I wanted to email you guys before the meetings this week because of a few
things:

It is possible psychology people, and if I act quickly today, people from
my biology class, will come to the Thursday meeting. I am trying to start
a new Psychology group with a more specific and perhaps structured focus
than the being group, and I thought I would use the Thursday meeting space
to start it out with. I am planning to advertise a discussion about
various topics related to the nature of life in my biology class so maybe
people will be interested in that. There is also a small possibility that
people from the philosophy discussion list (phildisc@u) will come to the
Wednesday meeting, or even the Thursday one.

But to be honest, my prediction based on past experience is that no one
new will come to any of the meetings, but we will see, I am trying a few
new things here. The Thursday meeting should also be listed in the Daily's
Calendar, if not this week, then next week. If it is not there next week I
will go investigate the situation at the Daily.

------the universe--------

I have been taking a look at two very interesting books lately, Order Out
of Chaos by ILYA PRIGOGINE and Evolution without Selection by A.
LIMA-de-FARIA.

What I find so wonderful about them is that they address questions I've
thought were valid ones- What is wrong with Thermodynamics, What is wrong
with Randomness, And what is wrong with the idea that the mechanism of
evolution is "natural selection"?

The two books seem to take opposing positions, but I have not read enough
to be sure. Prigogine's book seems to make a case for "order arising out
of chaos or randomness"

What is randomness? "It is when every member of a set has an equal chance
of being selected" actually, that is not right at all, I would say,
because one member of the set, is, in the end, selected. Randomness is
merely that one member of the set and not others is selected for reasons
which we are not aware of. (chance is the word we want to get rid of) But
I'm not really sure what randomness is. We are able to make predictions
using the concept of randomness, at least I think we are.

It is interesting how order can arise from randomness, as in the example
of a coin flip. The distribution that results is very ordered.


The other book, Evolution without Selection, presents what I would call a
unified theory of evolution- a theory which includes the evolution of
molecules, atoms, and RNA. IT is a beautiful Idea, but I think it could be
a bit better presented. My hypothesis is that we will see the "principle
of Natural selection" relegated to a much lesser role than it currently
holds in people's conceptions of evolution, and we will eventually look on
our present understanding of evolution as we now look on creationism.

One of the hypotheses of Lima-de-Faria's theory of auto evolution is that
order, form and function are neither created or destroyed, only
transformed by combination (p.309)...At any rate, the goal is a predictive
theory of evolution that includes subatomic particles and human societies.
It seems that this guy's theory is a step in the right direction.

When I look at myself and the organisms around me, It seems ridiculous to
me that I once accepted 'natural selection' (a sort of god-word, if you
will :) ) as the primary explanation of all this.



What is most interesting is that both books say that the time has come
that Physics must accomidate Biology, not the other way around. PRIGOGNE
says it by embracing Thermodynamics and Irreversability, I think, in the
face of those recalcitrant physicists, like Einstein, I believe, who think
that embracing irreversability is like using a god to explain things. And
all of this has to due with the nature of time. I don't quite understand
it. The second law of thermodynamics appears to be accepted as the one
unbreakable law that exists in PRIGOGNE's book, but I am not sure.

IN the Autoevolution book. The Second Law is rejected. Sure life can exist
in spite of the second law, because we are all open systems, but the laws
of thermodynamics don't predict life (I don't know if this matters). It
seems that the laws of physics should take some notice of the existence of
life.
I would like to posit a fourth law of thermodynamics: There is a limit to
how fast order goes to disorder, and we (life) are the result.

But Charles S. Pierce as quoted in PRIGOGNE's book believes that chance is
a tendency which increases as disorder increases, and that as disorder
increases, so does the chance that energy will be reconcentrated in order
(life or other things.. planets) and that there may actually be a balance
which is achieved, "There must be a point at which the two tendencies are
balanced and that is no doubt the actual condition of the whole universe
at the present time."

-----

So why is all this important? I guess I am motivated by what the social
psychologists think is a principle of human nature, the need to feel that
I have an accurate conception of what is going on. And while it might not
seem like it now, I believe these sort of discussions can and do effect
the immediate existence of members of the community of life.

Gordon and I were talking about free will (as usual) It seems a perception
of the universe which includes chance can include this sort of will. I
don't like it though. I like LIMA-de-FARIA's statement that "disorder in
physics and biology is only an expression of the ignorance of early events
or of the ignorance of lower levels of organization." p309


PRIGOGNE is able to accomodate the mystics, l-d-f is not. I think we may
be able to say the universe has a will, and we are expressions of that
will, if we translate that as, the universe is the expression of some
basic law or tendency, as are we.

The principle of emerging properties is also an interesting one, where
organization of matter with greater complexity has additional properties
to the matter which it is composed of, but matter with greater complexity
is also subject to additional laws of behavior (?)

Oh well- I hope to talk to you at a meeting sometime-
Wednesdays in the Social work library room 1 at 5:30
or
Thursdays in hub209b (4/10/97) or 200b(the rest of the quarter) at 5:30.



Here's another thing that would be good to do (today!):

Subject: work party wednesday, 4:00 pm

Hey, everybody, just wanted to remind you about the work party this
Wednesday, April 9th, at 4:00 pm.  I was given four flats of violets this
weekend, so we get to plant them then.  And we also get to check on our
new cabbages.

As usual, we'll meet in Section G, which is across the street from the
rest of the garden, between the botany greenhouse and the forestry
building.  If you're lost, hang out near the shed in section c, by the bus
stop south of the chem building.

See you around,
Colin