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Author Topic:   What type of biological life will more than likely be found on other planets?
Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 348 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 61 of 178 (670768)
08-18-2012 7:06 PM
Reply to: Message 60 by jar
08-18-2012 7:04 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
No.
Well I disagree with that but ok, make the environment hostile.

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 Message 60 by jar, posted 08-18-2012 7:04 PM jar has replied

Replies to this message:
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jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 62 of 178 (670769)
08-18-2012 7:43 PM
Reply to: Message 61 by Dogmafood
08-18-2012 7:06 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
You are free to disagree with anything, but I see little evidence that intelligence offers any advantage or that it is a characteristic likely to be found in biological life on other planets.

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

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Replies to this message:
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NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 63 of 178 (670770)
08-18-2012 7:44 PM
Reply to: Message 55 by Dogmafood
08-18-2012 6:13 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
On the one side you have life springing up at every possible opportunity in every imaginable form. On the other, you have natural selection screening out the unsuited candidates. If intelligence is a beneficial characteristic (which I think is undeniable) then does it not stand to reason that organisms with more intelligence than their co-habitants will be more likely to survive?
An intelligent rat might have better chances for survival then an unintelligent one. But perhaps other strategies can give unintelligent rats and edge over intelligent humans. We may actually outnumber rats on earth, but their population is likely on the same order of magnitude as the human population.
And there might well be circumstances in which no degree of intelligence will enable survival, but some of those other strategies (like being able to forgo eating and drinking for a few days or months or being able to survive after flash freezing) will allow unintelligent animals to survive when any human would be long dead.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal and hasten the resurrection of the dead. William Lloyd Garrison.
Choose silence of all virtues, for by it you hear other men's imperfections, and conceal your own. George Bernard Shaw

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 348 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 64 of 178 (670771)
08-18-2012 8:16 PM
Reply to: Message 63 by NoNukes
08-18-2012 7:44 PM


Accumulated Intelligence
Is there any species who's evolutionary history shows that they have become less intelligent over time?

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 Message 63 by NoNukes, posted 08-18-2012 7:44 PM NoNukes has replied

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jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 65 of 178 (670772)
08-18-2012 8:42 PM
Reply to: Message 64 by Dogmafood
08-18-2012 8:16 PM


Re: Accumulated Intelligence
Jury is still out, but I know of no species where there is evidence they have become more intelligent over time either.

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

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 Message 64 by Dogmafood, posted 08-18-2012 8:16 PM Dogmafood has not replied

  
Blue Jay
Member (Idle past 2697 days)
Posts: 2843
From: You couldn't pronounce it with your mouthparts
Joined: 02-04-2008


Message 66 of 178 (670773)
08-18-2012 9:37 PM
Reply to: Message 52 by Taq
08-17-2012 4:46 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
Hi, Taq.
Taq writes:
We can also point out that an articulated skeleton evolved twice. There seems to be a general trend towards this condition for ambulatory terrestrial species.
Well, I think we know that this condition is beneficial for ambulatory terrestrial species, because both lineages in which the condition appeared were very successful. But, it isn't a matter of where these characteristics are successful, but where they can evolve.
In both cases, the articulated skeleton predated terrestriality. So, it wouldn't be accurate to say that terrestriality selects for articulated skeletons. So, under what conditions does an articulated skeleton evolve? They apparently evolved as marine ambulators and swimmers.
But, skeletal creatures don't seem to be unusually successful as marine ambulators: soft-bodied molluscs and radial echinoderms are just as competitive. Skeletal creatures were exceptionally successful as swimmers, though, but other groups were, as well (e.g. squid). To me, this suggests that the complete lack of articulated skeletons would be a very real possibility for an alien biosphere.
(Again: devil's advocate here. I also think skeletons would be relatively likely to evolve).

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)
Darwin loves you.

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Blue Jay
Member (Idle past 2697 days)
Posts: 2843
From: You couldn't pronounce it with your mouthparts
Joined: 02-04-2008


Message 67 of 178 (670774)
08-18-2012 10:11 PM
Reply to: Message 62 by jar
08-18-2012 7:43 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
Hi, Jar.
jar writes:
...I see little evidence that intelligence offers any advantage...
That intelligence offers evolutionary advantages is pretty obvious. Only a select few species have spread across the entire globe, one of which is us, and most of the others of which were helped along by our actions. And, it's a demonstrable fact that our intelligence was the key to our expansion across the globe. Denying this is pretty silly.
Intelligence is clearly beneficial. For example, exploiting a new food source typically requires some evolutionary change, which entails mutations and natural selection and several generations, and blah blah blah.
But, with intelligence, a single individual can learn how to exploit a new food source within a single lifetime. And, the more intelligence, the more new food sources an individual can learn to exploit in a single lifetime. This is highly useful in a variable environment, or in an environment in which food is difficult to find.
However, human intelligence (let's use the word "sapience") is perhaps less useful. Physiologically, our big brain is more expensive than other animals' brains; and the added versatility sapience provides over, for example, lemur intelligence, is probably more a luxury than an evolutionary necessity. This means it will only prove evolutionarily successful under certain circumstances.
So, will sapient life be rare? Probably. There are probably fewer life-bearing worlds with sapient life than without. But, it seems pretty naive and silly to say that it isn't advantageous, and even more naive and silly to use this to justify saying that intelligent life will not be found on other planets.

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)
Darwin loves you.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 62 by jar, posted 08-18-2012 7:43 PM jar has replied

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 Message 68 by jar, posted 08-18-2012 10:20 PM Blue Jay has replied
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jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


(1)
Message 68 of 178 (670775)
08-18-2012 10:20 PM
Reply to: Message 67 by Blue Jay
08-18-2012 10:11 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
You are free to hold that belief, but I don't see any evidence that supports it. Exploiting a new food source is not an indication of intelligence that I can see.
As I have said many times, human intelligence is an outlier and so far the jury is out on whether intelligence will prove to be an advantage. Sure, humans have expanded into most environments thanks to technology and it does seem that we are the only species so far to actually develop the concept of technology. But are we more successful than cockroaches?

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 67 by Blue Jay, posted 08-18-2012 10:11 PM Blue Jay has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 72 by Blue Jay, posted 08-19-2012 12:40 AM jar has replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 69 of 178 (670776)
08-18-2012 11:10 PM
Reply to: Message 64 by Dogmafood
08-18-2012 8:16 PM


Re: Accumulated Intelligence
Is there any species who's evolutionary history shows that they have become less intelligent over time?
How many species have changed intelligence at all over time? Have homo sapiens increased in intelligence?

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal and hasten the resurrection of the dead. William Lloyd Garrison.
Choose silence of all virtues, for by it you hear other men's imperfections, and conceal your own. George Bernard Shaw

This message is a reply to:
 Message 64 by Dogmafood, posted 08-18-2012 8:16 PM Dogmafood has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 73 by Dogmafood, posted 08-19-2012 8:18 AM NoNukes has not replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


(2)
Message 70 of 178 (670778)
08-18-2012 11:23 PM
Reply to: Message 67 by Blue Jay
08-18-2012 10:11 PM


Re: Hands are Handy -- so are survival memes
Hi Blue Jay, Jar and Dogmafood
Dogmafood Message 57: Intelligence is certainly not a prerequisite for survival.
But if you take 2 cephalopods and one is more intelligent than the other, which is more likely to survive any particular environment?
My guess would be that it would be marginal in some situations and neutral in others, that intelligence needs to be considered to be more important when communication is involved.
jar Message 58: No idea.
If you take 2 humans and one is more intelligent than the other, which is more likely to survive any particular environment?
I have no idea there either. A bunch of the brightest most intelligent folk I knew were dead before they were 25.
Also irrelevant.
Biology and evolution involve populations not individuals.
And your anecdotal evidence applies to individuals not populations. If the advantage in organisms with intelligence is marginal or neutral then it can spread within the population until a level is reached where some threshold his passed. That threshold, imhysao, is when communication kicks in.
Blue Jay: But, with intelligence, a single individual can learn how to exploit a new food source within a single lifetime. And, the more intelligence, the more new food sources an individual can learn to exploit in a single lifetime. This is highly useful in a variable environment, or in an environment in which food is difficult to find.
What we see in other species that we recognize as intelligent in varying levels up to where some select apes are measurable more intelligent than some (clinically moron) humans ... is the ability to communicate.
A single organism that learns how to exploit a new food resource or other means of survival will have an advantage in some situations compared to the others, but when it can pass that information to others then the whole population benefits.
We see many animals (mostly mammals) where the young stay with the mother for extended periods learning how to survive. A mother bear cares for their offspring for 3 years or so (iirc) in order that they learn how to use the available food sources. Birds teach their young how to find food, and many other examples exist of similar teaching of survival behaviors.
Dawkins coined the term "meme" to refer to this passage of knowledge from one generation to the next within a breeding population.
That intelligence offers evolutionary advantages is pretty obvious.
That intelligence + communication offers evolutionary advantage is documented fact.
Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day, teach them to fish and you feed them for life, teach a village how to fish and you improve their overall ability to survive.
But ...
... my personal opinion is that curiosity and creativity are more important aspects than plain vanila intelligence, and this accounts for some anomalies in humans -- high IQ people are not notable for attracting mates, rock stars are. Imho, sexual selection of creative people (artists) is increasingly more important in the recent (last ~8million years) evolution of humans than survival selection. See Sexual Selection, Stasis, Runaway Selection, Dimorphism, & Human Evolution for more of my thoughts in this regard.
Enjoy.
Edited by RAZD, : .

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.


Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click)

This message is a reply to:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 71 of 178 (670779)
08-18-2012 11:47 PM
Reply to: Message 55 by Dogmafood
08-18-2012 6:13 PM


The inevitable rise of intelligence through evolution
Hi Dogmafood,
If intelligence is a beneficial characteristic (which I think is undeniable) then does it not stand to reason that organisms with more intelligence than their co-habitants ...
... will evolve?
Yes, it seems to me that it is inevitable - you can't get stupider than dead but there is no limit to how intelligent you can get, and this results in a skewed curve with lots of comparatively low intelligence organisms but no limit to the top end ... the pattern we can see -- even within humans (an IQ of 50 or less cannot survive iirc, while the average is arbitrarily set to 100, and there are a lot of people with over 150 IQ ... meaning there are as many people between 50 and 100 as there are over 100 ... including the ones between 150 and 200).
There are also several stages we can see in the development of usefulness for intelligence:
  1. marginal intelligence, marginal or neutral survival benefit
  2. communication, allows memes to be passed from one generation to the next
  3. self-awareness, allows cognition of self as an entity within a larger whole
  4. tribe awareness, allows cognition of the value of cooperation with other humans
  5. global awareness, allows cognition of the value of all organic life in an integrated whole for long term survival (a process we seem to have trouble getting through)
There may be more.
If this is true would it not lead to an accumulation of intelligent creatures over billions of years and billions of planets?
Again, yes. In my personal opinion, if there were a purpose behind the use of evolution by and intelligent designer, that it would be to create intelligent organisms, that we may just be one stepping stone or one trial along that path that is still evolving.
But that's the Deist in me ...
Enjoy.
Edited by RAZD, : clrty

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.


Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 55 by Dogmafood, posted 08-18-2012 6:13 PM Dogmafood has replied

Replies to this message:
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Blue Jay
Member (Idle past 2697 days)
Posts: 2843
From: You couldn't pronounce it with your mouthparts
Joined: 02-04-2008


Message 72 of 178 (670782)
08-19-2012 12:40 AM
Reply to: Message 68 by jar
08-18-2012 10:20 PM


Re: Hands are Handy
Hi, Jar.
jar writes:
You are free to hold that belief, but I don't see any evidence that supports it. Exploiting a new food source is not an indication of intelligence that I can see.
Really? I realize that the burden of proof is on me, but if you're going to be the skeptic and play the "deliberately obtuse" game, you have to say more than, "nope, no evidence" in each one of your posts.
jar writes:
As I have said many times, human intelligence is an outlier and so far the jury is out on whether intelligence will prove to be an advantage.
Humans have adapted to every terrestrial habitat on the planet in under 1,000,000 years. No other species has even come close to that. And this is demonstrably related to our intelligence, because we couldn't have done it if we hadn't figured out how to make clothing, control fire, hunt hundreds of different kinds of prey, build tools for processing many types of materials, and harvest thousands of kinds of plant foods.
jar writes:
But are we more successful than cockroaches?
Do we have to be?

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)
Darwin loves you.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 68 by jar, posted 08-18-2012 10:20 PM jar has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 75 by jar, posted 08-19-2012 9:07 AM Blue Jay has replied

  
Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 348 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 73 of 178 (670794)
08-19-2012 8:18 AM
Reply to: Message 69 by NoNukes
08-18-2012 11:10 PM


Re: Accumulated Intelligence
How many species have changed intelligence at all over time? Have homo sapiens increased in intelligence?
I don't mean within a species but when compared to a predecessor. I suppose that it would be difficult to determine but surely Homo Sapiens are more intelligent than say Homo Heidlebergensis or Homo Ergaster.

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 348 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 74 of 178 (670796)
08-19-2012 8:57 AM
Reply to: Message 71 by RAZD
08-18-2012 11:47 PM


Re: The inevitable rise of intelligence through evolution
In my personal opinion, if there were a purpose behind the use of evolution by and intelligent designer, that it would be to create intelligent organisms, that we may just be one stepping stone or one trial along that path that is still evolving.
I don't see the need to invoke 'purpose' but just looking at it as a process of refinement where the more intelligent creatures are more likely to make it through the sieve...but that is just the atheist in me.
Also, with regard to memes, as the general level of education of a population increases do their chances of survival not also increase? We may not be more intelligent than our ancestors from the 14th C but we are more able to survive, say, a plague or an asteroid attack.

This message is a reply to:
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jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 75 of 178 (670797)
08-19-2012 9:07 AM
Reply to: Message 72 by Blue Jay
08-19-2012 12:40 AM


Re: Hands are Handy
The issue is whether or not intelligence is advantageous and whether or not it is likely to be a characteristic of life found on other planets.
Yes, in the single example of humans, they, as a species developed technology and it is that technology, not their intelligence, that allowed them to spread.
I know of no way to tell if a human is smarter than a cephalopod or elephant or dolphin and we just ain't been here long enough to know if human intelligence is going to be an advantage.
But when discussing what life forms may be found elsewhere the overwhelming evidence is that the vast majority of successful life forms here on earth are NOT intelligent.

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 72 by Blue Jay, posted 08-19-2012 12:40 AM Blue Jay has replied

Replies to this message:
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