How did we get language?

Your learned dissertation is impressive!

However, to me it is rather obvious and simple understood that language is an "ambi-advantageously
evolved" (ambi-advantagously adaptive or "ambi-adaptive"😉 function.

Thee word "ambi" being used by me partly to generally reflect the fact that "opportunity and
adversity type selective pressures" have often and with apparently decisive 'genotyping'
significance often 'pressured' living organisms simultaneously.

Language functions has of course deep and elaborate roots in phylogeny.

Language has an ambi-advantageously controling social function. E.g., it serves cooperative niche-
exploiting efforts, and the learning/refinement of such efforts; And, some *not-just-neocortical*
correlates of language also serve a function that I call "selective Hibernation" (others have used
words and phrases such as repression, "pain gating" and "ideas as opiates", for the same thing).

One end of the meaning of "ambi" serves selective consciousness the other serves "selective
_unconsciousness_" .

(Apropos consciousness, A.R. Luria, as per Chapter 2 of his book "The Working Brain, and
Introduction to Neuropsychology", has, perhaps unintentionallly, suggested a very pragmatic simple
and unifying "neuropsychophysiological" defintion of consciousness -- that an essential
neurophysiological cause of consciousness is the "energizing" component behind any motor and
"sensorimotor" activity is "reticular activating type" [my name] neurons.)

All our capabilities, including those that uses or have close couplings to language, conform to, and
are organized (in individual real-time) by, the general brain-functional principle "lateral
inhibition" [or "center/surround excitation/inhibition"]. Lateral inhibition is a major organizing
mechanism by which one and not the other of functionally-adaptively incompatible "actention modules"
(this EPT concept, or concEPT, is closely related to the rather recent concepts of "sensorimotor
contingencies" and to one as old as "neural assemblies"😉.

I have noticed that stage performances that exploit the power of hypnosis are very instructive as
far as getting an insight into the ordinary (every-day) functional and adptational depth of the
powers of language.

E.g.:- Children being socialized by parents and peers; The fact that disciples of gurus or subjects
of states/governments and of dictators, being (for better or for worse) *steered* by lingually-
transmitted behaviour and attitude reinforcing and specifying "demagogic instructions"; And how,
and that, an "actention selection system" can come to pay vital actentional (consciousness
generating) "energy" on producing a *hopeful* mental-ideational focus of actention instead of a
painful (or distressful) *futile* such *when* an individual's reality (or life-stiuational
totality) actually contains a "selective Hibernation imploring type situation" and/or the conditioned-
in dynamic aftermath of such.

[Whilst I label such residues of such experiences with the acronym CURSES, most people tend to
describe this category of memories as "tramatic memories"; others would euphemistically call them
"engrams", and yet others would more bluntly call such memories "primal pain".]

In these (and other) ways, language offers the means whereby neural-motivational impulses, impulses
that would *potentially* become self/socially defeating instinctive behaviours, can be blocked (or
"gated"😉 and rerouted in the direction of being utilized for learning/developing/refining ((and of
course for energizing or activating) more productive, or even straight-out *reproductive* (or at
least _less improductive and more likely lineage-perpetuating) actention modules.

Regards,

P

"Peter F." <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Your learned dissertation is impressive!

Thanks.

Quoted message said:

However, to me it is rather obvious and simple understood that language is an "ambi-advantageously
evolved" (ambi-advantagously adaptive or "ambi-adaptive"😉 function.

It is one thing to ask what function(s) language serves in general terms and another to ask why
languages have the specific universal properties that they have. Why do we have this language
capacity and not some other communication system with different rules? I personally think this
question is more interesting and leads to more focussed inquiry.

Quoted message said:

Thee word "ambi" being used by me partly to generally reflect the fact that "opportunity and
adversity type selective pressures" have often and with apparently decisive 'genotyping'
significance often 'pressured' living organisms simultaneously.

I think we should expect there to be multiple pressures both for and against _any_ given
evolutionary change. All that is required is that the benefits outweigh the costs for the change to
confer a selective advantage.

Quoted message said:

Language functions has of course deep and elaborate roots in phylogeny.

Language has an ambi-advantageously controling social function. E.g., it serves cooperative niche-
exploiting efforts, and the learning/refinement of such efforts;

One apparent paradox arises here. If language is advantageous because it allows us to learn about
the world without having to directly experience it, then we appear to have an advantage associated
with understanding language, but not for producing language. What is the advantage to the speaker's
genes in providing information to others? You could approach this from the point of view of kin
selection, in which case providing information to others confers an advantage to the speaker's genes
if the individuals that hear that information are close kin (i.e., share a significant proportion of
the speaker's genes). Another way would be to invoke ideas of a social contract (helping others
makes them more likely to help you in return). The benefits of this kind of cooperation would
presumably outweigh the very low costs associated with providing information to others.

But I don't think there really is a question to answer here because it simply isn't true that
providing information only ever benefits the listener. There are many cases in which speaking
appears to benefit the speaker rather than the listener (e.g., boasting, propaganda) and many cases
in which it is potentially beneficial to both parties
(e.g., persuasion, negotiation), so the question of the speaker's advantage may not be as
paradoxical as some have suggested. For a bit more on this issue, have a look at the second
half of this paper:

Turner, H. (2002). An introduction to methods for simulating the evolution of language. In A.
Cangelosi & D. Parisi (Eds.) Simulating the evolution of language. London: Springer-Verlag.

Quoted message said:

And, some *not-just-neocortical* correlates of language also serve a function that I call
"selective Hibernation" (others have used words and phrases such as repression, "pain gating" and
"ideas as opiates", for the same thing).

I'm not sure how making someone feel better would provide a selective advantage to either the
speaker or the listener. Pain and emotional distress are presumably adaptive responses to threats
from the environment.

Quoted message said:

One end of the meaning of "ambi" serves selective consciousness the other serves "selective
_unconsciousness_" .

Not sure what you mean by this.

Quoted message said:

(Apropos consciousness, A.R. Luria, as per Chapter 2 of his book "The Working Brain, and
Introduction to Neuropsychology", has, perhaps unintentionallly, suggested a very pragmatic simple
and unifying "neuropsychophysiological" defintion of consciousness -- that an essential
neurophysiological cause of consciousness is the "energizing" component behind any motor and
"sensorimotor" activity is "reticular activating type" [my name] neurons.)

I'm not sure we gain anything by bringing consciousness into a discussion about language evolution.

Quoted message said:

All our capabilities, including those that uses or have close couplings to language, conform to,
and are organized (in individual real-time) by, the general brain-functional principle "lateral
inhibition" [or "center/surround excitation/inhibition"]. Lateral inhibition is a major organizing
mechanism by which one and not the other of functionally-adaptively incompatible "actention
modules" (this EPT concept, or concEPT, is closely related to the rather recent concepts of
"sensorimotor contingencies" and to one as old as "neural assemblies"😉.

I'm not sure what lateral inhibition has to do with it either. And what do you mean by 'actention'?

Quoted message said:

I have noticed that stage performances that exploit the power of hypnosis are very instructive as
far as getting an insight into the ordinary (every-day) functional and adptational depth of the
powers of language.

I guess you are alluding to powers of suggestion, which don't appear to be limited to the domain
of language.

Quoted message said:

E.g.:- Children being socialized by parents and peers; The fact that disciples of gurus or
subjects of states/governments and of dictators, being (for better or for worse) *steered* by
lingually-transmitted behaviour and attitude reinforcing and specifying "demagogic
instructions"; And how, and that, an "actention selection system" can come to pay vital
actentional (consciousness generating) "energy" on producing a *hopeful* mental-ideational
focus of actention instead of a painful (or distressful) *futile* such *when* an individual's
reality (or life-stiuational totality) actually contains a "selective Hibernation imploring
type situation" and/or the conditioned-in dynamic aftermath of such.

[Whilst I label such residues of such experiences with the acronym CURSES, most people tend to
describe this category of memories as "tramatic memories"; others would euphemistically call them
"engrams", and yet others would more bluntly call such memories "primal pain".]

In these (and other) ways, language offers the means whereby neural-motivational impulses,
impulses that would *potentially* become self/socially defeating instinctive behaviours, can be
blocked (or "gated"😉 and rerouted in the direction of being utilized for
learning/developing/refining ((and of course for energizing or activating) more productive, or
even straight-out *reproductive* (or at least _less improductive and more likely lineage-
perpetuating) actention modules.

You've lost me.

Quoted message said:

Regards,

P

f.

---
Like-minds don't notice shared mistakes. Talk to someone else.

When I wrote,

Quoted message said:

Thee word "ambi" being used by me partly to generally reflect the fact

that

Quoted message said:

"opportunity and adversity type selective pressures" have often and with apparently decisive
'genotyping' significance often 'pressured' living organisms simultaneously,

I perhaps should have stolen some spacetime to mention that my main aim (ulterior philosophical
motive or undertaking) is that the meaning of "ambi" (of the pragmatic construct ambi-advantageous)
of its rational philosophical funneling into putting (and perversely promoting) a special focus of
attention onto a certain powerfully revealing (provided it is appropriately understood😉 evolution
theoretical _sub_principle.

This subprinciple rests partly (but importantly) on my notion (and defintion) of selective (as in
specific or precisely localized) Hibernation (as in "an adaptive minimization of metabolic
activity"😉.

Other necessary prerequisits are a capability and willingness to recognize the fact and logical
validity of that occurrence of "selective Hibernation imploring type situations" ([censored] for short)
with significant frequency (almost throughout phylogeny) have coincided or overlapped with what may
be *very importantly meant* by (to [censored] dialectically opposed by, but not in any strict physical or
philosophical sense diametrically juxaposed) "Opportunity-type" selective/evolutionary pressures.

"AEVASIVE", then, needs to be understood and grasped (and used with grammatical flexibility) with a
multi-pronged mind-set, or from an - suitably EPT - perspective; one that *amongst else* include
having come to grips with the notion of "selective Hibernation" and its role in the functioning of
"Actention Selection Systems" (concEPTual replacement of brains, nervous systems, or most broadly,
"brainbody" systems). Thereof my instructive inclusion of the term "endo-opiates" (at the end of the
very much pragmatically contrived acronym AEVASIVE).

P

P.S.I have framed this (by me spotted) subprinciple - and contrived its "concEPTual form" - by help
of a small and stylistically consistent assortment of freshly redesigned terms. Some of these
are turgid or at least relatively straight examples of fuzzy logic being applied and made
concrete by amalgamation of two ordinary words, others are built to be turdgid or otherwise bent
enough to deserve to be considered concrete (concEPTual) examples of fuzz_silly logic; However,
regardless, all are classified/identified as concEPTs.

More importantly, to the uncertain extent that my "explanation pursuing thinking" has led to a
written philosophical product, that product (EPT) is of course basically and almost totally built
from, and upon, relevant and by Science# as a whole already securely established: principles,
theories, interpretations, concepts, or suchlike intellectually informative 'items'.

You won't be surprised that the "super principle" that my subprinciple is "sub to" (or needs to be
su-understood by) is of course Darwin's "natural selection".

To the deliberate extent that EPT contains certain jocular dimensions, these are also either
explained or explainable by rational and science-aligned EPT arguments. But I suggest you just enjoy
them to the extent that you can. (BTW, one of these dimensions is such that it would help if you had
some "septic" humor.)

---
# Science - always with a capital S to indicate that the word is meant in a
holistic, and more encompassing than usual, sense - can be very approximately defined as:~ Human
practical and/or mental pursuits and discoveries whereby *anything* from philosophical insights to
technological know-how has accumulated.

Huck Turner said:

"Peter F." <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Your learned dissertation is impressive!

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Language functions has of course deep and elaborate roots in phylogeny.

Language has an ambi-advantageously controling social function.
E.g., it serves cooperative niche-exploiting efforts, and the learning/refinement of such
efforts;

One apparent paradox arises here.

Only if one does not even do the most basic of analysis on the problem.

Quoted message said:

If language is advantageous because it allows us to learn about the world without having to
directly experience it, then we appear to have an advantage associated with understanding language,
but not for producing language. What is the advantage to the speaker's genes in providing
information to others?

This is trivial, so trivial, that I keep wondering why people even put forward any argument that
"help others" is *not* good for the *individual*. I note below, that you do realise this, my agro,
is that one has to be amazingly ignoranant to not see immediately that, e.g.:

anasoft.co.ukmorals.htmlOpen ↗
*********
Consider walking home from the pub alone, i.e. a group of 1. Further consider an oncoming group of
skin heads with metal toe cap boots. Which group member(s) has the best chances of surviving the
encounter? What this author finds amazingly surprising is that there is any debate whatsoever that
such cursory apparent altruistic behavior is not in accord with the basic tenet of maximizing
individual numbers. Arguable, an attempt to do anything in a society on ones own, without the
equivalent of a policemen, is tantamount to suicide. Any group that did develop by mutations, would
surely take the resources of such lone individuals such that all of that group members individually
benefit by sharing such spoils amongst themselves.
*********

Quoted message said:

You could approach this from the point of view of kin selection, in which case providing
information to others confers an advantage to the speaker's genes if the individuals that hear
that information are close kin (i.e., share a significant proportion of the speaker's genes).

Kin selection, is a complete red herring. Its not required in the slightest.

Quoted message said:

Another way would be to invoke ideas of a social contract (helping others makes them more likely to
help you in return).

Indeed.

Quoted message said:

The benefits of this kind of cooperation would presumably outweigh the very low costs associated
with providing information to others.

Nothing presumably about it, again, it is trivial:
anasoft.co.ukaltruism.htmlOpen ↗
******
Consider chance mutations that resulted in two Replicators deciding to aid each. If we make the
reasonable assumption that two replicators can defeat a single Replicator, these selfish pairs,
could immediately steal the resources of all those single Replicators and kill them. It wouldn't
take long for essentially all loners to be driven to extinction. Consider now mutations that cause
these Replicators to up the odds to 3's and 4's. It can be seen that an evolutionary selection
process will generate larger and larger groups, with members co-operating with each other, for the
selfish advantage of each member. Of course, suitable punishment for defectors would also have to
evolve, since those pair uppers require suitable responses to non payback, i.e. the help others
trait must be conditional.

It is therefore trivially obvious as to why general society has evolved to be social. Any remaining
loners simply don't have a chance.

Comment - The argument relies on the probability of continued success. For example, suppose that
there is a 50% chance that a lone individual can steal the resources (R) of another and kill that
competitor, and, for the sake of argument the pair has a 95% chance to do the same. Although in the
first encounter, the average advantage for the loner is .5R, where as for the pair, it is only
0.95/2=0.475R, at the next encounter the loner undergoes a further 0.5 chance to lose all of its
resources and its life, i.e. 0.25, where as for the pair, its only .451. The point being, that it is
a cumulate effect. In the long run, pairs have a much greater change of surviving, and hence passing
on those genes and memes.

*******

Quoted message said:

But I don't think there really is a question to answer here because it simply isn't true that
providing information only ever benefits the listener.

That's right. There is zero of a question to answer. So much so, that anyone that does not see it as
you do note here, simply have not got even the most basics of evolution under their belt.

There are many cases in which speaking appears to benefit

Quoted message said:

the speaker rather than the listener (e.g., boasting, propaganda) and many cases in which it is
potentially beneficial to both parties
(e.g., persuasion, negotiation), so the question of the speaker's advantage may not be as
paradoxical as some have suggested.

ROTFLOL. I suppose such individuals have never walked home from the pub noting that those steel toe
capped yobbos accross the road are conversing with each other as to mug you right there, or wait
until you turn the corner.

Quoted message said:

For a bit more on this issue, have a look at the second half of this paper:

Turner, H. (2002). An introduction to methods for simulating the evolution of language. In A.
Cangelosi & D. Parisi (Eds.) Simulating the evolution of language. London: Springer-Verlag.

My take is here anasoft.co.uklanguage.htmlOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

And, some *not-just-neocortical* correlates of language also serve a function that I call
"selective Hibernation" (others have used words and phrases such as repression, "pain gating" and
"ideas as opiates", for the same thing).

I'm not sure how making someone feel better would provide a selective advantage to either the
speaker or the listener.

Of course it can. The trivial assumption is that of pay back. Suitable mutual cooperation, as
explained above, always wins other loners. If you make people feel good, the learned memes tell you
that you have a better probability of having them make you feel good in return. The fundamental
issue here, is that there is no reason whatsoever to restrict behaviour to one off encounters, where
it might from a very naive perspective indeed, be advantages to use a simple strategy. Evolution has
developed technique to deal with this dreadfully ineffective way of maximising *individual* numbers.

Kevin Aylward

anasoft.co.ukanasoft.co.ukOpen ↗ SuperSpice, a very affordable Mixed-Mode Windows Simulator with Schematic
Capture, Waveform Display, FFT's and Filter Design.

anasoft.co.ukindex.htmlOpen ↗

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Huck Turner said:

"Peter F." <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Language has an ambi-advantageously controling social function.
E.g., it serves cooperative niche-exploiting efforts, and the learning/refinement of such
efforts;

One apparent paradox arises here.

Only if one does not even do the most basic of analysis on the problem.

Hence the word 'apparent'.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

If language is advantageous because it allows us to learn about the world without having to
directly experience it, then we appear to have an advantage associated with understanding
language, but not for producing language. What is the advantage to the speaker's genes in
providing information to others?

This is trivial, so trivial, that I keep wondering why people even put forward any argument that
"help others" is *not* good for the *individual*. I note below, that you do realise this, my agro,
is that one has to be amazingly ignoranant to not see immediately that, e.g.:

anasoft.co.ukmorals.htmlOpen ↗
*********
Consider walking home from the pub alone, i.e. a group of 1. Further consider an oncoming group of
skin heads with metal toe cap boots. Which group member(s) has the best chances of surviving the
encounter? What this author finds amazingly surprising is that there is any debate whatsoever that
such cursory apparent altruistic behavior is not in accord with the basic tenet of maximizing
individual numbers. Arguable, an attempt to do anything in a society on ones own, without the
equivalent of a policemen, is tantamount to suicide. Any group that did develop by mutations,
would surely take the resources of such lone individuals such that all of that group members
individually benefit by sharing such spoils amongst themselves.
*********

Quoted message said:

You could approach this from the point of view of kin selection, in which case providing
information to others confers an advantage to the speaker's genes if the individuals that hear
that information are close kin (i.e., share a significant proportion of the speaker's genes).

Kin selection, is a complete red herring. Its not required in the slightest.

Quoted message said:

Another way would be to invoke ideas of a social contract (helping others makes them more likely
to help you in return).

Indeed.

Quoted message said:

The benefits of this kind of cooperation would presumably outweigh the very low costs associated
with providing information to others.

Nothing presumably about it, again, it is trivial:
anasoft.co.ukaltruism.htmlOpen ↗
******
Consider chance mutations that resulted in two Replicators deciding to aid each. If we make the
reasonable assumption that two replicators can defeat a single Replicator, these selfish pairs,
could immediately steal the resources of all those single Replicators and kill them. It wouldn't
take long for essentially all loners to be driven to extinction. Consider now mutations that cause
these Replicators to up the odds to 3's and 4's. It can be seen that an evolutionary selection
process will generate larger and larger groups, with members co-operating with each other, for the
selfish advantage of each member. Of course, suitable punishment for defectors would also have to
evolve, since those pair uppers require suitable responses to non payback, i.e. the help others
trait must be conditional.

It is therefore trivially obvious as to why general society has evolved to be social. Any
remaining loners simply don't have a chance.

Comment - The argument relies on the probability of continued success. For example, suppose that
there is a 50% chance that a lone individual can steal the resources (R) of another and kill that
competitor, and, for the sake of argument the pair has a 95% chance to do the same. Although in
the first encounter, the average advantage for the loner is .5R, where as for the pair, it is only
0.95/2=0.475R, at the next encounter the loner undergoes a further 0.5 chance to lose all of its
resources and its life, i.e. 0.25, where as for the pair, its only .451. The point being, that it
is a cumulate effect. In the long run, pairs have a much greater change of surviving, and hence
passing on those genes and memes.

*******

Quoted message said:

But I don't think there really is a question to answer here because it simply isn't true that
providing information only ever benefits the listener.

That's right. There is zero of a question to answer. So much so, that anyone that does not see it
as you do note here, simply have not got even the most basics of evolution under their belt.

There are many cases in which speaking appears to benefit

Quoted message said:

the speaker rather than the listener (e.g., boasting, propaganda) and many cases in which it is
potentially beneficial to both parties
(e.g., persuasion, negotiation), so the question of the speaker's advantage may not be as
paradoxical as some have suggested.

ROTFLOL. I suppose such individuals have never walked home from the pub noting that those steel
toe capped yobbos accross the road are conversing with each other as to mug you right there, or
wait until you turn the corner.

My point was that you don't even need to think of this in terms of co-operation (i.e., your example
about the men with steel-capped shoes is also irrelevant). Sometimes it's in the speaker's interest
to provide others with information even when he/she does not expect any information in return. For
instance, if the information is something bad about one of the speaker's rivals, or something good
about the speaker him- or herself, then the speaker can potentially increase his or her social
status by passing on this information to others. There is only a question here for people who assume
that the transmission of information is only ever useful to the receiver, but this is not the case.
Anyone who works in advertising or public relations will confirm this.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

For a bit more on this issue, have a look at the second half of this paper:

Turner, H. (2002). An introduction to methods for simulating the evolution of language. In A.
Cangelosi & D. Parisi (Eds.) Simulating the evolution of language. London: Springer-Verlag.

My take is here anasoft.co.uklanguage.htmlOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

And, some *not-just-neocortical* correlates of language also serve a function that I call
"selective Hibernation" (others have used words and phrases such as repression, "pain gating"
and "ideas as opiates", for the same thing).

I'm not sure how making someone feel better would provide a selective advantage to either the
speaker or the listener.

Of course it can. The trivial assumption is that of pay back. Suitable mutual cooperation, as
explained above, always wins other loners. If you make people feel good, the learned memes tell
you that you have a better probability of having them make you feel good in return. The
fundamental issue here, is that there is no reason whatsoever to restrict behaviour to one off
encounters, where it might from a very naive perspective indeed, be advantages to use a simple
strategy. Evolution has developed technique to deal with this dreadfully ineffective way of
maximising *individual* numbers.

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you can
make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality information can
help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is in heaven now" serve
to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-related way. Indeed,
getting back to the language of Peter F.'s post, if by "ideas as opiates" he was alluding to Marx,
then we should remember that when Marx said "religion is the opiate of the masses", it was intended
as a criticism of organised religion for discouraging action that could improve the lives of the
exploited masses. As I said in my last post "Pain and emotional distress are presumably adaptive
responses to threats from the environment."

H.

---
Like-minds don't notice shared mistakes. Talk to someone else.

"Huck Turner" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you can
make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality information
can help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is in heaven now"
serve to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-related way.

So YOU presumtiously say! ;-)

Quoted message said:

Indeed, getting back to the language of Peter F.'s post, if by "ideas as opiates" he was alluding
to Marx, then we should remember that when Marx said "religion is the opiate of the masses", it
was intended as a criticism of organised religion for discouraging action that could improve the
lives of the exploited masses.

I was alluding to Primal Theory. [PT is a straightened-out modern day descendant of (and much more
highly evolved than) Freud's theorizing and psychoanalytical poking around with people.]

Quoted message said:

As I said in my last post "Pain and emotional distress are presumably adaptive responses to
threats from the environment."

My point was precisely that they are NOT always adaptive.

Specifically, NOT when an individual has ended up in (as often happens) a "selective Hibernation
imploring" (type of) situation or (IOW) a ditto physically inescapable and more or less chronically
and influential familial - or otherwise environmental - life-situational "setting".

[NB that such settings also automatically put CURSES (or CCKHHURSES) type memories inside the brain
of those that are in a [censored] (i.e., are in and being challenged by a traumatic - whether slowly or
rapidly so - situation). Also note that CURSES can accumulate/be "put in" more than once in a life-
time; and that they work as both "Darwinian selective" and "actention selecting" {within a brain or
"Actention Selection System"} *pressures* within individuals and their societies.]

Quoted message said:

Like-minds don't notice shared mistakes. Talk to someone else.

Good slogan! Hope you adhere to it. ;-)

Merry Xmas,

Peter

Huck Turner said:

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Huck Turner said:

"Peter F." <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> Language has an ambi-advantageously controling social function.
> E.g., it serves cooperative niche-exploiting efforts, and the learning/refinement of such
> efforts;

One apparent paradox arises here.

Only if one does not even do the most basic of analysis on the problem.

Hence the word 'apparent'.

I did realise this.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

There are many cases in which speaking appears to benefit

Quoted message said:

the speaker rather than the listener (e.g., boasting, propaganda) and many cases in which it is
potentially beneficial to both parties
(e.g., persuasion, negotiation), so the question of the speaker's advantage may not be as
paradoxical as some have suggested.

ROTFLOL. I suppose such individuals have never walked home from the pub noting that those steel
toe capped yobbos accross the road are conversing with each other as to mug you right there, or
wait until you turn the corner.

My point was that you don't even need to think of this in terms of co-operation

In principle, maybe.

Quoted message said:

(i.e., your example about the men with steel-capped shoes is also irrelevant).

Hardly irrelevant.

Quoted message said:

Sometimes it's in the speaker's interest to provide others with information even when he/she does
not expect any information in return. For instance, if the information is something bad about one
of the speaker's rivals, or something good about the speaker him- or herself, then the speaker can
potentially increase his or her social status by passing on this information to others. There is
only a question here for people who assume that the transmission of information is only ever useful
to the receiver, but this is not the case. Anyone who works in advertising or public relations will
confirm this.

This is pretty trivial. Yes this is correct, but arguably it is a "higher" level aspect of language
communication. Something that occurs after the basics of lanuage has been developed. The idea
presented here is that telling tales on rivals is *more* important to the development of language,
than the mutual co-operation aspects. I don't buy this in the slightest. Arguable, mutual helping
each other, rather than doing a possible detriment to another is usually more beneficial. Telling
tales is not that effective in eliminating rivals in general. Try it sometime. Indeed, *all* news is
usually good news. One only has to note the success of Hugh Grants follow-up film to his "public
event" to appreciate this.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I'm not sure how making someone feel better would provide a selective advantage to either the
speaker or the listener.

Of course it can. The trivial assumption is that of pay back. Suitable mutual cooperation, as
explained above, always wins other loners. If you make people feel good, the learned memes tell
you that you have a better probability of having them make you feel good in return. The
fundamental issue here, is that there is no reason whatsoever to restrict behaviour to one off
encounters, where it might from a very naive perspective indeed, be advantages to use a simple
strategy. Evolution has developed technique to deal with this dreadfully ineffective way of
maximising *individual* numbers.

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you can
make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality information
can help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is in heaven now"
serve to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-related way.

That's correct. One can be programmed to feel good about *anything*. Memes evolved for the purposes
of increasing replication numbers, but their very nature in selection of emotions to achieve
adaptability to *all* environments necessarily results in, essentially, complete arbitrary
programmability.

I address this at anasoft.co.ukpsychology.htmlOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

Indeed, getting back to the language of Peter F.'s post, if by "ideas as opiates" he was alluding
to Marx, then we should remember that when Marx said "religion is the opiate of the masses", it was
intended as a criticism of organised religion for discouraging action that could improve the lives
of the exploited masses. As I said in my last post "Pain and emotional distress are presumably
adaptive responses to threats from the environment."

I agree, and this is, essentially *provable*, if we exclude magic, so no presumption is required.
i.e. anasoft.co.ukemotions.htmlOpen ↗

e.g. Whatever the mechanism, emotions must be physical traits of a Replicator, but traits that have
underwent numerous selection, variation and replication, hence they *must* be selfish. etc...

Kevin Aylward

anasoft.co.ukanasoft.co.ukOpen ↗ SuperSpice, a very affordable Mixed-Mode Windows Simulator with Schematic
Capture, Waveform Display, FFT's and Filter Design.

That which is mostly observed, is that which replicates the most.
anasoft.co.ukindex.htmlOpen ↗

Peter F. said:

"Huck Turner" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you
can make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality
information can help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is
in heaven now" serve to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-
related way.

So YOU presumtiously say! ;-)

Quoted message said:

Indeed, getting back to the language of Peter F.'s post, if by "ideas as opiates" he was alluding
to Marx, then we should remember that when Marx said "religion is the opiate of the masses", it
was intended as a criticism of organised religion for discouraging action that could improve the
lives of the exploited masses.

I was alluding to Primal Theory. [PT is a straightened-out modern day descendant of (and much more
highly evolved than) Freud's theorizing and psychoanalytical poking around with people.]

Quoted message said:

As I said in my last post "Pain and emotional distress are presumably adaptive responses to
threats from the environment."

My point was precisely that they are NOT always adaptive.

Specifically, NOT when an individual has ended up in (as often happens) a "selective Hibernation
imploring" (type of) situation or (IOW) a ditto physically inescapable and more or less
chronically and influential familial - or otherwise environmental - life-situational "setting".

Would you care to re-phrase this so it actually makes sense?

I have skimmed a few of your posts. What do to expect to gain by writing in such an
incomprehensible way?

What you have wrote here is, essentially, completely meaningless.

Kevin Aylward

anasoft.co.ukanasoft.co.ukOpen ↗ SuperSpice, a very affordable Mixed-Mode Windows Simulator with Schematic
Capture, Waveform Display, FFT's and Filter Design.

That which is mostly observed, is that which replicates the most.
anasoft.co.ukindex.htmlOpen ↗

"Peter F." <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

"Huck Turner" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you
can make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality
information can help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is
in heaven now" serve to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-
related way.

So YOU presumtiously say! ;-)

I'm only saying that it isn't _obvious_ that there are survival-related benefits. It needs to be
demonstrated.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Indeed, getting back to the language of Peter F.'s post, if by "ideas as opiates" he was
alluding to Marx, then we should remember that when Marx said "religion is the opiate of the
masses", it was intended as a criticism of organised religion for discouraging action that could
improve the lives of the exploited masses.

I was alluding to Primal Theory. [PT is a straightened-out modern day descendant of (and much more
highly evolved than) Freud's theorizing and psychoanalytical poking around with people.]

Quoted message said:

As I said in my last post "Pain and emotional distress are presumably adaptive responses to
threats from the environment."

My point was precisely that they are NOT always adaptive.

Specifically, NOT when an individual has ended up in (as often happens) a "selective Hibernation
imploring" (type of) situation or (IOW) a ditto physically inescapable and more or less
chronically and influential familial - or otherwise environmental - life-situational "setting".

[NB that such settings also automatically put CURSES (or CCKHHURSES) type memories inside the
brain of those that are in a [censored] (i.e., are in and being challenged by a traumatic - whether
slowly or rapidly so - situation). Also note that CURSES can accumulate/be "put in" more than once
in a life-time; and that they work as both "Darwinian selective" and "actention selecting" {within
a brain or "Actention Selection System"} *pressures* within individuals and their societies.]

If I understand what you're saying, CURSES are like phobias, and these make it more difficult for
a person to deal with genuinely threatening situations. I guess an example would be someone who
is agoraphobic who needs to flee from a burning building, but can't because they fear the open
spaces outside.

So I guess you're saying that language might have been favoured in evolution partly because it
is useful as a remedy for mental illness (if it can be used to encourage people to get past
such fears).

I don't know what kind of evidence you could use to support this view, and it seems to me that there
are already reasons to doubt it given that problems with self-talk seem to be a significant factor
in depression.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Like-minds don't notice shared mistakes. Talk to someone else.

Good slogan! Hope you adhere to it. ;-)

I try my best to.

Quoted message said:

Merry Xmas,

Peter

And to you,

H.

---
Like-minds don't notice shared mistakes. Talk to someone else.

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Huck Turner said:

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Huck Turner wrote:
> "Peter F." <[email hidden]> wrote in message
> news:<[email hidden]>...

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>> Language has an ambi-advantageously controling social function.
>> E.g., it serves cooperative niche-exploiting efforts, and the learning/refinement of such
>> efforts;
>
> One apparent paradox arises here.

Only if one does not even do the most basic of analysis on the problem.

Hence the word 'apparent'.

I did realise this.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

There are many cases in which speaking appears to benefit
> the speaker rather than the listener (e.g., boasting, propaganda) and many cases in which it
> is potentially beneficial to both parties
> (e.g., persuasion, negotiation), so the question of the speaker's advantage may not be as
> paradoxical as some have suggested.

ROTFLOL. I suppose such individuals have never walked home from the pub noting that those steel
toe capped yobbos accross the road are conversing with each other as to mug you right there, or
wait until you turn the corner.

My point was that you don't even need to think of this in terms of co-operation

In principle, maybe.

Quoted message said:

(i.e., your example about the men with steel-capped shoes is also irrelevant).

Hardly irrelevant.

It's unnecessary to bring this up in a discussion about whether there is ever any benefit to
speakers because there are simpler, more direct examples of speaker benefit. I'm not saying that co-
operation isn't important. Given that talking is an activity that we don't generally engage in
alone, I think it is fairly safe to conclude that considerations of speaker-hearer co-operation are
pretty fundamental to understanding the selective advantage of language. Having said that, self-talk
(thinking in words) might be quite important too.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Sometimes it's in the speaker's interest to provide others with information even when he/she does
not expect any information in return. For instance, if the information is something bad about one
of the speaker's rivals, or something good about the speaker him- or herself, then the speaker
can potentially increase his or her social status by passing on this information to others. There
is only a question here for people who assume that the transmission of information is only ever
useful to the receiver, but this is not the case. Anyone who works in advertising or public
relations will confirm this.

This is pretty trivial. Yes this is correct, but arguably it is a "higher" level aspect of
language communication. Something that occurs after the basics of lanuage has been developed.

Why? Information is information. What would be different about the language used to pass on a piece
of information when the passing on of that information is in the speaker's interests versus the
interests of a hearer or hearers?

Quoted message said:

The idea presented here is that telling tales on rivals is *more* important to the development of
language, than the mutual co-operation aspects. I don't buy this in the slightest. Arguable,
mutual helping each other, rather than doing a possible detriment to another is usually more
beneficial. Telling tales is not that effective in eliminating rivals in general. Try it sometime.
Indeed, *all* news is usually good news. One only has to note the success of Hugh Grants follow-up
film to his "public event" to appreciate this.

Saying bad things about another person (particularly when they are true and looked upon very
negatively by others - e.g., so-and-so murdered some children) is just one example of where the
speaker potentially benefits. I'm not suggesting that this is the primary reason language was
selected, but it could be for all I know. Other examples where the speaker can be expected to be the
primary benefactor are boasts, requests, commands and questions. How important are each of these?
Again, I think it's hard to say, but it seems to me that the information we communicate is very
often of mutual benefit rather than exclusively of benefit to either the speaker or hearer. It is
co-operative, but not in the sense that the speaker provides information with the expectation of
receiving something back in return although this kind of thing might happen as well. There are many
speech acts that are of mutual benefit in themselves. This is the whole point of persuasive
comments, contractual promises and of expressions that reinforce social bonds. These are generally
of immediate benefit to both parties without any delayed payment to one or the other.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>
> I'm not sure how making someone feel better would provide a selective advantage to either the
> speaker or the listener.

Of course it can. The trivial assumption is that of pay back. Suitable mutual cooperation, as
explained above, always wins other loners. If you make people feel good, the learned memes tell
you that you have a better probability of having them make you feel good in return. The
fundamental issue here, is that there is no reason whatsoever to restrict behaviour to one off
encounters, where it might from a very naive perspective indeed, be advantages to use a simple
strategy. Evolution has developed technique to deal with this dreadfully ineffective way of
maximising *individual* numbers.

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you
can make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality
information can help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is
in heaven now" serve to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-
related way.

That's correct. One can be programmed to feel good about *anything*.

I don't know about *anything*. You seem to like making hard-and-fast rules. I'm a bit more tentative
about these things.

Quoted message said:

Memes evolved for the purposes of increasing replication numbers, but their very nature in
selection of emotions to achieve adaptability to *all* environments necessarily results in,
essentially, complete arbitrary programmability.

I address this at anasoft.co.ukpsychology.htmlOpen ↗

[snip]

I don't know how you could say that for *all* conceivable environments, there is a conceivable meme
that can replicate in it. I doubt that this is so for the same reason that I doubt that there is any
conceivable life form that could live in a hostile environment like the centre of a star.

H.

---
Like-minds don't notice shared mistakes. Talk to someone else.

Huck Turner said:

"Kevin Aylward" <[email hidden]> wrote in

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>>
>> I'm not sure how making someone feel better would provide a selective advantage to either the
>> speaker or the listener.
>
> Of course it can. The trivial assumption is that of pay back. Suitable mutual cooperation, as
> explained above, always wins other loners. If you make people feel good, the learned memes tell
> you that you have a better probability of having them make you feel good in return. The
> fundamental issue here, is that there is no reason whatsoever to restrict behaviour to one off
> encounters, where it might from a very naive perspective indeed, be advantages to use a simple
> strategy. Evolution has developed technique to deal with this dreadfully ineffective way of
> maximising *individual* numbers.
>

Okay, but we're talking about making people feel good by telling them things. In general, you
can make someone feel better by helping them and you could argue that receiving quality
information can help someone, but saying things like "Don't worry, it'll be okay" and "Mummy is
in heaven now" serve to make people feel good without benefiting them in any obviously survival-
related way.

That's correct. One can be programmed to feel good about *anything*.

I don't know about *anything*. You seem to like making hard-and-fast rules. I'm a bit more
tentative about these things.

I think the fact that there are suicide bombers about confirms absolutely that people can be
programmed to do, essentially, anything.

My hard and fast rules are based on experience. I *know* that that the way to create an entity
capable of dealing with *all* environments, from a practical point of view, *requires* generic
software programmability. The engineering cost of custom hardware to deal with killing the killer of
a killers killer is way too much. As soon as programmability arises, one automatically inherits the
ability to program for, essentially, anything. Its the *only* way to be able to deal with
*anything*.

My view is that evolution has taken a simple solution. It has evolved emotions (a gene trait)
to instigate behaviour, and morals (meme traits) to select (a Darwinian process) what emotion
is invoked.

anasoft.co.ukemotions.htmlOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Memes evolved for the purposes of increasing replication numbers, but their very nature in
selection of emotions to achieve adaptability to *all* environments necessarily results in,
essentially, complete arbitrary programmability.

I address this at anasoft.co.ukpsychology.htmlOpen ↗

[snip]

I don't know how you could say that for *all* conceivable environments, there is a conceivable
meme that can replicate in it.

I don't. That would be daft.

Quoted message said:

doubt that this is so for the same reason that I doubt that there is any conceivable life form
that could live in a hostile environment like the centre of a star.

I said that to deal with all environments, one requires the ability to have memes/genes that can
deal with all of those environments. I was not implying that such memes/genes were actually
realisable in practise. There are laws of physics you know.

Kevin Aylward

anasoft.co.ukanasoft.co.ukOpen ↗ SuperSpice, a very affordable Mixed-Mode Windows Simulator with Schematic
Capture, Waveform Display, FFT's and Filter Design.

That which is mostly observed, is that which replicates the most.
anasoft.co.ukindex.htmlOpen ↗