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bowman
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 Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 8:05 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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Sound of Trumpet wrote:
| Quote: |
the "Darwinian myth" is becoming the "ordering myth" for the West,
replacing the Christian story, with potentially disastrous
consequences.
|
That's natural selection for you -- not only was the Christian story a
disaster in itself, it couldn't hold the center.
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com |
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raven1
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 8:35 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 15:11:08 -0700, Sound of Trumpet
<soundoftrumpet@mailcan.com> wrote:
| Quote: |
"Who would you rationally trust when we legalize doctor-assisted
suicide?" he asked. "A Darwinist physician or a doctor who believes in
judgment after death?"
|
This is completely irrelevant to the truth or falsity of either
belief, dipshit.
--
"O Sybilli, si ergo
Fortibus es in ero
O Nobili! Themis trux
Sivat sinem? Causen Dux" |
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Davej
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 8:44 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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On Jul 13, 5:11 pm, Sound of Trumpet <soundoftrum...@mailcan.com>
wrote:
Ah, another Christian kook with a blog. |
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Uncle Vic
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 8:50 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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One fine day in alt.atheism, Sound of Trumpet <soundoftrumpet@mailcan.com>
bloodied us up with this:
| Quote: |
Darwinism and popular culture: Darwinism becoming the West's myth,
doctor says
|
Andrew B Chung, probably.
--
Uncle Vic
aa Atheist #2011
Supervisor, EAC Department of little adhesive-backed "L" shaped
chrome-plastic doo-dads to add feet to Jesus fish department.
Convicted by Earthquack. |
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Stephen Knight
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 9:00 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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The Idiot... Sound of Trumpet spewed...
| Quote: |
Darwinism and popular culture: Darwinism becoming the West's myth,
doctor says
|
Look at it like a break from a god making a man out of dirt and a
woman from a piece of bone.
You have the 'Idiots Book of Stupidity' to prove this and hundreds
of thousands of scientific hours proving, empirically that evolution
is fact.
'Goddidit' doesn't work for thinking people.
Do you have any scientific evidence to verify divine creation? Even
one tiny little thing?
Warlord Steve
BAAWA |
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Lorentz
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 11:02 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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On Jul 13, 6:11 pm, Sound of Trumpet <soundoftrum...@mailcan.com>
wrote:
| Quote: |
http://post-darwinist.blogspot.com/2007/06/darwinism-and-popular-cult...
Thursday, June 28, 2007
My friend and colleague Deborah Gyapong reports on a recent talk by
Dr. John Patrick, Ottawa pediatrician and retired professor of
medicine, noting that
It is good he retired, as she obviously hasn't kept up in the |
field of medicine. Furthermore, she is making false comments. She may
have once been a competent doctor, but based on what you are saying
she has become a hack.
| Quote: |
"Who would you rationally trust when we legalize doctor-assisted
suicide?" he asked. "A Darwinist physician or a doctor who believes in
judgment after death?"
Given those two choices, and no other information, I would |
trust the Darwinist doctor. The law doesn't matter here as long as I
am making the decision. Therefore, I would try to choose the doctor
who I feel could give me the most accurate knowledge on what I could
expect. I know there are Darwinist and religious doctors who would
tell me things to manipulate my behavior. I would try to avoid
dishonest doctors regardless of religious or atheist orientation,
because I want the truth. At least with an openly Darwinist doctor, I
right off have a person who has an interest in biological reality. If
I decide to live, I most certainly don't want a religious doctor. I
want a scientist, not a wizard, to treat me. I want someone who will
get an accurate diagnosis regardless of what happens to my soul. I
want Doctor House.
| Quote: |
Darwin's theories of natural selection, survival of the fittest and of
evolutionary progress are making an impact on health care, even though
Patrick describes the art of medicine as "very anti-Darwinist" in its
care for the sick and the vulnerable. But that is changing as society
becomes "profoundly incoherent," he said.
Patrick was speaking at a conference of Christian medical doctors,
June 3-9 at St. Augustine College in Ottawa.
The most interesting aspect of the current aggressive promotion of
evolutionary medicine (Darwinism in medicine and veterinaray
practice ) is its sheer clinical uselessness.
I'll start with a basic fact about viral vaccines, that shows |
clearly that Doctor Patrick is WRONG. Vaccines are currently made
anticipating the strains that are most likely to break out in an
epidemic. Strains are tested for rate of mutation, and vaccines are
prepared against the strains that mutate the fastest. That's right,
not the ones who start out spreading the fastest. The ones that mutate
the fastest. This is a direct application of Darwin's theory of
evolution. Darwinism, right there, has been shown to be clinically
useful. Doctor Patrick, by not even acknowledging this application,
shows himself to be an ignorant quack.
| Quote: |
The proclamations are grand, to be sure:
I was about to call Doctor Patrick senile. However, he may be just |
a liar.
| Quote: |
Similarly, with antibiotic resistance (an often-cited passage in the
Gospel According to Darwin),
L
I have it on good authority that the main
cause of the resistance is overprescription (and other overuse) of
antibiotics. We helped the bugs get where they are. We could stop
helping them. But that doesn't mean telling the old, old story of
Darwinism over and over again; it means getting patients to accept
alternative treatments. They will only do that if they can be
persuaded that other approaches work.
With regard to antibiotics, I present five pieces of evidence that |
Doctor Patrick is incompetent (because of either senility or lying, I
don't care which).
1) Most of the abuse is in cases where the antibiotics aren't
needed in the first place. The Darwinist story prevents doctors from
giving them prophylactic doses of antibiotics. Often, the doctor knows
the antibiotic isn't necessary even as a prophylactic. He gives it to
make the parent or child feel that they got their moneys worth.
Apparently, the ignorant Doctor Patrick would give prophylactic
antibiotics if he would come out of retirement.
2) Much of the MDR strains developed because the patient wasn't
completing their course of treatment. The surviving bacteria evolved
after repeated but incomplete treatments. Without the Darwinist story,
there would be no chick on this dangerous practice. Doctors are now on
their patients to complete their sequence of therapy.
Apparently, the ignorant Doctor Patrick would not pressure his
patients to complete their course of treatment if he would come out of
retirement.
3) New antibiotics have to be developed all the time to counter
the emerging MDR strains. However, some of these antibiotics are being
designed so that mutations that make them ineffectual will be
unlikely. Regardless, new antibiotics have to be used all the time
now.
The ignorant Doctor Patrick obviously doesn't keep up with research
on antibiotics.
4) Some MDR strains have been generated from the use of antibiotics on
cattle, given to them mostly to fatten them up.
The Darwinist story is convincing some farmers to use fewer
antibiotics.
Apparently, the ignorant Doctor Patrick obviously is unaware of
veterinary medicine.
5) Some patients really do the right thing and avoid behaviors that
put both other people at risk, and sometimes even themselves.
Apparently, the ignorant and arrogant Doctor Patrick obviously
doesn't think enough of his own patients to trust that some of them
have concern for others.
| Quote: |
I suspect that Darwinian medicine will just go the way of evolutionary
psychology. I wonder how much harm it will do first.
All things pass. Fortunately, evolutionary medicine will |
continue longer than the ignorant Doctor Patrick. Evolutionary
psychology will be useful in explaining how lying ignorant quacks like
Doctor Patrick have evolved. |
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J.H.Boersema
Guest
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 11:02 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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[Followup-To: alt.atheism]
On 2007-07-13, Sound of Trumpet <soundoftrumpet@mailcan.com> wrote:
| Quote: |
http://post-darwinist.blogspot.com/2007/06/darwinism-and-popular-culture-darwinism.html
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Darwinism and popular culture: Darwinism becoming the West's myth,
doctor says
My friend and colleague Deborah Gyapong reports on a recent talk by
Dr. John Patrick, Ottawa pediatrician and retired professor of
medicine, noting that
the "Darwinian myth" is becoming the "ordering myth" for the West,
replacing the Christian story, with potentially disastrous
consequences.
"Who would you rationally trust when we legalize doctor-assisted
suicide?" he asked. "A Darwinist physician or a doctor who believes in
judgment after death?"
Darwin's theories of natural selection, survival of the fittest and of
evolutionary progress are making an impact on health care, even though
Patrick describes the art of medicine as "very anti-Darwinist" in its
care for the sick and the vulnerable. But that is changing as society
becomes "profoundly incoherent," he said.
Patrick was speaking at a conference of Christian medical doctors,
June 3-9 at St. Augustine College in Ottawa. Unfortunately, other
speakers attempted to soothe the audience with tales of some kind of
accommodation with Darwinism, as long as the Darwinists would just
remember that Darwinism is not supposed to be the ordering myth of the
West. Yeah really.
|
What you people need to do is think harder, not less. Darwin was great.
His theory does not at all promote hate against the weak, rather the
exact opposite. But for that to become obvious you'd have to really look
at evolution theory, and see what it is *really* saying: survival of
the `fittest,' meaning `the best adapted to its circumstance.'
Superficial people immediately make the link with animal behavior -
lions, hyena's, etc, and "surely" humanity must behave similarly and
conduct a strong amount of internal violence. The animals survived
that way, and so must we. But wait a minute, doesn't `best
adapted to circumstance' mean we have to take account of those
`circumstances,' just to see what exactly is `best adapted to our
human circumstances.' ?
What makes humanity different from all other animals is not our
intelligence (that much is obvious, humanity isn't that bright at
all, just marginally compared to other creatures IMHO), but it is our
technology. Which does slowly make humanity more smart also, so we
are becoming slowly more intelligent then all other animals. Good
use of technology requires brains which equals human survival:
pressure to become much smarter, unlike other animals who are not
in this new environment.
Other animals are fighting so much: they don't have technology
to defend themselves. Therefore they have to fight, which selects
for better bodily weapons (teeth/claw). Their need for these weapons
outstrips the costs of this violence. Those groups that don't fight
go down, as their predators and competitors do fight between themselves,
and eventually the non-fighting group loses strength and falls off
(extinction).
Humans have technology. No weak people are being killed by lions,
and nobody is being killed by deer defending itself from a speer
attack either. The weak survive, and the violent (now already outlaw
criminals!) continue to destroy each other. The evolution of mankind
has reversed course when it comes to violence, thanks to technology.
We are in a new era since roughly 1947, with the invention of the
all-powerful AK-47 machine rifle. We entered the era of technology
when we first through a stone, from then on our power rested part
on technology and part on bodily skills that would still improve
thanks to fighting. Since 1947 we are basically in the pure-technology
era, our bodily skills don't contribute to our power anymore and
fighting does therefore no longer help us. Unfortunately, we entered
in 1947 immediately in the third stage: fighting could extinct humanity.
The US build the Atom-bomb, so we have a technological shock. This
is very dangerous, because we haven't yet been familiar culturally
to the AK-47 effect and come to understand it, yet we suddenly have
weapons about in 1967 set up to go, while still in the old war rush.
That is dangerous, needless to say. Humanity's technical evolution
goes much faster then its social evolution: imbalance. Maybe
Neanderthal would have done better, I've read they had a slower
technical evolution. That would have kept social and technical evolution
closer together, which is much safer. (Maybe we are in a death-trap
with homo-sapiens; its smaller brain, instinctual behavior and
dangerously fast technical progress, faster then it can handle.)
Darwinism is great, it is the most social of all theories and much
better then all religions, including Christianity. It convinces and
proves. But to make it work: use your head. And to make it known:
defeat the Mafia establishment, because they thrive on the violence of
people, and their struggle against it. The exploitive establishments
float on a level of back-ground violence, and the more determined parts
will use tools to maintain that back-ground violence. So far they've
been able to abuse Darwinism to that end: you could turn Darwin around
and use it to defeat the exploiters. In the mean time making scientific
progress.
| Quote: |
The most interesting aspect of the current aggressive promotion of
evolutionary medicine (Darwinism in medicine and veterinaray
practice ) is its sheer clinical uselessness.
The proclamations are grand, to be sure:
"Nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution," is
the oft-quoted title of a 1973 article for biology teachers by the
great evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky. In it, he writes,
"Seen in the light of evolution, biology is, perhaps, intellectually
the most satisfying and inspiring science. Without that light it
becomes a pile of sundry facts some of them interesting or curious but
making no meaningful picture as a whole."
Evolution's role is equally central in the subset of biology
addressing human health and disease. The co-evolution of humans and
our pathogens, the rapidly shifting resistance of those pathogens to
our antibiotics, and our persistent vulnerability to chronic disease
all gain significance when viewed in the context of continuing
evolution. These subjects form the core of "Darwinian medicine," also
known as "evolutionary medicine."
But how exactly do these ills "gain significance when viewed in the
context of continuing evolution"? For the purpose of counselling and
treatment of the patient in the present day, it hardly matters when
they appeared or who - besides immediate ancestors and sibs, and
people who live nearby - has them.
Consider, for example, an illness for which there is apparently a
genetic predisposition: alcoholism. Fundamentally, the patient has
decisions to make (Will I drink or not? Will I get drunk or not?) What
if Alley Oop had the same problem? What if he didn't?
For that matter, what if there is really no genetic predisposition to
alcoholism? It makes no difference to the patient in the end. He
either drinks or he doesn't, and accepts the consequences.
One could say the same thing about obesity, that other scourge of the
family practitioner's office in prosperous countries everywhere. If
the Willendorf Venus was fat, so what? What if she had been thin? I
doubt that most Stone Age women were as certain of their next meal as
she must have been. But in the end, today's woman decides whether she
wants obesity, along with its problems, or not. And she's the only one
who can really do something about it.
Similarly, with antibiotic resistance (an often-cited passage in the
Gospel According to Darwin), I have it on good authority that the main
cause of the resistance is overprescription (and other overuse) of
antibiotics. We helped the bugs get where they are. We could stop
helping them. But that doesn't mean telling the old, old story of
Darwinism over and over again; it means getting patients to accept
alternative treatments. They will only do that if they can be
persuaded that other approaches work.
I suspect that Darwinian medicine will just go the way of evolutionary
psychology. I wonder how much harm it will do first.
|
The human race can not continue to exist if it continues to worship
violence in all its different and often shaded forms, ranging from
atomic war to pestering a weak individual at work (that used to
be called cowardice on the part of the strong, humanity seems to be
degenerating; these anti-peace behaviors might be a reaction from
the elite-powers encouraging it through cultural expressions such as
TV shows etc, who feel threatened in their understanding of the
world by peaceful/non-violent people, who do not need them to keep
them in line and who do not share the morality and instincts of the
power-elite to a recognizable extend).
Now that violence is our greatest threat and an evolutionary dead end
(suddenly the reverse), survival of humanity is still helped by the
"normal" activities such as helping specimen in need, things that
could also benefit non-technological species. Injured specimen may
cure and become productive again, much resources were also spend in
their upbringing. Secondly, weirdness is to be treasured, because it
means evolutionary diversity ! Who knows what the weird people will
come up with, we can't miss out on that, evolution theory depends
on it.
But me thinks you guys might not want to find real peace, and
therefore you can't perhaps find it in Darwinism, even though it
is so obvious. It seems humanity can't let go of war, it scares
it (instinctual as it is in most of its behavior), and that is
natural. The hunger for war and violence is an instinct that has kept
humanity alive, and kept our ancestors alive, kept the species from
which we evolved alive. To let it go seems dangerous, suicide. But
if you know what you're doing, not letting go is dangerous. Call it
an evolutionary test: is there intelligent life on earth to overcome
the now wrong instincts, or is humanity just a plant which accidentally
stumbled upon the technology game... a plant which retains violence
and which might therefore one day attempt to rule the universe by
oppression. We can therefore be happy that the world is divided in
planets that require very powerful technology to travel from one
to the next. It protects us from potential oppressors who face their
moral/technical barrier, and them from us. Until we overcome the
technical and therefore moral barrier, we aren't going anywhere
far. If we don't cross the moral barrier, we will destroy ourself
and rain down back on Earth as animals. Not exactly conducive for
survival, is it. Morality is good for survival, however you look
at it.
Formal argument: http://www.xs4all.nl/~joshb/technical_darwinism.html
--
http://www.xs4all.nl/~joshb |
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Ash
Guest
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| Posted: Sat Jul 14, 2007 11:02 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
|
|
Sound of Trumpet wrote:
| Quote: |
http://post-darwinist.blogspot.com/2007/06/darwinism-and-popular-culture-darwinism.html
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Darwinism and popular culture: Darwinism becoming the West's myth,
doctor says
My friend and colleague Deborah Gyapong reports on a recent talk by
Dr. John Patrick, Ottawa pediatrician and retired professor of
medicine, noting that
the "Darwinian myth" is becoming the "ordering myth" for the West,
replacing the Christian story, with potentially disastrous
consequences.
"Who would you rationally trust when we legalize doctor-assisted
suicide?" he asked. "A Darwinist physician or a doctor who believes in
judgment after death?"
|
Is that a trick question? Ignoring the massive dishonesty in setting up
the either/or dilemma here (there is of course nothing to suggest the
"Darwinist Physician" does not believe in life after death, the obvious
answer would be to trust the person who doesn't consider death to be a
minor and temporary inconvenience |
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Meteorite Debris
Guest
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| Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2007 9:53 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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|
Last time that great scribe Lorentz <drosen0000@yahoo.com> chipped away
at his/her stone these gems of wisdom for posterity ...
| Quote: |
I have heard the pseudo-Darwinist argument that elimination
of the weak by secondary smoke may result in stronger race of people.
However, the person who made this statement was a scientific moron as
well as being a paranoid lunatic. He knew nothing about Darwin or
biology.
|
It would seem. The effect of allowing secondary smoke to select
survivors would not be a "stronger race" of people, only a race of
people who were not affected by secondary smoke, with all other traits,
good, bad and indifferent, still being present in the gene pool. There
seems to a an impression of some absolute "stronger" set of traits for
all and any environment.
--
Remove both YOUR_SHOES before replying
apatriot #1, atheist #1417,
Chief EAC prophet
Jason Gastrich is praying for me on 8 January 2009
Apatriotism Yahoo Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/apatriotism
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make
you commit atrocities." - Voltaire |
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Meteorite Debris
Guest
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| Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2007 10:12 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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Last time that great scribe Jack Tingle <wjtingle@hotmail.com> chipped
away at his/her stone these gems of wisdom for posterity ...
| Quote: |
On Sat, 14 Jul 2007 08:41:05 -0500, "Mark K. Bilbo"
gmail@com.mkbilbo> wrote:
On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 20:57:39 -0500, Bill Snyder wrote:
On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 19:58:18 -0500, "Mark K. Bilbo" <gmail@com.mkbilbo
wrote:
On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 16:42:30 -0700, HayekFan wrote:
piggybacking, Squawking Turd is in my killfile
Similarly, with antibiotic resistance (an often-cited passage in the
Gospel According to Darwin), I have it on good authority that the
main cause of the resistance is overprescription (and other overuse)
of antibiotics
Oh damn, do they get any stupider than this?
If you need to ask, you haven't heard from very many of them.
I've heard from a lot of them and yet they still manage to surprise me.
Right when you think they've reached bottom...
That applies to a lot of things. All worldly things are impure, and
all systems are imperfect.
|
There is purity but for the most part purity is toxic and unhealthy.
When you purify some good thing you get toxic poison. Purify opium,
purify coca leaves etc. Purify a gene line and you make it weaker. Pure
bred animals do not have the healthy vigour of hybrids. I think the same
principle applies to life generally. Purify a political idea, economic
efficiency or anything else and misery follows. Impurity is robustness.
In demographics, language, multiculturalism etc, diversity and
heterogeneity is to be preferred to orthodoxy and uniformity.
If you see purity in anything, dirty it with another idea.
| Quote: |
My company has been laying off continuously
from the 90's to very recently, and yet I still come across the
occasional idiot that they missed. I've decided there is no bottom,
and the non-existen bottom keeps changing.
|
Economic efficiency - a purification of another sort. An orthodoxy
causing so much grief.
--
Remove both YOUR_SHOES before replying
apatriot #1, atheist #1417,
Chief EAC prophet
Jason Gastrich is praying for me on 8 January 2009
Apatriotism Yahoo Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/apatriotism
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make
you commit atrocities." - Voltaire |
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Dan Clore
Guest
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| Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2007 10:57 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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Cary Kittrell wrote:
| Quote: |
"Mark K. Bilbo" <gmail@com.mkbilbo
On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 16:42:30 -0700, HayekFan wrote:
piggybacking, Squawking Turd is in my killfile
Similarly, with antibiotic resistance (an often-cited passage in the
Gospel According to Darwin), I have it on good authority that the main
cause of the resistance is overprescription (and other overuse) of
antibiotics
Oh damn, do they get any stupider than this?
Excuse me, but I believe he said he had that on "good authority".
You...you scoffing person, you.
|
Good authority -- that can only mean --
Gawd told him so!
--
Dan Clore
My collected fiction, _The Unspeakable and Others_:
http://amazon.com/o/ASIN/1587154838/ref=nosim/thedanclorenecro
Lord We˙rdgliffe & Necronomicon Page:
http://www.geocities.com/clorebeast/
News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
Strange pleasures are known to him who flaunts the
immarcescible purple of poetry before the color-blind.
-- Clark Ashton Smith, "Epigrams and Apothegms" |
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brique
Guest
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| Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2007 11:01 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
|
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Meteorite Debris <epicurusboth@YOUR_SHOESaapt.net.au> wrote in message
news:MPG.210449848222b44e989832@news.ade.connect.com.au...
| Quote: |
Last time that great scribe Lorentz <drosen0000@yahoo.com> chipped away
at his/her stone these gems of wisdom for posterity ...
I have heard the pseudo-Darwinist argument that elimination
of the weak by secondary smoke may result in stronger race of people.
However, the person who made this statement was a scientific moron as
well as being a paranoid lunatic. He knew nothing about Darwin or
biology.
It would seem. The effect of allowing secondary smoke to select
survivors would not be a "stronger race" of people, only a race of
people who were not affected by secondary smoke, with all other traits,
good, bad and indifferent, still being present in the gene pool. There
seems to a an impression of some absolute "stronger" set of traits for
all and any environment.
|
There does seem to be an ass-backwards concept of Darwins theories that
suggests that evolution inevitably pushes towards producing the 'perfect'
being and that a species will all become a perfect copy of such a perfect
example of that species, thus producing the best possible variant for all
circumstances. Thus we get eugenics and what tends to get called
'Darwinism'.
It's all a nonsense, the strength of a species, its ability to survive and
adapt and therefore procreate is not in being, or striving to be, the same
uber-specimen, it is in variety, in the multiplicity of differences to be
found within its genetic pool. This is what enables a species to adapt to
changing environments and conditions, allowing the _species_ to survive
regardless of the consequence of natural selection to any particular
_individual_ within that species at any particular time.
In effect, eugenics, genetic manipulation or other intervention in the
natural selective process is contra-darwinism. Removing potentially faulty
( within the context of the then environment) variants is not 'Darwinist' at
all.
There's a funny thing, it's those who object to genetic manipulation,
scanning and selective abortion for 'negative traits', etc who are the
'Darwinists' in _that_ argument.
| Quote: |
--
Remove both YOUR_SHOES before replying
apatriot #1, atheist #1417,
Chief EAC prophet
Jason Gastrich is praying for me on 8 January 2009
Apatriotism Yahoo Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/apatriotism
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make
you commit atrocities." - Voltaire |
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Al Klein
Guest
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| Posted: Mon Jul 16, 2007 4:29 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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On Sat, 14 Jul 2007 18:08:43 -0700, Lorentz <drosen0000@yahoo.com>
wrote:
Gesundheit. |
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brique
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| Posted: Sat Jul 21, 2007 11:12 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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Lorentz <drosen0000@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1184971169.567432.207320@w3g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
| Quote: |
On Jul 15, 5:36 am, "brique" <briquen...@freeuk.c0m> wrote:
Meteorite Debris <epicurusboth@YOUR_SHOESaapt.net.au> wrote in message
news:MPG.210449848222b44e989832@news.ade.connect.com.au...
There does seem to be an ass-backwards concept of Darwins theories that
suggests that evolution inevitably pushes towards producing the
'perfect'
being and that a species will all become a perfect copy of such a
perfect
example of that species, thus producing the best possible variant for
all
circumstances. Thus we get eugenics and what tends to get called
'Darwinism'.
I don't think this is very good eugenics either. For one thing, it
isn't really based on any hereditary.
In effect, eugenics, genetic manipulation or other intervention in the
natural selective process is contra-darwinism. Removing potentially
faulty
( within the context of the then environment) variants is not
'Darwinist' at
all.
This, I'm afraid, is incorrect. Darwin himself did suggest that
selective breeding could result in certain overall improvements. The
idea of improving the race is consistent with the idea of natural
selection. He did point out some of the possible shortfalls, however.
In "Ascent of Man," he pointed out that the choice of romantic
courtship probably ended up resulting in a sort of eugenics result
anyway. People are always striving for mates who are more intelligent,
stronger, healthier, more compassionate, etc. Forcing a eugenics
program on people will probably end up eliminating the natural
selection for compassion, something many of us don't want to do. So he
suggested leaving the dating game as it is.
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You miss my point, Darwins Theories cover 'natural selection'... the random
mixing of various traits in a specific environment which will tend to
promote those traits best suited to survival of the species. But those
traits which are not best suited do not disappear, they re-occur, frequently
and it is necessary that they do, to meet the challenge of a future changed
environment and provide an alternative development path for that speices.
Eugenics, and here it does get a bit complicated, and 'Darwinism' or
'neo-darwinism' (why complex, because the terms are interchanged and
confused with each other when they are not scientifically compatible at all
: Darwinism is the study of the theory of natural selection, 'neo-darwinism'
is a specific application of political and social 'rules' allegedly derived
from those theories) covers 'selective breeding' : the effort to remove
undesirable traits and promote a 'pure breed' containing only those traits
deemed desirable. In doing so, the aim is to stop 'natural selection' in its
tracks, to channel evolutionary pressures into a fixed path and once
achieved, halt any further development or variation.
Mixing up all the terms does not aid the debate, which, I often think, is
the purpose of doing so for some, in the hope of giving a 'scientific' or
'natural' sheen to their theories.. |
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chazwin
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| Posted: Sat Jul 21, 2007 11:12 am Post subject: Re: Darwinism Is Becoming The West's Myth |
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On 14 Jul, 00:42, HayekFan <sallymo...@yahoo.com> wrote:
| Quote: |
On Jul 13, 5:11 pm, Sound of Trumpet <soundoftrum...@mailcan.com
wrote:
http://post-darwinist.blogspot.com/2007/06/darwinism-and-popular-cult...
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Darwinism and popular culture: Darwinism becoming the West's myth,
doctor says
My friend and colleague Deborah Gyapong reports on a recent talk by
Dr. John Patrick, Ottawa pediatrician and retired professor of
medicine, noting that
the "Darwinian myth" is becoming the "ordering myth" for the West,
replacing the Christian story, with potentially disastrous
consequences.
"Who would you rationally trust when we legalize doctor-assisted
suicide?" he asked. "A Darwinist physician or a doctor who believes in
judgment after death?"
Darwin's theories of natural selection, survival of the fittest and of
evolutionary progress are making an impact on health care, even though
Patrick describes the art of medicine as "very anti-Darwinist" in its
care for the sick and the vulnerable. But that is changing as society
becomes "profoundly incoherent," he said.
Patrick was speaking at a conference of Christian medical doctors,
June 3-9 at St. Augustine College in Ottawa. Unfortunately, other
speakers attempted to soothe the audience with tales of some kind of
accommodation with Darwinism, as long as the Darwinists would just
remember that Darwinism is not supposed to be the ordering myth of the
West. Yeah really.
The most interesting aspect of the current aggressive promotion of
evolutionary medicine (Darwinism in medicine and veterinaray
practice ) is its sheer clinical uselessness.
The proclamations are grand, to be sure:
"Nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution," is
the oft-quoted title of a 1973 article for biology teachers by the
great evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky. In it, he writes,
"Seen in the light of evolution, biology is, perhaps, intellectually
the most satisfying and inspiring science. Without that light it
becomes a pile of sundry facts some of them interesting or curious but
making no meaningful picture as a whole."
Evolution's role is equally central in the subset of biology
addressing human health and disease. The co-evolution of humans and
our pathogens, the rapidly shifting resistance of those pathogens to
our antibiotics, and our persistent vulnerability to chronic disease
all gain significance when viewed in the context of continuing
evolution. These subjects form the core of "Darwinian medicine," also
known as "evolutionary medicine."
But how exactly do these ills "gain significance when viewed in the
context of continuing evolution"? For the purpose of counselling and
treatment of the patient in the present day, it hardly matters when
they appeared or who - besides immediate ancestors and sibs, and
people who live nearby - has them.
Consider, for example, an illness for which there is apparently a
genetic predisposition: alcoholism. Fundamentally, the patient has
decisions to make (Will I drink or not? Will I get drunk or not?) What
if Alley Oop had the same problem? What if he didn't?
For that matter, what if there is really no genetic predisposition to
alcoholism? It makes no difference to the patient in the end. He
either drinks or he doesn't, and accepts the consequences.
One could say the same thing about obesity, that other scourge of the
family practitioner's office in prosperous countries everywhere. If
the Willendorf Venus was fat, so what? What if she had been thin? I
doubt that most Stone Age women were as certain of their next meal as
she must have been. But in the end, today's woman decides whether she
wants obesity, along with its problems, or not. And she's the only one
who can really do something about it.
Similarly, with antibiotic resistance (an often-cited passage in the
Gospel According to Darwin), I have it on good authority that the main
cause of the resistance is overprescription (and other overuse) of
antibiotics. We helped the bugs get where they are. We could stop
helping them. But that doesn't mean telling the old, old story of
Darwinism over and over again; it means getting patients to accept
alternative treatments. They will only do that if they can be
persuaded that other approaches work.
I suspect that Darwinian medicine will just go the way of evolutionary
psychology. I wonder how much harm it will do first.
Quit confusing biological evolution with cultural evolution.
Human medical science is an example of cultural evolution in action,
not Darwinism.- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -
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To avoid cock suckers, sheep shaggers, spammers and religious nutters
AND to enjoy a expletive free philosophy News Group join
"philosophise"!
Your reasonable and thoughtful contributions are most welcome.
Chaz Wyman |
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