Posted on 07/04/2004 5:19:27 PM PDT by PatrickHenry
Professor Ernst Mayr, the scientist renowned as the father of modern biology, will celebrate his 100th birthday tomorrow by leading a scathing attack on creationism.
The evolutionary biologist, who is already acclaimed as one of the most prolific researchers of all time, has no intention of retiring and is shortly to publish new research that dismantles the fashionable creationist doctrine of “intelligent design”.
Although he has reluctantly cut his workload since a serious bout of pneumonia 18 months ago, Prof. Mayr has remained an active scientist at Harvard University throughout his 90s. He has written five books since his 90th birthday and is researching five academic papers. One of these, scheduled to appear later this year, will examine how “intelligent design” — the latest way in which creationists have sought to present a divine origin of the world — was thoroughly refuted by Charles Darwin a century and a half ago.
His work is motivated in part by a sense of exasperation at the re-emergence of creationism in the USA, which he compares unfavourably with the widespread acceptance of evolution that he encountered while growing up in early 20th-century Germany.
The states of Florida, Mississippi, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky and Oklahoma currently omit the word “evolution” from their curriculums. The Alabama state board of education has voted to include disclaimers in textbooks describing evolution as a theory. In Georgia, the word “evolution” was banned from the science curriculum after the state’s schools superintendent described it as a “controversial buzzword”.
Fierce protest, including criticism from Jimmy Carter, the former President, reversed this.
Prof. Mayr, who will celebrate his 100th birthday at his holiday home in New Hampshire with his two daughters, five grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren, was born on 5 July 1905 in Kempten, Germany. He took a PhD in zoology at the University of Berlin, before travelling to New Guinea in 1928 to study its diverse bird life. On his return in 1930 he emigrated to the USA. His most famous work, Systematics and the Origin of Species, was published in 1942 and is regarded still as a canonical work of biology.
It effectively founded the modern discipline by combining Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection with Gregor Mendel’s genetics, showing how the two were compatible. Prof. Mayr redefined what scientists mean by a species, using interbreeding as a guide. If two varieties of duck or vole do not interbreed, they cannot be the same species.
Prof. Mayr has won all three of the awards sometimes termed the “triple crown” of biology — the Balzan Prize, the Crafoord Prize and the International Prize for Biology. Although he formally retired in 1975, he has been active as an Emeritus Professor ever since and has recently written extensively on the philosophy of biology.
Hee hee. I got 1,000 without even trying.
you point out any interesting view. if man strives to be happy, according to "function" and the geometric models, shouldn't our very being vibrate with Truth? in this case, why would anyone renounce purpose, if they can ever state that something must have a physical reason to exist?
wouldn't this, if trully believed, lead to scientists shooting themselves in fits of depression?
our very brains are strewn with thoughts of "meaning"
why would that be if meaning is temporary, yet we are formed of things that must have "meaning"?
and yet, "emotion" is related to intellect. wonder why....
Multi-level-marketing; AKA: "Amway"......
see also: "Ponzi scheme"
depends on what you need it for. either way, its only a theory.
Hmmmm. I'm wondering if I can somehow work up a description of evolution as a Ponzi scheme? Or at least a chain letter ...
Arithmetic on the set of Real numbers.
does 0.999... = 1, or not?
THIRD REQUEST
Now just add the Lotto, work-from-home, and you've got it!!
Fire your boss! Quit your day job, enhance your manhood, please your partner, lower your mortage rate, get meds by overnight delivery, earn a diploma, and make big money from evolution in the privacy of your own home.
ya know? i dont recall you drawing any conclsuions yourself aside from "you're wrong"
and even then, all you state is "your conclusion/logic/magical piece of cake does not follow your premise/evidence/flying butt-monkeys"
please, provide something to the conversations. or by your own logic of "does not provide a thesis, nor solve any problems" you yourself don't exist.
on the set of real numbers, decimals are statiscally insignificant, so it would be "1"
ask it corrrectly and you shall recieve.
that was your first real request.
I didn't ask for a "statistical" justification; I just want to know if you think 0.999.... is exactly equal to 1, or not.
It's a very simple question; there's no need to be evasive in responding to it.
the point of my qualifying 3/3 into the other ways was to prove that there is no "always" in math. only often enough that we assume, and are correct.
Please don't evade the question. Your motives for posting what you posted are irreleavant to the question. It's very straightforward.
You posted:
3/3 = .999999....? no, it is 3 divided by 3, or "1"
Is 0.999... exactly equal to 1, or not?
A "yes" or a "no" will suffice.
a simple "yes" or "no" will not suffice, beacause its like trying to prove the square root of "i"
we only make assumptions to come to the conclusion.
Complex numbers have nothing to do with the question. Please don't change the subject, or further evade the question. It's very straightforward; a gradeschool student could answer it.
You posted:
3/3 = .999999....? no, it is 3 divided by 3, or "1"
Is 0.999... exactly equal to 1, or not?
Yes, or no?
Thanks for the ping… I just returned from a much needed vacation (hiking in the Smoky Mountains)… and I see the philosophical debates continue.
Because I'm a Christian, a believer in God, you feel that nothing I say can be trusted -- because I'm "brainwashed."
I think you should actually state that, “Because RM&NS made me a Christian (LOL), a believer in God, you feel that nothing I say can be trusted -- because I'm a teleologist in regard to science. It seems a non-teleologist (or naturalist) must also deal with this axiomatic problem but refuse to deal with the problem from its actual beginning and prefer to look at it after the fact from an ironic intelligently designed perspective. The fundamental questions of ‘where we came from’ are ignored because ‘we have the benefit of being here’.
So… If the naturalist only assumes the axioms which are necessary for naturalism we must ask, ‘what is greater and what determines this value?’ The ant developed its social structure long before we did… Is our social structure “better”? What is “better”? Let naturalism deal with; ethics, morality, consciousness, life, and intelligence from the beginning until the here and now.
The answers you may receive of, “naturalistic science will figure it out” are not just unfulfilling – they are empty when truly we look at our existence for this perspective.
Right, wrong, and justice – all ‘man made’, and ants have the evolutionary advantage… Don’t they? If human justice is made by man than ant justice is made by… nature? Is there no justice in nature and only what ‘we’ created without design or purpose? If we came from purely natural origins then we emerged from chaos without order, design, or purpose.
I guess an ant should regard and struggle for its life in the same non-teleogical manner science says about our life. But should we trust a naturalist because they are a believer in axiomatic naturalism and refuse to see design in regard our lives?
in the case of .999..., no, but in the case of 3/3, yes, except when provided with what i showed you, .3333... + .666... = .999... or 1/3 + 2/3 = 3/3
also, a gradeschool student could tell you what they think is right, that doesnt mean you should listen.
the reason you cant get a yes or no is because there is not one. this is a mathematical principle. .999... approaches 1, but is so close, it is often used as 1.
Galatians 4:16
hehehe, well put as well :) i am in the presence of those who word things better than i.</p>
Please, I didn't ask if "0.999..." was "close" to "1", I asked if it is exactly equal to "1."
This is mathematics, it isn't Clintonian rhetoric. There is a straighforward answer to this question, and I can't fathom why you are evading it so arduously.
Is 0.999... exactly equal to "1" or not?
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