johnbrandt wrote:Nope. I would wager even going so far as to say "Never".

Deep down we're still animals, tribal animals at that. There will always be people at all levels of society who look for the weak, watch for opportunities to prey on anyone who they see as lesser beings, and who see nothing wrong with breaking whatever law is in place on whatever subject.

I find these "there will always be" statements to be strangely typical. Why would a truly honest, generous person presume to be a prophet?

And on eugenics:

Without human eugenics programs (You're a Nazi! A NAZI!! ) there would be no way to weed out these people.

This is the humdrum (sorry to say it!) Fallacy of Guilt by Association. No person in his right mind will denounce eugenics solely on the basis that Hitler was a eugenicist.

Quite frankly, I think compassionate eugenics is a brilliant idea. We could take measures to make the lives of people with genetic deformities comfortable and even sexually service them (by means of "safe sex"). The stigma against sex and against "ugly people" has been perpetrated by the myths of Christianity. Now that we are an advanced civilization, we can do much better. I, for one, think that evil has arisen primarily from our treatment of people we perceive as "ugly."

Mean people, of course, will need to be put away as obstacles to happiness. The rest -- those with disabilities or "unattractive" features -- far from "weeding them out," why don't we gratify them?

I think eugenics is stupid, because it means we're trying to steer evolution. Evolution is a kind of optimization algorithm that needs zero knowledge to adjust to a thing. If we start tampering with it too much, our tampering will be limited by our knowledge of things, we may very well end up optimizing for things that are useless, optimizing away things that are important, etc. I could write a longer, more detailed post on my reasoning about this.

I object to eugenics because evolution is a better optimization technique when there's unknown variables involved.

Zwaarddijk wrote:I think eugenics is stupid, because it means we're trying to steer evolution. Evolution is a kind of optimization algorithm that needs zero knowledge to adjust to a thing. If we start tampering with it too much, our tampering will be limited by our knowledge of things, we may very well end up optimizing for things that are useless, optimizing away things that are important, etc. I could write a longer, more detailed post on my reasoning about this.

I object to eugenics because evolution is a better optimization technique when there's unknown variables involved.

My first response to your objection is that we could "phase in" a eugenics program, limiting it at first to a single island or society for a few decades (or even centuries!) and seeing what would come of it. That way, there will be far less danger involved in "tinkering" with human DNA as you might call it.

Second, we could begin with a sensible approach about what to eliminate from the gene pool (or encourage the elimination of). Things that bring about intense agony or suffering, or misery of any other kind, such as certain physical deformities, probably do not contribute as much to success in human endeavor as do some very special anomalies such as autistic genius. In our attempt to better our quality of life genetically, we could at least begin with what we know is bad.

On what do you base your claim that unknown variables make evolution a better optimizing technique? On the contrary, shouldn't all knowledge lead to a clearer comprehension of what would be most beneficial?

Scott H wrote:

Zwaarddijk wrote:I think eugenics is stupid, because it means we're trying to steer evolution. Evolution is a kind of optimization algorithm that needs zero knowledge to adjust to a thing. If we start tampering with it too much, our tampering will be limited by our knowledge of things, we may very well end up optimizing for things that are useless, optimizing away things that are important, etc. I could write a longer, more detailed post on my reasoning about this.

I object to eugenics because evolution is a better optimization technique when there's unknown variables involved.

My first response to your objection is that we could "phase in" a eugenics program, limiting it at first to a single island or society for a few decades (or even centuries!) and seeing what would come of it. That way, there will be far less danger involved in "tinkering" with human DNA as you might call it.

You still don't understand the problem. Evolution works best, given that we don't know what we'll need to adapt to*, if there's a good random selection of genes available. Eugenics limits the random selection.

* unlike dog-breeding, where you know you want dogs that fit a given kind of profile

Second, we could begin with a sensible approach about what to eliminate from the gene pool (or encourage the elimination of). Things that bring about intense agony or suffering, or misery of any other kind, such as certain physical deformities, probably do not contribute as much to success in human endeavor as do some very special anomalies such as autistic genius. In our attempt to better our quality of life genetically, we could at least begin with what we know is bad.

I think autistic genius best serves us in the long run if we let it be *ahem* weeded out by natural means. That is, those autists (and genius autists among them) who are good at learning to fit in are more likely to procreate. Why

On what do you base your claim that unknown variables make evolution a better optimizing technique? On the contrary, shouldn't all knowledge lead to a clearer comprehension of what would be most beneficial?

Look, you clearly misunderstand my point. For natural, random evolution to work, we need zero knowledge about anything. Over enough generations, given big enough variation and enough resources and assuming nothing catastrophic occurs to the population, it will optimize, taking into account variables we don't even know yet.

If we have knowledge, we could of course optimize for those variables, but hey, there may always be variables we just don't know. If we go in for efficient eugenics, we will limit the natural variety in the gene pool more than nature would, and that limits the options. There will always be unknowns that we can't take into account when doing this optimization, whereas evolution seems to be pretty good at providing enough variation to ensure (not always, but more often than we have - just look at all breeds of dogs that have serious health issues due to overengineering) a good pool to pick from in the future.

This is the kind of problem you need to learn to think of, and stop thinking of a romanticised eugenics as something that would've been so great hadn't the nazis tarred it forever; you seem, basically, to think of it as the most misunderstood thing ever. And I am saying you are misunderstanding evolution way more than we misunderstand eugenics.

But eugenics is soooo much kinder and more humane than natural evolution.

Instead of "weeding" out the weak, which generally means let them meet an unpleasant death, we could get the same effect through sterilization.

Tyrannical wrote:But eugenics is soooo much kinder and more humane than natural evolution.

Instead of "weeding" out the weak, which generally means let them meet an unpleasant death, we could get the same effect through sterilization.

But if we arbitrarily have to draw a line for what weakness is, we're not really providing more genetic variation.

Weeding out the week also doesn't necessarily mean letting them meet an unpleasant death - sterility caused by nature is a weakness in this instance, and sterile people don't die any more painful deaths than the rest of us.

To end Evil via eugenics, you need to prevent individuals that exhibit violent or anti-social behavior from reproducing. Simple as that, just put extreme environmental selection against those traits.

It's just so mean to let all these freaks (I'm reappropriating the word 'freak') wallow in torment for the amusement of bullies, television viewers, and the general public. I do not see anything in Zwaarddijk's "unknown variables" argument to excuse all these painful illnesses, when we could very well just pretend to be another ("natural") instrument of natural selection, by introducing standards of fitness. If evolution is an optimizing algorithm, as Zwaarddijk says, why wouldn't it optimize to the presence of a eugenics program?

And this is nothing like the cruel eugenics programs heretofore envisioned by Nietzsche and his contemporaries. Even Francis Galton said something in Kantsaywhere about "surveillance" of the unattractive. He went so far as to suggest that they be encouraged to leave the island. What I'm speaking of here is indulgence of the unattractive, showing them a little love, while at the same time raising health- and fitness-consciousness in the context of sexual selection.

Scott H wrote:It's just so mean to let all these freaks (I'm reappropriating the word 'freak') wallow in torment for the amusement of bullies, television viewers, and the general public. I do not see anything in Zwaarddijk's "unknown variables" argument to excuse all these painful illnesses, when we could very well just pretend to be another ("natural") instrument of natural selection, by introducing standards of fitness. If evolution is an optimizing algorithm, as Zwaarddijk says, why wouldn't it optimize to the presence of a eugenics program?

Have you even tried considering what I mean? It seems not. Look, electronic optimization programs have come up with solutions for some electrical engineering problems that no electrical engineer would ever consider, yet they work. We're the result of billions of years of such an algorithm. Yet you think we, with very meager knowledge, can step in and fix stuff? That's intellectual arrogance at its worst, which pretty much *always* has been one main problem of eugenics.

When it comes to unattractiveness, it is quite likely that attractiveness is judged in comparison to what's available, and we'll perceive anyone in the small tail of a bell curve as attractive, those in the middle as ok, and those in the small tail on the other end as repulsive. Doing something to adjust that will probably just adjust the scales so the same percentages are maintained. (If what we find attractive is based on learning - which it seems fairly sure it is.)

Zwaarddijk wrote:Have you even tried considering what I mean? It seems not. Look, electronic optimization programs have come up with solutions for some electrical engineering problems that no electrical engineer would ever consider, yet they work. We're the result of billions of years of such an algorithm. Yet you think we, with very meager knowledge, can step in and fix stuff? That's intellectual arrogance at its worst, which pretty much *always* has been one main problem of eugenics.

I'd like to know more about what you mean when you say that "evolution is an optimizing algorithm." What is being optimized here, and when does evolution -- in the "natural" sense -- stop being evolution? (If the answer is that "fitness" is being optimized, how are we defining fitness?)

I'm not suggesting that we go in and try to convert every nation in the world to a eugenics program, either. What I'm saying is that we start out with a single colony, and see how compassionate eugenics works first. That's not intellectual arrogance, I wouldn't say.

When it comes to unattractiveness, it is quite likely that attractiveness is judged in comparison to what's available, and we'll perceive anyone in the small tail of a bell curve as attractive, those in the middle as ok, and those in the small tail on the other end as repulsive.

I do not for a minute believe that it is likely that attractiveness has to be bell-curve-judged among people. Surely fitness is measured on an absolute scale (unless we're bullies), whether or not attractiveness is. So our absolute fitness would still go up and presumably increase our quality of life.

In addition to proving that unattractiveness has to be bell-curve-measured, I think you'd also have to prove that unattractiveness is inescapably proportional to suffering, and that the constant of proportionality is fixed over time -- i.e., that the unattractive would be just as miserable with the eugenics program as without.

I couldn't really think of any other word to describe what I mean. What I'm asking is, do you guys think there will ever be a time when people will stop having hurtful and overly selfish ideas?

Oh,I reckon about the same time you do.

There is a little bad in the best of us,and a little good in the worst of us(anon)

Scott H wrote:

Zwaarddijk wrote:Have you even tried considering what I mean? It seems not. Look, electronic optimization programs have come up with solutions for some electrical engineering problems that no electrical engineer would ever consider, yet they work. We're the result of billions of years of such an algorithm. Yet you think we, with very meager knowledge, can step in and fix stuff? That's intellectual arrogance at its worst, which pretty much *always* has been one main problem of eugenics.

I'd like to know more about what you mean when you say that "evolution is an optimizing algorithm." What is being optimized here, and when does evolution -- in the "natural" sense -- stop being evolution? (If the answer is that "fitness" is being optimized, how are we defining fitness?)

If you even have to ask

I'm not suggesting that we go in and try to convert every nation in the world to a eugenics program, either. What I'm saying is that we start out with a single colony, and see how compassionate eugenics works first. That's not intellectual arrogance, I wouldn't say.

When it comes to unattractiveness, it is quite likely that attractiveness is judged in comparison to what's available, and we'll perceive anyone in the small tail of a bell curve as attractive, those in the middle as ok, and those in the small tail on the other end as repulsive.

I do not for a minute believe that it is likely that attractiveness has to be bell-curve-judged among people. Surely fitness is measured on an absolute scale (unless we're bullies), whether or not attractiveness is. So our absolute fitness would still go up and presumably increase our quality of life.

In addition to proving that unattractiveness has to be bell-curve-measured, I think you'd also have to prove that unattractiveness is inescapably proportional to suffering, and that the constant of proportionality is fixed over time -- i.e., that the unattractive would be just as miserable with the eugenics program as without.

Do you even understand evolution? I am getting powerful vibes that you're really more getting something halfway between superhero comic evolution and real actual evolution.

Whether attractiveness is bell-curvey or not, the fact that attractiveness isn't culturally universal does kind of favor my suspicion that it does adjust to the circumstances. How the fuck would fitness be measured universally? It's pretty clear different things make for fitness in different circumstances (hence, ... fucking SPECIATION), and evolution has made us somewhat good at spotting what's good in different circumstances (but our ability is spotty enough to permit for some random variation). Even thinking that fitness is an universal measurement makes me wonder whether you understand evolution the slightest! Why you think being a bully has anything to do with it remains a mystery. Absolute fitness is a fucking joke.

I wonder whether you know how evolution works at this point.

Zwaarddijk,

I'm not here to make you angry. I have always disliked bitter flamewars in forum threads. So I will end with this: I don't understand why you'd claim that evolution is an "optimization algorithm." Evolution is something that happens over a span of billions of years and results in the ever-increasing complexity of lifeforms. An optimization algorithm is, by definition, a set of instructions operating on some kind of material to produce a "best" outcome. How you deduce that the second concept applies to the first, I do not know.

Really, I just want everyone to have this beautifully hot and fulfilling sex. Maybe compassionate eugenics is a step in that direction.