Yes, I did mention Tierra in my class tonight. Also Swarm and the Game of
Life as working examples of simple evolutionary processes observable within
a human timescale.
>> I'm also curious about something--how can one justify having any sort of
>> religious faith at all, if one takes a pancritical rationalist approach
>> to existence?
>
>Oh, come now, you should know better than that.
>"How many legs does a dog have, if you call a tail a leg?"
>"Four - calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg."
>
>If God exists, then a fully informed pancritical rationalist would have
>absolutely no choice but to believe in It.
If you are using "faith" simply to mean the content of a belief system,
Eleizer, then your response is correct. However, I take faith to more
usually refer to the *way* in which a belief is held, i.e, not in
accordance with or sensitive to evidence and reasons. In that sense,
pancritical rationalism is *not* compatible with religious faith.
Max
Max More, Ph.D.
more@extropy.org
http://www.primenet.com/~maxmore
President, Extropy Institute: exi-info@extropy.org, http://www.extropy.org