Evolution Is Practically Useless, Admits Darwinist

Creation Evolution Headlines ^ | 08/30/06 | Creation Evolution Headlines

[DannyTN]

Evolution Is Practically Useless, Admits Darwinist    08/30/2006  
Supporters of evolution often tout its many benefits.  They claim it helps research in agriculture, conservation and medicine (e.g., 01/13/2003, 06/25/2003).  A new book by David Mindell, The Evolving World: Evolution in Everyday Life (Harvard, 2006) emphasizes these practical benefits in hopes of making evolution more palatable to a skeptical society.  Jerry Coyne, a staunch evolutionist and anti-creationist, enjoyed the book in his review in Nature,¹ but thought that Mindell went overboard on “Selling Darwin” with appeals to pragmatics:

To some extent these excesses are not Mindell’s fault, for, if truth be told, evolution hasn’t yielded many practical or commercial benefits.  Yes, bacteria evolve drug resistance, and yes, we must take countermeasures, but beyond that there is not much to say.  Evolution cannot help us predict what new vaccines to manufacture because microbes evolve unpredictably.  But hasn’t evolution helped guide animal and plant breeding?  Not very much.  Most improvement in crop plants and animals occurred long before we knew anything about evolution, and came about by people following the genetic principle of ‘like begets like’.  Even now, as its practitioners admit, the field of quantitative genetics has been of little value in helping improve varieties.  Future advances will almost certainly come from transgenics, which is not based on evolution at all.

Coyne further describes how the goods and services advertised by Mindell are irrelevant for potential customers, anyway:

One reason why Mindell might fail to sell Darwin to the critics is that his examples all involve microevolution, which most modern creationists (including advocates of intelligent design) accept.  It is macroevolution – the evolutionary transitions between very different kinds of organism – that creationists claim does not occur.  But in any case, few people actually oppose evolution because of its lack of practical use.... they oppose it because they see it as undercutting moral values.

Coyne fails to offer a salve for that wound.  Instead, to explain why macroevolution has not been observed, he presents an analogy .  For critics out to debunk macroevolution because no one has seen a new species appear, he compares the origin of species with the origin of language: “We haven’t seen one language change into another either, but any reasonable creationist (an oxymoron?) must accept the clear historical evidence for linguistic evolution,” he says, adding a jab for effect. “And we have far more fossil species than we have fossil languages” (but see 04/23/2006).  It seems to escape his notice that language is a tool manipulated by intelligent agents, not random mutations.  In any case, his main point is that evolution shines not because of any hyped commercial value, but because of its explanatory power:

In the end, the true value of evolutionary biology is not practical but explanatory.  It answers, in the most exquisitely simple and parsimonious way, the age-old question: “How did we get here?”  It gives us our family history writ large, connecting us with every other species, living or extinct, on Earth.  It shows how everything from frogs to fleas got here via a few easily grasped biological processes.  And that, after all, is quite an accomplishment.

See also Evolution News analysis of this book review, focusing on Coyne’s stereotyping of creationists.  Compare also our 02/10/2006 and 12/21/2005 stories on marketing Darwinism to the masses.

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¹Jerry Coyne, “Selling Darwin,” Nature 442, 983-984(31 August 2006) | doi:10.1038/442983a; Published online 30 August 2006.

You heard it right here.  We didn’t have to say it.  One of Darwin’s own bulldogs said it for us: evolutionary theory is useless.  Oh, this is rich.  Don’t let anyone tell you that evolution is the key to biology, and without it we would fall behind in science and technology and lose our lead in the world.  He just said that most real progress in biology was done before evolutionary theory arrived, and that modern-day advances owe little or nothing to the Grand Materialist Myth.  Darwin is dead, and except for providing plot lines for storytellers, the theory that took root out of Charlie’s grave bears no fruit (but a lot of poisonous thorns: see 08/27/2006).
    To be sure, many things in science do not have practical value.  Black holes are useless, too, and so is the cosmic microwave background.  It is the Darwin Party itself, however, that has hyped evolution for its value to society.  With this selling point gone, what’s left?  The only thing Coyne believes evolution can advertise now is a substitute theology to answer the big questions.  Instead of an omniscient, omnipotent God, he offers the cult of Tinker Bell and her mutation wand as an explanation for endless forms most beautiful.  Evolution allows us to play connect-the-dot games between frogs and fleas.  It allows us to water down a complex world into simplistic, “easily grasped” generalities.  Such things are priceless, he thinks.  He’s right.  It costs nothing to produce speculation about things that cannot be observed, and nobody should consider such products worth a dime.
    We can get along just fine in life without the Darwin Party catalog.  Thanks to Jerry Coyne for providing inside information on the negative earnings in the Darwin & Co. financial report.  Sell your evolution stock now before the bottom falls out.
Next headline on:  Evolutionary Theory

[Coyoteman]

Come on!! DRAWINGS??? you can do better right???

I posted a nice transitional skull, along with a chart showing its posited relationship to other skulls, and all I get is complaints (no evidence to the contrary, just willfull disbelief).

OK, here is another skull for you to disbelieve. I can post a lot more if you want. Just let me know.

I spent a lot of time with the cast of this one in grad school. Its really a very pretty specimen!

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Fossil: Sts 5

Site: Sterkfontein Cave, South Africa (1)

Discovered By: R. Broom & J. Robinson 1947 (1)

Estimated Age of Fossil: 2.5 mya * determined by Stratigraphic, floral & faunal data (1, 4)

Species Name: Australopithecus africanus (1, 2)

Gender: Male (based on CAT scan of wisdom teeth roots) (1, 30) Female (original interpretation) (4)

Cranial Capacity: 485 cc (2, 4)

Information: No tools found in same layer (4)

Interpretation: Erect posture (based on forward facing foramen magnum) (8)

Nickname: Mrs. Ples (1)

See original source for notes:
http://www.mos.org/evolution/fossils/fossilview.php?fid=24

[Quark2005]

geesh...DRAWINGS???? You call that evidence???

Ever been to the Natural History museum in DC? Fascinating place. You can see some of the evidence there first hand, if you're so inclined.

[Suzy Quzy]

OK..tell me WHAT of?? Animals...viruses....Men???

[Virginia-American]

Evolutionary theory is foundational to our modern understanding of biology. Anyone who says otherwise is trying to sell you a bill of goods. ...

And a few CDs and books too. I've become convinced that most of the professional creationists and ID-ists are totally cynical con artists, preying on Christians and Muslims just like fake preachers and faith healers.

. Drilling for oil is expensive, and involves a degree of risk. The more you understand about the ancient climate at the time the strata was laid down, the better your chance of identifying a possible crude oil reservoir. Modern oil exploration makes heavy use of micropaleontology, or the study of microscopic fossil life, such as algaes and diatoms. Combined with stratigraphy, geologists paint a picture of the ancient climate in order to drill fewer dry holes. In this way, geology and evolutionary theory combine into the applied science of petroleum engineering.

Excellent point. Here's links to some essays on the subject from the

. This is the professional organization of the oil prospectors. One can say that the free market has proven evolution and normal geology to be true; if another theory worked better and made more money, it would be used.

[Suzy Quzy]

Not so fast....I asked for EVIDENCE of EVOLUTION.....the gradual changes over the years...the TRAIL of Gradual Changes over the years....not some picture of a skull.

[DannyTN]

"Sure, evolutionary theory didn't have anything to do with the changes in the past, as Darwin proposed his theory in 1859. But his theory (as modified and improved for 150 years) accounts for those changes and explains those changes."

Which was the point. Evolution theory didn't contribute squat. It only attempts to explain in retrospect how we got here. (And I think it's a bad, extremely week, explanation.)

It didn't contribute to the breeding or selection experiments. Men didn't need evolution theory for that.

ToE didn't contribute to the discovery of genetics, you can thank the creationist George Mendel for that.

ToE didn't contribute to the discovery of vaccines, again thank creationists.

In fact, the only thing ToE contributes to is the government grant industry.

[Suzy Quzy]

They CLAIMED all that!! Where is the GRADUAl CHANGING EVIDENCE of EVOLUTION??? Hint...it doesn't exist except in viruses.

[Physicist]

I didn't call you any names. I asked you a couple of simple, honest questions. You should have no problem telling me how old the Earth is.

In answer to your question, the fact that an ancient bird, archaeopteryx, had teeth while no birds do today is evidence for evolution.

BTW, the above picture is from a creationist website, and they say it's a bird. Can you really look at it and deny that birds have changed over time?

[caffe]

LOL ..show me where Darwin predicted the pre cambrian fossils........this discovery is major evidence against Darwin!

[Coyoteman]

Not so fast....I asked for EVIDENCE of EVOLUTION.....the gradual changes over the years...the TRAIL of Gradual Changes over the years....not some picture of a skull.

What do you think a skull is? It is a data point.

A lot of skulls are a lot of data points.

The theory of evolution puts this data together following the scientific method.

This is scientific evidence.

Now you may not accept it (for religious reasons or lack of education in one of the specific fields), but that does not diminish the theory in any way. If you are not an evolutionary scientist, with a least some training in the field, your opinion is of no value.

[Suzy Quzy]

I want to see the evolution...the EVOLVING of an animal!! It's NOT there. The age of the earth has NOTHING to do with anything....Face it...you have NO evidence of the evolving of an animal...NONE. That skull could be anything....coul;d have been a bird that is now extinct...doesn't mean it evolved...God could have created it that way and then it went extinct.....still WAITING. No drawings please.

[Coyoteman]

I want to see the evolution...the EVOLVING of an animal!! It's NOT there. The age of the earth has NOTHING to do with anything....Face it...you have NO evidence of the EVOLVING of an animal...NONE. That skull could be anything....coul;d have been a bird that is now extinct...doesn't mean it evolved...God could have created it that way and then it went extinct.....still WAITING. No drawings please.

There is no evidence that can possibly convince a closed mind.

Goodnight all.

[Suzy Quzy]

Step by step GRADUAL EVOLVING would be the definition of evolution....where is it.....waiting...waiting. Step by step evidence....GRADUAL evolving.

[Suzy Quzy]

Chicken...you have NO evidence because ther IS no evidence. You live in a Godless bubble...sad....I'll pray for you.

[Quark2005]

OK..tell me WHAT of?? Animals...viruses....Men???

A bit of all those and more. Not really something that can be described second hand. The Smithsonian is quite an extant place, with lots of awesome displays.

[Suzy Quzy]

Well...then show me the Gradual EVOLVING of anything except viruses...SHOW IT TO ALL OF US.

[Quark2005]

I see you conveniently overlooked the biggest problem with that particular skull. That the skull was badly diseased, a fact that even the Smithsonian admits for which I provided a link in the debunking.

The only link provided with regard to the Rhodesia Man skull (I) is to a web page by Dr. Jack Cuozzo, who doesn't appear to have any official affiliation with the Smithsonian. He's the only one I see claiming it's a diseased specimen, and he's the same nut who seems to thing this 100,000+yr. old skull was killed by a bullet wound. How silly can you get?

A little research shows that Cuozzo isn't a paleontologist or anthropologist of any type, he's an orthodontist from New Jersey, for crying out loud! In his book, Buried Alive, he apparently claims Neanderthals were humans that lived for hundreds of years. He claimed to find fossils at a site in England that later turned out to be nothing but pieces of gravel. I swear, you can't make this stuff up!

Looks like Cuozzo and others of his ilk should leave science to the professionals. On second thought, why should he? Looks like he's made quite a bit of $$ selling his crackpot book, without having to go through pesky ordeals like research, fact checking, peer review, further testing etc....

[Virginia-American]

... Bacteria have not 'evolved' drug resistance; the resistant bacteria have always been there ...

This is false. You can start with a single bacterium and it will make many copies of itself. A few of these will, randomly, have mutations that confer antibiotic resistance. Google Luria-Delburuck or Lederberg experiments to learn the details.

[Jaguarbhzrd]

Why is it that if someone understands evolution, that you assume that they are godless, or an atheist?

I find that fascinating.

Would you kindly explain?

[Virginia-American]

In common usage, gravity is interchangeable as both hypothesis and observation. There's no denying that variation exists within species, just as there's no denying that if I hold my hand out and drop a penny, it will accelerate downward. Both observations are true and self evident.

The hypothesis of common descent, like ...

You're forgetting some other crucial observations that Darwin's theory explains.

First is the Law of Faunal Succession, the fact that a particular fossil organism is restricted to certain strata, and the more recent fossils more closely resemble living animals and plants. This is evidence of descent within lineages, if not complete common descent.

Another data set that Darwin used was the geographic distribution of species and fossils. Wegener cited some of this in his continental drift hypothesis, now part of plate tectonic theory.

Yet another thing Darwin considered was the experience of animal and plant breeders.