The Protoplasmic Venture

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Chapter 6

• The Protoplasmic Venture

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Humans cant live without seeking to describe
and explain the universe. (Sir Isaiah Berlin)
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Four Great Etiological Questions

1. What is the origin of life?
2. What is the origin of human beings?
3. What is the origin of matter?
4. What is the origin of the universe?

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Biochemical Evolution

• Alexander Oparin (1922)
• J.B.S. Haldane (1928)
• Stanley Miller (1953)
• First laboratory synthesis of a complete
  mammalian gene (1975)
• Cyril Ponnamperuma
• George Wald (1957)

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The Beginning of Life on Earth

• When did life begin on the planet Earth?
• Fossil records indicate that life developed
  sometime between 4.5 billion years ago and 3.5
  billion years ago
• During that billion-year period, some wonderful
  and incredible events were taking place

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Earths Life-Forms An Inventory

• Hot thin soup
• 1.5 million species of living organisms
• 10,000 new species added annually
• Estimated 10 million species of organisms exist
• Estimated 10 billion species produced by
  evolution on Earth since planet began

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Biogenetic Theories

• Panspermia
• Spontaneous generation
• Hylozoism
• Creationism
• Vitalism

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Can Life Be Defined?

• What is life?
• Self-replication
• Mutability
• Motility
• Metabolism
• Growth
• Irritability
• Dynamic Equilibrium

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Evolution as a Field Theory

• Darwins genius 1) his ability to bring a
  synoptic mind to these disparate elements and fit
  them all together 2) his meticulous gathering of
  scientific data to support his theory

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Three Basic Processes of evolution

1. The laws of heredity
2. Mutations produced by changes in the DNA code
3. The dynamics of natural selection

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Evolution Based on Five Observations

1. Species produce like species
2. There is an enormous excess of reproductive
   material
3. Individual variations in genetic characteristics
4. Competition for food and living room
5. Environmental niches are dynamic

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Evolution and Meaning

• The Doctrine of Progress
• Nietzsche, The main goal of history is to produce
  a man who has such greatness that he would be a
  new species
• Bergson, Vital Life-force

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Evolution and Progress

• Natural Selection is an Arms Race
• Evolutionary Convergence
• Epigenetics

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A Case of Convergence The Eye

• Represents a new worldview for understanding all
  living things
• Exactly the same structures, functions, and
  behavioral mechanisms exist everywhere throughout
  the animal and plant kingdoms
• The eye as an example of convergence
• Eyes have continued to evolve along independent
  lines of development
• No individual organism should be seen as a stage
  on the way up to something else

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Suffering and the Arms Race

• Terrible but true, the suffering among wild
  animals is so appalling that sensitive souls
  would best not contemplate it. --Richard Dawkins
• What is the meaning of human suffering?
• Traditional Problem of Evil

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Philosophic Implications

• Do we understand how life evolves?
• What does it mean to say this?
• Chemical biogenesis as first-magnitude field
  theory
• Ethical considerations
• Cosmic implications

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Philosophic Problems

• Irreversibility
• Convergence

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Charles DarwinThe Grandest Synthesis

• Darwin saw the key to the puzzle the mechanism
  of evolvement is the struggle for survival and
  the survival of the fittest.
• Under the perpetual threat of starvation and
  annihilation in the harsh environment, all
  species of life on Earth continually struggle for
  survival, and only the fittest survive.

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Reflections

• What do you think are the most far-reaching
  philosophic implications of the biochemical
  theory of the origin of life? Do you feel a sense
  of relief that foundations have been laid for an
  empirical answer to this question?

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Humans

• This chapter describes the evolutionary context
  for reflecting on the human situation and
  suggests that evolution has now taken a new and
  unpredictable turn.

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The Sculptor-Gods

• Pottery as a universal skill
• Shards of pottery have been found wherever people
  have lived
• Clay figurines were made for fun
• Creation myths based on sculpting clay
• Examples Tu, Titi and Tame Ewe-speaking tribes
  of Togo, West Africa Toradjas of the Celebes
  Hebrew account of creation Shilluks of White Nile

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The Story of Human Origins

• Homo Sapiens wise humans
• Homo Habilis
• Australopithecus (Lucy)
• Homo erectus

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Update Human Origins

• Sahelanthropus tchadensis
• Australopithecus afarensis
• Australopithecus africanus
• Ardipithecus ramidus
• Homo ergaster
• Homo floresiensis
• Homo habilis
• Homo erectus
• Homo sapien

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Still Trying to Define Human

• Physical characteristics
• Ethical feelings
• Esthetic feelings
• Religious feelings
• Soul-essence (psyche)

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The Killer-Ape Theory

• Killing on principleinherited or learned?
• Leakey and Lorenz and the killer-ape theory
• Montagus dispute of the theory
• How do we humans differ from our animal kin
  regarding feelings of aggression?
• What distinguishes humans from other animals?

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The Immense Journey

• Rapid progress in science/technology has
  radically altered the selective function of the
  environment
• Destruction of our natural environment

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Soren KierkegaardThat Individual

• Now called Existentialism, it is a philosophy of
  the experiencing human self, and Kierkegaards
  life is the story of one mans search for what it
  means to be human
• The thing is to understand myselfto see what
  God really wishes me to do the thing is to find
  a truth which is true for me, to find the idea
  for which I can live and die.

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Reflections

• Make an attempt to define human. How would you
  describe essential man? What are some of the
  problems we must face in developing a definition?

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Earth

• This chapter is a meditation on humankinds
  relationship to other living creatures on Earth
  and to the Earth itself. It raises the question
  of who has a right to control and exploit other
  species.

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Our Place in the Scheme of Things

• General evolution
• Human evolution
• Cultural evolution
• 3 stages 1) Parent-child relationship 2) man as
  conqueror 3) protective feeling toward nature

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An Ecospheric Ethic

• Who has a right to do what to whom and why?
• The notion of right
• Professor Sessions assessment
• Rachel Carsons attack
• St. Francis of Assisi
• Professor Charles Hartshornes Ultimate Value
• Professor John Cobbs intrinsic criteria

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Coexistence - In Life Death

• Physical/ecological relationships
• Psychological/ecological relationships
• Why do we kill for pleasure?
• Human sacrifice
• Anthropomorphizing animal kin 1) we cant help
  it 2) we want other creatures to like us

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No Man Is An Island

• Each is a part of the whole, subject to the same
  physical forces that move the atoms and the
  planets
• We are part of an awesome protoplasmic venture

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Albert SchweitzerReverence for Life

• Reverence for life In that principle my life
  has found a firm footing and a clear path to
  follow.

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Reflections

• Think about Schweitzers Reverence for Life a
  concept he believed to be the realistic answer
  to the realistic question of how man and the
  world are related to each other. How do you feel
  about this all-inclusive ethic?

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Future

• This chapter describes several future scenarios,
  both optimistic and pessimistic

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The Theoretical Life

• Practical life (praktikos bios) short-range
  goals
• (versus the)
• Theoretical life (theoretikos bios) long-range
  goals

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Research Into the Future

• Utopias and anti-Utopias
• Futures research 1) forecasting techniques 2)
  world catastrophe 3) world systems 4) past
  frameworks obsolete
• What is the goal of futures research?

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Mankind at the Turning Point

1. A world consciousness
2. A new ethic in the use of material resources
3. An attitude toward nature must be developed based
   on harmony rather than conquest
4. A sense of identification with future generations

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The Futurists the Future

• No single world-picture, although there is
  remarkable agreement on many points
• Short-range futurists
• Middle-range futurists
• Long-range futurists
• Alvin Tofflers Future Shock
• Arthur C. Clarke

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A New Kind of Realism

• Based on a more objective assessment of empirical
  data, this realism attempts to project a variety
  of scenarios in the hope we can, in time, face
  them and solve them

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The Players

• Sir Fred Hoyle
• Edward O. Wilson
• Robert T. McCall
• Ray Bradbury

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Many Futures A Common Vision

• Todays world has come unglued, unraveled
• There is a pressing need for a sense of global
  identity and a shared vision of the future a
  reason to exist
• A shared vision of our common future is therefore
  enormously important

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Friedrich NietzscheThe Glory of Becoming Human

• Nietzsche built on a theory of evolution to
  reinterpret the history of the human race and to
  lay foundations for his grand vision of the
  future of mankind
• Will to power as the basic drive
• Ubermensch Superman

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The Nietzsche Myth

• Myth Nietzsche is a bigoted anti-Semite
• Myth Nietzsche is an advocate of Darwins
  Evolutionary Theory
• Only after Nietzsches death was his philosophy
  appropriated as official ideology of Nazi
  apologetics
• The Germans saw themselves as the master race

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Reflections

• Recall the statement that opens this chapter
  That we create the past and can also create
  alternative futures and that we need both past
  and future to see ourselves in perspective. How
  much value is there in this way of looking at
  ourselves and our place in time?