The story goes that Picasso was sitting in a Paris café when an admirer approached and asked if he would do a quick sketch on a paper napkin. Picasso politely agreed, swiftly executed the work, and handed back the napkin — but not before asking for a rather significant amount of money. The admirer was shocked: “How can you ask for so much? It took you a minute to draw this!” “No”, Picasso replied, “It took me 40 years”
Jerry Fodor, at the 7:20 mark in the OP's video, states "
It's a very simple argument", referring to the "conceptual" part of his critique on Natural Selection theory (hereafter NST). His book comprises of two halves; a technical critique and a conceptual critique. I will focus here only on the latter.
It is, indeed, a very simple argument, and can be stated thus:
Premise 1: Natural selection theory requires intensional (with an S) discrimination.
Premise 2: We cannot conceive of any mechanism, given the constraints of the theory (e.g. the mechanism cannot have a mind), that can carry out the requisite intensional discrimination.
Conclusion: Natural selection theory is almost certainly false.
A simple argument if ever there was one. The problem, or one of them, is that Fodor draws on material from both the philosophy of mind and language to support his premises; recondite material which breaches interdisciplinary boundaries. Biologists, as a general rule (I presume), do not spend a lot of time plumbing the depths of philosophical esoterica, nor can they be expected to -- they have better things to do. And vice versa.
I must, with all due respect to everyone here, urge you not to underestimate the superficial simplicity of the argument, nor to dismiss Fodor without due consideration. Personally speaking, on my first reading of Fodor's book three years ago or so, I sensed something very important was being said, though I had great difficulty putting my finger on it; a feeling of unease that Positor has echoed in my own thread. A struggle involving several sleepness nights ensued, after which I do now believe I can claim, albeit with some hesitancy, to understand Fodor's attempted conceptual refutation of NST. My diffident confidence has been raised by a recent re-reading, upon which everything he says in the book fits into place. You know the old "
Yes, that's what I thought he meant" feeling.
Now, a few ground rules first:
1. If one takes that position,
"Pfft! No one is that kind of Darwinian these days. NTS is unimportant to contemporary evolutionary biology", we can stop here. Fodor, however, belies this gambit with various quotes in his book -- NTS continues to play a major, if not dominant role in evolutionary theory, as attested to by prominent biologists themselves.
2. We must bear closely in mind exactly what it is NS that is supposed to do: Natural selection purports to be an
exogenous mechanism of some kind or other, responsible for identifying those traits which are conducive to fitness, and conversely, those detrimental to fitness, indifferent to neutral traits, thereby causing a rearrangement of phenotypes.
(If Fodor or myself are inadvertently attacking a strawman (always a possibility), I request our members to state precisely what TNS is
supposed to do.)
"
Daddy! Why do ostriches have this and that traits?"
"
That's because of natural selection, son. Many, perhaps most, of the traits you see on the ostrich are a result of natural selection. NS selects for those traits, as it does for any organism, which enhance fitness in a given ecology."
One of the duties incumbent on NST, then, is to
explain phenotypical distribution. It is
because of natural selection that the ostrich, largely, has the traits it now has.
NS must be able to distinguish, somehow, those traits that cause fitness from those that do not. If it cannot do this, the entire theory collapses: it fails to explain phenotypes.
3. Fodor adheres mainly to the original principal Darwinian units of selection (a vexed issue in itself), i.e. individual organisms; though his critique, I believe, applies
mutatis mutandis, to
any theory of selection, insofar as
all require intensional discrimination.
Before moving on, a thought of my own. I suspect, reading through the replies in my own thread, is that the main obstacle to grasping Fodor's point, besides the weighty philosophical baggage, is the difficulty, after a lifetime of exposure, to view the world through selection-free spectacles. Fodor is
denying selection. Be very clear on this. Try to place yourself circa 1850. The claim is that selection theory cannot be right.
Yes, we
know that polar bears with white fur probably fare better than those with bright orange fur (if there are, or ever were, any). But this is something
intuition -- a very powerful intuition -- tells us; not selection theory. Selection theory is entirely mute on this issue; precisely Fodor's point -- it
cannot distinguish between the two.
Supposing we doubt these powerful intuitions, there is nonetheless a
fact of the matter as to which (white or orange polar bears) are more fit, moreover, we could get to the bottom of this, at least in principle, through empirical investigation. We can
find out which color of polar bear is more likely to survive and reproduce successfully. All of this is beside Fodor's point: viz, NTS cannot make the discrimination necessary, hence
cannot explain the white fur of polar bears. And that's what it's supposed to do, right?
We can! But that's another story. We can also explain, or try to, why the USA prevailed in WW2. By invoking a non-nomological explanation; not by appealing to
laws. Presumably there is no law that "
Such-and-such countries, given such-and-such conditions, will prevail, or tend to prevail, in such-and such-wars". The situation for selection theory is yet more dire. Can there be a law that "
organisms with such-and-such a trait (big eyes, say), given such-and-such an ecology, will prevail (or tend to prevail) in wars with organisms with smaller eyes"?
Why is this even more implausible than laws about countries winning wars? Ans: Because there may be organisms --
different species -- in the very same ecology, one with big eyes and one without; one upon whom an advantage is conferred, the other not.
Laws need not be universally exceptionless (Positor's worry in my thread). In fact, it's something of a platitude these days, among philosophers at least, that all laws outside physics, if there are any, are
ceteris paribus (all else being equal, no perturbing influences, etc). That said, how far before we succumb to triviality...
"
All Donald Trump's (yes, that one)
in 21st century USAs, given such-and-such circumstances, become presidents"?
Is there a story to be told how Trump ascended to the presidency? There'd better be or the principle of sufficient reason (nothing happens for no reason) is fooked. Can his ascendency be subsumed under a law of nature? I don't think so; neither does Jerry.
This, however, is incidental to the thrust of Fodor's attack. Laws represent a lifebelt; not the shipwreck itself.
The Titanic in a nutshell, then:
The hypotheses that "
Spandrels were selected for and arches were simply selected (i.e. free-riding cheapskates)" and "
Arches were selected for and spandrels came along for the ride" are both perfectly compatible with all the actual data -- all the
actual observable facts of this world.
Well, is there a fact of the matter? Which is the paying customer and which the stowaway? You betcha. And what determines its truth? Ans: Appeal to counterfactuals. "
The architect had a mind, and he would have chosen spandrel-free arches over arch-free spandrels anyday". The architect was able to mentally represent counterfactual scenarios.
Back to these polar bears now: (and this is where it's essential to stifle your intuitions; we
know the answer, or think we do, but that's not the issue. The issue is:
can TNS discriminate?). On second thoughts, let's appeal to the polar bear heart, whose properties include, among others, making pump-pump noises and pumping blood.
The hypotheses H1 "
hearts were selected for making pumping noises, and blood-pumping was simply selected" and H2 "
Hearts were selected for blood-pumping and the pumping-noises snuck on the ship when the Captain wasn't looking" are both perfectly compatible with all the actual data -- all the
actual facts of this world.
I repeat. You must overcome your intuitions and think only of what the theory has to say on this --
must say on this to do what it must do.
Ans: It has nothing to say.
In the former case, the deadlock is broken by appeal to counterfactuals: "
The architect would have .... if ... "
In the latter case, NST must likewise appeal to counterfactuals -- the actual facts of the world cannot discriminate between the two (and there are more than two) hypotheses. But how? Mother nature has a mind? Preposterous. Laws of selection seem highly implausible.
There seems to be nothing left to appeal to.
Final thought: Frankly, and once again with all due respect to our members, I don't believe it is
possible to understand Fodor's conceptual argument without some background in certain recherche philosophical concepts such as intensionality. The book is a valiant struggle even to those who have such a background.
Fodor claims it's an easy arguemnt; Picasso, it was a simple sketch.
I fear, disciplinary committee, you have passed sentence on Mr Sims without sufficient consideration.
