?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Adc&rft.title=On+Fodor+on+Darwin+on+Evolution&rft.creator=Harnad%2C+Stevan&rft.subject=Philosophy+of+Science&rft.description=Jerry+Fodor+argues+that+Darwin+was+wrong+about+%22natural+selection%22+because+(1)+it+is+only+a+tautology+rather+than+a+scientific+law+that+can+support+counterfactuals+(%22If+X+had+happened%2C+Y+would+have+happened%22)+and+because+(2)+only+minds+can+select.+Hence+Darwin's+analogy+with+%22artificial+selection%22+by+animal+breeders+was+misleading+and+evolutionary+explanation+is+nothing+but+post-hoc+historical+narrative.+I+argue+that+Darwin+was+right+on+all+counts.+Until+Darwin's+%22tautology%2C%22+it+had+been+believed+that+either+(a)+God+had+created+all+organisms+as+they+are%2C+or+(b)+organisms+had+always+been+as+they+are.+Darwin+revealed+instead+that+(c)+organisms+have+heritable+traits+that+evolved+across+time+through+random+variation%2C+with+survival+and+reproduction+in+(changing)+environments+determining+(mindlessly)+which+variants+were+successfully+transmitted+to+the+next+generation.+This+not+only+provided+the+(true)+alternative+(c)%2C+but+also+the+methodology+for+investigating+which+traits+had+been+adaptive%2C+how+and+why%3B+it+also+led+to+the+discovery+of+the+genetic+mechanism+of+the+encoding%2C+variation+and+evolution+of+heritable+traits.+Fodor+also+draws+erroneous+conclusions+from+the+analogy+between+Darwinian+evolution+and+Skinnerian+reinforcement+learning.+Fodor%E2%80%99s+skepticism+about+both+evolution+and+learning+may+be+motivated+by+an+overgeneralization+of+Chomsky%E2%80%99s+%E2%80%9Cpoverty+of+the+stimulus+argument%E2%80%9D+--+from+the+origin+of+Universal+Grammar+(UG)+to+the+origin+of+the+%E2%80%9Cconcepts%E2%80%9D+underlying+word+meaning%2C+which%2C+Fodor+thinks%2C+must+be+%E2%80%9Cendogenous%2C%E2%80%9D+rather+than+evolved+or+learned.&rft.date=2009-04-12&rft.type=Preprint&rft.type=NonPeerReviewed&rft.format=other&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F6417%2F1%2Ffodorcomm.rtf&rft.format=application%2Fpdf&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F6417%2F3%2Ffodorcomm.pdf&rft.format=text%2Fhtml&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F6417%2F4%2Ffodorcomm.htm&rft.format=text%2Fhtml&rft.identifier=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F6417%2F5%2Ffodor-harnad1.html&rft.identifier=++Harnad%2C+Stevan++(2009)+On+Fodor+on+Darwin+on+Evolution.++%5BPreprint%5D+++++&rft.relation=http%3A%2F%2Fcogprints.org%2F6417%2F