BTW, folks, in case anybody is wondering, the timing of this mailbag item was a coincidence. Not to give away too many secrets to the inner workings of the Mailbag, but I received this question shortly after the earlier evolution-related one had been posted, and started considering it sometime in late October. I finished it a number of weeks ago, and into the queue it went, to come up whenever it was its time.
Studog, as I mentioned, if you want to discuss evolution in general, you’re welcome to join us in Great Debates. But here’s a link that debunks some of what Behe says – there’s a lot more out there: http://www.onthenet.com.au/~stear/bartelt_a_scientist_responds.htm
You are right that much of the discussion of your answer has to do with tone. I must add my voice to those who noted that the tone of your reply might have been more respectful.
I routinely deal with questions from confident individuals with a level of intellectual curiousity that is not always matched by a complete command of the facts. I have found that, for these individuals especially, the most effective responses show respect for the questioner, a willingness to treat the questioner as an intellectual equal, and a lively interest in the topic.
You obviously have a lively interest in this topic, for which I commend you. You may find that your responses become more instructional (and thus more effective) when you are able to incorporate more respect and intellectual equality in your replies.
studog I have heard the “explain the human eye” question before. It is obvious that an eye missing a key part would not work. Evolution is not about a bunch of parts joining together to form an organism. If you want to see how the human eye developed, try looking at the (so-called) lesser animals. Anyone who looks with an open mind should be able to clearly see the progression from primitive light detecting organs to full blown human eyes. To say this is a problem for evolution is weak at best, if not downright silly.
Thank you Cecil, for pointing out the facts!!!
When will people see that the theory of evolution is simply the interaction of mathematics and environment, and stop treating it like it’s an attack on their religion?
If you are strong in your religion, you should be able to understand that religion’s benefit. I doubt it’s scientific teachings are what most people would consider it’s biggest benefit, so knock it off!!!
This will be my last post on this board before going to the great debate one. Umm… About the article David B posted, it really doesn’t say a whole lot to refute whate Behe says, it basically says Behe (who has a PhD ) is some sort of uniformed sloppy researcher who is motivated by the christian right. It really doesn’t tackle the issues other than just poopooing the ideas and the motivations behind the ideas.
To DRMATRIX about the eye, your response to me seems kind of a cop out. You say that some animals have more primitive eyes and that ours evolved from some sort of light sensitive organ. Just because some things like flys have primitive eyes, doesn’t mean that our eyes evolved from their type. Secondly, how does an organ become light sensitive in the first place? Behe covers this second issue in his book and explains why it is a “Grand Canyon” and can’t be explained by current evolution theory.
What I don’t understand is why some people condemn him for being a nutty Christian? He claims to believe in common descent, however he believes evolution as we now understand it is incredibly flawed.
As someone who has been critical in the past of mailbag answers with tones that I felt were improper, I just want to say that I didn’t find David’s tone all that improper in this answer. Certainly, a measure of exasperation is present in the answer. However, the general lack of understanding of the theory of ‘evolutionary’ species creation shown by the person who sent in the ‘question’ understandably would exasperate anyone who knows the topic better.
Further, while one can always suggest that a more didactic response would serve better, frankly, the topic has been discussed, dissected, and digested endlessly in this forum, and elsewhere, and the person who wrote in isn’t really seeking ellucidation. (ick, an awful paragraph, but, oh well…)
If any criticism should be levelled at poor David, it might be that this answer might not be something that merits posting on the site for all to see, not because it is a bad answer, but because answering such drivel isn’t worth being posted.
studog I have to confess I am not familiar with Behe. I know this will sound arragant, but I will probably not read any of his drivel. I have heard the question before; it seems to me than any attempt to answer this “question” (or any other of the silly creationist questions that we have heard over and over) will result in the response “Oh yeah, then how did that happen?”. It hardly seems a “Grand Canyon” to me. Light sensing organs exist because some chemicals react to light, these traits are passed on because they convey an advantage. Or you might check out: http://www.spacelab.net/~catalj/peepers.htm
… Yeah, I know, I should have left the bait alone. I just thought that maybe this once…
You are correct, there is a misunderstanding of “survival of the fittest”. All that phrase means is that the animals/plants most suited to their environment (and niche) are the ones that survive long enough to reproduce or reproduce better. It’s not a directed movement in the sense that the animal decides to try a new color scheme, but rather a random feature that shows up and happens to help it. “Survival of the fittest” just means they had an edge on reproducing.
To DavidB:
Your statement seemed to be something along the lines of ridiculing the possibility of that change occurring, not that it did or didn’t happen.
from Studog:
Actually, evolution does a very nice job of explaining the development of eyes. In fact, they have evolved independently at least 6 times.
As for eyes not functioning if not 100% complete, that is false. An intermediate step can provide a benefit without being completely formed. I will now give you an example of an eye in the process of evolving, in one of those intermediate steps. Check out pit-vipers.
You know, rattlesnakes. They don’t get their name from a habit of hinding in holes in the ground, but from the possession of pits in their face. These facial pits are below their regular eyes, which see some of the visual spectrum. These pits are infrared sensitive, and aid snakes in finding prey in the dark. They are concave portions of skin sensitive to one band of EM, but do not have any type of lens or focus. The concave shape gives a small ability to aim, similar to if you are sitting in a stadium and watch the sunlight come in through the roof, you can judge the location of the sun by the angle of shadows. There is a “primitive” eye, providing an advantage. It remains to be seen if this eye will evolve greater capability in the future.
This is in response to the post by John W. Kennedy.
Hey John-boy - I suppose you’ve never heard of attributing your quotes before flaming their makers? Or putting them in context? Or would that distract you from half-assed flaming?
By the way, ad hominem means “marked by an attack on an opponent’s character rather than by an answer to the contentions made”. Telling someone that their postulate is ridiculous without addressing the merits of their postulate is an attack on their intelligence, and thus on their character.
Whether the postulate is ridiculous or not, the tone used by DavidB was one which appeared to me to express contempt, much as your entire post did. I thought the point DavidB was making in that paragraph was the equivalent of saying “you’re an idiot” - which is pretty much the point I’m trying to make about you, Johnny, I suppose.
The exasperation here is more or less justified if we accept that believing things for no real reason is stupid, as i think we can. I’m not so sure, however, that some yokel being dumb and David making a show of how dumb he (the yokel) is, even if perfectly justified, lives up to the standard of informativeness we have come to expect in a mailbag answer. Be smug on your own time, by all means, but don’t inflict your smuggery on us. Or at least make it funny.
This is in response to John W. Kennedy’s posting, that we should learn to read before we criticize. Let me tell you that my posting was right on the mark as far as David’s lousy attitude ( not Cecilworthy even in his own eyes) and that which I misquoted was completely irrelevant - the fact that he was downright nasty remains obvious. I believe he has even conceded to this fact. And your Charles Williams quote is moronic. Stop trying to show off. There’s nothing worse than an intellectual wannabe.
IrishCait: Please don’t speak for me – ever. I did not concede the things that you claim. I noted that my wit didn’t live up to Cecil’s, but since Cecil is the master, this is no surprise. I pointed out that the person was ignorant and needed to be told so. I’m sorry you disagree, but, hey, to each his own.
Perhaps an analogy will help. There are many processes in nature that are well documented, well understood and yet one person’s observations (even over a lifetime) would lead them to think false. For example, botanists tell us that trees grow and geologists tell us that the continents move. An observant person can look at a tree every day for some time and conclude that it isn’t growing. Only over months or years will the change be seen. In the case of the continents, no one person’s observations -even over a lifetime- can “prove” that they move. However, not seeing the motion does not give that observer the right to declare that the motion does not occur. Some things are too slow or too subtle. The data is cumulative over time, and our window is like a single frame of a long movie - we can’t guess the end or declare how things “should be” progressing. The writer’s claim that certain animals “should be” evolving a certain direction is poor science - he has decided ahead of time what he wants to see.
It is truly amazing to see how the replies have “evolved” from a perfectly justified smarmy reply answering a currently conceptually challenged individual, into a discussion of online etiquette. David’s initial short-tempered reply was born out of the exhaustion from answering the same topic throughout life. How many times have the rest of you had to attempt to explain any obvious physical science to some ill-prepared mental bumpkin who was told in what to believe at the threat of expulsion from Heaven? Creationists and anybody religious purposely disregard plain facts, that’s how faith and religion are maintained. By the same overall logic which pervades their thinking, I would expect them to energetically refute that a bowling ball dropped onto their collective big toes would hurt because the Bible doesn’t say it will and because it’s never happened to them. I suppose that if Jesus had been a lousy bowler things might be different.
An enlightend friend of mine said it best, “Religion is fine for those who need it.” You want a smarmy reply? Religion is for the feeble. I don’t expect them to understand the facts any more than I would expect a toddler to understand a financial spreadsheet. There’s nothing one can do to make it easier other than say, “Someday when you grow up, you’ll understand.” It’s like watching James Randi spend the last 30 years of his life proving that ESP and related pyschic abilities don’t exist. Of course they don’t, why spend your life trying to teach the toddlers? Screw 'em. Let them waste their silly lives channeling and moving pencils under aquaruims. Go enjoy the beauty of the Earth and stars, and life, complete with the understanding that we have - so far.
Come on, God made only two people, right? Adam and Eve. What color were they? White? Black? Green? Were they Chinese or Ugandan? Haven’t humans evolved from A & E? The Great Floods killed everyone but Noah, his wife, and whoever the hell else was on the Ark. Just what race were the Noahs? Caucasoid? Mongoloid? Negroid? Well, it seems that humans have evolved again. You Creationists may read this and pray for my salvation, but, isn’t it all pre-ordained? Why do you pray? To get God to change His plan? To try and stack the odds against God’s plan?
Christ, somebody get me a bowling ball!
Not that it is really on point, but I can’t help myself (I DID try!).
An ad hominem argument is an argument that seeks to refute a statement made by a person by referring to that person’s personality, prejudices, character, physicality, etc., rather than attacking the correctness of the statement. Had David said: “Your idea that animals should just get more and more dangerous while they grow bigger and bigger is not surprising, given how dumb you are” one could accuse him of attacking the person, and not the statement. Saying that the statement is ‘ridiculous’ simply attacks the validity of the statement, albeit, admittedly without much attempt to support the assertion with any additional reasoning.
Indeed, calling something ‘ridiculous’ is always a fun thing to do, since it is kind of self-defining. If you are ridiculing a statement, then, by definition, the statement is ‘ridiculous’, that is, capable of being ridiculed!
But saying that a statement is ‘ridiculous’ does not attack the character of the person making the statement. It doesn’t even attack the person’s intelligence, for even smart people can say dumb things.
First, thanks for the answer in the voice of reason. Anti-Evolutionists use two or three tactics to press their “correctness” upon others - public ignorance, the inherent doubt that skepticism requires of the Scientific Method and the fear that scientists have when accused of being wrong, and Creationists’ own self-righteous assurance of their infallibility (G*d is on our side!).
I hate this crap. People who espouse religion over scientific rigor start and end with their heads in their own…navels. Logic won’t dent their tautologies, anything that indicates that their tiny interpretation of a huge, complex universe MUST BE WRONG is just the tool of the devil. Let’s just tell them that Jesus is waiting right past the edge of that cliff, there, and they can hike over to him anytime they want, but stay the heck out of the legislature, OK? Any clever question is OK, but don’t hug it like a teddy bear if someone point out the obvious flaws in your argument and cork your ears. That process is the basis of science - you hypothesize, you test, you fix the hypothesis, you test… and you build your theory on the data, not on your phlosophy.
Wow this the first topic I ever opened just to clarify a mundane point, and look what happens!
Since this thread has become in large part an argument concerning David B’s alleged overzealous endorsement of evolutionary theory versus a hapless opponent, allow me to make an observation. It says on the front page of The Straight Dope Homepage (I assume it’s the motto) “Fighting Ignorance Since 1973.” Well, that mailbag questioner was pretty ignorant, and he got beat up. That’s what happens in a fight. The fact that he left himself wide open and practically handed David B a bazooka is his own fault not David B’s. Conviction and ignorance are a lethal mix.
In the fight against ignorance one must strike hard and fast with whatever weapon comes to hand. It’s the only way for the point to sink in against such ridiculous assertions.
