It took me a few minutes to think of the word … ″teleology″.
From wikipedia: A thing, process or action is teleological when it is for the sake of an end, i.e., a telos or final cause.
I remember that teleology is a really big no-no in the scientific worldview, but I can’t recall the context (perhaps evolution?) and the arguments against it at the moment. Without remembering the first context, and not having at hand the generalized shape of the fallacy, I’m about two steps away from owning what the error is.
The context is not just evolution but naturalism in general.
The teleological fallacy, found in religious and “traditional” world-views, says that most or all things exist for a purpose. By examining how they are useful to us, or to other living creatures, we can often discover this purpose. The purpose is an inherent and unchanging quality of things, which also means there are objectively ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ ways to use certain things, ‘natural’ and ‘unnatural’ behaviors.
Examples: hares exist for foxes to eat. The Sun exists for us to be able to see. Air exists for us to be able to breath it.
This is, in fact, a triple fallacy. First, it often assumes (or, worse, tries to prove) a creator God that created everything for a purpose, which is false. Second, it reverses the direction of adaptation: in reality, given that there is a sun, we evolved eyes that can see its light; subterranean creatures lose their eyesight. Third, it claims to find objective, inherent, unchanging purposes in things (and thus, define ‘natural’ or ‘correct’ behaviors), but in fact these claimed purposes are entirely subjective either due to the choice of the method for finding them, or (in many cases) due to people simply announcing what they think a thing’s purpose is without any method at all.
The fallacy is anthropomorphism, because only beings with intention and planning can do something ‘so that..‘. For example, I can save money for college so that I can get a degree. Even a cat can wait by the bird cage ‘so that’ it catches the bird if the bird ever escapes. However, water can’t drip through a rock ‘so that’ it makes a stalactite.
The author is making this mistake of teleology if he explains events occurring so that they break down civilization; if he describes a model whereby the system was ready for the disruption to occur and then events happened so that it would.
For example, saying that an earthquake occurs ‘to release energy’ is such a conceptual mistake. The earthquake event is related to the build up of energy, and the release of energy is a by-product of the event, but the earthquake did not occur in order to release energy. That is the teleological mistake. (The author might have made this mistake, or not, I’m just relieved I remembered what was tickling my brain after reading this post.)
It took me a few minutes to think of the word … ″teleology″.
From wikipedia: A thing, process or action is teleological when it is for the sake of an end, i.e., a telos or final cause.
I remember that teleology is a really big no-no in the scientific worldview, but I can’t recall the context (perhaps evolution?) and the arguments against it at the moment. Without remembering the first context, and not having at hand the generalized shape of the fallacy, I’m about two steps away from owning what the error is.
The context is not just evolution but naturalism in general.
The teleological fallacy, found in religious and “traditional” world-views, says that most or all things exist for a purpose. By examining how they are useful to us, or to other living creatures, we can often discover this purpose. The purpose is an inherent and unchanging quality of things, which also means there are objectively ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ ways to use certain things, ‘natural’ and ‘unnatural’ behaviors.
Examples: hares exist for foxes to eat. The Sun exists for us to be able to see. Air exists for us to be able to breath it.
This is, in fact, a triple fallacy. First, it often assumes (or, worse, tries to prove) a creator God that created everything for a purpose, which is false. Second, it reverses the direction of adaptation: in reality, given that there is a sun, we evolved eyes that can see its light; subterranean creatures lose their eyesight. Third, it claims to find objective, inherent, unchanging purposes in things (and thus, define ‘natural’ or ‘correct’ behaviors), but in fact these claimed purposes are entirely subjective either due to the choice of the method for finding them, or (in many cases) due to people simply announcing what they think a thing’s purpose is without any method at all.
Ha. I remember now.
The fallacy is anthropomorphism, because only beings with intention and planning can do something ‘so that..‘. For example, I can save money for college so that I can get a degree. Even a cat can wait by the bird cage ‘so that’ it catches the bird if the bird ever escapes. However, water can’t drip through a rock ‘so that’ it makes a stalactite.
The author is making this mistake of teleology if he explains events occurring so that they break down civilization; if he describes a model whereby the system was ready for the disruption to occur and then events happened so that it would.
For example, saying that an earthquake occurs ‘to release energy’ is such a conceptual mistake. The earthquake event is related to the build up of energy, and the release of energy is a by-product of the event, but the earthquake did not occur in order to release energy. That is the teleological mistake. (The author might have made this mistake, or not, I’m just relieved I remembered what was tickling my brain after reading this post.)