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Where did you read this? "Purpose" is a very loaded word. If life has any purpose at all, it's to reproduce and propagate one's genes. Additional entropy just s

by kmoser 2y ago

Where did you read this? "Purpose" is a very loaded word. If life has any purpose at all, it's to reproduce and propagate one's genes. Additional entropy just sounds like an inevitable side-effect of that.

deleted 2y ago
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firecall 2y ago
Agreed about purpose being a loaded term. It's my, somewhat lazy, philosophical opinion, that there isn't any purpose and there doesn't need to be one. I don't see why the universe would need a purpose for anything. Things are what they. Things changing state. Entropy. I see reproduction as more of built in motivation to our system than a purpose as such. But that's semantics, and my purpose in life is not to argue about words! ;-)
justanotherjoe 2y ago
Could be. Could also be that reproduction and propagation is the inevitable side effect of that, no? We cant dissipate energy when we're dead.
- guerrilla 2y ago
  Rather a way to accomplish that. Life reproducing in order to accelerate the generation of entropy, in other words.
__MatrixMan__ 2y ago
"to reproduce and populate its genes" feels like a better fit for the purpose of an organism. If you subscribe to the big bang theory (and the idea that the purpose of a system is what it does), then the universe's purpose is to walk a path from low entropy to high entropy. Of what use is life, in such an endeavor? Well, life tends to seek out bits of stuck energy (food/fuel) and release it (metabolism/economy)--moving the universe further along on its path. This gives a sort of answer to the question: "why bother have live at all?" And so I think the entropy purpose makes sense--moreso than just having it just be a side effect. Nobody will ever be absolutely right or wrong about such things (purposes), but they're handy to have around sometimes.
- gsf_emergency_2 2y ago
  Stafford Beers, "The Purpose of a System is What it Does (POSIWID)", very hot right now.. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/come-on-obviously-the-purpose-of/comments https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/come-on-obviously-the-purpo... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_what_it_does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha...
  - __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
    When Beers says: > According to the cybernetician the purpose of a system is what it does... The "according to the cybernetician" part makes it pretty clear that we're now entering some kind of abstract space that cares not for the stated intentions of humans. It seems that what's "very hot right now" is to ignore the first part. I think it's an especially reasonable position to take when the system in question has no designer to disagree with anyhow.
    - tsimionescu 2y ago
      Not necessarily. Cybernetics was specifically the study of systems, so that part can also be taken as an appeal to the experts in the matter. Generally the point of this observation is specifically about human systems, either designed or evolved. The observation stems from the fact that it's (a) impossible to ascertain what the true intention of a human that designed a system was (they may be publicly lying about it, or even privately, it even to themselves), and (b) any complex enough system has been influenced and possibly "warped" by many more than one human, so the original unique intention, whatever it was, isn't the sole guiding principle behind it. So, if analyzing a system, rather than trying to dig into its creators' history or anything like that, it's best to just look at what the system is doing and consider that its true current purpose.
    - hnbad 2y ago
      > we're now entering some kind of abstract space that cares not for the stated intentions of humans But that's the thing about systems: they may involve humans but they don't necessarily reflect the intentions of the individual humans involved. Even when a system is created with a stated intent (i.e. for a stated purpose) that doesn't mean it will actually behave in a way that aligns with this intent. Logically you then shouldn't take the human intent into consideration when analyzing a system's actual effects and outcomes (except to determine whether it aligns with those but that's secondary). IOW the purpose of a system (i.e. "what it exists for") can be different from the purpose for which it was created (i.e. "what it is meant to do"). I guess "purpose" in this case is an overloaded term because the former more uses a meaning that more closely aligns with "function" (like the function of a predator in an ecosystem may be controlling prey population but that doesn't suggest intent nor design) and the latter uses a meaning that more closely aligns with "intent" (like during wildfires controlled burns are performed with the intent of stopping the spread of the wildfire). But I'd say it's a stretch to apply this to statements like "the purpose of organisms is to increase entropy" because that strongly implies intent rather than function (because the latter could also be simply expressed as "organisms create entropy").
deleted 2y ago
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kouru225 2y ago
Pretty sure this is what Schrodingers opinion is in his book “what is life?” But I haven’t read it. Maybe OP got it from that
mjan22640 2y ago
Reproduction is not really a purpose. What makes copies of itself, happens to persist.

by kmoser 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

firecall 2y ago

Agreed about purpose being a loaded term. It's my, somewhat lazy, philosophical opinion, that there isn't any purpose and there doesn't need to be one. I don't see why the universe would need a purpose for anything. Things are what they. Things changing state. Entropy. I see reproduction as more of built in motivation to our system than a purpose as such. But that's semantics, and my purpose in life is not to argue about words! ;-)

justanotherjoe 2y ago

Could be. Could also be that reproduction and propagation is the inevitable side effect of that, no? We cant dissipate energy when we're dead.

guerrilla 2y ago
Rather a way to accomplish that. Life reproducing in order to accelerate the generation of entropy, in other words.

__MatrixMan__ 2y ago

"to reproduce and populate its genes" feels like a better fit for the purpose of an organism. If you subscribe to the big bang theory (and the idea that the purpose of a system is what it does), then the universe's purpose is to walk a path from low entropy to high entropy. Of what use is life, in such an endeavor? Well, life tends to seek out bits of stuck energy (food/fuel) and release it (metabolism/economy)--moving the universe further along on its path. This gives a sort of answer to the question: "why bother have live at all?" And so I think the entropy purpose makes sense--moreso than just having it just be a side effect. Nobody will ever be absolutely right or wrong about such things (purposes), but they're handy to have around sometimes.

gsf_emergency_2 2y ago
Stafford Beers, "The Purpose of a System is What it Does (POSIWID)", very hot right now.. https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/come-on-obviously-the-purpose-of/comments https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/come-on-obviously-the-purpo... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_what_it_does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha...
- __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
  When Beers says: > According to the cybernetician the purpose of a system is what it does... The "according to the cybernetician" part makes it pretty clear that we're now entering some kind of abstract space that cares not for the stated intentions of humans. It seems that what's "very hot right now" is to ignore the first part. I think it's an especially reasonable position to take when the system in question has no designer to disagree with anyhow.
  - tsimionescu 2y ago
    Not necessarily. Cybernetics was specifically the study of systems, so that part can also be taken as an appeal to the experts in the matter. Generally the point of this observation is specifically about human systems, either designed or evolved. The observation stems from the fact that it's (a) impossible to ascertain what the true intention of a human that designed a system was (they may be publicly lying about it, or even privately, it even to themselves), and (b) any complex enough system has been influenced and possibly "warped" by many more than one human, so the original unique intention, whatever it was, isn't the sole guiding principle behind it. So, if analyzing a system, rather than trying to dig into its creators' history or anything like that, it's best to just look at what the system is doing and consider that its true current purpose.
  - hnbad 2y ago
    > we're now entering some kind of abstract space that cares not for the stated intentions of humans But that's the thing about systems: they may involve humans but they don't necessarily reflect the intentions of the individual humans involved. Even when a system is created with a stated intent (i.e. for a stated purpose) that doesn't mean it will actually behave in a way that aligns with this intent. Logically you then shouldn't take the human intent into consideration when analyzing a system's actual effects and outcomes (except to determine whether it aligns with those but that's secondary). IOW the purpose of a system (i.e. "what it exists for") can be different from the purpose for which it was created (i.e. "what it is meant to do"). I guess "purpose" in this case is an overloaded term because the former more uses a meaning that more closely aligns with "function" (like the function of a predator in an ecosystem may be controlling prey population but that doesn't suggest intent nor design) and the latter uses a meaning that more closely aligns with "intent" (like during wildfires controlled burns are performed with the intent of stopping the spread of the wildfire). But I'd say it's a stretch to apply this to statements like "the purpose of organisms is to increase entropy" because that strongly implies intent rather than function (because the latter could also be simply expressed as "organisms create entropy").

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

kouru225 2y ago

Pretty sure this is what Schrodingers opinion is in his book “what is life?” But I haven’t read it. Maybe OP got it from that

mjan22640 2y ago

Reproduction is not really a purpose. What makes copies of itself, happens to persist.