If you had simply stated that you didn't believe in the concept of "objectives", instead of singling out my precious emergent systems, there would be no rabbit holes to run down. :) Also is 1 thing that has an objective too much to ask for?
I'm saying that complex systems in and of themselves don't have "objectives".
Deliberately designed systems can absolutely have purposes and objectives.
If you want to be nitpicky there's a frothing sea of philosophers smashing endlessly against the little rowboat we're in here. Feel free to dive off and swim around, I'll stay here.
I'm responding to your philosophical ideas about emergence, I don't intend on making any philosophical points here, only responding to the ones that you made. You disagreed with the idea that society can have objectives based on philosophical grounds.
>>Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate.
Society may or may not have some emergent qualities, but it definitely has "deliberately designed" qualities, so therefore according to you: society "can absolutely have purposes and objectives".
Examples of deliberately designed qualities: banking system, fiat currency, stock market, credit card infrastructure, etc. All engineered to streamline economic activities and to allow those who control them to wield power(among other purposes).
>>>The production of wealth, as measured by GDP, or by the stock markets, or consumer spending, is our yardstick of success.
What is success other than the ability to succeed at wielding power, control over your environment etc?
> You disagreed with the idea that society can have objectives based on philosophical grounds.
I objected to the idea that an emergent phenomenon can be assumed to have objectives. Society wasn't "designed", it simply is.
Teleology is the name for assigning human-like motives to things. For example, saying "the hamstring muscle is designed to flex the knee and extend the hip" is erroneous. There is no designer. It evolved; we discern these functions independently of the system.
While subsystems may have designed elements, generally these too go on to have complex, emergent properties. And they're subsumed within the larger system anyway. Laws, stock markets etc are all emergent from human interactions. Nobody sat down at the start of history and designed the system we are part of today. It happened without any one guiding intelligence.
It's meaningless to say "society's objectives" because there was nobody to assign such objectives and nobody can assign such objectives. Anybody who says "the objectives for society are X" is basically saying "my personal preference for the unfolding of the emergent system are X". It's a substitution error.
Well now you've jumped off the boat into the frothy water, just like you said you wouldn't ;). Let me get us back in the boat.
I agree that the definition of the concept of emergence is that there is no objective. No one even vaguely familiar with the concept could possibly disagree with that. My questions before were not disbelief, just making sure you had some passing familiarity with the concepts before I engaged you.
This is the heart of the matter: you still have not named me one deliberately designed system that has purposes and objectives, like you said you could here:
>>>Deliberately designed systems can absolutely have purposes and objectives.
Your inability to name one thing that is not emergent makes me think this:
1-You believe that everything is emergent. From the hamstring to society, banks and currency and economics and bartering, and everything in between. If everything is emergent then obviously nothing has objectives, since that is in the definition of the concept of emergence.
Ah, I didn't realise that's what you were driving at.
Human-designed systems have a purpose. Otherwise, they wouldn't have been designed in the first place (hello, circular reasoning).
But they can also be viewed as emergent phenomena within the larger System of Everything.
If you want an example, how about an Olympic weightlifting barbell?
Its purpose is to facilitate the sport of weightlifting. Such bars are designed to exhibit properties such as flexing under load while returning to true, robustness to being dropped from overhead and having a collar spin with the right amount of resistance.
Weightlifting itself seems to have emerged from status plays between ancient greek men. "Hey Themistocles, I bet you can't lift this big rock!"
Which in turn emerges from status play, which emerges ... well. You get the idea. From the POV of "society", none of this was ever planned. From the POV of the people working for Eleiko, the bar is a piece of lovingly engineered and carefully manufactured high-grade steel.
This post isn't as long as it looks, only the first half is about our discussion. The part of this post that directly relates to our discussion is (only?) 300 words. In those 300 words I will agree with your latest post, then show why I disagree with your initial post.
>>>Human-designed systems have a purpose ... But they can also be viewed as emergent phenomena within the larger System of Everything.
I think that banks and society and weightlifting are all are examples of human-designed systems. Therefore according to you they can "have a purpose ... But they can also be viewed as emergent phenomena..."
In your opinion, is it simultaneously both, or is there some means of deciding which one? I think you answer this question when you mention POV:
>>>From the POV of "society", none of this was ever planned. From the POV of the people working for Eleiko, the bar is a piece of lovingly engineered and carefully manufactured high-grade steel.
I think this is also not controversial and I completely agree with it. But I think it reveals why I disagree with your initial post.
'From the [point of view] of "society", none of this was ever planned'. Luckily we don't look at societal problems from the POV of society....we look at them from our own POV! Which explains my disagreement with your initial post:
>>>Emergent phenomena don't have "objectives", mate.
Using the things you said above, I now think that you meant:
>>>From the POV of the emergent phenomena known as society, society doesn't have objectives, mate.
I contend that we are humans assigning objectives to society from our own POV, and therefore your comment has nothing at all to do with what the OP posted.
Saying that emergent phenomena can't hold their own objectives is a truism and I can imagine it being useful. But the truism doesn't seem to add anything to the OP's discussion. I would love for you to prove me wrong and show me the usefulness of the truism to the OP's discussion.
As a show of good faith, here is the usefulness of looking at society from our own human perspective:
If we are humans looking at society from our own perspective (as opposed to society looking at itself from its own perspective...?), then we can assign it purpose and objectives willy-nilly, based on the apparent actions and tendencies of the emergent phenomena.
The tragedy of the commons is an emergent phenomena. From its POV, there is no objective. From our POV, TOTC seems to say that SOMETIMES small collective sacrifices can prevent large collective sacrifices.
From the POV of a fire, there is no objective. From our POV, fire burns things and spreads from house to house so that one neighbor's irresponsible actions can cause a city-wide fire and hurt collective society very greatly(tragedy of the commons). So we should all make a small collective sacrifice and pay some firefighters to combat the selfish and irresponsible house-burning tendencies of our neighbors. Society++ because we have traded millions of dollars of damage and constant fear of burning to death for a small amount of money.
From the POV of toxic waste, there is no objective. From our POV toxic waste hurts the environment that we all share, so we try to take actions to mitigate or prevent the damage of toxic waste. Society++.
To address the OP directly, assigning society objectives seems very useful as it has resulted in firefighting and food stamps and police and healthcare and regulations against toxic waste dumping, all of which have seemed to reduce crime and disease and fear and pain and ignorance and economic uncertainty. Reducing these things allows for more efficiency and entrepreneurship and invention and time-saving and long term planning because we aren't so busy worrying about our next meal or our immediate safety. The OP hopes we can keep making progress.
They might have a post-hoc discernible function, but that's not the same as a predetermined purpose.