Random Thoughts

In an entirely different way, some philosophers have always found something fishy in the Darwinian theory of evolution. An obvious sticking point is the concept of fitness itself. If by the fitter organisms, biologists mean merely those that survive, then the doctrine that natural selection winnows out those organisms that are not fit expresses a triviality. This is a logical point and not a matter of experiment or research. The biologist who wishes to know why a species that represents nothing more than a persistent snore througout the long night of evolution should suddenly or slowly develop a novel characteristic will learn from the neo-Darwinian theory only that those characteristic that survive survive in virtue of their relative fitness. Those characteristics that are relatively fit, on the other hand, are relatively fit in virtue of the fact that they have survived. This is not an intellectual circle calculated to inspire confidence.... The doctrine that survival favors the survivors is what logicians call a *tautology*, a statement that is all form and no content. For obvious reasons, the evolutionary biologists are uncomfortable with the idea that the chief claim of their theory is roughly on the intellectual order of the declaration that whatever will be, will be" (Berlinski, D., "The Evidence for Evolution," in "Black Mischief: Language, Life, Logic, Luck,")