Moderators: Calilasseia, DarthHelmet86, Onyx8
Spearthrower wrote:First, we don't resurrect previously falsified hypotheses just because we still quite like them... so you can chuck Creationism out right now. It's not a scientific explanation, it's a religious narrative.
Spearthrower wrote:Further, Evolution already explains how such organs and functions came to be - no need to invoke magic. While Creationism can assert that God made people love one another, it does so without any evidence other than deferring to authority and tradition. Also, it fails to explain how an all good, all knowing, all powerful being could create/permit 'evil' or dysfunctional behavior. In summary, drop the pleas to magic - it's not going to wash for a moment.
Spearthrower wrote:Second, you're talking about Evolutionary Psychology, as such, your desire for them to talk about the 'wonders of Creation' is what is know as 'way outside the scope'. Science, even such a speculative, qualitative science as this, has a scope - a remit. No biologist needs to contemplate the motions of fundamental particles to talk about the way an organ functions, or a species reproduces. As such, your criticism is invalid.
falconjudge wrote:Yeah... talking bad about a professional lecturer explaining how a dysfunction came about will NOT strengthen your Creationist position, which is an attempt to get away from explaining such things.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:First, we don't resurrect previously falsified hypotheses just because we still quite like them... so you can chuck Creationism out right now. It's not a scientific explanation, it's a religious narrative.
The way I see it, Creationism is basically a rejection of the evolution explanation for the biological past. before Darwin there was no such word as Creationism. I agree it’s not a scientific explanation.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Further, Evolution already explains how such organs and functions came to be - no need to invoke magic. While Creationism can assert that God made people love one another, it does so without any evidence other than deferring to authority and tradition. Also, it fails to explain how an all good, all knowing, all powerful being could create/permit 'evil' or dysfunctional behavior. In summary, drop the pleas to magic - it's not going to wash for a moment.
The Creator might not be all good or might not see good the way we do, or might use a wider frame of reference. The Creator might not be a being. We humans have some cheek, a hundred thousand years into sharing language on one planet around one sun in one galaxy, to pontificate about the qualities of creator of the universe.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Second, you're talking about Evolutionary Psychology, as such, your desire for them to talk about the 'wonders of Creation' is what is know as 'way outside the scope'. Science, even such a speculative, qualitative science as this, has a scope - a remit. No biologist needs to contemplate the motions of fundamental particles to talk about the way an organ functions, or a species reproduces. As such, your criticism is invalid.
Well I’m pointing to a problem for a model which is (a) in contention (b) forms an origin narrative and (c) is used as a tool for weak and silly explanations.
Jayjay4547 wrote:falconjudge wrote:Yeah... talking bad about a professional lecturer explaining how a dysfunction came about will NOT strengthen your Creationist position, which is an attempt to get away from explaining such things.
How dare one be sceptical about the utterances of a professional lecturer? Well in the first place this one admits that many other professionals don’t see issues like domestic violence the same way he does.
Jayjay4547 wrote:We humans have some cheek, a hundred thousand years into sharing language on one planet around one sun in one galaxy, to pontificate about the qualities of creator of the universe.
Jayjay4547 wrote:The local May issue of Popular Mechanics carries an article “On the Edge”, that reports on what two of the brightest people on the planet answer to the question “What is your favourite deep, elegant of beautiful explanation?”. One response is from David M Buss, professor of psychology at the University of Texas.
Mr.Samsa wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:The local May issue of Popular Mechanics carries an article “On the Edge”, that reports on what two of the brightest people on the planet answer to the question “What is your favourite deep, elegant of beautiful explanation?”. One response is from David M Buss, professor of psychology at the University of Texas.
Wait, hold on. If they were interviewing two of the brightest people on the planet, why are they also interviewing Buss? I'd rather hear what the bright people have to say.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:First, we don't resurrect previously falsified hypotheses just because we still quite like them... so you can chuck Creationism out right now. It's not a scientific explanation, it's a religious narrative.
The way I see it, Creationism is basically a rejection of the evolution explanation for the biological past.
Jayjay4547 wrote:before Darwin there was no such word as Creationism. I agree it’s not a scientific explanation.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Further, Evolution already explains how such organs and functions came to be - no need to invoke magic. While Creationism can assert that God made people love one another, it does so without any evidence other than deferring to authority and tradition. Also, it fails to explain how an all good, all knowing, all powerful being could create/permit 'evil' or dysfunctional behavior. In summary, drop the pleas to magic - it's not going to wash for a moment.
The Creator might not be all good or might not see good the way we do, or might use a wider frame of reference.
Jayjay4547 wrote:The Creator might not be a being. We humans have some cheek, a hundred thousand years into sharing language on one planet around one sun in one galaxy, to pontificate about the qualities of creator of the universe.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Second, you're talking about Evolutionary Psychology, as such, your desire for them to talk about the 'wonders of Creation' is what is know as 'way outside the scope'. Science, even such a speculative, qualitative science as this, has a scope - a remit. No biologist needs to contemplate the motions of fundamental particles to talk about the way an organ functions, or a species reproduces. As such, your criticism is invalid.
Well I’m pointing to a problem for a model which is (a) in contention (b) forms an origin narrative and (c) is used as a tool for weak and silly explanations.
Jayjay4547 wrote:falconjudge wrote:Yeah... talking bad about a professional lecturer explaining how a dysfunction came about will NOT strengthen your Creationist position, which is an attempt to get away from explaining such things.
How dare one be sceptical about the utterances of a professional lecturer?
Jayjay4547 wrote:Well in the first place this one admits that many other professionals don’t see issues like domestic violence the same way he does.
Jayjay4547 wrote:“ Major conflicts within romantic couples were and still are typically seen as signs of dysfunction.”
In the second place, to accept an argument it needs to click. And Buss’s declaration that for example domestic violence is due to different reproductive interests of the partner’s genes, just doesn’t click for me.
Jayjay4547 wrote:I think of the case of domestic violence that I came across most disturbingly for me. It involved a fellow parishioner who did a great deal with the church youth, teaching guitar and building up a church band. We were all eating out of his hand. Then it turned out that in the privacy of their bedroom he was terrifying his wife with his service pistol. Sure one could interpret that as arising from different reproductive interests of his and her genes but I’d rather listen to some pathologist’s explanation. And it was dysfunctional.
Spearthrower wrote:Mr.Samsa wrote:Wait, hold on. If they were interviewing two of the brightest people on the planet, why are they also interviewing Buss? I'd rather hear what the bright people have to say.
I dunno - you'd have to be pretty bright to make heads or tails of the question:
“What is your favourite deep, elegant of beautiful explanation?”
Sounds like a Google translation from Swahili.
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote: The way I see it, Creationism is basically a rejection of the evolution explanation for the biological past.
A rejection that is massively pointed and laughed at by real world evidence. But please, don't let this stop you from pretending that blind mythological assertion counts for more than the honking big Himalayan mountain range of empirical evidence.
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Further, Evolution already explains how such organs and functions came to be - no need to invoke magic. While Creationism can assert that God made people love one another, it does so without any evidence other than deferring to authority and tradition. Also, it fails to explain how an all good, all knowing, all powerful being could create/permit 'evil' or dysfunctional behavior. In summary, drop the pleas to magic - it's not going to wash for a moment.
The Creator might not be all good or might not see good the way we do, or might use a wider frame of reference.
Ah, the "mysterious ways" apologetic evasion, erected whenever inconvenient facts from the real world make a mockery of mythological assertions written 3,000 years ago. Oh by the way, amongst the assertions in said collection of myths, is that it's possible to change the genomes of living organisms wholesale, simply by having the parents shag alongside different coloured sticks. Care to explain to us all why Mendel was wrong, and some backward, piss-stained Middle Eastern nomads were right on this one?
Jayjay4547 wrote:The Creator might not be a being. We humans have some cheek, a hundred thousand years into sharing language on one planet around one sun in one galaxy, to pontificate about the qualities of creator of the universe.
Calilasseia wrote: Doesn't stop mythology fetishists doing just that, does it? Strange how their assorted eructations are also completely in accord with their personal fantasies and bigotries. All we do here is take those eructation at face value, then apply reductio ad absurdum to them.
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Second, you're talking about Evolutionary Psychology, as such, your desire for them to talk about the 'wonders of Creation' is what is know as 'way outside the scope'. Science, even such a speculative, qualitative science as this, has a scope - a remit. No biologist needs to contemplate the motions of fundamental particles to talk about the way an organ functions, or a species reproduces. As such, your criticism is invalid.
Well I’m pointing to a problem for a model which is (a) in contention (b) forms an origin narrative and (c) is used as a tool for weak and silly explanations.
You've just described creationism in a nutshell. Congratulations.
As for evolutionary psychology, it's a discipline that's still in its infancy. Which is why you'll see the odd wrong idea emerge from time to time within that discipline, until said wrong ideas are weeded out by empirical evidence. Which, oddly enough, never happened in the world of creationism.
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:falconjudge wrote:Yeah... talking bad about a professional lecturer explaining how a dysfunction came about will NOT strengthen your Creationist position, which is an attempt to get away from explaining such things.
How dare one be sceptical about the utterances of a professional lecturer?
As opposed to not being sceptical about the witterings of superstitious, pre-scientific nomads?
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Well in the first place this one admits that many other professionals don’t see issues like domestic violence the same way he does.
Basically, in the world of science, disagreements aren't "doctrinal positions". Please toss any idea that this is so into the bin where it belongs. In the world of science, disagreements are merely a sign that we need more empirical evidence, to decide one way or the other. No competent scientist thinks evolutionary processes don't happen. Whether those processes are the root cause of certain phenomena is sometimes not immediately evident, until someone comes along and devises the requisite empirical test. See Dobzhansky for examples of how it's done.
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:“ Major conflicts within romantic couples were and still are typically seen as signs of dysfunction.”
In the second place, to accept an argument it needs to click. And Buss’s declaration that for example domestic violence is due to different reproductive interests of the partner’s genes, just doesn’t click for me.
Actually, there are numerous animal models supporting this from the world of Cichlid fishes alone. For example, any aquarist who has kept Julidochromis species in the aquarium, will tell you that these fishes are prone to episodes of the red mist descending before their eyes if there's an unexpected change in their environment. These fishes are well known amongst Tanganyikan Cichlid keepers for what are termed "murderous divorces". Similar violent break-ups of previously successful reproductive partnerships can be observed in other Cichlid species, for example, amongst one or two of the Central American Nandopsis species (all of which have a 'take no prisoners' reputation in the aquarium), or between individuals belonging to certain Caquetaia species that likewise exhibit a propensity for brutality if they're not given conditions to their liking. Phenomena like this are what lead aquarists like myself to ask ourselves what does the fish want, before trying to keep it in captivity in an aquarium, usually by reference to known data on the wild behaviour of these species. In the case of some of the fishes I've just cited, it's the reason aquarists resort to certain devices in order to minimise the fallout if things go wrong at breeding time.
Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:I think of the case of domestic violence that I came across most disturbingly for me. It involved a fellow parishioner who did a great deal with the church youth, teaching guitar and building up a church band. We were all eating out of his hand. Then it turned out that in the privacy of their bedroom he was terrifying his wife with his service pistol. Sure one could interpret that as arising from different reproductive interests of his and her genes but I’d rather listen to some pathologist’s explanation. And it was dysfunctional.
Well just because humans happen to have a large cerebral cortex grafted onto the other parts of their brains, doesn't in the least prevent humans from being influenced by past inheritance. Carl Sagan covered this in some detail, with respect to the R-complex and the limbic system, for example, both of which influence our behaviour even though we possess a large cerebral cortex that is theoretically capable of overriding those antecedent systems. Anyone who claims that those antecedent systems don't play a part in human behaviour is scientifically illiterate.
Jayjay4547 wrote:
Not blind. But the mythological assertion has informed evolutionary explanations, which have become its opposite. A dialectic has developed.
Jayjay4547 wrote:
I was taking up Spearthrower’s query of how an all-knowing, all powerful being could create/permit dysfunctional behaviour. Mendel has nothing to do with that nor do I have any problem with Mendel’s science.
Jayjay4547 wrote:
In this case it was an atheist (or agnostic?) evolutionist who was demanding some characteristic of the creator of the universe.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Pronouncements made in the name of science can be taken up as they stand in the here and now, without invoking some supposed future self-correction. I’m suggesting that evolutionary psychology is marked by weakness and triviality and as such it reflects a scientific failure.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Creationism isn’t a science. it’s a contradiction of what is proposed and clothes itself as science, which is in fact scientific in part- and which increasingly, is being driven into failure by its unimaginative opposition to creationism.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:falconjudge wrote:Yeah... talking bad about a professional lecturer explaining how a dysfunction came about will NOT strengthen your Creationist position, which is an attempt to get away from explaining such things.
How dare one be sceptical about the utterances of a professional lecturer?
As opposed to not being sceptical about the witterings of superstitious, pre-scientific nomads?
Witterings, piss-stained, backwards, eructations. I’m polite. I wish you would be.
Jayjay4547 wrote:
As you can see from the above, Falconjudge was making an appeal to authority- or to my lack of authority. And my response, that other authorities evidently disagree with Buss by his own admission, is perfectly valid. Buss is engaging in a little intellectual propaganda when he writes “Major conflicts within romantic couples were and still are typically seen as signs of dysfunction. A radical reformulation embodied by sexual conflict theory changes these views”. So the old view is being replaced by his new progressive one –though that hasn’t happened yet. To be fair to him, Buss is being unguarded. If someone asks for your view as “one of the brightest people on the planet”, you can be excused for spreading yourself.
Spearthrower wrote:Actually, Falconjudge was quite specific in his criticism, and it didn't say 'You can't be sceptical of professional lecturers' - he said, 'you can't use your criticisms of this lecturer to bolster the validity of Creationism' - I thought that was quite clear.
Jayjay4547 wrote:There is another side to this issue of selection-to-spokesman. I’m quoting from Popular Mechanics whose local editor would fit in perfectly well on this forum – he is clearly a nice guy incidentally and hard working. Anyway he selected 2 out of 192 responses from the supposedly brightest people in the planet. Buss might have been selected as one of those because of his book “Why Women have Sex”. I guess his answer to that is different than lust/coercion/wish for children/wish for child subsidy/wish to be like the neighbour. So that caught the selector’s eye. I’s fruitful to question such highly selected “trendy” views that us grease-monkeys are fed with.
Jayjay4547 wrote:
I‘m curious to have that explained in terms of game theory. If you keep animals under more restricted conditions than the wild, and they do something murderous, isn’t what happens dysfunctional? Isn’t the solution to restore wild conditions? You say “Cichlid fishes ALONE” but from fish keepers coining the term “murderous divorce” that implies something unusual applies to them in captivity. I acknowledge that murderous violence often happens in nature. Elephants kill rhinos and each other. And men kill people in war, on a truly “industrial” scale. Human domestic violence is a problem, I’m not convinced it has the same root as in male cichlids.
Jayjay4547 wrote:
Limbic system? Is that in game theory?
Jayjay4547 wrote:The issue isn’t whether humans are influenced by past inheritance. Actually game theory rather discounts the influence of inheritance. If “romantic interactants” (yuk) optimise the reproductive chances of their genes then it’s a new game every generation. You can explain what happens without reference to inheritance.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote: The way I see it, Creationism is basically a rejection of the evolution explanation for the biological past.
A rejection that is massively pointed and laughed at by real world evidence. But please, don't let this stop you from pretending that blind mythological assertion counts for more than the honking big Himalayan mountain range of empirical evidence.
Not blind.
Jayjay4547 wrote:But the mythological assertion has informed evolutionary explanations
Jayjay4547 wrote:which have become its opposite. A dialectic has developed.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Further, Evolution already explains how such organs and functions came to be - no need to invoke magic. While Creationism can assert that God made people love one another, it does so without any evidence other than deferring to authority and tradition. Also, it fails to explain how an all good, all knowing, all powerful being could create/permit 'evil' or dysfunctional behavior. In summary, drop the pleas to magic - it's not going to wash for a moment.
The Creator might not be all good or might not see good the way we do, or might use a wider frame of reference.
Ah, the "mysterious ways" apologetic evasion, erected whenever inconvenient facts from the real world make a mockery of mythological assertions written 3,000 years ago. Oh by the way, amongst the assertions in said collection of myths, is that it's possible to change the genomes of living organisms wholesale, simply by having the parents shag alongside different coloured sticks. Care to explain to us all why Mendel was wrong, and some backward, piss-stained Middle Eastern nomads were right on this one?
I was taking up Spearthrower’s query of how an all-knowing, all powerful being could create/permit dysfunctional behaviour. Mendel has nothing to do with that nor do I have any problem with Mendel’s science.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:The Creator might not be a being. We humans have some cheek, a hundred thousand years into sharing language on one planet around one sun in one galaxy, to pontificate about the qualities of creator of the universe.Calilasseia wrote: Doesn't stop mythology fetishists doing just that, does it? Strange how their assorted eructations are also completely in accord with their personal fantasies and bigotries. All we do here is take those eructation at face value, then apply reductio ad absurdum to them.
In this case it was an atheist (or agnostic?) evolutionist who was demanding some characteristic of the creator of the universe.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Spearthrower wrote:Second, you're talking about Evolutionary Psychology, as such, your desire for them to talk about the 'wonders of Creation' is what is know as 'way outside the scope'. Science, even such a speculative, qualitative science as this, has a scope - a remit. No biologist needs to contemplate the motions of fundamental particles to talk about the way an organ functions, or a species reproduces. As such, your criticism is invalid.
Well I’m pointing to a problem for a model which is (a) in contention (b) forms an origin narrative and (c) is used as a tool for weak and silly explanations.
You've just described creationism in a nutshell. Congratulations.
As for evolutionary psychology, it's a discipline that's still in its infancy. Which is why you'll see the odd wrong idea emerge from time to time within that discipline, until said wrong ideas are weeded out by empirical evidence. Which, oddly enough, never happened in the world of creationism.
Pronouncements made in the name of science can be taken up as they stand in the here and now, without invoking some supposed future self-correction. I’m suggesting that evolutionary psychology is marked by weakness and triviality and as such it reflects a scientific failure.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Creationism isn’t a science. it’s a contradiction of what is proposed and clothes itself as science, which is in fact scientific in part- and which increasingly, is being driven into failure by its unimaginative opposition to creationism.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:falconjudge wrote:Yeah... talking bad about a professional lecturer explaining how a dysfunction came about will NOT strengthen your Creationist position, which is an attempt to get away from explaining such things.
How dare one be sceptical about the utterances of a professional lecturer?
As opposed to not being sceptical about the witterings of superstitious, pre-scientific nomads?
Witterings, piss-stained, backwards, eructations. I’m polite. I wish you would be.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Well in the first place this one admits that many other professionals don’t see issues like domestic violence the same way he does.
Basically, in the world of science, disagreements aren't "doctrinal positions". Please toss any idea that this is so into the bin where it belongs. In the world of science, disagreements are merely a sign that we need more empirical evidence, to decide one way or the other. No competent scientist thinks evolutionary processes don't happen. Whether those processes are the root cause of certain phenomena is sometimes not immediately evident, until someone comes along and devises the requisite empirical test. See Dobzhansky for examples of how it's done.
As you can see from the above, Falconjudge was making an appeal to authority- or to my lack of authority. And my response, that other authorities evidently disagree with Buss by his own admission, is perfectly valid. Buss is engaging in a little intellectual propaganda when he writes “Major conflicts within romantic couples were and still are typically seen as signs of dysfunction. A radical reformulation embodied by sexual conflict theory changes these views”. So the old view is being replaced by his new progressive one –though that hasn’t happened yet. To be fair to him, Buss is being unguarded. If someone asks for your view as “one of the brightest people on the planet”, you can be excused for spreading yourself.
Morran et al, 2011 wrote:Most organisms reproduce through outcrossing, even though it comes with substantial costs. The Red Queen hypothesis proposes that selection from coevolving pathogens facilitates the persistence of outcrossing despite these costs. We used experimental coevolution to test the Red Queen hypothesis and found that coevolution with a bacterial pathogen (Serratia marcescens) resulted in significantly more outcrossing in mixed mating experimental populations of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Furthermore, we found that coevolution with the pathogen rapidly drove obligately selfing populations to extinction, whereas outcrossing populations persisted through reciprocal coevolution. Thus, consistent with the Red Queen hypothesis, coevolving pathogens can select for biparental sex.
Morran et al, 2011 wrote:The Red Queen hypothesis has been empirically supported in studies of natural snail populations, which show that sexual reproduction is more common where parasites are common and adapted to infect the local host population (14, 15). Outcrossing also seems to reduce the degree of infection relative to biparental inbreeding and asexual reproduction in fish (16). Finally, the capability of antagonistic interactions to drive rapid evolutionary change has also been determined for several different systems (17–20). Nonetheless, direct controlled tests for the effect of coevolution on the maintenance of sex have proven difficult, because they require biological systems in which host and pathogen populations can coevolve for multiple generations in a manner that selects for increased infectivity by a pathogen as well as increased resistance (or enhanced avoidance) by the host. Further, the host species should exhibit genetic variation in its degree of outcrossing. Thus, we chose to examine the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans and its pathogenic bacteria Serratia marcescens, which exhibit these desired properties.
Populations of the host species, C. elegans, are composed of males and hermaphrodites. The hermaphrodites can reproduce through either self-fertilization or by outcrossing with males (21). Although usually low (<1% to 30%) (22), outcrossing rates can be genetically manipulated to produce either obligately selfing (5, 23) or obligately outcrossing (5, 24) populations. The pathogen, S. marcescens 2170, is highly virulent and capable of exerting strong selection on C. elegans. When consumed, live S. marcescens can produce a systemic infection that kills the nematode within 24 hours (25). This interaction has a heritable genetic basis (26), which allows for a potential response to selection. Moreover, C. elegans populations are capable of evolving greater fitness in response to S. marcescens exposure (5), and S. marcescens can evolve greater infectivity when successful infection of C. elegans is its only means of proliferation. Selection for increased infectivity can be imposed by propagating only those bacterial cells that have been harvested from the carcasses of hosts, which were killed by the bacteria within 24 hours of exposure. Therefore, the C. elegans/S. marcescens system can be used to generate antagonistic coevolution when a host population and a pathogen population are repeatedly
passaged under selection together, thus permitting a direct test of the Red Queen hypothesis.
Marron et al, 2011 wrote:We used experimental coevolution in the C. elegans/S. marcescens system to test the prediction that antagonistic coevolution between host and pathogen populations can maintain high levels of outcrossing despite the inherent cost of males. We used obligately selfing, wild-type, and obligately outcrossing populations of C. elegans with a CB4856 genetic background (5). Whereas the reproductive modes of the obligately selfing and obligately outcrossing populations are genetically fixed, the wild-type populations can reproduce by either selfing or outcrossing [the baseline outcrossing rate is ~20 to 30% (5)], and the rate of outcrossing can respond to selection (5). Before the experiment, we mutagenized five independent replicate populations of each mating type (obligate selfing, wild-type, and obligate outcrossing) by exposing them to ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS) to infuse novel genetic variation in each population. The five replicate populations were then passaged under three different parasite treatments (table S1): (i) control (no exposure to S. marcescens), (ii) evolution (repeated exposure to a fixed, nonevolving strain of S. marcescens), and (iii) coevolution. The coevolution treatment involved repeated exposure (30 host generations) to a potentially coevolving population of S. marcescens, which was under selection for increased infectivity. S. marcescens Sm2170 served as the ancestral strain in the coevolution treatment, as well as thefixed strain in the evolution treatment.
The results were consistent with the Red Queen hypothesis. In the coevolution treatment, all of the obligately selfing populations became extinct within 20 generations (fig. S1). However, none of the obligately selfing populations went extinct in either the evolution treatment or in the control treatment. In addition, all of the obligately outcrossing and wild-type populations persisted throughout the experiment in all three treatment types (fig. S1). Thus, extinction was only observed in obligately selfing hosts when confronted with coevolving pathogens.
Arnqvist, 1998 wrote:Rapid divergent evolution of male genitalia is one of the most general evolutionary trends in animals with internal fertilization; the shapes of genital traits often provide the only reliable characters for species identification1. Yet the evolutionary processes responsible for this pattern remain obscure. The long-standing lock-and-key hypothesis, still popular among taxonomists, suggests that genitalia evolve by pre-insemination hybridization avoidance; that is, hybrid inferiority drives the evolution of male genitalia with a proper mechanical fit to female genitalia. The sexual selection hypothesis2,3, in contrast, proposes that divergent evolution of genitalia is the result of sexual selection, brought about by variation in postinsemination paternity success among males. Here, by comparing pairs of related clades of insects that differ in mating system, I assess how the opportunity for postmating sexual selection affects the rate of divergent evolution of male genitalia. Genital evolution is more than twice as divergent in groups in which females mate several times than in groups in which females mate only once. This pattern is not found for other morphological traits. These findings provide strong empirical evidence in favour of a postmating sexual selection mechanism of genital evolution.
Arnqvist, 1998 wrote:Under the postmating sexual selection hypothesis, selection on male genitalia is caused by mechanisms that generate variation in postinsemination paternity success among males. Such mechanisms include: first, any of several female processes that affect male paternity success (that is, cryptic female choice3–5); second, competition between male gametes for fertilization (that is, sperm competition6,7); and third, evolutionary arms races between males and females over the control of fertilization (that is, sexual conflict4,8–10). The key prediction of this hypothesis concerns the relationship between mating system and the rate of genital evolution1,3. In taxa in which females typically mate with only one male (monandry), there can be little variation in male postinsemination paternity success and postmating sexual selection on genitalia will thus be weak or absent. If females mate with many males (polyandry), on the other hand, there will be ample opportunity for variation in male postinsemination paternity success and therefore for postmating sexual selection also. Under the lock-and-key hypothesis, selection for hybridization avoidance is suggested to impel the evolution of male genitalia with a proper mechanical fit. In contrast to postmating sexual selection, such selection for preinsemination reproductive isolation would be expected to be more intense in monandrous species than in polyandrous species.
Arnqvist, 1998 wrote:Comparisons of the rate of evolutionary divergence of complex morphological traits in a set of related species have been hampered by problems with identifying homologous structures, as well as by a lack of appropriate methods for quantifying shape variation. Previous comparative studies have often resorted to various subjective ratings of morphological complexity11–13. Here I use one of the new tools of geometric morphometrics14, which not only provides objective and quantitative descriptors of shape but also avoids the problem of defining homologous landmarks (that is, structural points with correspondence resulting from descent from the same point in a common ancestor) across species14,15. By describing the outlines of the genitalia of each species with a nonlinear function (see Methods), and by subsequently analysing morphological shape variation among species as variance in the parameters of the fitted functions, this method allows the ordination of all the species in each contrast in a common multivariate morphological shape space (Fig. 1b).
The results of this analysis show that male genitalia evolve much more divergently in taxa in which females mate many times. The shape of male genitalia of polyandrous species were more dissimilar
than were those of monandrous species in 18 out of 19 contrasts, and the average morphological distance between the genitalia of polyandrous species was more than twice that of monandrous species (see Table 1 for tests). This pattern did not differ between orders (Kruskal–Wallis analysis of variance, P = 0:84), and the
taxonomic distance between the two clades in each contrast did not significantly affect the relative degree of genital divergence within clades (within versus between-family contrasts; Mann–Whitney U-test, P = 0:80). There was no association between the distance ratios of genitalia and the distance ratios of other traits across
contrasts (Spearman rank correlation, P > 0:9). The analysis did not reveal any influence of mating system on evolutionary divergence for morphological traits other than genital traits (Table 1), and the distance ratios of genital traits were indeed significantly larger than those of other traits (paired Wilcoxon signed rank test, P = 0:023; Kolmogorov–Smirnov two-sample test, P = 0:003).
Hosken & Stockley, 2004 wrote:Genitalia are conspicuously variable, even in closely related taxa that are otherwise morphologically very similar. Explaining genital diversity is a longstanding problem that is attracting renewed interest from evolutionary biologists. New studies provide ever more compelling evidence that sexual selection is important in driving genital divergence. Importantly, several studies now link variation in genital morphology directly to male fertilization success, and modern comparative techniques have confirmed predicted associations between genital complexity and mating patterns across species. There is also evidence that male and female genitalia can coevolve antagonistically. Determining mechanisms of genital evolution is an important challenge if we are to resolve current debate concerning the relative significance of mate choice benefits and sexual conflict in sexual selection.
Chapman et al, 2003 wrote: exual conflict occurs when the genetic interests of males and females diverge. Recent evidence supporting the view that male and female genomes are in conflict has now revolutionized the way in which we interpret interactions between the sexes, and suggests that sexual conflict is a potent force in male–female coevolution. Here, we consider the nature of sexual conflict and what distinguishes it from models of coevolution by sexual selection. There are advantages and pitfalls to the various experimental and comparative approaches now used. More precise predictions derived from theory are essential to evaluate much of the empirical data in support of sexually antagonistic coevolution. Equally, there needs to be a mechanistic understanding of the traits underlying sexual conflict to formulate and test these predictions.
Jayjay4547 wrote:There is another side to this issue of selection-to-spokesman. I’m quoting from Popular Mechanics whose local editor would fit in perfectly well on this forum – he is clearly a nice guy incidentally and hard working. Anyway he selected 2 out of 192 responses from the supposedly brightest people in the planet. Buss might have been selected as one of those because of his book “Why Women have Sex”. I guess his answer to that is different than lust/coercion/wish for children/wish for child subsidy/wish to be like the neighbour. So that caught the selector’s eye. I’s fruitful to question such highly selected “trendy” views that us grease-monkeys are fed with.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:“ Major conflicts within romantic couples were and still are typically seen as signs of dysfunction.”
In the second place, to accept an argument it needs to click. And Buss’s declaration that for example domestic violence is due to different reproductive interests of the partner’s genes, just doesn’t click for me.
Actually, there are numerous animal models supporting this from the world of Cichlid fishes alone. For example, any aquarist who has kept Julidochromis species in the aquarium, will tell you that these fishes are prone to episodes of the red mist descending before their eyes if there's an unexpected change in their environment. These fishes are well known amongst Tanganyikan Cichlid keepers for what are termed "murderous divorces". Similar violent break-ups of previously successful reproductive partnerships can be observed in other Cichlid species, for example, amongst one or two of the Central American Nandopsis species (all of which have a 'take no prisoners' reputation in the aquarium), or between individuals belonging to certain Caquetaia species that likewise exhibit a propensity for brutality if they're not given conditions to their liking. Phenomena like this are what lead aquarists like myself to ask ourselves what does the fish want, before trying to keep it in captivity in an aquarium, usually by reference to known data on the wild behaviour of these species. In the case of some of the fishes I've just cited, it's the reason aquarists resort to certain devices in order to minimise the fallout if things go wrong at breeding time.
I‘m curious to have that explained in terms of game theory. If you keep animals under more restricted conditions than the wild, and they do something murderous, isn’t what happens dysfunctional? Isn’t the solution to restore wild conditions?
Jayjay4547 wrote:You say “Cichlid fishes ALONE” but from fish keepers coining the term “murderous divorce” that implies something unusual applies to them in captivity. I acknowledge that murderous violence often happens in nature. Elephants kill rhinos and each other. And men kill people in war, on a truly “industrial” scale. Human domestic violence is a problem, I’m not convinced it has the same root as in male cichlids.
Jayjay4547 wrote:Calilasseia wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:I think of the case of domestic violence that I came across most disturbingly for me. It involved a fellow parishioner who did a great deal with the church youth, teaching guitar and building up a church band. We were all eating out of his hand. Then it turned out that in the privacy of their bedroom he was terrifying his wife with his service pistol. Sure one could interpret that as arising from different reproductive interests of his and her genes but I’d rather listen to some pathologist’s explanation. And it was dysfunctional.
Well just because humans happen to have a large cerebral cortex grafted onto the other parts of their brains, doesn't in the least prevent humans from being influenced by past inheritance. Carl Sagan covered this in some detail, with respect to the R-complex and the limbic system, for example, both of which influence our behaviour even though we possess a large cerebral cortex that is theoretically capable of overriding those antecedent systems. Anyone who claims that those antecedent systems don't play a part in human behaviour is scientifically illiterate.
Limbic system? Is that in game theory?
Jayjay4547 wrote:The issue isn’t whether humans are influenced by past inheritance. Actually game theory rather discounts the influence of inheritance.
Jayjay4547 wrote:If “romantic interactants” (yuk) optimise the reproductive chances of their genes then it’s a new game every generation. You can explain what happens without reference to inheritance.
Jayjay4547 wrote:The Creator might not be all good or might not see good the way we do, or might use a wider frame of reference. The Creator might not be a being. We humans have some cheek, a hundred thousand years into sharing language on one planet around one sun in one galaxy, to pontificate about the qualities of creator of the universe.
Spearthrower wrote:
I've just had a quick revelation, Bert. Thor's noticed your lack of enthusiasm and expects you to engage in a little ritualised wenching too today. Thought I'd pass that on and save you the smiting.
Spearthrower wrote:Mythological assertion hasn't informed evolutionary explanations - empirical data has. If the resulting explanation is 'opposite' (not that this makes any logical sense) that only highlights how erroneous Creationist claims were.
Spearthrower wrote:I think you'll note that this [Buss’s explanation] is hypothetical and unestablished. It's a line of questioning which they are trying to verify through evidence. The method is the key here, Jayjay, not the ideas themselves. Any idea can be subjected to scientific inquiry, most will fall because they don't agree with the data. This is how science operates. Religious narratives don't submit themselves to be tested against evidence; quite the contrary, it's typical to hear the notion that when evidence and scripture disagree, scripture is automatically correct regardless.
If you look into this topic - Buss' claims - I think you'll find there's a rather robust, healthy debate on the claim. Again, not something you'll find in religion - you don't have religious professionals questioning god's existence, or the tenets of their religious practices. Religion is not a way of knowing, it's a way of doing.
Spearthrower wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:
I was taking up Spearthrower’s query of how an all-knowing, all powerful being could create/permit dysfunctional behaviour. Mendel has nothing to do with that nor do I have any problem with Mendel’s science.
You omitted the rather key quality there - all good. An all good creator cannot, by definition, create evil. So, either this deity is not all-good, or is not all-powerful, or is just not all-knowing... a fundamentally erroneous triumvirate of characteristics that is, once again, at odds with the real world.
Spearthrower wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:Pronouncements made in the name of science can be taken up as they stand in the here and now, without invoking some supposed future self-correction. I’m suggesting that evolutionary psychology is marked by weakness and triviality and as such it reflects a scientific failure.
No, you're just unaware of the difference between qualitative and quantitative inquiry. I've already explained partially why this discipline is considered fraught with problems. However, we accept qualitative inquiries in other disciplines like Sociology, so it's a case of refining the methods of observation and data collection.
Spearthrower wrote:Secondly, this thread includes the notion of Creationism. As such, you can make as many criticisms as you like of any area of science, but it's still vastly superior to Creationism, which is just flat-out wrong.
Spearthrower wrote:Finally, modern science operates by removing misunderstandings - lessening uncertainty. As such, there are no failures because something proven false helps elucidate the problem by removing errors. Again, as the thread is raising the spectre of Creationism, can you explain where religious methodology practices such an important self-regulation? Scripture is right, because God says so, and we know God says so because it's written in the scriptures. Imagine this kind of appeal to authority in science - Einstein said that energy and mass are equivalent, and Einstein was a genius, so he's right and we don't need to question it. Imagine where we'd be now in terms of scientific progress were this the way scientific method operated.... well, no need to imagine, just read a book on pre-Enlightenment thought.
Spearthrower wrote:Hmm looks like you're losing your grip on reality here, Jayjay.
I take it that you're pretending that the alleged failures of Evolutionary Psychology are tantamount to failures in the biological Theory of Evolution, and as such, you think this strengthens the case for Creationism.
Unfortunately, you're just engaging specious reasoning and consequently coming to erroneous conclusions.
Spearthrower wrote:Creationism is not something that popped up to combat scientific naturalism. Whether the term was coined in the 1920's or not is irrelevant - the narrative is precisely the same as had been espoused by religious authorities and scripture for over a thousand years prior to Darwin's insight. Really, all that Creationism amounts to is an antiquated fairy tale - only, unlike the other myths of the past, some people still believe this narrative to be true. They cannot accept that a study of the natural world would not result in their narrative being corroborated, so they fear science as an enemy, or pretend that science is being practiced by wrong-minded people, and consequently just getting the wrong answers. This results in the fallacy of the stolen concept:these scientific findings are acceptable because they don't contradict my interpretation of scripture! i.e. cherrypicking.
Spearthrower wrote:Secondly, evolution is an established fact. Saying otherwise to people who know what they talk about receives the same kind of response as if you started trying to claim that gravity is just pretend science. People point and laugh - people are cruel sometimes, huh? But you have only yourself to blame if you're capable of posting on an internet as opposed to rambling round a park, with tousled hair and untucked shirt, shouting at strangers. In that case, pity would be more appropriate. If you're going to proselytise your belief, you can't do so by lying about facts.
Spearthrower wrote:Which brings me to the final error in your argument: Even if Evolution is falsified, it doesn't make Creationism true. Science works by providing explanations for phenomena - Creationism routinely fails to explain phenomena, it ignores the contradictory evidence and works tirelessly to pretend otherwise though apologetics. These dualistic notions are a core component of the religious mode of thinking, and they're completely at odds with the real world. There are billions of possible answers to a question; if answer A is shown wrong, it doesn't confer validity on answer B - you need to consider the rest of the alphabet. Note your fallacy with respect to this above. Should evolution be falsified, it would be done so by a model that is better able to account for the available data, not by a logically dysfunctional and evidentially erroneous claim.
Spearthrower wrote:Finally, the whole paragraph is deluded. I think you've been on too many Creationist sites recently and have bought into the notions that evolution is an anti-religion movement rather than just a well established science, and that there is some dark conspiracy to foist this god-hating rhetoric onto the world to pervert society. Science is only in opposition to religion insomuch as religion makes claims about the natural world - provably erroneous claims. Science isn't a conspiracy to dethrone religion. To be frank, science doesn't give a rat's chuff about your god, or anyone else's. Gods are not within the remit of science, as you've already agreed, and as such - what possible benefit would be achieved? Cui bono, Jayjay? The devil?![]()
Spearthrower wrote:
Can you explain precisely how this is impolite? If I described the Vikings as mass-murdering rapists, is that considered impolite to the person I am talking to? It's potentially incorrect, but impolite? Let's not be silly here - not one of those adjectives is directed at you.
Spearthrower wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:
As you can see from the above, Falconjudge was making an appeal to authority- or to my lack of authority. And my response, that other authorities evidently disagree with Buss by his own admission, is perfectly valid. Buss is engaging in a little intellectual propaganda when he writes “Major conflicts within romantic couples were and still are typically seen as signs of dysfunction. A radical reformulation embodied by sexual conflict theory changes these views”. So the old view is being replaced by his new progressive one –though that hasn’t happened yet. To be fair to him, Buss is being unguarded. If someone asks for your view as “one of the brightest people on the planet”, you can be excused for spreading yourself.
First, I already explained your mistake with respect to your reading of Falconjudge's post. It is not an appeal to authority. Let me show you again:Spearthrower wrote:Actually, Falconjudge was quite specific in his criticism, and it didn't say 'You can't be sceptical of professional lecturers' - he said, 'you can't use your criticisms of this lecturer to bolster the validity of Creationism' - I thought that was quite clear.
The idea that this is intellectual propaganda is plain nuts, Jayjay - you are doing the rambling in the park thing, only on the internet. There's no other way to say it - it's so delusional. What he's doing is being human. He's got a job to produce explanations for these phenomena. He's come up with a notion he thinks is valid. He is promoting that idea, defending it, arguing for it. Now, he might be clueless, he might have been lucky and hit the jackpot. He might also be an idiot and completely wrong. He might be many things, but the idea that he's part of some shadowy cabal trying to combat Creationism is utter drivel and you're already scraping through the bottom of the barrel if this is what this thread's about. The fact is that Buss probably doesn't give a toss about a religious narrative with respect to this discipline - he may even be a religious practicioner himself. What he's doing is self-promotion, not intellectual propaganda.
Spearthrower wrote: However, I am not sure quite how far down the rabbit hole you are. When people start to actively perceive every interaction in the world in the terms of their ideological dialectic, then such pronouncements are common. As an example for your consideration, although you need not respond: Have you ever thought to yourself that the media is a mouthpiece of this evolutionary cabal when they write about chimpanzees being our closest ancestor?
Spearthrower wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:There is another side to this issue of selection-to-spokesman. I’m quoting from Popular Mechanics whose local editor would fit in perfectly well on this forum – he is clearly a nice guy incidentally and hard working. Anyway he selected 2 out of 192 responses from the supposedly brightest people in the planet. Buss might have been selected as one of those because of his book “Why Women have Sex”. I guess his answer to that is different than lust/coercion/wish for children/wish for child subsidy/wish to be like the neighbour. So that caught the selector’s eye. I’s fruitful to question such highly selected “trendy” views that us grease-monkeys are fed with.
As opposed to someone invoking Gods to explain it? Yep, you're spot on there Jayjay. This 'trend' of explaining natural phenomena without recourse to gods has been going on for a few centuries - a few centuries that just so happens to coincide with the fastest expansion of our knowledge of the universe in the history of our species. Quite a coincidence that.
Spearthrower wrote:Jayjay4547 wrote:
I‘m curious to have that explained in terms of game theory. If you keep animals under more restricted conditions than the wild, and they do something murderous, isn’t what happens dysfunctional? Isn’t the solution to restore wild conditions? You say “Cichlid fishes ALONE” but from fish keepers coining the term “murderous divorce” that implies something unusual applies to them in captivity. I acknowledge that murderous violence often happens in nature. Elephants kill rhinos and each other. And men kill people in war, on a truly “industrial” scale. Human domestic violence is a problem, I’m not convinced it has the same root as in male cichlids.
Population density and cognitive 'carrying capacities' are responsible for actual social dysfunction in many cases. The examples you listed aren't dysfunctional - dysfunction is when the normal means of interaction fails. Elephants killing elephants is functional within elephant society, even if the actual mortal outcome is unintended. As an example, elephant females form a matriarchal herd. If, in a particular population of female elephants, it was observed that the herd broke apart and the females began living solitary lives, then there's a dysfunction there.
In terms of the cichlids Cali mentioned, there's a clear external factor to this sudden failure of the 'normal' cichlid relations: a change in the environment. I don't know enough about cichlids to use this as an example, but the point is that the dysfunction is a result, not a cause itself - the cause could be many things. One very well documented example is, as I mentioned, population density. This is very much apparent in fish-keeping as well - take a tank large enough to comfortably house 50 neon tetra and watch them enjoy their lives. Then try putting in 200 neon tetra into the same size tank and see what happens.
Robin Dunbar has done the most work on this with respect to primates. It's very suggestive that the types of dysfunction the popular press erroneously associates with the failings of modern society is in fact the result of our over-dense populations caused by our increasingly centralised and urbanised societies, and the absurd expansion of the numbers of individuals in the last century.
Spearthrower wrote: I say all this because I know the religious arguments too well, having been both religious and still having very religious family members, and the 'culture war' you're clearly buying into. Scientific understanding and consequent undermining of religious dominance is not the root problem of human society - there was no golden age of universal good predating the concept of biological evolution, or the diminishment of theocratic institutions. The medieval era of Europe was a violent, barbaric, and nasty time to live for the majority of people. Mass inequality, mass disease, mass violence - these are not the hallmarks of contemporary societies where the belief in Christianity has diminished.
Just consider all that a 'nipping in the bud'. I pay attention to people's arguments, and I know where you're going already Monsieur Jay.
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