Darwin never said differential reproductive success
backspace
"....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
Where did Darwin say "reproductive success" or "differential
reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
Ken Shackleton
Perhaps he did not use those exact words and Weiner is using a modern
term for Darwin's description of the process.
It is clear that Darwin meant differential reproductive success.
Will in New Haven
Nothing is clear if you can backspace through it.
--
Will in New Haven
Mitchell Coffey
I agree that that passage in the T.O. FAQ is ambiguously phrased. I
would recommend the removal of the entire sentence reading "Darwin
himself did not use the phrase in the first edition of Origin of
Species." It serves no purpose and might cause some people to
interprit the sentence that follows as meaning that Darwin literally
wrote in the Origin of Species "heritable variations lead to
differential reproductive success." It might be particularly apt to
confuse people unfamiliar with the practice among English speakers of
not using quotations marks when verbatim quotation is not intended.
Mitchell Coffey
David Hare-Scott
It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion. His literal words have
no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
and culture. This is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
and their successors are what is important. The way the observable world
fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether you think
'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
Tautology Man has returned - the moon must be waxing.
Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the system
and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the theory for
ever and one day. Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are attacking.
Try to grow your puling intellect past the 12 year old stage that says "I
found a spelling mistake in your work so all of what you say must be wrong".
David
backspace
> backspace wrote:
> >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
> on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
> syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
few know this.
> His literal words have
> no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
> development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
> and culture.
His literal words had a profound effect on the direction mankind took
with two world wars, a ongoing culture war in America. But it wasn't
his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
> �ｿｽThis is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
> and their successors are what is important.
It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
> �ｿｽThe way the observable world
> fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether you think
> 'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
Who made what predictions? Only somebody could have made a prediction
- who si this person.
> Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the system
> and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the theory for
> ever and one day. �ｿｽ
What theory?
> Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
> understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are attacking.
What is the modern system?
> Try to grow your puling �ｿｽintellect past the 12 year old stage that says "I
> found a spelling mistake in your work so all of what you say must be wrong".
What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
Einstein .
backspace
Does "differential reproductive success" have a single true fixed
meaning? Where was the concept defined and who defined it. DRS like NS
isn't even a sentence, it can be made to mean whatever you want it to
mean.
g...@risky-biz.com
My daughter just did a report on the legend of Sisyphus. Kin of yours,
I imagine?
Greg Guarino.
Kermit
He probably didn't say either. Why are you fixated on Darwin? Do you
think chemistry is confined to the ideas and language of Lavoisier?
Must physicists learn archaic Italian to do physics?
You have most peculiar ideas, lad.
Kermit
Ken Shackleton
Well.....it means that some organisms are more successful at
reproduction than others of their species. This much should be obvious.
Iain
> Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
> reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
So? If he didn't use the phrase, maybe he should have. Do you think
science is done by scrutinising old, immutible texts? Don't you think
you may be projecting, judging science by your own crooked yardstick?
--Iain
haiku jones
And nowhere in _1984_ will you find the phrase
"totalitarianism is bad". But that's what the book
sets out to convince you of.
Similarly with _Origin of Species_ That phrase
in fact does not appear -- but it's what Darwin
spent an entire book aimed at convincing you of.
Haiku Jones
Kermit
> On Jan 25, 10:13�pm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>
> > backspace wrote:
> > >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> > It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
> > on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
> > syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
>
> It matters because
No, it *doesn't matter. It doesn't matter who started doing
evolutionary science first, nor when, nor what language he spoke.
> like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
> 1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
> few know this.
Correct, because nobody cares except pathological magic-obsessed
idiots. The science depends on the evidence and the model, not the
language of, and certainly not on the choice of words, of a long-dead
man.
>
> > His literal words have
> > no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
> > development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
> > and culture.
>
> His literal words had �a profound effect on the direction mankind took
> with two world wars,
Evidence?
> a ongoing culture war in America. But it wasn't
> his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
> Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
Who? I don't see him anywhere when I Google. I
> documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
> selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
>
Perhaps so. Nobody starts civilization anew; nobody rebuilds culture
or science from scratch. When folks speak of the music Mozart created
we do not mean that he started from nothing, a blank slate. He added
to a culture awash in music, but contributed enough himself that he is
seen as a great composer.
And he didn't "lift" the words from anybody; he learned much (he went
to school) and then added to the body of collective knowledge that has
been accumulating for a hundred thousand years and more.
> > �This is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
> > and their successors are what is important.
>
> It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
What's yer point? In which book did Empedocles write about natural
selection acting on a pool of inheritable variation?
>
> > �The way the observable world
> > fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether you think
> > 'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
>
> Who made what predictions? Only somebody could have made a prediction
> - who si this person.
Nearly every research paper published covers predictions and results.
Look up any of the several million papers on evolutionary biology
published in the last 150 years.
>
> > Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the system
> > and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the theory for
> > ever and one day. �
>
> What theory?
You have been pointed to various descriptions of it hundreds of times.
It is not our problem if you have some peculiar pathology which
prevents using or comprehending intelligible language. I do suggest
that you learn to real simple books before attempting to criticize
science, however. If synonyms confound you, you are probably not ready
for more subtle or complex concepts.
>
> > Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
> > understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are attacking.
>
> What is the modern system?
Evolutionary biology.
>
> > Try to grow your puling �intellect past the 12 year old stage that says "I
> > found a spelling mistake in your work so all of what you say must be wrong".
>
> What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
> starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
> into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
> Einstein .
No, Empedocles did not do biology, nor did he describe the General
Theory of Relativity. He didn't design automobiles or computer chips,
either. See, we (meaning everybody but you) know more than our
ancestors did 1000 or 1,000,000 years ago. This is because the people
who contribute to civilization learn from those who came before them,
then add art or knowledge themselves. They *build on knowledge. In
this way, knowledge accumulates, and those willing to learn know more
than those in the past.
Some of us have to spend much time fighting those who struggle against
knowledge, however.
Kermit
chris thompson
Why do you think Darwin had to have used those exact words? Are we
limited to Darwin's choice of words in all our writing about
evolution?
Chris
haiku jones
> On Jan 25, 10:13�ｿｽpm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>
> > backspace wrote:
> > >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > > Where did Darwin say �ｿｽ"reproductive success" or "differential
> > > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> > It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
> > on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
> > syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
>
> It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
> 1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
> few know this.
>
> > His literal words have
> > no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
> > development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
> > and culture.
>
> with two world wars, a ongoing culture war in America. But it wasn't
> his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
> Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
> documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
> selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
>
> > �ｿｽThis is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
> > and their successors are what is important.
>
> It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
>
> > �ｿｽThe way the observable world
> > fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether you think
> > 'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
>
> Who made what predictions? Only somebody could have made a prediction
> - who si this person.
>
> > Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the system
> > and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the theory for
> > ever and one day. �ｿｽ
>
> What theory?
>
> > Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
> > understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are attacking.
>
> What is the modern system?
That would be the system that evaluates the various
contributions of transposons, population
genetics, partial and wholesale genomic captures, frame-
shift mutations, sexual selection, reproductive isolation,
parasite-driven differentation, genetic drift, modification
of transcription factors, monte carlo simulations,
epigenetic factors both in utero and later,
"costly displays", gene duplicaton followed
by mutation, gene, individual, and group level
selection, copy number "errors", lateral
genetic transfer, and dozens of other particulars
which, if Empedocles et. seq. did discuss, have
been sadly lost to the ages.
>
> > Try to grow your puling �ｿｽintellect past the 12 year old stage that says "I
> > found a spelling mistake in your work so all of what you say must be wrong".
>
> What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
> starting with Aristotle
And Democritus talked about atoms. But good
luck trying to explain cleavage of the dinitrogen
bond with subsequent C-N bond formation as
catalyzed via a halfnium-based organometallic
cyclopentadienyl sandwich using the insights
of Democritus.
Haiku Jones
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 25, 10:13�pm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>> backspace wrote:
>> >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
>> > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
>> > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
>> > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
>> > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
>> > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
>> > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>>
>> > Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
>> > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>>
>> It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
>> on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
>> syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
>
>It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
>1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
>few know this.
actually everyone knows this. darwin didn't know about genetics.
you're an idiot
>What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
>starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
>into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
>Einstein .
AND he goes on about aristotle.
aristotle's view of science died 400 years ago. as did creationism
bpuharic
he has a form letter. he just inserts a term from science, says 'what
is its true meaning and who defined it'
he can't even spell his own name without asking who gave it to him
bpuharic
here we go. another round of linguistic masturbation from a
creationist whose language skills are so poor and twisted by religion
that, when i asked him if he was different than his parents he
shrieked:
"THAT'S ONLY A THEORY!" 'who was the first one to say this?"
if he can't understand he's different than his parents then explaining
reproduction is hopeless
Ron O
Is backspace really claiming to not have gotten that point?
You can't make this junk up. No matter how stupid something is, an
anti-evolution creationist will have meant it when he says it.
Ron Okimoto
Stuart
Other than as an historical perspective, who gives a shit
what Darwin said or didn't say and why?
What does that have to do with the current state of TOE and
biological research?
Stuart
Stuart
> On Jan 25, 10:13 pm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>
> > backspace wrote:
> > >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> > It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
> > on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
> > syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
>
> It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
> 1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
> few know this.
>
Darwin didn't know anything about genetics. He didn't know anything
about DNA either.
But Darwin did know about variation and "sports".
> > His literal words have
> > no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
> > development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
> > and culture.
>
> His literal words had a profound effect on the direction mankind took
> with two world wars, a ongoing culture war in America.
WW1 and 2 started because Europeans couldn't get their collective shit
together. I don't think
the Serb that shot Ferdinand was thinking about Darwinism when he did
that.
Unable to come up with a rational argument against TOE, you do what
most
diseased religious fundamentalists do, seek to blame the worlds
troubles
on TOE or impugn Darwin's good name.
While Darwin was an ardent abolitionist, the SBC was being formed to
keep
the institution of slavery. Those are your forebears and you are their
legacy,
not Darwin's.
You really want to go down this road? I'll make mincemeat out of you.
Stuart
Conan the bacterium
> On Jan 25, 10:13�pm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>
> > backspace wrote:
> > >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> > It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who insists
> > on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
> > syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
>
> It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
> 1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
> few know this.
Huh? Very few whats know this? People who got their
understanding of evolution from a newspaper article?
Pretty much everybody who's read even an overview
of evolutionary theory is well aware of this.
Darwin candidly discussed three major objections that could
be raised to his theory, adding that he could only
hope that future discoveries would somehow answer
these objections, because he himself could not.
The mystery of how beneficial changes could persist
without being diluted out of existance was one of
these big three. So of course Darwin did not
use the phrase "random mutations" -- a phrase
which arose when Mendelian genetics was re-
discovered and expanded.
But Darwin DID postulate novel variations
in inheritable characteristics, even though
he did not use that exact term, nor understand
its present context. But the idea itself ay at the
very heart of his theory.
Conan
>
> > His literal words have
> > no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
> > development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
> > and culture.
>
> His literal words had �a profound effect on the direction mankind took
> with two world wars, a ongoing culture war in America. But it wasn't
> his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
> Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
> documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
> selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
>
> > �This is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
> > and their successors are what is important.
>
> It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
>
> > �The way the observable world
> > fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether you think
> > 'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
>
> Who made what predictions? Only somebody could have made a prediction
> - who si this person.
>
> > Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the system
> > and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the theory for
> > ever and one day. �
>
> What theory?
>
> > Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
> > understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are attacking.
>
> What is the modern system?
>
> > Try to grow your puling �intellect past the 12 year old stage that says "I
David Hare-Scott
> On Jan 25, 10:13 pm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>> backspace wrote:
>>> http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
>>> "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
>>> evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first
>>> edition of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable
>>> variations lead to differential reproductive success. This is not
>>> circular or tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has
>>> been, experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>>
>>> reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>>
>> It doesn't matter unless you are a monomaniac formalist cretin who
>> insists on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some
>> extended mystical syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a
>> religion.
>
> It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
> 1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
> few know this.
>
Everybody who has studied biology knows this, clearly you never have.
Saying it surfaced after he published does nothing at all to explain why it
matters, it is a non-sequitur.
>> His literal words have
>> no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in
>> the development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th
>> century writing and culture.
> His literal words had a profound effect on the direction mankind took
> with two world wars, a ongoing culture war in America.
Bullshit. You ascribe to the rest of the world your insanity.
But it wasn't
> his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
> Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
> documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
> selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
>
Well if that was the case then humanity had long time (in some cases two
millenia) to respond to those ideas and the impact of Darwin repeating them
on the culture would have been minimal or zero. You have obviously declared
war on your own feet.
The idea that science is mostly the steady accumulation of knowledge has
escaped you. Do you recall anybody famous saying "If I have seen further
than others it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants". Should
Charlie's shade drop in for a word or two I am pretty sure he would not
claim to have created every idea he wrote down from his own navel fluff but
that he benefitted greatly from those who went before and those who
corresponded with him during his life.
>> This is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
>> and their successors are what is important.
>
> It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
>
So if Darwin didn't do the dirty deed all your posts about him are empty are
they not. That's the second toe you have blown away. You are going fall on
your arse at this rate.
>> The way the observable world
>> fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether
>> you think 'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
> Who made what predictions? Only somebody could have made a prediction
> - who si this person.
>
All the scientists who work in the field and in fields that provide
supporting evidence made the predictions.
>> Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the
>> system and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the
>> theory for ever and one day.
> What theory?
>
Now you want to play more word games. I have been here before. Let's call
it the modern synthesis. The point is what you call it doesn't matter.
>> Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
>> understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are
>> attacking.
>
> What is the modern system?
The one expounded in all those biology books that you haven't read.
>
>> Try to grow your puling intellect past the 12 year old stage that
>> says "I found a spelling mistake in your work so all of what you say
>> must be wrong".
>
> What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
> starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
> into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
> Einstein .
Well get in your time machine and turn that gun on Empedocles instead of
your feet 'cause he obviously causes you to lose sleep which makes you post
the same monomaniac drivel every few weeks and we could do without that.
David
backspace
But if a cow was meant to produce beer instead of milk would it still
be a success? For who is what a success, who is this person.
backspace
> > It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> > in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
> What's yer point? In which book did Empedocles write about natural
> selection acting on a pool of inheritable variation?
Are you using "acting" in the pattern or design sense. This is
something I picked up in OoS where Darwin says ".....NS acts...." but
he was using "acts" in the pattern sense, no will or volition was
involved. In English we have much ambiguity, it is a quirk of the
language itself leading to profound confusion.
> Nearly every research paper published covers predictions and results.
> Look up any of the several million papers on evolutionary biology
> published in the last 150 years.
Which one of them defined what Life is? or what is the transition
matrix that maps polypeptide space in Human space.
> > What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
> > starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
> > into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
> > Einstein .
> No, Empedocles did not do biology, nor did he describe the General
> Theory of Relativity. He didn't design automobiles or computer chips,
> either. See, we (meaning everybody but you) know more than our
> ancestors did 1000 or 1,000,000 years ago. This is because the people
> who contribute to civilization learn from those who came before them,
> then add art or knowledge themselves. They *build on knowledge. In
> this way, knowledge accumulates, and those willing to learn know more
> than those in the past.
Empedocles and Aristotle made society think in tautological terms,
this has for example made it impossible for people to understand
bacterial resistance as a cause effect phenomena.
backspace
> That would be the system that evaluates the various
> contributions of transposons, �population
> genetics, partial and wholesale genomic captures, frame-
> shift mutations, sexual selection, reproductive isolation,
> parasite-driven differentation, genetic drift, modification
> of transcription factors, monte carlo simulations,
> epigenetic factors both in utero and later,
> "costly displays", gene duplicaton followed
> by mutation, gene, individual, and group level
> selection, copy number "errors", lateral
> genetic transfer, and dozens of other particulars
Taking all those insights into something you cannot define: Life,
explain how the egg of a chicken transmits the inverted pendulum
control algorithm to a full grown chicken.
backspace
> Unable to come up with a rational argument against TOE, you do what
> most
> diseased religious fundamentalists do, seek to blame the worlds
> troubles
> on TOE or impugn Darwin's good name.
What theory? What is the theory, spell it out in concrete terms define
it like darwin did. He defined the ToE only once in OoS ".....
theory of gradual evolution....." take the term an look it up on
gutenberg.
John Wilkins
<sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
> backspace wrote:
> > On Jan 25, 10:13 pm, "David Hare-Scott" <sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
> >> backspace wrote:
...
> > But it wasn't
> > his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
> > Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
> > documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
> > selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
Osborn's book (no "e") is the worst kind of whig history. Empedocles
said nothing that could reasonably be interpreted as natural selection
to which we have access. Here's what Aristotle reports Empedocles as
saying:
"Here sprang up many faces without necks, arms wandered without
shoulders, unattached, and eyes strayed alone, in need of foreheads (B
57)."
"Many creatures were born with faces and breasts on both sides,
man-faced ox-progeny, while others again sprang forth as ox-headed
offspring of man, creatures compounded partly of male, partly of the
nature of female, and fitted with shadowy parts. (B 61)"
From Aristotle, Phys. II 8, 198b29
and
"Come now, hear how fire as it was separated raised up the nocturnal
shoots of men and pitiable women: it is no erring nor ignorant tale.
Whole-nature shapes first sprang up from the earth, having a portion of
both water and heat. These fire sent up, wishing to come to its like:
they did not yet display the desirable form of limbs nor voice, which
is the part proper to men. (B 62)"
This is nothing like natural selection, and if the parts join (because
of "Love") and are successful, they remain like that thereafter. Here's
a good introduction to Empedoclean thought, assuming against all
evidence that you are concerned about the truth rather than rhetorical
ploys:
backspace
<deinococcus0radiodur...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Darwin candidly discussed three major objections that could
> be raised to his theory, adding that he could only
> hope that future discoveries would somehow answer
> these objections, because he himself could not.
> The mystery of how beneficial changes could persist
> without being diluted out of existance was one of
> these big three.
Beneficial , "without being diluted out" and "persist" makes the
sentence a "truthiness-tautology" . Not exactly tautological but
somewhere between a truism and tautology.
rephrase:
".. The mystery of how ... changes could persist without being
diluted out ..."
The fact that they "persist" implies they aren't being diluted out,
making diluted out redundant:
rephrase:
".. The mystery of how ... changes could persist ..."
Now we see your sentence is a disguised truism lets rephrase again:
"..Changes do persist ..." and therefore my world view is correct. ,
which is a non-sequitur.
The stile of writing we get from the neo-empedoclians is formulating
truisms as tautologies , banal truths and "truthiness-tautologies" in
such a way that the overarching thrust can't be disputed .
backspace
> What does that have to do with the current state of TOE and
> biological research?
Where is the current theory that explains how Life is transmitted ?
backspace
> "Come now, hear how fire as it was separated raised up the nocturnal
> shoots of men and pitiable women: it is no erring nor ignorant tale.
> Whole-nature shapes first sprang up from the earth, having a portion of
> both water and heat. These fire sent up, wishing to come to its like:
> they did not yet display the desirable form of limbs nor voice, which
> is the part proper to men. (B 62)"
> This is nothing like natural selection, and if the parts join (because
> of "Love") and are successful, they remain like that thereafter. Here's
> a good introduction to Empedoclean thought, assuming against all
> evidence that you are concerned about the truth rather than rhetorical
> ploys:
Depends what you define as a Natural Selection. Osborn meant
"...survival of the fittest...." with natural selection. NS isn't a
concept, tautology or a process: It isn't even a sentence, but a term
that could be used as a proxy for any concept. The concept understood
by John Tyndall 1874 in his famous address was SoF , which is a
sentence and this sentence was meant with the term NS back then. What
is meant today with NS could be anything one wishes to: It has no
single true meaning. See http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/JohnTyndall
Osborn actually translated a German work into English, he like many
other people were interpreting other authors. He at least acknowledged
his sources but also made unique contributions. IN 1898 his views on
Evolution were "chance" but Waagen influenced him into "non-chance",
directed or non-random by the time of his NYtimes article in 1924 as
described here:
"...the idea of the 'Survival of the Fittest' must actually be traced
back to Empedocles, six centuries before Christ....", p.117 'From the
Greeks to Darwin by Osborn , available at Gutenberg press.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Fairfield_Osborn
=== darwin greek connection ===
http://www.amazon.com/Darwin-question-form-connection-Metaphysics/dp/B000X4EJUA/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1258653107&sr=1-12
=== p.246 ===
The idea of Evolution, rooted in the cosmic evo- lution and ' movement
' of Heraclitus and Aristotle, has passed to the progressive
development and succession of life seen in Empedocles, Aristotle,
Bruno, Descartes, Goethe, and in the more concrete mutability of
species ' of Bacon, Leibnitz, Buffon, Lamarck, and St. Hilaire.
The direct transition from the inorganic to the
organic is seen to have had a host of friends, nearly
to the present time, including, besides all the Greeks,
Lucretius, Augustine, Maillet, Buffon, Erasmus
Darwin, Lamarck, Treviranus, Oken, and Chambers-
Then we have seen the difficulty of ' origin ' removed
one step back by the ' pre-existent germs ' of Anaxa-
goras, revived by Maillet, Robinet, Diderot, and
Bonnet. Again, the rudiments of the monistic idea
of the psychic properties of all matter, foreshadowed
by Empedocles, are seen revived by Maupertuis and
Diderot. The difficulty of origin has been avoided
by the assumption of primordial minute masses,
which we have seen developed from the ' soft germ '
of Aristotle, to the 'vesicles' and 'filaments' of
Buffon, Erasmus Darwin, Lamarck, Oken, and
finally into our primordial protoplasm.
To the inquiry : Where did life first appear ? we
find the answer, ' in the sea,' given by Thales,
Anaximander, and Maillet; 'between sea and land,'
is the answer of Anaximenes, Diogenes, Democritus,
and Oken; 'from the earth,' is the solitary reply of
Lucretius. Now we are too wise to answer it. For
the succession of life we have followed the ' ascend-
ing scale ' of Aristotle, Bruno, Leibnitz, and others,
until Buffon realized its inadequacy, and Lamarck
substituted the simile of the branching tree. Of
man as the summit of the scale, and still in process
of becoming more perfect in his endowments, we
learn from Empedocles, Aristotle, Robinet, Diderot,
Erasmus Darwin, Lamarck, and Treviranus.
=== p.249 ===
Anatomy and Embryology, as pursued by Buffon,
Kant, Erasmus Darwin, Lamarck, Goethe, Trevi-
ranus, St. Hilaire, and Serres. The significance of
' degeneration ' and of * vestigial structures ' mean-
while grew clear in the interpretations of Sylvius,
Buffon, Kant, Goethe, and Lamarck.
=== p.245 ===
Remarkable as this parallelism 1 is, it is not com- plete. The line of
argument is the same, but the point d'appui is different. Darwin
dwells upon variations in single characters, as taken hold of by
Selection ; Wallace mentions variations, but dwells upon full-formed
varieties, as favourably or unfavour- ably adapted. It is perfectly
clear that with Darwin the struggle is so intense that the chance of
sur-
vival of each individual turns upon a single and even slight
variation. With Wallace, Varieties are already presupposed by causes
which he does not discuss, a change in the environment occurs, and
those varieties which happen to be adapted to it survive. There is
really a wide gap between these two statements and applications of the
theory.
=== p.242 ===
Sixth edition of the Origin of Species (1880, p. 424). In the
modification of species he refers as causes, successively to his own,
to Lamarck's, and to Buffon's factor in the following clear language:
"This has been effected chiefly through the natural selection of
numerous, successive, slight, favourable variations; aided in an
important manner by the inherited effects of the use and disuse of
parts....."
=== p.234 ===
Darwin soon saw the force of Selection as the secret of man's success
in forming useful races of animals and plants; and in October, 1838,
while reading Mal- thus on population, the idea of Selection in a
state of Nature first occurred to him as the result of the struggle
for existence, or rather for life, between different individuals and
species.
=== p.230 ===
Osborn quotes Kingsley out of context:
As Canon Kingsley wrote to Maurice : " Darwin is conquering
everywhere, and rushing in like a flood by the mere force of truth
and fact." Osborn left out "...absolute empire of accident..." -
[[CharlesKingsley]], because Osborn didn't believe evolution happened
by chance.
=== p.221 ===
http://www.archive.org/stream/fromgreekstodarw00osborich/fromgreekstodarw00osborich_djvu.txt
THE SELECTIONISTS:
The modern theory of Natural Selection was ex-
pressed first by DR. W. C. WELLS, in 1813, then by
St. Hilaire the elder, then by Matthew, in 1831, and
finally, with considerably less clearness, if at all, by
Naudin, in 1852. Darwin gives us references to
the two English writers. That of Wells is the first
statement of the theory of the survival, not simply
of fittest organisms, as understood by previous
writers, such as Buffon and Treviranus, but of or-
ganisms surviving because of their possession of
favourable variations in single characters. Wells'
paper, read before the Royal Society in 1813, was
entitled, " An Account of a White Female, part of
whose Skin resembles that of a Negro " ; it was not
published until iSiS. 1 He here recognizes the prin-
ciple of Natural Selection, as applied to the races
1 See his Two Essays upon the Dew and Single Vision.
222 DARWIN.
of men, and to the explanation of the origin of sin-
gle characters.
=== Henry Fairfield Osborn ===
{{{
On Nov 7, 8:08 pm, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
> === rephrased ===
> ".... The weak and insufficiently endowed among all forms tend to drop
> out.....The strongest.... win. .... The naturally weak fall by the
> wayside............."
And then follow the non-sequitur by John Burroughs
>Species have come to be what they are through this process..
The same theme is carried forth in the book "From the Greeks to
Darwin" by Henry Fairfield Osborn
http://www.archive.org/stream/fromgreekstodarw00osborich/fromgreekstodarw00osborich_djvu.txt
p.117
:''".... It is rather a form of the Survival of the Fittest theory
applied, not to entire organisms,
but to the particles of which it is composed. Blind and ceaseless
trials, such as those imagined by Em- pedocles, Democritus, and
Lucretius, are made by these particles, impelled by their rude
sensibility. As a sequel of many failures, finally a favourable
combination is formed, which persists until a recom- bination is
rendered necessary....."''
Now this was essentially the interpretation of Burroughs of Darwin,
but note how Osborn and Burroughs differed over the term natural
selection.
:''...Morley (not knowing of Empedocles' hypothesis) speaks of as an
anticipation of a famous modern theory, referring of course to *
Natural Selection.' This is especially valuable because it affords
another conclusive proof that the idea of the ' Survival of the
Fittest ' must
actually be traced back to Empedocles, six centuries before Christ. It
is contained in an imaginary dialogue upon the teleological view of
Nature
between ' Saunderson ' and the ' Professor ' : " ... all the faulty
combinations of matter disappeared, and that those individuals only
survived whose mechanism implied no important misadaptation
(contradiction), and who had the power of supporting and per-
petuating themselves....." ''
=== Tautological essence ===
: " ... all the faulty ...disappeared, and that those that
survived.... had the power of .....perpetuating themselves....." ''
Stuart
If I need to explain that to you, you are in deeper kim chee than I
thought.
Stuart
Ken Shackleton
Most creationists seem to be stupid on purpose....it's a wall that
they throw up to protect their faith.
Ken Shackleton
Reproduction by cows would entail the production of calves....not milk
or beer.
C'mon....are you really this stupid?
backspace
> :''...Morley (not knowing of Empedocles' hypothesis) speaks of as an
> anticipation of a famous modern theory, referring of course to *
> Natural Selection.' This is especially valuable because it affords
> another conclusive proof that the idea of the ' Survival of the
> Fittest ' must
> actually be traced back to Empedocles, six centuries before Christ. It
> is contained in an imaginary dialogue upon the teleological view of
> Nature
> between ' Saunderson ' and the ' Professor ' : " ... all the faulty
> combinations of matter disappeared, and that those individuals only
> survived whose mechanism implied no important misadaptation
> (contradiction), and who had the power of supporting and per-
> petuating themselves....." ''
Who was Morley and Saunderson, because their paragraph was
reformulated verbatim by Darwin and he labeled it Theory of Evolution
as per OoS:
"......This difficulty, as in the case of unconscious selection by
man, is avoided on the theory of gradual evolution, through the
preservation of a large number of individuals, which varied more or
less in any favourable direction, and of the destruction of a large
number which varied in an opposite manner. hat many species have been
evolved in an extremely gradual manner, there can hardly be a
doubt......"
Burkhard
It would be a success if it increased its reproductive fitness, i.e.
have more viable offspring than the milk producing one. If for
instance beer producing cows would attract the attention of a certain
bipedal parasite that drinks the beer, and in turn feeds the cow and
protects it from predators, this could be a differential advantage
that results in more offspring than that of milk producing cows. It
leaves the problem how to feed that offspring, but if the parasite
takes care of this it could work.
Burkhard
It is commonly called sex education, and we teach it in secondary
school. It involves mummy and daddy who like each other very much. Ask
your father about it.
backspace
> > But if a cow was meant to produce beer instead of milk would it still
> > be a success? For who is what a success, who is this person.
>
> It would be a success if it increased its reproductive fitness, i.e.
> have more viable offspring than the milk producing one. If for
> instance beer producing cows would attract the attention of a certain
> bipedal parasite that drinks the beer, and in turn feeds the cow and
> protects it from predators, this could be a differential advantage
> that results in more offspring than that of milk producing cows. It
> leaves the problem how to feed that offspring, but if the parasite
> takes care of this it could work.
A success is something you achieve on reaching a goal. Do cows have
goals? If cowbat had evolved instead of cow from which perspective
would this be either a success or failure. Lets presumed nothing
evolved ,no animals no humans just blissful unconsciousness , from
which perspective would this be a success or failure.
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 26, 10:06�am, Burkhard <b.scha...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>> > But if a cow was meant to produce beer instead of milk would it still
>> > be a success? For who is what a success, who is this person.
>>
>> It would be a success if it increased its reproductive fitness, i.e.
>> have more viable offspring than the milk producing one. If for
>> instance beer producing cows would attract the attention of a certain
>> bipedal parasite that drinks the beer, and in turn feeds the cow and
>> protects it from predators, this could be a differential advantage
>> that results in more offspring than that of milk producing cows. It
>> leaves the problem how to feed that offspring, but if the parasite
>> takes care of this it could work.
>
>A success is something you achieve on reaching a goal
let me do a pre emptive strike and be backspace, with his linguistic
leukemia:
'who determines this 'success'? and goals are chosen. who 'chooses'
this goal'?
yadda yadda
bpuharic
and he grows more hair on the palms of his hands, asking questions he
can't begin to understand
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 26, 12:24�am, Kermit <unrestrained_h...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> > It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
>> > in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
>
>> What's yer point? In which book did Empedocles write about natural
>> selection acting on a pool of inheritable variation?
>
>Are you using "acting" in the pattern or design sense. This is
>something I picked up in OoS where Darwin says ".....NS acts...." but
>he was using "acts" in the pattern sense, no will or volition was
>involved. In English we have much ambiguity, it is a quirk of the
>language itself leading to profound confusion.
>
the collapse of meaningfull language is a characteristic of
creationism. thus we have creationists admitting evolution happens
while calling it something else; and we have this guy who thinks the
fact he is different than his parent is a 'theory' and wants to know
who invented that idea.
creationism kills language
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 26, 2:46�am, Conan the bacterium
><deinococcus0radiodur...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Darwin candidly discussed three major objections that could
>> be raised to his theory, adding that he could only
>> hope that future discoveries would somehow answer
>> these objections, because he himself could not.
>> The mystery of how beneficial changes could persist
>> without being diluted out of existance was one of
>> these big three.
>
>Beneficial , "without being diluted out" and "persist" makes the
>sentence a "truthiness-tautology" . Not exactly tautological but
>somewhere between a truism and tautology.
>
>rephrase:
and his assault on language continues. creationists think in a 3rd
century mindset, before science was invented
so his 'rephrase' is an attempt to recast science in the language of a
pre-scientific culture
dan diner, in his book 'lost in the sacred; why the muslim world stood
still' discussed how, among islamist fundamentalists, language could
not change because it encapsulated sacred ideas
creationism is the same. creationists have their medieval view of the
world. he 'rephrases' scientific concepts in ways that someone from
the 14th century would recognize, but modern science does not
and it's because of his religion
Iain
Burkhard
> On Jan 26, 10:06�am, Burkhard <b.scha...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>
> > > But if a cow was meant to produce beer instead of milk would it still
> > > be a success? For who is what a success, who is this person.
>
> > It would be a success if it increased its reproductive fitness, i.e.
> > have more viable offspring than the milk producing one. If for
> > instance beer producing cows would attract the attention of a certain
> > bipedal parasite that drinks the beer, and in turn feeds the cow and
> > protects it from predators, this could be a differential advantage
> > that results in more offspring than that of milk producing cows. It
> > leaves the problem how to feed that offspring, but if the parasite
> > takes care of this it could work.
>
> A success is something you achieve on reaching a goal. Do cows have
> goals?
Says who? The example I gave you explicated how "success" in
"differential reproductive success" is understood, goals are not
mentioned. You could say that this uses the word partly in an
analogous way (but then, success as "achieving a goal is a relatively
recent meaning too - originally, it just mean: "to follow" ) but every
competent speaker of Englis who reads a standard textbook in biology
should get the meaning.
If cowbat had evolved instead of cow from which perspective
> would this be either a success or failure.
As far as the ToE is involved, neither. Just a thing that happened
Burkhard
> On Jan 26, 2:46�am, Conan the bacterium
>
> <deinococcus0radiodur...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Darwin candidly discussed three major objections that could
> > be raised to his theory, adding that he could only
> > hope that future discoveries would somehow answer
> > these objections, because he himself could not.
> > The mystery of how beneficial changes could persist
> > without being diluted out of existance was one of
> > these big three.
>
> Beneficial , "without being diluted out" and "persist" makes the
> sentence a "truthiness-tautology" . Not exactly tautological but
> somewhere between a truism and tautology.
>
> rephrase:
aka: falsify
> ".. The mystery of how ... changes could persist �without being
> diluted out ..."
> The fact that they "persist" implies they aren't being diluted out,
> making diluted out redundant:
> rephrase:
aka: forge
> ".. The mystery of how ... changes could persist ..."
>
> Now we see your sentence is a disguised truism lets rephrase again:
aka: let's dishonestly put words in your mouth you did not use.
Mitchell Coffey
First place, you should look up the word "verbatim," it doesn't mean
what you think it means. Secondly, even a simpleton should understand
that ideas and facts are true regardless who thought of it, in your
satisfaction, first. Third and significantly, since Morley was about
21 when the OoS was published and Saunderson wasn't born until about
fourteen years after Darwin's death, there are serious issue regarding
your claim that they anticipated Darwin's ideas.
Mitchell Coffey
g...@risky-biz.com
> On Jan 25, 9:12�pm, Ken Shackleton <ken.shackle...@shaw.ca> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On Jan 25, 11:58�am, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > > Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
> > > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> > Perhaps he did not use those exact words and Weiner is using a modern
> > term for Darwin's description of the process.
>
> > It is clear that Darwin meant differential reproductive success.
>
> Does "differential reproductive success" have a single true fixed
> meaning? Where was the concept defined and who defined it.
Choose any word in your paragraph above. Tell me who defined it and
when.
> DRS like NS
> isn't even a sentence,
Luckily scientists do use sentences, paragraphs and indeed whole books
to explain their ideas clearly. It's you, and only you, who dissects
language into tiny bits in a desperate attempt to feign confusion.
Sad.
Greg Guarino
Mitchell Coffey
At least you've evolved yourself, at bit; last year you insisted that
in the OoS Darwin never defined the theory of evolution. It doesn't
of course matter what Darwin wrote in 1859, neither is there any sane
reason to define it in 2010 as Darwin did, but this is the first time
I've ever seen you acknowledge that facts exist.
Mitchell Coffey
hersheyh
To say that a cow was "meant" to produce x is meaningless gibberish
unless you can point to a sentient mechanism that led to that result.
The mechanism that did lead to the production of milk rather than beer
was natural selection, in which the dumb, non-sentient environment led
to the result by natural selection. The dumb non-sentient environment
did not *mean* to produce milk. It is simply the result to which cows
were constrained and that led to their successful reproduction.
> For who is what a success, who is this person.
Biological success is empirically defined by biologists as that
phenotypic variation that has the greatest reproductive outcome
relative to its competitor phenotypes in a species. There are a
number of ways to measure this relative reproductive success. That
success is always conditional on the current environment. Being a
relative "success" in a disappearing environment favorable for your
species doesn't prevent extinction. It just means that you (or,
rather, your progeny) are the last of your species to go to that dark
end. Being a relative success in either a stable or growing
environmental niche or in being able to enter a previously unusable
niche means that your particular phenotypes get perpetuated to the
extent that they are genetically determined.
You could, if you were so moved, define biological success as early
death or sterility, all without issue. As a member of a cult that
wishes for a good sin-free death, perhaps that is how you define
"biological success." But few biological organisms would regard that
as "success" as evidenced by the amount of energy and effort put into
the competition for mates and care for offspring.
hersheyh
Life has *continuously* and *uninterruptedly* been transmitted and
informed by genetic chemicals since life first appeared on this
planet (by whatever means it first appeared) some 3.8 bybp ago. The
exact genetic chemical may have changed since that time (the current
genetic chemical for all but a few viruses is a chemical called DNA;
it may have been RNA or PNA or something else earlier on). The exact
genetic information certainly has during that time, since it has
diverged and changed over all that time to produce the entire present
biota from bacteria to plants to other eucaryotes to metazoan
animals. This chemical generates and is transmitted as an enclosed
self-perpetuating chemical reaction. Once that reaction stops, the
organism is individually called 'dead', but, if fortunate it may have
transmitted the information (perhaps modified) to a new generation.
What is your current theory that explains how Life is transmitted?
Vital force? Protein?
jillery
> On Jan 26, 1:03�am, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Jan 26, 2:06 am, Stuart <bigdak...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > What does that have to do with the current state of TOE and
> > > biological research?
>
> > Where is the current theory that explains how Life is transmitted ?
>
> Life has *continuously* and *uninterruptedly* been transmitted
IOW common descent.
Just thought I should make this point even more blatantly obvious to
the ID crowd.
Carry on.
haiku jones
> On Jan 26, 1:04 am, haiku jones <575jo...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > That would be the system that evaluates the various
> > contributions of transposons, population
> > genetics, partial and wholesale genomic captures, frame-
> > shift mutations, sexual selection, reproductive isolation,
> > parasite-driven differentation, genetic drift, modification
> > of transcription factors, monte carlo simulations,
> > epigenetic factors both in utero and later,
> > "costly displays", gene duplicaton followed
> > by mutation, gene, individual, and group level
> > selection, copy number "errors", lateral
> > genetic transfer, and dozens of other particulars
>
> Taking all those insights into something you cannot define: Life,
> explain how the egg of a chicken transmits the inverted pendulum
> control algorithm to a full grown chicken.
Before we continue this discussion, may I
suggest that you might want to invest in one
of these:
It will significantly reduce the work
required for you to repeatedly excavate and
relocate the goal posts.
Haiku Jones
Inez
> http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
> reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
I'm curious if you can point to a single person who finds your line of
argument convincing. Creationist, "evolutionst," anyone.
Conan the bacterium
Hey, I think you could even have left out "convincing"...
Conan
backspace
> The mechanism that did lead to the production of milk rather than beer
> was natural selection, in which the dumb, non-sentient environment led
> to the result by natural selection. �The dumb non-sentient environment
> did not *mean* to produce milk. �It is simply the result to which cows
> were constrained and that led to their successful reproduction.
But if the cow had in fact produced beer, you would tell me the same
story(milk replaced with beer) making your narrative unfalsifiable.
> > For who is what a success, who is this person.
> Biological success is empirically defined by biologists as that
> phenotypic variation that has the greatest reproductive outcome
> relative to its competitor phenotypes in a species. �
Who is this biologist and when did he define it?
>There are a
> number of ways to measure this relative reproductive success.
Begging the question here, you are assuming the term is an accepted
agreed apon protocol between signal sender and receiver. As a term DRS
could be used as a proxy for any concept defined by any individual: To
which person are you referring to. Take the term "ninja turtles", in
our cultural context it refers to a pietza eating turtle by the name
of Donatello. In Japan though 200 years ago it would be a Ninja hiding
in a turtle suite.
NT like NS and DRS aren't sentences but terms , used as and encoding
mechanism between signal sender and receiver, an agreed apon protocol
for some agreed apon concept. What is the concept with DRS and who has
this concept because DRS like NS , NT , SoF and "Beer is beer" has no
single true meaning
>�That
> success is always conditional on the current environment. �
Truism, anything in existence depends on its environment.
> Being a
> relative "success" in a disappearing environment favorable for your
> species doesn't prevent extinction.
Truthiness -tautology
> �Being a relative success in either a stable or growing
> environmental niche or in being able to enter a previously unusable
> niche means that your particular phenotypes get perpetuated to the
> extent that they are genetically determined.
TAutology
> You could, if you were so moved, define biological success as early
> death or sterility, all without issue. �
Not moved, who has defined what in the same sense Newton defined the
inverse square law.
David Hare-Scott
I don't think that facts matter in the Backspace universe. He is like the
marketeer commanded to sell shrink-wrapped turd sandwiches, he hopes that if
he skips around quickly enough and repeats 'all natural straight from the
cow to you' often enough somebody will buy it.
David
Stuart
> On Jan 26, 6:30 pm, hersheyh <hershe...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > The mechanism that did lead to the production of milk rather than beer
> > was natural selection, in which the dumb, non-sentient environment led
> > to the result by natural selection. The dumb non-sentient environment
> > did not *mean* to produce milk. It is simply the result to which cows
> > were constrained and that led to their successful reproduction.
>
> But if the cow had in fact produced beer, you would tell me the same
> story(milk replaced with beer) making your narrative unfalsifiable.
His narrative, you microencephalopath, is independent of whatever it
is a cow
produces. The what is irrelevant, the how is via differential
reproductive success.
>
> > > For who is what a success, who is this person.
> > Biological success is empirically defined by biologists as that
> > phenotypic variation that has the greatest reproductive outcome
> > relative to its competitor phenotypes in a species.
>
> Who is this biologist and when did he define it?
Any number of biologists use this definition.
Your preoccupation with who said what, when.. is ridiculous and quite
besides the point.
>
> >There are a
> > number of ways to measure this relative reproductive success.
>
> Begging the question here, you are assuming the term is an accepted
> agreed apon protocol between signal sender and receiver.
Who said anything about signal and sender?
Where did that come from?
Stuart
Mitchell Coffey
He believes observed instances of natural selection in some mystical
sense did not happen, despite being observed, if in writing up their
observations scientists use terminology not instantly understood by
microencephalopaths.
Mitchell
Stuart
Aahhhh... now I see.
Stuart
Frank J
> http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
> reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
Why are you reading Darwin anyway? You can support your "theory"
without any reference to him, or to the 150 years of science that
followed.
hersheyh
> On Jan 26, 6:30�pm, hersheyh <hershe...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > The mechanism that did lead to the production of milk rather than beer
> > was natural selection, in which the dumb, non-sentient environment led
> > to the result by natural selection. �The dumb non-sentient environment
> > did not *mean* to produce milk. �It is simply the result to which cows
> > were constrained and that led to their successful reproduction.
>
> But if the cow had in fact produced beer, you would tell me the same
> story(milk replaced with beer) making your narrative unfalsifiable.
If cows were the *only* mammal to make beer instead of milk, that
would be the equivalent of a cow giving birth to a eagle and could be
used as evidence against evolution. But since cows, like the long
line of mammals that preceded that species, produces milk like its
still extant close relatives among the ruminants, I don't have to
explain why cows produce beer.
The evolutionary narrative is falsifiable. If only you had that
example of a cow producing beer instead of milk like all its close
living relatives. Too bad.
>
> > > For who is what a success, who is this person.
> > Biological success is empirically defined by biologists as that
> > phenotypic variation that has the greatest reproductive outcome
> > relative to its competitor phenotypes in a species. �
>
> Who is this biologist and when did he define it?
I am uninterested in your boring nonsense wrt to demanding names of
originators. If you are interested in learning whether biologists use
this empirical definition, read the biological literature on natural
selection.
> >There are a
> > number of ways to measure this relative reproductive success.
>
> Begging the question here, you are assuming the term is an accepted
> agreed apon protocol between signal sender and receiver.
Among *biologists* and people interested in biology, it is. And
biologists don't give a flying f**k that a biological ignormous like
you doesn't accept it. Especially since you remain intentionally
ignorant precisely in order to avoid understanding what they mean.
Every field has its jargon. If you want to understand the field, you
have to learn the meaning of the jargon rather than complain that you
don't want to.
> As a term DRS
> could be used as a proxy for any concept defined by any individual: To
> which person are you referring to. �
I am uninterested in the fact that you have brain damage like the
person who mistook his wife for a hat rack (confusing the concept of
DRS for something else).
> Take the term "ninja turtles", in
> our cultural context it refers to a pietza eating turtle by the name
> of Donatello. In Japan though 200 years ago it would be a Ninja hiding
> in a turtle suite.
I didn't know that hotels had turtle suites. But your argument above
show the fatuity of your problem with the fact that Darwin didn't say
exactly this or that word or phrase. I am using the terms as they are
used in light of modern evidence, not using the exact wording that
Charles Darwin used.
> NT like NS and DRS aren't sentences but terms , used as and encoding
> mechanism between signal sender and receiver,
Only when the receiver is not a dim-witted creationist, apparently.
Most people learn to parse English *in context* to determine the
underlying meaning. If I use the phrase Ninja turtle in a discussion
of 80s cartoons, the context is different from a discussion of ancient
Japanese Ninjas in turtle suits. Fundamentalists, apparently, have
real problems when terms are used in non-literal ways. Must be a form
of brain damage.
> an agreed apon protocol
> for some agreed apon concept. What is the concept with DRS and who has
> this concept because DRS like NS , NT , SoF and "Beer is beer" has no
> single true meaning
>
> >�That
> > success is always conditional on the current environment. �
>
> Truism, anything in existence depends on its environment.
Yes. But what is "more fit" is, in fact, environmentally determined
without any necessary intelligent input from that environment.
>
> > Being a
> > relative "success" in a disappearing environment favorable for your
> > species doesn't prevent extinction.
>
> Truthiness -tautology
Well, the above is true. That doesn't make it a tautology. Or if it
does, than *anything* that is true (actually happens in empirical
reality) is a tautology. If, for example, no organisms could go
extinct (perhaps the invisible maker interferes), then change to adapt
to the environment would be unnecessary. Evolution would then be
unnecessary.
> > �Being a relative success in either a stable or growing
> > environmental niche or in being able to enter a previously unusable
> > niche means that your particular phenotypes get perpetuated to the
> > extent that they are genetically determined.
>
> TAutology
Only to the extent that any true statement is a tautology. If the
reproductive success of any phenotype were unaffected by environment,
then adaptive evolution would be unnecessary. If genotype could not
change, then no evolution could happen. IOW it is possible for
evolution to be impossible and thus falsified. That it isn't
falsified because of the way that the *real* material world actually
works does not make it a tautology unless you also think that the fact
that earth's orbit around the sun is an ellipse is also a tautology.
Just because something is actually true does not make it a tautology
in most people's understanding. You apparently have a form of brain-
damage that makes you think otherwise.
>
> > You could, if you were so moved, define biological success as early
> > death or sterility, all without issue. �
>
> Not moved, �who has defined what in the same sense Newton defined the
> inverse square law.
I give a flying *uck. I just told you how you can define "biological
success" in a way that would be the exact opposite of what biologists
today mean and you reject that definition, even thought it probably is
more agreeable to your death cultish ideas. So how would you define
"biological success" differently from most biologists and also from
your death cult?
Cory Albrecht
> Does "differential reproductive success" have a single true fixed
> meaning? Where was the concept defined and who defined it. DRS like NS
> isn't even a sentence, it can be made to mean whatever you want it to
> mean.
>
Does "orange" have a single true fixed meaning? Where was the concept
defined and who defined it? Blah, blah, blah...
Cory Albrecht
> On Jan 25, 10:13 pm, "David Hare-Scott"<sec...@nospam.com> wrote:
>> backspace wrote:
>>> http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
>>> "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
>>> evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
>>> of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
>>> lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
>>> tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
>>> experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>>
>>> Where did Darwin say "reproductive success" or "differential
>>> reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>>
>> on treating Charles Darwin as the formulator of some extended mystical
>> syllogism or the preceptor and prophet of a religion.
>
> It matters because like "random mutations" the term surfaced around
> 1910 in the Journals. Darwin also never said "random mutation" very
> few know this.
So what? That matters not a whit and does not prevent random mutations
from either existing or from providing the fodder of variation for
natural selection to work upon.
>
>> His literal words have
>> no intrinsic significance except to historians who are interested in the
>> development of the ideas of evolution in the context of 19th century writing
>> and culture.
> His literal words had a profound effect on the direction mankind took
> with two world wars, a ongoing culture war in America. But it wasn't
> his words, he lifted the ideas from Maltus, Mudie, Lucretius,
> Democritus, Epicurus, Aristotle and Empedocles. Henry Osborne
> documented how Empedocles was the orginator of the concept of natural
> selection. Aristotle reformulated Empedocles.
Again, so what? That may be important to cultural historians looking at
how Western culture developed, but is completely irrelevant to the
theory of evolution which based upon observed facts, not upon the words
of one man.
>
>> This is the 21st century and the concepts that he formulated
>> and their successors are what is important.
>
> It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
So what? Irrelevant to what modern biology actually is.
>
>> The way the observable world
>> fits the structure and its predictions is significant, not whether you think
>> 'survival of the fittest' is a tautology.
> Who made what predictions? Only somebody could have made a prediction
> - who si this person.
Every scientist makes predictions all the time.
>
>> Darwin's words represent one historical formulation of part of the system
>> and those words do not limit or determine the validity of the theory for
>> ever and one day.
> What theory?
>
>> Unless you are a blinkered literalist with no
>> understanding of the modern system that you imagine that you are attacking.
>
> What is the modern system?
With all the time you spend posting talk.origins, perhaps you should try
reading more? Though I doubt that would help - your logic comprehension
is crippled.
>
>> Try to grow your puling intellect past the 12 year old stage that says "I
>> found a spelling mistake in your work so all of what you say must be wrong".
>
> What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
> starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
> into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
> Einstein .
>
backspace
> I didn't know that hotels had turtle suites. �But your argument above
> show the fatuity of your problem with the fact that Darwin didn't say
> exactly this or that word or phrase. �I am using the terms as they are
> used in light of modern evidence, not using the exact wording that
> Charles Darwin used.
What is the modern evidence or modern explanation for how abstract
algorithms are transmitted from egg to chicken as opposed to how
Darwin explained this using his concept that he encoded for with the
term natural selection? How does a single term "natural selection"
explain the signal/noise relationship in cell signaling or the Gecko's
ability to stick to surfaces. Or more specific how does Darwin, John
Tyndall, Spencer, Osborn, Wallace concept - SoF - explain this.
Darwin used a specific wording to communicate a specific concept: The
favorable one was preserved and the non-favorable wasn't preserved,
which was the same thing Aristotle told us and Democritus as shown by
John Tyndall in 1874 where he championed the great breakthrough in
19th century thinking : Survival of the fittest, which Darwin said was
a "better expression". That was their concept, perhaps it isn't yours
why then are you using their terminology ?
What is your concept with natural selection and how did you derive the
concept because the term "natural selection" has no single true
meaning and no single true concept it can be associated with.
backspace
In other words you don't know who defined what a "differential
reproductive success" is. Let me ask you a question then " You have a
green light " - what does that mean if we don't know who said so?
You have a green light at least is a sentence DRS isn't even a
sentence. If we don't know what a sentence means without knowing who
uttered the sentence then how could we determine what DRS if we don't
know who said so?
Kleuskes & Moos
> On Jan 27, 1:39锟絘m, hersheyh <hershe...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > I didn't know that hotels had turtle suites. 锟紹ut your argument above
> > show the fatuity of your problem with the fact that Darwin didn't say
> > used in light of modern evidence, not using the exact wording that
> > Charles Darwin used.
>
> What is the modern evidence or modern explanation for how abstract
> algorithms are transmitted from egg to chicken as opposed to how
> Darwin explained this using his concept that he encoded for with the
> term natural selection?
Quite simple: abstract algorithms aren't transmitted from the egg to
the chicken. DNA does not contain any algorithms (look up the
definition of the word, please). At the very best it transmits a set
of concrete heuristics, and i apply the word "heuristics" very
loosely.
> How does a single term "natural selection"
> explain the signal/noise relationship in cell signaling or the Gecko's
> ability to stick to surfaces.
Not sure what you're referring to here.
> Or more specific how does Darwin, John
> Tyndall, Spencer, Osborn, Wallace concept - SoF - explain this.
Wha'?
> Darwin used a specific wording to communicate a specific concept: The
> favorable one was preserved and the non-favorable wasn't preserved,
> which was the same thing Aristotle told us and Democritus as shown by
> John Tyndall in 1874 where he championed the great breakthrough in
> 19th century thinking : Survival of the fittest, which Darwin said was
> a "better expression". That was their concept, perhaps it isn't yours
> why then are you using their terminology ?
Wording (in the sense of "using a specific syntactic/semantic
construct from a natural language") is only a very vague and fuzzy
medium employed to convey idea's from one brain to (a number of) other
(s). Many sciences have already abandoned it for more precise formal
languages, such as math or reaction equations in chemistry.
> What is your concept with natural selection and how did you derive the
> concept because the term "natural selection" has no single true
> meaning and no single true concept it can be associated with.
Words, words, words... Any word or phrase can be misinterpreted,
especially by those hell-bent on doing so.
rmacfarl
"Kleuskes & Moos" <kle...@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:4fb9b845-7d16-40b6...@e25g2000yqh.googlegroups.com...
> On Jan 27, 7:35 am, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jan 27, 1:39 am, hersheyh <hershe...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>> > I didn't know that hotels had turtle suites. But your
>> > show the fatuity of your problem with the fact that Darwin
>> > didn't say
Survival of the fittest was not Darwin's phrase and originally
did not appear in The Origin of Species.
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 27, 1:39�am, hersheyh <hershe...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> I didn't know that hotels had turtle suites. �But your argument above
>> show the fatuity of your problem with the fact that Darwin didn't say
>> exactly this or that word or phrase. �I am using the terms as they are
>> used in light of modern evidence, not using the exact wording that
>> Charles Darwin used.
>
>What is the modern evidence or modern explanation for how abstract
>algorithms are transmitted from egg to chicken as opposed to how
>Darwin explained this using his concept that he encoded for with the
>term natural selection? How does a single term "natural selection"
>explain the signal/noise relationship in cell signaling or the Gecko's
>ability to stick to surfaces. Or more specific how does Darwin, John
>Tyndall, Spencer, Osborn, Wallace concept - SoF - explain this.
darwin posited a mechanism. DNA is the ground for the mechanism. it is
the source of the variation on which natural selection acts
i could hypothesize that there must be a light source which causes
daylyght. the sun would be that source.
>
>Darwin used a specific wording to communicate a specific concept: The
>favorable one was preserved and the non-favorable wasn't preserved,
>which was the same thing Aristotle told us and Democritus as shown by
>John Tyndall in 1874 where he championed
well, no. and you keep ignoring the fact the 'favorable is preserved'
because it offers a reproductive advantage. aristotle did not say WHY
the favorable was preserved
but, i'm sure you'll dance around this like creationists always
do....it's not a theological explanation.
your language skills have been crippled by your religion so you can't
understand the explanation.
>What is your concept with natural selection and how did you derive the
>concept because the term "natural selection" has no single true
>meaning and no single true concept it can be associated with.
for a language obsessed religious fanatic, your language continues to
be imprecise
what is a 'single true meaning'? what is a 'single true concept'?
you creationists have unique and eccentric definitions of terms and
ideas that science does not use
again, proof that your language skills are corrupted by religion
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 27, 1:27�am, Frank J <f...@verizon.net> wrote:
>> On Jan 25, 1:58�pm, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
>> > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
>> > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
>> > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
>> > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
>> > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
>> > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>>
>> > Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
>> > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>>
>> Why are you reading Darwin anyway? You can support your "theory"
>> without any reference to him, or to the 150 years of science that
>> followed.
>
>In other words you don't know who defined what a "differential
>reproductive success" is.
again the creationist, with his corrupted view of religion, thinks
science is authority based
to a scientist, it's irrelevant 'who' did 'what'. to a creationist,
that's EVERYTHING since creationism is based not on logic, but on
authority.
thats why, in spite of the fact people have explained, ad nauseum, the
concepts of evolution to this creationist, he continues to focus on
WHO did something instead of WHAT they did.
to him, WHO is the only question. was it mathew? mark? luke? john?
otherwise he can't understand it.
Burkhard
This just shows your profound misunderstanding of how language works.
First, even if we have nothing else but "You have a green light", we
can make reasonable inferences to its meaning - presumably someone
gave the permission to go ahead with something. Now this inference
might turn out wrong as we get more information, but that is true with
_all_ understanding. At the moment for instance, I simply assume that
with "Darwin" you mean the natural scientist and author of the OoS,
but should I learn that your psychiatrist told you to write "Darwin"
every time you want to say "Picasso" to overcome your Picasso phobia,
I would revise this inference.
Now in your example, knowing who said "you have a green light" is
actually unlikely to make the inference more reliable. Knowing that it
was Mr Jones on the 23.3 does not tell us anything helpful. If instead
we learn that it was a driving instructor to a student in a car hating
in front of a traffic light by contrast tells us a lot, even if we'll
never know who these people were (the inference is still defeasible -
the instructor might have suffered from a migraine attack and is
commenting on a visual aura he sees around the student)
What we do not need to understand the sentence at all is to know who
first defined "green", "light" or "you", nor do we need to know how Mr
Jones defines these terms as he probably doesn't and just picked up
their meaning contextually, like all of us do.
In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
anyone remotely competent in the field to understand the term and
sentences containing it. Knowing who first defined it is as irrelevant
as knowing if it was Mr Jones who spoke about green lights.
backspace
> "Kleuskes & Moos" <kleu...@xs4all.nl> wrote in messagenews:4fb9b845-7d16-40b6...@e25g2000yqh.googlegroups.com...
Virtually nothing Darwin said was his ideas or phrases, he lifted the
stuff from many other authors such as Blyth, Mudie , Erasmus Darwin,
Aristotle, Democritus, Spencer, Treviranus etc. then lied saying how
he had a profound insight like for example in his letter to Asa Gray
how he discovered "descent with modification" after a "flash of
insight in 1848" - but it was Halloy a Catholic theist that he lifted
the term and concept from in a paper of 1848 by Halloy.
backspace
> darwin posited a mechanism. DNA is the ground for the mechanism. it is
> the source of the variation on which natural selection acts
Darwin used "natural selection acts" in the pattern sense not design
sense 13 times. Which sense are you using it?
=== asdf ===
ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE ACTION OF NATURAL SELECTION, OR THE SURVIVAL OF
THE
FITTEST.
In order to make it clear how, as I believe,*natural selection acts*,
I must beg permission to give one or two imaginary illustrations. Let
us take thecase of a wolf, which preys on various animals, securing
some by craft, some by strength, and some by fleetness; and let us
suppose that the fleetest prey, a deer for instance, had from any
change in the country increased in numbers, or that other prey had
decreased in numbers, during
that season of the year when the wolf was hardest pressed for food.
Under such circumstances the swiftest and slimmest wolves have the
best chance of surviving, and so be preserved or selected, provided
always that they retained strength to master their prey at this or
some other period of the year, when they were compelled to prey on
other animals. I can see no more reason to doubt that this would be
the result, than that man should be able to improve the fleetness of
his greyhounds by careful and methodical selection, or by that kind of
unconscious selection which follows from each man trying to keep the
best dogs without any thought of modifying the breed. I may add
that, according to Mr. Pierce, there are two varieties of the wolf
inhabiting the Catskill Mountains, in the United States, one with a
light greyhound-like form, which pursues deer, and the other more
bulky, with shorter legs, which more frequently attacks the shepherd's
flocks.
== qsdf ==
*Natural selection acts* only by the preservation and accumulation of
small inherited modifications, each profitable to the preserved being;
and as modern geology has almost banished such views as the excavation
of a great valley by a single diluvial wave, so will natural
selection banish the belief of the continued
creation of new organic beings, or of any great and sudden
modification in their structure.
== asdf ==
Natural selection acts solely through the preservation of variations
in some way advantageous, which consequently endure. Owing to the
high geometrical rate of increase of all organic beings, each area is
already fully stocked with inhabitants, and it follows from this, that
as the favoured forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less
favoured decrease and become rare. Rarity, as geology tells us, is
the
precursor to extinction. We can see that any form which is
represented by few individuals will run a good chance of utter
extinction, during great fluctuations in the nature or the seasons, or
from a temporary increase in the number of its enemies. But we may go
further than this; for as new forms are produced, unless we admit that
specific forms can go on indefinitely increasing in number, many old
forms must become extinct.
That the number of specific forms has not indefinitely increased,
geology plainly tells us; and we shall presently attempt to show why
it is that the number of species throughout the world has not become
immeasurably great.
== asdf ==
We have seen that in each country it is the species belonging to the
larger genera which oftenest present varieties or incipient species.
This, indeed, might have been expected; for as natural selection acts
through one
form having some advantage over other forms in the struggle for
existence, it will chiefly act on those which already have some
advantage; and the largeness of any group shows that its species have
inherited from a common ancestor some advantage in common. Hence, the
struggle for the production of new and modified descendants will
mainly lie between the larger groups, which are all trying to increase
in number. One large group will slowly conquer another large group,
reduce its number, and thus lessen its chance
of further variation and improvement. Within the same large group,
the later and more highly perfected sub-groups, from branching out and
seizing on many new places in the polity of nature, will constantly
tend to
supplant and destroy the earlier and less improved sub-groups. Small
and broken groups and sub-groups will finally disappear.
== asdf ==
Natural selection acts exclusively by the preservation and
accumulation of variations, which are beneficial under the organic and
inorganic conditions to which each creature is exposed at all periods
of life. The ultimate
result is that each creature tends to become more and more improved in
relation to its conditions. This improvement inevitably leads to the
gradual advancement of the organisation of the greater number of
living
beings throughout the world. But here we enter on a very intricate
subject, for naturalists have not defined to each other's satisfaction
what is meant by an advance in organisation.
== asdf ==
As natural selection acts solely by the preservation of profitable
modifications, each new form will tend in a fully-stocked country to
take the place of, and finally to exterminate, its own less improved
parent-form
and other less-favoured form s with which it comes into competition.
Thus extinction and natural selection go hand in hand. Hence, if we
look at each species as descended from some unknown form, both the
parent and all the transitional varieties will generally have been
exterminated by the very process of the formation and perfection of
the new form.
== asdf ==
As natural selection acts by life and death, by the survival of the
fittest, and by the destruction of the less well-fitted individuals, I
have sometimes felt great difficulty in understanding the origin or
formation of
parts of little importance; alm ost as great, though of a very
different kind, as in the case of the most perfect and complex
organs. In the first place, we are much too ignorant in regard to the
whole economy
of any one organic being to say what slight modifications would be of
importance or not. In a former chapter I have given instances of very
trifling characters, such as the down on fruit and the colour of its
flesh,
the colour of the skin and hair of quadrupeds, which, from being
correlated with constitutional differences, or from determining the
attacks of insects, might assuredly be acted on by natural selection.
The tail of the
giraffe looks like an artificially constructed fly-flapper; and it
seems at first incredible that this could have been adapted for its
present purpose by successive slight modifications, each better and
better fitted, for so
trifling an object as to drive away flies; yet we should pause before
being too positive even in this case, for we know that the
distribution and existence of cattle and other animals in South
America absolutely depend on
their power of resisting the attacks of insects: so that individuals
which could by any means defend themselves from these small enemies,
would be able to range into new pastures and thus gain a great
advantage. It is not
that the larger quadrupeds are actually destroyed (except in some rare
cases) by flies, but they are incessantly harassed and their strength
reduced, so that they are more subject to disease, or not so well
enabled
in a coming dearth to search for food, or to escape from beasts of
prey.
== asdf ==
Natural selection will never produce in a being any structure more
injurious than beneficial to that being, for natural selection acts
solely by and for the good of each. No organ will be formed, as Paley
has
remarked, for the purpose of causing pain or for doing an injury to
its possessor. If a fair balance be struck between the good and evil
caused by each part, each will be found on the whole advantageous.
After the lapse
of time, under changing conditions of life, if any part comes to be
injurious, it will be modified; or if it be not so, the being will
become extinct, as myriads have become extinct.
== What does natural selection do ==
Natural selection acts solely through the preservation of variations
in some way advantageous, which consequently endure. Owing to the
high geometrical rate of increase of all organic beings, each area is
already fully stocked with inhabitants, and it follows from this, that
as the favoured forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less
favoured decrease and become rare.
=== asdf ===
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.talk.creationism/browse_thread/thread/28c79b61c55b2df1
{{{
On Feb 8, 4:45 pm, backspace <Stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Natural selection acts was used 13 times by DArwin. Most of the
> passages below are tautologies and you should be able to identify it
> by now.http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/TauTology
== What does natural selection do ==
> Natural selection acts solely through the preservation of variations in some way advantageous, which consequently endure. Owing to the high geometrical rate of increase of all organic beings, each area
> is already fully stocked with inhabitants, and it follows from this, that as the favoured forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less favoured decrease and become rare.
== rephrase ==
Natural selection acts through the preservation of variations in
some way advantageous, which consequently endure. .... the favoured
forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less favoured
decrease and become rare.
== rephrase to stip out natural selection red herring ==
The preservation of advantageous variations endure. .... the
favoured forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less
favoured decrease and become rare.
== rephrase ==
The preservation of advantageous variations endure , the favoured
forms increase and the less favoured decrease and this tautology I
Charles Darwin call natural selection damning half humanity to an
eternity with me in the lake a fire because they are to stupid to
comprehend what a tautology is.
Those that were advantageous endured and those favored increased is a /
TauTology.
}}}
> >Darwin used a specific wording to communicate a specific concept: The
> >favorable one was preserved and the non-favorable wasn't preserved,
> >which was the same thing Aristotle told us and Democritus as shown by
> >John Tyndall in 1874 where he championed
> well, no. and you keep ignoring the fact the 'favorable is preserved'
> because it offers a reproductive advantage. �aristotle did not say WHY
> the favorable was preserved
He did, he said they were "preserved because they weren't perishable"
or " those constituted weren't perishable" - which Darwin said
"...shadowed forth the principle of natural selection......."
Burkhard
Amazingly enough, if you read the book of any scientist, they all use
words that have been used before by others. It is mainly novelists and
poets who make up their own words.
backspace
> What we do not need to understand the sentence at all is to know who
> first defined "green", "light" or "you", nor do we need to know how Mr
> their meaning contextually, like all of us do.
> In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
> biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
> anyone remotely competent in the field to understand the term and
> sentences containing it. Knowing who first defined it is as irrelevant
> as knowing if it was Mr Jones who spoke about green lights.
The attempt at obfuscation won't work here is what http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatics
says:
The sentence "You have a green light" is ambiguous. Without knowing
the context, the identity of the speaker, and their intent, it is not
possible to infer the meaning with confidence. For example:
* It could mean you are holding a green light bulb.
* Or that you have a green light to drive your car.
* Or it could be indicating that you can go ahead with the
project.
* Or that your body has a green glow
Similarly, the sentence "Sherlock saw the man with binoculars" could
mean that Sherlock observed the man by using binoculars; or it could
mean that Sherlock observed a man who was holding binoculars.[http://
ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Linguistics-and-Philosophy/24-903Spring-2005/
CourseHome/] The meaning of the sentence depends on an understanding
of the context and the speaker's intent. As defined in linguistics, a
sentence is an abstract entity � a string of words divorced from non-
linguistic context � as opposed to an utterance, which is a concrete
example of a speech act in a specific context. The cat sat on the mat
is a sentence of English; if you say to your sister on Tuesday
afternoon: "The cat sat on the mat", this is an example of an
utterance. Thus, there is no such thing as a sentence with a single
true meaning; it is underspecified (which cat sat on which mat?) and
potentially ambiguous. The meaning of an utterance, on the other hand,
is inferred based on linguistic knowledge and knowledge of the non-
linguistic context of the utterance (which may or may not be
sufficient to resolve ambiguity).
backspace
> In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
> biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
In the case of Darwin his pragmatics with selection was preservation
=== 1863 preservation ===
In 1863 Darwin wrote that he should have used "natural preservation"
instead of selection. Substitute "preservation and survival" when
reading an Aristotelian polemic on how monkeys were the ancestors of
humans.
OoS:
"....In order to make it clear how, as I believe,*natural selection
acts*, I must beg permission to give one or two imaginary
illustrations. Let us take the case of a wolf, which preys on various
animals, securing some by craft, some by strength, and some by
fleetness; and let us suppose that the fleetest prey, a deer for
instance, had from any change in the country increased in numbers, or
that other prey had decreased in numbers, during that season of the
year when the wolf was hardest pressed for food. Under such
circumstances the swiftest and slimmest wolves have the best chance of
surviving, and so be '''preserved or selected''', provided always that
they retained strength to master their prey at this or some other
period of the year, when they were compelled to prey on other
animals....."
".....best chance of surviving, and so be '''preserved or
selected'''....."
surviving and preserved says the same thing twice.
Burkhard
>
> > What we do not need to understand the sentence at all is to know who
> > first defined "green", "light" or "you", nor do we need to know how Mr
> > Jones defines these terms as he probably doesn't and �just picked up
> > their meaning contextually, like all of us do.
> > In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
> > biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
> > anyone remotely competent in the field to understand the term and
> > sentences containing it. Knowing who first defined it is as irrelevant
> > as knowing if it was Mr Jones who spoke about green lights.
>
> says:
>
> The sentence "You have a green light" is ambiguous.
All sentences are in varying degree. That is not an impediment for
communication.
Without knowing
> the context, the identity of the speaker, and their intent, it is not
> possible to infer the meaning with confidence. For example:
>
> � � * It could mean you are holding a green light bulb.
> � � * Or that you have a green light to drive your car.
> � � * Or it could be indicating that you can go ahead with the
> project.
> � � * Or that your body has a green glow
>
Guess what, wikipedia is wrong on this, as my example shows, or at
least badly worded. "Confidence of inference" comes in degrees. The
identity of the speaker is frequently unnecessary to increase the
confidence - as wikipedia's own example shows, since non of its
disambiguations mentions the speaker. His function, role or status ar
eregularly moe relevant.
For a proper academic analysis of how we tenattively disambiguate
sentences, see D Jurafsky, JH Martin, A Kehler, K Vander Linden, :
Speech and language processing 2000
> Similarly, the sentence "Sherlock saw the man with binoculars" could
> mean that Sherlock observed the man by using binoculars; or it could
> mean that Sherlock observed a man who was holding binoculars.[http://
> ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Linguistics-and-Philosophy/24-903Spring-2005/
> CourseHome/]
And this torpedoes of course your won argument, since despite knwoing
the identity of the speaker, we still have ambiguity.
>The meaning of the sentence depends on an understanding
> of the context and the speaker's intent. As defined in linguistics, a
> sentence is an abstract entity � a string of words divorced from non-
> linguistic context � as opposed to an utterance, which is a concrete
> example of a speech act in a specific context. The cat sat on the mat
> is a sentence of English; if you say to your sister on Tuesday
> afternoon: "The cat sat on the mat", this is an example of an
> utterance. Thus, there is no such thing as a sentence with a single
> true meaning; it is underspecified (which cat sat on which mat?) and
> potentially ambiguous. The meaning of an utterance, on the other hand,
> is inferred based on linguistic knowledge and knowledge of the non-
> linguistic context of the utterance (which may or may not be
> sufficient to resolve ambiguity).
And again, you torpedo your own argument. _Every_ sentence can be
misunderstood. Still language works. So it is neither necessary nor
desirable to have excessive contextual information - as soon as we
have specific reasons to believe two speakers are at cross purpose, we
rectify this by asking for a specific clarification.
Arkalen
*snip*
> The sentence "You have a green light" is ambiguous. Without knowing
> the context, the identity of the speaker, and their intent, it is not
> possible to infer the meaning with confidence. For example:
>
> � � * It could mean you are holding a green light bulb.
> � � * Or that you have a green light to drive your car.
> � � * Or it could be indicating that you can go ahead with the
> project.
> � � * Or that your body has a green glow
>
> Similarly, the sentence "Sherlock saw the man with binoculars" could
> mean that Sherlock observed the man by using binoculars; or it could
> mean that Sherlock observed a man who was holding binoculars.[http://
> ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Linguistics-and-Philosophy/24-903Spring-2005/
> CourseHome/] The meaning of the sentence depends on an understanding
> of the context and the speaker's intent. As defined in linguistics, a
> sentence is an abstract entity � a string of words divorced from non-
> linguistic context � as opposed to an utterance, which is a concrete
> example of a speech act in a specific context. The cat sat on the mat
> is a sentence of English; if you say to your sister on Tuesday
> afternoon: "The cat sat on the mat", this is an example of an
> utterance. Thus, there is no such thing as a sentence with a single
> true meaning; it is underspecified (which cat sat on which mat?) and
> potentially ambiguous. The meaning of an utterance, on the other hand,
> is inferred based on linguistic knowledge and knowledge of the non-
> linguistic context of the utterance (which may or may not be
> sufficient to resolve ambiguity).
As Burkhard said, what you need is the context. The identity of the
speaker may be a relevant part of that context... Or it may not. In
the case of "differential reproductive success" it's a term that's
specific to evolutionary theory, you don't need to know who defined it
to know its definition in that context.
hersheyh
> On Jan 27, 1:39锟絘m, hersheyh <hershe...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > I didn't know that hotels had turtle suites. 锟紹ut your argument above
> > show the fatuity of your problem with the fact that Darwin didn't say
> > used in light of modern evidence, not using the exact wording that
> > Charles Darwin used.
>
> What is the modern evidence or modern explanation for how abstract
> algorithms are transmitted from egg to chicken as opposed to how
> Darwin explained this using his concept that he encoded for with the
> term natural selection?
The mechanism of natural selection does not depend on the exact
mechanism of inheritance. It depends on there being a mechanism of
inheritance (more precisely an *imperfect* mechanism of inheritance).
That Darwin was wrong about the precise mechanism is irrelevant. That
he recognized the existence of 'heritable variations' (which are
necessary) is obvious from any intelligent reading of TOoS and well
recognized even by stone-age farmers and hunters. It was certainly
understood by the biological scientists of Darwin's day. If you read
for comprehension rather than whatever it is you are reading for, you
would see that. That you to addlepated to see it is your problem, not
that of biologists.
> How does a single term "natural selection"
> explain the signal/noise relationship in cell signaling or the Gecko's
> ability to stick to surfaces. Or more specific how does Darwin, John
> Tyndall, Spencer, Osborn, Wallace concept - SoF - explain this.
Only a specific aspect of those organismal features is explained by
"natural selection". Can you be more specific?
> Darwin used a specific wording to communicate a specific concept:
No. He used a specific wording to *concisely* communicate concepts he
explained in great detail over the course of several rather long books
that he modified over time, taking into account the comments of
others. That a concise phrase, like SoF or natural selection or
evolution or quantum mechanics or species, does not fully convey all
aspects of its meaning is rather typical of language.
> The
> favorable one was preserved and the non-favorable wasn't preserved,
> which was the same thing Aristotle told us and Democritus as shown by
> John Tyndall in 1874 where he championed the great breakthrough in
> 19th century thinking : Survival of the fittest, which Darwin said was
> a "better expression". That was their concept, perhaps it isn't yours
> why then are you using their terminology ?
Darwin wrote a whole book on sexual selection, so clearly his
conception of "survival of the fittest" doesn't necessarily involve
actual *literal* "survival", but is expansively referring to
reproductive success. That is part of the problem with concise
wording (and is also why biologists don't often use the SoF phrase
today). Some idiot, not to name names, will try to interpret
*literally* what takes a whole book to explain and qualify.
> What is your concept with natural selection and how did you derive the
> concept because the term "natural selection" has no single true
> meaning and no single true concept it can be associated with.
The *basic* idea of NS is quite simple and empirically observable by
basic experiments that can be done in a bacteria lab. The subtle
meanings require reading more widely and deeply than you seem capable
of.
Kermit
> On Jan 27, 1:27�am, Frank J <f...@verizon.net> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On Jan 25, 1:58�pm, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> > > "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> > > evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> > > of Origin of Species. What Darwin said is that heritable variations
> > > lead to differential reproductive success. This is not circular or
> > > tautologous. It is a prediction that can be, and has been,
> > > experimentally verified (Weiner 1994). .............."
>
> > > Where did Darwin say �"reproductive success" or "differential
> > > reproductive success" - I can 't find in in OoS. ?
>
> > Why are you reading Darwin anyway? You can support your "theory"
> > without any reference to him, or to the 150 years of science that
> > followed.
>
> In other words you don't know �who defined what a "differential
> reproductive success" is. �Let me ask you a question then " You have a
> green light " - what does that mean �if we don't know who said so?
What green light? We don't need permission to find out how things
work. Everybody who uses the language, or is in a community that uses
technical vocabulary, defines the meaning of words and phrases.
You really need some sort of remedial education or even therapy son.
You should not argue linguistics when you don't know how dictionaries
work.
>
> You have a green light at least is a sentence DRS isn't even a
> sentence. If we don't know what a sentence means without knowing who
> uttered the sentence then how could we determine what DRS if we don't
> know who said so?
No, "differential reproductive success" isn't a sentence; there are no
verbs.
It is insane to think that we need to know who first used a sentence
in order to say something. How could we know, why would it matter, and
who gave him or her permission to say it?
Who gave you permission to post what you did, and who posted it first?
Kermit
Kermit
> On Jan 27, 1:49�pm, Burkhard <b.scha...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>
> > What we do not need to understand the sentence at all is to know who
> > first defined "green", "light" or "you", nor do we need to know how Mr
> > their meaning contextually, like all of us do.
> > In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
> > biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
> > anyone remotely competent in the field to understand the term and
> > sentences containing it. Knowing who first defined it is as irrelevant
> > as knowing if it was Mr Jones who spoke about green lights.
>
> The attempt at obfuscation won't work here is whathttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatics
> says:
People who do not understand dictionaries should not read articles on
pragmatics.
<snip sophomoric silliness>
Kermit
Kermit
> On Jan 27, 1:49�pm, Burkhard <b.scha...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>
> > In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
> > biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
>
> In the case of �Darwin his pragmatics with selection was preservation
>
> === 1863 preservation ===
> In 1863 Darwin wrote that he should have used "natural preservation"
> instead of selection. Substitute "preservation and survival" when
> reading an Aristotelian polemic on how monkeys were the ancestors of
> humans.
Why not just preservation? Why do you add an additional word? Since
"preserve" and "Select" are not identical n meaning, he would have had
to change the sentences about, but yes, he could have used "natural
preservation" instead.
This simply means that there are numerous correct ways to describe the
same idea.
>
> OoS:
> "....In order to make it clear how, as I believe,*natural selection
> acts*, I must beg permission to give one or two imaginary
> illustrations. Let us take the case of a wolf, which preys on various
> animals, securing some by craft, some by strength, and some by
> fleetness; and let us suppose that the fleetest prey, a deer for
> instance, had from any change in the country increased in numbers, or
> that other prey had decreased in numbers, during that season of the
> year when the wolf was hardest pressed for food. Under such
> circumstances the swiftest and slimmest wolves have the best chance of
> surviving, and so be '''preserved or selected''', provided always that
> they retained strength to master their prey at this or some other
> period of the year, when they were compelled to prey on other
> animals....."
>
> ".....best chance of surviving, and so be '''preserved or
> selected'''....."
>
> surviving and preserved says the same thing twice.
No, this is not a tautology, if that is the assertion you are fumbling
for. In this paragraph Darwin specifically mentions that particular
inheritable traits (slim and swift) are more likely to be preserved
because they are more likely to provide necessary food.
Because the individual *organisms survive, their inheritable traits
are *preserved. This is not a tautology; there are creationists now
(such as Ray Martinez, and Madman to a lesser degree) who claim that
while some individuals may be preserved and others not, in a
particular situation, this does not bring about the preservation (and
subsequent spread) of their various traits.
Kermit
Kleuskes & Moos
> On Jan 27, 1:12�pm, bpuharic <w...@comcast.net> wrote:
>
> > darwin posited a mechanism. DNA is the ground for the mechanism. it is
> > the source of the variation on which natural selection acts
>
> Darwin used "natural selection acts" in the pattern sense not design
> sense 13 times. Which sense are you using it?
<snip plagiarism>
Cut&Copied from "http://www.bartleby.com/11/4003.html"
Kermit
> On Jan 26, 12:24�am, Kermit <unrestrained_h...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > It wasn't his concepts but those of Empedocles as documented by Osborn
> > > in his book "From the Greeks to Darwin"
> > selection acting on a pool of inheritable variation?
>
> Are you using "acting" in the pattern or design sense.
Neither. "Act on" means that it "has an effect on".
I see that you ignored my question, also. Doesn't matter; it was an
unimportant point. But so was pointing out that Darwin's ideas did not
spring from a void. However, they also were not as derivative as you
seem to think.
> This is
> something I picked up in OoS where Darwin says ".....NS acts...." but
> he was using "acts" in the pattern sense, no will or volition was
> involved.
Yes. Heat acts on ice to release the bonds in the crystalline lattice
of the H2O molecules, and it melts.
Sunlight acts on chlorophyll in green leaves, and sugars are produced,
which the plants uses for energy (with, I might point out, no apparent
intention to do so).
"Act" is linguistically more vigorous than "has an effect on", and is
generally preferred by good writers, and understood by normal readers.
> In English we have much ambiguity, it is a quirk of the
> language itself leading to profound confusion.
It can, yes, especially when - as you are - the writer or speaker is
trying to avoid clarity.
>
> > Nearly every research paper published covers predictions and results.
> > Look up any of the several million papers on evolutionary biology
> > published in the last 150 years.
>
> Which one of them defined what Life is? or what is the transition
> matrix that maps polypeptide space in Human space.
Current usage defines the meaning of a word.
>
> > > What has been found is Empedocles reformulated through the ages ,
> > > starting with Aristotle .... his trial and error metaphysics infused
> > > into our collective thinking as noted by Popper in his discussion of
> > > Einstein .
> > No, Empedocles did not do biology, nor did he describe the General
> > Theory of Relativity. He didn't design automobiles or computer chips,
> > either. See, we (meaning everybody but you) know more than our
> > ancestors did 1000 or 1,000,000 years ago. This is because the people
> > who contribute to civilization learn from those who came before them,
> > then add art or knowledge themselves. They *build on knowledge. In
> > this way, knowledge accumulates, and those willing to learn know more
> > than those in the past.
>
> Empedocles and Aristotle made society think in tautological terms,
They "made" us?
> this has for example made it impossible for people to understand
> bacterial resistance as a cause effect phenomena.
What educated person doesn't think bacterial resistance is a cause-
effect phenomenon? It is a simple and often used example of natural
selection. I suspect you are simply confused about language again.
Perhaps you might explain it in your own words so we can see what you
are talking about.
Kermit
Dwib
> http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA500.html
> "....."Survival of the fittest" is a poor way to think about
> evolution. Darwin himself did not use the phrase in the first edition
> of Origin of Species.
Good point. Like, long necks for Girrafes is "survival of the
sexiest"!
Gene Poole
> On Jan 26, 1:03 am, backspace <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jan 26, 2:06 am, Stuart <bigdak...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> What does that have to do with the current state of TOE and
>>> biological research?
>> Where is the current theory that explains how Life is transmitted ?
>
> Life has *continuously* and *uninterruptedly* been transmitted and
> informed by genetic chemicals since life first appeared on this
> planet (by whatever means it first appeared) some 3.8 bybp ago.
[SNIP]
"3.8 bybp ago"?
Give it up Howard. If there's one thing that Backspace has taught me
it's that improperly worded phrases (real or imagined) are sufficient to
completely destroy an argument. So there!
el cid
May actually be survival of the best headbangers(1).
(1) Oddly enough, the term headbanger may have its origins
in a Led Zeppelin show at The Boston Tea Party. I don't think
there's a relation to the neo-Tea Partyists, whatever the
politics of Nuggent may lead you to believe. However, upon
further speculation, posers in leather pants bobbing their
heads violently enough to cause brain damage might offer
some explanation.
hersheyh
> On Jan 27, 1:12�pm, bpuharic <w...@comcast.net> wrote:
>
> > darwin posited a mechanism. DNA is the ground for the mechanism. it is
> > the source of the variation on which natural selection acts
>
> Darwin used "natural selection acts" in the pattern sense not design
> sense 13 times. Which sense are you using it?
If you actually understood language and how it is used, you would
*know* that one of the innate biases in human communication is to
ascribe "personhood" or "activity" to inanimate objects and natural
processes and do so by using the active voice. It simply seems more
comfortable and natural to say "gravity caused the flooding" rather
than "the flooding was caused by the rain". The former can, for some
particularly stupid people, leave the impression that the "rain"
intentionally caused the flood. The latter more passive phrasing
implies that we are being acted upon by forces or events which we
cannot control. The former led to the first animistic religions in
which we hoped to control our reality.
> === asdf ===
> ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE ACTION OF NATURAL SELECTION, OR THE SURVIVAL OF
> THE
> FITTEST.
>
> In order to make it clear how, as I believe,*natural selection acts*,
> I must beg permission to give one or two imaginary illustrations. �Let
> us take the case of a wolf, which preys on various animals, securing
> === asdf ===http://groups.google.com/group/alt.talk.creationism/browse_thread/thr...
guscubed
IF we assume for one second that you are right and not just making
stuff up as per usual, isn't this evidence in support of Darwin's
theory? That ToS is a synthesis of other people's ideas, as you claim,
should lend weight to the proposition that the theory was not
controversial and was widely supported by evidence even 150 years ago?
John Wilkins
<2db26dcb-f7c8-4d6d...@g1g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,
Burkhard <b.sc...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
Actually, it's only James Joyce.
haiku jones
Oh, it's just the old "Claim that Darwin was a plagiarist/
hypochondriac/
liar/adulterer/eater of babies" tactic, as if discrediting Darwin
the man would cause the entire edifice of the theory
of evolution, that product of tens of thousands of
researchers laboring for a century and a half,
to abruptly collapse.
I hear that Isaac Newton could be a big meanie...
Haiku Jones
John Wilkins
<513a1617-e226-4c62...@v37g2000prh.googlegroups.com>,
haiku jones <575j...@gmail.com> wrote:
Newton was a plagiarist. He was a nonbeliever in Christianity. He was
an alchemist. He stole from the treasury. He was a boring lecturer.
Ergo, physics is false.
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>Virtually nothing Darwin said was his ideas or phrases, he lifted the
>stuff from many other authors such as Blyth, Mudie , Erasmus Darwin
actually he didn't. natural selection was a new mechanism. you, as a
religious fanatic whose language is fatally corrupted by your beliefs,
simply are unable to understand science
you're not alone. dan diner has pointed out the same phenomenon with
islamist fanatics
apparently being a religous fanatic compromises language.
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 27, 1:49�pm, Burkhard <b.scha...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>> In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
>> biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
>
>In the case of Darwin his pragmatics with selection was preservation
>
>=== 1863 preservation ===
>In 1863 Darwin wrote that he should have used "natural preservation"
>instead of selection. Substitute "preservation and survival" when
>reading an Aristotelian polemic on how monkeys were the ancestors of
>humans.
aristotle never mentioned 'differential reproduction'
you are a linguistic illiterate
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 27, 1:49�pm, Burkhard <b.scha...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>> What we do not need to understand the sentence at all is to know who
>> first defined "green", "light" or "you", nor do we need to know how Mr
>> Jones defines these terms as he probably doesn't and �just picked up
>> their meaning contextually, like all of us do.
>
>> In the case of DRP, we have a clear idea of the context (evolutionary
>> biology), substantial amount of explanation through examples etc for
>> anyone remotely competent in the field to understand the term and
>> sentences containing it. Knowing who first defined it is as irrelevant
>> as knowing if it was Mr Jones who spoke about green lights.
>
>The attempt at obfuscation won't work here is what http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatics
>says:
>
>The sentence "You have a green light" is ambiguous. Without knowing
>the context, the identity of the speaker, and their intent, it is not
>possible to infer the meaning with confidence.
such a statement is true about any idea. any idea.
thus your view of language renders language impossible
in fact, one can ask
-who came up with the idea of lanaguge
-in what context was it developed
etc. without this info, language is impossible
is that your claim?
bpuharic
<steph...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Jan 27, 1:12�pm, bpuharic <w...@comcast.net> wrote:
>> darwin posited a mechanism. DNA is the ground for the mechanism. it is
>> the source of the variation on which natural selection acts
>
>Darwin used "natural selection acts" in the pattern sense not design
>sense 13 times. Which sense are you using it?
quite frankly, it's useless to explain anything to you. any number of
people have tried
as i pointed out, historian dan diner has developed an idea that
religious fundamentalists are incapable of understanding modern
science. their language skills are fatally compromised by their
fanaticism. they think all the answers ever needed are contained in
their religious view, and therefore science has nothing to add
attempts to help fanatics understand science is futile. you can not
understand 'experiment', 'empiricism', 'evidence', etc.
your whole worldview is based only on authority. and that recipe, for
2000 years, led nowhere.
> == rephrase ==
> Natural selection acts through the preservation of variations in
>some way advantageous, which consequently endure. .... the favoured
>forms increase in number, so, generally, will the less favoured
>decrease and become rare.
of COURSE you have to 'rephrase'. you have no choice. this proves
diner's contention
the very reason you 'rephrase' is because you extract the science from
an idea and try to recast it in terms your religion can handle
that is PROOF of how compromised your language skills really are.
thank you for proving what is so obvious to objective observers
>
>Those that were advantageous endured and those favored increased is a /
>TauTology.
you don't know what a tautology is.
if natural selection was a tautology it would not be testable. but it
IS. you, however, can not understand what role EXPERIMENT plays in
science
so you 'rephrase' scientific ideas to extract from them any concepts
that must be tested.
again you prove my point: you, with your religoius beliefs, can not
handle science. it is a failing of your religious views of the world
>
>> well, no. and you keep ignoring the fact the 'favorable is preserved'
>> because it offers a reproductive advantage. �aristotle did not say WHY
>> the favorable was preserved
>
>He did, he said they were "preserved because they weren't perishable"
which has nothing to do with natural selection
you can not understand. it's that simple. your religious beliefs have
destroyed your place in the 21st century
>
>
>
Michael Siemon
John Wilkins <jo...@wilkins.id.au> wrote:
And that mostly in his last work, and in his own self-generated pun
cascades. Surely that has to enter into the evaluation? (but don't call
me Surely....)
hersheyh
> On Wed, 27 Jan 2010 05:33:16 -0800 (PST), backspace
>
>
> >Virtually nothing Darwin said was his ideas or phrases, he lifted the
> >stuff from many other authors such as Blyth, Mudie , Erasmus Darwin
>
> actually he didn't. natural selection was a new mechanism. you, as a
> religious fanatic whose language is fatally corrupted by your beliefs,
> simply are unable to understand science
Actually "natural selection" was not a new mechanism. It was
described by Malthus and Paley among others. But they thought that
"natural selection" acted to *preserve* stasis by removing deleterious
variants. That was largely because their thinking was limited to the
relatively short time-frames of human lifetimes. Darwin was able to
think through the consequences of natural selection in non-constant
(changing) environments over deep time. *That* is what was new in
Darwin's thought. The recognition that the very same mechanism that
produces the appearance of stasis in our lifetimes (species
immutability as a kind of Platonic ideal created as is) could, in the
longer time frames of an old earth and its ever changing environments,
lead to change, the very opposite of short-term stasis. IOW, Darwin
linked the new geology to biology in a way that other scientists of
his time did not.
BTW, during the later decline of Darwin, the popular explanation of
evolutionary changes were that species, like individuals, had a
developmental pattern (birth, youth, adulthood, senesence).
backspace
> > Virtually nothing Darwin said was his ideas or phrases, he lifted the
> > stuff from many other authors such as Blyth, Mudie , Erasmus Darwin,
> > he had �a profound insight like for example in his letter to Asa Gray
> > how he discovered "descent with modification" after a "flash of
> > insight in 1848" - but it was Halloy a Catholic theist that he lifted
> > the term and concept from in a paper of 1848 by Halloy.
>
> IF we assume for one second that you are right and not just making
> stuff up as per usual, isn't this evidence in support of Darwin's
> theory? That ToS is a synthesis of other people's ideas, as you claim,
> should lend weight to the proposition that the theory was not
> controversial and was widely supported by evidence even 150 years ago?
He lifted the ideas from the authors below, as I get time a full
citation and article will be uploaded to http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/TauTology.
They all made the same mistake: The favorable was preserved, the non-
favorable wasn't preserved therefore there is a God (Blyth) or there
isn't a God. Both conclusions (any conclusion) is a non-sequitur
1. mudie 1832
2. oken
3. dunglinson 1832
4. hooker 1856
5. Robert Chambers,1844
6. Sullivan 1794
7. Polehampton 1815
8. Marten 1737
9. morgan 1822
10. Wilson J
11. Fishbough 1852
12. (Foster and Whitney,1851)
13. Clark
14. (Good,1837)
15. Smith
16. 1834 Hunt
17. Baden Powell 1856
18. --------------------------
19. 1850
20. (Polehampton and Good,1821)
21. (La Cepede,1798-1803)
22. (Bartlett,1830)
23. (Hope, 1831)
24. (Anon,1835a)
25. (Gaskell, 1833)
26. (Knight,1808)
27. (Hamilton,1855)
28. (Boyne,1815)
29. (Watson, 1848)
30. (Pictet,1844-45)
31. (Lloyd,1828)
32. (Lankester,1841)
33. (Anon,1843)
34. (Smith,1855)
35. (Morgan,1819).
36. (Fluorens, 1855)
37. (Jenyns, 1856)
38. (Agassiz, 1850).
39. (Muller, 1843)
40. (Henfrey,1849)
41. (Blyth, 1837)
42. (Justamond, 1776)
43. (Chambers,1844b)
44. (Goldsmith,1852)
45. (Matthew,1831a)
46. (Baden Powell,1856c)
47. (Bishop, 1829).
48. (Loudon,1831)
49. (Roget,1834b).
50. (Chambers,1844c).
51. A critique of �Paley�s watch�
52. (Blyth,1835)
53. (Lyell,1835).
54. (Tucker,1768), (Wade,1834).
1. Patrick Matthew 1831
55. Wade 1834
56. (Jesse,1835).
57. Sebrigth 1809
58. Ryan 1837
59. Owen 1841
60. Erasmus Darwin 1818)
61. (Beart Simonds,1849).
62. (Carpenter,1855).
63. (Bakewell,1839).
64. (Long, 1839).
65. (Pickering,1830)
66. (Sears,1856).
1. (Shoberl, 1834).
2. (Hughes,1855).
3. (Webster, 1834)
4. (Wollaston,1856).
5. (Blyth,1836
6. (Burnett,1852).
7. (Schouw,1852).
8. (Cooke Taylor,1841).
9. (Thompson,1851b).
10. (Anon,1828).
11. (Anon,1832b).
12. (Leidy,1853).
13. (Dadd,1856).
14. (Schouw,1852).
67. (Ward,1849).
1. (Skinner,1827).
2. (McIntosh,1855).
3. m(Anon,1855d)
4. (Buchanan, 1857).
5. (Henfrey, 1853).
6. (Henfrey,1853b).
7. (Flagg, 1855).
8. [Erasmus],1818b).
9. (Herbert,1820-21).
10. (Blyth,1836b).
11. (Fries,1826).
12. (Davies, 1852).
13. (Anon,1836).
14. (Nicholson,1821).
68. (Anon, 1800)
1. (Ward,1849) MAN MONKEY
2. (Barlow,1814)
3. (Anon,1842b).
4. (Wells,1818).
5. (Stark,1851).
6. (Brodie,1853).
7. (Naudin,1852).
69. (Adams, 1815).
1. (Edmonds,1832b).
2. (Anon,1844).
3. (Strickland and Melville,1848).
4. (Miller,1850).
5. (Anon,1820).
6. (Baden Powell,1856p).
7. (Davy,1838).
70. (D�Holbach, 1770).
71. (Prichard,1850).
72. (Everett Hale,1852).
73. (Henfrey,1853)
74. (Hitchcock,1852).
75. (Hunt,1852).
76. (Matthew,1831b).
77. (Jouffroy,1838).
78. Three ELEMENTS TO Darwins theory: The Eclectic Review 1860
1. FIX REFERENCES
79. (Gale, 1982):
80. (Brown, 1996).
81. (Cannon, 1958):
82. Professor H. Graham Cannon (Cannon, 1958)
83. (Lovejoy,1909)
84. (|Grant Allen,1889).
85. (Zirkle, 1946)
86. Just Before the �Origin�
87. (Anon, 1857-60) - TAUTOLOGY
88. (Crawfurd,1868)
89. (Huxley,1856)
90. Darwin�s notebooks and priority
91. Hype regarding the Sales Figures for �On the Origin of Species�
92. What made Hooker convert to transmutation?
93. Matthews, last mention of his theory of natural selection
94. Wallace�s late claim to natural selection
95. Patric Matthew Tautology 1
96. Alistair Hardy
97. Matthew Emigration fields
# William Paley and Ken Ham's mistake
1.
1. gould
2. Darwinism in Forestry (Zon, 1913), in American Naturalist
3. Patrick Darwin differed in views
4. Patrick review Gardeners� Magazine of 1832
5. United Services Journal on Matthew
6. Matthew letter to Darwin
7. But is it Matthew�s theory?
8. John Tyndall
backspace
> On Jan 27, 9:33�pm, bpuharic <w...@comcast.net> wrote:
>
> > On Wed, 27 Jan 2010 05:33:16 -0800 (PST), backspace
>
> > <stephan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >Virtually nothing Darwin said was his ideas or phrases, he lifted the
> > >stuff from many other authors such as Blyth, Mudie , Erasmus Darwin
>
> > actually he didn't. natural selection was a new mechanism. you, as a
> > religious fanatic whose language is fatally corrupted by your beliefs,
> > simply are unable to understand science
>
> Actually "natural selection" was not a new mechanism. �It was
> described by Malthus and Paley among others. �But they thought that
> "natural selection" acted to *preserve* stasis by removing deleterious
Paley made the same mistake Ken Ham makes today: The deleterious one
was eliminated , with deleterious and eliminated saying the same thing
twice, it doesn't explain why something was eliminated,the actual
reason.
backspace
> Oh, it's just the old "Claim that Darwin was a plagiarist/
> hypochondriac/
> liar/adulterer/eater of babies" tactic, as if discrediting Darwin
> the man would cause the entire edifice of the theory
> of evolution, that product of tens of thousands of
> researchers laboring for a century and a half,
> to abruptly collapse.
>
> I hear that Isaac Newton could be a big meanie...
>
> Haiku Jones
And what exactly is this ToE - spell it out, show us the journal paper
as to how this theory explains what nobody can define: Life itself.
How do you have a theory about something you can't define?