The role of chance and contingency in life (Introduction)

by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Monday, January 19, 2015, 21:29 (3385 days ago) @ David Turell


> > Tony: And how is the determination being made about what is random? Is it truly random if a star explodes because of a series of progressive changes that were dictated by the very nature of its composition like a clock winding down? Is it random if the ejecta, traveling along a trajectory determined by the explosion of the star crashes in to planet Earth which->David: Obviously, what I am looking at is the issue of teleology in evolution. That involves probability as follows: Random mutations do follow rules in the genome, but some of them are truly random in appearance. Mistakes in copying for example. They suddenly appear. Other mutations are the result of epigenetic effects and are not truly random. Specified complexity in biology requires more than contingent chance sequential events. Biology is not as strictly mechanistic as your cosmologic example. Thus the true importance of the consideration of randomness in Darwin theory. Gould said we are a glorious accident. I don't believe it.-And who defines what is a mistake? I'm not saying that they don't happen, but then again, we also know the genome has self correcting functions so that these errors generally don't get out of control or last very long. I would not be surprised to find out that 4 generations or so is enough to wipe out the copy errors for most things. Call it a hunch. -I am not arguing against the possibility of randomness, in its entirety, but I do not believe that is as big of a factor as they would have us believe.

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What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.