Re: No distinction between artificial and natural selection - John
- From: Tim Tyler <seemysig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 6 Apr 2008 13:48:30 -0700 (PDT)
Apologies in advance for threading issues.
r norman wrote:
Tim Tyler <seemysig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Biology is, by definition, the study of life.
Skyscrapers and satellites are the products of living systems,
in much the same way that hair and feathers are. They are part
of the extended phenotype of the human/machine civilization.
Their study is absolutely part of biology.
It is appallingly blinkered for biology textbooks not to so
much as mention such phenomena - *especially* given the
expected long-term biological significance of such things.
What is now called biochemistry was, at one time, part of physiology.
What is now called biology was, at one time, natural history. What is
now called science was, at one time, natural philosophy. Biologists
do read literature and go to plays and art museums but biologists do
not professionally study literature or drama or art even though those
are activities performed by living organisms.
Oh, it's worse than that. Check out the textbooks:
Evolution, Mark Ridley, and Evolution, Mark Ridley, and
Evolutionary Biology, Douglas Futuyma.
Not only is there no mention of plays and art museums,
but there is no mention of genetic engineering or other
forms of scientific/technological progress.
Except for these four sentences from Ridley:
``Changes that take place in human politics, economics,
history and technology and even scientific theories are
sometimes loosely described as "evolutionary".
In this sense, evolutionary means mainly that there has
been change through time and perhaps not in a preordained
direction.
Human ideas and institutions can sometimes split during
their history but their history does not have such a
clear-cut, branching, tree-like like structure as does the
history of life. Change and spitting provide two of the
main themes of evolutionary theory.''
It's like they don't even /realise/ that culture varies,
is inherited, and the variations affect their persistence -
and so culture is thus part of evolution, by definition.
To quote Daniel Dennett:
``Many Darwinians are anxious, a little uneasy, would like
to see some limits on just how far the Darwinism goes.
It's all right, you know. Spider webs? Sure, they are
products of evolution. The World Wide Web? Not so sure.
Beaver dams, yes; Hoover Dam, no.''
- http://blog.ted.com/2007/07/dan_dennett_on_2.php
It is /absurd/ nucleic-acid centrism, that totally misses
what's been going on for the last few thousand years.
These guys are writing evolution textbooks that would
have been badly out of date if they had been published
before Darwin was born. They are badly in need of a
rude awakening.
--
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