On 12/13/06, Charles D Hixson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
To speak of evolution as being "forward" or "backward" is to impose upon it our own preconceptions of the direction in which it *should* be changing. This seems...misguided.
Evolution includes random mutation, and natural selection. It is meaningful to talk of the relative strength of these effects. If you write a genetic algorithm, for example, you must set the mutation rate, and the selection pressure. Everyone who has ever run a GA has had to make choices about that. If you set the mutation rate too high relative to selection pressure, you get devolution. It is wrong to call it "evolution in a different direction that does not appeal to your subjective values".
Stephen J. Gould may well have been more of a populizer than a research scientist, but I feel that your criticisms of his presentations are unwarranted and made either in ignorance or malice.
Gould did in fact do significant research as well as produce a good textbook. But I've read many of his books, and I believe they are all slanted towards his social agenda, which is a strong form of relativism. When E. O. Wilson published Sociobiology, Stephen J. Gould helped lead a book discussion group that took several months to study the book, and write a damning response to it. The response did not criticize the science, but essentially said that it was socially irresponsible to ask the sorts of questions that Wilson asked. That in itself is quite bad. But what proves to me that Gould had no interest in the scientific merits of the book is that, if he had, he could at any time during those months have walked down one flight of stairs and down a hall to E. O. Wilson's office, and asked him about it. He never did. He never even told him they were meeting each week to condemn it. This one act, in my mind, is quite damning to Gould. ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?list_id=303
