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Darwin's five laws
In a message to soc.culture.scientists, on testing the Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis, Benjamin J. Tilly referred to "Darwin's theory of
evolution". Lojbab passed the message on to the Lojban list.
How should Lojbanists refer to what Darwin discovered?
Why is it still common among speakers of English to hear Darwin's
discoveries refered to as a `theory' rather than as a set of five
`laws'?
Consider this discussion of the conventional distinction among the
terms hypothesis, theory, and law, from Webster's New Collegiate
Dictionary, 1958, page 409:
_Hypothesis_ implies insufficiency of presently attainable evidence
and, therefore, a tentative explanation; _theory_ implies a much
greater range of evidence and greater likelihood of truth; _law_
implies a statement of order and relation in nature that has been
found to be invariable under the same conditions. The terms are not
rigidly applied, however...
Darwin figured out how simple entities can become more complex without
teleological guidance. His statements of order and relation have
certainly been well established, so they should be called laws.
The five laws of evolution by natural selection:
1. Evolution occurs. Unlike mathematical species, such as triangles
or square, biological species change from one kind to another.
2. Multiplication of species. Species split into daughter species,
or bud off different types of decendant.
3. Natural selection. In any generation, the relatively few
individuals who survive, owing to a particularly well adapted
combination of inherited characteristics, give rise to the next
generation; and the combination of characteristics of the
surviving subset of the generation may be different from the
combination of characteristics of the generation as a whole.
4. Gradualism. Evolutionary change occurs through gradual change of
populations. (Note that current discussions of `sudden' or
`episodic' evolution refer to periods of time that are
certainly `gradual', except by comparison to the even longer time
scales that some have presumed.)
5. Common descent. All currently living organisms are descended
from a single ancestor.
(Adapted from "One Long Argument", Ernst Mayr, Harvard Univ. Press, 1991.)
Mayr notes that most evolutionists in Darwin's time rejected one or
more of these laws; and that Darwin himself saw them as a logically
inseparable package.
I myself suspect that the word "theory" remains in the conventional
title because the ideas of evolution by natural selection require new
ways of thinking: thinking about the importance of individuals in
groups, rather than of stereotypes; thinking about unimaginably long
periods of time; and thinking about consequences of changes so small
that they have no consequences measurable within several generations.
Also, Darwin's discoveries go against Aristotle's theories of
causation, which work well for human artifacts such as plays and pots,
and also go against hypotheses about biological speciation that grant
humans the appearance of more importance in the nature of things than
they possess as a species.
Will someone volunteer to write a description of evolution by natural
selection in Lojban, using all the appropriate abstractions that
Lojban so conveniently provides?
I lack the time to pass on more than a few thoughts:
Evolution is a process, {pu'u farvi}.
Speciation may be considered a point-event/achievement,
{mu'e jutsi binxo}, a `point-event of a species type of transformation'.
---Except that in the case of speciation, the so-called point-event
may persist over a period of time longer than is intuitively
comprehensible!
You can say:
Individuals/members of a species experience different environments.
lo lu'a jutsi cu lifri lo drata vanbi
and
Different environments experienced by members of a species cause
the process and the point-event of evolution.
lo dratyvanbi ri'i lo lu'a jutsi cu rinka lo pu'u je mu'e farvi
One might even say
The experience of life rewards members of a species for the
atypical state of differences by the standard established by the
stereotypical member of the last-mentioned.
lo li'i jmive cu cnemu lo lu'a jutsi lo za'i drata be fi le'e ri
Although this is a somewhat unusual use of the the gismu {cnemu}, I
think it is applicable.
It is a mistake to say that
A sterotypical proto-lion evolves into a sterotypical lion.
le'e clirycinfo cu farvi le'e cinfo
since the experience of evolution, {li'i farvi}, applies to
individuals. However, you might well say that the
Children of individual proto-lions evolve into sterotypical lions.
lo lu'a panzi be lu'a clirycinfo cu farvi le'e cinfo
Robert J. Chassell bob@gnu.ai.mit.edu
Rattlesnake Mountain Road bob@grackle.stockbridge.ma.us
Stockbridge, MA 01262-0693 USA (413) 298-4725
ri'i BAI experienced by
lifri modal, 1st place patient/passive case tag;
happens to...,experienced by...,with passive...
li'i experience of lifri liz
x1 is an experience of <the bridi> to experiencer x2
mu'e point-event of mulno mub
x1 is a point-event/achievement of <the bridi>
pu'u process of pruce pup
x1 is a process of <the bridi>
za'i state of zasti zam
x1 is a state of <the bridi>
le'e LE the stereotypical
lu'a LAhE an individual/member/component of
farvi fav develop 'evolve' <> x1 develops/evolves towards/into x2
from x3 through stages x4 <> (cf. pruce, banro, makcu,
ciste, cupra, ferti)
jutsi jut species <> x1 is a species of genus x2, family x3,
etc.; [open-ended tree-structure categorization] <>
binxo bix bi'o become <> x1 becomes/changes/converts/transforms into
x2 under conditions x3 <> [resultative, not-necessarily
agentive, change]; (cf. cenba for non-resultative,
galfi for agentive, stika for non-resultative,
non-agentive change; zasni)
lifri lif fri experience 'life' <> x1 [person/passive/state]
undergoes/experiences x2 (event/experience); x2 happens
to x1 <> [also has/have (of events/experiences);
(adjective:) x1 is empirical; suggests passive
undergoing but does not exclude active (per zukte)
intent; a deserved experience: reward or punishment (=
jernyfri, zanjernyfri, maljernyfri)]; (cf. cmavo list
ri'i, jmive, fasnu, renvi)
drata dat other <> x1 isn't the-same-thing-as/is
different-from/other-than x2 by standard x3; x1 is
something else <> (cf. mintu, frica)
vanbi vab environment 'ambient' <> x1 (ind./mass) is part of an
environment/surroundings/context/ambience of x2 <>
[(adjective:) x1 is ambient]; (cf. cmavo list va'o,
sruri, jibni, jbini, ferti, tcini)
rinka rik ri'a cause <> x1 (event/state) effects/physically causes
effect x2 (event/state) under conditions x3 <> [x1 is a
material condition for x2; x1 gives rise to x2];
(cf. gasnu, krinu, nibli, te zukte, se jalge, bapli,
jitro, cmavo list ri'a, mukti, ciksi, xruti)
cnemu nem ne'u reward <> x1 (agent) rewards x2 [recipient] for
atypical x3 (event/property) with reward/desserts x4 =
<> [differs from earned payment because of atypical
nature; rewards need not be positive but are in some
sense deserved from the point of view of the rewarder:
positive reward (= zanyne'u), punishment, penalty,
demerit (= malne'u, sfane'u); x4 may be a specific
object, a commodity (mass), an event, or a property;
pedantically, for objects/commodities, this is
sumti-raising from ownership of the object/commodity (=
posne'u, po'ervelne'u for unambiguous semantics)];
(cf. dunda, friti, jerna, jinga, jivna, pleji, sfasa,
venfu, prali, dapma)
panzi paz offspring <> x1 is a [biological]
offspring/child/kid/hybrid of parent(s) x2;
(adjective:) x1 is filial <> (cf. grute, verba, bersa,
tixnu, se rorci, patfu)
clira lir early <> x1 (event) is early by standard x2 <>
cinfo lion <> x1 is a lion/[lioness] of species/breed x2 <>
jmive miv ji'e live <> x1 lives/is alive by standard x2; x1 is an
organism/living thing <> [(adjective:) x1 is vital,
organic]; (cf. lifri, morsi, stuzi, zvati, xabju)