psikhrangkur said:Before we can continue, assuming of course that after having another chance to see my reiteration of your argument you still feel that it's a fair restating of your argument, I need you to hear more of your thoughts concerning the capacity of a given organism. I've described it as a greater ability to function in and interact with its surrounding environment, but this still strikes me as vague, and I'd appreciate clarification on this point.
The capacity of the organism as int he potential of its development, meaning what it can develop into. The acorn can develop into a tree, but not into a fern or a car. Its 'capacity' for development is limited due to the kind of thing it is. It's potential for development is limited.
As for its 'functional' ability in its environment, let me use an analogy. Now mind you, this analogy will use the 'subjective' sense of purpose in order to draw attention to the 'objective' sense of it, which is a more complex understanding of function. Let's say you take a hammer. A hammer is something you can use to drive nails or bludgeon someone's skull. It serves more than one end. but there are things the hammer serves and things which don't because of that difference in functionality. You can't hammer a nail or bludgeon someone's skull with a cloud or with a quart of beer (minus the class).
So we see two kinds of 'capacity' here. The first is the capacity, the potential of the organism to develop into its adult form, which is its actuality/purpose because that form is the fulfillment of that potential. The second refers to functional capacity, which applies also to the acorn as well as the adult and the aging oak. The telos is the fully adult organism, which is the actualization-of-the-potential.
Does that answer your question?