Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!ames!ncar!tank!cs_bob@gsbacd.uchicago.edu
From: cs_bob@gsbacd.uchicago.edu
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: random vs. ran(seed) (RE: choice, will, etc. etc.)
Message-ID: <3471@tank.uchicago.edu>
Date: 26 May 89 22:18:20 GMT
Sender: news@tank.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago Graduate School of Business
Lines: 39

>Here's an interesting story... (I think)...  In 1967, a few
>mathematicians and biologists were chatting over a picnic lunch
>organised by Victor Weisskopf, prof. of physics at MIT.  A "weird"
>discussion took place as the conversation turned to the subject of
>evolution by natural selection.  The mathematicians were stunned by
>the optimism of the evolutionists about what could be achieved by
>chance.  The wide rift between the participants led them to organise a
>conference on "Mathematical Challenges to the Neo-Darwinian Theory of
>Evolution"...(skip to the conference)...  which opened with a paper by
>Murray Eden, Prof. of Electrical Engineering at MIT, entitled "The
>Inadequacy of Neo-Darwinian Evolution as a Scientific Theory".  Eden
>showed that if it required a mere six mutations to bring about an
>adaptive change, this would occur by chance only once in a billion
>years --while, if two dozen genes were involved, it would require
>10,000,000,000 years, which is much longer than the age of the earth.
>(See Gordon R. Taylor's "The Great Evolution Mystery").  "Since
>evolution does occur and has occured, something more than chance
>mutation must be involved."
> 
This IS an interesting story, and it shouldn't surprise anyone who's
ever been exposed to evolutionary biology, but you don't know what you're 
up against. You see, the counter to this argument is, "Yes, but if there
are 10,000,000,000 possible worlds (that is, planets) where life could
have evolved, then the chance it would have evolved somewhere is very great."
This from people who call themselves scientists. Essentially the argument is
"yes, the chances are slim, but they are non-zero, so in a very large
universe over a very large space of time, life was bound to emerge sometime,
purely by accident." The adherents to this version of Darwinism are often as
reluctant to give up their world view as any creationist. I don't know why,
but any suggestion that evolution is active, as opposed to passive, 
(known as Lemarckianism, or some such, after the person credited with first
proposing the possibility) is treated as utter heresy. 

Certainly Lemarck's (sp?) hypothesis, in which he used giraffes as a primary
example, is naive, but why are we expected to seriously accept this "
very, very slim possibility" argument? What is the advantage to a "passive"
view of evolution over the "active" alternative?

R.Kohout