Editing Infinite monkey theorem (section)

===Evolution===
[[Image:Thomas Henry Huxley - Project Gutenberg eText 16935.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Thomas Huxley]] is sometimes misattributed with proposing a variant of the theory in his debates with [[Samuel Wilberforce]].]]
In his 1931 book ''The Mysterious Universe'', Eddington's rival [[James Hopwood Jeans|James Jeans]] attributed the monkey parable to a "Huxley", presumably meaning [[Thomas Henry Huxley]]. This attribution is incorrect.<ref name="Padmanabhan2005">{{cite journal |first=Thanu |last=Padmanabhan |title=The dark side of astronomy |journal=Nature |volume=435 |pages=20–21 |year=2005 |doi=10.1038/435020a |issue=7038|bibcode=2005Natur.435...20P |doi-access=free }} {{cite book |author=Platt, Suzy |title=Respectfully quoted: a dictionary of quotations |year=1993 |publisher=Barnes & Noble |isbn=0-88029-768-9 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/respectfullyquot00suzy/page/388 388–389] |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/respectfullyquot00suzy/page/388 }}</ref> Today, it is sometimes further reported that Huxley applied the example in a [[1860 Oxford evolution debate|now-legendary debate]] over [[Charles Darwin]]'s ''[[On the Origin of Species]]'' with the Anglican Bishop of Oxford, Samuel Wilberforce, held at a meeting of the [[British Association for the Advancement of Science]] at Oxford on 30 June 1860. This story suffers not only from a lack of evidence, but the fact that in 1860 the typewriter was [[Typewriter#History|not yet commercially available]].<ref name="Rescher2006">{{Cite book |last=Rescher |first=Nicholas |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_NSBWYdDDAoC |title=Studies in the Philosophy of Science: A Counterfactual Perspective on Quantum Entanglement |date=2006 |publisher=Ontos Verlag |isbn=978-3-11-032646-8 |pages=103 |language=en}}</ref>

Despite the original mix-up, monkey-and-typewriter arguments are now common in arguments over evolution. As an example of [[Christian apologetics]] Doug Powell argued that even if a monkey accidentally types the letters of ''Hamlet'', it has failed to produce ''Hamlet'' because it lacked the intention to communicate. His parallel implication is that natural laws could not produce the information content in [[DNA]].<ref name="Powell2006">{{cite book |last=Powell |first=Doug |title=Holman Quicksource Guide to Christian Apologetics |year=2006 |publisher=Broadman & Holman | isbn = 0-8054-9460-X |pages=60, 63}}</ref> A more common argument is represented by Reverend [[John F. MacArthur]], who claimed that the genetic mutations necessary to produce a tapeworm from an amoeba are as unlikely as a monkey typing Hamlet's soliloquy, and hence the odds against the evolution of all life are impossible to overcome.<ref name="MacArthur2003">{{cite book |first=John |last=MacArthur |title=Think Biblically!: Recovering a Christian Worldview |year=2003 |publisher=Crossway Books |isbn=1-58134-412-0 |pages=78–79}}</ref>

[[Evolutionary biology|Evolutionary biologist]] [[Richard Dawkins]] employs the typing monkey concept in his book ''[[The Blind Watchmaker]]'' to demonstrate the ability of [[natural selection]] to produce biological [[complexity]] out of random [[mutation]]s. In a simulation experiment Dawkins has his [[weasel program]] produce the Hamlet phrase ''METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL'', starting from a randomly typed parent, by "breeding" subsequent generations and always choosing the closest match from progeny that are copies of the parent with random mutations. The chance of the target phrase appearing in a single step is extremely small, yet Dawkins showed that it could be produced rapidly (in about 40 generations) using cumulative selection of phrases.  The random choices furnish raw material, while cumulative selection imparts information.  As Dawkins acknowledges, however, the weasel program is an imperfect analogy for evolution, as "offspring" phrases were selected "according to the criterion of resemblance to a ''distant ideal'' target."  In contrast, Dawkins affirms, evolution has no long-term plans and does not progress toward some distant goal (such as humans).  The weasel program is instead meant to illustrate the difference between [[non-random]] cumulative selection, and [[random]] single-step selection.<ref name="Dawkins1996">{{cite book |last=Dawkins |first=Richard |year=1996 |title=The Blind Watchmaker |publisher=W.W. Norton & Co. |isbn=0-393-31570-3 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/blindwatchmaker0000dawk/page/46 46–50] |url=https://archive.org/details/blindwatchmaker0000dawk/page/46 }}</ref>  In terms of the typing monkey analogy, this means that ''Romeo and Juliet'' could be produced relatively quickly if placed under the constraints of a nonrandom, Darwinian-type selection because the [[fitness function]] will tend to preserve in place any letters that happen to match the target text, improving each successive generation of typing monkeys.

A different avenue for exploring the analogy between evolution and an unconstrained monkey lies in the problem that the monkey types only one letter at a time, independently of the other letters. Hugh Petrie argues that a more sophisticated setup is required, in his case not for biological evolution but the evolution of ideas:

{{blockquote|In order to get the proper analogy, we would have to equip the monkey with a more complex typewriter. It would have to include whole Elizabethan sentences and thoughts. It would have to include Elizabethan beliefs about human action patterns and the causes, Elizabethan morality and science, and linguistic patterns for expressing these. It would probably even have to include an account of the sorts of experiences which shaped Shakespeare's belief structure as a particular example of an Elizabethan. Then, perhaps, we might allow the monkey to play with such a typewriter and produce variants, but the impossibility of obtaining a Shakespearean play is no longer obvious. What is varied really does encapsulate a great deal of already-achieved knowledge.<ref name="Blachowicz1998">As quoted in {{cite book |first=James |last=Blachowicz |title=Of Two Minds: Nature of Inquiry |year=1998 |publisher=SUNY Press |isbn=0-7914-3641-1 |page=109}}</ref>}}

[[James W. Valentine]], while admitting that the classic monkey's task is impossible, finds that there is a worthwhile analogy between written English and the [[metazoa]]n genome in this other sense: both have "combinatorial, hierarchical structures" that greatly constrain the immense number of combinations at the alphabet level.<ref name="Valentine2004">{{cite book |first=James |last=Valentine |title=On the Origin of Phyla |year=2004 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=0-226-84548-6 |pages=77–80}}</ref>