Reflectorites
Today I received posts on the List from DNAunion@aol.com with the titles:
>Chris Cogan: Entropy (Sat Oct 21 2000 - 08:58:58 EDT)
>Could it be that FMAJ finally gets it????? (Sat Oct 21 2000 - 06:20:34 EDT)
>Susan's at it again (Sat Oct 21 2000 - 05:47:26 EDT)
>FMAJ and his outdated support of abiogenesis (Sat Oct 21 2000 - 04:55:48 EDT)
I regard putting fellow Reflectorites names in subject lines as a form of ad
hominem.
Also, it unnecessarily personalises the debate before it even starts. To me
the important thing in the debate is the *positions* held, not the individuals
holding them (I am not saying the individuals are not important BTW).
I know there is a fine line in this because it is sometimes hard to separate an
individual from his philosophy.
Mostly Reflectorites have avoided this putting Reflectorite names in subject
lines, which makes me think that others agree with me on this.
May I encourage DNAunion, as part of his "turning over a new leaf", to
emphasise the *positions* themselves rather than the persons holding them.
And as part of this, I would therefore ask him (and others) to please don't put
fellow Reflectorites' names in subject lines.
Steve
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"Finally, can genes build bodies? One of the truly gaping holes in
evolutionary theory is the void in our understanding of how genes actually
construct bodies. This is important for neo-Darwinism because selection is
usually thought to act on *individuals*, in terms of survival or fitness, and
yet the central mathematical theory of natural selection is expounded in
terms of *genes* (a distinction which, as we shall see, is crucial). Is there
the implied simple one-to-one correspondence between genes and bodies?
It would appear that there is not. The processes which cause a bag of genes
to 'become' a multi-million-celled complex organism are still a huge
mystery, but the most recent theories of development appear hard to
reconcile with the mechanistic and 'reductionist' neoDarwinism." (Leith B.,
"The Descent of Darwin: A Handbook of Doubts about Darwinism,"
Collins: London, 1982, p.24. Emphasis Leith's)
Stephen E. Jones | Ph. +61 8 9448 7439 | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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