George's SciSat diavlog with Mike Lemonick. [Added] Note that one of the "Indignant rebuttals to Wade’s review" (a sidebar link) is from Dan Dennett. [Added2] Which George goes on to mention, but I'll leave the above up, just for emphasis.

John took me back to substance-enhanced arguments in the dining room of my old Baltimore rowhouse during college about such esoteric topics as "How Plato Ruined Christianity". Leaving aside how professors pitted thinkers against one another so that we needed substances, a few Christians resented Plato's impact on the Church, what is called here essentialism. I didn't like the Guardians because I couldn't sing. But, at the end of the evening, we all agreed Plato was evil.

George, Tristes Tropiques is a great book, at least in French. Give it another try. Calling Lévi-Strauss (pronunciation: laiveee strosse) a dilettante anthropologist (in French: ethnologue.... not at all the same thing) in relation to Clifford Geertz seems to me a gross injustice. Lévi-Strauss devoted decades of his long life to a comparative study of the myths of North and South America, as well as other regions of the world. The subtlety, ingenuity and breadth of his reconstructions and parallels should impress even the most diligent Anglo-American field anthropologist and fact-finder. The French mind is just too Cartesian to be happy with mere facts.

Quoting Baltimoron: John took me back to substance-enhanced arguments in the dining room of my old Baltimore rowhouse during college about such esoteric topics as "How Plato Ruined Christianity". Leaving aside how professors pitted thinkers against one another so that we needed substances, a few Christians resented Plato's impact on the Church, what is called here essentialism. I didn't like the Guardians because I couldn't sing. But, at the end of the evening, we all agreed Plato was evil.

Or how Christianity ruined Plato? Christianity, or Platonism for der Pöbel, as someone once said.

This discussion is just classic, and it resembles the political debate between the base and the centrists in either party. I agree with Horgan and the base on this one, but Johnson has a point: complacency and arrogance is the ultimate enemy.

Identifying Plato with the 'People" - and I assume you mean "Volk" - is nonsense.

No no no! The Chomsky school is not pretty much the only school in linguistics, not even in the USofA. It may well be the most visible school, especially outside the academy, but it certainly hasn't carried the day. The cognitive linguists -- George Lakoff & Co. -- have a rather different view and Sidney Lamb's stratification linguistics is quite different from Chomsky. And you've got M A K Halliday's functional linguistics.

The vaccination discussion is not for amateur scientists or pseudo=physicians, get the information from the real experts: http://flu.gov/individualfamily/vacc...itygroups.html

I have known people who swear by Mathematica, but I have never known what the point of it is, all the stuff about playing equations and such. Give me MATLAB any day.

This is certainly depressing, when John says his students don't think evolution by natural selection should be presented as proven by science. John, I do not think it is a question of whether you call it a fact vs. a theory. George is completely right that the correct term is a theory, and you can't ever make scientific theories untouchable. I don't think the troubling opinion of your students has anything to do with this semantic question. I assume these are people in their 20s. The problem is that there is a semiotic failure on the part of Dawkins and people like him, who appear to the general public as though they are weighing in on some non-existent debate over the non-existent creationist/evolutionist axis. Where there's smoke, there's fire, and your students see smoke, see Dawkins smoking, and reflexively fall back on the #1 ingrained lesson of generation Y, which is that you chart some middle way about how lunatic fringes are lunatics and you're a good, sensible, mindful individual who's waiting for all the data to come in. And if you grew up with cable news, Clinton, and Bush like they did, you'd run your

Those damn creationists in the back of his mind. I liked this part a lot.

the people who think ID is real

Even the 'we may be in a computer program' crowd?

Stewart Brand was interviewed by Tom Ashbrook on the radio program OnPoint not long ago. Here is the URL: http://www.onpointradio.org/2009/10/...-nuclear-power

That's less than six degrees of separation

Quoting osmium:
I don't think the troubling opinion of your students has anything to do with this semantic question. I assume these are people in their 20s. The problem is that there is a semiotic failure on the part of Dawkins and people like him, who appear to the general public as though they are weighing in on some non-existent debate over the non-existent creationist/evolutionist axis.

Where there's smoke, there's fire, and your students see smoke, see Dawkins smoking, and reflexively fall back on the #1 ingrained lesson of generation Y, which is that you chart some middle way about how lunatic fringes are lunatics and you're a good, sensible, mindful individual who's waiting for all the data to come in. And if you grew up with cable news, Clinton, and Bush like they did, you'd run your life this same way.

I just think Dawkins should shut the fuck up. He (and I mean he and people doing what he does) is creating this image of a 21st century edgy, opinion-laden scientist, and it doesn't fit with what the general public expects out of a scientist. Don't make evolution by natural selection *seem* like an opinion. Don't generate massive

This is certainly depressing, when John says his students don't think evolution by natural selection should be presented as proven by science.

The reason the students think this, is because its true. That's why intelligent men like John McWhorter had questions about it. Its why Vox Day is skeptical. Its why its still being debated. If there was overwhelming proof, no one question it, anymore than they question the theory of relativity. And any time people like McWhorter ask questions they don't get answers, they get banished or ridiculed. Open minded people read criticism of evolution by natural selection like this:

Karl Popper, a leading philosopher of science and originator of the falsifiability as a criterion of demarcation of science from nonscience, stated that Darwinism is "not a testable scientific theory, but a metaphysical research programme."

Our theory of evolution has become, as Popper described, one which cannot be refuted by any possible observations. Every conceivable observation can be fitted into it. It is thus outside of empirical science but not necessarily false. No one can think of ways in which to test it. Ideas, either without basis or based on a few laboratory

I'm new here -- enjoyed this diavlog very much.
But I was surprised and disappointed to hear John Horgan dis the anthropic principle so strongly ... I'd venture to say that it seemed to be a bit of a knee-jerk reaction. I Googled and found this earlier diavlog where he also betrays a strong bias against it, despite Sean Carroll's patient and clear explanation of when it could be reasonably applied.
All you need are an ensemble of situations in which life has evolved or is evolving, and the anthropic principle can be invoked as *a possible* means to explain some of the observed conditions around us -- i.e., why these conditions and not others?
In the quote John reads from Dawkin's book, it seems an entirely appropriate to me. Dawkins is attempting to explain the improbability of the earth's rich ecosystem, including us. In this case the anthropic-principle hypothesis is that in the ensemble of other earth-like planets on which life is evolving (or other multiverses, if you'd rather) only those with such rich biodiversity would spawn intelligent life -- it seems completely reasonable to me.

Quoting rcocean: The reason the students think this, is because its true. That's why intelligent men like John McWhorter had questions about it. Its why Vox Day is skeptical. Its why its still being debated. If there was overwhelming proof, no one question it, anymore than they question the theory of relativity.

And any time people like McWhorter ask questions they don't get answers, they get banished or ridiculed.

Open minded people read criticism of evolution by natural selection like this:

And wonder, if true, how can it be stated that Evolution is a PROVEN theory.

You do understand that your pal Behe is in the business of proposing what he asserts are Popperian falsifications of Darwinian evolution, right? Should we conclude that you believe that DE is unfalsifiable when that supports your preferred outcome; but that when somebody proposes what they say is an airtight falsification you're open to that, too? Also, so far, none of Behe's propositions has proved true - which is why McWhorter was ridiculed. The worst "sin" you can commit in a context like this is to be insufficiently skeptical; and McWhorter made a fool of himself in that sense.

Great discussion. Regarding the question about the inevitability of mankind (or at least the emergence of intelligent beings) one´s standpoint may be a function of how probable we believe life itself is: if we believe in a universe filled with millions/billions/zillions of life-bearing planets (and this number should be arrived at through an integration over the whole effective lifespan of the universe - and all past and future universes - and not just the 14 billion years that have passed up until now in in our particular universe) then the "evolutionary" experiment will have been repeated so many times that the "inevitability" that Dawkins is talking about - that we find ourselves here thinking about these questions - simply arises out of shear probabilistic considerations and does not depend on an anthropomorphic principle.

Quoting AemJeff: You do understand that your pal Behe is in the business of proposing what he asserts are Popperian falsifications of Darwinian evolution, right? Should we conclude that you believe that DE is unfalsifiable when that supports your preferred outcome; but that when somebody proposes what they say is an airtight falsification you're open to that, too?

Also, so far, none of Behe's propositions has proved true - which is why McWhorter was ridiculed. The worst "sin" you can commit in a context like this is to be insufficiently skeptical; and McWhorter made a fool of himself in that sense.

Your response is exactly why students think Natural selection is "Unproven". I never mentioned Behe or ID. The point is not your tiresome war against ID. Its about the validity of Evolutionary theory, its status as a theory, or as "proven fact". As usual Jeff, since you can't respond to what I wrote, or wish to play dumb. I'll let you have the last word.

Quoting osmium: This is certainly depressing, when John says his students don't think evolution by natural selection should be presented as proven by science.

John, I do not think it is a question of whether you call it a fact vs. a theory. George is completely right that the correct term is a theory, and you can't ever make scientific theories untouchable.

I don't think the troubling opinion of your students has anything to do with this semantic question. I assume these are people in their 20s. The problem is that there is a semiotic failure on the part of Dawkins and people like him, who appear to the general public as though they are weighing in on some non-existent debate over the non-existent creationist/evolutionist axis.

Where there's smoke, there's fire, and your students see smoke, see Dawkins smoking, and reflexively fall back on the #1 ingrained lesson of generation Y, which is that you chart some middle way about how lunatic fringes are lunatics and you're a good, sensible, mindful individual who's waiting for all the data to come in. And if you grew up with cable news, Clinton, and Bush like they did, you'd run your

Quoting rcocean: Your response is exactly why students think National selection is "Unproven". I never mentioned Behe or ID. The point is not your tiresome war against ID. Its about the validity of Evolutionary theory, its status as a theory, or as "proven fact".

As usual Jeff, since you can't respond to what I wrote, or wish to play dumb. I'll let you have the last word.

rc, I pointed out what looks like a basic paradox in your point of view; one that seems to say that you have a preferred belief. I'm not sure why you think you have a clearer view of the validity of a scientific theory than the people who actually work in the relevant fields; but, your argument fails for the reasons I gave here, and those I've presented elsewhere. You haven't demonstrated that you have the tools to evaluate Evolutionary theory, and the authorities you cite instead contradict each other - and, in the case of Behe, are demonstrably wrong.

Where is John Horgan's review of Dawkin's "Greatest Show on Earth"? He alludes to it a couple of times, but I can't find it anywhere.

Quoting AemJeff: That was a strong, clear statement of truth. I'll quibble with the term "retards," though. I think there are a few species here - charlatans like Behe, who very likely understands quite clearly that he's full of shit; religious charlatans who understand how to manipulate true believers; the true believers, themselves (who "know" the Bible is the only Truth); and relatively sincere folks who have been lied to by either type of charlatan, and who either accept the arguments or the authority of their sources.

Added: Oops I meant to also say that I'd step back a bit from wishing Dawkins, et al, would "shut the fuck up." The point about the dignity of the scientific process is a beautiful, and true, idea, I think. But are you sure there's really no room for a muscular defense of certain ideas under siege?

Quoting osmium: I have known people who swear by Mathematica, but I have never known what the point of it is, all the stuff about playing equations and such. Give me MATLAB any day.

Agreed. But I do find MAPLE useful for all its symbolic math manipulation capabilities. MATLAB has still a long way to go in its symbolic math toolbox. MATHEMATICA, on the other hand, is just for Wolfram's friends

Quoting Klortho: I'm new here -- enjoyed this diavlog very much.
But I was surprised and disappointed to hear John Horgan dis the anthropic principle so strongly ... I'd venture to say that it seemed to be a bit of a knee-jerk reaction. I Googled and found this earlier diavlog where he also betrays a strong bias against it, despite Sean Carroll's patient and clear explanation of when it could be reasonably applied.
All you need are an ensemble of situations in which life has evolved or is evolving, and the anthropic principle can be invoked as *a possible* means to explain some of the observed conditions around us -- i.e., why these conditions and not others?
In the quote John reads from Dawkin's book, it seems an entirely appropriate to me. Dawkins is attempting to explain the improbability of the earth's rich ecosystem, including us. In this case the anthropic-principle hypothesis is that in the ensemble of other earth-like planets on which life is evolving (or other multiverses, if you'd rather) only those with such rich biodiversity would spawn intelligent life -- it seems completely reasonable to me.

I agree. I don't get the opposition

Guys, there is an actual board game that works just like this, and I played it growing up.

Quoting Simon Willard: I agree. I don't get the opposition to the anthropic principle. Had physical constants been tuned slightly differently we would not be here. But something else would be here, something unrecognizable to us, yet possibly something equally complex and conscious, and it would be saying "isn't it wonderful how the constants of nature are tuned for us?"

I'm not clear whether John objects to both kinds of anthropic principles (WAP and SAP) or only to the strong anthropic principle.

Quoting AemJeff: That was a strong, clear statement of truth. I'll quibble with the term "retards," though. I think there are a few species here - charlatans like Behe, who very likely understands quite clearly that he's full of shit; religious charlatans who understand how to manipulate true believers; the true believers, themselves (who "know" the Bible is the only Truth); and relatively sincere folks who have been lied to by either type of charlatan, and who either accept the arguments or the authority of their sources.

look: You're right, because ID strictly speaking could be totally true. Rather I should say the problem is people who wish to use it as proof against evolution by natural selection. rcocean: I think John McWhorter should come back. We observe species changing through the fossil record. People like our friend ERV watch viruses evolve in real time. I believe in the necessity of falsifiability, but Popper is incorrect that evolution by natural selection is unfalsifiable. AEMJeff: Dawkins shouldn't STFU entirely, but he should give up on trying to convince people there is no God (you can't, and it doesn't matter), and he should stop with the PR blitz to convince everyone that all scientists are sententious, moralizing assholes. Especially today, being Carl

Quoting rcocean: Your response is exactly why students think National selection is "Unproven".

National selection. Genius! Hmmm. We might have to bring in Dr. Freud for this one.

"I unplugged it and it's still ringing!?" "I'm just gonna..I'm just goona pull out......pulling out plugs here" It's always nice to see a demonstration of the scientific method. 'New and improved' is right.

Emergence: The Hole at the Wheel's Hub by Terry Deacon The metaphor of the world as an immense machine full of smaller machines is however deeply infected with the special assumptions of human artefact design. Hence when Richard Dawkins caricatures evolution as a ‘blind watchmaker’ he still characterizes organisms as machines, and machines are assembled to do something for some end. Though we typically think of organisms as analogous to engineered artefacts performing some designed task, the analogy can provide quite misleading expectations. Design is a function of imposed order that derives from outside. The integration of parts in a machine is the result of the careful selection of materials, shaping of parts, and systematic assembly, all of which occurs with respect to an anticipated set of physical behaviours and ends to be achieved. Although living processes are at least as precisely integrated with parts which are as interdependent in function as in any machine yet conceived, there is little else that makes them like anything that could have been engineered. Whole organisms are not assembled by bringing together disparate parts but by having their

AEMJeff: Dawkins shouldn't STFU entirely, but he should give up on trying to convince people there is no God (you can't, and it doesn't matter), and he should stop with the PR blitz to convince everyone that all scientists are sententious, moralizing assholes. Especially today, being Carl Sagan day, I believe you can do everything Dawkins does and still seem like an even-keeled nice guy. Please send us another Sagan, God. Science should not seem reactionary. The siege natural selection is under is illusory. And I shouldn't say "retards" because a) it's offensive and b) it's the same kind of internet-age rhetorical overreach that I accuse Dawkins of.

I agree with the ideas expressed in your first post, and am glad to see you tone down the "retard" part here. Presenting the case for science as if it's a debate about what we know to be true only brings attention to extremists. That's precisely why two scientists dropped out of BH. They thought -- rightly -- that such "debate" is silly and counterproductive. Most religious thinkers (including the Pope!) have "evolved" beyond the denial of natural selection and evolution. It is only the most fundamentalist branches of religion (the dramatically undereducated) that cling to a creationist

Quoting Simon Willard: ....Had physical constants been tuned slightly differently we would not be here. But something else would be here, something unrecognizable to us, yet possibly something equally complex and conscious, and it would be saying "isn't it wonderful how the constants of nature are tuned for us?"

I'm not sure you're arguing for or against the AP, but the point is, that presumably those unrecognizable creatures, whatever their chemistry or structure, would be looking around saying "Isn't it amazing, the richness of our ecosystem, the fantastic biodiversity, etc." If they had come to being through the same general process of evolution, that is.
That's not vacuous statement -- if true (which is debatable in its own right), it informs us about how we should consider things in our environment that seem highly improbable.

Quoting Ocean: I'm not clear whether John objects to both kinds of anthropic principles (WAP and SAP) or only to the strong anthropic principle.

I think he doesn't distinguish between them, and that's the problem. Anything the gives the whiff of the AP, produces a knee-jerk negative reaction. At least, that's my estimate from watching this and the other diavlog.
John, by all means, let me know if I'm wrong.

I think a lot of people intuitively invented this game (I know I did). We used to play a lot as kids, and it immediately becomes obvious that you can cheat by changing the answer in your head depending on the emerging questions. We soon built in cheating-detection mechanisms by making the person write down the answer before the game began.

Bob Wright ... listen to the first ten minuted and revisit the concet of editing these chats. Appoint an editor, give them a high profile, and give this site a more journalistic professional reputation ... the loss of which many of your guests seem to bemoan.

Quoting Wonderment: I think a lot of people intuitively invented this game (I know I did). We used to play a lot as kids, and it immediately becomes obvious that you can cheat by changing the answer in your head depending on the emerging questions.

We soon built in cheating-detection mechanisms by making the person write down the answer before the game began.

Right, but in the game I played, changing the answer was the POINT of the game which is sort of how the thought experiment works. I don't even know if they make it anymore, but it was a genius piece of board gamery.

Quoting David Edenden: Bob Wright ... listen to the first ten minuted and revisit the concet of editing these chats.

Appoint an editor, give them a high profile, and give this site a more journalistic professional reputation ... the loss of which many of your guests seem to bemoan.

I didn't mind that opening bit of banter. For future reference, if such an exchange is too tedious, I'd recommend using the section links below the diavlog. Note that in this case, the first one begins about sixteen minutes in.

Right, but in the game I played, changing the answer was the POINT of the game which is sort of how the thought experiment works. I don't even know if they make it anymore, but it was a genius piece of board gamery.

Yeah, that is cool.

Quoting Klortho: I'm not sure you're arguing for or against the AP, but the point is, that presumably those unrecognizable creatures, whatever their chemistry or structure, would be looking around saying "Isn't it amazing, the richness of our ecosystem, the fantastic biodiversity, etc." If they had come to being through the same general process of evolution, that is.
That's not vacuous statement -- if true (which is debatable in its own right), it informs us about how we should consider things in our environment that seem highly improbable.

I think Simon is arguing for the weak anthropic principle. He is just giving an example that if the conditions of our ecosystem had been different, there would (possibly) be another intelligent species wondering how come their conditions were so well suited to their development or at least appreciating them as necessary for their being. As to the last part of your comment, any species' capacity to derive pleasure from the appreciation of the complexity and beauty that surrounds us, is a whole other story.

Amen!!

Okay, this diavlog scares me. Sheez, I feel ignorant.

John, Re: the utility of Excedrin. A little trick I've learned from girlfriends is that Midol has pretty much the same effect... (i'm a dude, by the way.) Thanks for the discussion. Good to have you guys back!

Just one word- placebo...

Just one word- placebo...

I wish you hadn't said that....... I was so looking forward to winning the Nobel Prize in Literature while running a marathon and conquering Mt. Everest. Now I guess I'll just post funny stuff on BloggingHeads and eat a bag of Fritos.

Quoting Wonderment: I wish you hadn't said that.......

I was so looking forward to winning the Nobel Prize in Literature while running a marathon and conquering Mt. Everest. Now I guess I'll just post funny stuff on BloggingHeads and eat a bag of Fritos.

You can still do all that, it will be the fruit of your hard work and determination... (Yes, we can... )

David Orr

...Or Bob Wright

Ignorance - the beginning of science through good questions!

Isn't this the same bad practice as binge drinking, or addiction itself? I thought endorphins were the body's natural pain-killer, and adrenaline the fallback. I strained my knee in BCT, and received aspirin. When I ran again, I used the aspirin to kill the pain. It was easier. But, my scores didn't start improving until a few weeks later after I had stopped taking the aspirin. It might be easier to exercise on pain-killers, but it also might be fruitless.

I just think Dawkins should shut the fuck up. He (and I mean he and people doing what he does) is creating this image of a 21st century edgy, opinion-laden scientist, and it doesn't fit with what the general public expects out of a scientist. Don't make evolution by natural selection *seem* like an opinion. Don't generate massive heat 'defending' what needs only the most mild defense, i.e. a 200-word reminder that it's true.

I am the most godless empiricist you will meet. But I think the strategy of scientists who maintain fora dedicated to mocking the retards (and yes, fair readers: they are retards, the people who think ID is real) only works against itself. The advantage of science is that it is correct and dignified. Don't over engage in debates that only remove dignity.

I don't think Horgan/Johnson talked abut this, but I think Randy Olson's point in Flock of Dodos is applicable. Trying to educate laypeople about science might require some unscientific thinking, as long as it's not anti-scientific.

Quoting Baltimoron: [...]Trying to educate laypeople about science might require some unscientific thinking, as long as it's not anti-scientific.

I'd say this is more true as a first step before education per se -- one has to employ some other tools to deal with the massive amounts of misinformation, willful ignorance, and especially, those parties with vested interests in keeping the people who listen to them in this woeful state. To this end, I am very grateful indeed for people like Richard Dawkins, who, I might add, is very rarely unscientific. (I'll grant he treats all religious belief as though it is the same as the more simplistic varieties and can be quite polemical in this regard.) I'm almost sure it's just semantics, but for the record: I am uncomfortable with the notion of educating people about science using unscientific thinking. It's likely I have a broader notion of scientific thinking than you had in mind when you said "unscientific thinking," though.

I think we agree, going back to that PZ Myers diavlog, that such creative expression would be unnecessary if the education system weren't dysfunctional. Teaching students how to incorporate empiricism, experiment, and democracy into their daily thinking might be a better first reform

Here is a link to many books on environmentalism published in 2009, cataloged in OCLC WorldCat: http://j.mp/2Trw82 . From the same source, here's a list of books on climate change, published in 2009: http://j.mp/SLpDm . And here's a link to an interview with Stewart Brand about his new book, Whole Earth Discipline: http://j.mp/3fnKSD

Quoting Baltimoron: I think we agree, going back to that PZ Myers diavlog, that such creative expression would be unnecessary if the education system weren't dysfunctional. Teaching students how to incorporate empiricism, experiment, and democracy into their daily thinking might be a better first reform

I'm not against these goals by any means, but I think it'll be a long time before we see them realized. They have been identified for longer than I've been alive, and we seem even farther from them now than we were when I was in school. Further, one of the very battlegrounds -- i.e., impediments to these goals -- is at the level of the school board itself. Here is where a Dawkins-style approach is helpful, especially in places like Texas, Lousiana, and Oklahoma. Uh, and Pennsylvania. Okay, pretty much everywhere. I think that we can't just wish for better schools somewhere down the road. Sure, we should be working toward them, but we also have to deal with reality right here, right now.

Quoting Klortho: I think he doesn't distinguish between them, and that's the problem. Anything the gives the whiff of the AP, produces a knee-jerk negative reaction. At least, that's my estimate from watching this and the other diavlog.
John, by all means, let me know if I'm wrong.

I'd like to suggest that John isn't objecting due to perceived shortcomings in either WAP or SAP, but rather a popular debased version that reverts the direction of explanation. Quoting Klortho: "the anthropic principle can be invoked as *a possible* means to explain some of the observed conditions around us ...", is the accepted 'scientific' usage referred to by Carroll in the diavlog he [Klortho] references. There is bastardization of this principle that attempts to explain *our* existence, and it is possible John is referencing this. It did not really appear that John had any issues with the 'scientific' definition provided by Sean.

Quoting Baltimoron: Identifying Plato with the 'People" - and I assume you mean "Volk" - is nonsense.

You are right I should have said "Volk." Nietzsche: "Christianity is Platonism for the people," an entirely different proposition than identifying Plato with the people. But that is your nonsense, not mine.

How such anti-scientific thinkers as Plato and Socrates made it into this diavlog is a travesty

Quoting Baltimoron: How such anti-scientific thinkers as Plato and Socrates made it into this diavlog is a travesty

I will have to listen to the dialogue again. Didn't you bring Plato into it?

Horgan starts his discussion of Dawkins's critique of essentialism with Plato and Johnson chimes in with an anecdote about "chair-ness". I recall a fellow student who now teaches philosophy at our alma mater making jokes about "-ness" for about a month. I could have done without the rabbit hole, and Horgan's point about war and human nature didn't need it.

Quoting osmium: I just think Dawkins should shut the fuck up. He (and I mean he and people doing what he does) is creating this image of a 21st century edgy, opinion-laden scientist, and it doesn't fit with what the general public expects out of a scientist. Don't make evolution by natural selection *seem* like an opinion. Don't generate massive heat 'defending' what needs only the most mild defense, i.e. a 200-word reminder that it's true.

Excellent advice, I mean to Dawkins. He keeps flogging a dead horse. It is no wonder ID'ers think the corpse may still have some life left in it. But I think there is nonetheless a legitimate distinction to be made between the fact of evolution, which no rational person acquainted with the evidence could deny, and the theory of evolution and, in particular, natural selection i.e. the mechanism by which ALL the phenomena of evolution are explained. Natural selection has always been the weak link in the theory (even to some who have accepted the theory). I would go so far as to say that Dawkins' interpretation of natural selection* is one of the reasons why the dead horse of ID keeps rising up from the dead. *(Added) I am

Further, one of the very battlegrounds -- i.e., impediments to these goals -- is at the level of the school board itself. Here is where a Dawkins-style approach is helpful, especially in places like Texas, Lousiana, and Oklahoma. Uh, and Pennsylvania. Okay, pretty much everywhere.

I think that we can't just wish for better schools somewhere down the road. Sure, we should be working toward them, but we also have to deal with reality right here, right now.

I certainly agree that taking on the school boards is a good fight. How about more centralization within the Department of Education? On a very basic level, I have to ask, though, why are organizations, like Discovery Institute or churches, so bent on eradicating evolution and to pay for it, while evolution proponents won't put up money to fight them. I've never been so idealistic, that I feared an idea, so I sort of don't understand such opposition. I see evolution as a fact, so I put teaching evolution on the level of teaching standardized test-taking skills, not some ethical contest.

it's all about money. As long as people buy Dawkins's book, anti-evolutionists will fear for the future.It's not so much a matter of debate, but of creating political constituencies against ID and creationists. I'd say eggheads are the liability, because every fact they see is a fundamentalist's idea of the apocalypse.

What about taxes? If we wanted to reduce the influence of clergy in government and science, we could start taxing the income of churches and their administrators at the same rates we tax corporations and individuals.

Talk about tempting the whirlwind! That might actually help save the Catholic Church and its paedophiles from extinction! There's nothing that makes Americans feel more sympathy for another like tax rates. I do like the idea, though....hmmmmm....

Maybe this is the right time to promote secularism, that Army nut-job grew up in Virginia, was the product of the Army scholarships and still became an Islamic fanatic murderer... http://scienceblogs.com/effectmeasur...utm_medium=rss I doubt we have the "cojones" to truly separate State affairs/policies and religion, but we need to start sometime. At least try...

Quoting Wonderment: I wish you hadn't said that.......

I was so looking forward to winning the Nobel Prize in Literature while running a marathon and conquering Mt. Everest. Now I guess I'll just post funny stuff on BloggingHeads and eat a bag of Fritos.

Try winning the BloggingHeads prize in Literature while eating a Mt Everest of Fritos.

Quoting Francoamerican: Excellent advice, I mean to Dawkins. He keeps flogging a dead horse. It is no wonder ID'ers think the corpse may still have some life left in it.

But I think there is nonetheless a legitimate distinction to be made between the fact of evolution, which no rational person acquainted with the evidence could deny, and the theory of evolution and, in particular, natural selection i.e. the mechanism by which ALL the phenomena of evolution are explained. Natural selection has always been the weak link in the theory (even to some who have accepted the theory). I would go so far as to say that Dawkins' interpretation of natural selection* is one of the reasons why the dead horse of ID keeps rising up from the dead.

*(Added) I am referring to Dawkins' bizarre belief, first stated in the Selfish Gene, that evolution is all about the self-replication of DNA, that the motor of evolution is the survival of the fittest genes.

A good point I think, but with some qualifications. Had Darwin not included the mechanism of natural selection in his work, it is questionable whether we would even know his name today. The concept of ‘evolution’ after all was very much

dreading the arrival of what comes next: http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/236...3:18&out=63:28
BTW: Has any academic discipline repudiated its roots more than anthropology? Not only has it more or less abandoned its original task, ethnography, instead concerning itself with abstract questions like "does culture even exist?," but the moral reprobation contemproary anthropologists visit on their forebearers is really quite astonishing. Obviously, challening the assumptions of your discipline is an extremely useful and valuable thing to do, but it seems that today's super-trendy "anthropolgists" have taken it a bit too far, charging their ancestors with gross moral crimes. (So much of the contemporary outrage seems hung up on antiquated terminology - "savage," "primitive," even "tribe".)

Quoting spandrel: A good point I think, but with some qualifications. Had Darwin not included the mechanism of natural selection in his work, it is questionable whether we would even know his name today. The concept of ‘evolution’ after all was very much in the air during Darwin’s time and its origins can be traced back to the pre-Socratics (Anaximander) up through, of course, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck and William Chilton. It was only with ‘natural selection’ that a theory of evolution gained momentum as a true scientific theory. I think to separate the concept of ‘evolution’ from ‘natural selection’ and then argue that the former is ‘fact’ is a weak argument and reduces one to the same vocabulary as the creationists (i.e., arguing on their terms). Of course, one can take the enormous evidence for evolution, admit [correctly] that the mechanism of natural selection is probably incomplete [I prefer this to ‘weak’] as it stands today, and then argue that the ‘general concept’ of evolution is an accepted ‘fact.’ In a non-scientific sense, I would totally agree. But THE ‘Theory of Evolution’ is very much a theory in the scientific sense and I think John is on weaker ground here (and George on much stronger ground) in arguing the ‘theory’ vs. ‘fact’ angle[/i]

Quoting Baltimoron: I certainly agree that taking on the school boards is a good fight. How about more centralization within the Department of Education? On a very basic level, I have to ask, though, why are organizations, like Discovery Institute or churches, so bent on eradicating evolution and to pay for it, ...

Probably a lot of reasons. Some of them are purely religious -- an objection to the notion that humans be thought of as just another species, resulting from the same natural processes that brought about all the rest, rather than being created, as is. Another part probably has to do with this being a convenient symbol to use as part of fight against a wider range of things; e.g., "liberalism," "relativism," "rewriting history," "Big Government," "Washington telling us what to do/think," etc.

Quoting Baltimoron: ... while evolution proponents won't put up money to fight them. I've never been so idealistic, that I feared an idea, so I sort of don't understand such opposition. I see evolution as a fact, so I put teaching evolution on the level of teaching standardized test-taking skills, not some ethical contest.

You pretty much answer your own question. People who are adamantly for or against one thing are more focused and will be able

Quoting Baltimoron: Isn't this the same bad practice as binge drinking, or addiction itself? I thought endorphins were the body's natural pain-killer, and adrenaline the fallback. I strained my knee in BCT, and received aspirin. When I ran again, I used the aspirin to kill the pain. It was easier. But, my scores didn't start improving until a few weeks later after I had stopped taking the aspirin. It might be easier to exercise on pain-killers, but it also might be fruitless.

Why is a "natural" pain killer inherently superior to something from the outside the body, or something that is - gasp - synthetic? What we consider to 'actual,' 'level' consciousness (the state I'm in right now) is a result of particular endorphins or hormones in my bloodstream. There's no "default." It seems tendentious to make a normative judgment about changing that consciousness with an external input... Then again, you can take this with a grain (or rim) of salt, 'cuz I don't consider binge drinking a "bad" practice...(especially when I'm in Korea, the land of soju!)

Quoting spandrel: [...]

Very well put.

Try winning the BloggingHeads prize in Literature ....

One word: Denvillesteve. (Ok, maybe two words). He's unstoppable though.

.....while eating a Mt Everest of Fritos.

Thanks for trying to ruin the American dream and my self-esteem! I'll still think to the big prizes, however. I've decided to stock up on the Excedrin and start my dosage with a dozen, my lucky number. I asked my medically-marijuanaed friends who watch a lot of educational TV and they all said, "Be all you can be, go for it" and "think outside the bun." Plus, the last time I asked my doctor about taking handfuls of multivitamins every day, he told me "It can't hurt." Since caffeine is a natural food found in coffee beans and tea leaves, that proves Extascedrin is safe. I may blend the jumbo bargain bottle with assorted leaves, grasses and flowers from my back yard. As science has established, juice is good for you. I'll send you a tweet you from the top of Everest.

Then again, you can take this with a grain (or rim) of salt, 'cuz I don't consider binge drinking a "bad" practice...(especially when I'm in Korea, the land of soju!)

The peer pressure to drink or socialize as part of work ended any appeal binge drinking had for me in college years ago. Having to dodge unconscious drunks and expectorating, chain smoking middle-aged men has driven me to DVDs and this site. I used to be fairly libertarian about smoking, but now having to deal with an apartment building where secondhand smoke wafts along gaps in the walls and across common balconies has changed both my attitude and my wife's. As for natural vs. artificial substances, my broader point was, that it's hard to know if it really improves performance or just fools one to believe so. John needs a control, so perhaps we should have a bhTV hockey game, where one-third take aspirin, one-third goes unassisted, and one-third gets drunk.

In Malcom Gladwell's book "Blink" he describes the work of John Gottman who is a psychologist who took video snippets ( well ranging from 3 min. to an hour ) of couples and could find patterns of behavior that defined them. I think this qualifies as effective "thin slicing" of our classic Science Saturday paring. I loved the diavlog and laughed out loud to this part just listening to it in the library to my chagrin.

Quoting Francoamerican: Darwin, as I am sure you know, elaborated on an idea he found in Malthus, who had rather gloomy ideas about the tendency of the lower orders to reproduce beyond the capacity of the food supply to feed their offspring. .... Evolution happens because the fittest members of a species kill off their competitors and leave behind the most offspring, or (milder version) because other predators kill off the less fit members of a species before they can reproduce.

This little fable appeals to many people, but is it any truer than Hobbes' war of all against all?

Rather than ‘truer’, I’d say ‘explanatory’ and on this account I’d say yes, natural selection has more explanatory power than Hobbes’ “war against all.” Hobbes was essentially putting forth a ‘state of nature’ hypothesis in competition with many others (ref: Rousseau, Locke, etc.). Few if any contemporary philosophers consider the ‘state of nature’ problem one worth serious attention. And with a bit of irony perhaps, that is precisely due to the triumph of evolutionary theory via the mechanism of natural selection.

Quoting spandrel: Rather than ‘truer’, I’d say ‘explanatory’ and on this account I’d say yes, natural selection has more explanatory power than Hobbes’ “war against all.” Hobbes was essentially putting forth a ‘state of nature’ hypothesis in competition with many others (ref: Rousseau, Locke, etc.). Few if any contemporary philosophers consider the ‘state of nature’ problem one worth serious attention. And with a bit of irony perhaps, that is precisely due to the triumph of evolutionary theory via the mechanism of natural selection.

I see little difference between Hobbes' view of human nature and the Darwinian (or Malthusian) view of of what causes natural selection, viz. natural scarcity, competition, and the killing of cospecifics. Except that Hobbes had a deeper understanding of human psychology... If natural selection is, as you say, a scientific triumph of causal explanation, and if, as I say, it is reheated Hobbes, how can political or moral philosophers regard Hobbes et al. as not worth serious attention? Is that because most Anglo-American philosophers are only half-hearted Darwinians? Rhetorical question. No need to answer.

Quoting Francoamerican: I see little difference between Hobbes' view of human nature and the Darwinian (or Malthusian) view of of what causes natural selection, viz. natural scarcity, competition, and the killing of cospecifics. Except that Hobbes had a deeper understanding of human psychology...

If natural selection is, as you say, a scientific triumph of causal explanation, and if, as I say, it is reheated Hobbes, how can political or moral philosophers regard Hobbes et al. as not worth serious attention? Is that because most Anglo-American philosophers are only half-hearted Darwinians?

Rhetorical question. No need to answer.

OK, then, I'll leave the rhetorical question alone. As to your other comment, I'd argue that there is in fact a great deal of difference between Hobbes' philosophy and the mechanism of natural selection. Hobbes' 'state of nature' is essentially a premise on which he formulates an essentially political/social philosophy whereas "natural selection" (in its full explanatory form) is a mechanism found in nature to be the primary force of evolutionary change. Please keep in mind that it is not simply the equivalent to Hobbes' description of our 'brutish' life, but rather encompasses the elements of random genetic mutation, genetic replication errors, sexual reproduction, competition, etc.

Quoting spandrel: OK, then, I'll leave the rhetorical question alone. As to your other comment, I'd argue that there is in fact a great deal of difference between Hobbes' philosophy and the mechanism of natural selection. Hobbes' 'state of nature' is essentially a premise on which he formulates an essentially political/social philosophy whereas "natural selection" (in its full explanatory form) is a mechanism found in nature to be the primary force of evolutionary change. Please keep in mind that it is not simply the equivalent to Hobbes' description of our 'brutish' life, but rather encompasses the elements of random genetic mutation, genetic replication errors, sexual reproduction, competition, etc.

Yes, natural selection as currently understood is quite different from Hobbes, because we now see genes as the primary agent of the process. But Darwin didn't--Darwinian natural selection (which is what Franco refers to above) was essentially based on the notion that the strong physically killed off the weak by beating them to resources. And that is sort of Hobbesian.

Quoting PreppyMcPrepperson: Yes, natural selection as currently understood is quite different from Hobbes, because we now see genes as the primary agent of the process. But Darwin didn't--Darwinian natural selection (which is what Franco refers to above) was essentially based on the notion that the strong physically killed off the weak by beating them to resources. And that is sort of Hobbesian.

Yes, it is "Hobbesian." But I don't think that is what we are talking about. Franco was referring to "natural selection" in the contemporary sense (at least that was the context of my original post), and I would assume in the contemporary biological sense, in stating that it is just 'reheated' of Hobbes. I can always be more precise I suppose by referring to "neo-darwinism" but I didn't think that was necessary here.

Quoting spandrel: Yes, it is "Hobbesian." But I don't think that is what we are talking about. Franco was referring to "natural selection" in the contemporary sense (at least that was the context of my original post), and I would assume in the contemporary biological sense, in stating that it is just 'reheated' of Hobbes. I can always be more precise I suppose by referring to "neo-darwinism" but I didn't think that was necessary here.

No, here's Franco's post--maybe you just misread it.

Quoting Francoamerican: I see little difference between Hobbes' view of human nature and the Darwinian (or Malthusian) view of of what causes natural selection, viz. natural scarcity, competition, and the killing of cospecifics.

Quoting PreppyMcPrepperson: No, here's Franco's post--maybe you just misread it.

No, I did not. You are taking it out of context. His was a reply to my posts so you need to go back to the beginning. I had simply made a point that Darwin's original formulation to include 'natural selection' was what made him foundational to later evolutionary theory (yes, neo-darwinism). A widely accepted and non-controversial view I would think. Franco is now suggesting, unless I misread him, that this was nothing but 'reheated' Hobbes. I don't think so; I find it rather unlikely that had Darwin not produced his works that we would today be holding up Hobbes as the father of evolutionary theory. But this would be a paper, not a post. So let's just respectfully agree to disagree on this.

Quoting spandrel: No, I did not. You are taking it out of context. His was a reply to my posts so you need to go back to the beginning. I had simply made a point that Darwin's original formulation to include 'natural selection' was what made him foundational to later evolutionary theory (yes, neo-darwinism). A widely accepted and non-controversial view I would think. Franco is now suggesting, unless I misread him, that this was nothing but 'reheated' Hobbes. I don't think so; I find it rather unlikely that had Darwin not produced his works that we would today be holding up Hobbes as the father of evolutionary theory. But this would be a paper, not a post. So let's just respectfully agree to disagree on this.

Of course I didn't mean to suggest that Hobbes is the father of evolutionary biology or of the theory of natural selection. We all know that the idea of natural selection was suggested to Darwin by Malthus. I was only suggesting that Hobbes' "anthropology"--- his "psychology" or conception of human nature---is Darwinian avant la lettre. Malthus furnished the explanatory framework for natural selection: natural scarcity + overpopulation = competition or struggle for existence, but Hobbes furnished the psychological underpinnings for Darwin's view

Quoting spandrel: No, I did not. You are taking it out of context. His was a reply to my posts so you need to go back to the beginning. I had simply made a point that Darwin's original formulation to include 'natural selection' was what made him foundational to later evolutionary theory (yes, neo-darwinism). A widely accepted and non-controversial view I would think. Franco is now suggesting, unless I misread him, that this was nothing but 'reheated' Hobbes. I don't think so; I find it rather unlikely that had Darwin not produced his works that we would today be holding up Hobbes as the father of evolutionary theory. But this would be a paper, not a post. So let's just respectfully agree to disagree on this.

I read the whole exchange. I realize you were making a point about the trajectory from Darwin to neo-Darwinism, but Franco appears to be making a point about Darwin himself and what's specifically in the text of his works. And Franco's point is, so long as you confine it to Darwin's own writings, correct.

Quoting PreppyMcPrepperson: I read the whole exchange. I realize you were making a point about the trajectory from Darwin to neo-Darwinism, but Franco appears to be making a point about Darwin himself and what's specifically in the text of his works. And Franco's point is, so long as you confine it to Darwin's own writings, correct.

Yes, Malthus influenced Darwin (if that was the intent of the post).

Quoting spandrel: Yes, Malthus influenced Darwin (if that was the intent of the post).

No. As I take Franco, he means something more than this. He means that Darwin took Malthusian ideas about demographics and competition and combined them with an anthropological framework that may not have been drawn directly from Hobbes, but is similar to Hobbes' work, to explain a set of natural phenomena that were fundamentally different from the phenomena Hobbes or Malthus set out to explain. Thought experiment: Imagine a world in which NOBODY had bothered to read Darwin, no neo-Darwinian science had developed on top of his work and the sum total of evolutionary biology was Darwin's writings. In that world, Darwinism might well seem like a reheated mashup of Hobbes and Malthus. We don't live in that world, and you rightly point out that Darwin's work became the foundation for a whole field of science that has little to do with Hobbes. But Franco is simply pointing out that Darwin's writings--which undergird the rest of neo-Darwinian science--have intellectual roots in philosophy and anthropology. Given that, it seems we who embrace Darwinian and neo-Darwinian science should still be

I hate to throw a spanner into this, but how does money fit into this? If a corporation or think tank donates money, is the result biased? In other words, isn't process important?

Quoting PreppyMcPrepperson: No. As I take Franco, he means something more than this. ... Franco is simply pointing out that Darwin's writings--which undergird the rest of neo-Darwinian science--have intellectual roots in philosophy and anthropology. Given that, it seems we who embrace Darwinian and neo-Darwinian science should still be paying attention to philosophers whose intellectual frameworks left their fingerprints on Darwin's theories.

Preppy, I re-read the trail and I'm afraid I'm at a loss. I do in fact agree with much of what you wrote (with the exception of the 'thought experiment') and if it is the case that you are simply rephrasing Franco's posts, then I retract most of what I posted and further recommend that Franco hire you as an editor. However, reviewing the posts, I am reading something quite different than you are. I am seeing statements referring to Darwin's formulation as "this little fable"; a question asking if Darwin's formulation is "really any different than Hobbes' war of all against all"; the statement, "natural selection is ... reheated Hobbes." These are some of the statements I was attempting to address. I simply would not characterize Darwin's formulation as a "little fable; Yes, Hobbes' "war against all" really is significantly different than Darwin's formulations involving

Franco will ultimately have to speak for himself. The passages in his posts you refer to, I interpret thus: if Darwin is taken alone, and not in the context of the subsequent science that developed from his work, some of the elements you point out as distinctive from pre-existing philosophy seem speculative [fable-like] since much of the experimental evidence that supports our understanding of those concepts today appeared later. The parts of his writing that had weight, depth and force EXACTLY AND IMMEDIATELY AS he wrote them were the more descriptive, anthropological aspects which were, if examined from a 19c, rather than a contemporary lens, not wholly dissimilar to Hobbesian notions of human nature as based in a fight to survive. I wouldn't go as far as Franco to say it's just reheated Hobbes, because I think, even at an anthropological level, Darwin was adding something to the Hobbesian argument, but I do think he was building on a mix of Hobbes and Malthus and I do agree with Franco that it's a failing of contemporary philosophy that we don't engage those building blocks anymore.

Darwin, as I am sure you know, elaborated on an idea he found in Malthus, who had rather gloomy ideas about the tendency of the lower orders to reproduce beyond the capacity of the food supply to feed their offspring. In Darwin this became a general theory for all living beings: Natural selection= scarcity of food + overpopulation + competition for scarce food + predators. Evolution happens because the fittest members of a species kill off their competitors and leave behind the most offspring, or (milder version) because other predators kill off the less fit members of a species before they can reproduce.

I think you're straying into a Social Darwinian caricature. You've also missed the environmental context. It's not that there is strife, but that certain traits, say beak size, allow individuals to adapt to conditions in their environment. Those individuals who find mates can pass on traits, and this process might lead to variations and new species. It's possible, though, that environmental conditions will change, or that other organisms will compete for food or shelter, not just direct strife.

Considering Rawls' influence, contract theory is not dead. Also, I see "the state of nature" like a field theory: one can front-load a theory of human nature with any presupposition, and then work out the consequences in a society model.

Quoting Baltimoron: I think you're straying into a Social Darwinian caricature. You've also missed the environmental context. It's not that there is strife, but that certain traits, say beak size, allow individuals to adapt to conditions in their environment. Those individuals who find mates can pass on traits, and this process might lead to variations and new species. It's possible, though, that environmental conditions will change, or that other organisms will compete for food or shelter, not just direct strife.

All very true, but irrelevant. Social Darwinism was the creation of Herbert Spencer, many of whose ideas Darwin accepted, although they have little bearing on the theory of evolution. In fact, Spencer began expounding them before 1859. I could easily quote you dozens of passages from the Origin of Species that show the direct influence of Malthus. Natural selection only makes sense---in Darwin's time no less than now---if you assume several things: the natural propensity of every species to "strive to the utmost to increase its numbers," the scarcity of food, the struggle for existence that results from this and, of course, the existence of natural predators.

Quoting PreppyMcPrepperson: Franco will ultimately have to speak for himself. The passages in his posts you refer to, I interpret thus: if Darwin is taken alone, and not in the context of the subsequent science that developed from his work, some of the elements you point out as distinctive from pre-existing philosophy seem speculative [fable-like] since much of the experimental evidence that supports our understanding of those concepts today appeared later.

The parts of his writing that had weight, depth and force EXACTLY AND IMMEDIATELY AS he wrote them were the more descriptive, anthropological aspects which were, if examined from a 19c, rather than a contemporary lens, not wholly dissimilar to Hobbesian notions of human nature as based in a fight to survive.

I wouldn't go as far as Franco to say it's just reheated Hobbes, because I think, even at an anthropological level, Darwin was adding something to the Hobbesian argument, but I do think he was building on a mix of Hobbes and Malthus and I do agree with Franco that it's a failing of contemporary philosophy that we don't engage those building blocks anymore.

I agree, and indeed you could cite any number of intellectual historians who know

Quoting spandrel: However, reviewing the posts, I am reading something quite different than you are. I am seeing statements referring to Darwin's formulation as "this little fable"; a question asking if Darwin's formulation is "really any different than Hobbes' war of all against all"; the statement, "natural selection is ... reheated Hobbes." These are some of the statements I was attempting to address. I simply would not characterize Darwin's formulation as a "little fable; Yes, Hobbes' "war against all" really is significantly different than Darwin's formulations involving inheritance, morphology, homology, natural selection, etc., etc. (the gulf between Leviathan and On the Origin of Species is absolutely enormous);

I didn't say natural selection was reheated Hobbes, but I was a little too elliptical and deliberately provocative. I meant to say that the psychology of Darwinism is Hobbesian, by which I meant that human beings and all other living beings (according to Darwin) are bent on survival and will kill to survive if necessary (Hobbes calls this the "desire for self-preservation"). Whether human beings can be understood in such terms seems to me doubtful, but there can be no doubt at all that that is how Darwin thought of "uncivilized" human beings. Natural selection IS reheated Malthus. That is a commonplace of intellectual

Quoting Francoamerican: I didn't say natural selection was reheated Hobbes

But you did: "If natural selection is, as you say, a scientific triumph of causal explanation, and if, as I say, it is reheated Hobbes ...". However, I did as you say clearly misinterpret at least a good portion of your response based on your last statement in the post (regarding fables). So I'll just stop here, apologize for that, and leave only this minor qualification: There really is a lot of room for argument as to whether Darwinism (as attributed to Darwin himself) is nothing more that 'reheated' Malthus. I understand that you are not attempting to dismiss, out of hand, the years of painstaking field work that Darwin undertook and recorded in such detail to lead him to his insights and conclusions, but the statement itself, as written, certainly does.

Quoting spandrel: But you did: "If natural selection is, as you say, a scientific triumph of causal explanation, and if, as I say, it is reheated Hobbes ...". However, I did as you say clearly misinterpret at least a good portion of your response based on your last statement in the post (regarding fables). So I'll just stop here, apologize for that, and leave only this minor qualification: There really is a lot of room for argument as to whether Darwinism (as attributed to Darwin himself) is nothing more that 'reheated' Malthus. I understand that you are not attempting to dismiss, out of hand, the years of painstaking field work that Darwin undertook and recorded in such detail to lead him to his insights and conclusions, but the statement itself, as written, certainly does.

The statement, I agree, is ambiguous. I should have said: If natural selection is, as you say, a triumph of casual explanation, and if, as I say, Darwinian psychology is reheated Hobbes..... A brilliant naturalist, a bold thinker, and a gifted writer---all those things Darwin most decidedly was. But I (and I am hardly the first person to say this) find natural selection, which is what makes Darwin's theory of evolution "scientific" (as you yourself point out), a less than satisfying explanation of how evolution

Quoting Francoamerican: The statement, I agree, is ambiguous. I should have said: If natural selection is, as you say, a triumph of casual explanation, and if, as I say, Darwinian psychology is reheated Hobbes.....

A brilliant naturalist, a bold thinker, and a gifted writer---all those things Darwin most decidedly was. But I (and I am hardly the first person to say this) find natural selection, which is what makes Darwin's theory of evolution "scientific" (as you yourself point out), a less than satisfying explanation of how evolution occurs.

I'm pretty sure a guy named "spandrel" will agree with that on some level. FA, I'm on to you. You're trying to wind us up here. It's in how you use the word explanation.

Quoting claymisher: I'm pretty sure a guy named "spandrel" will agree with that on some level.

FA, I'm on to you. You're trying to wind us up here. It's in how you use the word explanation.

If natural selection can explain how a man called Darwin wrote the Origin of Species, then it can also explain how I am winding you up.

Quoting Francoamerican: I agree, and indeed you could cite any number of intellectual historians who know more about the origins of Darwinism than contemporary biologists do. But they have their own axes to grind.

I was being provocative when I said "reheated Hobbes." I think I made that clear in my restatement to spandrel.

I think that both you and Preppy may find Arthur O. Lovejoy and one of his critics, Quentin Skinner, interesting. You both appear interested in the historical trace of ideas and Lovejoy started, and coined I believe, the History of Ideas field of study (Johns Hopkins, Brandeis, and several other universities now have departments or programs devoted to this). Isaiah Berlin had left the field of philosophy to pursue it. Lovejoy wrote a wonderful book, The Great Chain of Being, that traces the development of an idea through history. In this case it is not the idea itself, but rather the immense complexity involved it such a pursuit that makes this work so impressive. Skinner's critiques are also quite insightful, especially in his detailed historical accounts of numerous cases where scholars have repeatedly fallen into a range of intellectual 'traps', however obvious they may seem, such as assuming

Quoting spandrel: I think that both you and Preppy may find Arthur O. Lovejoy and one of his critics, Quentin Skinner, interesting. You both appear interested in the historical trace of ideas and Lovejoy started, and coined I believe, the History of Ideas field of study (Johns Hopkins, Brandeis, and several other universities now have departments or programs devoted to this). Isaiah Berlin had left the field of philosophy to pursue it.

Lovejoy wrote a wonderful book, The Great Chain of Being, that traces the development of an idea through history. In this case it is not the idea itself, but rather the immense complexity involved it such a pursuit that makes this work so impressive. Skinner's critiques are also quite insightful, especially in his detailed historical accounts of numerous cases where scholars have repeatedly fallen into a range of intellectual 'traps', however obvious they may seem, such as assuming that a particular idea or concept had in some sense 'existed', just waiting to be found, before its fully realized form at some later time. While obvious when stated, he has impressively detailed so many examples that one walks away with a much better appreciation for

Quoting Francoamerican: Lovejoy, Berlin, Skinner....thank you. I read them long ago. Frankly, I think you need to read them too.

Yep, been there, done that. Skinner was a favorite of mine, for a while.

Quoting Francoamerican: George, Tristes Tropiques is a great book, at least in French. Give it another try.

Calling Lévi-Strauss (pronunciation: laiveee strosse) a dilettante anthropologist (in French: ethnologue.... not at all the same thing) in relation to Clifford Geertz seems to me a gross injustice. Lévi-Strauss devoted decades of his long life to a comparative study of the myths of North and South America, as well as other regions of the world. The subtlety, ingenuity and breadth of his reconstructions and parallels should impress even the most diligent Anglo-American field anthropologist and fact-finder.

The French mind is just too Cartesian to be happy with mere facts.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...medium=twitter

Quoting SkepticDoc: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/...medium=twitter

How sweet. Especially the anecdote of Lévi-Strauss silently sketching cats. He is famous for his "structuralist" analysis of Baudelaire's poem "Les chats"

Could you guys discuss the Global Warming chapter in the new Super-freakonomics (SFE) book? It has been discussed by Bill Scher & Matt Lewis who seem to be distinctly unqualified to pass judgement on such an economic/scientific problem (I know they're just reporting on blogosphere but they cast book/authors in a negative light). Scher misrepresents SFE badly by accusing them of saying we should go straight to geo-engineering without trying to reduce emissions (see min 37.50 secs onwards of Schers divalog). This is not what they are saying (see p. 199 of SFE - very disappointing Bill!) I have followed all the links Scher/Lewis referred to and have been unable to find real counter-arguments to the SFE geo-engineering ideas. I am sympathetic to carbon reduction efforts but predict a tragedy of the commons, or a problem with policing any caps, or the price of stopping emissions may be too high for economies to cope with. I am happy to discount geo-engineering if it there are sound counters that refute the arguments but I have not found them. I am sure that such even-handed and deep thinkers such as yourselves could cast light on this topic.

Quoting rcocean: The reason the students think this, is because its true. That's why intelligent men like John McWhorter had questions about it. Its why Vox Day is skeptical. Its why its still being debated. If there was overwhelming proof, no one question it, anymore than they question the theory of relativity.

But scientists do have questions about the Theory of Relativity. It's just a theory like biological evolution - demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt, but always amenable to further evidence. You don't seem to understand the nature of science, rcocean, or of evolution or relativity. Perhaps you should learn more before you speak again on these topics.

Quoting Francoamerican: I see little difference between Hobbes' view of human nature and the Darwinian (or Malthusian) view of of what causes natural selection, viz. natural scarcity, competition, and the killing of cospecifics. Except that Hobbes had a deeper understanding of human psychology...

If natural selection is, as you say, a scientific triumph of causal explanation, and if, as I say, it is reheated Hobbes, how can political or moral philosophers regard Hobbes et al. as not worth serious attention? Is that because most Anglo-American philosophers are only half-hearted Darwinians?

Rhetorical question. No need to answer.

This weekend I read something by Thomas H. Huxley, and it made me think of this Darwin and Hobbes discussion:

[Writing about Darwin here.] The facts of variability, of the struggle for existence, of adaptation to conditions, were notorious enough; but none of us had suspected that the road to the heart of the species problem lay through them, until Darwin and Wallace dispelled the darkness.

I might not grok what you guys are really talking about, but I kept thinking "Hobbes and Malthus didn't do any writing about bird beaks or tortoise shells, ergo Darwin is the scientist we remember." But I could be misunderstanding. I thought it was a cool quote, though.

Nice catch.

Quoting osmium: This weekend I read something by Thomas H. Huxley, and it made me think of this Darwin and Hobbes discussion:

I might not grok what you guys are really talking about, but I kept thinking "Hobbes and Malthus didn't do any writing about bird beaks or tortoise shells, ergo Darwin is the scientist we remember." But I could be misunderstanding.

I thought it was a cool quote, though.

Natural selection was NOT a part of the theory of evolution before Darwin. So I am puzzled by what your "cool" Huxley quotation proves. Malthus gave Darwin the idea of the struggle for existence. There is no dispute about that. Does that mean Darwin wasn't a scientist? Far be it from me to say... Here is another cool quotation from Huxley (Evolution and Ethics, and other Essays). Huxley is talking about man "in the state of nature." NB: His words. "State of nature" comes straight from Hobbes (and Locke and Rousseau). And what was the state of nature like according to Huxley? Each man " appropriated whatever took his fancy and killed whomever opposed him." "Life was a continual free fight, and beyond the limited and temporary relations of the family, the Hobbesian war of each against

Quoting Francoamerican: Natural selection was NOT a part of the theory of evolution before Darwin. So I am puzzled by what your "cool" Huxley quotation proves. Malthus gave Darwin the idea of the struggle for existence. There is no dispute about that. Does that mean Darwin wasn't a scientist? Far be it from me to say...

Here is another cool quotation from Huxley (Evolution and Ethics, and other Essays). Huxley is talking about man "in the state of nature." NB: His words. "State of nature" comes straight from Hobbes (and Locke and Rousseau). And what was the state of nature like according to Huxley? Each man " appropriated whatever took his fancy and killed whomever opposed him." "Life was a continual free fight, and beyond the limited and temporary relations of the family, the Hobbesian war of each against all was the normal state of existence."

The war of each against all is a direct quotation from Hobbes. So Huxley was indeed a bulldog....Darwin's bulldog or Hobbes' bulldog?

"The road to the heart of the species problem..." One day in the past, someone woke up and realized that 1 + 1 = 2. However, that person is not revered as the father of all mathematics, and

Quoting osmium: Am I in some kind of political discussion and I don't know it?

You're caught in between the grinder and FA's favorite ax.

Quoting osmium: "The road to the heart of the species problem..."

One day in the past, someone woke up and realized that 1 + 1 = 2. However, that person is not revered as the father of all mathematics, and everyone who came after is not considered a reheating.

Am I in some kind of political discussion and I don't know it?

If you think that the propositions 1 + 1 = 2 and the state of nature=state of war are equally self-evident, then I am fairly certain that you have no idea of what a political discussion is. I, for one, would hesitate before engaging you in a political discussion. It might prove to be mortal.

Quoting Francoamerican: If you think that the proposition 1 + 1 = 2 and the state of nature =state of war are equally self-evident, then I am fairly certain that you have no idea of what a political discussion is. I, for one, would hesitate before engaging you in a political discussion. It might prove to be mortal.

Allrighty then.

Quoting osmium: Allrighty then.

Flippancy aside, do you really think that the two propositions are equally self-evident? If they are, then why are human beings NOT engaged in a war of each against all at this very moment? Have the laws of nature (natural selection) been suspended? If so, why? A so-called scientific statement about human beings should be true at all times and all places, shouldn't it?

Quoting Francoamerican: Flippancy aside, do you really think that the two propositions are equally self-evident? If they are, then why are human beings NOT engaged in a war of each against all at this very moment? Have the laws of nature (natural selection) been suspended? If so, why? A so-called scientific statement about human beings should be true at all times and all places, shouldn't it?

When I look at history, I think I see a rate of change in the extent to which the particles of humanity are at war with one another. I.e. there appears to be a change in the scope of cooperation. (Non-Zero, et cetera.) But environmental stresses are not necessarily all imposed from members of our species on each other. They can be completely external to the species. And those may change in importance over time. So is Hobbes' war meant to pertain to man vs. man, or man vs. environment (which may include other men or may not)? Does Hobbes allow for the environmental stress to shift with time, or is it more of a philosophical man vs. man statement?

Quoting Francoamerican: Flippancy aside, do you really think that the two propositions are equally self-evident? If they are, then why are human beings NOT engaged in a war of each against all at this very moment? Have the laws of nature (natural selection) been suspended? If so, why? A so-called scientific statement about human beings should be true at all times and all places, shouldn't it?

Well, here you make your own point as to how the simple Hobbesian 'state of nature' analogy to natural selection breaks down. Natural selection is in no way restricted to intra-species competition (suggested above). Hobbes' "state of nature" was essentially the premise on which he developed a philosophy of governance and civic duty, leading to his "social contract." Simply citing his "war against all" premise does little to advance the hypothosis that it had any significant contribution to Darwinian thought. Various 'state of nature' hypotheses have been put forth since the Old Testament. EDIT: Apologies to osmium who made my first point here before me. I was responding to franco's earlier post before reading on to osmium's subsequent one.

Quoting bjkeefe: You're caught in between the grinder and FA's favorite ax.

... and a hard place.

Quoting Francoamerican: ... Have the laws of nature (natural selection) been suspended?

Calling "natural selection" a law of nature is assuming the resolution of a great deal of debate (ref: Gould, Beatty, et al.), and the context you use here suggests something equivalent to a physical law, which few biologists would ascribe to. Unlike the laws of physics, evolutionary biology is a contingency model with [possible] underlying biological "laws" governing it. But I know of no reputable evolutionary biologist who would (1) profess the completeness of 'natural selection' (to include sexual selection, etc.) as a mechanism to explain all evolutionary processes; and (2) would view the sudden and abrupt pacification of the entire world's human population as some sort of refutation of 'natural selection.'

Quoting Francoamerican: A so-called scientific statement about human beings should be true at all times and all places, shouldn't it?

No.

Quoting spandrel: Calling "natural selection" a law of nature is assuming the resolution of a great deal of debate (ref: Gould, Beatty, et al.), and the context you use here suggests something equivalent to a physical law, which few biologists would ascribe to. Unlike the laws of physics, evolutionary biology is a contingency model with [possible] underlying biological "laws" governing it. But I know of no reputable evolutionary biologist who would (1) profess the completeness of 'natural selection' (to include sexual selection, etc.) as a mechanism to explain all evolutionary processes; and (2) would view the sudden and abrupt pacification of the entire world's human population as some sort of refutation of 'natural selection.'.

First of all, I was talking about natural selection as it was understood by Darwin and Huxley (see quotation above from Evolution and Ethics). Second, I am perfectly well aware that contemporary biologists have a more complex understanding of evolution. Third, I did not say that the pacification of the entire world's population would be a refutation of natural selection. I said, what should be self-evident even to the most benighted Darwinian, that natural selection, as it was understood by Darwin and Huxley, is NOT operative among human beings as they

Quoting spandrel: Well, here you make your own point as to how the simple Hobbesian 'state of nature' analogy to natural selection breaks down. Natural selection is in no way restricted to intra-species competition (suggested above). Hobbes' "state of nature" was essentially the premise on which he developed a philosophy of governance and civic duty, leading to his "social contract." Simply citing his "war against all" premise does little to advance the hypothosis that it had any significant contribution to Darwinian thought. Various 'state of nature' hypotheses have been put forth since the Old Testament.

No kidding! You are mistaken. Did you even bother to read the passage I quoted from Huxley? Do you even understand the premises underlying the original doctrine of natural selection? Natural selection may not be restricted to intra-specific competition, but it certainly includes intraspecific competition. Are you denying that? Huxley thought it did. My "hypothesis" is a commonplace of intellectual history, at least as regards Malthus. Darwin had lifelong habit of concealing his intellectual debts. But the debt to Malthus is clear in the introduction of the Origin of Species and in the third chapter. And it takes no great leap of intelligence

There's a huge gulf between Hobbes and Darwin. Hobbes was talking about politics, society, and human psychology. There's one illustration in "The Origin of Species," the first evolutionary tree of life: It weren't Hobbes what drew it. Darwin's famous for shedding some light on how all these different kinds of finches and ferns seem so well adapted to their ecological niches. It's not for his speculations on the origins of human consciousness and personality, which is (as far as I can tell) what you're getting on about. I gather you think there's something non-material and ineffable about the sweet mystery of life. Maybe you can fill us in on that.

Quoting claymisher: There's a huge gulf between Hobbes and Darwin. Hobbes was talking about politics, society, and human psychology.

There's one illustration in "The Origin of Species," the first evolutionary tree of life:

It weren't Hobbes what drew it.

Darwin's famous for shedding some light on how all these different kinds of finches and ferns seem so well adapted to their ecological niches. It's not for his speculations on the origins of human consciousness and personality, which is (as far as I can tell) what you're getting on about. I gather you think there's something non-material and ineffable about the sweet mystery of life. Maybe you can fill us in on that.

I don't think you have been following the discussion. The topic was the idea of "natural selection" and how Darwin arrived at it....not consciousness or the human personality or the sweet mystery of life. Nor did I say that Hobbes invented the idea of natural selection or the theory of evolution---two entirely different things in any case. Malthus gave Darwin the idea for natural selection. Darwin did not deduce it from the evidence he discovered as a naturalist. You can find that little

Quoting Francoamerican: Overbreeding and overpopulation + scarcity of food = struggle for life= war of all against all. Huxley said it all with admirable clarity. Read him and find out for yourself.

It's that second equals sign that is the bone of contention. I do not think struggle for life is equivalent to war of all against all, especially in the sense Hobbes intended it, which was social and political. The "Darwin is reheated Hobbes" is contained in that equals sign. Darwin and Hobbes may resonate, but they're not the same.

Quoting Francoamerican: I don't think you have been following the discussion. The topic was the idea of "natural selection" and how Darwin arrived at it....not consciousness or the human personality or the sweet mystery of life. Nor did I say that Hobbes invented the idea of natural selection or the theory of evolution---two entirely different things in any case. Malthus gave Darwin the idea for natural selection. Darwin did not deduce it from the evidence he discovered as a naturalist. You can find that little piece of information in any history of evolutionary thought. Once again here is the formula: Overbreeding and overpopulation + scarcity of food = struggle for life= war of all against all (and elimination of the unfit). Huxley said it all with admirable clarity. Read him and find out for yourself.

If you have something to say in reply to my remarks about natural selection as applied to human beings, say it. Did I say something you find objectionable? I have no desire to repeat what I said to spandrel in two different posts.

Everybody inherits knowledge from the past. That's not news. What incremental increase of knowledge or insight would you give

Quoting osmium: It's that second equals sign that is the bone of contention. I do not think struggle for life is equivalent to war of all against all, especially in the sense Hobbes intended it, which was social and political.

The "Darwin is reheated Hobbes" is contained in that equals sign. Darwin and Hobbes may resonate, but they're not the same.

I retracted "reheated" last week. But there is that Huxley quotation equating the state of nature with the state of war... There is an ambiguity in the expression "struggle for life:" Does it mean only the struggle to obtain food? Or does it also mean the struggle with competitors to obtain food and mates? If the latter, then it is no wonder that Huxley thought of Hobbes. The important thing to remember is that Hobbes was very much part of the furniture of 19th-century English intellectual life, especially in "radical" circles. So, yes, he did resonate with people like Malthus and Darwin.

Quoting Francoamerican: I don't think you have been following the discussion. The topic was the idea of "natural selection" and how Darwin arrived at it....not consciousness or the human personality or the sweet mystery of life.

Franco, to be fair, do these posts not have somewhat of a dual trajectory? Many of the earlier posts certainly expressed various opinions regarding the influences on Darwin, a theme returned to off and on throughout. But aren't you aiming at something a bit more foundational when you write?: "In any case, you cannot prove it because there is absolutely no evidence for the operation of natural selection in the evolution of homo sapiens----whatever may be true of other species." And as relates to this statement, perhaps you can clarify your point just a bit. When I read "in the evolution of homo sapiens," am I to understand that as the historical process of evolution leading to homo sapiens? Or are you here referring to the current debates surrounding the question as to whether or not homo sapiens remain subject to evolutionary forces (moving forward)? Or both?

Quoting claymisher: Everybody inherits knowledge from the past. That's not news.

What incremental increase of knowledge or insight would you give Darwin credit for? None?

Clay, I haven't been following this thread too closely, and perhaps I shouldn't jump in, but it seems like Franco is trying to make a point that is more abstract than that. I think he refers to the general themes and ideas that were being discussed in the intellectual circles at the time. He is equating at an abstract level, the idea of struggle and all against all. It refers more to the dynamic of opposing forces, possible destructive in their nature that change and create new configurations. Well, at least that's the way I'm interpreting it...

Quoting osmium: rcocean: I think John McWhorter should come back. We observe species changing through the fossil record. People like our friend ERV watch viruses evolve in real time. I believe in the necessity of falsifiability, but Popper is incorrect that evolution by natural selection is unfalsifiable.

I may not have researched this post thoroughly enough and missed it, but just in case, to set the record straight, Popper did in fact retract that statement in 1978: “I have changed my mind about the testability and logical status of the theory of natural selection; and I am glad to have an opportunity to make a recantation” (Dialectica 32:344-346).

Quoting spandrel: Franco, to be fair, do these posts not have somewhat of a dual trajectory? Many of the earlier posts certainly expressed various opinions regarding the influences on Darwin, a theme returned to off and on throughout. But aren't you aiming at something a bit more foundational when you write?:

"In any case, you cannot prove it because there is absolutely no evidence for the operation of natural selection in the evolution of homo sapiens----whatever may be true of other species."

And as relates to this statement, perhaps you can clarify your point just a bit. When I read "in the evolution of homo sapiens," am I to understand that as the historical process of evolution leading to homo sapiens? Or are you here referring to the current debates surrounding the question as to whether or not homo sapiens remain subject to evolutionary forces (moving forward)? Or both?

Both. But I am still too engrossed in reading about the current state of opinion on the subject to comment. However, it seems to me pretty obvious that if you start from the Darwin/Huxley conception of natural selection, then homo sapiens is no longer

Not Francoamerican's evil twin, Crankoamerican:

Quoting Francoamerican: However, it seems to me pretty obvious that if you start from the Darwin/Huxley conception of natural selection, then homo sapiens is no longer subject to it. The three factors of natural selection--overbreeding, scarcity of food, and the struggle for life (whether Hobbesian or not)--are no longer operative. Hence homo sapiens can no longer evolve. The big question, it seems to me, is this: how did natural selection (à la Darwin and Huxley) bring forth a species that seems "designed" to escape natural selection?

Surely, we haven't completely stopped evolving, physically. But the thought of evolution bringing us to the tipping point of consciouness is fascinating. O brave new world, with such people in't!

Quoting look: Not Francoamerican's evil twin, Crankoamerican:Surely, we haven't completely stopped evolving, physically. But the thought of evolution bringing us to the tipping point of consciouness is fascinating. O brave new world, with such people in't!

Evolve physically? Well, people are getting fatter and fatter. Will the obese succumb to the fit in the struggle for life? Joking aside, I was referring to evolution only in the biological sense.

Quoting claymisher: Everybody inherits knowledge from the past. That's not news.

What incremental increase of knowledge or insight would you give Darwin credit for? None?

Darwin was a brilliant man. No one denies that. Natural selection, on the other hand, has been criticized from the very beginning.

Quoting Francoamerican: Evolve physically? Well, people are getting fatter and fatter. Will the obese succumb to the fit in the struggle for life?

When civilization falls, we'll see who has the last laugh.

Quoting Francoamerican: The three factors of natural selection--overbreeding, scarcity of food, and the struggle for life (whether Hobbesian or not)--are no longer operative. Hence homo sapiens can no longer evolve.

Um... no. Relative breeding rates are still the most obvious influencing factors on gene frequency. Sexual selection is also a clear issue.

The big question, it seems to me, is this: how did natural selection (à la Darwin and Huxley) bring forth a species that seems "designed" to escape natural selection?

It didn't.

Quoting Caledonian: Um... no. Relative breeding rates are still the most obvious influencing factors on gene frequency. Sexual selection is also a clear issue.

It didn't.

Then what did? As for relative breeding rates: bullshit. Natural selection, in case you haven't heard, implies the elimination of the unfit before they can breed.

Quoting Francoamerican: Then what did?

Your question is built upon a false premise.

As for relative breeding rates: bullshit. Natural selection, in case you haven't heard, implies the elimination of the unfit before they can breed.

Your point, while correct, is not meaningful in any broader context. If humans with certain traits outbreed other types of humans, and those traits are heritable, then the trait distribution of humanity will shift - even if no individuals or traits are ever eliminated from the population. Changes in trait distribution are evolution. Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with the concepts being discussed before you contribute to the topic again.

Quoting Caledonian: Your question is built upon a false premise..

No, it is not. Human beings have most definitely escaped the forces of natural selection. Apparently, you haven't yet noticed. Perhaps you live in a Caledonian cave.... Perhaps you are a Caledonian caveman.

Quoting Caledonian: Your point, while correct, is not meaningful in any broader context. If humans with certain traits outbreed other types of humans, and those traits are heritable, then the trait distribution of humanity will shift - even if no individuals or traits are ever eliminated from the population. Changes in trait distribution are evolution.

Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with the concepts being discussed before you contribute to the topic again.

Where do you read such rubbish?

Quoting Francoamerican: Then what did?

As for relative breeding rates: bullshit. Natural selection, in case you haven't heard, implies the elimination of the unfit before they can breed.

I'm pretty sure that's not the case, unless you're making "imply" work really hard there. It's fun to problematize the foundations of the sciences, but where are you going with this? Are you taking a side in the Gould vs Dawkins debate? Neutral theory of evolution? Lynch's "nothing in evolution makes sense except in the light of population genetics"? Kauffman's self-organization? If you have alternative account of natural history just give it to us straight.

Quoting claymisher: I'm pretty sure that's not the case, unless you're making "imply" work really hard there.

It's fun to problematize the foundations of the sciences, but where are you going with this? Are you taking a side in the Gould vs Dawkins debate? Neutral theory of evolution? Lynch's "nothing in evolution makes sense except in the light of population genetics"? Kauffman's self-organization? If you have alternative account of natural history just give it to us straight.

There is NO debate. Homo sapiens is no longer subject to the "laws" of natural selection.

Quoting Francoamerican: There is NO debate. Homo sapiens is no longer subject to the "laws" of natural selection.

I'm pretty sure it is. People don't all have the same number of children. The nightmare of HIV/AIDS in Africa has to count as selective pressure. Come on, answer the question. If not evolution by natural selection, what?

Quoting Francoamerican: There is NO debate. Homo sapiens is no longer subject to the "laws" of natural selection.

I'm afraid it is. More importantly, it's still subject to evolution - because while natural selection has certainly diminished as a force acting on human beings, there are other forces besides it which contribute to evolution.

Quoting claymisher: I'm pretty sure it is. People don't all have the same number of children. The nightmare of HIV/AIDS in Africa has to count as selective pressure.

Come on, answer the question. If not evolution by natural selection, what?

I'm with clay, here. There's always pressure from sexual selection; and there are certainly environmental factors that will make some people less likely to survive to sexual maturity than others, or will shorten their period of fertility. Some diseases are less curable than others and are more of a threat to certain individuals than others. There's no reason to believe that natural selection has ceased to be an issue for our species. It's probably closer to correct if we say that the forces of natural selection have become, to a certain extent, malleable to our deliberate actions.

Quoting claymisher: I'm pretty sure it is. People don't all have the same number of children. The nightmare of HIV/AIDS in Africa has to count as selective pressure.

Come on, answer the question. If not evolution by natural selection, what?

You are confusing two questions: Does evolution in general occur by natural selection? Is homo sapiens subject to natural selection? The second question has been settled for a long time. The unfit survive. Indeed they often govern the fit.

Quoting Caledonian: I'm afraid it is. More importantly, it's still subject to evolution - because while natural selection has certainly diminished as a force acting on human beings, there are other forces besides it which contribute to evolution.

Maybe, but until homo sapiens gives birth to another species you might as well be talking through your hat. And you are.

Quoting Francoamerican: You are confusing two questions: Does evolution in general occur by natural selection? Is homo sapiens subject to natural selection?

The second question has been settled for a long time. The unfit survive. Indeed they often govern the fit.

When did natural selection for humans stop? 100,000 years ago? 10,000 years ago? 1945? I think maybe instead of rejecting the political implications of evolution and biology in general (as bioligists have for a long time now) you've internalized them.

Quoting claymisher: When did natural selection for humans stop? 100,000 years ago? 10,000 years ago? 1945?.

Good question. Historians, anthropologists et al. have been asking it for some time now.

Quoting claymisher: I think maybe instead of rejecting the political implications of evolution and biology in general (as bioligists have for a long time now) you've internalized them.

You are obviously deaf to irony.

according to the latest genetic research the rate of evolution in homo sapiens has dramatically increased over the last 10,000 years - basically the time frame for development of agriculture and civilization - the forces that you are identifying as bringing the process of evolution to a stop, correct?

Quoting popcorn_karate: according to the latest genetic research the rate of evolution in homo sapiens has dramatically increased over the last 10,000 years - basically the time frame for development of agriculture and civilization - the forces that you are identifying as bringing the process of evolution to a stop, correct?

Would you care to elaborate, i.e. give a reference? What exactly do you mean by the "rate of evolution"? There has been no physical transfomation in homo sapiens in the last 10,000 years.

Quoting Francoamerican: Would you care to elaborate, i.e. give a reference? What exactly do you mean by the "rate of evolution"? There has been no physical transfomation in homo sapiens in the last 10,000 years.

Try this, for starters: http://discovermagazine.com/2009/mar...e-they-used-to

Quoting AemJeff: Try this, for starters:

http://discovermagazine.com/2009/mar...e-they-used-to

I read the article very quickly, but I see no reason to change my mind. I have several questions: 1. Are the changes that have occurred in the past ten thousand years the result of natural selection or of random genetic drift? 2. Can geneticists demonstrate mutations going back further in time? Five hundred thousand years for example? Homo sapiens is, after all, much older than ten thousand years. How would they do that? 3. Do these mutations portend a new species?

Quoting Francoamerican: I read the article very quickly, but I see no reason to change my mind. I have several questions:

1. Are the changes that have occurred in the past ten thousand years the result of natural selection or of random genetic drift?

2. Can geneticists demonstrate mutations going back further in time? Five hundred thousand years for example? Homo sapiens is, after all, much older than ten thousand years. How would they do that?

3. Do these mutations portend a new species?

I think they're asserting that it's not random drift. The article contained a discussion of changes in the rate of change, which would likely be more or less constant if it was just random. I think the answer to the second question depends on the source of the data. Testable DNA is a resource that deteriorates over time. I don't think the third question was addressed directly in the article, and I'm not really sure what it would mean as a practical matter. The definition of "species" is relatively fuzzy. When a significant subpopulation can no longer interbreed with the rest of us, that would be a positive indication - nothing in the article (or anything else I've ever encountered) suggests

Genetic change in Nature is random, as is weather and other "forces of nature". That is why we cannot predict the antigens in the next flu virus, we can only observe, check at sentinel sites and then try to choose the right combination for the next vaccine. Our existence is so brief that most humans cannot understand the changes that take place over thousands or million of years, heck even recent modern history can be edited and massaged to suit whoever has the bullhorn!

Quoting SkepticDoc: Genetic change in Nature is random, as is weather and other "forces of nature". That is why we cannot predict the antigens in the next flu virus, we can only observe, check at sentinel sites and then try to choose the right combination for the next vaccine.

Our existence is so brief that most humans cannot understand the changes that take place over thousands or million of years, heck even recent modern history can be edited and massaged to suit whoever has the bullhorn!

Yeah Doc, I agree. But, "evolution" implies a feedback process. The results of evolution are stochastic, but they have a (chaotically nonlinear) dependency on prior states; purely random change has no such dependency. In a purely random system, you'd generally expect the derivative of the rate of change to hover somewhere near a constant value.

If you watch the last Nova program "Becoming Human" the cover the extrapolation of humanoid evolution by projecting back the random changes in DNA. The specific statement is made that the rate of change in the DNA is "constant" and it allows the estimation of the time of divergence from our common ancestors. NOVA part 3 "Becoming Human"

I decided to re-read the article to see if it made more sense the second time around. Just think a moment about the implications of the following remarks regarding the mutation that supposedly resulted in Attention Deficit Disorder: "Sequencing studies suggest that the DRD4 mutation arose 50,000 years ago, just as humans were spreading out of Africa. Its prevalence tends to increase the farther a population is from Africa, leading some investigators to dub it “the migratory gene.” At least one allele (or copy of the gene) is carried by 80 percent of some South American populations. In contrast, the allele is present in 40 percent of indigenous populations living farther north in the Americas and in just 20 percent of Europeans and Africans. Children with the mutation tend to be more restless than other youngsters and to score higher on tests of novelty-seeking and risk-taking, all traits that might have pushed those with the variant to explore new frontiers. In the context of a modern classroom, it may be hard to understand why kids who appear distractible and disruptive might have a survival advantage. But research shows people with

Quoting Francoamerican: I decided to re-read the article to see if it made more sense the second time around. Just think a moment about the implications of the following remarks regarding the mutation that supposedly resulted in Attention Deficit Disorder:

"Sequencing studies suggest that the DRD4 mutation arose 50,000 years ago, just as humans were spreading out of Africa. Its prevalence tends to increase the farther a population is from Africa, leading some investigators to dub it “the migratory gene.” At least one allele (or copy of the gene) is carried by 80 percent of some South American populations. In contrast, the allele is present in 40 percent of indigenous populations living farther north in the Americas and in just 20 percent of Europeans and Africans. Children with the mutation tend to be more restless than other youngsters and to score higher on tests of novelty-seeking and risk-taking, all traits that might have pushed those with the variant to explore new frontiers.

In the context of a modern classroom, it may be hard to understand why kids who appear distractible and disruptive might have a survival advantage. But research shows people with

Quoting SkepticDoc: If you watch the last Nova program "Becoming Human" the cover the extrapolation of humanoid evolution by projecting back the random changes in DNA. The specific statement is made that the rate of change in the DNA is "constant" and it allows the estimation of the time of divergence from our common ancestors.

NOVA part 3 "Becoming Human"

But that's not the argument being made in the article we were discussing. The research detailed there was explicitly questioning that assumption.

Quoting Francoamerican: Would you care to elaborate, i.e. give a reference? What exactly do you mean by the "rate of evolution"? There has been no physical transfomation in homo sapiens in the last 10,000 years.

Of course there have been physical changes! Most of them have been biochemical, and thus not readily apparent to cursory visual inspection, but features such as the ability to digest milk late in life and heat-conserving body structures vary pretty much as you'd expect them to.

thanks Jeff!

Quoting AemJeff: But that's not the argument being made in the article we were discussing. The research detailed there was explicitly questioning that assumption.

The rate of DNA mutation is the same or maybe has increased because of the higher exposure to ionizing radiation, the selective forces have increased exponentially as cultural factors have played a more important role in survival. And don't forget epigenetics...

Quoting SkepticDoc: The rate of DNA mutation is the same or maybe has increased because of the higher exposure to ionizing radiation, the selective forces have increased exponentially as cultural factors have played a more important role in survival.

And don't forget epigenetics...

Changes in the level of background radiation is a fine hypothesis for why the rate may have changed. Phenotypic explanations would fall into the general "feedback" umbrella, I think.

I'd like to suggest that everyone go back and look at Franco's premise. Much of this thread started on a very different, but related theme - the original influences on Darwin's concept of 'natural selection'. I believe the trap many of us have fallen into started about here. In the earlier posts Franco expressed his opinion that evolution by natural selection was basically "reheated" Hobbes which he later retracted and reformulated as "reheated" Malthus. The discussion continued for a few posts when he then put forth the claim that 'natural selection' could not be shown to be a causal factor in human evolution (conceding that it may or may not have been with other organisms). But the basic premise has always been his formulation of natural selection as: "overbreeding and overpopulation + scarcity of food = struggle for life = war of all against all (and elimination of the unfit)", or, as he also states, equivalently: Malthus + Hobbes. You may or may not want to backtrack and reconstruct this for yourselves (it's a bit tedious), but what has happened here is that the somewhat arguably valid assumptions made in support of

Quoting Francoamerican: You might want to read the Australian philosopher David Stove, Darwinian Fairytales

Alright, since you haven't exactly been making yourself clear I thought I'd check it out. This seems to be what you're cribbing from. Darwin, Huxley, Hobbes, Malthus, it's all there. The first paragraph:

IF DARWIN'S THEORY of evolution were true, there would be in every species a constant and ruthless competition to survive: a competition in which only a few in any generation can be winners. But it is perfectly obvious that human life is not like that, however it may be with other species.

Can you spot the strawman? He's right there! You can't miss him! Let's look for some more logic:

in a "continual free fight of each other against all" there would soon be no children, no women and hence, no men. In other words, that the human race could not possibly exist now, unless cooperation had always been stronger than competition, both between women and their children, and between men and the children and women whom they protect and provide for.

Franco, this is about the dumbest thing I've ever read. It's a monstrously overwritten screed (maybe you're used to that, being French and all), so far as I can tell

Quoting claymisher: Alright, since you haven't exactly been making yourself clear I thought I'd check it out. This seems to be what you're cribbing from. Darwin, Huxley, Hobbes, Malthus, it's all there. The first paragraph:

I made no secret of the source. The information on Malthus and Huxley is commonplace....except, apparently to you. Your knowledge of the entire subject seems to consist of googling and namedropping.

Quoting claymisher: Can you spot the strawman? He's right there! You can't miss him!

I would be happy if you would point out the strawman. The only strawman, I am afraid, is you. Stove's argument, which he develops at length over several chapters (and which I "cribbed" as you say: but when do YOU do anything else?), is that the behavior and psychology of civilized, contemporary human beings is a key to understanding our human past--whatever may be true of other species. Darwinians assume the opposite. The problem, though, is that Darwin and his followers right up to the present have incorporated into evolutionary theory certain unempirical assumptions about human nature and the state of nature, derived from Malthus and Hobbes rather than from observation. Stove also has interesting things to say about sociobiology aka evolutionary psychology and Dawkins' genetic Calvinism. Stove sometimes has a deliberately paradoxical

Quoting Francoamerican: ...is that the behavior and psychology of civilized, contemporary human beings is a key to understanding our human past--whatever may be true of other species.

Are you saying that our bent, genetically, is that of cooperation, and has been since the branch into homo sapiens? That 'state of nature' was left behind?

Quoting Francoamerican: I made no secret of the source. The information on Malthus and Huxley is commonplace....except, apparently to you. Your knowledge of the entire subject seems to consist of googling and namedropping.

I would be happy if you would point out the strawman. The only strawman, I am afraid, is you. Stove's argument, which he develops at length over several chapters (and which I "cribbed" as you say: but when do YOU do anything else?), is that the behavior and psychology of civilized, contemporary human beings is a key to understanding our human past--whatever may be true of other species. Darwinians assume the opposite. The problem, though, is that Darwin and his followers right up to the present have incorporated into evolutionary theory certain unempirical assumptions about human nature and the state of nature, derived from Malthus and Hobbes rather than from observation. Stove also has interesting things to say about sociobiology aka evolutionary psychology and Dawkins' genetic Calvinism.

Stove sometimes has a deliberately paradoxical and humorous way of expressing his argument, but he is always developing a complex and subtle argument. Maybe that is why you missed it. A bon entendeur, salut!

Sorry you find it so dumb. I find your summary dumb and

Quoting spandrel: I'd like to suggest that everyone go back and look at Franco's premise. Much of this thread started on a very different, but related theme - the original influences on Darwin's concept of 'natural selection'. I believe the trap many of us have fallen into started about here.

In the earlier posts Franco expressed his opinion that evolution by natural selection was basically "reheated" Hobbes which he later retracted and reformulated as "reheated" Malthus. The discussion continued for a few posts when he then put forth the claim that 'natural selection' could not be shown to be a causal factor in human evolution (conceding that it may or may not have been with other organisms). But the basic premise has always been his formulation of natural selection as:

"overbreeding and overpopulation + scarcity of food = struggle for life = war of all against all (and elimination of the unfit)",

or, as he also states, equivalently: Malthus + Hobbes.

You may or may not want to backtrack and reconstruct this for yourselves (it's a bit tedious), but what has happened here is that the somewhat arguably valid assumptions made in support of

Quoting Francoamerican: And what is the mechanism you refer to if it is not natural selection? And how is this dull formulation different from Darwin's? "Reproduce successfully"---can one reproduce unsucessfully?

yes. if your children have no children you have reproduced unsuccessfully.

Quoting popcorn_karate: yes. if your children have no children you have reproduced unsuccessfully.

In that case, failure is inevitable in the long run. If my grandchildren and great grandchildren and my great great grandchildren have no children, I am unsuccessful. Dear me, I am sure to be a failure!

Quoting Francoamerican: In that case, failure is inevitable in the long run. If my grandchildren and great grandchildren and my great great grandchildren have no children, I am unsuccessful.

Dear me, I am sure to be a failure!

nah. its just that you will never know if you are successful - you can only know if you are a failure. I suggest competing for a truly fit mate, investing heavily in your progeny, and hope for the best ; )

Quoting popcorn_karate: nah. its just that you will never know if you are successful - you can only know if you are a failure.

I suggest competing for a truly fit mate, investing heavily in your progeny, and hope for the best ; )

It may be too late for me to compete for a truly fit mate. In any case, I long ago concluded that I was unfit to reproduce. So by not "reproducing successfully," I am doing a service to mankind.

Quoting Francoamerican: In any case, I long ago concluded that I was unfit to reproduce. So by not "reproducing successfully," I am doing a service to mankind.

Finally, an argument we can all get behind.

Quoting Caledonian: Finally, an argument we can all get behind.

nope. made me sad. but i couldn't think of anything reasonable to say about it.

Quoting Francoamerican: It may be too late for me to compete for a truly fit mate. In any case, I long ago concluded that I was unfit to reproduce. So by not "reproducing successfully," I am doing a service to mankind.

Now get in there and practice till you get it right!

Quoting claymisher: My summary may be dumb and infantile but it's not wrong.

Franco, the very first sentence of that essay is straight up strawman: "IF DARWIN'S THEORY of evolution were true, there would be in every species a constant and ruthless competition to survive: a competition in which only a few in any generation can be winners." The whole thing is built on that faulty premise (it's so dumb that even FreeRepublic commenters can see through it). Does the existence of cooperation invalidate natural selection in people? What about other cooperating critters? There's evidence of the evolution of cooperation all over. There are plenty of social ants, bees, slime molds, trees, mammals, you name it. There are 20,000+ citations for "evolution of cooperation" on Google Scholar. I can print that out on vellum for you if using Google offends you.

As for Gardner, I figure he shared the critique of Popper with Stove. It's not that Stove is wrong about everything but there are plenty of sound critiques of social darwinism, evolutionary psychology, public choice economics, ultradarwinism, adaptationism, Dawkins, etc that don't rely on huge leaps of logic or grousing about Hobbes.

You still haven't understood my point, and until you read Stove and stop repeating

Quoting look: Are you saying that our bent, genetically, is that of cooperation, and has been since the branch into homo sapiens? That 'state of nature' was left behind?

oo
,*
.^.

Quoting look: oo
,*
.^.

I somehow missed your question, what with the caledonian caveman, spandrel, claymisher at my heels. See my response to claymisher. The bent to cooperation would be one way of describing what distinguishes human beings from other animals, even so-called social animals. But I think the "specific difference," as philosophers used to say, is deeper than that. It has to do with our capacity for speech or reason (logos) and our freedom, our indetermination. Man, the undetermined animal---as Nietzsche somewhere says.

Quoting Caledonian: Finally, an argument we can all get behind.

Crawl back to your cave, grotesque Neanderthal.

As I have recently stated in another context, I don’t know anything about evolutionary theory. But I thought the main point of natural selection was that every species is in a struggle for survival and that each species selects for those traits which best allow it to survive in a competitive struggle for survival on earth. That is, the theory is not primarily about competition within a species, it’s about competition among species as well as about the struggle of each species for survival with the inanimate aspects of the biosphere. So I don’t see how the Hobbesian struggle of each human against all humans in the state of nature is directly related to natural selection in Darwinian theory. And secondly, this Hobbesian struggle takes place among homines sapientes, within a species that has already evolved biologically, in the main. Sexual selection for dominant males, for example, is a form of cooperative behavior. Are there any species in which a dominant male or males destroys every other male of the species in a fight for dominance, i.e. in which there is a civil war that reduces the species population to

Quoting ledocs: As I have recently stated in another context, I don’t know anything about evolutionary theory. But I thought the main point of natural selection was that every species is in a struggle for survival and that each species selects for those traits which best allow it to survive in a competitive struggle for survival on earth.

No. Darwin's argument primarily applied to competition between individuals within a species, and between individuals and their environment - this is what causes each species to adapt. Species can be said to compete with each other as well, but that's not what drives the transformation of species generally. Species do not select individuals within themselves so they can adapt to environment. Individuals seek out mating partners who show visible signs of health and traits which are likely to further reproductive success (or create that impression). That's the only degree to which species tend to select within themselves.

Here are some citations from the beginning of the Wikipedia article on "natural selection." "The natural genetic variation within a population of organisms means that some individuals will survive and reproduce more successfully than others in their current environment. For example, the peppered moth exists in both light and dark colors in the United Kingdom, but during the industrial revolution many of the trees on which the moths rested became blackened by soot, giving the dark-colored moths an advantage in hiding from predators. This gave dark-colored moths a better chance of surviving to produce dark-colored offspring, and in just a few generations the majority of the moths were dark." "A rabbit that runs faster than others may be more likely to escape from predators, and algae that are more efficient at extracting energy from sunlight will grow faster. Individuals that have better odds for survival also have better odds for reproduction. If the traits that give these individuals a reproductive advantage are also heritable, that is, passed from parent to child, then there will be a slightly higher proportion of fast rabbits or efficient algae

If you're interested in a good, accessible source for current ideas about evolution and their complexity, I strongly recommend this book. I think all of this discussion of philosophy and Darwin's intellectual progenitors, and what they believed is ultimately beside the point. Zimmer makes a concrete case out of the study of a single type of bacterium that has been the most illuminating account I'm aware of.

yeah - you're just wrong. do some research. further down in that article, for example: Types of selection Natural selection can act on any phenotypic trait, and selective pressure can be produced by any aspect of the environment, including sexual selection and competition with members of the same species.

Quoting ledocs: As I have recently stated in another context, I don’t know anything about evolutionary theory. But I thought the main point of natural selection was that every species is in a struggle for survival and that each species selects for those traits which best allow it to survive in a competitive struggle for survival on earth. That is, the theory is not primarily about competition within a species, it’s about competition among species as well as about the struggle of each species for survival with the inanimate aspects of the biosphere..

That is an ambiguity in Darwin. Is the struggle for life only the struggle of species to obtain food and reproduce? Or is it a struggle with competitors to obtain food and mates? The two formulas aren't the same. Is Darwin talking about interspecific competition or intraspecific competition? Or both? If you read Huxley and Spencer you might conclude that the theory encompasses both. Darwin himself was more discreet. The Origin of Species says nothing whatever about man. I am not sure what the consensus is among modern evolutionary biologists. They usually talk about "selection pressure," i.e such things as

Popcorn karate said, I think in response to me:

yeah - you're just wrong. do some research.

further down in that article [sc. Wikipedia, "Natural Selection"] for example:

Types of selection

Natural selection can act on any phenotypic trait, and selective pressure can be produced by any aspect of the environment, including sexual selection and competition with members of the same species.

I think you should rehearse what was said before you tell me that I'm "just wrong." Caledonia said in response to my initial post that Darwin had focused *primarily* upon competition within a species as the mechanism for natural selection. But that thesis is not borne out by the opening of the Wikipedia article I cited. I had said that the theory of natural selection focused *primarily,* not exclusively, upon competition among species and on the struggle of each species with the inanimate natural environment. In the case of sexual competition/selection within a species, what is the biological point of the selection or of gaining a comparative reproductive advantage within the species? Isn't it for the species as a whole to be more competitive vis-a-vis the overall environment? That is, isn't any intra-species competition usually a means

I don't want to get too abstract or spiritual, but the survival of the fittest can go beyond genetic material. Please don't get me wrong, the genes remain the foundation for biological development, but Society, Culture and intellectual developments allow the manifestation of that genetic material in H. sapiens. Where other animals are prisoners of their environment, H. sapiens has been able to change the environment to a certain degree. Malthus had no idea that an agricultural revolution could come about increasing the supply of food!

Quoting ledocs: I think you should rehearse what was said before you tell me that I'm "just wrong."

ok. good point. sorry for the brevity.

Quoting ledocs: I thought the main point of natural selection was that every species is in a struggle

i think this is probably the basis of much of your confusion. selection does not operate on species. selection operates on individuals. This is a hugely important difference for understanding evolution.

Quoting ledocs: That is, the theory is not primarily about competition within a species, it’s about competition among species

selection pressures will be different for different individuals at different times. the "environment" includes other members of your own species. therefore a statement like this:

Quoting ledocs: Sexual selection for dominant males, for example, is a form of cooperative behavior.

makes no sense. If i keep beating the crap out of you, never let you mate, and i get to pass on my genes while yours are a dead end - we did not cooperate. again, sorry for the abruptness of my earlier response, but does some of that make sense and give you a little different perspective?

Quoting SkepticDoc: Where other animals are prisoners of their environment, H. sapiens has been able to change the environment to a certain degree.

lots of other species do that too. Ants for example are known to be quite productive fungus farmers and aphid herders. there are no categorical differences between h. sapiens and other animals, its a matter of degrees.

Millions of degrees! No other animal could annihilate life on Earth with Nuclear Weapons!

Perhaps you could interpret the passages I cited from the Wikipedia article on "natural selection" in such a way as to be consistent with your assertion that "Selection does not operate on species, it operates on individuals." If the point is that from the point of view of biological mechanics all change begins with individuals, that seems pretty obvious. I mean, the whole species doesn't change simultaneously. In the sexual competition among mammals that I've seen described on TV, typically lesser males *do* get to reproduce. It's not that there is only one stud and every other male is a complete loser. My general point was that yielding to authority, as opposed to forming a band of lesser males to challenge the stud, for example, is a form of cooperation. And isn't this one of the points that is made about bees, for example, that although their reproductive arrangements are highly hierarchical and selective, they are also extremely cooperative? In other words, reproductive arrangements that are very hierarchical do not preclude cooperation.

Quoting ledocs: Perhaps you could interpret the passages I cited from the Wikipedia article on "natural selection" in such a way as to be consistent with your assertion that "Selection does not operate on species, it operates on individuals."

well here is the FIRST SENTENCE from the article: Natural selection is the process by which heritable traits that make it more likely for an ORGANISM to survive and successfully reproduce become more common in a population over successive generations. ORGANISM not SPECIES. really, do some reading -this is an interesting subject, but i don't have the patience or interest to continue on with this particular discussion.

Quoting AemJeff: I think all of this discussion of philosophy and Darwin's intellectual progenitors, and what they believed is ultimately beside the point.

You are absolutely correct. I tried, rather unsuccessfully, to make this same point earlier. It's like arguing the case against f=ma based on Newton's conception of the aether. EDIT: meant to state: "... on the progenitors of Newton's conception of the aether."

Popcorn: Here is a quote I just found from an acknowledged expert in evolution: Q: What is natural selection, and how is it central to the theory of evolution? Futuyma: Natural selection is the process by which species adapt to their environment. Natural selection leads to evolutionary change when individuals with certain characteristics have a greater survival or reproductive rate than other individuals in a population and pass on these inheritable genetic characteristics to their offspring. Simply put, natural selection is a consistent difference in survival and reproduction between different genotypes, or even different genes, in what we could call reproductive success.

So, you know, I'm not that swift, I haven't studied biology since the 9th grade, but that seems like a pretty straightforward statement to me that natural selection has to do with species, not with individuals. The mechanism for the evolutionary change is via individuals, but the change has to do with species.

I also don't wish to continue talking with you or to you, and, as you say, I should definitely read more about the subject. One doesn't have to read very far, though, to suspect that there is something deeply wrong with what you've been saying. But

read more . . .

Quoting Francoamerican: You still haven't understood my point, and until you read Stove and stop repeating what you think you understand about him, I have nothing to say in reply. But I doubt that you will.

I did not say, nor does Stove say, that cooperation disproves natural selection. What disproves natural selection in humans (and perhaps in other animals as well) is that there is no empirical evidence for the population thesis of Malthus. Nor is there any evidence for the "struggle for existence" that follows from it.

From the absence of evidence the only conclusion it seems to me is IGNORANCE. Like so many people unschooled in logic and philosophy you seem to think that when a critic or sceptic questions a theory, he is necessarily defending another theory. WRONG. The burden of proof lies on the proponents of a theory. They are obliged to support every link in the chain of reasoning supporting it, whereas a critic has only to pick out its weak links and flaws.

I know that there is a vast literature on the evolution of cooperation in other "social" animals as well as on the evolution of "altruism" in

I believe that cockroaches are predicted to survive.

Quoting ledocs: Futuyma: Natural selection is the process by which species adapt to their environment. Natural selection leads to evolutionary change when individuals with certain characteristics have a greater survival or reproductive rate than other individuals in a population and pass on these inheritable genetic characteristics to their offspring. Simply put, natural selection is a consistent difference in survival and reproduction between different genotypes, or even different genes, in what we could call reproductive success.

I'd say that Futuyma's use of the term 'species' is a bit ambiguous here and I would want to see the full context of the paragraph cited. Notice that in his last sentence he goes on to frame the answer around genotypes, which are subject to the mutations that make natural selection possible. Species of course, do not have genotypes. Natural selection itself is generally understood to act at the phenotype level. I had earlier referenced H. Allen Orr in a completely different context (more in support of Claymisher's skepticism regarding the claims of evolutionary psychology, but in a previous discussion), but it just happens that his specialty is speciation. There is a very brief reference to

Quoting piscivorous: I believe that cockroaches are predicted to survive.

Flour beetles are more likely to survive: Cockroach Survival Myth: Cockroaches will be the only living thing to survive the radiation from a nuclear blast They focused on the radiation left over from a nuclear blast as the blast itself would most certainly kill a cockroach. This myth derives from the fact that the soft tissue in bone marrow and intestinal track makes humans more suspectible than insects. They tested two aspects of this myth: that cockroaches can survive the radiation from a nuclear blast and that they would be the only survivors. They decided to also test fruit flies (classic science subject) and flour beetles (very tough). They chose the german cockroach to represent cockroach-kind: they can cause allergic reactions in human and are known to consume human night-time dribble.
Setup * Cobalt 60 radiation source at Pacific Northwest Laboratory
* Plastic boxes to hold insects (aka "Holiday End")
* 50 flour beetles per test
* 100 fruit flies per test
* 50 german cockroaches per test Michelle Johnson told them that the PNL's Cobalt 60 was capable of delivering 55,000 rads/hr, which is lethal to humans in 10 minutes (1000 rads is the lethal

Quoting claymisher: spandrel pointed out[/url] you're not using the regular definition of natural selection. You and Stove are using some weird eliminationist rhetoric to make your case. Natural selection really is about differential reproduction! It's true! Look it up!

If you want to make an argument about "Stovian-Malthusian-Darwinian evolution" that's fine but you can't make us call it natural selection.

I don't need to look it up. I know what it means Differential reproduction is just another cheap intellectual subterfuge of evolutionary biologists. It is as tautological and as meaningless as natural selection itself. Differential reproduction means that some species multiply by leaving more offspring than one-for-one, and others leave one-for-one and remain stable, while other leave leave less than one-for-one and dwindle or die out. Why do some dwindle and die out? To which biologists, in their impeccable inability to think straight, say: Because some multiply, while others remain stable, dwindle, or die out. The two sides of the equation are the same. We thus have another tautology. At least natural selection, Darwin's "great discovery," attempts to explain WHY some species dwindle and die out and WHY others flourish and eventually give birth to new species. But since there is no evidence

Quoting ledocs: Popcorn:

Here is a quote I just found from an acknowledged expert in evolution:

Q: What is natural selection, and how is it central to the theory of evolution?

Futuyma: Natural selection is the process by which species adapt to their environment. Natural selection leads to evolutionary change when individuals with certain characteristics have a greater survival or reproductive rate than other individuals in a population and pass on these inheritable genetic characteristics to their offspring. Simply put, natural selection is a consistent difference in survival and reproduction between different genotypes, or even different genes, in what we could call reproductive success..

Ledocs, don't let yourself be bullied by the people commenting here. You don't have to be a professional biologist to understand that the field suffers from serious intellectual deficiencies....which is not to contest the fact of evolution. The above definition is a perfect example of empty verbiage. When the modern synthesis was put in place, natural selection in its Darwinian (Malthusian) version, which applied to individuals, was supplemented by something call differential reproduction, which applies to populations. It goes like this (I am quoting myself in my response to claymisher above): Differential reproduction

Quoting Francoamerican: Differential reproduction means that some species multiply by leaving more offspring than one-for-one, and others leave one-for-one and remain stable, while others leave less than one-for-one and dwindle or die out.

Why do some dwindle and die out? To which biologists, in their impeccable inability to think straight, answer: Because some multiply, while others remain stable, dwindle, or die out. The two sides of the equation are the same. Differential reproduction is just another cheap intellectual subterfuge, as tautological as natural selection itself.

At least natural selection, Darwin's "great discovery," attempted to explain WHY some species dwindle and die out and WHY others flourish and eventually give birth to new species. But since there is no evidence for Darwinian (Malthusian) natural selection, that explanation ends up being a tautology too.

This thread seemed to have been centered at least at some point on what I'll call the history of, and precedents to Darwin's theory of evolution. I'm not qualified to opine on this subject as I'm not versed in the historical aspects of science. However, I've been following your (Franco and others) comments because I find them thought provoking and I can learn quite a bit. As an observer of

That was an outstanding post, Doc.

Ocean writes.... Thanks for your thoughtful comments. I am mainly interested in the history of scientific and political thought, but you can hardly study Darwin without looking ahead to what became of Darwinism, both inside and outside of evolutionary theory---for example in sociobiology or evolutionary psychology. Speciation is THE problem of evolutionary theory, but the extinction of a species poses the same kind of problem. Just as it is all too easy to say that a new species comes into being when it is successful at adapting to some new challenge (overcoming various "selective pressures"), it is all too easy to say that a species becomes extinct when it fails to adapt to new challenges. In both cases the establishment of success or failure comes down to this: the existence or not of the species, i.e. it is an ex post facto explanation. You survive because you are fit (adapted) and you are fit because you survive; or you die because you are unfit and you are unfit because you die. Natural selection was understood by Darwin to be the mechanism by which this process took place at

Quoting Francoamerican: Like you I would love to hear a contemporary evolutionary biologist debate a philosopher who knows something about the history of scientific thought since the 19th century. Maybe the Wright/Pinker dialogue is the answer to my wish.

Thank you for your response. Shortly after posting my comment I noticed the above mentioned diavlog. It doesn't address the questions that you posed, but a treat nonetheless!

I have a book by Ernest Mayr called "The Growth of Biological Thought" in my library. I had not read it, of course. I have now delved into it, prompted by this discussion. I would think that this is the standard book in English about the subject we are discussing. You should check this book out, franco, if you have not read it. In pages I was reading, Mayr argues that Malthus was a minor influence on Darwin, who was mainly struck by a single sentence of Malthus's. Also, Mayr says that Darwin talks about differential reproductive rates in "The Origin...," at about p. 81 in whatever standard edition gets cited. So perhaps differential reproductive rates were not just tacked on later. Mayr makes it abundantly clear that Darwin took a particular interest in individual variability within species. Darwin's interest in highly individualized variation ran counter to the primarily theologically motivated essentialism that dominated biological thinking and taxonomy prior to Darwin. This was a sine qua non for the Darwinian theory of natural selection, since only the individual variation could provide the raw material for selection. So, I don't know, but I get the impression that I was talking at cross-purposes with Caledonian

Quoting ledocs: A long time ago, I read a book called "Chance and Necessity," I think, by Jacques Monod, who won a Nobel Prize in biology. In that book, Monod said a very politically incorrect thing, namely that the human gene pool was being diluted by a lot of people of lesser intelligence. Monod feared for humanity's future on the grounds that the stupidest people had the higher fertility rates.

This argument is what I referred to by mentioning a Youtube video that someone else posted. In the same, while a highly intelligent and educated couple plans, discusses and fails at reproduction for all their fertile years, other couples are violently fighting, getting intoxicated and reproducing at high rates.

This would seem to be an example of natural selection not working, or so it must have seemed to Monod. But maybe stupidity will prove to be just what is needed after the climactic apocalypse.

In another post I commented that we have altered the rules of evolution by natural selection by introducing choice and changes to reproductive capacity and many other cultural/societal and ecological modifications. We are actively rendering natural selection irrelevant. As to the 'climactic apocalypse', I'm

Quoting ledocs: I have a book by Ernest Mayr called "The Growth of Biological Thought" in my library. I had not read it, of course. I have now delved into it, prompted by this discussion. I would think that this is the standard book in English about the subject we are discussing. You should check this book out, franco, if you have not read it. In pages I was reading, Mayr argues that Malthus was a minor influence on Darwin, who was mainly struck by a single sentence of Malthus's. Also, Mayr says that Darwin talks about differential reproductive rates in "The Origin...," at about p. 81 in whatever standard edition gets cited. So perhaps differential reproductive rates were not just tacked on later. .

That's interesting, but the term differential reproduction dates from the the 1930s. It is still a tautology, like natural selection. Mayr's denial of the influence of Malthus is pretty typical of the profession.

Quoting ledocs: Mayr makes it abundantly clear that Darwin took a particular interest in individual variability within species. Darwin's interest in highly individualized variation ran counter to the primarily theologically motivated essentialism that dominated biological thinking and taxonomy prior to Darwin. This was a sine qua non for

Most of the issues under discussion are covered here: http://darwin-chicago.uchicago.edu/course.html You have to do the homework!

I am not sure how to deal with people who not only get the definitions of simple concepts like "differential reproduction" wrong, but who fail to grasp that fitness in an environmental context is not a tautological concept. Well, that's not true. I know a whole bunch of ways. But they're all illegal, and their personal cost-benefit ratio is too high.

Quoting Caledonian: I am not sure how to deal with people who not only get the definitions of simple concepts like "differential reproduction" wrong, but who fail to grasp that fitness in an environmental context is not a tautological concept.

Well, that's not true. I know a whole bunch of ways. But they're all illegal, and their personal cost-benefit ratio is too high.

Come on Caledonian Caveman, give me YOUR definition of differential reproduction without being tautological. So far, I have heard nothing from you....except stupidity.

Quoting SkepticDoc: Most of the issues under discussion are covered here:

http://darwin-chicago.uchicago.edu/course.html

You have to do the homework!

I have done my homework, "skepticdoc." Unlike you I don't need to google because I can think.

Sacré bleu, a little touchy mon ami! I suggest you sit at he edge of the chair, back straight, take relaxed breaths and clear out your mind... 15 minutes a day should help... Little children get benefit from a nap most of the time. Or like Monty Python finished "Live at the Hollywood Bowl"- "piss off" BTW, my post was not directed to you, unless the "shoe fits..."

Quoting SkepticDoc: Sacré bleu, a little touchy mon ami!

I suggest you sit at he edge of the chair, back straight, take relaxed breaths and clear out your mind...

15 minutes a day should help...

Little children get benefit from a nap most of the time.

Or like Monty Python finished "Live at the Hollywood Bowl"- "piss off"

BTW, my post was not directed to you, unless the "shoe fits..."

The shoe doesn't fit. And piss off to you too. If the post wasn't directed to me, why did you direct it to me?

Quoting Francoamerican: The shoe doesn't fit. And piss off to you too.

If the post wasn't directed to me, why did you direct it to me?

My netiquette understanding is that you need to quote the poster that you are addressing if you want to direct a post to a previous one. If there is no quote, the post is general to the thread...

Thanks for that link, skepticdoc. I'll try to listen to the whole thing. If there is homework, I won't do it.

Quoting SkepticDoc: My netiquette understanding is that you need to quote the poster that you are addressing if you want to direct a post to a previous one.

If there is no quote, the post is general to the thread...

Good. Then let caledonian read up on the subject. He needs to. As for me, it's late, almost 11PM, et j'ai besoin de me livrer au monde de mes rêves.

Quoting Francoamerican: I don't need to look it up. I know what it means

Differential reproduction is just another cheap intellectual subterfuge of evolutionary biologists. It is as tautological and as meaningless as natural selection itself. Differential reproduction means that some species multiply by leaving more offspring than one-for-one, and others leave one-for-one and remain stable, while other leave leave less than one-for-one and dwindle or die out.

Why do some dwindle and die out? To which biologists, in their impeccable inability to think straight, say: Because some multiply, while others remain stable, dwindle, or die out. The two sides of the equation are the same. We thus have another tautology.

At least natural selection, Darwin's "great discovery," attempts to explain WHY some species dwindle and die out and WHY others flourish and eventually give birth to new species. But since there is no evidence for Darwinian (Malthusian) natural selection, the explanation ends up being a tautology too.

Is natural selection (the variation and differential reproduction kind) a meaningless tautology or an actual process that occurs in nature? Which is it?

Now I've clicked on your link, skepticdoc. Do you think that's a free course to the public, because I get the impression that one has to register and pay money to download the podcasts? I never found where to do that, although, if it's not free, I won't audit the course. The link you provided produced an error in Firefox.

I downloaded the video and audio files earlier this year, don't know why the links are not working! They were free!

This is the first lecture: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=VGWA3WUP It takes a long time to upload the files, I will post the rest as the upload is finished. Let me know if it does not work.

Week 2- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=6GMH3GMJ 3- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=QVR6XIH9 4- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=II2XI7VV 5- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=O9RWTQW0 6- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=DI77GSDH 7- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=GUJ540RD 8- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=58G85RAG 9- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=5ERXXHS1 10- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=YQNIYFPK
Homework Texts
A. The following texts are in the Seminary Co-operative Bookstore (5757 University Ave.) under HiPSS 24901:
Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species (Harvard University Press)
Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex (Princeton)
Peter Bowler, Evolution: the History of an Idea, 3rd ed. (Univ. of California)
Jonathan Hodge and Gregory Radick (eds.), Cambridge Companion to Darwin (Cambridge University Press).
B.
Recommended Texts (also in the Seminary Co-Op):
Charles Lyell, Principles of Geology, vol. 2 (Univ. of Chicago)
Paul Barrett et al (eds.) Charles Darwin's Notebooks (Cornell)
Charles Darwin, The Autobiography of Charles Darwin (Norton)