Posted: May 23, 2012 12:23 pm
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.
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.
Jayjay4547 wrote:before Darwin there was no such word as Creationism. I agree it’s not a scientific explanation.
Whereas evolutionary processes are a scientific explanation, one that has been subject to empirical test and found to be in accord with reality.
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.
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.
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.
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?
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.
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.
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.