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To: js1138
It doesn't have a goal or direction.

Not a morphological goal no, but it does have a goal in the sense that natural selection selects for mutations that increase the "fitness" of individuals within an environment. Passing on genes is the "goal." I think your economic metaphor is apt here -- this selection is an invisible hand, and of course not an intelligence.

185 posted on 11/04/2005 2:20:43 PM PST by Alter Kaker (Whatever tears one may shed, in the end one always blows one’s nose.-Heine)
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To: Alter Kaker
...but it does have a goal in the sense that natural selection selects for mutations that increase the "fitness" of individuals within an environment. Passing on genes is the "goal."

If selection of fitness translates to reproduction as a goal of natural selection, then how do you explain homosexuality, which necessarily yields a state of reproductive stasis. Furthermore, why could I not then conclude that your claim is incorrect, since such a goal of reproductive stasis is the observation which would falsify your claim. And lastly, if such an observation of reproductive stasis does not falsify your claim, then how can the claim be useful, let alone falsifiable, if it can accommodate states which are in opposition to each other.

211 posted on 11/04/2005 4:56:52 PM PST by csense
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