Path: utzoo!yunexus!geac!syntron!jtsv16!uunet!seismo!esosun!cogen!celerity!jjw
From: jjw@celerity.UUCP (Jim )
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: cross-posting from info-evolution
Message-ID: <184@celerity.UUCP>
Date: 31 Oct 88 17:15:46 GMT
Article-I.D.: celerity.184
References: <8810242341.AA07687@multimax.ARPA>
Reply-To: jjw@celerity.UUCP (Jim (JJ) Whelan)
Organization: FPS Computing, San Diego CA
Lines: 16

In article <8810242341.AA07687@multimax.ARPA> SCHOLTES@ascf.sdr.slb.COM ("SCHOLTES%ASC@SDR.SLB.COM") writes:
>Why is natural selection the dominant evolutionary mechanism of life?
Because that's the simplest mechanism -- what works stays around, what
doesn't work goes away.  "Lamarkian" genetics would first have to pass that
test (i.e. it would have to work in order to stay around).

>So, why hasn't it happened naturally?
Actually, it has, it just doesn't use the genetic mechanisms.  The genetic
mechanisms work best by encoding the ability to change (like fur color
change with seasons) rather than by leaving the latest state of the parent
as the next state of the offspring.

>... human social change, which is basically Lamarckian ...
BINGO! -- intelligence and intra-species communication(language) are
naturally evolved mechanisms which allow a species to learn how to cope
with its environment and to pass the knowledge on to offspring.