MetaFilter posts tagged with darwinism

Misunderstanding Darwin

homunculus — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 10:23:22 -0800

Misunderstanding Darwin: Natural selection’s secular critics get it wrong. Ned Block and Philip Kitcher review Jerry Fodor's (previously) and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini's book What Darwin Got Wrong. Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini respond: “Misunderstanding Darwin”: An Exchange.

NATIONAL ZOO: Mei Xiang and Tian Tian tried to mate

kliuless — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 20:09:24 -0800

"Because competent mating did not occur," the zoo statement said, veterinarians anesthetized both pandas on Saturday, collected semen from Tian Tian and inserted it into Mei Xiang's uterus. [previously 1 2 3]

Jerry Fodor, on Why Pigs Don't Have Wings

decoherence — Tue, 06 May 2008 07:08:55 -0800

Rutgers professor of philosophy Jerry Fodor created a bit of a stir last October when he wrote an article for the London Review of Books arguing that natural selection may not be such a great theory after all, and that a "major revision of evolutionary theory... is in the offing." Not many fellow philosophers and academics agree, it seems. Fodor responds to his critics here and here. Six months later, it's still not entirely clear whether his argument is, as Justin E.H. Smith put it, "irresponsible and stupid or so subtle that none of his adversaries, defending a status quo interpretation of the theory of natural selection, have been able to get it yet."

"Inside every lawyer is the wreck of a poet."

amro — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 04:06:09 -0800

This is Darrow,
Inadequately scrawled, with his young, old heart,
And his drawl, and his infinite paradox
And his sadness, and kindness,
And his artist sense that drives him to shape his life
To something harmonious, even against the schemes of God. [MI]

Challenging Darwin: Is sex really all about the genes?

dnash — Thu, 15 Apr 2004 07:49:23 -0800

Author challenges Darwin's theory of "sexual selection." To Darwin, mutations that don't enhance survival, like peacocks' tails, must be aids to attracting mates to pass on genes. Homosexuality, therefore, is to Darwin and the Christian-right both an unnatural aberration. But with ever growing evidence of homsexual behavior in animals, from bonobos to penguins, isn't it time that Darwin's theory get replaced?

Darwinian assembly lines.

monju_bosatsu — Tue, 22 Jul 2003 17:59:43 -0800

Darwinian assembly lines.

Working against evolution?

111 — Fri, 07 Feb 2003 11:16:51 -0800

In an article called "The Sociobiological Conceit", Gene Callahan says darwinism is logically flawed and inherently self-contradictory: "if moral ideas are simply an 'illusion' fostered on us by our genes then so are all of our other ideas – including the ideas of sociobiology!". Callahan, fyi, belongs to the ultra-libertarian circles of the Mises Institute and LewRockwell. Would any of the evolutionists among us care to politely refute him?

I'll take "Western Superiority Complexes" for $500, Alex...

tgrundke — Fri, 11 Oct 2002 15:46:57 -0800

I'll take "Western Superiority Complexes" for $500, Alex... Let the wars begin: The ever controversial Ayn Rand Institute suggests that on the eve of Columbus Day we reject revisionist Politically Correct history that Columbus was a butcher. By what justification could we state that Western Civilization is superior to others? Is multiculturalism a bad idea? Does this suggest we have a 'right' to wipe out peoples inferior to us? Darwinism at its potential worst--or a scary reality to admit?