Abstract
Ecological systems and the process of biological evolution cannot be understood apart from each other. According to the latter, organisms of a particular species compete with each other for survival. Those that are most fit for survival are more likely to survive, and hence are more likely to produce offspring that are similarly fit. And so on. But environmental conditions are constantly changing, and random genetic mutation produces new forms, so the process of evolution does not result in a final stasis. In fact, organisms, and the ecological systems of which they are a part, play a causal role in changing the organic and inorganic environments within which future organisms must compete. Thus, organisms and ecological communities are integral to the very process of biological evolution that creates them. Evolutionary theory has influenced the development of metaphysics by making logical room for a non-essentialist conception of biological species and an explanation for the process of speciation that does not resort to the metaphysics of formal and final causation. In so doing, it agrees with the empirical fact that the biological world is full of imperfection. Indeed, imperfection, in the form of disadvantage in the struggle to live and reproduce, is the driving force of biological evolution. Better adapted organisms outcompete their conspecifics and are thus naturally selected to pass on their advantageous traits.
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Notes
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The extent to which Darwin was aware of the metaphysical ramifications of biological evolution is another topic. It is obvious that Darwin was aware of the impact of biological evolution on the Judeo-Christian worldview. But generally speaking Darwin was not well-versed in the subtleties of academic Philosophy. In his own words, “My power to follow a long and purely abstract train of thought is very limited. I should, moreover, never have succeeded with metaphysics or mathematics” (1958, 140). While this ignorance may have disadvantaged Darwin when it came to defending his theory in open debate (Hull 1967, 336), it may have had the greater advantage of freeing his mind to think in new ways. As Mayr says in his introduction to the Origin, “It is almost universally stated that Darwin was no philosopher, that he was totally unphilosophical. Even though he himself would probably have pleaded guilty, this accusation is quite misleading. To be sure, Darwin did not belong to any of the established schools of philosophy, nor did he publish an essay or volume explicitly devoted to an exposition of his philosophical ideas. Yet few writers in the last 200 years have had so profound an impact on our thinking. This holds for logic, metaphysics, and ethics. It has taken 100 years to appreciate that Darwin’s conceptual framework is, indeed, a new philosophical system” (Darwin 2003, xviii).
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Or, more accurately, pendentives as Dennett (1996, 272) points out, technically, the curvilinear space created by the intersection of two arches and a dome depicted in Fig. 4.3 is a pendentive, whereas a spandrel is a wall with an arch punched through it. This misnomer has no bearing on the validity of Gould and Lewontin’s argument.
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Keller, D.R. (2019). Patterned Process in Biological Evolution. In: Ecology and Justice—Citizenship in Biotic Communities. Studies in Global Justice, vol 19. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11636-1_4
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