At 09:28 PM 11/13/99 -0500, you wrote:
>bertvan:
>I am merely a fascinated observer of those scientists such as Kauffman,
>Denton, Margulis, Spetner, Shapiro and the panspermia people who are
>interested in looking beyond "chance". I'm sure there are others out there
>that I haven't heard of.
>
>huxter:
>And I am interested that most of those folks you mention have an
>'anti-Darwinian' axe to grind.
>
>>Bertvan
>>Right!! Everyone searching for something less simplistic than "random
>>mutation and natural selection" as an explanation for major biological
>>novelties "has an anti-Darwinian axe to grind".
Susan:
>I don't think huxter saying that the list of people above has a body of
>evidence which has persuaded them to become anti-Darwinian. I think huxter
>is saying that these people have a pre-existing anti-Darwinian view and only
>collect negative evidence, discarding anything else.
>I'm extremely curious if you have read any of the works meant for the
>general public which explains evolution? Beak of the Finch? Anything by
>Gould? Donald Johanson? It might be interesting to you to read what
>evolutionists actually say about evolution rather than read
>misrepresentations of evolution by people who have a prior reason to dislike
>it and wish to conceal the reality of it.
>Yes, evolutionists sometimes use the word "chance" but that is hardly the
>central focus of evolution. And I think they, like I, prefer "chance" to the
>"whim" of some carefully unnamed "designer."
Susan, once and for all, I have read the Beak of the Finch, Donald Johanson,
and Gould up to the gills. I even read a bunch of Dawkins. Have you read
Spetner, Kauffman and Denton? I don't "dislike" Darwinism"; I don't consider
it credible. I doubt if any the people critical of Darwinism "disliked" it
prior to becoming familiar with the details. Evolution and Darwinism are
not synonymous. Darwin's contribution to biology was the notion that the
diversity of nature can be accounted for by "random mutation and natural
selection". He stated that if this process were shown to be impossible by
small, gradual, incremental steps, his theory would collapse. As it was
about to collapse, a bunch of biologists held a conference and invented neo
Darwinism. The belief that "natural selection" is the designer of biological
novelty, and that it is a gradual process, is the principle belief of Neo
Darwinism. If you "prefer" chance to design, fine. What one "prefers" is
not supposed to be relevant to science.
Bertvan