Vision and Evolution (A Critique of Dawkins)

[GrandizerII]

Did I say "hotter"? No?

You're a student of psychology, right? Do you remember what it takes for a theory to be a good scientific theory?

Are you saying the theory of evolution is not a good scientific theory?

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Here's a secret for you:

Organisms do NOT need qualia to detect "red" or any other color.

Cool, and once they do, it needs to be accounted for.

Why does evolution need to account for qualia exactly? Regardless of what the true theory of consciousness is, evolution works just fine with a number of them. If the mind is directly a causal product of the complex brain, evolution makes sense just fine. If the world somehow is panpsychist or even dualistic, evolution can still operate on consciousness indirectly by acting on the physical biological structures that consciousness is contingent on or linked to. So, no problem there. The problem that you think is there is in your head.

The theory of evolution is a great theory, specially for psychological explanations, very good at highlighting where not to look for answers.

You got that right. Evolution, as a basis, is a good way to explain a lot of our biases. You've done psychology and should be aware of the various types of cognitive biases, I hope.

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At work.

I must admit to not quite grokking the term 'Qualia'.

Qualia refers to the subjective experience/awareness of that which is being observed or reacted to or what have you.