[Taxacom] Fwd: teleology example

[John Grehan]

Adding the previous sentence does not change anything. The author just says
it is hard to avoid the sloppy thinking that presumes there is an adaptive
explanation for every biological observation (although I don't know what is
hard about that) and then proceeds to invoke purpose as a scientific
concept for explaining adaptation.

John Grehan


On Thu, Mar 7, 2013 at 4:13 PM, Bevan Weir <WeirB at landcareresearch.co.nz>wrote:

> Well you did just cherry-pick one sentence out of an otherwise good
> article, in fact you omitted the preceding sentence:
>
> "I try very hard to avoid the sloppy thinking that presumes there is an
> adaptive explanation for every biological observation"
>
> The real link to the post is here:
> http://sciblogs.co.nz/the-atavism/2012/07/29/sunday-spinelessness-hairy-snails/
>
> Bevan
>
> --
> Dr Bevan Weir
> Research Scientist, Mycology and Bacteriology
> Curator, ICMP culture collection
> Systematics Team
> Landcare Research
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu [mailto:
> taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of John Grehan
> Sent: Thursday, 7 March 2013 3:13 p.m.
> To: taxacom
> Subject: [Taxacom] teleology example
>
> At various times I have raised, in this and other lists, the continued
> presence of intelligent design theology in science in the form of explicit
> teleology. Often the response is "that is not what they really intended".
> Here's a nice explicit example: "it's hard to see how these hair-like
> processes would evolve if they didn't serve a purpose." This from David
> Winter, "a PhD student in evolutionary genetics who very occasionally
> thinks he has something that the internet simply needs to know..." See
> http://sciblogs.co.nz/the-atavism/tag/new-zealand/
>
> John Grehan
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