Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!bellcore!decvax!wanginst!ulowell!ci-dandelion!talcott!husc6!harvard!cmcl2!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka From: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) Newsgroups: net.bio,net.origins,net.philosophy Subject: Re: the Goal of evolution Message-ID: <1382@mmintl.UUCP> Date: Sat, 3-May-86 02:24:45 EDT Article-I.D.: mmintl.1382 Posted: Sat May 3 02:24:45 1986 Date-Received: Thu, 8-May-86 21:57:32 EDT References: <487@bcsaic.UUCP> <1002@cybvax0.UUCP> Reply-To: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) Organization: Multimate International, E. Hartford, CT Lines: 80 Xref: watmath net.bio:446 net.origins:3079 net.philosophy:5269 In article <318@dg_rtp.UUCP> throopw@dg_rtp.UUCP writes: >>>[...] An entity >>>must have understanding to have goals. Evolution has no understanding, >>>and hence is a goal-less process. Let me change the semantics here a bit. "Evolution" per se has no goals; but I think it makes sense to say that the species which are evolving do have a goal: to survive. (And the individuals of the species have the more complex goal of perpetuating their genes.) I am inclined to agree that understanding is necessary in order to have goals; but I think the genetic information in the DNA does constitute a rudimentary kind of understanding. (Very rudimentary, if we compare it to a human's understanding; but perhaps not so bad compared to a cockroach's. I have no problem ascribing goals to a cockroach.) >> Viewed game-theoretically, the evolutionary payoff matrix has two >> results -- extinction or survival. I fail to see how to prevent >> evolution from becoming tautological unless it is seen as the rationale >> behind the first scientifically sanctified `goal'; appropriately, this >> goal is existence. > >Nonsense. To be viewed "game-theoretically", species playing the >evolution game must make a "play" and receive a "payoff". You have >defined no such plays made by species, and a large part of the idea >behind Darwinian evolution is to show how evolutionary change could >occur in the absence of such "plays" that species could "make", since >there seem, in fact, to be no such plays. More accurately, the "plays" that the species makes are individuals, and the "payoff matrix" has a potentially infinite number of results: zero offspring, one offspring, etc. >> Sure -- we usually view biological teleology behavioristically -- one >> does not have to attribute conscious goals to genes, organs, species, or >> whatever, to speak of the `purpose' of that which is under analysis. >> The purpose of my heart is, after all, to pump blood, is it not? > >To you, yes. [...] >The point is that "purpose" implies some entity with goals. Different >entities can see different purposes in the same thing. Objects per se >have no purpose. Purpose is attributed to objects by agents which use >them. There is a real sense in which the evolutionary purpose of your heart is to pump blood. It would not exist if it did not perform that function. >Thus, speaking of the "purpose of evolution" is like speaking of the >"purpose of the atlantic ocean". Here I agree with you. Evolution, as a whole, has no purpose. >Or, a clearer case, tigers don't have claws because they >hunt, they hunt because they have claws. Not so clear. The first ancestors of the modern tiger which hunted probably had claws of some sort. But because they hunted, those claws became adapted to hunting. It certain is true that tigers have claws well adapted to hunting because they hunted. >Uh.... what does this have to do with evolution? Natural selection >doesn't involve contra-temporal feedback. Michael's feedback loops actually are a useful way to think about natural selection, as long as you remember that they don't *really* represent contra-temporal feedback. Each cycle through the feedback loop is another generation. >And evolution cannot explain why consciouisness is >intentional by virtue of evolution's intrinsic teleology, since >teleology is not intrinsic in Darwinian evolution and never was. Agreed. This conclusion depends on evolution itself having purpose, which it does not. >> -michael >-- >Wayne Throop !mcnc!rti-sel!dg_rtp!throopw Frank Adams ihnp4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka Multimate International 52 Oakland Ave North E. Hartford, CT 06108