rationalskepticism.org

Calilasseia wrote:I'd like to submit one of my posts as a contender for an essay ... namely Why Design Assertionists Are Screwed ... (regulars will understand the reference in the title ) ...

Acktoooally, professional biologists do use a "design" paradigm when considering adaptation, but from an engineering standpoint of the organ or tissue involved, but the "designer" is, of course, NS, Sexual selection, drift etc...and is subject to the constraints of the process: like no "look-ahead capabilities", every stage must be functional and positively selected, etc, etc. So within this context, asking a question like "What is the purpose of a wing?", or how well does the wing do it's job?" etc, are perfectly valid.

There is actually something that looks like a "look ahead" capability in evolution because genes build bodies that can cope with historical environments. As environmental conditions often cycle, then some trait can look "predictive" because the organism's gene pool has encountered that condition before. Like fur coats molting for the onset of summer. Plus there is "bet-hedging"...by some females that will mate with multiple males in the hope [metaphorically speaking, of course] that a more genetically diverse litter of offspring will allow some of the young to survive in a greater range of environmental stresses. Creationists see all this as some sort of divine plan, of course. They ignore the blood, death and suffering that the NS process uses to produce such [apparent] "fine-tuning" of organism to environment. There is also, sex, parasite loads etc....

The larger the population, [and hence the amount of variation available in the gene pool] and the faster the generational rate, the mutanogenic stimuli [radiation, toxins etc] the more likely an appropriate mutation will turn up to save the day, and be able to meet a novel environmental challenge. So under Hardy-Weinburg equilibrium conditions, the right mutation[s] will appear instantaneously. However, [of course] H-W conditions are never seen in nature, but populations and generation times etc are often large enough to save a species from extinction. But of course, in the end, extinction is inevitable. The law of averages catches up.