I have taught many talented biology students, both in the US and the UK, who could not give a coherent account of evolution by natural selection – teleology remains strikingly popular – and while it may or may not be the case that
evolution provides the conceptual ‘foundation’ of life science, it is certainly not the case that biologists need to have command of any such theory to do competent work, for example, on the sex life of marine worms, on algal photosynthesis, or on the nucleotide sequence of breast cancer genes. Lots of practitioners of lots of modern expert practices turn out not to be very good at articulating their practices’ supposed foundations.
Don't count the evolutionary myth of self-importance to go away anytime soon though.
Cornelius asserts
ReplyDelete"Evolution does not play a crucial role in life science research"...
...based on statements such as
"it is certainly not the case that biologists need to have command of any such theory to do competent work"
Sure, many biologists take evolution for granted. They work on the proximate side of things. Figuring out how mechanisms work. Yet their work still relies on evolutionary principles. For example, it doesn't take much knowledge of evolution to study the physiology of mice, yet medical applications of such work rely on the shared ancestry of mice and men.
CH: Finally someone has stated the obvious: Evolution does not play a crucial role in life science research.
ReplyDeleteThat's not what the article said at all CH. The main thrust of the article was the celebration of Darwin's birthday and understanding Darwin the man.
The point of that paragraph you quote-mined was that for some 'turn the crank' type scientific jobs one does not need a thorough understanding of the theoretical underpinnings of the subject. That's a long way from saying ToE doesn't play a role in the understanding and guidance of new research concepts. Heck, I bet even you could do competent scientific work in an evolutionary biology lab as long as you kept the test tubes clean and the floor swept.
"Heck, I bet even you could do competent scientific work in an evolutionary biology lab as long as you kept the test tubes clean and the floor swept."
ReplyDeleteIsn't that what Cornelius did to get a PhD?
"medical applications of such work rely on the shared ancestry of mice and men"
ReplyDeleteThat's not necessarily so. You can simply see from a molecular cell biology prospective that men and mice are very similar and then have the appropriate rationale that medical applications if they work in mice will work in men as well (say herceptin in the use of Her2/Neu positive breast cancer in mice) this does not necessarily entail a belief in evolution.
Evolution is only an explanation for why they are similar and so is design. The fact they are similar is the reason why the medical applications work, not b/c of either theory...
*gasp* You 'Science!'-hating fundie, you! *gasp*
ReplyDeleteDon't you know that the Holy TalkOrigins site has beat you to the punch ;-)
"Evolution is the cornerstone of modern biology. It unites all the fields of biology under one theoretical umbrella. It is not a difficult concept, but very few people -- the majority of biologists included -- have a satisfactory grasp of it. ..."
Dig it! Even the majority of biologists don't *really* understand the very basis and necessary cornerstone of their field!
... even though it's incredibly simple.
ReplyDeleteReally, when you think about it, given that almost no one *really* understands "evolution," it's no wonder that we still don't have the flying cars we were promised we'd have by the year 2000.
ReplyDeleteBecause, after all, and as simply anyone who knows anything knows, "evolution" is the basis of *all* of 'Science!'
Dr. Hunter, you wrote:
ReplyDelete"But one need not have one eye on the evolution text in order to rightly do life science research…"
If that's true, why aren't the labs of Harvard and Stanford filled with creationist biologists?
Why aren't the ones who self-identify DOING any science?
Smokey said:
ReplyDeleteDr. Hunter, you wrote:
"But one need not have one eye on the evolution text in order to rightly do life science research…"
If that's true, why aren't the labs of Harvard and Stanford filled with creationist biologists?
Have you seen the documentary "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" smokey? The darwinian mafia won't allow Creation scientists or scientists who accept I.D because they don't blindly worship darwin...they like to teach the FACTS without evolutionary assumptions tainting them. Imagine that.
I guess Thornton doesn't know what his fellow darwinist, Jerry Coyne has said:
ReplyDeleteIn science's pecking order, evolutionary biology lurks somewhere near the bottom, far closer to phrenology than to physics. For evolutionary biology is a historical science, laden with history's inevitable imponderables. We evolutionary biologists cannot generate a Cretaceous Park to observe exactly what killed the dinosaurs; and, unlike "harder" scientists, we usually cannot resolve issues with a simple experiment, such as adding tube A to tube B and noting the color of the mixture.
Of Vice and Men The New Republic April 3 2000 p.27
This is an extremely poor argument CH.
ReplyDeleteIn any field there are always practitioners who have a poor grasp of their disciplines underlying principles and foundations. I work in Information Technology. I work with some very smart people who have a solid grasp of computer science, and indeed the history of their discipline. Yet there are a good number of people who are programmers who know next to nothing about how the internals of a computer work. The know absolutely nothing about CPUs, or registers, memory buses, or how silicon is turned into a chip. And of course they don't need to. But you can be sure that they wouldn't be able to do what they do unless those that had gone before them did not have a very solid grasp of these things.
And I suspect this same phenomena could be applied to just about any discipline you care to mention.
Don't worry CH, keep on trying and maybe one day you'll succeed from ridding the world of this terrible awful scourge called evolution! Then you can rest.
And, as the example here of Janfeld attests (and a I can testify from personal experience), there are even persons in the IT field who cannot (or will not) reason logically. Which is really odd, since logic is the very heart of the field.
ReplyDeleteCornelius, you are grasping at straws.
ReplyDeleteShapin's observation simply highlights the compartmentalized nature of biology and, as he says, of other sciences. You can do competent work in solid-state physics without knowing the Standard Model of particle physics. That does not invalidate the Standard Model. Likewise, my students don't need general relativity in their everyday work. So what? It's still indispensable to the understanding of the Universe.
See where I'm going?
"Finally someone has stated the obvious: Evolution does not play a crucial role in life science research."
ReplyDeleteAdvancing science normally falsifies many assumptions and predictions which evolutionist find comfort in. If scientists cease from trying to explain evolution in light of new discoveries, one is still learning new things about nature.
"The evolutionary myth of self-importance" isn't going away which is true because one has to give a reason on why billions of dollars are being spent on research to explain it and then re-explain it many times over.
As I scan through the posts I see a conflation of historical evolution with "laboratory" evolution.
ReplyDeleteThe observation that bacteria mutate and develop antibacterial resistance is orders of magnitude different from the yet undemonstrated hypothesis that the great morphologogical transformations observed in the fossil record were the result of random variation and natural selection.
I can see how laboratory evolution is helpful; I do not see the value of historical evolution. If there never was a theory to explain the history of life, laboratory science could still be conducted because it is based on what is observable and testable, and not what is thought to have occurred in the distant past.
Doublee said...
ReplyDeleteAs I scan through the posts I see a conflation of historical evolution with "laboratory" evolution.
The observation that bacteria mutate and develop antibacterial resistance is orders of magnitude different from the yet undemonstrated hypothesis that the great morphologogical transformations observed in the fossil record were the result of random variation and natural selection.
But the same identical mechanisms are observed both places. If they work in the lab, you have to come up with some good reason why they couldn't have worked at an earlier time outside the lab.
I can see how laboratory evolution is helpful; I do not see the value of historical evolution. If there never was a theory to explain the history of life, laboratory science could still be conducted because it is based on what is observable and testable, and not what is thought to have occurred in the distant past.
The evidence left by evolution is both observable and testable with repeatable results The actual historical events themselves don't have to be repeatable, just the measurements of the effects they left behind.
I don't know why so many IDCers continue to get those two different ideas confused.
throntard,
ReplyDeleteIt is very telling that you cannot produce a testable hypothesis for your position.
thorntard:
ReplyDeleteBut the same identical mechanisms are observed both places. If they work in the lab, you have to come up with some good reason why they couldn't have worked at an earlier time outside the lab.
There isn't any evidence from any lab that can extrapolated to get UCD.
In the end all you can do is throw Father Time at small changes and have faith that is enough to get the job done.
I'd be more impressed if this quote came from a practicing biologist, and not a historian and sociologist of science. His doctoral thesis was the impact of Society on Hanoverian science. I feel his commentary is misplaced and quite naive.
ReplyDeleteWe might accept there are lab skills in biology which require no understanding of evolution. For example, one could observe the "sex life of marine worms, on algal photosynthesis, or on the nucleotide sequence of breast cancer genes." Fine. Then, one might want to compare mechanisms of photosynthesis across species, or determine which mutations give cancer cells selective advantages to propagate and evolve drug resistance. One might want to do the population genetics of marine worms, and different mating behaviors. These require an understanding of evolution.
I wonder if he knows of drug cycling, a means to slow the resistance of drug resistant HIV and antibiotic resistant bacteria which is is based on the understanding of how these resistances are evolved.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/120478.php
Or that Deep Homology suggests functional pathways to probe human diseases such as autism and cancer in diverse model organisms.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/science/27gene.html?pagewanted=all
Or that directed evolution produces useful products for industry, particularly enzyme catalysis.
http://www.nature.com/nchembio/journal/v5/n8
Or that directed evolution has been used to predict the evolution of antibiotic resistance-and to combat it in advance.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11224569
Like this blog, Shapin says things like this, but has little evidence to back them up. His interaction with College Freshman is the demonstration that biologists need not understand evolution? Laughable.
And BA, how many times do we have to play the random chemical input plus selection yields function game? You seem to skip over the comments where people post the empirical proof of that, and the next day, return to shouting how there is no such hypothesis in all biology.
music wrote:
ReplyDelete"Have you seen the documentary "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" smokey?"
It's not a documentary. Tell me, do you agree with the following statements?
1) “The fox remains always a fox, the goose remains a goose, and the tiger will retain the character of a tiger.”
2) “For it was by the Will of God that men were made of a certain bodily shape, were given their natures and their faculties.”
3) “But nowhere inside a kind shows such a development as the breadth of the jump , as Man must supposedly have made, if he has developed from an ape-like state to what he is today.”
Agree or disagree, music?
------------------
"The darwinian mafia won't allow Creation scientists or scientists …"
What a lie!
You didn't list anything that they aren't allowed to do. Is Dr. Hunter allowed to do biology at Biola? Is Doug Axe allowed to do real research at the Biologic Institute? Is someone keeping Mike Behe out of his own lab at Lehigh?
Doesn't the ID movement have its own, laughably thin journals?
Who's stopping fundies from starting their own creationist biotech company, music?
Smokey:
ReplyDeleteIf you like at the context, the first quote from "Mein Kampf" above means that the fox is always true to its foxy nature, and doesn't show mercy on a goose. And he was discussing the fact that animals don't readily interbreed.
Here's the whole quote:
Any crossing of two beings not at exactly the same level producesa medium between the level of the two parents. This means: the offspring will probably stand higher than the racially lower parent, but not as high as the higher one. Consequently, it will later succumb in the struggle against the higher level. Such mating is contrary to the will of Nature for a higher breeding of all life. The precondition for this does not lie in associating superior and inferior, but in the total victory of the former. The stronger must dominate and not blend with the weaker, thus sacrificing his own greatness. Only the born weakling can view this as cruel, but he after all is only a weak and limited man; for if this law did not prevail, any conceivable higher development of organic living beings would be unthinkable.
The consequence of this racial purity, universally valid inNature, is not only the sharp outward delimitation of the various races,but their uniform character in themselves. The fox is always a fox, the goose a goose, the tiger a tiger, etc., and the difference can lie at most in the varying measure of force, strength, intelligence, dexterity, endurance,etc., of the individual specimens. But you will never find a fox who inhis inner attitude might, for example, show humanitarian tendencies towardgeese, as similarly there is no cat with a friendly inclination toward mice.
troy ...
ReplyDeleteand thornton the man whose mind has been on HOLD for so long he can't remember the last time he actually had a real thought:
"test tubes clean and the floor swept. ... Isn't that what Cornelius did to get a PhD?"
1. What scientific domain do you have a PhD in?
Oh, gee thats what we all thought anyway.
How bout a Masters?
No, well, a bachelors?
Non plus!?
Well do you have at least a high school diploma?
Really! Wow so now you're experts huh!
No wonder CH is so worried about your devastating "reasoning" if I may abuse the term.
Here's another quote from "Mein Kampf" that sounds like pretty conventional evolutionary theory:
ReplyDeleteThe first step which outwardly and visibly removed man from the animal was that of invention. Invention itself is originally based on the finding of stratagems and ruses, the use of which facilitates the life struggle with other beings, and is sometimes the actual prerequisite for its favorable course. These most primitive inventions do not yet cause the personality to appear with sufficient distinctness, because, of course, they enter the consciousness of the future, or rather the present, human observer only as a mass phenomenon. Certain dodges and crafty measures which man, for example, can observe in the animal catch his eye only as a summary fact, and he is no longer in a position to establish or investigate their origin, but must simply content himself with designating such phenomena as 'instinctive.'
But in our case this last word means nothing at all. For anyone who believes in a higher development of living creatures must admit that every expression of their life urge and life struggle must have had a beginning; that one subject must have started it, and that subsequently such a phenomenon repeated itself more and more frequently and spread more and more, until at last it virtually entered the subconscious of all members of a given species, thus manifesting itself as an instinct.
Nat, neither of those quotes include anything resembling evolutionary theory. The idiocy of the rant about hybridization is in direct conflict with Mendelian genetics, too.
ReplyDeleteHitler was a garden-variety creationist.
You are incredibly ignorant, unable to read for comprehension, or both.
I notice you didn't address the point about looks being irrelevant to speciation. How come? Are you conceding the point?
troy wrote:
ReplyDelete"1. What scientific domain do you have a PhD in?"
Biology, specifically virology. And you, Troy?
"Oh, gee thats what we all thought anyway."
What were you thinking?
"How bout a Masters?"
That's funny. In the US hard sciences at top-tier schools, master's degrees are generally, but not always, given to those who fail to pass the qualifying exams for the PhD.
So no, I don't have a master's. Do you?
No, well, a bachelors?
Yup. Zoology. And you?
"Really! Wow so now you're experts huh!"
I really am an expert. But what makes me an expert isn't letters after my name, it's the new knowledge that I contribute. It's what I DO, and the ID movement lacks the faith to DO anything real in science.
Gary:
ReplyDelete"What scientific domain do you have a PhD in?"
Mathematical biology. More specifically models of ecology and evolution.
"How bout a Masters?
No, well, a bachelors?
Non plus!?"
Masters in Zoology and Theoretical Biology
Bachelors in Maths
"Well do you have at least a high school diploma?"
Yeah, and they made me learn Latin too. Quod erat demonstrandum.
Quid pro quo?
I did say that they look alike, and readily interbreed, and have overlapping territories. All that combined means that they might be one species.
ReplyDeleteAnd in part two of "Mein Kampf" Hitler seems to take a utilitarian approach to conventional religion. He wrote that it was usseful for organizing society, but that it was time to go on to a race based approach.
And he seems to use God and Nature interchangably. This would make him more of a pantheist than a convetional Christian.
Smokey, that was Gary - not me.
ReplyDeleteSorry, troy.
ReplyDeleteNat:
"I did say that they look alike, and readily interbreed, and have overlapping territories. All that combined means that they might be one species."
But they aren't, which is why we have the term "ring species." They've been tested empirically, something that seems to escape you.
You also can't explain why the lines between species are so fuzzy. Evolutionary theory does, and it makes testable predictions.
"And in part two of "Mein Kampf" Hitler seems to take a utilitarian approach to conventional religion. He wrote that it was usseful for organizing society, but that it was time to go on to a race based approach."
So what? Racism is far more common among creationists than it is among biologists.
"And he seems to use God and Nature interchangably. This would make him more of a pantheist than a convetional Christian."
You're just being dishonest, Nat. I said that Hitler was a creationist, not a Christian.
You seem to be unable to address what I actually write.
BTW, I don't consider most fundie Christians to be conventional Christians anyway, since they place the OT and Paul far above the teachings of Jesus from the Gospels. Therefore your attempt to draw some subtle distinction is ridiculous.
Hitler was a creationist. Period.
"The first step which outwardly and visibly removed man from the animal was that of invention."
ReplyDeleteThis passage seems to be saying that at first humans were not removed from animals, then they were by means of invention. It doesn't say humans were created seperately. And since there were steps invovled it was a process, not a separate creation. What am I missing?
And how do you know the gulls form different species?
Nat wrote:
ReplyDelete"This passage seems to be saying that at first humans were not removed from animals, then they were by means of invention. It doesn't say humans were created seperately. And since there were steps invovled it was a process, not a separate creation. What am I missing?"
That there's no connection with evolutionary theory. Hitler was a conventional creationist.
"And how do you know the gulls form different species?"
Because you're LYING about them readily interbreeding. Where the ends of the ring meet, they don't interbreed—they are separate species.
You also can't explain why the lines between species are so fuzzy. Evolutionary theory does, and it makes testable predictions.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you ignore this fundamental point, Nat? How do you get ring species from whatever it is you accept today?
We both know that you don't.
Here Hitler seems to use fairly convetional evolutionary theory:
ReplyDeleteIn our case this term has no meaning. Because everyone who believes in the higher evolution of living organisms must admit that every manifestation of the vital urge and struggle to live must have had a definite beginning in time and that one subject alone must have manifested it for the first time. It was then repeated again and again; and the practice of it spread over a widening area, until finally it passed into the subconscience of every member of the species, where it manifested itself as 'instinct.'
According to this:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.surfbirds.com/ID%20Articles/adriaensgulls1203.html
they have been observed interbreeding.
You're lying, Nat. You don't have the slightest idea what evolutionary theory even is.
ReplyDeleteHint: there's no such thing as "higher evolution."
Second hint: he's talking about a single species.
Hitler was a creationist. Quit lying and deal with it.
Nat tried to move the goalposts:
ReplyDelete"According to this:
http://www.surfbirds.com/ID%20Articles/adriaensgulls1203.html
they have been observed interbreeding."
You claimed that they READILY interbreed, Nat. You lied.
How many have produced fertile offspring?
You also can't explain why the lines between species are so fuzzy. Evolutionary theory does, and it makes testable predictions.
I don't see anywhere Hitler talking about separate creations. He does talk about evolution and how humans were once like animals but were removed by a naturalistic process. So your interpretation is that humans and all animals were created separatly, then continued to evolve with humans developing tools? It certainly doesn't sound like conventional creationism to me.
ReplyDeleteAnd Hitler might have been an evolutionist, but not a very good one.
They have been observed interbreeding under natural conditions. Mauybve readily was a poor choice.
ReplyDeleteThis quote is from the article I linked on gulls:
ReplyDeleteThese large colonies also produce and attract a number of hybrids. At least 11 adult or near-adult hybrid large gulls have been observed and studied since 2000. In this article, 9 of them are presented. One was colour-ringed. Most were paired with either Herring or Lesser Black-backed Gull, and some successfully reared young. At the end of this article, a juvenile hybrid from Zeebrugge and another colour-ringed hybrid (photographed at Oostende) are also included.
A lot has been written about hybridization in the Herring -- Lesser Black-backed -- Yellow-legged Gull species complex (see extensive list of references at the end of this article), but many papers are in Dutch, German or French, and very little attention has gone to describing the characters of such hybrids. This article aims to illustrate the appearance of Belgian hybrid gulls.
Mixed breeding in western Europe
All three species may interbreed, as has been observed quite regularly in western Europe. The following are just examples, not an all-inclusive list.
natschuster: All three species may interbreed, as has been observed quite regularly in western Europe.
ReplyDeleteAgain, that closely related species hybridize is considered crucial evidence of evolution. Darwin devoted a whole chapter of Origin of Species to hybridization. Reproductive isolation is often a matter of degree. Birds are notorious hybridizers, but there are a variety of mechanisms that promote speciation, including bird song and other behavioral differences. Consider lions and tigers, polar bears and brown bears, horses and donkeys. They are still considered separate species, because they tend to maintain separate populations and distinct characteristics. The exact dividing line between species and variety can sometimes be arbitary, though — just as would be expected of something that varies by degree.
So how do you define a speciation event?
ReplyDeleteOne population of brown bear is actually closer genetically to polar bears than to other brown bears.
Looks like lots of smoke and mirrors there smokey.
ReplyDelete"Hitler was a conventional creationist."
OMG, being as utterly ignorant as you obviously are, no wonder I question your understanding. If you had anything intelligent to contribute here I might really believe you - but I don't because you don't.
I really am an expert. But what makes me an expert isn't letters after my name, it's the new knowledge that I contribute. It's what I DO, and the ID movement lacks the faith to DO anything real in science.
Indeed? Tell it to Douglas Axe, Rich Sternberg et al.
I think you are just another very ignorant wannabe.
"New knowledge you contribute"?
Well gee if you're such an expert why don't you enter the "The Origin-of-Life Prize"® and win?
Sign up with yer buddy Troy, also making claims here. Hmmm? http://lifeorigin.info/
Go ahead make history or just lose like everyone else that tries.
So tell me, did you just have to say, "I swear allegiance to secular humanism and Darwin forever" then they just handed over a degree?
Or are you just lying through yer teeth like so many other Web experts?
natschuster: So how do you define a speciation event?
ReplyDeleteSpeciation is not always an "event," but is more often a process.
There are a number of species definitions, which vary depending on the field of study and methodology. But you should recognize, by now, the essential point. There is not always a distinct dividing line between closely related species.
Polar bears are considered a separate species because they maintain distinct characteristics, including behavioral patterns, and a separate breeding population. It's a lot more than just color. They diverged relatively recently from brown bears, so they can still interbreed, but gene-flow is minimal.
Evolution is crucial to philosophy and theology.
ReplyDeleteGary:
ReplyDelete"Indeed? Tell it to Douglas Axe, Rich Sternberg et al."
I consulted Web of Science.
Axe DD: 10 papers in 23 years.
Sternberg RV: 3 in 8 years.
That is considered extremely poor performance in the competitive world of real science. No wonder these dimwits couldn't hack it there.
Hey Gary, of those 13 papers, which ones support ID? Shouldn't be too hard to select from such a measly collection, even for you.
troy, quantity does not equal quality. Likewise, complexity does not equal specificity.
ReplyDeleteNat, what Zach said about speciation as a process. MET predicts fuzziness. What does your hypothesis predict?
ReplyDelete“But nowhere inside a kind shows such a development as the breadth of the jump , as Man must supposedly have made, if he has developed from an ape-like state to what he is today.”
Hitler was a creationist. Period.
Gary wrote:
"Indeed? Tell it to Douglas Axe, Rich Sternberg et al."
What's there to say? Neither of them does anything any more. I have a far better publication record than theirs combined.
"I think you are just another very ignorant wannabe."
You do? How much are you willing to bet?
"Well gee if you're such an expert why don't you enter the "The Origin-of-Life Prize"® and win?"
I don't do OOL research. Besides, $50K/year without indirect isn't worth much time.
"So tell me, did you just have to say, "I swear allegiance to secular humanism and Darwin forever" then they just handed over a degree?"
No, I had to publish four papers in the primary literature.
"Or are you just lying through yer teeth like so many other Web experts?"
How much do ya wanna bet, Gary?
I once made a list a of all the Nobel Prizes given for Medicine and noticed that none, NONE of the discoveries for which the prize was awarded were in any way indebted to the theory of evolution.
ReplyDeletetroy,
ReplyDeleteThere still isn't ONE peer-reviewed paper that supports your position.
smokey:
ReplyDeleteI really am an expert. But what makes me an expert isn't letters after my name, it's the new knowledge that I contribute.
BWAAAHAAAHAAA-
YOU can't even provide a testable hypothesis nor positive evidence for your position.
IOW you are an expert bullshitter and nothing more...
smokey:
ReplyDeleteEvolutionary theory does, and it makes testable predictions.
Let's see-
We cannot predict what will be selected for at any point in time and we cannot predict what mutation/ variation will arise at any point in time.
You cannpot provide a testable hypothesis so that means you are lying.
Celal wrote:
ReplyDelete"I once made a list a of all the Nobel Prizes given for Medicine and noticed that none, NONE of the discoveries for which the prize was awarded were in any way indebted to the theory of evolution."
That's pretty funny. I love the way that you constructed it so that you had to judge, based on a list and your knowledge of medicine, whether they were indebted.
It's funny that you wouldn't look to see if they involved aspects of evolution, you didn't look at their publications, you didn't look at their Nobel lectures to see if the laureates talked about how their work was related to evolution.
It's even funnier when you consider the impact of last year's prize in CHEMISTRY on our understanding of the evolution of the earliest life.
So major that Stephen Meyer had to lie about it in his book. He clearly understood its impact.
Regardless of the impact of evolution in biological research, we can be 100% certain that a knowledge of Intelligent Design is totally inconsequential in research of any sort. This is the real point that Cornelius is hoping everyone will forget by deflecting comment towards some supposed flaw in evolution.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMike:
ReplyDeleteRegardless of the impact of evolution in biological research, we can be 100% certain that a knowledge of Intelligent Design is totally inconsequential in research of any sort.
True it can't help if people don't let it.
However only through ID will biology be complete.
That is because living organisms are software driven.
As an aside- how much research is aided by "knowing" our existence is nothing but an accident?
smokey:
ReplyDeleteIt's even funnier when you consider the impact of last year's prize in CHEMISTRY on our understanding of the evolution of the earliest life.
Nice equivocation.
Last year's PRIZE in CHEMISTRY had NOTHING to do with BLIND, UNDIRECTED CHEMICAL PROCESSES.
Why are you such a liar?
Giving this Hitler question another try.
ReplyDeleteA garden variety, conventional creationist ... period?
Zweites Buch
http://www.zogsnightmare.com/books/NEWBOOKS2_4_08/newbooks!/ZweitesBuch.pdf
In the times before man, world history was primarily a presentation of geological events: the struggle of natural
forces with one another, the creation of an inhabitable surface on this planet, the separation of water from land,
the formation of mountains, of plains, and of the seas. This is the world history of this time. Later, with the
emergence of organic life, man's interest concentrated on the process of becoming and the passing away of its
thousandfold forms. And only very late did man finally become visible to himself, and thus by the concept of
world history he began to understand first and foremost only the history of his own becoming, that is, the
presentation of his own evolution. This evolution is characterised by an eternal struggle of men against beasts
and against men themselves. From the invisible confusion of the organisms there finally emerged formations:
Clans, Tribes, Folks, States. The description of their origins and their passing away is but the representation of
an eternal struggle for existence.
..
First of all a very violent struggle for existence sets in, which only individuals who are the
strongest and have the greatest capacity for resistance can survive. A high infant mortality rate on the one hand
and a high proportion of aged people on the other are the chief signs of a time which shows little regard for
individual life.
Since, under such conditions, all weaklings are swept away through acute distress and illness,
and only the healthiest remain alive, a kind of natural selection takes place. Thus the number of a Folk can
easily be subject to a limitation, but the inner value can remain, indeed it can experience an inner heightening.
But such a process cannot last for too long, otherwise the distress can also turn into its opposite. In nations
composed of racial elements that are not wholly of equal value, permanent malnutrition can ultimately lead to a
dull surrender to the distress, which gradually reduces energy, and instead of a struggle which fosters a natural
selection, a gradual degeneration sets in. This is surely the case once man, in order to control the chronic
distress, no longer attaches any value to an increase of his number, and resorts on his own to birth control. For
then he himself immediately embarks upon a road opposite to that taken by nature. Whereas nature, out of the
multitude of beings who are born, spares the few who are most fitted in terms of health and resistance to wage
life's struggle, man limits the number of births, and then tries to keep alive those who have been born with no
regard to their real value or to their inner worth. Here his humanity is only the handmaiden of his weakness, and
at the same time it is actually the cruellest destroyer of his existence. If man wants to limit the number of births
on his own, without producing the terrible consequences which arise from birth control, he must give the
number of births free rein but cut down on the number of those remaining alive.
http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=167&page=13
Looks like it's working....
ReplyDeleteFor a world population of 2,250,000,000 one can count on the 170 religions of a certain importance – each of them claiming, of course, to be the repository of the truth. At least 169 of them, therefore, are mistaken! Amongst the religions practiced today, there is none that goes back further than 2500 years. But there have been human beings, in the baboon category, for at least three hundred thousand years. There is less distance between the man-ape and the ordinary modern man than there is between the ordinary modern man and a man like Schopenhauer. In comparison with this millenary past, what does a period of 2000 signify?
The universe, in its material elements, has the same composition whether we’re speaking of the earth, the sun or any other planet. It is impossible to suppose nowadays that organic life exists only on our planet.
Table Talk # 51
24th October 1941, evening
The monkeys, our ancestors of prehistoric times, are strictly vegetarian. http://www.ivu.org/history/eur...
“Man has discovered in nature the wonderful notion of that all-mighty being whose law he worships. Fundamentally in everyone there is the feeling for this all-mighty, which we call god (that is to say, the dominion of natural laws throughout the whole universe).” — Adolf Hitler Source: Adolf Hitler, Hitler’s Secret Conversations, 1941-1945 (New York: Farrar, Straus and Young, 1953), p. 5.
In the New Age envisioned by National Socialism, biblical Christianity was politically subversive, even a “rebellion … against nature”(page 91 . It’s perceived absurdity had been impressed on Hitler during his Austrian schooldays, when, as he mockingly recalled, students attended a catechism class at ten A.M. to hear the biblical story of Creation, only then to listen, at eleven A.M., to Darwin’s version of it in a natural science class - the latter winning hands down. (page 92) During the war years Hitler recommended a slow “natural death” for Christianity by exposing its dogmas to the light of science.(page 93)
Harvard historian, Steven Ozment’s A Mighty Fortress: A New History Of The German People.
All that is left is to prove that in nature there is no frontier between the organic and the inorganic. When understanding of the universe has become widespread, when the majority of men know that the stars are not sources of light but worlds, perhaps inhabited worlds like ours, then the Christian doctrine will be convicted of absurdity.
(Table Talk, 14th October, 1941)
When we National Socialists speak of a belief in God, we do not understand by God, like naive Christians and their spiritual opportunists, a human-type being, who sits around somewhere in space…The force of natural law, with which all these innumerable planets move in the universe, we call Almighty or God. The claim that this world force is concerned about the fate of every single being, of every smallest earth bacillus, or can be influenced by so-called prayers or other astonishing things, is based on a proper dose of naivety or alternatively on a commercial shamelessness.
ReplyDeleteThat’s in accordance with the laws of nature. By means of the struggle, the elites are continually renewed. The law of natural selection justifies this incessant struggle, by allowing the survival of the fittest. Christianity is a rebellion against natural law, a protest against nature. Taken to its logical extreme, Christianity would mean the systematic cultivation of human failure.
(Table Talk, 10th October, 1941)
http://www.worldfuturefund.org.....cology.htm
For as soon as the procreative faculty is thwarted and the number of births diminished, the natural struggle for existence which allows only healthy and strong individuals to survive is replaced by a sheer craze to ‘save’ feeble and even diseased creatures at any cost. And thus the seeds are sown for a human progeny which will become more and more miserable from one generation to another, as long as Nature’s will is scorned.” — Adolf Hitler Source: Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Chapter 4.
“Difference which exists between the lowest, so-called men, and the other higher races is greater than between the lowest men and the highest apes.” — Adolf Hitler Source: Hitler quoted in Heinz Bruecher, Ernst Haeckels Bluts- und Geisteserbe (München: Lehmann, 1936), p.
“[Hitler] stressed and singled out the idea of biological evolution as the most forceful weapon against traditional religion and he repeatedly condemned Christianity for its opposition to the teaching of evolution . For Hitler, evolution was the hallmark of modern science and culture, and he defended its veracity as tenaciously as Haeckel.”—*Daniel Gasman, Scientific Origins of Modern Socialism: Social Darwinism in Ernst Haeckel and the German Monist League (1971), p. 188.
“Adolf Hitler’s mind was captivated by evolutionary thinking—probably since the time he was a boy. Evolutionary ideas, quite undisguised, lie at the basis of all that is worst in Mein Kampf and in his public speeches. A few quotations, taken at random, will show how Hitler reasoned . . [*Hitler said:] ‘He who would live must fight; he who does not wish to fight, in this world where permanent struggle is the law of life, has not the right to exist.’ “—*Robert E.D. Clark, Darwin: Before and After (1948), p. 115.
How 'bout you find some practicing biologists bringing medical, agricultural, an biotech products to the world, and see how many say evolution doesn't matter. I'm sure you can find me pretty creationist quotes, and a few odd historians, philosophers, and sociologists. Sadly for you, evolution is too useful and predictive a tool to depart with. No one has presented a coherent argument to the contrary.
ReplyDelete"To see the integral role of evolution in biomedical research, consider Nobel Prizes, a good indicator of the most important breakthroughs in biology. Reviewing the last 50 years of Nobel Prizes in medicine or physiology, I asked, "Is training in evolutionary biology necessary for a thorough understanding of the award-winning discoveries and work resulting from each breakthrough?" By my criteria, understanding of evolution is necessary in 47 of 50 cases. From vaccines, viral cancer genes, and nerve cell communication to drug trials, and genes controlling cholesterol and heart disease, evolutionary insights are crucial."
"What does evolution have to do with biotechnology? As the president of a biotech firm in St Louis, I can tell you that evolutionary biology is an integral part of what we and other companies do. I hire scientists who are well-trained in molecular evolutionary biology; who know how to recognize the business end of enzymes simply by looking at DNA sequences; who know which changes in a protein are important; who can design research tools based on the way a species manipulates the genetic code. Today, these skills are as important to discoveries in the laboratory as knowing how to use a microscope, and it takes an understanding of evolution to master them."
James McCarter
President
Divergence Inc
http://ncse.com/rncse/25/3-4/evolution-is-winner-breakthroughs-prizes
As for Hitler, the words Darwin, natural selection, speciation do not appear in Mein Kampf, or any other source I'm aware of.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand:
"I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord."
Does.
Blood-line narratives or human progress predate Darwin by millennia.
Even if Hitler did have some misguided notion of Darwinism, does that invalidate modern evolutionary biology and validate creationism? Strange logic.
Smokey said:
ReplyDelete1) “The fox remains always a fox, the goose remains a goose, and the tiger will retain the character of a tiger.”
2) “For it was by the Will of God that men were made of a certain bodily shape, were given their natures and their faculties.”
3) “But nowhere inside a kind shows such a development as the breadth of the jump , as Man must supposedly have made, if he has developed from an ape-like state to what he is today.”
Agree or disagree, music?
Why are you posting Hitler quotes when we're discussing the fact one not need believe in common ancestry evolution to conduct biological research???
Also, if you would like some quotes, I will be HAPPY to oblige:
If Nature does not wish that weaker individuals should mate with the stronger,
she wishes even less that a superior race should intermingle with an inferior one;
because in such a case all her efforts, throughout hundreds of thousands of
years, to establish an evolutionary higher stage of being, may thus be rendered
futile.
History furnishes us with innumerable instances that prove this law. It shows,
with a startling clarity, that whenever Aryans have mingled their blood with that
of an inferior race the result has been the downfall of the people who were the
standard-bearers of a higher culture.
Mein Kampf
"The German Fuhrer, as I have consistently maintained, is an evolutionist; he has consciously sought to make the practice of Germany conform to the theory of evolution."
Evolutionist Sir Arthur Keith, 'Evolution and Ethics'
Contrast this with what Keith said about Christianity.
“Christianity makes no distinction of race or color; it seeks to break down
all racial barriers. In this respect, the hand of Christianity is against that of Nature, for are not the races of mankind the evolutionary harvest which Nature has toiled through long
ages to produce?”
(Ibid., p. 72)
"Since Darwin's death, all has not been rosy in the evolutionary garden. The theories of the Great Bearded One have been hijacked by cranks, politicians, social reformers-and scientists-to support racist and bigoted views. A direct line runs from Darwin, through the founder of the eugenics movement-Darwin's cousin, Francis Galton-to the extermination camps of Nazi Europe."
(Brookes, Martin.,"Ripe old age," Review of "Of Flies, Mice and Men," by Francois Jacob, Harvard University Press, 1999. New Scientist, Vol. 161, No. 2171, 30 January 1999, p.41).
"Haeckel was the chief apostle of evolution in Germany. Nordenskiold (1929) argues that he was even more influential than Darwin in convincing the world of the truth of evolution. ... But, as Gasman argues, Haeckel's greatest influence was, ultimately, in another, tragic direction-national socialism. His evolutionary racism; his call to the German people for racial purity and unflinching devotion to a "just" state; his belief that harsh, inexorable laws of evolution ruled human civilization and nature alike, conferring upon favored races the right to dominate others; the irrational mysticism that had always stood in strange communion with his brave words about objective science-all contributed to the rise of Nazism. The Monist League that he had founded and led, though it included a wing of pacifists and leftists, made a comfortable transition to active support for Hitler."
Stephen J. Gould, "Ontogeny and Phylogeny,"
Search Hitler's second book. Struggle for existence, selection and evolution are all helpful search terms.
ReplyDeletehttp://tripatlas.com/Zweites_Buch
music wrote:
ReplyDelete"Why are you posting Hitler quotes when we're discussing the fact one not need believe in common ancestry evolution to conduct biological research??? "
Because you claimed that Expelled was a documentary. It's a vile pack of lies. The Nazi parts of it are especially disgusting because many, many Jews are biologists.
"Also, if you would like some quotes, I will be HAPPY to oblige:"
It shows that Hitler, like you and most other creationists, didn't understand evolution. Quoting someone else talking about Hitler doesn't cut it.
The Nazis banned Darwin's book. Hitler never mentioned Darwin's name. Hitler said whatever he thought would work.
What Hitler did was put Martin Luther's prose into practice.
Oh, and music, I asked if you agreed with the quotes.
ReplyDeleteI don't agree with what Gould wrote about Haeckel. I don't agree with any of the Hitler quotes, even when he mentions evolution.
You didn't answer my simple question. How come?
Hitler's garden variety creationism is one where there is no frontier between the organic and the inorganic, where man is descended from monkeys, baboons in particular, then an ape-man, went through thousands of forms before he evolved, via natural selection far enough to even contemplate himself. And where there is no god, let alone God, other than the laws of nature.
ReplyDelete"like the flat earth theory, does make some helpful predictions."
ReplyDeleteReally? I wish someone would write a book about all the predictions of Darwinism that turned out to be wrong. From the idea that a cell is a simple blob of goo that can easily form from base chemicals, to the idea of Junk DNA.
Junk DNA is particularly interesting. Here we can see how Darwinists rewrite history in real time to save the theory.
Some are honest enough to call it a mistake.
Some still use it as a "powerful" argument against design.
Some denies that that Darwinism ever predicted or required junk DNA.
I suspect as we learn more in biochemistry, we will see more and more of the third argument. Just like with Eugenics.
Then again, Haeckle's Drawings are a monument to the ability of Darwinists to consistantly distort and misrepresent science. Here you have a drawing that has been KNOWN to be fraudulent for over a 100 years, and it STILL appears in school textbooks as "powerful evidence for evolution"!! And don't expect those "science loving" materialist fundamentalists to come running to the rescue of scientific accuracy. Some of them, like die NCSE continue to DEFEND their use to this day. You see, the Scientific Method for the NCSE is "Any fairytale that conforms to Darwinism".
Sorry, I'm ranting. It's a weakness of mine. I'll just be quiet now.
The point I'd like to make is more predictions of Darwinism turned out to be wrong than otherwise. I would not like to have a committed Darwinist as my doctor.
"The point I'd like to make is more predictions of Darwinism turned out to be wrong than otherwise."
ReplyDeleteAnd, the part of Darwinism that's right has been understood for thousands of years. Oddly enough, one can even see this understanding reflected in a certain famous "Bronze Age religious text."
Hanno -
ReplyDeleteI would not like to have a committed Darwinist as my doctor.
Amusing. I suspect you more than likely do. Have you asked them?
Ilion -
ReplyDeleteAnd, the part of Darwinism that's right has been understood for thousands of years. Oddly enough, one can even see this understanding reflected in a certain famous "Bronze Age religious text."
I'd love to hear you elaborate on that one. What is this 'part of evolution that is right', which you also claim appears in this Bronze Age religious text?
There's a lot of equivocation by Darwinists going on here. They equivocate between "evolution" and "common ancestry," especially when discussing the benefits of darwinism. "Evolution" (some changes in a gene pool over time) is uncontroversial and is very important in bacterial research. "Common ancestry" is mostly irrelevant in medical research which isn't directly aimed at the question of "common ancestry."
ReplyDeleteSo, you darwinists can equivocate all you want. When your equivocation is pointed out, it just makes your position look weak. If you had strong arguments, you wouldn't need to equivocate.
There's a fairly new journal called "Evolutionary Applications", here. It's behind a pay wall, but the first issue is for free, including this paper on medicine and public health. Enjoy.
ReplyDeletePS: note that the number of papers in this journal alone dwarfs the number of papers in all ID journals combined.
TomH -
ReplyDelete"Evolution" (some changes in a gene pool over time) is uncontroversial and is very important in bacterial research. "Common ancestry" is mostly irrelevant in medical research which isn't directly aimed at the question of "common ancestry."
Perhaps not common ancestry. By the process of natural selection must be understood - for example, to combat viruses and epidemics. Don't complete a course of antibotics? You are creating a selection pressure for your virus to develop drug immunities.
troy:
ReplyDeleteThere's a fairly new journal called "Evolutionary Applications",
Which papers deal with blind, undirected chemical processes?
Please be specific.
smokey:
ReplyDeleteBecause you claimed that Expelled was a documentary. It's a vile pack of lies.
Said the known liar.
The Nazi parts of it are especially disgusting because many, many Jews are biologists.
Strange that a German woman made the claims about the nazis and darwinism.
You didn't answer my simple question. How come?
Most likely because you are avoiding answering simple questions that expose your position as nonsense.
Ritchie:
ReplyDeleteBy the process of natural selection must be understood - for example, to combat viruses and epidemics.
That is false.
All we need to know is how to "kill" the viruses and pathogens.
Joe:
ReplyDelete"Which papers deal with blind, undirected chemical processes?
Please be specific."
I am afraid this is way over your head Joe. Don't you have a broken remote control to fix or something to kill some time?
"Which papers deal with blind, undirected chemical processes?
ReplyDeletePlease be specific."
troy:
I am afraid this is way over your head Joe
IOW you cannot produce any- that is what I thought.
But thank you for continuing to prove that you are an ignorant coward.
And if it is over my head then you must have drowned by now...
troy:
ReplyDeletePS: note that the number of papers in this journal alone dwarfs the number of papers in all ID journals combined.
Yet not one paper pertains to blind, undirected chemical processes.
IOW what you said is meaningless as not one paper supports your position.
TomH:
ReplyDeleteThere's a lot of equivocation by Darwinists going on here. They equivocate between "evolution" and "common ancestry," especially when discussing the benefits of darwinism. "Evolution" (some changes in a gene pool over time) is uncontroversial and is very important in bacterial research. "Common ancestry" is mostly irrelevant in medical research which isn't directly aimed at the question of "common ancestry."
So, you darwinists can equivocate all you want. When your equivocation is pointed out, it just makes your position look weak. If you had strong arguments, you wouldn't need to equivocate.
Equivocation and Evolution Revisited
That is all they can do Tom.
They sure as hell cannot support tehir position.
Joe G -
ReplyDeleteThat is false.
All we need to know is how to "kill" the viruses and pathogens.
No it is not false. It is absolutely true.
If you start a course of antibiotics you must finish it. Any doctor will tell you that. Why? Because if you stop before you finish and only kill off, say, 95% of the virus, the 5% that's left is probably the 5% which is most resistant to the antibiotic.
So now the virus gets to build back up again - but you're probably immune to it now. But you can still pass it on, and the virus you pass on will be descended from this 'most drug resistant 5%'.
The result probably won't be noticable after just one person doing this. But if this virus passes through a chain of people who all take incomplete courses of antibiotics, then each person will be killing off the least resistant 95%. Eventually you will end up with a strain of the virus that is immune to the antibiotics.
That's an example of evolution through natural selection in action. And it is a real problem for real doctors today. Not at all 'irrelevant in medical research'.
They shouldn't try to develop antimicrobials.
ReplyDeleteWikipedia says,
'Viruses are an important natural means of transferring genes between different species, which increases genetic diversity and drives evolution.'
If evolution got us here why try to stop it with antivirus'? Let's catch virus' from pigs and birds so our kids can mutute and get better.
(sarcasm hopefully noted)
Notice the teleological language the Wiki author uses. What, do you recon, are the odd that any of our local DarwinDefender brigade will object to such blatant "misunderstanding" of "evolution?"
ReplyDelete... What, do you recon, are the odds that any of them would even have noticed it on their own?
ReplyDeleteFil -
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to see what point you imagine you're making... Viruses still hurt us! They make us ill, even kill us. And we combat this using medicine.
If evolution got us here why try to stop it with antivirus'?
We try to thwart evolution all the time - caring for the sick and infirm, adopting children, working to protect endangered animals... That doesn't mean evolution isn't real.
No-one is on a mission to make sure evolution happens as much as possible. Indeed, it is largely a ruthless process which we may find distasteful. Neither of these points, however, stop evolution being a fact - if it happens, then it happens whether we want it to or not.
Joe G:
ReplyDeleteTrue it can't help if people don't let it.
I have no vested interest in evolution - if it was replaced by another explanation tomorrow my reponse would be "OK - that's interesting". My objection to ID is the almost total lack of direct evidence supporting it.
However only through ID will biology be complete.
Let's review Cornelius' point. He is saying, in essence, that our understanding of the past history of evolution is not necessary to do current biological research.
Evolutionary mechanisms are observable today. ID, on the other hand, exists solely in the past. (Unless, of course, you can show me a documented example of a designer creating a new species.)
If the history of evolution isn't relevant to current research, then ID has the same problem
in spades.
But go ahead - show me how ID can illuminate HIV research, or improve a cancer treatment. At that point I'll start paying attention.
That is because living organisms are software driven.
Well, no. You can equate mechanisms in living organisms to software (if you like), but that's an analogy in your mind - it's not proof. We
can completely explain the sources, purpose and process for creation for any piece of software we encounter. Can you do the same for the supposed designer of DNA?
As an aside- how much research is aided by "knowing" our existence is nothing but an accident?
All of it. I've done research - how do I control for the possibility of a "designer" who might be screwing with the results in some arbitrary fashion? Eventually, the only way to make forward progress is to assume (in the absence of direct evidence) that such a designer either doesn't exist or always
behaves in the same way and shows no signs of conscious choice.
Mike,
ReplyDeleteThe way you present your convictions are strange, it borders on very strange. Let my try and explain:
you said:
"Evolutionary mechanisms are observable today. ID, on the other hand, exists solely in the past. (Unless, of course, you can show me a documented example of a designer creating a new species.)"
The only consequence of your words here is that you simply claim the observed genetic variation in modern species to be extrapolated by default to the origin of all genetic variation on earth. Then you project the biggest problem of evolution on to ID, without any awareness of this statement actually implies.
It implies that you won't admit that the scientist working on Genetically Modified organisms will never be able to produce a new species. Or at least you won't admit that the scientists are designing new GM crops.
Surely you are not qualified to make any judgement about ID with this level of confusion.
Mike,
ReplyDeleteI think I understand now. You got completely mixed up in your hangups about a transcendent designer. Better you don't do that, because I know for sure ID does not have such a hangup.
I hope my "GM crops" example help you overcome your self imposed misconceptions about ID.
"...Genetically Modified organisms will never be able to produce a new species."
ReplyDeleteshould be read, without the "never",
"...Genetically Modified organisms will be able to produce a new species."
music1028 said...
ReplyDeleteSmokey, if Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed was a 'vile pack of lies' why do we have the evidence to support it?
Simple. You don't.
If you were naive enough to get sucked in by the baseless propaganda "we're bein' oppressed!!!" con game run by the IDiots, you deserved to lose the cost of the ticket.
Mike:
ReplyDeleteMy objection to ID is the almost total lack of direct evidence supporting it.
True we haven't observed the designer(s) in action.
Evolutionary mechanisms are observable today.
What do you mean by that?
You can equate mechanisms in living organisms to software (if you like), but that's an analogy in your mind - it's not proof.
You equate "evolution" with blind, undirected processes...
But I digress- there isn't any analogy.
It is a fact- living organisms are software driven.
As an aside- how much research is aided by "knowing" our existence is nothing but an accident?
All of it.
Nonsense.
How was it determined that we are the result of accidents?
music1028 -
ReplyDeleteYou see, in Christianity, we don't claim one 'race' of people to be inferior or superior the way darwin's MYTH does.
How on Earth do you figure Darwinism claims any race of people to be superior? That doesn't even make sense. If anything, it teaches that all races are cousins - none more or less primative than any other!
Religion in general, by contrast, is rife with the concepts of 'chosen people' and 'heathens'. In fact, genocide is sanctioned or even directly ordered by God Himself several times in the Bible! Consider the slaughter of the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites:
Deuteronomy 7:1-2, 20:16-17
"...and when the Lord thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them."
"But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee."
What spite and bloodlust and hate; what cheerful and shameless extermination of entire races of people. Inexcusable when the Nazis did it - why is it fine when God does it?
How else do you think ol' Adolph was able to claim Jews, gays, etc were sub-human and should not be allowed to live?
Eugenics has little to do with evolution through natural selection. It is an extension of evolution through artificial selection - known to be a fact for centuries by farmers who have bred livestock for certain features.
And again, how does evolution through natural selection identify anyone as 'sub-human'? Racist sentiments were common in Darwin's time, it is true, but that is more through imperialism than evolutionary logic.
I don't know about Darwinism, but Darwin himself in "The Descent of Man" said that it was inevitable that the more highly evolved European races would exterminate the less highly evolved non-Europeans.
ReplyDeletenatschuster said...
ReplyDeleteI don't know about Darwinism, but Darwin himself in "The Descent of Man" said that it was inevitable that the more highly evolved European races would exterminate the less highly evolved non-Europeans.
Can one of you guys explain why you are so hung up over Darwin himself? OOS was written over 150 years ago. The scientific theory he started has moved way beyond his first wonderful insights on common descent.
Is it because your 1611KJV "science" text hasn't moved on in 400 years that you can't comprehend scientific progress?
"""""As you stated above, "Hitler said whatever he thought would work.""""""
ReplyDeleteOf course the comments he made in public to the remnants of a Christian nation (his so-called garden variety creationist ones) are more likely the dishonest opportunistic propaganda than are his unpublished and private evolutionary statements (his actual garden variety evolutionist ones).
While we're debunking Panda's Thumb propaganda, which book of Darwin's was banned by "the Nazis"?
None, right?
http://post-darwinist.blogspot.com/2006/11/hitler-as-social-darwinist-another.html
Thorton is right. It doesn't really matter what Darwin was like as a person, and yes, he did live in a time and culture where a great deal of racism and ideas of racial superiority were normal. Call Darwin a racist if you must, but the theory he pioneered does not follow from his beliefs.
ReplyDeleteThe theory of evolution shows us that we are all cousins. Nothing seperates the races except for a few tremendously insignificant and superficial genetic differences. It also shows that ideas of 'genetic/racial purity' are doomed and, in any case, actively undesirable.
Unlike the heathen-smiting xenophobia that pervades most holy books - including the Bible.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMichael:
ReplyDeleteThe only consequence of your words here is that you simply claim the observed genetic variation in modern species to be extrapolated by default to the origin of all genetic variation on earth. Then you project the biggest problem of evolution on to ID, without any awareness of this statement actually implies.
It implies that you won't admit that the scientist working on Genetically Modified organisms will never be able to produce a new species. Or at least you won't admit that the scientists are designing new GM crops.
Well, in previous discussions with ID proponents I've never had to distinguish "the designer" from artificial selection, but I'll clarify a bit.
ID claims that natural processes are insufficient (alone) to generate bio-diversity and that an intelligence is required. It is reasonably assumed that this intelligence is non-human. ID has not presented any direct evidence so far of this non-human designer in action in recent history, so the only evidence lies in the (often distant) past. Yet we still manage to do biological research.
How is this any different from Cornelius' original point about evolution?
thortard:
ReplyDeleteThe scientific theory he started has moved way beyond his first wonderful insights on common descent.
His "insights" were untestable then and they still are untestable.
As for "scientific progress" seeing you cannot even provide a testable hypothesis for your position it ain't science...
Mike:
ReplyDeleteID claims that natural processes are insufficient (alone) to generate bio-diversity and that an intelligence is required.
Actually it is blind, undirected processes- design is natural.
Joe G -
ReplyDeleteHis "insights" were untestable then and they still are untestable.
As for "scientific progress" seeing you cannot even provide a testable hypothesis for your position it ain't science...
That's laughable coming from someone who advocates a designer on the strength of no evidence at all.
If you want evidence of natural selection in progress, then there is plenty. There are lots of scientific journals dedicated to the study of evolution through natural selection. Pick up any biology journal and it will be crammed full of studies on the topic of evolution.
Want a specific study? Lenski's bacteria study was a beautiful demonstration of natural selection recorded in meticulous detail.
Or if you are asking for a way of testing that natural selection is NOT guided by an external agent, then that is like asking for a way of testing that a volcano does NOT feel anger - in short, it is the rational default position. We assume it until evidence comes up to contradict it.
Unless, of course, we have a particular agenda to push, like, say, the proposition that a God exists and that nature demonstrates evidence of his handiwork... people who want to do THAT will generally just willfully ASSUME life is designed, just like others might willfully ASSUME the volcano feels anger.
Actually it is blind, undirected processes- design is natural.
... if you are proposing a natural designer. Are you?
Ritchie:
ReplyDeleteThat's laughable coming from someone who advocates a designer on the strength of no evidence at all.
I advocate design on the strength of positive evidence.
If you want evidence of natural selection in progress, then there is plenty.
Plenty showing it doesn't do very much.
Also NS is not a very good filter.
Cooperation thwarts it it most cases.
Want a specific study? Lenski's bacteria study was a beautiful demonstration of natural selection recorded in meticulous detail.
Bacteria "evolving" into bacteria doesn't help you.
Actually it is blind, undirected processes- design is natural.
... if you are proposing a natural designer.
But the origin of nature could not have been via natural processes as they only exist in nature.
Ritchie,
ReplyDeleteI have supported the claim that your position relies on blind, undirected processes.
And all you can do in response is to whine.
Joe G,
ReplyDeleteBut the origin of crabsticks could not have been via crabstick related processes as they only exist in crabsticks.
Joe G:
ReplyDeleteActually it is blind, undirected processes- design is natural.
Sure, although standard usage in English distinguishes between "natural" and "man-made" (and by extension, 'designed'). So if you want to change the English language, go ahead - my house will now be part of the natural landscape like trees and mountains.
However, you haven't addressed my question. If Cornelius can state that evolution has no impact on current biological research, then how does the same comment not also apply to ID?
Joe G,
ReplyDeleteYou said " If Cornelius can state that evolution has no impact on current biological research"
I can state things too. So can you. Big whoop.
Can you provide proof for your statements?
That's the difference. Some sort of survey perhaps? To find out by asking large numbers of the people involved if evolution has no impact on current biological research. Carried out by an independent trustworthy 3rd party? Are you willing to pay for such?
The thing you have to remember is that the origin of design could not have been via designed processes as they only exist in design.
Joe G,
ReplyDeleteThe thing you have to remember is that the origin of man-made could not have been via man-made processes as they only exist in man-made.
Joe G wrote:
ReplyDelete"But the origin of nature could not have been via natural processes as they only exist in nature."
Dude, that's deep. You should write a book with that as the title.
On the other hand, minds that habitually limit themselves to splashing in the foot-bath are likely to take the pool to be the ocean.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to see what point you imagine you're making...
ReplyDeleteI guess you failed to note the sarcasm.
Comment attributed wrongly there a few comments ago - Mike's words, not Joe's but still.
ReplyDeletePSB:
ReplyDelete"While we're debunking Panda's Thumb propaganda, which book of Darwin's was banned by "the Nazis"?
None, right?"
I dunno, but according to <a href="http://www.library.arizona.edu/exhibits/burnedbooks/documents.htm>these documents</a>:
"Writings of a philosophical and social nature whose content deals with the false scientific enlightenment of primitive Darwinism and Monism (Häckel)."
It specifically mentions Häckel, not Darwin, but clearly the Nazi regime wasn't too fond of primitive Darwinism and Monism. Perhaps they preferred advanced Darwinism and Dualism? What do you think?
Mike:
ReplyDeleteSure, although standard usage in English distinguishes between "natural" and "man-made" (and by extension, 'designed').
Anything that exists in nature is natural- look it up.
If Cornelius can state that evolution has no impact on current biological research, then how does the same comment not also apply to ID?
I have already addressed that- people like you won't let it.
But the origin of nature could not have been via natural processes as they only exist in nature.
ReplyDeletesmokey:
Dude, that's deep.
No, it's just a fact.
natural:
ReplyDelete1 Present in or produced by nature
So even though my car is artificial it is still natural because it is present in nature...
How would ID impact biological research?
ReplyDeleteFor one it does not assume that living organisms are reducible to matter, energy, chance and necessity.
IOW it would have a similar impact as archaeology- do you think a geologist or archaeologist is better able to understand Stonehenge?
Ritchie:
ReplyDeleteOr if you are asking for a way of testing that natural selection is NOT guided by an external agent, then that is like asking for a way of testing that a volcano does NOT feel anger - in short, it is the rational default position. We assume it until evidence comes up to contradict it.
It's the mutation process that would be directed just as spellchecker is directed.
Read "Not By Chance"- it has only been out since 1997...
Joe G:
ReplyDeleteAnything that exists in nature is natural- look it up.
I did.
Nature (noun):
1. the material world, esp. as surrounding humankind and existing independently of human activities.
2. the natural world as it exists without human beings or civilization.
3. the elements of the natural world, as mountains, trees, animals, or rivers.
Great - so by your standard when I take my kids to their highly anticipated beach vacation this summer and they have to spend the whole time collecting tar balls and watching sea life die I can comfort them with "don't worry kids - this is all natural". Let me guess - you work for BP?
I have already addressed that- people like you won't let it.
No you haven't. There is nothing stopping anyone from looking for evidence of design in any place they care to look. Despite this effort, no one has found any evidence of design in current research - which you said yourself a few comments previously. So ID (if it exists) only exists in the past.
So - how does Cornelius' comment not apply to ID? How is it crucial for current research?
Joe G:
ReplyDeleteIOW it would have a similar impact as archaeology- do you think a geologist or archaeologist is better able to understand Stonehenge?
Umm - the study of Stonehenge is largely the study of history (i.e. the past). Cornelius was talking about current biological research.
Should I assume since you're providing analogies that you can't come up with an actual example from biology?
re Troy and primitive Darwinism (Haeckel).
ReplyDeleteYes, that reference was already provided in my link.
Here's more:
""""""""""""""""
Darwinian biologists (and Darwinian theory) under the Nazi regime were promoted, not silenced. There are many good scholarly books that clarify this issue, such as Ute Deichmann's Biologists under Hitler (Harvard UP, 1996)and Paul Weindling's Health, Race and German Politics between National Unification and Nazism, 1870-1945 (Cambridge UP, 1989). These works and many others show that Darwinian biologists thrived under Nazism. Hans F. K. Guenther, who was appointed to a professorship in social anthropology by the Nazi minister Frick after the Nazis came to power in the state of Thuringia (against the objections of the faculty there), was committed to Darwinian theory. Eugen Fischer, a Darwinian anthropologist and eugenicist, was named rector of the University of Berlin in July 1933, and he headed up the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute on Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics, a leading research institute. In 1944 (that's still under Nazi rule) the institute was even named after Fischer! Many other Darwinian biologists landed in important positions under Nazism: Fritz Lenz, Emil Abderhalden, Konrad Lorenz, and the list could go on and on.
Another problem for Matzke's critique of my position is that just about all historians discussing Nazi eugenics, euthanasia, and racism have mentioned the importance of Darwinism as a precursor to Nazi ideology and policies. Also, most historians writing about Hitler's ideology have discussed the role of Darwinism in his thinking. Many other Nazi leaders were enthusiastic about Darwinism, too. Sure, some of these historians may call it "vulgar Darwinism" or "social Darwinism," or some other such appellation, but these still all had Darwinian elements of some sort. You cannot be a "social Darwinist" without first embracing Darwinism. This should be an obvious point, but apparently it eludes some people.
Finally, you might be interested to learn that historians (including myself) already know that Haeckel's ideas were not universally well-received in Nazi circles. An essay I published in 2002 about the Monist League showed that Haeckel and the Monist League supported pacifism and feminism, which did not sit well with the Nazis. Also, the Monist League had many socialist members, making it suspect. No wonder the Nazis dissolved the Monist League when they came to power. But it had nothing to do with any supposed antipathy toward Darwinism. (My article is: " Evolutionare Aufklarung'? Zur Geschichte des Monistenbundes" in Wissenschaft, Politik, und ™ffentlichkeit: Von der Wiener Moderne bis zur Gegenwart, ed. Mitchell G. Ash and Christian H. Stifter, Vienna: WUV Universitatsverlag, 2002. pp. 131-48).
"""""""""""""""
continued
""""""""""""""
ReplyDeleteThe infighting about Haeckel (but not about Darwinism!!) merely shows what many historians have been saying for years: Nazism was not a monolith (Matzke points this out, to his credit, but he doesn't point out that it undermines his critique of me, since I only discussed Hitler in my final chapter, not Nazism in general). There were considerable disagreements within Nazism. Weindling and others have shown that Haeckel's views were contested: some Nazis liked his views and others didn't. According to Deichmann, Walter Gross, the head of the Nazi Office of Racial Policy, was an avid Darwinist, but opposed Haeckel's monistic philosophy. However, Karl Astel, rector at the University of Jena, along with SS member and biologist Gerhard Heberer and biologist Viktor Franz, were all enthusiastic about Haeckel, as was Heinz Bruecher, who in 1935 published a tribute to Haeckel in the Nationalsozialistische Monatschrifte. This article, by the way, was published in a major Nazi journal the same year that the banned book list included Haeckel on the list!
So, Matzke's piece of evidence only proved what I already knew not all Nazis liked Haeckel. So what?
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""
IOW it would have a similar impact as archaeology- do you think a geologist or archaeologist is better able to understand Stonehenge?
ReplyDeleteMike:
Umm - the study of Stonehenge is largely the study of history (i.e. the past).
We are studying it NOW so that we can understand it NOW.
Should I assume since you're providing analogies that you can't come up with an actual example from biology?
Biology itself.
Ya see living organisms are the result of design and therefor can only be properly understood in that light.
Also the software part isn't an analogy- deal with it.
Anything that exists in nature is natural- look it up.
ReplyDeleteMike:
I did.
Nature (noun):
1. the material world, esp. as surrounding humankind and existing independently of human activities.
2. the natural world as it exists without human beings or civilization.
3. the elements of the natural world, as mountains, trees, animals, or rivers.
Ummm you were supposed to look up the word "natural".
OR you could have just read my post you know the post I linked to the definition.
What is your problem?
Great - so by your standard when I take my kids to their highly anticipated beach vacation this summer and they have to spend the whole time collecting tar balls and watching sea life die I can comfort them with "don't worry kids - this is all natural".
Oil is natural.
Do you think man made it and stuffed it under the sea-floor?
RotFLMAO
There is nothing stopping anyone from looking for evidence of design in any place they care to look.
It's been found and presented.
However it isd obvious that you and your ilk won't accept anything short of a meeting with the designers.
IOW it is clear that you are not interested in science.
Ritchie said: How on Earth do you figure Darwinism claims any race of people to be superior? That doesn't even make sense. If anything, it teaches that all races are cousins - none more or less primative than any other!
ReplyDeleteYou really should learn what Darwin and his 'bulldog' Thomas Huxley said:
At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked, will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla."
(Darwin, Charles R. [English naturalist and founder of the modern theory of evolution], "The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex," [1871], John Murray: London, Second Edition, 1922, reprint, pp.241-242).
"The more civilized so-called Caucasian races have beaten the Turkish hollow in the struggle for existence. Looking to the world at no very distant date, what an endless number of the lower races will have been eliminated by the higher civilised races throughout the world."
(Darwin, Charles R. [English naturalist and founder of the modern theory of evolution], "The Life of Charles Darwin", [1902], Senate: London, 1995, reprint, p.64).
"It may be quite true that some negroes are better than some white men; but no rational man, cognisant of the facts, believes that the average negro is the equal, still less the superior, of the average white man. And, if this be true, it is simply incredible that, when all his disabilities are removed, and our prognathous relative has a fair field and no favour, as well as no oppressor, he will be able to compete successfully with his bigger-brained and smallerjawed rival, in a contest which is to be carried on by thoughts and not by bites. The highest places in the hierarchy of civilisation will assuredly not be within the reach of our dusky cousins, though it is by no means necessary that they should be restricted to the lowest."
(Huxley, Thomas Henry [Anatomist, Dean of the Royal College of Science, and "Darwin's Bulldog"], "Emancipation-Black and White," in Rhys E., ed., "Lectures and Lay Sermons," [1871], Everyman's Library, J.M. Dent & Co: London, 1926, reprint, p.115).
Joe G:
ReplyDeleteWell, this is interesting.
Some final comments on the "Natural" thing.
You provided a definition of "Natural" - an adjective referring to "Present in or produced by nature". This, of course, is useless unless one defines "Nature", which I did. Hope this helps.
Perhaps you're thinking of 'natural' as distinct from 'supernatural' - it's hard to tell.
I've had a short meeting with my ilk, and we collectively don't see the need to actually meet your designer. A signature and contact info in flaming 30m high letters on a mountain is more than sufficient.
Cheers.
OK, JoeG. I followed your definitional link, and remembered why freedictionary annoys me: it's just not that good a dictionary. Lacks common senses that practically everybody uses, the definitions are often imprecise, et cetera.
ReplyDeleteLuckily, I have a subscription to the OED. Now that's a dictionary:
Natural
7. Formed by nature; not subject to human intervention, not artificial.
a. Of a substance or article: not manufactured or processed; not obtained by artificial processes; made only from natural products. Also: manufactured using only simple or minimal processes; made so as to imitate or blend with the naturally occurring article.
(and lest ye complain, here's a link to one that's free and somewhat less deficient than freedictionary:
Natural
1.
existing in or formed by nature ( opposed to artificial): a natural bridge.
Still kinda sucks though)
You had to know that's the relevant sense for this discussion. Why did you cite the most general possible definition, and one that actually includes the category of 'artificial' within it? How is that even useful in the least?
Well, it's quite useful to you in that it basically erases any meaningful and relevant distinctions, thereby allowing you to declare anything you want to be 'natural', namely 'design', but come on: that's just a cheap semantic trick and you know it. Or you should.
music1028
ReplyDeleteYou really should learn what Darwin and his 'bulldog' Thomas Huxley said:
[tired and tiresome irrelevancies snipped]
You on the other hand should learn what a genetic fallacy is. None of that matters, except historically. The modern theory of evolution is not sworn to forever uphold any and all opinions held by Darwin or anybody else alive at the time. It doesn't even matter what those opinions were about.
For instance, Darwin apparently thought side-burns, like the really substantial kind, were just downright awesome. Modern evolutionary biology? Yeah, it doesn't care. Not even a little. The only opinions of his that still matter in biology are those which:
a. Deal with matters scientific
and:
b. Aren't wrong.
Now, if you're just solely looking to debate Victorian attitudes on race, and where Huxley and Darwin fell on the racist-not racist line, fine. But you know full well that's not at all what you're doing by bring this utterly-irrelevant-to-modern-biology crap up yet again.
I mean, at least find something new to try and tar him with. C'mon: do it. If only for novelty's sake. Don't you think it's earned that much?
...Will ya at least consider it?
...Pretty please?
...Are we there yet?
didymos,
ReplyDeleteI cited that definition because most anti-IDists try to make as if design is supernatural.
Also anti-IDists are fond of equivocation.
didmos:
ReplyDeleteYou on the other hand should learn what a genetic fallacy is. None of that matters, except historically. The modern theory of evolution is not sworn to forever uphold any and all opinions held by Darwin or anybody else alive at the time.
The point is, the 'theory' of evolution allows for superior/inferior 'races' defined by an 'elite' group of people who usually place themselves in the 'superior' category....that's how eugenics got implemented.
BTW, if you think the 'modern' theory of evolution doesn't still hold to the racist views from the past, google JAMES WATSON RACIST....and see what comes up.
That's nice music1028. You do know that Mr. Watson isn't the theory of evolution, right? He's just a guy with some opinions, and like Darwin's, the only ones that matter are those which:
ReplyDeletea. Deal with matters scientific
and:
b. Aren't wrong.
And, do you really want to start playing this whole "Spot the racist!" game? 'Cause that isn't particularly smart.
For instance; google "Martin Luther Anti-semitic." Or "David Duke KKK" or "Pat Robertson racist", if you want someone still alive like Watson. Or just "Christian Identity racism". Enjoy the results.
Don't get me wrong: I don't think that particularly proves anything in general about Christianity, but you seem to think this sort of "proof" matters, so....
music wrote:
ReplyDelete"BTW, if you think the 'modern' theory of evolution doesn't still hold to the racist views from the past, google JAMES WATSON RACIST....and see what comes up."
Jim Watson is a racist. So what? I mean, if you want to talk about which side has the racists, and far more importantly, which side uses racist reasoning, check out your homeys here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L640vc_XBjk&feature=player_embedded
These are the yahoos you're claiming when you employ argumentum ad populum fallacies.
Good to see you're still here, Smokey.
ReplyDeleteI hope that means you've been reading and that we've seen the last of your "Hitler was a creationist" claims - along with your claim that the Nazis banned Darwin.
We'll have to lay that to rest one biologist at a time, I guess since Panda's Thumb has such an influence over you all.
Once again, all of you could do with a healthy dose of neuroscience. The reason why teaching evolution is important is not that it is the more parsimonious in explaining the fact (which it is, creationism is plain and simple an infantile belied system), but that it teaches minds how to develop a healthy reality testing function. Darwin wasn't mentally lazy (like most people these days). But Darwin still suffered from loss aversion, as we all do. We are loath to give up aspects of our self-narrative that we acquired for various reasons during our lives because to do so threatens our internal security - self-narrative being such a delicate balancing act, that one slight miss-step and we feel we are going to fall into the abyss. We need to teach people how to modify self-narrative on the fly, so that they don't feel threatened every time their theories are attacked. Inherent in the scientific method is the notion that no matter how cherished is your belief about something, if it doesn't fit the pattern of available evidence, then let it go. Hard, even for scientists, but at least they're in the game (unlike creationists, that are generally - and I say generally - more mentally lazy). Teaching evolution in schools means that we build into our children the ability to learn how to let go of self-narrative fragments if they do not fit the pattern of evidence, both exogenously and endogenously - this last distinction meaning that you can't just believe in God because your experience of embedded consciousness produced an irrevocable feeling of reality about it in your head. Our brains trick us. Plain and simple. Be careful. That's the message that evolution teaches us and why it matters that it is taught in class rooms.
ReplyDeleteUnlike the heathen-smiting xenophobia that pervades most holy books - including the Bible.
ReplyDeletelmao