Destroying Darwinism

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Natural Selection also applies to asexually reproducing creatures, so mating basicly has nothing to do with selection.

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Wow. I had no idea it was that simple. And so totally illogical.Selection acts on all characteristics that affect survival to, and success in, reproduction. Besides, I recall that you recently attempted to remove everything *except* mating from the relevant factors in natural selection. You are all over the map and can't seem to make up your mind.

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Population is the key? It's strange that you would say this after modern Darwinists have absolutely insisted that selection is about the individual, and not about the group.

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Absolutely, you say. So mutations take place in whole populations simultaneously, and reproduction is not carried out by individuals? If you can show me where "modern Darwinists have absolutely insisted" that, I'll go sign up for some classes at ICR. Scout's honor.

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Strange that you insist on a group for selection again, that the population is "the key". Of course "the key" is really the relationship of an organims to it's environment, in view of it's chance of reproduction.

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You know what would be a good idea? If you actually presented evidence for your own theory of how the current diversity of life appeared, instead of mounting these convoluted attempts to "destroy Darwinism" by defining some common scientific terms right out of existence.[This message has been edited by zephyr, 06-04-2003][This message has been edited by zephyr, 06-04-2003]

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If you can't see why that's a useful explanation in terms of explaining why organisms are adapted to their environments, then you're blind to science or something.

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Not to mention math. Trying to mock differential success ("this building and that building") when resources are nearly always limited does not imply much understanding of selection. A variation that even gives a tiny percentage more likelihood of producing viable offspring will, in time, spread throughout the population.

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**irrelevant Darwinism to Nazism anecdotes**

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Your continuing assumption that the abuse of an idea affects its truthfulness is completely ludicrous. The actions of human beings (especially military and political leaders) have ABSOLUTELY no bearing on the validity of scientific theory. You seem to think that we should believe based on the results of belief, not the factual nature of our beliefs. Unfortunately, this attitude would deprive us of both the truth about the world and the good that it would allow us to do in the world.

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The relationship of Islam to some attrocities is not at issue, nor the relationship of alcohol consumption to violent behaviour. Darwinism is.

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You, who were just belittling someone's abstract reasoning, make yourself look really bad when you fail to acknowledge the parallel. Over and over again in this forum you have claimed that a particular idea should be condemned because of its misuse by extremists. Now, after repeated attempts by several of us to deal with your hypocrisy, the closest you can come to acknowledging the issue is to simply handwave the comparison away, and then throw in another, truly irrelevant issue as a distraction. It's great that you can stay on topic (for once) but you're being so strict as to exclude relevant, related issues from your scope. Way to avoid the hard questions.

All we've tried to do, despite your stubbornly ignoring our questions, is point out that your own reasoning, were it sincere and objective, would require you to abandon or at least seriously question your own religion. Since you clearly haven't done this, one can conclude that either:1) you are either completely illogical, or
2) you are using this sorry argument, despite not really believing it, because you just can't think of anything better.

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What do you consider evolution to be?

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Very good question.Syamsu... I (among many others, it seems) am still waiting for some idea of how you think the present diversity of life came to be. You spend a lot of time attempting to trash commonly accepted ideas about evolution, but I still have no clue what your alternative is. Care to enlighten?