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Causality and chance could be considered as a 'systematic' pair in an 
epistemological sense...

but as an example of random outcome:  if you started the process of 
planet formation of the earth all over again, it is virtually 
impossible that that the outcomes 4.5 billion years on would look or 
live anything like the present day events, assuming that 'our kind' of 
biologic life started again.

Humans are indeed a random outcome, and I think that does bug those who 
require an inherent 'higher purpose'.

-Kevin



On Aug 5, 2005, at 10:59 AM, Jason Jay Stevens wrote:

>
> There's a mechanism involved here; we call it randomness or chance, 
> but it isn't the same kind of chance that gets you snake eyes three 
> times in a row.  Nature didn't Oops!  stumble upon a horse.  Lucky 
> Nature, lucky horse.  In this universe, with these physical laws, on 
> this planet, with these conditions, a horse is perhaps the logical 
> outcome.  Perhaps our brains are too little to follow the complex 
> course of causation, but calling it "chance," "random" or "accidental" 
> implies to non-scientists that humanity is an unwanted abberation in 
> the cosmos.
>
> Last time I brought this up (I mentioned the similarities between the 
> prehistoric American savannah fauna and present-day African savannah 
> fauna [similar ecologies give rise to similar organisms]), I got 
> swooped upon by some biologists, correcting me that evolution is, in 
> fact, a "random" process.
> But I hold my ground.  "Random" ain't the right choice of wording here.

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