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posted by janrinok on Monday February 11 2019, @03:29PM   Printer-friendly
from the monkey-business dept.

Darwin Day is a celebration of Charles Darwin's birthday, the theory of evolution and science in general. This year marks his 210th birthday and 160 years since the publication of The Origin of Species. Those looking to celebrate or learn more about Darwin and evolution will find a wealth of events going on, or if you'd rather not leave the house, try a Darwin Day card with designs generated by simulated evolution.

Recently, an important finding in man's evolution was announced; the so-called Missing Link was confirmed. Australopithecus Sediba fossils were found in 2010 but it took a decade of research and debate for scientists to confirm that this was indeed the missing link that connects man's evolution in an unbroken chain back to primate ancestors.

Not everyone is down with Darwin. The Pew Research Center reports, "In spite of the fact that evolutionary theory is accepted by all but a small number of scientists, it continues to be rejected by many Americans. In fact, about one-in-five U.S. adults reject the basic idea that life on Earth has evolved at all." In Indiana, senator Dennis Kruse introduced a bill that would, among other things, "require the teaching of various theories concerning the origin of life, including creation science."


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  • (Score: 0, Troll) by Alfred on Monday February 11 2019, @04:32PM (9 children)

    by Alfred (4006) on Monday February 11 2019, @04:32PM (#799567) Journal
    If evolution is true then there is no such thing as equality. If survival of the fittest is how the universe works then I can shoot you in the face and take your stuff, you just weren't fit enough. Blonde hair blue eye platforms are dependent on one genetic strain rising above all others and it can't rise without evolution. People need a justification like evolution to have a way to put themselves above another person. Evolution is as credible as phrenology, and they work together so nicely that evolutionists have to pretend that phrenology doesn't exist.
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  • (Score: 2) by VLM on Monday February 11 2019, @04:47PM

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Monday February 11 2019, @04:47PM (#799587)

    If evolution is true then there is no such thing as equality.

    Yeah, I think you get it. And if you have a political party / movement with an non-rational belief set demanding both inherently conflicting beliefs exist and are simultaneously true, gonna be some epic infighting. So here we are.

    Attempts at not fighting are fun to watch too. Before the theory of planetary movement based on ellipses was cool, they tried to force ever more ridiculous systems of circles within circles and similar nonsense to have a really complicated system of circular orbits that didn't work well and made no sense but sorta badly matched reality, rather than just admitting defeat and implementing elliptical planetary orbits. Thats kinda where we're at with evolution and equality right now, infinite hot air trying to make incompatible beliefs compatible with each other, its not possible, although funny to watch the attempt.

    Its a major social faux pas to point out the very inconvenient truth that modern string theory smells very much like the theory of epicycles from a couple centuries ago. With an opposing view that of course every actual breakthru historically looked like shit until it was beaten into working. Although I don't think the conflict between evolution and equality can be "historical breakthru'd" or hand waved away, its not a physics experiment but an inherently conflicting philosophical outlook.

  • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday February 11 2019, @11:37PM

    by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Monday February 11 2019, @11:37PM (#799828) Journal

    Found the idiot troll who's never actually read Darwin before! And who's deliberately confusing "equal" with "identical" for purposes of The Narrative (TM).

    The Russian troll farms really aren't doing much in the way of QC these days, are they, Ivan?

    --
    I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
  • (Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Monday February 11 2019, @11:47PM (3 children)

    by Joe Desertrat (2454) on Monday February 11 2019, @11:47PM (#799836)

    If evolution is true then there is no such thing as equality. If survival of the fittest is how the universe works then I can shoot you in the face and take your stuff, you just weren't fit enough.

    Such behavior would lead to barbarism and a degraded state of humanity, as only the most violent and aggressive would survive in the short term. Eventually, it would likely lead to the extinction of mankind. "Fittest" does not necessarily mean that which helps a particular individual survive in the short term, particularly if actions are disruptive to the population as a whole. Evolution tends towards behavior that not only helps an individual survive, but that which helps its family, community and so forth on up to better survive, and the more complex a community becomes the less it tolerates disruptive behavior. Most higher animal species evolve their own rules of order, be they pecking order in a flock, lizards defending their patch of your back yard, which wolves in a pack are allowed to mate, etc. Whatever, the rules get followed.

    • (Score: 2) by Alfred on Tuesday February 12 2019, @02:53PM (2 children)

      by Alfred (4006) on Tuesday February 12 2019, @02:53PM (#800099) Journal
      I cannot agree that evolution, as over simply spouted by it proponents, is the correct answer. We didn't get from raw materials to modern society that way.

      If evolution was the only way then humans would be as sparse as wolves and living a lot like them too. If morals were suddenly based on principles of evolution and survival of the fittest then things would be very barbaric until human population stabilized at a number much less than it is now. The rules of behavior that come from evolution are parallel to those from lord of the flies or middle school gym class. Whoever has greatest might makes what is "right" which is the same intelligence that legislates the value of pi to be 3. Order may come to a group by the strongest taking change and ruling with might, which usually does not align with smart. There is not an intellectual high road that organisms gain through evolving, it comes from something else. An organism that is the product of evolution does not have the concept of the long term future and operates on simple short term feedback loops of hunger and pain. (those loops being the very thing that drive a system based on the fittest or strongest). I guess Klingon society could have come from evolution but I'm a human and I cant see how I could have.

      The morals that are required for a society to really blossom do not come from advanced feedback loops. The "rules" that keep us civilized did not come about by evolution.

      And different from pretty much everyone, de-evolution, getting less fit, or evolving into something less is something I see pretty much everyday. So I do believe in evolution, just not that it is moving us in the same direction you think.
      • (Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday February 12 2019, @11:30PM

        by Joe Desertrat (2454) on Tuesday February 12 2019, @11:30PM (#800390)

        If evolution was the only way then humans would be as sparse as wolves and living a lot like them too. If morals were suddenly based on principles of evolution and survival of the fittest then things would be very barbaric until human population stabilized at a number much less than it is now.

        For a great deal of humanity's history that was the case. It still is, when circumstances require it. Physically, emotionally and mentally, modern humanity is literally the same as "Cro-Magnon Man". There has not been enough time since the last ice age for a global population to evolve into new species, being that environmental conditions have been relatively stable. The superficial differences between "races" are due to many factors, the most obvious being geographical isolation. Many such factors simply cause a genetic drift, the genes in the pool do not change, it is merely different ones that become dominant due to relatively temporary conditions.

        Cultural "evolution" is a different thing, although it seems similar in mechanism. The behaviors that allow cultures to change could come about in many ways. Temporary isolation of a population, a population suddenly being led by a particularly charismatic individual(s), an accidental discovery of a better way of procuring food, a loss or gain of a food supply, climate change, etc.

        The ability to change culture is an evolved trait, pretty much limited to humanity. Only with our evolved greater ability to reason and imagine have we made the leap from living like "savages" to however you want to describe more modern cultures. Something we have to be concerned about is whether or not our cultural ability to change our environment to suit our desires puts us at an evolutionary dead end, if we are altering our environment to suit our desires are we also altering the factors which affect any further evolution?

      • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday February 13 2019, @03:08AM

        by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday February 13 2019, @03:08AM (#800467) Journal

        Morality is older than humanity. If you are truly willing to expand your knowledge, you would do well to read "Our Inner Ape" by Franz de Waal, among others.

        No one says that individual morals are evolved the way an eye or a wing or a feather is evolved, and that's a pernicious strawman. Morality, instead, is *technology.* When you think of it as social technology instead of some gross morphological feature, sudden;y things start making a lot more sense.

        --
        I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday February 12 2019, @05:32AM (2 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 12 2019, @05:32AM (#799939) Journal

    then I can shoot you in the face and take your stuff, you just weren't fit enough

    And if you then get caught (which you probably would since you're an idiot) and spend life in jail, then you just weren't fit enough either.

    • (Score: 2) by Alfred on Tuesday February 12 2019, @02:32PM (1 child)

      by Alfred (4006) on Tuesday February 12 2019, @02:32PM (#800083) Journal
      Yes, but I survived which is the point of the hyperbole. That and the moral implications that cannot come from evolution.
      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday February 12 2019, @09:13PM

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 12 2019, @09:13PM (#800326) Journal

        Yes, but I survived

        Survival isn't good enough. You need to propagate those genes too.