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Darwinism explains how the biological transformations and adaptations lead to racial diversity. However, the very goal which drives the adaptation, growth, repr

by zkmon 2y ago

Darwinism explains how the biological transformations and adaptations lead to racial diversity. However, the very goal which drives the adaptation, growth, reproduction or replication etc is not clearly explained, in my view. Questions like, why should the creatures have a root goal of growth and reproduction, why should a cell divide etc might need more thought. Was there a cognitive intention behind this adaptation? How did that intention originate and evolve? If the intention originated from inorganic material, does it still happen?

bandushrew 2y ago
The why explains itself. Cells that do not divide and reproduce disappear.
jhrmnn 2y ago
There are no goals in evolution. The most fit strain reproduces faster, eventually dominating other less fit strains. There’s no purpose, it just happens.
- zkmon 2y ago
  The "fit" itself is the goal. It is not like water flowing in a direction guided by the terrain. Trees produce thorns to keep away animals. You could say that thorns worked best among multiple options that were tried. But the question is, why is the tree trying out with option at all. Why should it protect itself from animals? Why should it grow and reproduce? A rock boulder, lying next to the tree, doesn't seem to have these goals or intentions. The water flow has the motivation driven by gravitational force. What is driving the motivation behind the growth the reproduction of an organism? In fact, life, growth and build go against the principle of least action that governs the physical universe. And I'm not sure why someone has evolved the intention of downvoting me.
  - kjkjadksj 2y ago
    You are still anthropomorphizing. The tree doesn’t want anything. It is a structure of chemical reactions. Sometimes there are mutations that lead to new features. Sometimes these features confer success in the environment at the time. Sometimes that success leads to this new mutant taking over relative to the others. Fast forward billions of years and we go from a sludge of singe celled microbial life to every tree you can see.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - mehphp 2y ago
    > It is not like water flowing in a direction guided by the terrain. I understand it doesn’t seem intuitive at first, but evolution is actually quite similar to that. > Trees produce thorns to keep away animals. It's not that trees consciously produce thorns to keep animals away. Rather, trees with thorns (due to random mutations) are more likely to survive because they are less likely to be disturbed by animals. Over time, those trees are more likely to reproduce and pass on those traits. Just like water flows down the path of least resistance, evolution naturally selects for traits that improve survival. The "selecting" we are referring to is used in the same sense that water "selects" which route it takes. It doesn't actually select anything, it's just following the laws of physics.
  - alainx277 2y ago
    The "motivation" behind growth and reproduction is that lifeforms that reproduce more will dominate, while lifeforms that do not die out. This is called natural selection. Mutations in DNA can have a positive or negative impact on the ability to reproduce. Because of natural selection, positive mutations tend to be preserved while negative mutations tend to disappear. There is no intent behind this process; it is simply a consequence of how life works. While we can't yet say for certain how life got started, it is likely that the first "life" was made up of self-replicating RNA. Because this RNA self-replicated and produced imperfect copies, it was already undergoing evolution at that point, where the RNA strands which were better at copying themselves (due to mutations) were more plentiful.
whutsurnaym 2y ago
The questions you're asking sound to me like they're based around progressive evolution (or maybe teleology? I don't remember the specifics) -- basically the idea that organisms evolve towards some goal. The example that I heard in school was that of a giraffe's neck. It seems reasonable enough to say "giraffes evolved long necks in order to reach food sources in taller trees", but this is usually a kind of misleading shorthand for the much more accurate "some proto-giraffe acquired a mutation that increased the length of its neck, that change increased its likelihood of procreation (possibly by allowing it to reach food sources shorter-necked proto-giraffes could not, therefore allowing it to survive in harsher conditions), and that mutation was passed down to its offspring". It's easy to make the mistake in thinking "organisms change their characteristics to survive", but that's applying intent where there is none. Organisms' characteristics change naturally through mutation. Those organisms either live to reproduce or they don't. Mutations that increase the chance of reproduction are more likely to get passed down to future generations. Over a long enough time period you end up with a lot of distinct species that evolved naturally and entirely accidentally.

by zkmon 2y ago

bandushrew 2y ago

The why explains itself. Cells that do not divide and reproduce disappear.

jhrmnn 2y ago

There are no goals in evolution. The most fit strain reproduces faster, eventually dominating other less fit strains. There’s no purpose, it just happens.

zkmon 2y ago
The "fit" itself is the goal. It is not like water flowing in a direction guided by the terrain. Trees produce thorns to keep away animals. You could say that thorns worked best among multiple options that were tried. But the question is, why is the tree trying out with option at all. Why should it protect itself from animals? Why should it grow and reproduce? A rock boulder, lying next to the tree, doesn't seem to have these goals or intentions. The water flow has the motivation driven by gravitational force. What is driving the motivation behind the growth the reproduction of an organism? In fact, life, growth and build go against the principle of least action that governs the physical universe. And I'm not sure why someone has evolved the intention of downvoting me.
- kjkjadksj 2y ago
  You are still anthropomorphizing. The tree doesn’t want anything. It is a structure of chemical reactions. Sometimes there are mutations that lead to new features. Sometimes these features confer success in the environment at the time. Sometimes that success leads to this new mutant taking over relative to the others. Fast forward billions of years and we go from a sludge of singe celled microbial life to every tree you can see.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- mehphp 2y ago
  > It is not like water flowing in a direction guided by the terrain. I understand it doesn’t seem intuitive at first, but evolution is actually quite similar to that. > Trees produce thorns to keep away animals. It's not that trees consciously produce thorns to keep animals away. Rather, trees with thorns (due to random mutations) are more likely to survive because they are less likely to be disturbed by animals. Over time, those trees are more likely to reproduce and pass on those traits. Just like water flows down the path of least resistance, evolution naturally selects for traits that improve survival. The "selecting" we are referring to is used in the same sense that water "selects" which route it takes. It doesn't actually select anything, it's just following the laws of physics.
- alainx277 2y ago
  The "motivation" behind growth and reproduction is that lifeforms that reproduce more will dominate, while lifeforms that do not die out. This is called natural selection. Mutations in DNA can have a positive or negative impact on the ability to reproduce. Because of natural selection, positive mutations tend to be preserved while negative mutations tend to disappear. There is no intent behind this process; it is simply a consequence of how life works. While we can't yet say for certain how life got started, it is likely that the first "life" was made up of self-replicating RNA. Because this RNA self-replicated and produced imperfect copies, it was already undergoing evolution at that point, where the RNA strands which were better at copying themselves (due to mutations) were more plentiful.

whutsurnaym 2y ago

The questions you're asking sound to me like they're based around progressive evolution (or maybe teleology? I don't remember the specifics) -- basically the idea that organisms evolve towards some goal. The example that I heard in school was that of a giraffe's neck. It seems reasonable enough to say "giraffes evolved long necks in order to reach food sources in taller trees", but this is usually a kind of misleading shorthand for the much more accurate "some proto-giraffe acquired a mutation that increased the length of its neck, that change increased its likelihood of procreation (possibly by allowing it to reach food sources shorter-necked proto-giraffes could not, therefore allowing it to survive in harsher conditions), and that mutation was passed down to its offspring". It's easy to make the mistake in thinking "organisms change their characteristics to survive", but that's applying intent where there is none. Organisms' characteristics change naturally through mutation. Those organisms either live to reproduce or they don't. Mutations that increase the chance of reproduction are more likely to get passed down to future generations. Over a long enough time period you end up with a lot of distinct species that evolved naturally and entirely accidentally.