From: Gordon Worley (redbird@rbisland.cx)
Date: Tue Sep 17 2002 - 18:53:02 MDT
On Tuesday, September 17, 2002, at 02:30 PM, Cliff Stabbert wrote:
> Don't get me wrong, I admire you trying to capture Some Essence with
> these definitions -- I just don't think it can be done. IMO, at some
> point, identifying a process as Rational requires an intuitive and
> fallible judgment ;)
Let's not get mystical: my finite human brain isn't going to attain
Rationality. At the same time, I disagree with you that all such
judgments will be intuitive and fallible.
A good way to tell if something is rational is to see if it is in some
way involved with evolution. All processes drawing upon rationality
that we know of *right now* stem in some way from differential
reproduction. It could very well be that weather patterns draw on
rationality, but there is currently no rational evidence in support of
this. The weather has no goal; the weather isn't trying rain harder on
London or turn Brazil into a desert. In short, keep in mind that
processes that we currently view as arational could turn out to be
rational, but if it's not being considered rational now it's because of
a lack of rational evidence.
--
Gordon Worley "Man will become better when
http://www.rbisland.cx/ you show him what he is like."
redbird@rbisland.cx --Anton Chekhov
PGP: 0xBBD3B003
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