[Taxacom] teleology example

[John Grehan]

As Mike noted, the ability to do something is not the same as intention or
purpose. In practice, selection descriptions use teleological language when
referring to something being "selected for" and even 'selected' alone has
teleological inference since 'selection' only makes sense when the outcome
or end point is known, not during the process itself (as one person noted
on this list, language itself is often built on teleological thinking. Its
a dilemma for selection theorists so I won't try to solve this for them.

John Grehan

On Sat, Mar 9, 2013 at 5:34 PM, Fred Schueler <bckcdb at istar.ca> wrote:

> Quoting John Grehan <calabar.john at gmail.com>:
>
> >  Many evolutionists still use
> > explicitly teleological explanations while at the same time denying that
> > their words say what that say. Is this not bizarre?
>
> * no, it's not bizarre. Descent with modification by natural selection
> is the only known mechanism for generating purpose (the ability to do
> things that tend to promote survival), so it's not much of a stretch
> to refer to the selective function of a structure as the purpose for
> its perpetuation. There's a bit more of a stretch to refer to a
> purpose for an origin, which involves developmental and evolutionary
> pathways, rather than individual development, but to the extent that
> there is such a thing as purpose, evolutionary origin is some kind of
> a summation of individual 'purposes.'
>
> fred (though admittedly, in the present case the use of 'purpose' did
> grate).
> =========================================================
>
> > On Sat, Mar 9, 2013 at 10:33 AM, Richard Zander
> > <Richard.Zander at mobot.org>wrote:
> >
> >> Clearly most of us think that the author did not write "purpose" on
> >> purpose.
> >>
> >> But then, do even humans really have purpose? Or are we just neurons
> >> firing in concert following some higher pattern in the universe, and we
> >> pretend we have free-will and . . . purpose? Perhaps we are all just
> >> organic machines, and what we think is purpose is just reflex
> >> machination? Or are we living in a big video game following the higher
> >> purpose of a multidiminsional Xbox?
> >>
> >> This thread is actually quite bizarre. Whether you think about it . . .
> >> or not.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> ____________________________
> >> Richard H. Zander
> >> Missouri Botanical Garden, PO Box 299, St. Louis, MO 63166-0299 USA
> >> Web sites: http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/resbot/ and
> >> http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/bfna/bfnamenu.htm
> >> Modern Evolutionary Systematics Web site:
> >> http://www.mobot.org/plantscience/resbot/21EvSy.htm
> >> UPS and FedExpr -  MBG, 4344 Shaw Blvd, St. Louis 63110 USA
> >>
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> >> [mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Curtis Clark
> >> Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2013 9:43 PM
> >> To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> >> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] teleology example
> >>
> >> On 2013-03-06 6:12 PM, John Grehan wrote:
> >> > Here's a nice explicit example: "it's hard to see how these hair-like
> >> > processes would evolve if they didn't serve a purpose."
> >>
> >> "Purpose" is often used as an unfortunate substitute for "function" by
> >> biologists. Sloppy writing doesn't always mean sloppy thinking.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Curtis Clark        http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark
> >> Biological Sciences                   +1 909 869 4140
> >> Cal Poly Pomona, Pomona CA 91768
> >>
> >>
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