To the combatants (philosophical pugilists;) in this thread:

The different kinds of 'chancy' (;-) natural changes that "genetic drift"
imply are already part of what the concept "natural selection" implies,
AFAIAC.  And, it is easily just another "tree" whereby "the
forrest" may
become obscured. That far I am on the side of McGinn. (Or so I believe! :->)

On the road to a unifying understanding of any kind of "evolutionary (and,
for that matter, devolutionary) patterning", the only definition we need to
agree upon AS FAR AS the word "patterning/pattern" is concerned is that its
median (if not mutually agreed upon) meaning must be 'workable' (i.e.
explanatory and/or revealing and/or in some way practically workable) -- and
of course, the more workable the better.

Any in any way reliably (hence repeatably) detectable (by some of us ;-)
regularity (in/of space or spacetime), is what we must *make do* with -- as
a general definition of "a pattern" that is.

If we can agree on the above Tolerance Principled definition, then it will
not be difficult agreeing upon the meaning of the approximately synonymous
words "chaos" and "randomness". The word
"chance" is (on its own) roughly
synonymous with "mathematically described likelyhood of outcome",
"probability" (or "probability distribution") --- IOW
some recognizable
"pattern of patterning".

When we use the expression "entirely by chance" we usually (it seems to me)
refer to something that did or will occur (or was or will be caused)
*unpredictably*.

[However, that we now know or presume that something did or will occur (or
be caused) *unpredictably*, does not mean, or is not generalizable to mean,
that a now unpredictable phenomenon will necessarily (in every such case)
remain unpredictable also in the future.]

I can only hope that the above will seem accEPTable to you all, because the
complementary way I approximately understand our evolution tells me that,
realistically, I should expect continued AEVASIVE mental-behavioural
maneuverings here in s.b.e..

%-]

P
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 * RgateImp.MoonDog.BBS at 7/24/03 3:16:53 PM