Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id JAA19527 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 13 Aug 2001 09:15:07 +0100 From: <Wilkins@wehi.EDU.AU> Message-ID: <49152.144.134.52.1.997618541.squirrel@homebase.wehi.edu.au> Date: Sun, 12 Aug 2001 22:15:41 -1000 (EST) Subject: Re: Logic + universal evolution To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Importance: Normal X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 In-Reply-To: <F160xfR7ivKwjyghlYm00003981@hotmail.com> References: <F160xfR7ivKwjyghlYm00003981@hotmail.com> X-Mailer: SquirrelMail (version 1.1.2) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
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>>From: John Wilkins <wilkins@wehi.EDU.AU>
>>Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>>To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>>Subject: Re: Logic + universal evolution
>>Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2001 15:49:08 +1000
>>
>>On Friday, August 10, 2001, at 02:26 PM, Scott Chase wrote:
>>
>>>>From: John Wilkins <wilkins@wehi.EDU.AU>
>>>>Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>>>>To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>>>>Subject: Re: Logic + universal evolution
>>>>Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2001 09:53:34 +1000
>>>>
>>....
>>>>Buffon's view of transmutation of species was a degenerational one -
>>>>each species in a genus bar at most one was a degeneration from the
>>>>"prime stock" or "primary stem" (premiere souche). His pupil and
>>>>friend Lamarck applied a *generational* view to species
>>>>transmutation, but because he thought it was an internal impulse or
>>>>drive that caused it, he used the term "evolution", which Geoffroy,
>>>>*his* pupil, carried on into the 19th century debates.
>>>>
>>>So Lamarck actually did utilize the word "evolution"? Can you square
>>>this with what Richard Burkhardt says in his intro to Lamarck's
>>>_Zoological Philosophy_ (1984. The University of Chicago Press.
>>>Chicago.)? On page xxii Burkhardt writes:
>>>
>>>(bq) "Lamarck never used the word "evolution" to refer to the process
>>>of the origin and successive transformation and development of organic
>>>beings over time. Nor for that matter did he use the word
>>>"transformism"." (eq)
>>
>>Hmmm. I thought he did.
>>
> Whew! After posting the above, I had second thoughts as to whether I
> misread you. With all the he's and it's your passage could have been
> taken several ways and my not being up to speed on the relations
> between Buffon, Lamarck, and Geoffroy (which one...Etienne or
> Isidore?) did not help matters much. I vaguely remember the
> form-function tension between one of the Geoffroy's and that
> curmudgeon Cuvier. It's* almost as hard to keep up with as all that
> begetting in the Bible.
Okay, I checked my source (Richards' _The Meaning of Evolution_) and he
agrees that Lamarck never used the word. He also agrees, but with no direct
cite, that Lyell introduced the term into the biological lexicon when
discussing Lamarck. However, he claims that the use of "evolutio" from
development, and the cognate term Entwicklung, was applied both to
transmutation and development by Teidemann, von Baer, Serres, Haller and
Autenrieth.
>
> *-"it" meaning historical connection
>>
>>I'll check my sources, but there's no reason to
>>doubt that you (ie, Burckhardt) may be right about that. Perhaps it's
>>one of those snide remarks thrown at transformists by Cuvier? I know
>>it's in Lyell (or at least I recall it being in Lyell... my memory
>>isn't as good as it should have been. Principles has been rereleased in
>>facsimile by Chicago, I think - I'll see if I can find a copy of vol
>>2).
>>
>>Great. Now I have another thesis avoidance topic...
>>
> I wouldn't make it all that high a priority.
Avoiding the thesis is always a high priority, although I was a good boy
today, and counted the number of epithet substitutions in Pinnipedia.
>>
>>>>...
>>
>>>>Pluralism rears its ugly head, but AFAICT MR need not apply. To quote
>>>>Gould, the pluralistic hedonist, himself on this (from "Kropotkin was
>>>>no crackpot" as found in _Bully for Brontosaurus_, 1992, paperback
>>>>edition, W.W. Norton & Company, New York, p. 339):
>>>
>>>(bq) "I see no evidence for Teilhard's noosphere, for Capra's
>>>California style of holism, for Sheldrake's morphic resonance"(eq)
>>>
>>>Has anybody spoke to the infamous 100th monkey phenomenon yet?
>>>
>>Well they have now, damn you :-) Do we *really* have to go through
>>that? --
>>
> Well the more we struggle with the retelling of the retelling of the
> 100th monkey, the easier it will become for everyone else to grasp,
> even those not reading this list. If everybody on this list were to
> read extensively on the 100th monkey phenomenon, we could carve a
> mnemic groove deep enough that future generations would pick up on the
> story without much effort at all. They would be resonating with us via
> the collective memory storehouse. Ecphory abounds.
>
I checked my Liddell and Scott, and ekphoresis means the carrying out of
dead bodies (as in "bring out yer dead!" in MP&tHG). I wonder if that is
signifying?
John a
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