you know what's intelligently designed? science!

[rone]

Fresh off sciam is a writeup on the World Summit on Evolution, held (where else?) at the Galápagos Islands (sure, cute, but shouldn't we try to curtail human activity there?  holding the conference there is, frankly, a matter of vanity).

I wonder how long it'll take to find a Creationist or ID response to the conference.  I suppose it wouldn't matter, since they're just a bunch of vapid twits... but now i'm just being gratuitously mean.

VAPID.  TWITS.

Anyway, where was i... ah yes.  Although i'm basically rehashing the final paragraph, i'll point out regardless that the fact that the writeup lists people who present off-kilter theories (such as Provine's White Whale) or pooh-pooh currently held ideas (such as Margulis's declaration of the death of neo-Darwinism [whatever that means]) should put the lie to anti-evolution (let's call a spade a fuckin' shovel, yes?) proponents who claim that the state of science today is one that is intolerant of deviation from "scientific dogma", although some nuts will probably cling with desperation to small things like the one anonymous person who felt it impolitic to criticize Margulis because she was going to be awarded an honorary degree.

I did take issue, however, with one Richard Fortey quote: "Evolution was experimenting with many wondrous varieties..."  Although it's only a figure of speech, it anthropomorphizes science, and (i repeat myself) it's the sort of thing that the nutbar fringe will seize as proof of science's elitist attitude that dares personify and equate Evolution with Our Creator™.

Despite a few things that were over my head (duh, i last took a biology class in high school), it was an enjoyable read.

Comments

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Seems to me that evolution works would be pretty good proof of a higher power.

Well, it's supposed to happen through the mechanical working out of natural processes, combined with chance. The point is that it doesn't require direct miraculous intervention, so the role of God (if you believe in one) gets reduced, or enlarged depending on how you look at it, to that of a creator-of-laws, at least where the development of species is concerned.

Now, this is perfectly compatible with the religion of many people, including most of the mainstream Christian churches. But it certainly doesn't demand a personalized creator God of the traditional responds-to-prayers-and-does-miracles variety. All that upsets a lot of people who seem to want to see miraculous signs.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

The point is that it doesn't require direct miraculous intervention

It ain't necessarily so. Evolution could just be one drawn-out miracle. But people want instant gratification, i guess.

[sanspoof.livejournal.com]

It's true. Creating a working set of rules that can produce emergent awesomeness isn't as easy as it appears.
But NO, it's more fun to say that darwinists are cold cruel worshippers of the forces of selection, who root for unfit species to go extinct and rub their hands like General Grievous when people contract childhood diseases.