Selfish Gene & Selfish Patterns

Richard Dawkins' Selfish Genes & Selfish Memes (I read the part in The Mind's I: although a separate book with the same titlle is available) is an interesting and well formulated article (or story as it is called sometimes). It lays out the fundamental 'reasoning pattern' behind theory of evolution. While reading the article I sensed a back-story well hidden behind the main story. The back-story may or may not have been intentional (but that doesn't matter). The story is that of 'selfish patterns'.

Let me define 'pattern' as the way I see it. I quote from the article "The universe is populated by stable things. A stable thing is collection of atoms which is permanent enough or common enough to deserve a name". My 'pattern' includes - but is not limited to - the representation of this 'stable thing' in human mind. It also includes the concepts of genes and memes and many more. I would include non-physical concepts of reason, theories, laws, principles, algorithms (and memes), and physical concepts of animals, plants, rocks, cats, dogs, people (and genes). [Note: It is also possible that, what I mean by pattern is what Dawkins may have meant by memes. but I am not very sure..]

Patterns are the only way in which we can think. It is as fundamental to our way of thinking as ones and zeros are fundamental to working of a computer. The article talks of two concepts that are interesting in terms of patterns. The first concept is that of pre-programming done by genes (the Andromedans story) and the other concept is about 'simulation' (prediction) property of human mind. Both of these concepts are heavily based on pettern. A pattern is necessary to do a program and it is also a fundamental part of simulation. The simulation in human mind is unlike simulation in computers where different computations may be done on different inputs to simulate different outputs. The simulation in human mind is most probably related to pattern matching. The input (which itself is formed by pattern matching) is matched in different 'simulation patterns' to select the most appropriate simulation and then simulation pattern along with the input pattern generate an output pattern. This is how most likely the simulation in mind works. [I don't believe the brain would do number crunching to formulate an output.]

The 'pattern matching' biased human brain is probably not capable to think in a different way. So the reasoning behind 'Selfish Genes and Selfish Memes' is also heavily biased by thinking in terms of patterns. Instead of just reasoning like say : " A random set of atoms in universe million million years ago have changed their positions to form another random set of atoms in universe as of today ", we need to reason in terms of genes & species and animals and plants.
What I mean here is that we 'see' patterns (and only patterns) because we can think only in terms of patterns and not think in any other way. This is just similar to saying we see colors between range violet-red because we can see only in terms of those colors. Thus we seldom see 'non-patterns' in any given situation.

The 'selfish patterns' have taken control of human minds. The different varieties of these patterns are evolving in the human mind space. [Note the difference between patterns and memes here. Memes are occupying some space in human culture, whereas patterns are filling all the space in human visualizing and reasoning space]

So what are 'non-patterns' ? An explaination of non-patterns can probably explain what I mean by patterns. Let me give another story in terms of non-patterns, which may look funny or foolish, but it will explain what I mean. The story is made up of 'specific' entities and not a class of entities. It will contain ids (identifiers) for everything. Also, speaking in terms of non-patterns cannot be as brief as speaking about patterns. In fact if I recite the whole story, it would be so big that it cannot fit in all available space of all computers in the world. So I will give only some snapshots of the story. [Of course the story is random and thats what it is meant to be ]

In the begining there was a specific carbon atom. Lets call it c10254. ...c10254 was part of a primeval soup belonging to a shore of an ocean which is present day pacific ocean... As the 'replicators' were being formed, c10254 became part of replicator 35410... The replicator 35410 survived for long period in the soup and latter became part of the first cell of organism o530... Several million years latter c10254 was briefly part of the hind legs of a brontosaurus 456. It later became part of soil and survived being consumed by any organism for another million years... It was later consumed by a potato plant number 567. I ate that potato a few days ago and now c10254 is part of the tip of the finger with which I am typing.

The story looks meaningless without patterns in it, although it is a plausible story. This is what I mean by non-patterns.

[Another interesting thing that can come out of non-patterns story is that we can explain the evolution from other side. The non-organisms (like rocks, soil, water) can be actors in the story. They would be evolving to avoid being consumed by organisms (and thus loosing their non-organismness). The fittest non-organisms will survive. The non-organisms may be re-born from the waste and hides of dead organisms. well the possibilies are endless...]

Analysing Attrition

Attrition analysis is a common topic of discussion today. The managers sit down, brainstorm and bang their heads about why employees leave the company. They come up with various charts and figures to analyse attrition from the real data available. However inspite of all these metrices there is no way to predict or stop attrition.
Lets dig more into this.

While I agree there are several factors and constraints that may cause or stop attrition, such as salary issues, work culture, location constraints, legal constraints etc. I will discuss only on one factor. ie. a person's interest in work.

I am only going to re-visit the idea that says:
"A person's interest in his/her work holds him/her in a company, while a lack of interest in work may cause him/her to leave."

The above statement is just half true. In fact I find it almost opposite in may of the cases. The reason is that there is no proper definition of work.

Work could be termed as :
Technology / Skill / Domain (eg. 'C++ programming', 'software development', 'requirement analysis', 'web development) basically something that is not the IP of the company.
or it could be termed as :
Product / Service (eg. developing/maintaining product ABC. or providing service for XYZ ) which is basically a product/service of a comapany. Something which the person cannot find in other companies.

My theory is that, people stick to jobs either when they are interested in a specific product they are developing (although they may change teams) or when they are totally disinterested in the technology / field they work in.
They would frequently change jobs when they are interested in their domain / technology, but not in a specific product.

Here is an analogy related to cars :

Interest in specific:
If I am interested in cars and have a liking for a specific brand (say toyota), then depending on my capacity, I would change cars as frequent as I can, while sticking to the same brand. I may change to different models, or ugrade my models frequently. However I will be seen loyal to the brand. Same goes for a company. If I am interested in developing a specific product/service of the company, then I would stick to the company even though I might change groups and teams frequently. Still I will be considered loyal to the company.

Interest in generic:
If I am interested in cars in general and have no specific interest in a brand, I will keep changing my car models and car companies. Thus I may look disloyal to a brand, although my frequency of change is similar to the case of changing cars in a specific brand. I would appear to be disloyal to a brand. Similarly, if I am interest in a particular technology, I would keep changing jobs to find new avenues in the technology. In fact changing jobs is beneficial and keeps my interest. I would thus appear to be disloyal to a company.

No interest:
If I am not interested in cars at all, then I have several other things in life to worry about. I would not change the car as long as it is not giving be big trouble. If it goes without trouble (even though the maintainance is big expensive) I will go ahead with the same car. I may thus appear to be loyal to a specific car brand, although the reality is that I care less.
Similarly, if a person has other things more interesting in life and his/her job is not the most important thing in life, the person will carry on with the job.

If you think deeper the above three cases work for everything.. art, hobbies, cities you live in, houses you live in, books you read etc.

Forgetting fundaes

It is a common knowledge that if your fundaes (fundamental concepts) about a particular thing are clear, you do not forget it. I will dig deeper into this common knowledge.

First, let us re-check the meaning of above line. It could mean in different ways

P1. It may mean that when you have learned a concept and its fundamentals are clear, you would not forget the concept. eg. A mathematical formula, or a sorting algorithm.

P2. Or it could mean when you have learned a concept and its fundamentals are clear, you will have the ability to re-discover the concept in furture, even if you have forgotten it. For example, you could derive a mathematical formula or you could reconstruct an algorithm etc.

P1 is very superficial. I assume that most people realize it. What I mean is that fundaes of a thing being clear does not mean that you can recite a long formula or algorithm quickly whenever asked a long time in future.

P2 looks sensible, but this is where I would dig deeper. First lets see why ‘fundaes’ are anything special than normal memories. why would they remain intact while we forget other things related to them. There are 2 ways of interpreting this.

Pa. Fundaes could mean simply memories about fundamental concepts. These are special memories because they go beyond a concepts contexual meaning. Since it is not contextual, it is very basic and remains in some special area of brain where it is not forgotten. I assume here the fact that whichever memory is accessed frequently is not lost. The unaccessed memories for long time will be lost. As these fundaes get ‘touched’ frequently, they are never lost.

Pb. Fundaes could also mean the ability of brain to derive a concept. This is a unique setup of one’s brain and not like memory. So that could remain intact for long time, except for effects of aging.
If we assume ‘Pa’ then I think the fundaes themselves could be lost just like memories. And here is my explaination.

(For further discussion I assume myself as test subject and do not mean to boast about my abilities or hide by disabilities).

I clearly remember that throughout my academics and till date, I have been quick learner. When a new concept is introduced, I am able to understand (and re-discover) it quickly as compared to my classmates or collegues. This has been formarlly tested in my aptitude tests as well as certain tough tests on maths & science that are designed with the sole purpose of calculating onces ‘fundaes, understanding, analytical abilites etc’. Yet I find one problem with me. I find many a times, that I have forgotten completely the ‘fundaes’ that I had discovered about 5 years earlier, although other people (clasmates/collegues) could remember them very well. I mean here very basic fundaes like high school science or mathematics. I havn’t forgotten everything, but I don’t believe I would be able to do very good in a calculas test for example, as compared to my collegues. Although I am sure I did very well and was known to know calculas very well in high school.

So the question is why do I forget fundamental concepts as compared to other average people, when in fact I was first to understand a concept and did understand with greater depth. (as my previous records show)

I see these possible answers

1. It could simply be my brain’s way of storing the concepts is different

2. It could also be that I did not really understand the concepts well, that what I call as fundaes were not fundaes after all. and I did well in exams because of some ability to solve the problems on the fly without understand concepts well (eg point b. above).

3. However, the most probable reason I feel is the following:.

Fundaes could be combination of both Pa & Pb. They could be formed with a process of ‘re-discovery’ (ie for example understanding a mathematical theorm, in the same way the theorm’s proponent had thought before). The re-discovery could be assisted by formal knowledge (eg textbooks, teaching etc), but it is still a re-discovery. The next part after the re-discovery is the storing of concept just like any other memory, but in some special portion of the brain. It is also possible that this special portion is limited in the number of fundaes you could store. So when it is packed and there is no more space, it may forget some non-frequently used fundaes. For the people where this area is never full, the fundaes are intact. I know for sure that I have always been forming new fundaes, probably much more than an average person (for example this article) and so my fundaes box has no more space. It knows that ‘partial differential equations’ are never used by me and so they could be forgotten. Similarly some algorithms (eg sorting algorithms) that are not in frequent use can be forgotten.

.. all of above could be just true, or it could be just an excuse to say why I don’t remember quick-sort or cannot derive quick-sort quickly if asked to do so.

Abstract Art

I sometimes wonder what is my position on abstract art as opposed to classical art.

While I hate the abstract art, when it seems like created by a 5 year old, I also find myself defending abstract/modern art when people are trashing it as being meaningless. So I started wondering what is my real position. Am I a liberal or conservative in terms of art ?

After some thinking I came to a conclusion.

I normally accept and am inquisitive about all abstract art that does not contain human/natural forms. However, when it comes to abstart art with human forms, my liking is dependant on several factors. As I am myself interested in figure drawing & portraits and can manage to draw them with respectable quality, I become irritated when I see human forms in abstract art that seem to be drawn like a 12 year old.*

There is a minute but important aspect here. It only irritates me when I get a ‘clue’ from the artwork that the artist does not know or does not have skills to draw a realistic looking human form. So as far as Picasso or Dali is concerned, I have no problem as I can clearly see from their art that they have made serious attempts to make it look non-realistic. Or sometimes their art does contain abstract concepts pulled out of real forms. So when I visited the Dali Museum or the Pompidou Center in Paris, I loved it. There were no clues that the artists were incapable of drawing, as either they had represented human forms very well or they were so out of touch with reality that they did not look like created by a 5 year old.

So finally, what remains is the mediocre representations that sometimes show clearly that the artist made serious attempt to draw realistically, but when he/she couldn’t, tried to hide under the garb of modern art.

This concept is somewhat similar to the explaination about ‘fashion’ in ‘How the Mind Works‘. The fashion is an attempt by a class (ususally upper class) to redefine itself so that it stands out and is recognizable as ‘elite’. When the high quality fabrices with high quality designs become available at cheap stores for cheap prices, there is no way that the higher class can differentiate itself. So they try out an approach that would not be normally immitated by the following classes for some years to come. Thus they would design ugly and torn, ragged clothes that become elite and expensive. They also seem to look like ‘meaningless’ (just like art) in its peak season.
The modern artists of early times were similar to this high class elites in their art domain. It was no more possible to differentiate oneself with high quality realistic art because of some reasons. There were ample amount of draftsman who could draw or copy high quality work, the world was getting smaller and art from other places would become easily available and would naturally be more attractive because of its novelty. And finally because of invention of photography & printing techniques and the speed with which they were progressing it was easier to produce realistic pictures in short time. it was thus necessary for high skilled artists to differentiate themselves. So they may have resorted to ‘abstract’, as it was difficult to understand and copy a concept than a human form.

However, in due coarse of time, the less elites would learn how to copy the concepts too and how to use the ‘abstract’ medium to sell their art without having good skills in realistic drawing.

This is the only kind in abstract art that irritates me. The poor attempts from unskilled artists to pass on their art as being high quality just because it does not represent reality.

** Note here that I say 12 yr old instead of 5 yr old. What I mean is the forms lack the totally abstract quality of stick figures of 5 year old, and also do not come close to quality realistic drawing. They look like an attempt by a non-artist trying to draw a portrait or human figure.

Information Obesity

Is there something like too much of information? Is it possible that too much information in your head can stay in your head like too much fat, with you not excercising the information much to consume it ? Is it possible that this fat information comes in way of normal functioning of brain ? Is this type of obesity a new phenomenon or has it been there earlier ? These are some things that I would like to address.

First of all, I would say that this idea did not come out of nowhere. I am experiencing some such thing. I find I read (intake) too much of information, but I couldn’t recollect it when required on time. The information is also not ‘deleted’. It is simply lost. I know it is there somewhere in the head, as I could recollect it in other context. I do not know why and how this is happening, but I can surely make some guesses.

Fast food Information

The first thing contributing to too much information is its easy and instant availibility. Unlike the time spent in accessing, opening and reading books, or hearing information in others in a slow pace, we are presented with quick information on internet/tv/radio by means such as google/wikipedia/blogs/soap operas/news/discovery channels and such. Easy availibility is the reason for easy intake.

Low Nutrition value

Just like fast food, the easy information also has low nutrition value. What I mean here is that the information doesn’t come in a large enough digestable portion that our mind will be triggered to digest it. The information is in the form of small anecdotes. Just like we forget most of the jokes and anecdotes we hear and are unable to recollect them when we want them so badly, this type of easy information is stored but not wired well with other information to be able to recollect quickly. Since it is not digested (indexed properly) it lies in the brain just like memory leaks in a computer program.

Information Addiction

Information addiction is a serious problem. Much more serious if we think in terms of information obesity. How many times have I (or you) felt that I couldn’t control myself from further reading the related links on a wikipedia article. How many times have I felt uncontrollable urge to watch the tv serials one after another**. How many times I couldn’t stop reading a novel (though I will declare I must have read only 1/2 novels once in 2/3 years, the last being The Da Vinci Code.) I am sure you must have experienced such uncontrollable urges while getting some information. Shouldn’t we call this information addication ?

Obsesive Compulsive Brain waves.

If there could be information addition, why can’t there be uncontrollable brain waves ? This is what happens to me while I am not doing anything else (like driving). This is whats happening to me right now. The problem with these brain waves is that they are lost just the way fast food information is lost without proper digestion. A better way not to loose these brainwaves is to write them down, and that’s what I am doing now. (Writing the information down is itself a brain wave, and It is possible that I would loose this in a short while) So just remind me if you don’t see enough blogs after this blog

** I am starting to believe that tv serials havn’t got their name because they have a story serially split on every day, but rather because many such programs appear one after another ’serially’ on a given day. I remember, once on some thanksgiving or chirstmas day MTV was airing back-to-back episodes of MTV Punked and I watched them all day from morning to night