Re: Dawkins

Bill Hamilton (hamilton@predator.cs.gmr.com)
Mon, 11 Sep 1995 16:03:54 -0500

>Concerning a comment by Dawkins, Bill writes:
>
>"Saying that evolution cannot predict what man will be like in a million
>years is quite reasonable. That's not the sort of prediction we are
>talking about when we talk about the predictive power of theories.
>(Besides, I really doubt the Lord will tarry another million years, so why
>bother? :-))"
>
>Of course, this is a valid point: One simply needs to replace "what man
>will be like" by "what the solar system will be like" to see the
>reasonableness of Bill's point. Chaos is a fact of life.
>
>Then Bill adds:
>
>"But if he said evolution has no predictive power at all -- meaning that
>it cannot suggest further investigations and experiments, then I'd say
>that was news."
>
>I do wonder. What is the predictive content of evolution beyond broad
>generalities? Perhaps it does "suggest further investigations and
>experiments". But, as Niels Bohr once observed, prediction is hard
>because it describes the future. (The precise quote is better than this,
>but I could not find it on short notice. Does anyone remember it?)
>
>As I complete this, I observe that John Burgeson has just made a similar
>point.
>
>Of course, one of the problems is time scale. Neither evolution nor
>geology describe processes that move fast enough for predictions of the
>future to be of much value for human observers. In contrast, the laws of
>physics behave much more quickly - fast enough for us to see clearly.
>
>Gordie
Bill Hamilton | Vehicle Systems Research
GM R&D Center | Warren, MI 48090-9055
810 986 1474 (voice) | 810 986 3003 (FAX)