From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!ogicse!plains!news.u.washington.edu!carson.u.washington.edu!forbis Mon Aug 24 15:41:25 EDT 1992
Article 6662 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: forbis@carson.u.washington.edu (Gary Forbis)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Development of Complex Structures
Message-ID: <1992Aug20.153436.4779@u.washington.edu>
Date: 20 Aug 92 15:34:36 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Aug20.153436.4779
References: <1992Aug18.161151.12316@mp.cs.niu.edu> <1992Aug18.181021.14352@sequent.com> <915@tdat.teradata.COM>
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In article <915@tdat.teradata.COM> swf@tdat.teradata.com (Stanley Friesen) writes:
>In article <1992Aug18.181021.14352@sequent.com> bfish@sequent.com (Brett Fishburne) writes:
>|A side issue on the evolution argument.  Isn't it reasonable to believe that
>|some things which are considered essential for modern intellectual development
>|could have "evolved" at a time when they were not actually useful, been
>|discarded, and the "re-evolved" in a time when they were an advantage.
>
>I am not entirely sure just what you mean here.  No complex system or structure
>can possibly evolve without *some* use.  But individual, *simple* features
>may well occur more or less at random (*maybe*).  Culture is a very complex
>phenomenon, and could not exist without some use.

Would you support this claim?

It seems to me one structure can build upon another.  Unless there is some
negative to having a structure it can establish itself.  I feel that many 
mating rituals fit this category.  While one may say they serve a use that
use is not defined by the rituals themselves.  Likewise, much of physical
aspects of secondary sexual traits serve no other use than they are selected
by a mutually evolved behavior selecting that trait.

--gary forbis@u.washington.edu


