaitin%27s_constant

gh02t 9y ago

Eh, I don't know if you want to take it quite that far. Your genes might predispose you towards one path or another, but there is still free will involved. Complex sociological events like someone committing a criminal act can't just be reduced to "their genes made them do it." There are other factors involved and they are far more complex than what can be reduced to simple genetics. I think sexual orientation is probably an inherent trait in most people, but to say something like educational success is just a result of genetics and not other factors like teachers, parents etc is simplistic. Not to mention that the universe is hardly deterministic. Chaos theory and quantum physics show quite clearly that randomness and unpredictability are fundamental.

brucephillips 9y ago
> Your genes might predispose you towards one path or another, but there is still free will involved. Genetic determinism is not the same as free will. Our genes don't determine everything, but together with our environment, they do.
- gh02t 9y ago
  They don't determine everything is my point. Environment paired with genetics has a strong (sometimes overwhelming) influence on the decisions you make for sure, and they make many decisions harder or easier, but you still maintain the ability to choose. Free will isn't the ability to make any choice without external influences, it's just that you have a choice at all.
  - brucephillips 9y ago
    What are you calling a choice? Are you simply saying that people act? Then yes, that's of course tautologically true.
    - md224 9y ago
      I think we just have an unbridgeable gap of beliefs here: one of you believes that they are the ultimate author of their own words and actions, that their experience of making decisions should be taken as strong evidence that they are in fact making decisions, and that any theory that denied this fact would be in need of revision. The other believes that the scientific enterprise has conclusively disproven the possibility of actual free will, and therefore agency is merely an illusion. Lately I’ve been siding with the first stance, but I can understand both. It comes down to the strength of your faith that Science understands (for the most part) all of the essential features of reality, and also your trust in your immediate experience. It’s a tough question.

ISL 9y ago

Evolutionary-biologist Will Provine's perspective on free will helped very much to inform my own: https://evolutionnews.org/2015/09/william_provine/ https://evolutionnews.org/2015/09/william_provine/ (Edit: this is apparently an intelligent-design advocacy publication, but it is telling how much his opponents respected him. Provine would have been touched. Here's another link, for context: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/ptb/6959004.0007.003/--william-provine-1942-2015?rgn=main;view=fulltext* https://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/ptb/6959004.0007.003/--william-...) He had a lot of thoughtful and kind things to say, and a lot of courage to back it up. Have a gander at some of his work if it piques your interest. Thanks for your post -- it led me to the news that he had passed away. He had so long surpassed the odds on his specific guaranteed-to-recur cancer that I almost believed him to be invulnerable. Thank you, Will. We lead best by example; yours was superb.

brucephillips 9y ago

> law and order assumes the criminals are acting of free will, education assumes all students are equal, and societal success rests on the notion that all men are equal None of this is true. We would still imprison those who break the law, despite a deterministic universe, for quarantine, if nothing else.

Borealid 9y ago
We punish for dissuasion. Some who would break the law in the absence of punishment will "choose" (however one wants to interpret that word in a fully deterministic world) not to do so because of the possibility and cost of punishment. Even punishments such as fines still make sense in a fully deterministic world, and in one where there is no societal desire to be "fair" or give people what they "deserve".

_joe 9y ago

Physics gave up being "deterministic" (in the sense you used the term in) about 120 years ago. And mathematics is just a convenient tool with which we describe reality, no one would seriously think today that our math is deeply inscribed in the essence of reality as Galileo thought. Apart from this, and the fact that the paper shows a very weak statistical significance, I agree fully with your last statement.

brucephillips 9y ago
> the paper shows a very weak statistical significance How so? The p values are quite low.
- tempay 9y ago
  They're not low enough to account for the look elsewhere effect[1] (known by a different name in this field, but the idea is the same). In this case they look at 500,000 measurements so finding p-values of 10⁻⁵/10⁻⁶ is expected. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Look-elsewhere_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Look-elsewhere_effect
wyager 9y ago
> no one would seriously think today that our math is deeply inscribed in the essence of reality This is straight up wrong; most physicists I know, regardless of subdiscipline, basically agree on some variation of the idea that reality is somehow underpinned by algebraic structures.
excalibur 9y ago
Reality is just a convenient tool with which we can discern mathematics.

pm 9y ago

None of us are dealt an equal hand in life. Having a genetic predisposition that advantages or disadvantages someone does not absolve them of the responsibility of their actions. If we were unchanging machines, that may not be the case, but it's much more complex than we give it credit for, and the debate is unlikely to be resolved anytime soon.

nikolay 9y ago

Here's what I don't get: we glorify the Theory of Evolution and science in general, but at the same time we let politics and activism get involved. So, which of these is true, at the end, when we remove politics from our decision: homosexuality is a) "nature (not a disorder)", b) "nature (disorder)", or c) "nurture"? In addition to removing politics, let's remove emotions before answering. Science doesn't and shouldn't care if its conclusions are easy to digest or what we expect.

curun1r 9y ago

Not just genetics, but also our gut microbiome. The studies linking depression and other thinking to our gut bacteria raise some profound moral implications. I've had really interesting conversations with some of the gay people I know where I've urged them to at least start thinking about what would happen if science found a biological or genetic basis for homosexuality. If human sexuality can be altered with a probiotic, targeted antibiotic or gene therapy, the LGBT community should be prepared for the renewed attack on their way of life that would bring. Just because they intuitively consider it part of their identity doesn't mean that it is biologically so. Science isn't going to avoid investigating or finding these kinds of things, no matter how much opinion shifts towards acceptance of non-majority sexual preferences. I can also envision a world in which increased understanding of the mechanics of our sexuality poses some interesting moral questions and scenarios. What if all sexual preferences are governed by these mechanics, not just gender? Even straight people have a wide variety of preferences when it comes to race, body type and other physical characteristics. Could surreptitiously trying to alter someone's preferences be considered rape in much the same way that using GHB to bypass consent currently is? Could we have a world where gene therapies to increase compatibility become part of marital counseling? Might 23andme.com become the world's best online dating site? Might people in cultures with arranged marriages start forming the arrangements pre-birth and then selecting embryos for IVF based on the compatibility of their offspring? This field of study offers so many really interesting /r/WritingPrompts for near-future science fiction writers. So many of our institutions, customs and culture revolve around the propagation of the species that demystifying it could really turn society on its head in some interesting ways.

red75prime 9y ago

> law and order assumes the criminals are acting of free will It doesn't really matter if there's no "free will", while a behavior of an individual can be approximated as a behavior of rational agent who properly reacts to an expectation of positive or negative consequences. If a person can react rationally, then it is rational to disincentivize them. If they can't, then it is rational to move them to a psychiatric hospital, where they'll have better chances at fixing the problem knowing exact genetical causes. The same as now. > To be human is to be different. Within Overton window. No one is going to embrace pedophiles anytime soon.