Let's discuss evolution/SMBs raving insanity - Page 2

Professor Smarmiarty · 06-03-2010, 09:32 AM

Don't know if this trhead will be interesting to anyone, thought people might like to know. Would have been news thread but links too old.

So there's been a bit of a spat over evolution lately but unlike our normal spats ("Metabolic-systemists suck balls!") this one was played out in newspapers because a man named Fodor wrote a book called "What Darwin got wrong"- which I shall summarise:
Basically it seeks to show that natural selection cannot be the sole determiner of evolution/is meaningless in statement. The idea at the core is simple
A) Biological systems are so ridiculously interwoven and coeffect each other in such a myriad of ways that properties of organisms are basically interlinked.
B) Any selection for fitness cannot distinguish between properties that are interwoven
and thus
C) Selection for fitness is meaningless- selection for fitness won't lead to overall increases in fitness as while you select individual organisms that are fitter this won't increase fitness in a heritable way.

Now the main problem with this is that I made this very argument, while boozed, to a bunch of biologists to see if I could rankle them. People have made similar arguments in passing before, in the field I work (prebiotic chemistry where we deal with trying to make first cells) it is pretty much our biggest problem.

Various people have responded the most common undercurrent being that requiring natural selection to distinguish between which trait is actual the causal increase of fitness and whatever traits free-ride on that is a ridiculously harsh criteria that wouldn't be needed in many other fields. The problem is that in this response they greatly weaken their position by reinforcing the idea of natural selection as an explanatory force, not a predictory one- that natural selection can be used to explain wh things happen but can't predict them in future- a crucial scientific test. This is somewhat ignoring an important set of studies in the 80-90s on population analysis which tried to show that natural selection could be a predicitve force but if anything these may now have been torpedoed.
What people have been tying to do on the chemical side is precisely what Fodor wants- that is to understand why mechanisms are inherentely selected- to make a mathematical model but such things are limited to single cells.
Once you get larger than this, plasticitiy of organisms takes over. This is the key point that environments actually shape organisms as much as they select them- plasticity in gene structure and organism development lead to a breakdown of simple cause-effect relationships. This is where population studies take over but again they are limited by the free-rider/fitness creator problems. So basically we've got the same problems that emerged in the 50s, just people have managed to ignore them for a while till people write a book promoting public spats.S
Sources of these:

http://bostonreview.net/BR35.2/darwin_exchange.php

What is the point of this thread? Oh shit I don't know

06-03-2010, 09:32 AM	#1
Professor Smarmiarty Sent to the cornfield Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: K-space Posts: 9,758	Let's discuss evolution/SMBs raving insanity Don't know if this trhead will be interesting to anyone, thought people might like to know. Would have been news thread but links too old. So there's been a bit of a spat over evolution lately but unlike our normal spats ("Metabolic-systemists suck balls!") this one was played out in newspapers because a man named Fodor wrote a book called "What Darwin got wrong"- which I shall summarise: Basically it seeks to show that natural selection cannot be the sole determiner of evolution/is meaningless in statement. The idea at the core is simple A) Biological systems are so ridiculously interwoven and coeffect each other in such a myriad of ways that properties of organisms are basically interlinked. B) Any selection for fitness cannot distinguish between properties that are interwoven and thus C) Selection for fitness is meaningless- selection for fitness won't lead to overall increases in fitness as while you select individual organisms that are fitter this won't increase fitness in a heritable way. Now the main problem with this is that I made this very argument, while boozed, to a bunch of biologists to see if I could rankle them. People have made similar arguments in passing before, in the field I work (prebiotic chemistry where we deal with trying to make first cells) it is pretty much our biggest problem. Various people have responded the most common undercurrent being that requiring natural selection to distinguish between which trait is actual the causal increase of fitness and whatever traits free-ride on that is a ridiculously harsh criteria that wouldn't be needed in many other fields. The problem is that in this response they greatly weaken their position by reinforcing the idea of natural selection as an explanatory force, not a predictory one- that natural selection can be used to explain wh things happen but can't predict them in future- a crucial scientific test. This is somewhat ignoring an important set of studies in the 80-90s on population analysis which tried to show that natural selection could be a predicitve force but if anything these may now have been torpedoed. What people have been tying to do on the chemical side is precisely what Fodor wants- that is to understand why mechanisms are inherentely selected- to make a mathematical model but such things are limited to single cells. Once you get larger than this, plasticitiy of organisms takes over. This is the key point that environments actually shape organisms as much as they select them- plasticity in gene structure and organism development lead to a breakdown of simple cause-effect relationships. This is where population studies take over but again they are limited by the free-rider/fitness creator problems. So basically we've got the same problems that emerged in the 50s, just people have managed to ignore them for a while till people write a book promoting public spats.S Sources of these: http://bostonreview.net/BR35.2/darwin_exchange.php What is the point of this thread? Oh shit I don't know