Can biology do better than faith?

New Scientist ^ | November 2, 2005 | Edward O. Wilson

[VadeRetro]

Under "natural selection", just who is doing the selecting?

Nobody, unless you think Mother Nature is a goddess.

[Texas Eagle]

Nobody does the selecting??? How can something that doesn't even exist decide who or what should live and how?

[VadeRetro]

Nobody does the selecting??? How can something that doesn't even exist decide who or what should live and how?

The fast cheetah catches the (relatively) slow gazelle. No demons or djinni have to decide anything about it.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

" Under "natural selection", just who is doing the selecting?"

The environment that the organism exists in; this includes other species that are competing with it for resources, other species that may want to eat it, the climate, other members of it's species that want the same resources, and so on. It's not a *who*; it's the sum total of the conditions of life. Nature is truly a harsh taskmaster.

[Coyoteman]

A question from the back of the class. Under "natural selection", just who is doing the selecting?

Not who, what!

For some, this might apply:

Stupidity cannot be cured with money, or through education, or by legislation. Stupidity is not a sin, the victim can't help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death, there is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity.

Robert A. Heinlein, Time Enough for Love, 1973

Or, it might be bears (you didn't run fast enough), or crocs (you didn't swim fast enough), or vermin (you were not sufficiently resistant), or your neighbors (you answered the door unarmed). Or it might be a thousand other things.

The only way to tell is a simple question, answered a few thousand generations later: Did you leave any descendants, or not?

As was pointed out on some thread earlier today: its not survival of the fittest, its survival of the adequate! Anything that survives and reproduces is adequate.

The long term will determine if your "adequate" was good enough.

[Texas Eagle]

Ohhhhhhh.....but eventually the gazelle develops some sort of counter-measure in order to perpetuate its existence doesn't it? Who selects which counter-measure it should develop?

[PatrickHenry]

Nature is truly a harsh taskmaster.

O, how horrible! I will never believe in such an evil system.
</creationism mode>

[CarolinaGuitarman]

Yes, I was blatantly stealing from your tagline; though we both owe Mr. Heinlein a debt. :)

[Doctor Stochastic]

But his name is Legion; he served at Dien Bien Phu.

[VadeRetro]

Ever the infernal "Who?"

Most of us just think it's about a competition between and within species that shapes the survivors in certain ways because they had that something (in the area of bigger, faster, stronger, smarter, more armored, better camouflaged, etc.) that gave them an edge. You're obviously going to stay up all night thinking of "Who?" questions.

Where is the compelling evidence we need a "who" except for the persistence of some back of the class types who think what they DON'T know is science?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Ohhhhhhh.....but eventually the gazelle develops some sort of counter-measure in order to perpetuate its existence doesn't it? Who selects which counter-measure it should develop?"

Nobody. If the genetic variation doesn't come to be, the population goes extinct. There are no guarantees. The history of life is strewn with the corpes of dead ends and forgotten species.

[VadeRetro]

he served at Dien Bien Phu.

For the greatest menace of all, he doesn't seem to win that many fights. He even lost a court case to Daniel Webster.

[Texas Eagle]

You're obviously going to stay up all night thinking of "Who?" questions.

Yup.

Where is the compelling evidence we need a "who" except for the persistence of some back of the class types who think what they DON'T know is science?

The compelling evidence that we need a "who" rests in the wording of those "in the know". In order for something to "select" something, doesn't it make sense that something has to exist to do the selecting?

[Texas Eagle]

The history of life is strewn with the corpes of dead ends and forgotten species.

Somebody ping the supporters of The Endangered Species Act!

[Texas Eagle]

If the genetic variation doesn't come to be, the population goes extinct.

Who decided that the cheetah should be faster than the gazelle?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Somebody ping the supporters of The Endangered Species Act!"

That wouldn't be me.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Who decided that the cheetah should be faster than the gazelle?"

Nobody had to.

[VadeRetro]

The compelling evidence that we need a "who" rests in the wording of those "in the know". In order for something to "select" something, doesn't it make sense that something has to exist to do the selecting?

Argument from semantics. In the actual meat of Darwin's book, he makes clear what he means by natural selection. Nature is not an anthropomorphic deity and none are required. It is enough that some make it because of variations that set them somewhat apart from those that don't. That's all it is.

Willful misinterpretation is a form of lying. You really ought to think about how this looks. Anybody who would be influenced to discard science based upon what you're doing here has the critical faculties of a ham sandwich.

[PatrickHenry]

Who put the ram in the ramma ramma ding dong?

[Texas Eagle]

Oh. So under "Natural Selection" nobody actually does any selecting? Stuff just happens?