It is not, as Duhring seems to think, that individual plants will themselves to be toxic, or red, so as to survive, nor that they will themselves to grow taller, or grow in the direction of sunlight. All of these traits are simply ones they have as a consequence of their individual genetic make-up, mostly inherited from their parents, but also from mutation as a happy accident.
Duhring says,
“If, in growing, a plant takes the path along which it will receive most light, this effect of the stimulus is nothing but a combination of physical forces and chemical agents, and any attempt to describe it as adaptation — not metaphorically, but literally— must introduce a spiritistic confusion into the concepts”. (p 89)
If the Darwinian theory were that individual plants act in particular ways out of their own conscious will, rather than simply responding to these stimuli, then, of course, it would imply some ability to do so, some consciousness within the plant. But, that is not what the theory says. Yet, its that, as a species, those that develop certain characteristics are the ones that thrive and survive. By seeing the process as one in which certain desired ends are achieved consciously, but not as a result of any consciousness within the given species, Duhring simply transfers the source of this consciousness to Nature itself. He speaks of Nature's subtlety and will, and yet draws back from the logical conclusion from that. He says,
“The relation between means and end does not in the least presuppose a conscious intention”. (p 89)
Engels notes,
“What, then, is adaptation without conscious intention, without the mediation of ideas, which he so zealously opposes, if not such unconscious purposive activity?” (p 89)
In other words, it is not necessary to assign any conscious will on the part of Nature, as a whole, as some kind of spiritistic force, or to any given species or aspect of Nature, to achieve some given end, to identify a process in which the adaptation occurs, and does so for a definite purpose. The plants that become toxic do so as a result of a purposive process in which those individuals of the species that have this characteristic survive. Engels notes that its no accident that polar bears are white etc., given where they live.
This same unconscious, and yet purposive adaptation is seen in terms of the evolution of social organisms too, as Marx and Engels and later, Lenin describe, with these processes taking place “behind Men's backs”, as they put it. The development of first generalised commodity production and exchange, and, then, capitalism, was not something consciously planned and implemented by any individual or group of individuals, but arises out of the same adaptation to material conditions. Similarly, as Marx and Engels set out in Capital I, and III, the development of socialised capital, as the transitional form of property between capitalism and socialism was not something planned by individuals or society, but arises inevitably from the processes, the material conditions of capitalism itself, of the role of competition, and the consequent drive for capital accumulation, concentration and centralisation.
“... it cannot be denied that these animals, are purposively adapted through those colours to the environment in which they live, since they have thus become far less visible to their enemies. In the same way the organs with which certain plants seize and devour insects alighting on them are adapted to this action, and even purposively adapted. Consequently, if Herr Dühring insists that this adaptation must be effected through ideas, he is only saying, in other words, that purposive activity must likewise be brought about through ideas, must be conscious and intentional. As is usually the case in the philosophy of reality this again brings us to a purposive creator, to God.” (p 89-90)
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