Re: Does anybody have any evidence that all evolutionary events are

John Wilkins wrote:

John Harshman <jharshman.diespamdie@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


John Wilkins wrote:


Free Lunch <lunch@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:



On Sat, 04 Aug 2007 17:44:37 -0700, in talk.origins
"rev.goetz" <jimgoetz316@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<1186274677.314309.95380@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:


I am wondering if anybody can argue in defense of determinism in
regards to evolutionary history.

I'm sure that Wilkins or any number of others could make the argument,
but that doesn't mean that any accept that it is even worth pursuing.
Determinism makes assumptions as big as an Intelligent Designer and as
unsupported by the evidence.


Jim and I have been having a little backchannel discussion on this. My
basic principle is that every event* has a cause, and so evolution is
determinate (but that doesn't mean it has an outcome that is determinate
in the abstract). In other words, this is the outcome that was
necessary, but there is no way we could know ahead of time that this was
the necessary outcome based on a knowledge of [the best possible]
evolutionary theory. Evolutionary theory constrains outcomes, but not
uniquely.

* I.e., any event within the causal universe. About universes themselves
I have no idea. One might also draw a line at the quantum level. I do
not want to, but physicists tell me I must. Some physicists, anyway.

One could argue that individual quantum events have a major influence on
evolution, and if so then evolution is not determined even in the sense
you state. The question here is whether specific mutations are important
enough to change the course of evolution, or whether there are
sufficient mutations to give selection whatever it needs, insulating
macroscopic events from quantum randomness.


I am of the view that quantum events will turn out to be determinate.
But they may be determinate *enough* in any event.

It's my understanding, based on occasional and strictly exposure to
physics, that it's been shown that quantum events can't be determinate,
i.e. that there are no hidden variables. But if they are truly random,
and if mutations are the result of individual quantum events, which they
frequently are, and if individual mutations are at all important in
evolution, then evolution is indeterminate. Depending on how important
the mutations are, different independent trials of the history of earth
might produce quite different results. We of course have no opportunity
to test this hypothesis by making such independent trials. If we test it
on a local scale with repeated selection experiments, we sometimes get
identical results, sometimes very different ones. It's hard to say
whether the differences in outcome were due to quantum effects or to
some unknown, small, and uncontrolled difference in initial conditions.

.

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