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Topic: Elliot Sober

	Elliott Sober - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Sober is noted for his work in philosophy of biology and general philosophy of science.
		Sober taught for one year at Stanford University and has been a regular visiting professor at the London School of Economics.
		One of Sober's key fields of research has been the subject of simplicity or parsimony in connection with theory evaluation in the philosophy of science.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Elliot_Sober (309 words)

	sober
		And Elliot Sober argues that if the cause of a belief is independent from the grounds of its truth, this is a good probabilistic reason to count the belief false.
		Sober’s moral is this: where an independence relation holds between a belief’s cause and the truth of the belief, the belief is likely false.
		Sober’s intended target is a subjectivist argument which denies the validity of ethical statements by attacking their evolutionary and social origins, but the form of his argument allows it to be employed much more widely.
	www.uab.edu /ethicscenter/barron.htm (4044 words)

	Kipli's Cage Deconstruction examined
		Sober provides Behe's definition: "...a single system composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively stop functioning." There is no mention of what caused the supposedly irreducibly complex system.
		In particular, Sober posits that the time for an intelligent designer to create a new mind in nature is finite but positive; with this and a finite age of the universe, there can only be finitely many intelligent designers (the number may be huge, but still finite).
		Sober provides a weakened form of this premise that DS does not address: "cause must precede effect when the cause is an intelligenct designer's designing and constructing an irreducibly complex system and the effect is that system's existing and being irreducibly complex" (Footnote 7).
	kipliscage.powerblogs.com /posts/1145248888.shtml (1435 words)

	Sober - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		Sobriety, the state of being sober, and not under the influence of alcohol or other drugs
		Sober space, a type of sobriety of a topological space in mathematics
		This is a disambiguation page: a list of articles associated with the same title.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Sober (97 words)

	Metanexus Institute
		Sober and Wilson repeatedly make the claim that the group selection alternative is slighted in modern biology out of ignorance and prejudice.
		Wilson and Sober tell us that coefficient of relatedness (r) does not disappear from the Price equation but instead becomes "more generally, a degree of correlation between the genotype of the individual and the average genetic composition of its group." And that is exactly the point.
		Wilson and Sober tell us that kinship theory and reciprocal altruism are special cases of group selection, so study them in their own right and see if you can dream up other special cases, but be sure to keep kinship, reciprocal benefits and some, general group benefit separate in your mind.
	www.metanexus.net /metanexus_online/show_article2.asp?id=3041 (7119 words)

	Science & Theology News (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		Sober and Wilson argue that evolutionary theory solves problems related to biological and psychological egoism and altruism.
		Sober and Wilson offer their book to report and extend "a transition in evolutionary thought” that accepts group selection as a biological basis for affirming altruism.
		Sober and Wilson examine the common practice of equating altruism and morality, and they make several important claims.
	www.stnews.org /print.php?article_id=2050 (1038 words)

	Steven Hecht Orzack, Elliot Sober (eds.) - Adaptationism and Optimality - Reviewed by Roberta Millstein, California ...
		Orzack, Steven Hecht and Elliot Sober (eds.), Adaptationism and Optimality, Cambridge University Press, 2001, 404 pp, $28.00 (pbk), ISBN 0-521-59836-2.
		Orzack and Sober focus on developing a test to distinguish between the alternative hypotheses of phylogenetic inertia (organisms have a particular trait because their ancestors did) and natural selection (organisms have a particular trait because it is adaptive and has been selected for).
		Furthermore, as Orzack and Soberâs essay emphasizes, it is a mistake to focus oneâs efforts on one cause without any consideration of other possible causes.
	ndpr.nd.edu /review.cfm?id=1151 (2253 words)

	: ASP : CURIOUS : PHILOSOPHY : MAFTAB : TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENTS - Islamherald.com
		These are two importantly distinct principles, Sober gives an example of the observation (O) that while sitting in a cabin one hears rumblings in the attic.
		Paley, according to Sober, is attempting to apply the likelihood principle to the watch example.
		Sober later rejects the notion presented by Paley, and argues that the likelihood of an evolutionary hypothesis supersedes the likelihood of a creationist hypothesis.
	www.islamherald.com /asp/curious/philosophy/maftab/teleological_arguments.asp (1765 words)

	And Now, A Word from our Sponsor - by Mark Elliot
		During the first year of recovery the number one priority is to: Stay sober; Learn the steps and traditions, and apply them in your life.
		This is the kind of sponsor you are told to get, whether you want one or not… A newly sober recovering person will attend a recovery meeting: get someone's phone number and put it in their wallet.
		He’s never out of touch with the confusion he felt when he was newly sober; Constantly revisiting similar incidents from the past to make sense of what the sponsee is trying to understand.
	www.anonymousone.com /faq49.htm (1287 words)

	Antievolution.org - Antievolution.org Discussion Board -Topic::A Sober Sighting
		The keynote speaker of the event was Elliot Sober, a professor from the University of Wisconsin.
		Sober is a nationally recognized professor who is known for his work regarding the philosophy of biology.
		What about Natural Selection?” Sober was the only professor to give a presentation, with the rest of the presentations being put on by students.
	www.antievolution.org /cgi-bin/ikonboard/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST&f=2&t=95 (173 words)

	[No title]
		Sober's fundamental idea is to use the weather vane's 'freedom' and lack thereof as an analogy for constructing a compatibilist theory of what it is for the will to be free.
		And, proper functioning is to be understood to mean that the BGD and the DGD are causally sensitive to certain sorts of causal influences.
		Sober's theory will be compatible with the truth of Determinism because Sober's theory describes free will by understanding the mind as just another causal structure operating (like the weather vane) within the general causal flow of the universe.
	web.syr.edu /~jdodd/CompatibilismNotes.html (1631 words)

	Adventures in Philosophy: A Brief History of Islamic Philosophy
		Elliot Sober explains this in terms of the Likelihood Principle, which he defines as: "O" strongly favors "H1" over "H2" if and only if "H1" assigns to "O" a probability that is much bigger than the probability that "H2" assigns to "O" [Sober, pp.
		Sober gives an example of the observation (O) that while sitting in a cabin one hears rumblings in the attic.
		That is, given that the watch is intricate and well-designed for timekeeping (O), the inference that it was designed by an intelligent creator (H1) is higher than the conclusion that it came into being via random natural processes.
	radicalacademy.com /adiphilislamessay3.htm (1865 words)

	KONSTAN.html (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		As Elliot Sober and David Sloan Wilson put it in their recent book, Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology of Unselfish Behavior (1998: 287), if common sense is what people commonly believe, then it would seem that “egoism has made large inroads” into it, and “is now a worldview endorsed by large numbers of people.”
		Most of the relevant arguments are rehearsed or at least adverted to by Sober and Wilson, who seek to resolve the issue in favor of altruism by invoking considerations relating to evolution and natural selection.
		Aristotle defines pity as “a kind of pain in the case of a perceived fatal or painful harm of one not deserving to encounter it, which one might expect oneself, or one of one’s own, to suffer, and this when it seems near” (2.8.1385b13-16).
	www.apaclassics.org /Publications/PresTalks/KONSTAN.html (6306 words)

	WMU News - Visiting scholar examines 'logic of creationism' (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		KALAMAZOO--Philosopher of biology Dr. Elliot Sober of the University of Wisconsin and Stanford University will tackle the question "Is Creationism Logical?" when he speaks Monday, Sept. 27, at 5 p.m.
		Sponsored by the Department of Philosophy, Sober's talk is one of two presentations he will make on campus during his visit.
		Sober is the president of the Philosophy of Science Association and the author 11 books, including "From a Biological Point of View: Essays in Evolutionary Philosophy" and "Adaptation and Optimality."
	www.wmich.edu /~wmu/news/2004/09/054.html (167 words)

	Group selection - EvoWiki (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		Recently Elliot Sober and David S. Wilson have argued that the case against group selection has been overstated.
		They focus their argument on whether groups can have functional organization in the same way individuals do, and consequently, if groups can also be "vehicles" for selection.
		Wilson, D.S. and Sober, E. Reintroducing group selection to the human behavioral sciences.
	wiki.cotch.net /index.php?title=Group_selection&printable=yes (343 words)

	Amazon.com: The Nature of Selection: Evolutionary Theory in Philosophical Focus: Books: Elliott Sober (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		It presents a powerful analysis of the evolutionary concepts of natural selection, fitness, and adaptation and clarifies controversial issues concerning altruism, group selection, and the idea that organisms are survival machines built for the good of the genes that inhabit them.
		"Sober's is the answering philosophical voice, the voice of a first-rate philosopher and a knowledgeable student of contemporary evolutionary theory.
		Elliot Sober, recipient of the 1991 Imre Lakatos Prize, is Hans Reichenbach Professor of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
	www.amazon.com /exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0226767485?v=glance (848 words)

	Lichtenstein Creative Media - The Infinite Mind: Altruism
		Unselfish Behavior." Dr. Sober is a professor of philosophy at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and Dr. Wilson is a professor of biology at Binghamton State University, State University of New York.
		They also talk to Dr. Goodwin about how people tend to act less altruistically in a group setting, relying on the group’s wishes rather than their own sense of duty as individuals.
		Sober’s mailing address is The University of Wisconsin, Department of Philosophy, 5185 Helen C. White Hall, Madison, WI 53706.
	www.lcmedia.com /mind152.htm (1066 words)

	Evoluutio kirjallisuutta
		Sober, Elliot and Wilson, David Sloan 1994: 'A Critical Review of Philosophical Work on the Units of Selection Problem', Philosophy of Science 61: 534-555.
		Sober, Elliot and Wilson, David Sloan 1998: Unto Others.
		Sober, Elliott (ed.) 1994: Conceptual Issues in Evolutionary Biology.
	www.helsinki.fi /~pylikosk/opetus/valta/evokir.html (614 words)

	Making Time Stand Still: (ResearchIndex) (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		A Response to Sober's Counter-Example to the Principle of the Common Cause...
		I agree that Sober has indeed produced a genuine counter-example to the PCC, but argue against the methodological moral that Sober wishes to draw from it.
		Contrary to Sober, I argue that the possibility of exceptions to the PCC does not undermine its status as a central assumption for methods that endeavor to draw causal conclusions from...
	citeseer.ist.psu.edu /687079.html (201 words)

	The OpenScience Project » Elliot Sober on the Design Argument
		I was just reading this article on the Design Argument contributed to The Blackwell Guide to Philosophy of Religion by Elliot Sober.
		In the continuing conflict (in the United States) between evolutionary biology and creationism, creationists attack evolutionary theory, but never take even the first step toward developing a positive theory of their own.
		Sober gives this example in his paper on Intelligent Design and Probability Reasoning.
	www.openscience.org /blog/?p=65 (744 words)

	Monkeys, Typewriters, and Birthdays: A Dilemma
		If it is true, then Elliot Sober’s objection falls flat and (barring other difficulties) the version of the cosmological argument given here seems to be successful.
		However, if the principle is false, then the objection considered by David Hume fails to go through and (barring other difficulties) the version of the design argument given here seems successful.
		The one thing the skeptic of theism cannot do is assert that both Sober and Hume are correct, for doing so would entail the assertion a contradiction – namely, that the principle of plenitude is both true and false.
	startthinking.homestead.com /files/Monkss.htm (1710 words)

	Burying the Vehicle
		It would be unfair to accuse Wilson and Sober of including the snow as part of that which is selected, although it would follow from my view of the world that that is what they are, in effect, doing.
		Wilson and Sober should, to be consistent, say that {Fig + Wasp} is the vehicle.
		But now suppose that a fig species is equally dependent on a particular species of monkeys to spread its seeds in their dung, and the monkeys are completely dependent on the same figs for their food.
	www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk /dawkins/WorldOfDawkins-archive/Dawkins/Work/Articles/1994burying_the_vehicle.shtml (969 words)

	Psychological egoism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
		This statement is circular because its conclusion is identical to its hypothesis (it assumes that people only perform acts that give them personal enjoyment, and concludes that people only perform acts that give them personal enjoyment).
		One especially searching examination of the arguments for and against psychological egoism may be found in Unto Others (1998), by Elliot Sober and David Sloan Wilson.
		This page was last modified 12:20, 9 August 2006.
	en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Psychological_egoism (448 words)

	Buridan's Ass
		The following link is to a paper written by Elliot Sober, a philosopher of science at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
		Sober's paper "Intelligent Design and Probability Reasoning." is an excellent analysis of the Intelligent Design (ID) position and the failure of ID advocates to provide a viable scientific alternative to evolutionary theory.
		The paper also, and perhaps more importantly, illustrates very well the type of probabilistic reasoning that is necessary for any scientific approach.
	www.buridansass.com /index.php?/buridan/2005/02 (1010 words)

	Metapsychology Online Reviews - Unto Others (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		In 1998, Elliot Sober, a philosopher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and David Sloan Wilson, a biologist at Binghamton University, New York, published the contentious and debatable Unto Others: The Evolution And Psychology of Unselfish Behavior (based on decades of thought) and Unto Others remains contentious and debatable today!
		On the other hand, John Maynard Smith's review may be compared with that of Christopher Boehm, whom Sober and Wilson cited and wrote about as follows (page 184): "Christopher Boehm is uniquely qualified to comment on the evolution of human social behavior.
		Please read and consider, for example, some of the brilliant words of George C. Williams that Sober and Wilson cite, or Robert Axelrod, or even Charles Darwin (1809-1882) (whom Gardner cites as an example of "naturalist" intelligence!).
	mentalhelp.net /books/books.php?type=de&id=254 (1466 words)

	Rationally Speaking (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		Recently, however, several scientists and philosophers have been taking a second look at evolutionary theory and its relationship with ethics, and are finding new ways of realizing the project of Plato, Kant, and Mill of deriving a fundamentally rational way of being ethical.
		Elliot Sober and David Sloan Wilson, in their Unto Others: the Psychology and Evolution of Unselfish Behavior, as well as Peter Singer in A Darwinian Left: Politics, Evolution and Cooperation, argue that human beings evolved as social animals, not as lone, self-reliant brutes.
		In a society, cooperative behavior (or at least, a balance between cooperation and selfishness) will be selected in favor, while looking out exclusively for number one will be ostracized because it reduces the fitness of most individuals and of the group as a whole.
	www.darwin.ws /RationallySpeaking/RS%202001-03.htm (974 words)

	You scratch my back . . . - 12 September 1998 - New Scientist (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-30)
		After the work in the 1960s and 1970s of Bill Hamilton and John Maynard Smith, such a view has come to be considered fundamentally wrong.
		Philosopher Elliot Sober and biologist David Sloan Wilson would like us to think again.
		The notion that selection cannot act principally for the good of the species stems from the realisation that cheats can prosper.
	www.newscientist.com /article/mg15921515.400.html (263 words)

	Professor Elliot Sober
		Sober, Elliott; Orzack, S. 'Phylogenetic Inertia, Adaptation, and the Method of Controlled Comparisons.' In
		Sober, Elliott; Barrett, M.; Eells, E.; Fitelson, B. 'Ethics as Evolved Irrationality: A Review of Brian Skyrm's "The Evolution of the Social Contract"'.
		Sober, Elliott; Wilson, D. 'The Golden Rule of Group Selection: A Reply to R. Trivers' Review of "Unto Others".' In
	www.lse.ac.uk /people/0000016350/publications.htm (219 words)

	Elliott Sober - The MIT Press
		Eliott Sober is Hans Reichenbach Professor and William F. Vilas Research Professor of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
		He is the author of The Nature of Selection (MIT Press, 1984), Reconstructing the Past (MIT Press, 1988), Philosophy of Biology, and, with David S. Wilson, Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology of Unselfish Behavior.
		Twenty-three selections take up fitness, function and teleology, adaptationism, units of selection, essentialism and population thinking, species, systematic philosophies, phylogenetic inference, reduction of Mendelian genetics to molecular biology, ethics and sociobiology, and cultural evolution and evolutionary epistemology
	mitpress.mit.edu /catalog/author/default.asp?aid=776 (304 words)

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