Big-ID vs. small-id – Flip-Flopping IDM-Style

One doesn’t need to read far into ‘Intelligent Design’ (Big-ID) theory literature to discover the Intelligent Design Movement’s (IDM’s) refusal to study the supposed ‘Designer(s)’ of that which is said by IDists to be ‘Designed.’ This fact lowers the explanatory power of their theory immensely, almost entirely, even if Big-IDists don’t wish to acknowledge it for ideological purposes.

An easy way to highlight this challenge is to speak of Big-ID and small-id, as I’ve done on this blog already. Discussion about this has also taken place in commentary at Uncommon Descent (UD), one of the IDM’s most popular blogs. Unfortunately, no consensus has yet been reached and thus no clarity to stop the waffling back and forth between the two terms. Likewise, no attempt to sort out when or even if capitalisation of ‘Intelligent Design’ is justified or if non-capitalisation of ‘intelligent design’ is always preferred or if the two linguistic expressions carry the same meaning has been made at UD. This could be done simply by dedicating a single thread to the issue. But for ideological purposes, this is likely not going to happen.

Science Studies and Sociology of Science – On Human Extension

This audio presentation was delivered at the Historiae Scientiarum Baltica – International Baltic Conference on the History of Science October 5, 2012, in the session on Philosophy, Sociology and Humanities. Originally the presentation was titled: “On Natural and Social Scientific Knowledge in Post-Soviet Space,” and it relates to this Blog on the topic of Human Extension. The quality of the recording is not so high, but should be understandable as the first audio upload here at Human Extension Blog.

On Human Extension, Science Studies and Sociology of Science

 

Human Extension in Economics – an alternative to Evolutionary Economic Sociology

Recently during a visit to Krakow, Poland, I received copies of the Journal – “Theory and Practice of Institutional Reforms in Russia,” which included my article: “Evolutionary and Institutional Economics: A View from the Post-Neo-Classical Perspective.” This is the original English article, which was later translated by P.I. Litvinova and M.V. Sinyutin and published as «Рост, развитие и изменения: выход за пределы эволюционной парадигмы» (“Growth, Development and Change: A Post-Neo-Classical Approach to Evolutionary and Institutional Economics.”) and published in the book Evolutionary and Institutional Economics: Discussions, Methods and Applications. St. Petersburg: Aletheia Press, 2012: pp. 101-117.

This article elaborates on the notion of Human Extension (and Intension) in the realm of economics. It promotes the notion of economic tension sociology (ETS) as an alternative to evolutionary social-economics.

A slightly updated version of the article can be found here: 

http://www.academia.edu/2067111/Evolutionary_and_Institutional_Economics_A_View_from_the_Post-Neo-Classical_Perspective

On Extending Around the Globe

Here is a collection of photos from the author of Human Extension practicing the art/science/lifeworld of extending around the globe. These represent some of the author’s travels in recent years. 

London, England

Quebec City, Canada

Varieties of Evolution and Evolutionism – Sociological-Economical-Anthropological-Philosophical

This list of quotations, definitions and figures was collected by:

Gregory Sandstrom

M.A. Philosophy, B.A. Economics, B.A. Sociology

Candidate of Sociological Sciences

St. Petersburg State University

Russian Federation

(2006)

This collection of quotations, definitions and figures was done while in the Netherlands and Russia, working on my Master and PhD degrees. It was intended to show various ways the term ‘evolution’ is used in human-social sciences, i.e. outside of natural-physical sciences. I haven’t done much with it since 2006 and that means it’s in some ways out of date, at least in so far as I’ve probably collected 5+ times more quotations about evolution since then and haven’t yet come around to organise them.

A majority of these quotations were typed (or copy-pasted) directly from the book or article while reading them for academic research. This is not a ‘quote-mined’ list meant for ‘culture-warring’ (e.g. by anti-Darwinian IDists and Creationists), but rather is meant to provoke further thought about how ‘evolutionary’ theories are conceived and applied professionally, by major figures in human-social sciences. In light of the mission of this Blog about Human Extension,  the list also aims at provoking people to consider how evolution is or should be thought of as a limited concept and indeed, how it may even be inappropriate to use ‘evolution’ (i.e. instead of ‘development,’ ‘progress,’ ‘emergence’ or simply ‘change’) in the human-social sciences. The collector of these quotations is not an ‘evolutionist’ and in most cases does not advocate the uses of evolution shown below.

If you appreciate or enjoy a quotation from this list that you hadn’t seen before and would like to save and use it somewhere, please include the link to this Blog article at Human Extension as your mediated source for this citation. Information about the original source is cited in most cases, according to academic referencing standards.

Criticisms of and additions to this list are welcome in the Comments section below.

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Evolution (relative def’n): variation, natural selection, ‘struggle for life’ (T. Malthus) or ‘survival of the fittest’ (H. Spencer), (group rather than individual) change (over long periods of time), random mutation, adaptation, process, differentiation, integration, progress, growth, alteration, metamorphosis, advancement, development, emergence;

Whose Notion of ‘Design in Nature’ Do You Accept?

“Design is a dirty word.” – Adrian Bejan (2012b)

“Life was designed…planned…intended.” – Stephen C. Meyer (2010)

“The old argument of design in nature, as given by Paley, which formerly
seemed to me to be so conclusive, fails, now that the law of natural selection has been discovered.” – Charles Darwin (1887)

A row is ready to erupt over two competing notions of ‘design in nature.’ One has been proposed under the auspices of being a natural-physical law. The other continues to clamour for public attention and respectability among natural-physical scientists, engineers and educators, but carries with it obvious religious overtones (Foundation for Thought and Ethics, Wedge Document and Dover trial 2005) and still has not achieved widespread scholarly support after almost 20 years of trying.

The two positions could not be more different, yet they share something in common, a single phrase: ‘design in nature.’ On the one hand is the Seattle, Washington-based Discovery Institute (DI) Centre for Science and Culture’s notion of ‘design in nature,’ which says that an un-embodied, unnamed, transcendent ‘designer/Designer’ (usually assumed to be either aliens or God) is responsible for creating life on Earth and the cosmos generally speaking. They call this position ‘Intelligent Design’ (ID), which is a theory about life’s origins and the origins of biological information and sometimes about human origins.

4 Causes and 4 Effects: “Intelligent Design Movement” and “Darwinian Evolution”

               “The combination of the four causes and the four effects is the most comprehensive and capable framework that has been developed so far whereby to evaluate the impacts and implications of new technologies.” – William Sheridan (“The Paradigm Shift of the Information Age,” 1990)

In response to Aristotle’s Four Causes – Material, Efficient, Formal and Final - 20th century culture, media and technology theorist Marshall McLuhan – the so-called “Sage of the Wired Age” – came up with Four Effects: Retrieval, Reversal, Obsolescence and Enhancement (or Amplification). This blog post briefly outlines the Four Effects and then applies them along with Aristotle’s Four Causes to two contemporary topics: the Intelligent Design Movement and Darwinian Evolution.

The Laws of Media: Four Effects

Viewed in the form of a (here sequential, but meant as simultaneous) tetrad, Marshall McLuhan poses the following questions about media:

A. “What recurrence or RETRIEVAL of earlier actions and services is brought into play simultaneously by the new form? What older, previously obsolesced ground is brought back and inheres in the new form?”

B. “When pushed to the limits of its potential, the new form will tend to reverse what had been its original characteristics. What is the REVERSAL potential of the new form?”  

C. “If some aspect of a situation is enlarged or enhanced, simultaneously the old condition or un-enhanced situation is displaced thereby. What is pushed aside or OBSOLESCED by the new ‘organ’?”

D. “What does the artefact ENHANCE or intensify or make possible or accelerate? This can be asked concerning a wastebasket, a painting, a steamroller, or a zipper, as well as about a proposition in Euclid or a law of physics. It can be asked about any word or phrase in any language.” (Laws of Media, 1988)