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Talk:Mary Midgley/Archive 2

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Latest comment: 3 years ago by ජපස in topic More Dawkins, or rather, less Dawkins
Archive 1 Archive 2

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Latest comment: 6 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

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Date of Birth

Latest comment: 5 years ago8 comments4 people in discussion

Unfortunately the Grauniad obituary incorrectly gives her date of birth as 3/9/1919. The correct date is _13_ September 1919. I corrected this and it was swiftly and incorrectly reverted. Please do not revert this. I am Mary Midgley's son, and know the correct date to be 13 September 1919. I have other things to deal with at present - funeral etc. Will post a pic of her birth certificate today.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Ctmidgley (talk • contribs) 12:52, 16 October 2018 (UTC)

So, it appears that we have two reliable sources disagreeing with each other on the subject's date of birth. The Guardian has 3 September 1919, and The New York Times has 13 September 1919. Further, a user who says he is the subject's son, Ctmidgley (talk · contribs), has stated that the correct date of birth is 13 September 1919. I'm inclined to assume good faith and use 13 September.
Ctmidgley says he has a copy of the subject's birth certificate on hand. Unfortunately, the no original research policy prevents us from citing the birth certificate directly in the article, but I suppose that the certificate could be forwarded to WP:OTRS at info-en-q wikimedia.org as an extra layer of evidence to trust The New York Times over The Guardian. This is a fairly rare circumstance, so I would be open to alternative solutions, such as only listing "September 1919" or, as a last resort, listing both 3 and 13. Mz7 (talk) 23:01, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
Also, I think that I crossed a line, I am sorry about that Ctm.Lakeside Out!-LakesideMinersClick Here To Talk To Me! 23:07, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
Thank you LakesideMiners - without being unkind I think you're right there. We (Midgley family & colleagues) are dealing with her death at the moment, and I think the power of greater knowledge of this tribe's culture & technology is one that should be wielded for making a better, more accurate encyclopaedia, not just for the sake of it. Ctmidgley (talk) 16:55, 20 October 2018 (UTC)
We should list the date her son says is correct. It's not a contentious issue, and there's no reason to doubt him. SarahSV (talk) 23:10, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
That sounds good to me. Mz7 (talk) 23:15, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
Thank you SarahSV, what you say seems most sensible. I did promise to post the birth cert, but found it too difficult to understand the requirements when I attempted to so, so the evidence I can cite is :

Ctmidgley (talk) 16:55, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Ctmidgley, that kind of circular sourcing happens at times. A Wikipedia editor posts something dubious with a bad source or none; a mainstream newspaper or book publisher repeats it; another Wikipedia editor removes it as unsourced or poorly sourced; a third editor looks for a source, finds the newspaper or book, and restores it.
When you and your family have more time, I wonder whether you would consider releasing (or helping us to organize the release of) some photographs of your mother. It would be wonderful to have a range of photographs across different ages. The problem is that they would need to be released under one of our compatible Creative Commons licences, which involves gaining releases from the copyright holders, which usually means the photographers. Tracking down photographers or their heirs can be time-consuming. SarahSV (talk) 17:30, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Removal of POV in Midgley–Dawkins debate

Latest comment: 3 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

"but was judged by its targets to be intemperate and personal in tone, and as having misunderstood Dawkins' ideas. Midgley disputed this view, arguing" Is clearly POV. Who judged it so, and where? Wereas Midgley clearly did argue that Dawkins was in error; it is not claimed that what she said was true, only that she said it was true. --Banno (talk) 20:35, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

concur -----Snowded TALK 05:35, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

This is a lie

Latest comment: 3 years ago22 comments7 people in discussion

"he nonetheless slides over to saying that "we are born selfish""

It is not Wikipedia's job to repeat untruths. I want to know a real justification from the people who want that lie in the article. I do not think there is any. --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:14, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

If you read Midgley she makes the case for that statement - whatever it is what she said and we report that. It is part of the link she makes between Dawkins and Thatcherism. Many many philosophers may well have told untruths as have a lot of scientists (including Dawkins), it is not our role to correct that based on personal opinion. -----Snowded TALK 18:19, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
"you may disagree with that but we report what she said"
That is going far into alternative fact territory. I do not just "disagree", it is simply untrue. Dawkins never said that, and he repeatedly said he never said it. I don't care how she tries to justify it. Yes, Thatcherism is Social Darwinism, but Darwinism is not Social Darwinism.
If we are reporting what she said, we must also add a refutation, because of WP:FRINGE. I would actually prefer that solution, but User:Banno does not want it. --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:23, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
See WP:Verifiability, not truth. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 18:24, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
Midgley was a highly respected Philosopher who took Dawkins on, and also exposed many of the implications of his writing. The article reports that and reports that he attempted/actually (delete according to your perspective) challenge her views. This is nothing to do with alternative facts or policy on fringe beliefs. -----Snowded TALK 18:27, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
Highly respected philosopher, so what? His explanations of biology, which is not her field by any criterion, were obviously too complicated for her, so she botched it when she tried to understand them. Laywoman vs. expert - expert wins, because he is a reliable source on biology as well as on his own ideas, while she is neither. Welcome to Wikipedia. --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:35, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
WP:Verifiability, not truth is an essay. WP:FRINGE is a guideline. The claim that Dawkins embraced selfishness is fringe. --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:35, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
The core of Dawkins's response, in Philosophy 56 1981, is "I shall show that Midgley has no good point to make. She seems not to understand biology or the way biologists use language."
This response needs to be in the article, and her fringe ideas have to be toned down. This is a non-biologist talking about biology, and ignorantly so. I repeat: It is not Wikipedia's job to make people's anti-science propaganda for them, regardless of what their job is. "Highly respected Philosopher" is as irrelevant as any other non-biologist job description here. --Hob Gadling (talk) 18:53, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
We report Dawkins responses to her, if anything we give them too much prominence. He is not a definitive authority in biology either by the way - a controversial figure to say the least. But Midgely is commenting on the ethical (where she is a major authority) implications of his writing and we report that. Also you are revealing your ignorance - Midgely is not anti-science, very much the opposite. I saw her and one of the worlds leading geneticists at the Hay festival in complete agreement about the problematic nature of Dawkins's various polemics. We are not here to be Dawkins Bulldog (sorry couldn't resist that). Otherwise thank you for your welcome to wikipedia but I have been here for some time and have worked on pseudo-scientific and fringe issues and in my opinion you are just plain wrong here. -----Snowded TALK 19:01, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
No, she is commenting on the ethical implications of her misunderstandings of his writing. That distinction is important. Other philosophers, such as Karl Popper and Thomas Nagel, have also failed to understand evolution. Geneticists sometimes misunderstand evolution too, if they work in a part of genetics which has little relation to it. I have read pretty much all Dawkins' (and his opponent Gould's) popular writings. I am just a physicist, not a biologist, but even to me, it is clear that all those people Dawkins calls his "fleas", including mainly philosophers and theologians, but no biologists, have not even grasped a tiny smidgen of what he actually wrote. That "Dawkins is pro-selfishness" stuff is not just very common among the "fleas", it is also a superficial and stupid misrepresentation. There are biologists, such as Gould, who disagree with Dawkins, but their reasoning is generally much better (although not perfect).
You want us to present an ignorant person's rants about a scientific subject to take precedent over what experts say. That is in direct contradiction to WP:FRINGE. The following are not reliable sources, but they are partly by biologists, partly by people who do understand biology, and they point out some of Midgley's mistakes:
And, for balance, a creationist who agrees with Midgley: [6]. Egnor would probably love the current version of this Wikipedia article. --Hob Gadling (talk) 19:52, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Hob Gadling can I probe what your argument is here? I hope you recognise that we're on the same side with regard to FRINGE stuff, but the statement is attributed to her (she argued that...) - it's not like we're saying in Wikipedia's voice that he actually said that. Is it your position that she didn't actually say that and that we should therefore remove it, or that it's UNDUE and we should remove it (or some other similar guideline), or that we should leave it in but make a more prominent statement about how she was wrong? Not meaning to poke you, just trying to get clarity about the change you're suggesting. Cheers GirthSummit (blether) 20:08, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
Midgley may or many not have misunderstood Dawkins but the "You got me wrong" defence is common to all fields. Midgley, who is one of the most renowned moral philosophers of her generation drew a a conclusion from Dawkins's writings in respect of his ethical position and we have reported that here, together with his response. It is not our place to decide if she was right or wrong. Nor to take the position that a controversial biologist must be always be right over a philosopher; we simply report that which is clearly referenced.   Your endorsement of Dawkins polemical rhetoric about 'fleas' is indicative of a strong POV here and your risible attempt to link her with creationists not helpful; you might benefit from reading Science and Poetry if you want to understand where she is coming from. Your comments on Stephen J Gould and belief that few people have grasped more than a "smidgeon" of what Dawkins wrote is the language of an acolyte not an independent editor. -----Snowded TALK 22:03, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
And by the way - the history of knowledge is a history of criticism by one thinker based on what they have read by another. It is also a history of people claiming they said something else. If we are going to go around wikipedia attempting to determine who has or has not understood what someone else said then there are an awful lot of articles that are going to need radical change. -----Snowded TALK 22:09, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
I did not have a lot of time in the last days to argue here, and now this has been resolved without me in a way that satisfies me. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:15, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Might I suggest that the word "slides over", which doesn't appear to be part of the quotation, is a somewhat loaded expression that could be reworded without causing offence to anyone? Deb (talk) 07:29, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

From memory her position is that he is, by implication saying that we are born selfish. So you could replace "slides over" with "implies" or similar -----Snowded TALK 09:33, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
I'd support a change in that wording, especially if it's not supported by the source - 'implies' is more neutral. GirthSummit (blether) 09:55, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
Okay, I've made that change. Deb (talk) 11:03, 22 October 2020 (UTC)
oh no, Dawkins doesn't imply that, he says it outright, the oft quoted "Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish." The criticism of the metaphor, that Dawkins:

...constantly uses the language of conscious motive and depends entirely on it to create the impression that he is in a position to say anything about human psychology. Calling genes selfish is indeed a metaphor. Whatever may be deemed to be the usable part of this metaphor, which might fit it to become a model, everyone will agree that the attribution of conscious motive belongs to the unusable part. Yet that attribution is the only thing which makes it possible for him to move from saying ‘genes are selfish’ to saying ‘people are selfish’.

is not hers alone. Probably should point out some of "impatient tone", bankrupt, vacuous, bad science and science fiction, for the reader to understand the "bad feeling between Dawkins and Midgley". fiveby(zero) 16:14, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

I hadn't checked the talk page, but I did remove this as cherry picked and hence POV and undue. He is taken out of context there, plain and simple. Why are we singling that quote out? And without any response from him? Regarding the subsection as a whole (and it's evidently linked from the Richard Dawkins article), it's supposedly the "Midgley-Dawkins debate", but the vast majority of the section's text is presenting Midgley's POV. There is no way that is not WP:Undue weight. There is no evidence that the majority view of philosophers and/or biologists is weighted so heavily towards Midgley (indeed I suspect the opposite). So yes, more sourced material from the Dawkins side should be added (or some superfluous Midgley material removed) until near-parity is reached. Crossroads -talk- 04:29, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm happy with your removal of that quote as the key criticism she makes is in the sentence before it. Otherwise my general view is that Midgely is notable for far more than the debate with Dawkins. If there was an article on the Midgely/Dawkins debate then it would need to be balanced but that aside I think having a whole section here distorts the article - which is about her. Getting rid of the section and having some sentences that summarise her criticism of Dawkins with a reference to his response is better. Dawkins attracts a cult like following (which ironically was one of her criticisms where she said he was creating a new religion) and I suspect over time this has developed into a section. -----Snowded TALK 05:43, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
psychological egoism and genetic determinism i think the key criticisms, Dawkins going at great length to explain in Phenotype: "I believe that I may have inadvertently achieved some such unfortunate synthesis in the minds of a few readers of my previous book, and the result was comic misunderstanding...I shall expose the myth of genetic determinism, and explain why it is necessary to use language that can be unfortunately misunderstood as genetic determinism." That and the level of vitriol tell the reader about Midgley. fiveby(zero) 18:59, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

More Dawkins, or rather, less Dawkins

Latest comment: 3 years ago19 comments7 people in discussion

I think the quote containing this [There is] widespread discontent with the neo-Darwinist—or Dawkinsist—orthodoxy that claims something which Darwin himself denied, namely that natural selection is the sole and exclusive cause of evolution, making the world therefore, in some important sense, entirely random should be removed. It thoroughly oversimplifies, misunderstands and distorts a complex situation in several ways.

  • Darwin's non-natural-selection mechanism was pangenesis, a Lamarckian idea, and is long obsolete, and he introduced that only because of Lord Kelvin's computation that the Earth could not be as old as geologists said - which turned out to be wrong when radioactivity was discovered. So, equating his "natural selection plus sexual selection plus Lamarckism" stance with modern "mutation plus natural selection plus sexual selection plus neutral selection (genetic drift) plus symbiogenesis, plus various other mechanisms, plus emergent phenomena that follow from those, like allopatric speciation, punctuated equilibrium, or spandrels" is misleading.
  • "Neo-Darwinist orthodoxy" is a vague term, but I am not aware of any non-strawman meaning reducing evolution to natural selection with the exclusion of all other effects. Nobody believes that. Maybe it is supposed to be shorthand, but for what exactly?
  • Especially, Dawkins never "claimed that natural selection is the sole and exclusive cause of evolution". He just concentrates on explaining that part, rarely mentioning other mechanisms. That does not mean he denies them. In Sexual selection in humans, we quote him embracing the spandrel concept, although not calling it that, as well as sexual selection. He also accepts genetic drift, but regards it as not very important. Larry Moran describes Dawkins' position here: [7]. Biologists are criticizing him for neglect, not denial, of neutral selection.
  • Neutral selection is actually more random than natural selection, so Midgley's "entirely random" judgement may get it backwards.
  • Essentially, the quote lacks the important X in "evolution is natural selection plus X". Different people want different X: for pretty much every living biologist, including Dawkins, X is the things I listed above. For Darwin, it was pangenesis. For other historical biologists, see the table in Alternatives to evolution by natural selection. For creationists, it is God. For Midgley? Given the "entirely random" comment, I suspect she wants some Lamarckian element, or possibly Gaia, as X, but I cannot say. In any case, omitting that information allows her to be in the same "I want X" category as Darwin and non-Dawkins biologists.

Yes, WP:Verifiability, not truth allows quoting misleading statements, but it does not mandate quoting them. The full quote does nothing except giving the non-expert reader a false picture and exposing Midgley's confusion to the expert reader. Like the other quote that has been deleted, it is WP:UNDUE. As Snowded said, the Dawkins section is too long already, so let's cut the less useful parts. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:15, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

This is nothing but original research on your part. 31.187.2.184 (talk) 09:51, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
It's a good thing that I did not add it to the article then, isn't it? Almost as if I had known it does not belong there because of WP:OR.
Again for those who are a bit slow: Above, I explained why the quote is WP:UNDUE. --Hob Gadling (talk) 10:30, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
Well what you don't seem to understand is that Wikipedia should not change articles based on the detailed assertions/opinions on a complicated academic topic by an editor when it is not backed up by any sourcing. How are editors supposed to validate your claims here that you are using as a justification if you provide no evidence for your claims? 31.187.2.184 (talk) 11:49, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
Yes well, I think that you (Hob Gadling) supported a Dawkins line :-) As I understand it Midgely, like Darwin did not reject Lamarkianism, but is arguing against the linear material causality which threads through Dawkins work. What matters for this article is that she took him on, he responded and the Guardian quote probably best sums up her contribution. We don't have to argue the case here simply report it so my suggest to get it to 3/4 sentences and remove the section stands. If no opposition I'm happy to make an attempt at that.-----Snowded TALK 13:47, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
I don't understand the joke or the suggestion, so I'll just wait and see. Opposition to "material causality" sounds like belief in magic though. --Hob Gadling (talk) 14:53, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
"How are editors supposed to validate your claims here" - See WP:CIR. What I said is pretty basic evolutionary knowledge that can be seen from Wikipedia articles, and demanding specific sources for simple facts when the question is the deletion of a sentence that is obviously misleading is known as Wikilawyering. --Hob Gadling (talk) 14:53, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
Editors are not required to have an intricate knowledge of biology, and I suspect many here are not as comprehensively and throughly educated as you obviously are.31.187.2.212 (talk) 15:25, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
Editors should at least be able to ascertain, by consulting reliable sources, that what Midgley says about the different mechanisms of evolution and who supported what, is a fringe theory and should not be propagated by Wikipedia. It can be paraphrased in a neutral way instead of as a quote riddled with rookie mistakes.
See, the rules are there for a reason. They are not the purpose, they serve a purpose. They are Wikipedia's way of ascertaining that the article content is accurate and helps the read understand things. If you misuse the rules to ascertain the opposite, you are wrong here.
For cases like this, where somebody famous talks nonsense about a field far outside of their expertise, we have WP:FRINGE. I meet similar resistance when editors sympathetic to climate change deniers want to keep the denier's quotes, with pretty much the same reasoning you are using here. --Hob Gadling (talk) 16:51, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
Suggestion:
Midgley accuses Dawkins of "orthodoxy", of claiming that "natural selection is the sole and exclusive cause of evolution", of deviating from Darwin's position and of causing "widespread discontent".
That is how you write about such things neutrally. Not by quoting muddled sentences full of inaccuracies. --Hob Gadling (talk) 16:58, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
"Accuses", "claiming", "deviating". That doesn't sound NPOV to me. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 17:19, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
Hob Gadling has now attempted to link anyone who disagrees with him to climate denial on top of the earlier nonsensical creationist link. Given his association of a key aspect of complexity science (no linear material causality) with "magic" and evident lack of knowledge of scientific criticism of Dawkins which matches that of Midgley; I suggest that s/he adopts a slightly more collegiate approach to this debate. It feels like arguing with a Dawkins apologist and high priest of what Mary called 'Scientism'. This article is about Midgely, a notable and much cited Philosopher, who argued that science cannot replace the humanities and that Dawkins de facto acted as an apologist for Thatcher. You can agree or disagree with that position but it is in no way a fringe approach. In the context of this article her attack on Dawkins is notable and should be reported.-----Snowded TALK 21:33, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
The "material" in "no linear material causality" has nothing to do with complexity science; the latter (including emergence) is completely consistent with materialism, and anything beyond that does indeed sound like magic. And the idea that any school of thought in evolutionary biology promotes Thatcherism is indeed fringe. Indeed, I can't resist pointing out that Thatcherism is downright altruistic compared to the biosphere, what with all its predation, parasitism, infanticide, venoms, poisons, etc., etc. It's just an equally fallacious reversal of the appeal to nature. Anyway, Hob Gadling's summary seems good to me; maybe "accuses" can be replaced, but the other two words that were singled out are just her accusations against Dawkins, so I don't see the issue. Crossroads -talk- 04:15, 25 October 2020 (UTC)
You need to read more widely, it is extensively used (a link back to Aristotle) in CAS theory (a central theme in Juarrero's seminal work). Why you need to say that CAS is realist and materialist in nature when I can't see any questioning of that is puzzling. The point related to the linear nature of Dawkins thinking which is one of the things Midgely challenged. You may agree or disagree with it but there is nothing there that is fringe in nature and there is no reason to attempt to censor her propositions in this article. -----Snowded TALK 21:09, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

This condescending comment, such as it is, caused me to delve into CAS theory and, for that at least, I thank you because what a load of horseshit can you find in those parts. Juarrero is working in an area where she has almost no expertise, and it shows in her writing. She is commenting on the results of what other people have done in work in the 1980s and 1990s at the beginning of questions about numerical chaos which have been deeply and thoroughly studied by those in computer science, mathematics, and physics to some effect. Nevertheless, she argues without irony that somehow this work shows that causality as it is evoked in physics, for example, doesn't exist or needs to be amplified because emergence, a set of phenomena which has been well understood since work in statistical mechanics first started, somehow violates her own straw man of what scientists work with when they describe causes and effects. It's a bunch of people who don't know about the subject they are discussing having a love-in -- very reminiscent of some of the discussions I've seen brokered by New Age believers in quantum mechanics. Blech. Well, in any case, it encouraged me to clean up Complex adaptive system which made audacious claims that were unverified. What a rabbit hole! jps (talk) 16:26, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

I must admit I thought my response was mild rather than condescending given the tenor of the comments to which it was a response. Otherwise you might want to remostrate with the MIT Press editors and readers who allowed Juarrero's work to be pubished; her base is a lot wider that you suggest and the field is differetiated from "numerical chaos". You'll find that she is highly respected in Santa Fe and other centres of work on CAS such as Peter Allen's work at Cranfield and elsewhere. Yes there are some terrible New Age interpretations of CAS which made me wince, as do the misapropriation of things like mirroro neurons and quantum coupling; but that happens with most scientific theories. Good to see your edits on the CAS article - I monitor it but stay out of direct edits as to be honest it needs radical surgury and I am too involved to to do that, I think there is one error but will correct that directly.-----Snowded TALK 19:33, 5 November 2020 (UTC)
I have talked to enough academic editors to know that they don't care whether a text has been properly reviewed or not -- they only care about publication. All you need to do is show her discourse regarding causality to a physicist to see what they think. I can tell you, they're not going to be amused. It is very possible that she is respected for other work, but the explanations she provides for causality are almost completely divorced from the actual practice of it within physics (and causality is one of the most carefully studied concepts in the discipline!). jps (talk) 19:53, 5 November 2020 (UTC)
I've seen physicists in sessions with her and others at Santa Fe and elsewhere and her representation of Aristotle's four causes didn't gain derision, more interest. A lot of this is language an it often takes a philosopher to sort that out. Futher CAS as a field is anthropology, biology, chemistry (which might claim originality) and other. Even within physics we have challenges to the idea of material linear cauality (see Constructor Theory and others). There is a lot of interesting transdisciplinary work going on the moment. The New Age nonsense, or "New Age Fluffy Bunnies" to give a wider description is a pain, but so is an over narrow or single disciplinary approach. -----Snowded TALK 20:03, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

I mean, I've been in similar sorts of sessions. Derision is contextual: Aristotelian causes are philosophical/historical starting points, but this formulation was fundamentally and irrevocably abandoned some 300 years ago in physics and we never looked back because it led to absurdities (Galileo pointed out a few of them). Inasmuch as a physicist might find it relevant or interesting, it is either with an eye towards quaint historical context or curiosity about wildly different epistemic communities. I know physicists who worked at Santa Fe and moved on. Part of the issue that they had was that there was no operational position to have when your argument is, basically, you can't model this which is a lot of what a rejection of causality (physics) is proposing. jps (talk) 20:56, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

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