Here is a very interesting article from NATURE which shows how the
Darwinian `thought-police' rein in any biologist who starts to talk
of `purpose' in nature.
It reminds me of something I read in a back issue of New Scientist
about the British logical positivist philosopher A.J. Ayer's attempt
to rule out even thinking about God:
"One of the most stimulating contributions on Ayer's philosophy comes
from S. R. Sutherland, who compares Ayer's attack on religion and
theology in Language, Truth and Logic with George Orwell's "newspeak".
In Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, newspeak is an instrument of
suppression in which incompatible thoughts of Ingsoc are impossible.
Without an appropriate language in which to express them, heretical
thoughts simply become unthinkable. Sutherland's point is that the logical
positivism advocated by Ayer was similarly designed to diminish the range
of thinkable thoughts. According to Ayer, statements concerning God and
other metaphysical concepts are devoid of meaning and so are not worthy
of thought." (Baggott J., "The common sense philosopher," review of "A.
J. Ayer: Memorial Essays," edited by A. Phillips Griffiths, Cambridge
University Press, New Scientist, Vol. 135, No. 1830, 18 July 1992)
Note the references to Dennett and Dawkins as authorities!
My comments are in square brackets.
Steve
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30 NATURE VOL 399 16 MAY 1999
scientific correspondence
[...]
Cause and effect in evolution
The need to see 'purpose' in evolution, or at least some internal drive to
help the blind processes of random variation and natural selection, is
remarkably resilient 1. Recent manifestations in the scientific literature
imagine evolved mechanisms that actively promote further evolution or that
facilitate rapid response to changed conditions. For example, Rutherford
and Lindquist 2 (and the authors of related commentaries 3, 4) suggest that
the heat-shock protein Hsp90, by stabilizing developmental pathways,
fosters the accumulation of hidden variants that can be exposed by.
environmental challenges and subsequently fixed by selection.
[Maybe the reason why seeing purpose in nature is "remarkably resilient" is
because it is really there!]
This is interpreted as "an explicit molecular mechanism that assists the
process of evolutionary change" 2 (or even "a way of saving up mutations
for a rainy day" 4). Similarly, it is widely believed that organisms increase
mutation rates under stressful conditions to improve their chances of hitting
on appropriate adaptations 5.
[Saving up mutations for a rainy day? Go and wash out your mouth with
soap!]
Such interpretations seem to call for the evolution of properties that
anticipate future needs. But selection lacks foresight, and no one has
described a plausible way to provide it. In principle, group selection might
produce results that seem to escape this limitation. For example, increased
mutation rates may indeed allow populations to adapt more quickly to
changed conditions, even though they harm most individuals. The
evolutionary problem is that such group benefits are usually weaker than
individual costs, in a well-defined sense that makes group selection
effective only under very restrictive conditions 6. So, in general, we need
explanations that are based on individual fitness differences 7.
[Note the dogmatic assumption that the only possible explanation must
be natural selection.]
abnormalities of the kinds that appear when it is compromised. Up to a few
per cent of adults heterozygous for a mutation that inactivates Hsp90
display significant morphological abnormality, so clearly there is selection
to maintain its function. Likewise, increased mutation under stress might
plausibly arise from trade-offs affecting individual fitness: stressed cells
may simply be unable to maintain normal DNA repair without sacrificing
other vital functions.
[Interesting that even Darwinian ideologues have to use `purposeful'
language. Trying to disguise it by using `function' instead of `purpose'
does not change its teleology.]
In the natural world, only living things (and their artefacts) have 'purposes',
and natural selection is the ultimate source of all such 'purposeful' design 8.
When speaking of the function or purpose of some feature of an organism,
we are therefore referring to the selective advantages that brought the
feature into being and that maintain it in the face of recurrent damaging
mutations. It is especially important, in any discussion of evolutionary
processes, to observe the distinction between function or purpose on the
one hand, and effect or consequence on the other. This is not a semantic
quibble. Cosmic rays affect evolution by causing mutations, but we would
not claim that they exist for that purpose. Similarly, developmental
buffering and variable mutation rates may influence the course of evolution,
but this does not mean that they evolved to that end.
[Interesting that a couple of biologists are authorities on ultimate
sources, and they know that all design is only apparently `purposeful'
design, not really purposeful design].
W. Joe Dickinson, Jon Seger Department of Biology, University of Utah,
Salt Lake City, Utah 84112-0840, USA e-mail:
dickinson@bioscience.utah.edu
1. Dennett, D. C Darwin's Dangerous Idea (Simon & Schuster) New York,
1995).
2. Rutherford, S. L. & Lindquist, S. Nature 396, 336-342 (1998).
3. Cossins, A. Nature 396, 309-310 (1998).
4. Pennisi E. Science 282 1796 (1998).
5. Pennisi E. Science 281 1131-1134 (1998).
6 Williams, G. C. Adaptation and Natural Selection (Princeton Univ.
Press NJ, 1966).;
7. Bell, G. Selection: The Mechanism of Evolution(Chapman & Hall, New
York, 1997).
8. Dawkins, R The Blind Watchmaker (Norton, New York. 1986).
(Dickinson W.J. & Seger J., "Cause and effect in evolution," Nature Vol.
399, 6 May 1999, p30)
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"Any living being possesses an enormous amount of "intelligence," very
much more than is necessary to build the most magnificent of cathedrals.
Today, this "intelligence" is called "information," but it is still the same
thing. It is not programmed as in a computer, but rather it is condensed on
a molecular scale in the chromosomal DNA or in that of any other
organelle in each cell. This "intelligence" is the sine qua non of life. If
absent, no living being is imaginable. Where does it come from? This is a
problem which concerns both biologists and philosophers and, at present,
science seems incapable of solving it." (Grasse P.-P., "Evolution of Living
Organisms: Evidence for a New Theory of Transformation," Academic
Press: New York NY, 1977, p2)
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