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2014 ; 7
(3
): 377-388
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On the meaning of chance in biology
#MMPMID25870720
Coffman JA
Biosemiotics
2014[Dec]; 7
(3
): 377-388
PMID25870720
show ga
Chance has somewhat different meanings in different contexts, and can be taken to
be either ontological (as in quantum indeterminacy) or epistemological (as in
stochastic uncertainty). Here I argue that, whether or not it stems from physical
indeterminacy, chance is a fundamental biological reality that is meaningless
outside the context of knowledge. To say that something happened by chance means
that it did not happen by design. This of course is a cornerstone of Darwin's
theory of evolution: random undirected variation is the creative wellspring upon
which natural selection acts to sculpt the functional form (and hence apparent
design) of organisms. In his essay Chance & Necessity, Jacques Monod argued that
an intellectually honest commitment to objectivity requires that we accord chance
a central role in an otherwise mechanistic biology, and suggested that doing so
may well place the origin of life outside the realm of scientific tractability.
While that may be true, ongoing research on the origin of life problem suggests
that abiogenesis may have been possible, and perhaps even probable, under the
conditions that existed on primordial earth. Following others, I argue that the
world should be viewed as causally open, i.e. primordially indeterminate or
vague. Accordingly, chance ought to be the default scientific explanation for
origination, a universal 'null hypothesis' to be assumed until disproven. In this
framework, creation of anything new manifests freedom (allowing for chance), and
causation manifests constraint, the developmental emergence of which establishes
the space of possibilities that may by chance be realized.