>It's been a while since I read it,
>but I believe that discussion of .400 hitters _also_ demonstrates how in
>evolution the _appearance_ of a tendency towards "progress" disguises
>the reality of contingency in evolution.
Here's Gould from an essay about Joe DiMaggio's famous hitting streak:
Probability does pervade the universeand in this sense, the old chestnut about baseball imitating life really has validity. The statistics of streaks and slumps, properly understood, do teach an important lesson about epistemology, and life in general. The history of a species, or any natural phenomenon that requires unbroken continuity in a world of trouble, works like a batting streak. All are games of a gambler playing with a limited stake against a house with infinite resources. The gambler must eventually go bust. His aim can only be to stick around as long as possible, to have some fun while he's at it, and, if he happens to be a moral agent as well, to worry about staying the course with honor. The best of us will try to live by a few simple rules: do justly, love mercy, walk humbly with thy God, and never draw to an inside straight.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/4337