Edward Wilson finishes his book with a wonderful chapter that induces the reader to understand the fact that we are part of an environment, and we have reason, but that doesn't mean that everything will turn out to be alright.

We are not programmed to be perfect, we can make mistakes. And it's absolutely understandable that we make mistakes. There are things that work, others that won't. And the responsibility as conscious species is that we have to estimate and see if we're creating instead of constructing.

While reading this chapter, I have to admit I came to question certain facts about my economic perspectives. Until what extent are we free? Who speaks for the species that can't communicate? What is the borderline of our capacity to transform nature?

Thanks to Consilience, I can't stop thinking about how important it is for us to understand the fundamental rules of the world. It is incredibly valuable and beautiful.

We are parts of a species anyway. A part of history. With brains capable of reasoning and feeling.

Wilson ends with a wonderful phrase:
"... And if we should surrender our genetic nature to machine-aided ratiocination, and our ethics and art and our very meaning to a habit of careless discursion in the name of progress, imagining ourselves godlike and absolved from our ancient heritage, we will become nothing."

In order to prove the theory of Consilience, we must understand that there is no such thing as other rules out of the regime of this universe. That is the difference between Transcendentalism and Empiricism. Transcendentalism asserts that there are inherent moral rules (whether coming from god or not), and Empiricism asserts that moral rules are a result of human behavior.

The independence of moral values from humanity asserts that there's some knowledge or mind outside ours. And that is why, if proven, Transcendentalism can disprove the theory of Consilience.

Though it is a difficult conversation that is still in the arms of philosophy, we can't discard the fact that our mind is the one that perceives knowledge and that is the only way we can understand moral values. Even, Michael Polanyi quotes:


“So far as we know, the tiny fragments of the universe embodied in man are the only centers of thought and responsibility in the visible world. If that be so, the appearance of the human mind has been so far the ultimate stage in the awakening of the world; and all that has gone before, the striving of myriad centers that have taken the risks of living and believing, seem to have all been pursuing, along rival lines, the aim now achieved by us up to this point. They are all akin to us, for all these centers - those which led up to our own existence and the far more numerous others which produced different lines of which many are extinct - may be seen engaged in the same endeavor towards ultimate liberation. We may envisage then a cosmic field which called forth all these centers by offering them a short-lived, limited, hazardous opportunity for making some progress of their own towards an unthinkable consummation." That is why we believe in gods.

We try to explain things, but with that we use our mind, the circuits. Further understanding of the mind will certainly help a lot understand this magnificent aspect of philosophy and our own visualization as species.

Ah, Socrates has so much to teach in a couple paragraphs. You can get amazed in how much you can get out of those.
In the paragraphs read in this phase, Socrates is arguing how he is not afraid of death, of the unknown. Also, how his death is more harmful for others than that to himself.

He gives us an interesting lesson. I made a vlog for this one.

Ah, Emerson. You just keep amazing me.

"The picture waits for my verdict: it is not to command me, but I am to settle its claims to praise."

In the first paragraph we read today, the quote I just wrote was mentioned. Amazing, it is, that we are the meaning makers. We are the humans that give things that power to be valuable according to out own values. And us, as individuals are those who dictate that value.

Also, Emerson goes to the categorizing, hierarchical issue we've been having for centuries. We're trained to think with a category from the very first time we start to learn things. But we must be free and care about our own shining. That is were the real selves lie.

We first share the life by which things exist, and afterwards see them as appearances in nature, and forget that we have shared their cause. Here is the fountain of action and of thought. Here are the lungs of that inspiration which giveth man wisdom, and which cannot be denied without impiety and atheism. We lie in the lap of immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth and organs of its activity. When we discern justice, when we discern truth, we do nothing of ourselves, but allow a passage to its beams. If we ask whence this comes, if we seek to pry into the soul that causes, all philosophy is at fault. Its presence or its absence is all we can affirm. Every man discriminates between the voluntary acts of his mind, and his involuntary perceptions, and knows that to his involuntary perceptions a perfect faith is due. He may err in the expression of them, but he knows that these things are so, like day and night, not to be disputed. My wilful actions and acquisitions are but roving; — the idlest reverie, the faintest native emotion, command my curiosity and respect. Thoughtless people contradict as readily the statement of perceptions as of opinions, or rather much more readily; for, they do not distinguish between perception and notion. They fancy that I choose to see this or that thing. But perception is not whimsical, but fatal. If I see a trait, my children will see it after me, and in course of time, all mankind, — although it may chance that no one has seen it before me. For my perception of it is as much a fact as the sun. 


I must apologize for such a big quote I just posted, but it is of great importance for me to share this. I first ought to mention that Emerson is a Transcendentalist, for this I mean that he believes in an external universal ethic. He is a theist, undoubtedly. But in this, Is there consilience breathing underneath these words? 

Diego, Ana Isabel, Pablito y yo leimos el capítulo 5 y 6 de Don Quijote en el Jardin Ayau. Descubrí lo importante y magnífico que es Don Quijote. También la cantidad de libros que desconocemos que tenía nuestro personaje principal.

Don Quijote, siendo una persona íntegra y fiel a su Dulcinea había sido apaleado por unos hombres que se había encontrado en el camino, a los cuales les había mencionado de la belleza de su señora, pero nadie le hizo caso  y esto había enfadado a Don Quijote.

Aun así, se encontró a un conocido suyo el cual le mencionó quien era el: "el hidalgo de Quijana"...

"Yo sé quién soy —respondió don Quijote—; y sé que puedo ser no sólo los que he dicho, sino todos los Doce Pares de Francia, y aun todos los Nueve de la Fama, pues a todas las hazañas que ellos todos juntos y cada uno por sí hicieron, se aventajarán las mías."

Llevó pues el labrador a Don Quijote a su casa, en donde el ama, el barbero y el cura decidieron quemar una gran cantidad de los libros del caballero. Y los que no quemaron, los escondieron.

En el dialogo con Amable, el hizo una pregunta muy relevante para el libro. Si Don Quijote estaba siguiendo a ciegas su propósito (un nivel de idealismo a donde no se puede más), será seguir uno su propósito algo que equivale a locura?

Ah, yo prefiero que se me seque el cerebro como a Don Quijote y seguir eso que amo a que no se me seque el cerebro y vivir una vida de "cuerdo".

Tambien, elegí a la señora de mis ideales, mi Dulcinea, y ella se llama música.

Between instinct and reason, there's tradition. AH, Hayek. I remembered him all throughout this chapter. I'll explain further.

The Social Sciences goes through how complex societies are, and how the researchers in this field haven't acquired a good amount of knowledge, because they separate biology and psychology from human behavior. This is an incredible misunderstanding of human nature. After all, we're part of all this complex system called universe.

But the fact is, that society isn't either a purely deterministic system or a full culture product. It is an interaction of epigenetic rules and an evolving culture. (See Hayek hidden here somewhere?)

And it is amazing, how natural sciences have grown to reach social matters. Biology or psychology for instance, have found characteristics applicable to the society. These are proofs of consilience.

Then, he gets to the prediction topic. For this, he says that math can be made in order to measure certain things in society. Is that something that can be done? I'm of the people that think that society is far too complex... but what if? Would it be helpful?

For this, I'll claim (with help from Wilson) that in order to understand the complexity of society, we have to also understand the environment and our mind. For that, we should claim consilience.

There are some imperatives in our human nature such as categories of choice or rational calculation. Wilson even quoted our friend Daniel Khaneman (Thinking fast and Slow) on how we make irrational choices according to our heuristics and how we tend to make certain decisions according to time and avoiding risk.

This was the first dialogue I enjoyed with the MPC talking about Words and Rules. Definitely, this experience was really cool.
We decided to understand the theories that were introduced in chapter IV "In Single Combat".

Pablito commented something that is really relevant in this chapter: It is not just a matter of understanding verbs, language or grammar. It goes beyond: it is a study of the mind, of the methods of thinking. Are we fully rational? Are we fully empiricists?

The dialogue evolved beautifully, and I was able to understand many things I didn't see before in the chapter. Those are written in my reflections of the chapter.

This chapter talks about the different methods of thinking that are introduced in the preface. Is the mental process in which our language conjunctions happen associative or pure memory?

Pinker describes the two different theories: Chomsky and Halle's, and Rumelhart and McClelland's. Chomsky and Halle talk about how our mind is full of memorized rules, while Rumelhart and McClelland talk about how our mind is a network of associations. This is a debate that brings the matter to a more profound field: philosophy. The two schools of thinking: empiricism and rationalism. Chomsky and Halle's theory would be the rational, therefore, etc. (As my friend Euclid would say.)

Pinker mentions that the way language works, is a combination these two methods of thinking:

"Prince and I have proposed a hybrid in which Chomsky and Halle are basically right about regular inflection and Rumelhart and McClelland are basically right about irregular inflection. Our proposal is simply the traditional words-and-rules theory with a twist. Regular verbs are computed by a rule that combines a symbol for a verb stem with a symbol for the suffix. Irregular verbs are pairs of words retrieve from the mental dictionary, a part of memory. Here is the twist: Memory is not a list of unrelated slots, like RAM in a computer, but is associative, a bit like the Rumelhart-McClelland pattern associator memory. Not only are words linked to words, but bits of words are linked to bits of words."

This dialogue concentrated on the following part of The Apology, in which Socrates explains why he is being accused. And this is because he is wise. 
"Is he boasting?" Bert asked. "Is he being charged because he is human?" Carmen asked. 
Well, he is saying he is wise, and he is accepting his human wisdom, which is the one the gods agree that is the real human wisdom. And in that case, Carmen, I think he is being accuse for being a human!