Howard Hughes Medical Institute 2005 Holiday Lectures: Evolution – Constant Change and Common Threads

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On-Demand Webcasts of the lectures available free.



View webcasts here.

The lectures targeted to a high school audience:

Endless Forms Most Beautiful
Selection in Action
Fossils, Genes and Embryos
From Butterflies to Humans

Read text summaries of lectures here.

TonySeb: Fun lectures, basic evolutionary principles.

Defining “Experience” As Prerequisite To Explaining “Conscious Experience”

By Anthony Sebastian

Abstract accepted for presentation at the “Toward a Science of Consciousness” international meeting in Tucson, April 2006.

See meeting website.

ABSTRACT:

Lack of a precise definition of the word “experience” acts as an obstacle to formulating a fruitful explanation of “conscious experience” at the most general level of narrative explanation. The practice of synonymizing “experience” and “conscious experience” occasions a missed opportunity to understand “conscious” as a quality of “experience”, which can have qualities other than “conscious”.

After Leslie Dewart, I suggest a physiological definition of “experiencing” applicable to all sentient creatures. Organisms must perform a physiological activity in experiencing events of reality, first by receiving information about the event, then processing that information so as to generate a response (physical, mental) that serves the organism’s biological and/or cultural imperatives, directed ultimately to the production of biological and/or cultural progeny: genes and/or memes. The experience-initiating events may reside/originate in either the world outside the organism (external reality) or the world inside the organism (internal reality).

In performing the physiological activity of experiencing events of reality in the elemental sense as defined above, the organism lacks what generally goes by the term “conscious awareness”, either of the event experienced or of the ongoing activity of its experiencing the event. Elementally then, organisms perform the physiological activity of experiencing objects/events of reality “non-consciously”.

I emphasize that organisms perform the physiological activity of experiencing, just as they perform other physiological activities, such as regulating arterial blood pressure, walking, etc. As with any performance, performance of physiological activities admit of qualities of performance, for example, efficient or faulty regulation of arterial blood pressure, slow or brisk walking, articulate or stuttering speech. In that context, we can take the view that an organism’s performance of the physiological activity of experiencing may admit of different qualities of performance.

Humans can perform the physiological activity of experiencing events of reality “consciously”, a quality of performance that I next show admits of physiological definition. It does not stretch to recognize that performance of the very activity of non-consciously experiencing an event in, say, the external world, itself qualifies as an event of reality (i.e., an event of internal reality). As such it therefore potentially could initiate, within the organism, the performance of the activity of experiencing it as an event of reality, given the organism’s ability to experience events of reality, as I have defined “experiencing” as performed elementally. A cognitively advanced organism might have the ability to receive information about that mental (physiologically-based) activity of its non-conscious experiencing of an event of external reality, leading it to generate an adjustive response.

Performance of the physiological activity of an experiencing-complex consisting concurrently of experiencing the activity of a non-conscious experiencing has the quality we may define as “conscious”, as it speaks appositely to our intuitive conception of “conscious” and our intimate acquaintance with conscious experience. This formulation provides a physiological explanation of “conscious experience” at the most general level of narrative explanation.

A more proximate explanation requires understanding how we perform the physiological activity of receiving and processing the information about our receiving and processing information about objects/events of reality.

See: Dewart L. (Evolution and Consciousness: The Role of Speech in the Origin and Development of Human Nature. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1989.

Human Evolution: The Future

“Human evolution at the crossroads: Genetics, cybernetics complicate forecast for species”

Read article.

By Alan Boyle, Science editor, MSNBC
Updated: May 2, 2005

Excerpts:

The evolutionary future of humans:

“Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins says it's the question he's most often asked, and "a question that any prudent evolutionist will evade."”

“In the book "Future Evolution," University of Washington paleontologist Peter Ward argues that we are making ourselves virtually extinction-proof by bending Earth's flora and fauna to our will.”

“"The big thing that people overlook when speculating about human evolution is that the raw matter for evolution is variation," he said. "We are going to lose that variability very quickly, and the reason is not quite a genetic argument, but it's close. At the moment we humans speak something on the order of 6,500 languages. If we look at the number of languages we will likely pass on to our children, that number is 600."”

“Global epidemics or dramatic environmental changes represent just two of the scenarios that could cause a Unihuman society to crack, putting natural selection — or perhaps not-so-natural selection — back into the evolutionary game. Then what?”

“If different populations develop in isolation over many thousands of generations, it’s conceivable that separate species would emerge. For example, that virus-resistant strain of post-humans might eventually thrive in the wake of a global bioterror crisis, while less hardy humans would find themselves quarantined in the world’s safe havens.”

“Imagine improvements that could keep you in peak working condition past the age of 100. Those are the sorts of enhancements you might want to pass on to your descendants — and that could set the stage for reproductive isolation and an eventual species split-off.”

“[computer scientist Bill] Joy speculated that a truly intelligent robot may arise by the year 2030. “And once an intelligent robot exists, it is only a small step to a robot species — to an intelligent robot that can make evolved copies of itself,” he wrote.”

Books mentioned:

Future Evolution, Peter Ward, W. H. Freeman, 2001, ISBN: 0716734966

The Time Machine, H.G. Wells

Evolution (A Novel), Stephen Baxter, Orion Pub Co, 2002, ISBN: 0575073411

Radical Evolution : The Promise and Peril of Enhancing Our Minds, Our Bodies -- and What It Means to Be Human, Joel Garreau, Doubleday, 2005, ISBN: 0385509650

TonySeb: Interesting article, superficial.

“Is Human Evolution Over?”

Asks Robin McKie in The Guardian Unlimited:

Read article.

McKie comments on the split among scientists.

TonySeb: I say, human evolution not over so long as the natural selection and random genetic drift of genes and memes continues to operate. What can stop them?

Even if we learn to outsmart our genes and memes, we won't want to stand still.

Darwin Day Celebrations Berkeley & San Francisco, Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Presented by Bay
Area Biosystematists, UC Berkeley Entomology
Students Organization, and the Essig
Museum of Entomology

The Essig Museum holds an open house each year to celebrate the contributions of Charles Darwin to evolutionary thought. Researchers and the general public are welcome to view displays, talk shop, and enjoy presentations.

In 2006, Darwin Day will be celebrated on Tuesday, February, 14th from 1:00 to 5:00 pm. 2009 will mark Darwin's 200th birthday and the 150th anniversary of the publication of "On The Origin Of Species" with celebrations spanning the globe.

For more information about other Darwin Day activities,
please visit the Darwin Day Celebration: An international Recognition of Science and Humanity webpage.

Darwin Day (week) Events

Essig Museum of Entomology Open House (Wellman Hall): Open to the public - Posters and exhibits are available for viewing. Graduate student lead tours of the museum will begin on the hour at 2:00, 3:00, and 4:00 pm. Classes welcome (if more than 20 people please contact Cheryl Barr <cbarr@nature.berkeley.edu>).

A toast to Darwin (Wellman Hall): Limited to BNHM and BABS members - Cake and drinks in the Essig Museum at 5:30. Please RSVP to Steve Lew <stevelew@nature.berkeley.edu>

Talks and Discussion (2050 Valley Life Science Building):
Open to the public - Beginning at 7:30, all are invited to attend the following talks:

"The continuing Darwinian revolution" by Michael Ghiselin (California Academy of Sciences)

"Intellegent Design: A view from the trial" by Kevin Padian (University of California, Berkeley)

"From the Galapagos to the genome: Evolutionary biology in the 21st century" by Patrick O'Grady (University of California, Berkeley)

Nature documentary seminar (412 Wellman Hall): Open to the public - All week long, 12-1 pm, bring a lunch and enjoy a screening of the NOVA/WGBH series, "Evolution" (February 13, 15-17) and "Life in the Undergrowth - Intimate Relations" by David Attenborough (February 14 only).

Download or print a copy of our Darwin Day Flier

Understanding Evolution -- UC Berkeley Website

Below find link to the revised UC Berkeley evolution site that I discussed in a previous post (Dec. 25, 2005):

Understanding Evolution

Outstanding resource, including an Evolution 101 course, excellent illustrations, references, links to other sources. Possibly the best one-stop source of information on evolution.

A few topics:

What is evolution and how does it work?
What is the evidence for evolution?
What is the history of evolutionary theory?