Why Do Some Rail Against Darwin?

[Pyrotex]

I just came upon an interesting quote from H. P. Lovecraft. In "The Call of Cthulhu" (1926), Lovecraft wrote:

 

"The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its [the world's] contents... some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new Dark Age."

 

Eighty-one years ago. That was rather prescient, if'n you ask me. Those who so desparately desire to inter Darwin's Dangerous Idea !!! http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Dangerous-Idea-Evolution-Meanings/dp/068482471X/ref=pd_bbs_2/103-2081189-4457452?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193434553&sr=1-2 into the nearest book burning, may be recoiling from the horror of anticipated madness, if we are to believe Lovecraft.

 

It would appear, that the only shield of defense is an aggressively curious mind and a sound education. OR -- to run and hide in a society where knowledge is strictly limited, if not banned.

 

What say ye?

[HydrogenBond]

I consider myself a scientist, but one of the problems with Darwin is connected to the discontinuous data of evolution. The conclusion may right with respect the data, while being only partially true.

 

Let me give an analogy. Say you had a child who was just born. You decide that each day you will make an entry into a journal until they are 18 years old. One his 18th birthday, the child turns out a certain way. Next, we tell a stranger to randomly pick 300 pages put of that journal and tell us, base on that discontinuous data, why the child is how he is. One could tell a story that is logically consistent with that random data, but could be off the mark with respect to the reality of the situation.

 

For example, say there was a house fire that affected the child when he was in the 234 day of his nineth year. If we don't pick that page, this would not be part of the analysis. Not knowing that, one may assume his higher than normal anxiety level, is do to some genetic condition. This is logical and totally consistent with the know data, but still false. I am not saying Darwin is not part truth, but it may not be the whole truth.

 

Here is how I look at the data. If a creature reached an advantageous state of selective advantage in an environment its numbers would increase. As such, the odds of finding this data will get high. If a creature was an important transition link, but was not yet stable, there may be so few of them, that we may hardly find this type of data. So the data should be heavy on the steady state end of selective advantage. This makes it appear, that nature jumped from selective advantage to selective advantage, But the data is thin on a whole range of transition states, that could make evolution look more continuous or even different.

 

The environment is important to defining selective advantage and can override genetic changes that are very progression but don't suit the environment. For example, humans are very advanced. But if we placed most humans in a swamp with the ancient aligator, selective advantage goes to the lowest lifeform. If the gators don't get you, than a little spider will. In this Darwinian scenario, the spider is higher than the human since it has selective advantage. According to Darwin, humans would become replaced with the more more advanced genetics of a race of spiders.

 

Darwin works with steady state environment suited to an animal. But a more advanced animal may not be suited to that environment. Selective advantage can cause genetic to go backwards or forwards. In other words, genetics could have been advancing fast but was nipped in the bud constantly due to selective advantage with environments. The genetic may have to wait for the environment to change or migrate.

 

The mammals were around at the time of the dinosaurs but could not take their higher genetic place=selective advantage place on the map of genetic evolution until the environment changed. Darwin supports both regressive and progressive genes as long as it has advantage. While evolution, using 20/20 hindsight using progressing genetics.

[CraigD]

Those who so desparately desire to inter Darwin's Dangerous Idea !!! into the nearest book burning, may be recoiling from the horror of anticipated madness, if we are to believe Lovecraft.

…

What say ye?

I say Lovecraft was describing nearly the opposite of a creationist recoiling at the anticipate horror of scientific knowledge.

 

Lovecraft’s social context was of tremendous scientific progress, a time when credible experts were predicting that the complete conquest of nature and mathematical truth within a generation, and there seemed no limits to what technology could achieve. The thread of “correlate all its contents” referred not to the realization that the universe could be explained in objective scientific terms, but the realization that, despite the advance of reason and science, the universe was ultimately supernatural. Ancient legend, which mainstream society was increasingly coming to accept as mere allegory, was, in Lovecraft’s horror, cold, literal fact. The old gods were not primitive, discarded superstition – they were merely sleeping, to awake at any moment to sweep aside the orderly, rational world of science.

 

There are actually, I think, parallels between the apocalyptic end of days awaited with some affection by some religionists, and the sanity-shattering horror of Cthulhu rising. Rather than fearing this madness, such religionists embrace and await it (though their vision is less tentacle-y :hal_jackolantern: ).

 

Fortunately, both are merely frightful fictions, I believe.

[Racoon]

And according to evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry in recent news, the human race will reach its peak around the year 3000 and then split into 2 different species.

 

One, The beautiful, genetically gifted folk, and the other a bunch of recessive trolls and gnomes.

That kind of fits in with Pyro's theme of duality here..

 

How will technology affect Human evolution 10,000 years from now??

 

 

from the article, and read more at the link:

Human race will 'split into two different species' | the Daily Mail

 

The human race will one day split into two separate species, an attractive, intelligent ruling elite and an underclass of dim-witted, ugly goblin-like creatures, according to a top scientist.

 

100,000 years into the future, sexual selection could mean that two distinct breeds of human will have developed.

 

The alarming prediction comes from evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry from the London School of Economics, who says that the human race will have reached its physical peak by the year 3000...........

[charles brough]

The only railing against Darwin other than from the "Born Again" religious faithful is the social science brethern who rightfully fault Darwin for thinking that natural selection worked among RACES and that RELIGIONS and SOCIETES are based on race.

 

It was a big mistake of Darwin. Even great men make mistakes. Don't you?

 

Societies are not based on race but on religions. Religions or ideologies or world-view and way-of-thinking-systems bond people into the "SOCIETIES." The Natural Selection process is BETWEEN religion bonded societies, not between races. That is why we remain genetically the same and have for almost 200,000 years. Only the mainstream world's religion-bonded societies are subject to evolution!

 

When the old belief systems fail and don't work right, they are eventually replaced with new ones. That is they way it world history goes. All the ancient religions have been replaced in the mainstream. Others such as the 4,500 year old Chinese ancestor worship system are close to dying.

[Pyrotex]

The only railing against Darwin other than from the "Born Again" religious faithful is the social science brethern who rightfully fault Darwin for thinking that natural selection worked among RACES and that RELIGIONS and SOCIETES are based on race. It was a big mistake of Darwin. Even great men make mistakes. Don't you?....

Yes, it WAS a big mistake.

But, it WASN'T Darwin's mistake.

Darwin never applied evolution to anything other than biological systems at the individual level. Neither did Huxley, his chief supporter.

 

The origin of so-called "social evolution" actually predates the publication of Darwin's works -- according to Wikipedia. The term "social darwinism" was popularized in 1944 by the American historian Richard Hofstadter. The concept has been so controversial that folks have forgotten that Darwin did not invent it, did not advocate it.

[Pyrotex]

I say Lovecraft was describing nearly the opposite of a creationist recoiling at the anticipate horror of scientific knowledge....

 

There are actually, I think, parallels between the apocalyptic end of days awaited with some affection by some religionists, and the sanity-shattering horror of Cthulu. Rather than fearing this madness, such religionists embrace and await it....

Well, I like what you said, and can fault none of it. But what if a world without superstitious powers IS the nightmare that religionists are afraid of. To them, the constant intervention of gods, angels, boogerbears and demons is what comforts them. They have their "magic spells" and prayers to keep them safe. And they appear to work. :evil:

 

But if Science learns too much and does away with the comfortable hobgobblins and deities and miracles, then they are left living in a universe of just atoms and energy. Barren, devoid of supernatural purpose and the hope of supernatural intervention.

 

for them, THIS is the Horror of Cthulu. Perhaps. IMHO. :evil:

[modest]

The origin of so-called "social evolution" actually predates the publication of Darwin's works -- according to Wikipedia. The term "social darwinism" was popularized in 1944 by the American historian Richard Hofstadter. The concept has been so controversial that folks have forgotten that Darwin did not invent it, did not advocate it.

 

I also had heard that Darwin was a racist - I just looked into it. There are a bunch of sites out there perpetuating the myth.

 

Darwin was apparently outspokenly anti-slavery. He supported the north in the American civil war. He spoke out against the unethical treatment of native Americans in South America. Here is a quote from his autobiography talking about an incident between him and the captain of a ship he sailed on:

 

"Fitz-Roy's temper was a most unfortunate one. ...We had several quarrels; for when out of temper he was utterly unreasonable. For instance, early in the voyage at Bahia in Brazil he defended and praised slavery, which I abominated, and told me that he had just visited a great slave-owner, who had called up many of his slaves and asked them whether they were happy, and whether they wished to be free, and all answered "No." I then asked him, perhaps with a sneer, whether he thought that the answers of slaves in the presence of their master was worth anything. This made him excessively angry, and he said that as I doubted his word, we could not live any longer together. I thought that I should have been compelled to leave the ship; but as soon as the news spread, which it did quickly, as the captain sent for the first lieutenant to assuage his anger by abusing me, I was deeply gratified by receiving an invitation from all the gun-room officers to mess with them. But after a few hours Fitz-Roy showed his usual magnanimity by sending an officer to me with an apology and a request that I would continue to live with him." -- Charles Darwin, Autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809-1882 (restored edition)(1958), Nora Barlow editor, pp. 73- 74

 

Thank you for correcting that Pyrotex. I think not enough can be done to kill this myth.

 

-modest