Sam Brownback Digs Himself a Deeper Hole

No scientist says that evolution is an accident

Actually, what he was saying is, I think, correct. Not that evolution, per se, is an accident but that the existence of homo sapiens as a species is a historical accident. That is quite true and, perhaps, the real reason that many people don’t want to believe in evolution. They want to be special. They want to think that human beings are the pinnacle of creation (or evolution) and that the purpose of creation (or evolution) was the existence of human beings.

Some of those have mentioned that the natural selection was the mechanism of the design.

What do you mean? Are you suggesting the possibility that god could have designed the mechanism of natural selection as a means of guiding evolution? Because if so, I should point out that natural selection is not a natural law but a consequence of other natural mechanisms which are themselves consequences of other natural mechanisms several orders of complexity removed from the natural laws which are causing the observed behavior.

First, natural selection is not the only identified mechanism of evolution. Even Darwin also identified sexual selection, and several other things have been identified since (creationists often seem to think that no progress has been made in evolutionary science in the 100 plus years since Darwin died).

It’s true that people who feel that theistic evolution is the answer generally feel that god used these natural methods we’ve identified as the mechanisms to do god’s bidding. The thing there is that with that explanation, it works equally well with or without god, and there’s no evidence of god, so why include this extra thing — that’s part of where parodies like the Flying Spaghetti Monster came about.

The problem with words like accident or chance is that they are often mangled as they go along the “telephone” (like the game). Change in evolution is random, selection is not, but that doesn’t mean that selection is directed (that’s where [those few] creationists who attempt to be thoughtful often go wrong). Chance is another thing. People are often disturbed by the thought of the role of luck in evolution. For instance, with hominids and apes splitting, the changes were a matter of luck as to which branch you ended up in. Both the ape changes and the hominid changes worked very nicely for millions of years. It was just a lucky break for hominids that their changes turned out to support later changes that made it possible to live in multiple environments. This led to our getting to the point where we could live almost anywhere, while apes were still restricted to a more restricted set of environments, which in turn led to the point where we can and almost have) wipe them out. Bad luck, magnified by years and later changes.

One way to think about the role of chance and why it doesn’t look like it in hindsight (fooling many) is to think of crossing a snow-covered field which is strewn with logs and crossed by gullies, while blindfolded. You shuffle along, with many possible paths (the future) to take — paths you can’t see. You get to the other side and look back and you have a clear path. It looks like you deliberately took that path, but in fact you didn’t do it deliberately. It was chance and selection but it looks like deliberate action in hindsight.

Can you explain what you mean by “Natural selection acts purposefully…?”

Let me try that one. First thing is that it’s very difficult, without being really stilted, to not use words and phrases that have several possible meanings, or carry connotations and baggage, that can’t be misconstrued (or among creationists deliberately twisted). I would say that’s what happened there. When I talk about natural selection myself, I try not to say “selected for” or “purpose” or a few other words, but it’s not always easy to do especially in a popular venue. I also tend to say natural selection never selects “for” but instead only “against”, because the former suggests that natural selection is trying to accomplish something when all it really does is stop a specific organism from continuing its line. The language we have available does make it hard to construct an explanation without verbal traps when talking about evolution. In a newsgroup posting 12 years ago I tried putting it this way:

Natural selection works only by basically wiping out organisms; it “selects” by not “allowing” effective raising of young (at any stage of that process) (and my quote marks are proliferating because of the inherent problems and baggage associated with words like “allow” and “select”). In that sense, natural selection only selects “against”, never “for”. It only happens when something doesn’t work, and the fact that things that do work are left (and sometimes get “better”) is an artifact.

I also tend to say natural selection never selects “for” but instead only “against”

I would disagree with that. Take mating rituals, for example. Bright colorful feathers usually have no benefit other than attracting other birds. They develop through evolution because the birds that have them mate more often and not because the birds that lack them die sooner more often.

Miko… that’s an example of sexual selection, not natural selection.

From what I’ve heard, the term sexual selection is usually used in contrast to viability selection, fecundity selection, and survival selection, with all four considered as subcategories of natural selection. Natural selection is then most often contrasted with artificial selection through husbandry, etc. However, if by natural selection you mean only viability selection, then I’ll agree that it would have to always work in the negative direction.

From what I’ve heard, the term sexual selection is usually used in contrast to viability selection, fecundity selection, and survival selection, with all four considered as subcategories of natural selection

Some people do, while others don’t. I strongly side with those who think sexual selection shouldn’t be considered a subset of natural selection precisely because it often does work quite differently, in that there is active selection (albeit often not consciously) by a living agent, unlike natural selection.

On the “historical accident” business: I think this is yet another of these language pitfalls. There are simple accidents where bad luck wipes out a species — local population, big meteor, they’re toast, no matter how long they might otherwise have lasted — but by the time we became a pretty good environmental generalist and spread around (say a million and a half or more ago) we weren’t very susceptible to that kind of bad luck. Even disease has a hard time wiping out a species that is spread out over a couple continents and doesn’t travel huge distances in any individual’s lifetime. In the sense that we, as we are, are here that would fit in with some meanings of “historical accident”, except that I would try to find and use some other, less loaded, and perhaps more accurate term. It isn’t easy to avoid these pitfalls, though — I usually try pretty hard not to and I stumble into them at times.

Maria, poll numbers on those biologists, please. And I’d like to get a good look at the questions on the survey.

If there was a God who created the universe then natural selection would be no less a natural process. But that isn’t a question science deals with because it isn’t a question that is quantifiable or even observable. It’s a matter of presonal belief or non-belief or disbelief. I find that entirely reassuring because it means people are free to have their own ideas about it. I’d love to ask a representative sample of biologists some qustions about the nature of science and the limits of the questions it is able to handle.

QrazyQat, what I’d like to see is that people who think they are supporting the position of science have something to back up what they’re saying. My experience with materialists of many kinds is that they assume their position is science (it isn’t, it’s an ideological position since science can’t be done to back them up) and that “most scientists” back up their ideological position. I know you’ve read me on other issues, in other places, but you might not have read the several things I’ve posted about opinion polling. Opinion polling is an absurd way to try to figure out politics, as “science” it is insane. You’d have to give equal time to pseudo-science of the type Brownback supports if you believed that peoples’ opinion on science matters.

My personal experience talking with people with some knowledge of science is that even those who lean towards materialism have positions that are too complex and varied to show up in any but the most expensive polls and I’m guessing the results would show that there was no “majority” opinion on the overly broad questions surrounding materialist orthodoxy. I’ve also noticed that when an intelligent person is discussing these issues that the phrase “I don’t know” or “no one knows” crops up all through the discussion. The problem I’ve got with dogmatic materialists is that their opinion is that they do know and that everyone should agree with them because they are absolutely certain that they’ve got the truth. Well, that’s not science, it’s opinion AND it’s exactly the same thing as Biblican fundamentalism, just without a God. It’s my experience that Dawkins or Kurtz or some other big name materialist takes the place of one. Used to be Russell, clearly materilist fundamentalism has seen better days.

Why I asked is that generally people who make those kinds of statements are going on a hunch. I’d like to read more of the methodology of the polls before I spoke about them but I wonder what the scientists polled would say about any of the questions if allowed to go into detail instead of just giving a pat response.

As to the figures they come up with? It doesn’t matter what anyones opinion on the issue is, at least as far as the question of material fundamentalism is concerned. My point is that the opinion isn’t based in science, though it’s probably a reflection of the present day culture of science. That’s not a big surprise since science is exclusively concerned with the physical universe and it’s heavily weighted towards those who hold the ideologies of materialism, positivism, and even the absurd superstition of scientism. That does cause problems for some science, especially in the behavioral and cognitive areas through over confidence in the ideological basis of the scientists assumptions (and an absurd confidence in the development of these very young fields studying what is some of the most complex and unobservable phenomena yet attempted).

All in all, it doesn’t bother me.

There is no one single theory of evolution, as proponents of punctuated equilibrium and classical Darwinism continue to feud today.

There is no one single theory of God either, as proponents of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity (to name just three of the world’s religions) continue to feud today with each other, Of course there are feuds within as well as between each of those groups. In at least some cases the word “feud” is not to be taken merely figuratively.

umm, I was quoting Hemant when I said “Most biologists do NOT think God has a hand in evolution. And many people of faith understand this as well. If anything, some people may say God started the evolutionary process. But educated people understand that natural selection is, in fact, a natural process.” I was just saying I’ve seen many liberal religious people (not biologists) who agree with this. Sorry for the confusion.