Bertrand Russell said, "War does not determine who is right - only who is left."
From a Natural Selection viewpoint, who is left is right.
Bertie must be wrong?
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Feel free to reply to any comment by clicking the "Reply" button.From a Natural Selection viewpoint, yes.
From a Human viewpoint, no.
skado
Level 9
Jan 19, 2019
4
Well .... that's honest. But mate, this thread is not about humanity.
Not everything is about us. I'm talking about Entropy and how Order will always form as a fractal within Chaos. I'm talking about Cosmic Evolution. Darwin discovered Natural Selection and applied it life. He didn't realise, how could he at the time, that Natural Selection applies the whole Cosmos.
Sorry if I gave the impression that I'm interested and concerned about the problems of humanity. Mea Culpa, but I don't give a phuck.
Who is left is... left. They write the history. That doesn’t mean they were correct or morally superior.
I was thinking about this recently - we settle disagreements by killing each other? Being stronger, physically superior, does not make you right.
A2Jennifer
Level 8
Jan 19, 2019
5
I never said they were correct or morally superior.
What the phuck does superior mean when you come down it. The Universe is not obligated a species called Homo-sapiens. There is no good/evil in Natural Selection.
@Danggali then what is “right”?
@A2Jennifer ummmmmmmm .... urrrr ... Truth, Justice, and the American Way? Maybe?
‘Right’ is a thing of the moment and the context ... and in America it’s mostly propaganda.
Kruschev was an amazing Statesman, Johnson was a dope. But If I’d asked you in the early sixties who was right, you’d have said Johnson, cuz propaganda had you running scared of Reds. That’s the only right, your right.
Truth remains the same regardless of time or context or propaganda .. or even wishful thinking.
Sorry, no offence. 
@Danggali “From a Natural Selection viewpoint, who is left is right.” that’s YOUR assertion so it is reasonable to ask how you are defining “right” especially since you apparently don’t mean it in the obvious way fitting the context, that “right” means “correct.”
Hmmmmm ....
Dear Ms Persistence,
The only possible future that life can pursue (the ONLY possible) has to arise from the current DNA pool.
That is, if all the peoples in the world were only two colours, let’s say Red and Blue. And for good/bad, right/wrong, correct/incorrect reasons they went to War. Red against Blue or Blue against Red .. don’t matter.
And the Redskins won, and killed all the Blueskins ... only Redskin DNA would remain in the pool.
At this point Blueskin is extinct ... do you agree?
Doesn’t really matter now if Blueskins were upright, courageous, morally superior, correct, really fine nice human beings. ,,, does it? They’re gone forever and ever. That’s correct .. isn’t it?
Dear Jennifer, I know that you are a good person, that you’re principled, that you’re defending truth, justice, fairness ,, against me, a phuckin heathen. Unfortunately, all your values, your love, your emotions .. mean nothing to Natural Selection.
Natural Selection will only deal with Redskins from now on, even if they’re all Hitlers, Stalins .. because they are all that’s left. We now have to redefine what’s right don’t we. And that can only come from the redskins.
Am I right?
(I don’t mean to upset you, truly .. kiss)
Greg.
@Danggali natural selection doesn’t care what is “right.” It does not determine what is “right.”
And saying something stupid in a condescending way also doesn’t make YOU “right.” ?
You know, I'm becoming convinced that most people who claim agnosticism are kindly, loving, really nice theists.
Show them that there's no morality in Natural Selection and they instantly cry out for some omnipotent being.
Danggali
Level 4
Jan 19, 2019
0
@creative51 All species follow the path of least resistance. Our social graces, complex as they are, are biological in origin and underpinning
You're trying to play logical word games but are exhibiting leaps of logic. Some previous responses illustrate such leaps.How about dealing with some real human issues affecting us now?
Krish55
Level 8
Jan 19, 2019
1
You're confusing natural selection with Social Darwinism, a discredited theory. The idea that being the winner in a war means you were in any sense morally "right" is baseless.
If that were the case, then the Khmer Rouge were right, and the 25% of Cambodia's population they murdered were wrong. The Hutu in Rwanda were "right", and the Tutsi minority were clearly "wrong" and were massacred as a consequence. I could go on for pages and pages here.
Those instances where the victors were by coincidence fighting for a moral cause, such as in the US Civil War, had nothing to do with fitness to survive from a Darwinist perspective. In those cases, the war could have gone either way, the winner's strategy and preponderance of force determined the outcome, along with a healthy dose of good luck. The tide could easily have turned the other way at a number of points and resulted in (for example) victory for the South.
Paul4747
Level 8
Jan 19, 2019
2
No, I am not! read again!
It's you who are relating it emotion and morality. That's Social Darwinism
War and turmoil have nothing do with it! The survivor, right or wrong, fills the gene pool. That's NOT Social Darwinism.
@Danggali I read it several times. I suggest you read again.
"From a Natural Selection viewpoint, who is left is right." Your words.
"Right" is a value judgement and implies that the winners in war are morally right. That is Social Darwinism.
Morality has nothing to do with selection.
The only accurate statement is, "From a Natural Selection viewpoint, who is left is alive."
@Paul4747 Dear Paul,
Morals are not defensible from any position. Natural Selection ignores them unless they’re beneficial. And if they’re beneficial, it’s never on moral grounds.
Morals apply to Humans only.
I posted 4 (four) (Roman numerals IV) opening posts. You’re holding me morally irresponsible (snigger) on the headline only. (The word ‘right’ in the headline context meant ‘only the fit survive’ which contradicts Bertie’s statement)
This thread is about order fractals arising from chaos because it’s the quickest route to maximum entropy. THIS thread is posted in the SCIENCE forum. So really mate, read the first three or four posts, then quietly pack up your whip, your bible, and your tattered treatise on human morality and responsibly phuck off.
No offence Dude. I love all neuro-typs, there’s just too many of them and they’re all the same, not one of them ever seems to have an original thought.
@Danggali When you post a thread critiquing Bertrand Russell, a moral philosopher, from a scientific perspective, you are, once again, the one who is confused. You're further confused if you think I have anything to do with a Bible. Morality and religion are independent concepts.
To recap: You attempted to critique Russell's moral statement by relating it to natural selection, and attempted to give natural selection some moral weight (as if the survivors in natural selection have any moral superiority to those who die). And then you spent the rest of the argument denying this.
Natural selection, and science in general, make no comment on morality. Natural selection does not determine who is "right". Period. So until you can clear up the confusion in your mind, don't criticize those of us who do know what we're talking about.
I would think, from a natural selection viewpoint, whichever way keeps the most invasive force in nature at bay is right. In the end Mother Nature will be left standing.
JackPedigo
Level 9
Jan 19, 2019
1
Being the last one stading doesnt make you right. Just luckier than the other. This is Trump type thinking.
t1nick
Level 8
Jan 19, 2019
2
Trump? Is every-phuckin-thing on here Political. Why not ask Hitler join too?
I'm not talking from an emotional human perspective. Humans are not the most important things in this universe.
Your anthropomorphic arrogance is appalling.
Though the Universe is driving towards maximum entropy, it may be an impossible goal. There is a theory that maximum entropy can never be reached because, like a rainbow, the goal recedes the nearer you get. It's an asymptote. A carrot on a stick.
According to the Second Law of Thermodynamics: Order, arising from Chaos, is the simplest, quickest, most dynamic road to maximum entropy. Occam's Razor would support this.
From a logical perspective, (mine, and I'm only a monkey with a very little brain, barely down outta the trees) if maximum entropy can never be reached, then order must always prevail.
Which brings me to a song by Demis Roussous, Before the Storm. (a difficult song to find as it was never released in the western world)
Perhaps Demis was a Cosmologist of great foresight? .... Bwahahaaaaaaaaa
Danggali
Level 4
Jan 19, 2019
0
I teach Occam's Razor in my science classes. Good to see somebody else who is familiar with the concept.
@maturin1919 that's nice
@maturin1919 i don't know is it?
@maturin1919 maybe I do maybe I don't
@maturin1919 hahahahaha
Quote Bertrand Russell:
"That Man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man’s achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the débris of a universe in ruins
All these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul’s habitation henceforth be safely built.”
Danggali
Level 4
Jan 19, 2019
1
Quote Paul Davies:
"A hundred years ago, the mathematician and philosopher Bertrand Russell used the second law of thermodynamics in a trenchant attack on theism. The second law states, in effect, that the universe is dying, descending inexorably into chaos as its reserves of useful energy are squandered. Russell reflected on the "vast death of the solar system" that will follow when the sun burns out in several billion years time."
Danggali
Level 4
Jan 19, 2019
0
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