Misuse of evolution

quote:

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Originally posted by Andya Primanda:
I am sure everybody knows this.

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Evolution is hijacked by people with various interests to back their cause. This is why we are in this forum. Either to slam evolution or trying to hit back.

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Question is, can we do something to prevent misuse of evolution? Anti-evolution websites usually put the damage made by evolution hijackers first; I think that is what they are after.

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No there's not ... in the same way that there is nothing we
can do to prevent the mis-use of religous belief systems.I'm not sure what these mis-uses are ... can you give me some
links at all ?

Do racial supremicist views stem from evolutionary theory ?There were races that believed themselves superior long
before evolutionary theory was founded, weren't there ?Isn't superiority amongst races of man traditionally founded
in religous views ?Evolution doesn't actually have a concept of higher forms of
life, only religions do. God created man as the pinnacle
of creation in the bible.

I didn't say racism was founded in religion, but that the
view of one groups superiority over another was.They are not the same thing.From my brief researhes since you brought up social darwinism,
it seems that Herbert Spencer was already forming ideas, when he
came across Darwin's ideas of adaptation etc. He then shoe-horned
these onto his ideas ... but mistakenly incorporated a
concept of progress into evolution. A concept never intended
as far as I can see.Still, in the context of the debate here i.e. creation Vs Evolution
I really don't see the relevence of social darwinism.Sure people use ideas for political ends ... that doesn't make
the theories wrong.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
You are being very simplistic, trying to argue back the origin of Social Darwinism to one man, Herbert Spencer, who supposedly was the only person who "deviously" attached valueconcept to evolution, which were never intended. The original meaning of evolution with the old Greeks was progressive, so evolution was apparently at first intended to be noted as progressive complexity by Darwinists.

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All I was pointing out was that social darwinism ADDED a progress
concept when it hijacked evolutionary ideas.The original meaning of 'nice' was 'accurate', but that doesn't
mean that's what it means now.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

I get racist and genocidal thoughts all the time when I think about the past, present, and future of mankind in terms of "races of man encroaching on one another until some finally become extinct", as some kind of law of Nature (natural selection). There is no one person from which Social Darwinism stems, it is a general thing among Darwinists.

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Instead of 'man' put 'cat' ... do you still get racist feelings
from the phrase ?Man is just an animal, we are not special in any sense in
nature. If some races encroach on others, and resources are
limited, one or other race will become extinct, whether they
are men or cats or mice.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

A theory can also be wrong if the theory does not live up to ideals of neutrality in science. You can judge the selfish gene version of evolution theory wrong for instance, simply because it has the emotive word selfish in it.

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You could, but that would be unscientific in itself.Check the contents of the theory, not the wording.Evolutionary thinking has not lead to racism.Racism has been about for millenia, and is observable as a
kind of xenophobia in almost all social animals. It is a survival
instinct.Because we have intelligence, we know that those old instinctive
responses are no longer valid, and we override them ... some
of us anyway.Your objection to evolution appears to be that it promotes an
evil way of thinking ... this is not so ... that way of thinking
has been around for thousands of years ... it is simply
human.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
If I view cats or mice, or any other creature in terms of races encroaching on one another until some finally become extinct, then my view of those creatures tends to become racist, in my experience, to any extent that it is possible. I would tend to use language such as inferior and superior etc. Even a grass lawn can be made to look horrific in the context of Darwinist theory, by my experience.

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I don't view competition for resources, leading to potential
extinctions as racist at all. It's just nature.I don't view critters (including people) using concepts such as
superior and inferior.And I accept evolutionary theory.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

This is less so if I view creatures in terms of a general theory of reproduction, because the emphasis is shifted there from comparison of organisms (and competition) to looking at how organisms interact with the environment in reproducing.

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It's less horific because you are excluding the horrific bits,
that's hardly good science.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

Notice that Darwinists generally view nature as cruel, where a superficial look on nature whole would find that for the most time it is sedate and peaceful, and for very little time is it apparently cruel. So since there is no observation that legitimizes the emphasis on cruelty, the emphasis on cruelty has to come from prejudices (or faults) inherent to Darwinism itself.

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I don't think 'cruel' is appropriate. A cat isn't 'cruel' when
it kills a mouse, it's just being a cat.Nature is not sedate and peaceful most of the time.Observe the behaviours of the occuptants of a particular eco-system
and that behaviour is filled with motion and killing and reproducing
and a host of other things. To ignore any one when describing
animals in general is neglecting the full picture.That's not what evolutionary theory is focussed on, it has
defined a narrow sub-set of nature, and attempts to explain it.
Like all scientific theories it is founded in a reductionist
philosophy, but its clearly states that it is interested in
one aspect of biological systems.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

But we weren't talking about cats, we were talking about people. Schrafinator, Quetzal, you, John etc. should simply demonstrate what you come up with on account of thinking about people in terms of races encroaching on one another until some finally become extinct. As with Quetzal, I consider your denial of a meaningful link of Darwinism to Social Darwinism basicly empty politics, when you do not consider evidence like that.

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But from the viewpoint of ToE, cats and mice are no different,
superior, inferior, or othwerwise from people. They are just
animals who are trying their best to survive their environment.There is nothing inherent in ToE that leads to the evils that
you claim it does. That's human nature I'm afraid.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
Again, your opinion is just empty politics, since you don't demonstrate what you come up with on account of "races of man encroaching on one another until some finally become extinct", and things like that.

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Demonstrate how ? I've voiced my opinion that all I get from
the phrase you keep repeating is that there is a struggle for
existence.Certain races are dwindling in numbers as others proliferate.I do not acribe any merit or superiority to any particular
race ... they are just people.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

A general theory of reproduction doesn't exclude the horrific bits the horrific bits are incorporated in how organisms reproduce. Again, it just shifts the focus from a pretty meaningless (and often valueladen) comparison, to a pretty meaningful interaction of organism with the environment in view of the event of their reproduction.

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Again and again I say, differential reproductive success is a
measure of an underlying process ... but you just keep ignoring
me.How is it meaningless to study changes in population over time
by measuring which variants produce the most offspring ?How would you measure this ?Just using reproduction of an individual describe the potential
for adapting to a change in environment (be that the environment
changing or the movement of the population).Focussing on the event of reproduction may be interesting, but
it explains little.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
I guess that this should be properly researched by psychologists, since I think psychologists will be more able to get a response. A study of what people come up with on account of the main things in Darwinism. Your response is very short.

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I cannot begin to tell you what other people will come up with
when faced with various data.I do know that people's opinions and attitudes, and ultimately
their actions are the sum of their genetic pre-dispositions and
their upbrining (nature + nurture), and that no one single,
poorly understood (by most) scientific theory can account for
the atrocities that man inflicts upon his fellow man.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

The rest is a repetition of a discussion we had before. It is pretty meaningless knowledge to know how many of any particular sort there are in a population, since it tells you nothing about how any particular sort reproduces. Photosynthesis, how the eye works etc. are simply blissfully ignored in differential reproductive success. The one thing that has interest for a Darwinist, is to note how many organisms with eyes there are, in respect to organisms with no eyes, or different eyes. And the one of which there are the most of would then usually be referred to as fitter, better, superior.

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You disagree, that's OK.But you are wrong.Differential reproductive success is a measure not an explanation.If we take photosynthesis, what NS is suggesting is that some
organisms in the past could photsytnthesise and others couldn't
Those that could passed this useful feature to their offsring,
and along the way other traits were acquired (by some means ... and
for the logic of this it doesn't matter how) that eventually
lead to modern plant life. Those that didn't and had not other
energy fixation method (or a less efficient one) perished. At the
same time there was an alternative energy conversion process available
and other organisms that could use this respiration did, and eventually became animals as we know them today.A bit long winded, but perhaps you can see that NS does not
neglect function ... it relies on it to exaplain why one
variant might have a better survival chance.You seem to have a problem in thinking about natural selection,
in that you are trying to be far too narrow, and to use it to
explain something it wasn't intended to exaplain.e.g. use gravitational theory to explain why some apples are
green.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

No Darwinist I know talks about the potential to adapt to a future change, that is much your own reworking of Natural Selection. It is something like Dawkins his "evolvability" notion.

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ALL Darwinists talk about potential for adaptation, because that's
what Darwinian evolution IS. They might not phrase it that
way, but what do you think descent with modification is ?
Darwin didn't know about genetics so he assumed a certain
amount of natural variability was required for NS to work
on ... that IS adaptation potential (a rose by any other
name ... and all that).

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
I'm reasonably sure that close to a 100 percent will come up with racist and genocidal thoughts on account of it, if any psychologist would bother to research it. So I'm guessing that you would too, if you would spend more then half a page in response.

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I don't have racist or genocidal thoughts at all, let alone
due to Darwinist thinking.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

What you said before about races encroaching being just a natural phenomenon can be explained in differnt ways. Was the war in Yugoslavia just a natural phenomenon, just the same as with animals enroaching on one another? It is trickier then you make it out to be, to consider Natural Selection in neutral terms, especially the old Darwin version of it.

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All wars can be considered natural phenomena, in that they are
the result of a seeming territoriality inherent in human
the phsyche.Not just territoriality with respect to material possesion I
might add.It may be difficult for YOU to view natural selection in nuetral
terms, but don't project that onto everyone.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

You say, some could photosynthesize and others couldn't. Is it informative to know that some creatures can't photosynthesize? I don't think so. Why compare? It's meaningless.

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It depends on what you are aiming to achieve. What, precisely,
is wrong with comparison ?Would you be happier if we simply looked at trait distributions
within a current population ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

You have it the wrong way round. A general theory of reproduction is more inclusive, describes countless times more then the incredibly narrow differential reproductive success. As before the theory of differential reproductive success almost never applies, because there is almost always stasis.

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There is no theory or differential reproductive success, it is
a measure (and a theoretical one at that) of natural selection.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

What is the potential for adaptation of pinguins then? And giraffes? Potential in respect to which of the infinite number of possible changes to the environment? I never heared of such a thing from Darwinists, and it doesn't make sense to me to focus on it, over focusing on a static environment and mutation, as explained before.

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I don't have full and complete knowledge of either of these
creatures genotype (or phenotype for that matter), so I could
only make suggestions as to what sorts of thing may exist in
the population ... I will if you want, but it's just possible
example.But environments aren't static. You prize scientific approach
and yet over-simplify the situation. An over-simplified model
is next to useless.Darwinists always talk about changing environments. What do
you think it means for one section of a population to become
geographically isolated from another ?Change happens ... some old Greek said that several hundred
years ago ... I think he was right.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
Again, you simply do not give much of a response. No wonder if you do not think about it, you wouldn't get any racist or genocidal ideas. And then say it is not difficult for you, eventhough you don't talk about it at length, is a dishonest disregard for evidence. Please show me how you can easily talk about races of man encroaching on each other without being racist or genocidal. Name names of races, and then describe how these races encroach. Then maybe I will believe you. But what you say now is just empty politics without evidence, and I don't believe a word of it.

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You asked me if the phrase made me think in racist or genocidal
ways. It doesn't.Genocide is the murder of an entire race ... that is a deliberate
act. The phrase in question makes me think of a more mundane
struggle for existence.Like the south american indian tribes froced to move by deforestation.No one is deliberately acting against them directly, but the impact
is there none the less.racist ... doesn't that mean making choices/opinions/actions
based soley upon race ?How is that relevent to the phrase.YOU are applying emotion to non-emotional issues of evolution
and nature.Choice is hard to reconcile in nature, but comes down to
physchology ... which comes down to brain function ... which
is complex but natural.Not everyone thinks like I do though, but you asked for MY
opinion ... I've already said I cannot speak for anyone else.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

Even so, what you did respond was already questionable. War is not appropiately understood as a natural phenomenon in my opinion, inherent in the human psyche. You could better understand it in terms of choice and emotionality of people. Choice is not a mechanical cause and effect concept, by definition. In my experience Darwinists have a terrible time of understanding that, or even acknowledge the existence of choice, since they usually treat everything in terms of cause and effect.

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Territoriality is inherent in the human psyche, and that
territoriality leads, in many many instances to warfare.I don't necessarily mean geography, as I said. The 'territorial'
responses (which we share with most animal species) has been
extended due to our capacity for abstract thought to religion,
political leanings, etc.I don't know of a war that was motivated by race issues.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

Environments are much static, meaning that the overwhelming majority of organisms live in the same environment as their parent. You don't know the potential for adaptation of penguins, simply because you don't know which changed environment you are supposed to measure this potential against. It is your own reworking of Natural Selection.

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The environment I was born into was very different to the one
that my parents was born into.My father was born in the Eastend of London in 1929, while
I was born in a sub-urban housing estate in 1967. The availability
and quality of food, clothing, heating, lighting, etc. are
all very different for me as a youngster (and adult) than they
were for my father.Similarly take a look at the history of the rain forests in
south america (human encroachment on other species maybe,
but still!!)Or how about differences in the artic circle due to climatic change,
perhaps there are penguins with less dense feathers who will be able
to survive where once they died.You could argue that man has wrought many of these changes, but in
past times there were other events afoot that would have had
wide ranging environmental impact (end of the ice age springs
to mind).For evolution we are not talking sudden radical change (necessarily
either), and I've not even touched upon migration!!

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

I'm disappointed you didn't acknowledge the very limited scope of differential reproductive success, where before you wrongly argued that a general theory of reproduction was limited in scope.

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I thought I stated quite clearly that natural selection,as
a concept, was exactly that ... limiting itself to the question
in hand rather than becoming wide ranging, and less-able to
address the issues at hand.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
This is still not an open response, and not very long. When I personalise the question, then it makes me think about what race I belong to, what race is encroaching on my race, and what race is my race encroaching on. What are the numbers of my race, how are we doing, etc.

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How does the length of the response bear relevence ?Your views on the phrase show more about your own
phsychological make-up than about Darwinian evolution
and it's effects on the thinking of man-kind.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

Anyway Darwinism has changed since then into differential reproductive success of variants. There has already been a cleanup and shift of focus from competition to reproduction, and in my opinion this shift should be completed by going to a narrow definition of Natural Selection, as a general theory of reproduction.

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So you agree that your objections are, in light of the current
state of the theory, unfounded ?Natural selection never had a FOCUS on competition, and
it shouldn't focus on reproduction ... because there is more
to it than either.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

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Sorry, but in my opinion you and Schraffinator are basicly just political "liars" for implying that races of man encroaching on one another until some finally become extinct, is as easily a neutral concept as is, differential reproductive success of human variants.

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You are welcome to your opinion.Perhaps Schraffinator, like myself, was raised in an area where
there was little variance in ethnicity, and aso never directly
encountered racism against us. We therefore do not have
emotive, knee jerk, over-sensitive responses to things that were
not originally intended as anything other than nuetral.Racism is reprehensible, but we can only illiminate it through
education. I know very few educated people who are overtly
racist. I live in the UK where racism is rife in
areas where the population are highly unlikely to have had
any formal education in evolutionary theory.The phrase doesn't treat the different races differently
because of their race ... how then, can it promote racist thinking ?The genome stuff in mark's post is interesting, but unfortunately
most racists are phenotype-oriented.

Perhaps it is about education.Whilst growing up I only really knew on non-white person,
my next door nieghbour, for whom I had the greatest
respect (he played county cricket, and during WWII was in
the parachute regiment -- he dropped on Arhnem!! and was
always friendly and considerate). I judge people, but only
by thier actions towards me and my family.My parents can be bigotted in some racial attitudes, but have not
extended this to personal relations (with for example my
former neighbour) ... and my father has argued against ToE
with me on many occasions!!To Syamsu::Saying 'I'm not answering if you don't write a lot.' is pretty
much like saying 'Tisn't!!!' and stamping your feet.We disagree with you, and, in brief, have put forward evidence
from our own experiences that suggest that Darwinist thinking
has nothing to do with the prime motivators for racist thinking.Most racists I have met do not understand ToE, and many don't
know anything about it.It's not even lack of education!! Case in point::Some movie footage has recently come to light in the UK, showing
life at the start of the 20th century. There is one clip which
shows a group of miners coming out from the mine, laughing
and joking with ine another ... including one negro miner. There
is no indication of any difference of attitude toward him
from his fellow workers.Jump to the 1950's in the UK and we have signs on cafe's that say
'No coloureds and no Irish' ... why ?Could it be that the new immigrants were seen as a threat to jobs,
and resources in pots-war rationing ?Or could it be that those people versed in ToE considered themselves
superior ?Which seems more likely to you ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
Again, I would change my position if research would show differently, so I'm not a dogmatist. By the evidence I have now, it is clear in my own mind, that thinking about races encroaching on one another as some kind of law of nature which made mankind into what it is today, has obvious spinnoff racist and genocidal thoughts. Evidence of what you and other people think about has been too short and defensive, for me to be considered meaningful evidence.

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regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

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What is the evidence that you have now ?You have repeatedly said 'If psychologists did the study ...'
which suggests you do not have any evidence.You have asked people here if the 'races encroaching' quote
raises racist and genpcidal thoughts, and the answers you have
got are, in a nut-shell, 'No it doesn't'.Think of it this way, I, for example, do not view humans as
having any significant difference from any other animal from
a naturalistic perspective. We have behaviours that some deem
more complex than other animals, and we certainly have the most
technology of the known life on Earth, but we are, in the context
of Darwinina evolution, just animals. If two 'races' are
competing for the same resources (i.e. encroaching) then we
might expect that one will be more successful than the other.
I do not immediately assume that one will persecute and kill the
other.Until you brought it up, racism in connection with Darwinist
evolution had never even crossed my mind. So I can say definitely
that I do not have racist or genocidal thoughts.If that is not sufficient for you, then I'm sorry.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
The evidence I have now is of my own experience, as I've demonstrated before by personalising "races encroaching". There is also lots of secondary evidence of other people thinking that way on account of Darwinism. In "the Descent of Man" Darwin openly disusses these genocidal ideas that come up, and skillfully negotiates past them by putting up tenderness and sensitivity as being of the highest value. We shouldn't do genocide because it would harm our sensitive nature. Very skillfull, but still very wrong in my opinion for reasons that are too difficult to explain in a discussion like this.

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So relate this secondary evidence to us.In nature there IS a struggle for existence. You object to the
decriptive idea that nature is 'red in tooth and claw', despite
the FACT that animals kill each other to survive (which is all
that is being stated).So ... you say that Darwin himself pointed out the danger of
extending ToE in the direction that you claim everyone would
think ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

Obviously to say that "I do not immediately assume that one will persecute and kill the other" is a defensive answer to my question, and not an open answer.I am not satisfied. What race is encroaching on your race Peter?

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No, it's an honest personal answer. It's just not what you wanted
to hear.What race is encroaching on me ? None that I'm aware of, how about
you ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

Again, you should be much thankful that Darwinism has changed since Darwin, and should be open to changes that make the theory more neutral while not making it's scientific meaning less. For instance... by shifting the focus of the theory from a meaningless comparison on reproductive rates, to the relation of a trait/organism with the environment in view of the event of it's reproduction.

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The 'relation of a trait/organism with the environment' is largely
concerned with the organism's survival.Reproduction only comes into it when extrapolating the effects
of traits onto the changes in populations.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
It's no use to look at secondary evidence when the primary evidence is still disputed.

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The FACT is not that animals kill each other, the FACT is that they reproduce or not reproduce. Killing doesn't neccessarily enter into it at all.

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So, are you saying that animals do not kill each other to
survive ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

You don't really believe your answer would satisfy a psychologist that was researching any possible relationship between Darwinism and Social Darwinism do you? Then again my questions were not very precise either.

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Beyond the hijacking of some terms and generic notions, I don't
see that the link is very clear. The domain of Darwinism (assuming
by that you mean ToE as formulated by Charles Darwin) is
the natural world of population changes over time, rather than
any complex social mechanisms.You seem to be suggesting that ToE is responsible for racism
and genocidal behaviours as exhibited by mankind for centuries.This does not seem credible since these behaviours have existed
for hundreds if not thousands of years before ToE was ever
suggested.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

No race is encroaching on your race?

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None that I am aware of (unless there are some BEM's in
our midst )

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

"Do objects fall down, do races encroach? You must live in some superstitious religious fantasyworld, and can't face the FACT/TRUTH of races encroaching, and what it means to have politics that is based on REALITY in stead of your SUPERSTITION."

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Above is just to demonstrate how you can manipulate opinion with Darwinism.

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You can manipulate opinion with anything ... it's a manipulation
not anything inherent in the concept being used.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

I was thinking that if someone wrote a book about the extended family as a unit of selection, then that would have significant political impact. I think the ties of extended family are too weak in Western societies, so what if I got someone to produce a popscience book on extended families as the unit of selection, throw in some antireligious nonsense to make it look credible, then I'm sure in a few months intellectuals and artists would chatter about it, and a few months again the politicians would chatter about it as well. And then some years later, some family legislation would be passed to develop extended families more as socio-economic units. I don't think you would be able to tell that the book produced was just for manipulating public opinion, in stead of for creating formalized systemized knowledge, since the standards in Darwinism are exceedingly low.

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In what way are they low ?I know that in Darwin's time formalism wasn't as evident,
but we have a lot of scientific enquiry going into ToE since,
don't we ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:
I'm saying you can misrepresent animals by putting emphasis on something like killing, and not putting the emphasis on reproduction for instance. Reproduction is more a defining characteristic of animals then is killing.

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You are equally mis-representing them by ignoring it. It's about
survival (had that discussion already).When you say 'reproduction' what exactly do you mean ?

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

By your logic you can also argue that Nazism doesn't give rise to genocidal or racist ideas, since there was racism and genocide some centuries before there was Nazism. Your logic is faulty.

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The above defies logic.The basic principles of national socialism don't, the genocidal
and racists thoughts associated with Nazism come from:1) Historical knowledge of their existence within Nazi germany
2) Nietche's master-race.

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Originally posted by Syamsu:

When you have a theory about races of man encroaching on each other, and then you don't even know what race is encroaching on your race, then you are just not using the theory. It's obvious you are extremely fearful of using this theory to describe your own situation since you never do it, and you have good reason to. You would have to respond using the theory to your own situation to deny you are fearful of it's use.

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What theory are we talking about here ?Given the phrase 'races encroaching' I make observations of
my environment, and, based upon that empirical data say that
as far as my observations go, there are no races encroaching
upon mine.That's a scientific, non-emotive consideration of your claims.Please try to understand that just becuase you hold an opinion
doesn't mean you are right.