The influence of gaslight or electric light on the growth of paraheliotropic trees

What we know about the world implies that Aristotle was wrong about a final cause. Perceiving even then the art of existence, they imagined that there was some hidden final cause, some reason for the way things are — some end that things tend to, and are shaped by.

Science has shown two things: that Aristotle’s shaping end was revealed in the processes of chemical and biological evolution, and that these processes do not need a cause or purpose to work their magic. In a very real sense, we are amazing and elaborate sand castles, assembled only by the random blowing of random winds.

Where then telos? Are we then robbed of final causes, of ends, of goals, or purpose?

I said to my brother, evolution is not purpose, but pattern.

Perhaps not, at least in our own little corner of the universe.

The awakening of consciousness —