Home » News » Agnostic philosopher: If you discovered tomorrow a new and most un-Darwinian-looking species of animals, …

Agnostic philosopher: If you discovered tomorrow a new and most un-Darwinian-looking species of animals, …

October 7, 2011 Posted by News under News
2 Comments
David Stove, philosopher

If you discovered tomorrow a new and most un-Darwinian-looking species of animals, in which every adult pair produced on average a hundred offspring, but the father always killed all of them very young, except one which was chosen by some random process, it would take an armor-plated neo-Darwinian no more than two minutes to “prove” that this reproductive strategy, despite its superficially inadvisability, is actually the optimum one for that species. And what is more impressive still, he will be able to do the same thing again later, if it turns out that the species had been misdescribed at first, and that in fact the father always lets three of his hundred offspring live. In neo-Darwinianism’s house there are many mansions: so many, indeed, that if a certain awkward fact will not fit into one mansion, there is sure to be another one into which it will fit to admiration. — David Stove, Against the Idols of the Age, p. 244

Laszlo Bencze, who sent UD News this one, provides the handy formula, noting,

In short there is no conceivable fact which could not be shoe horned into an evolutionary scheme of one sort or another. After all, all evolutionary ‘proofs’ are speculations and you don’t have to pay retail for them. All you have to do is to use Darwin’s rhetorical trick of couching them as:

I see no reason why it would not be possible for…

It seems eminently reasonable that … should obtain.

Can anyone prove that it is not possible that … should be the case?

Certainly it seems quite possible that under conditions x, y, and z ___________ could have occurred and if this is the case then there is no reason to suppose that __________ would not have been the further result.

Science liberated from fact is so much easier.

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2 Responses to Agnostic philosopher: If you discovered tomorrow a new and most un-Darwinian-looking species of animals, …

  1. 1
    bornagain77October 8, 2011 at 4:24 am

    Neo-Darwinism, is, in fact, a anti-scientific materialistic philosophy of excuses, and is certainly not a ‘true’ science that will submit itself to testing and falsification, as do all other hard sciences. Moreover it ironically turns out that neo-Darwinism, if it were actually true, would render science impossible in the first place.

    What is the Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism? (‘inconsistent identity’ of cause leads to failure of absolute truth claims for materialists) (Alvin Plantinga) – video
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yNg4MJgTFw

    Should You Trust the Monkey Mind? – Joe Carter
    Excerpt: Evolutionary naturalism assumes that our noetic equipment developed as it did because it had some survival value or reproductive advantage. Unguided evolution does not select for belief except insofar as the belief improves the chances of survival. The truth of a belief is irrelevant, as long as it produces an evolutionary advantage. This equipment could have developed at least four different kinds of belief that are compatible with evolutionary naturalism, none of which necessarily produce true and trustworthy cognitive faculties.
    http://www.firstthings.com/ont.....onkey-mind

    “But then with me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind?” – Charles Darwin – Letter To William Graham – July 3, 1881

    Can atheists trust their own minds? – William Lane Craig On Alvin Plantinga’s Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism – video
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byN38dyZb-k

    “It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.” J. B. S. Haldane ["When I am dead," in Possible Worlds: And Other Essays [1927], Chatto and Windus: London, 1932, reprint, p.209.

    “Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning…”
    CS Lewis – Mere Christianity
    http://www.allaboutphilosophy......quotes.htm

    This following site is a easy to use, and understand, interactive website that takes the user through what is termed ‘Presuppositional apologetics’. The website clearly shows that our use of the laws of logic, mathematics, science and morality cannot be accounted for unless we believe in a God who guarantees our perceptions and reasoning are trustworthy in the first place.

    Presuppositional Apologetics – easy to use interactive website
    http://www.proofthatgodexists.org/index.php

    John Lennox – Science Is Impossible Without God – Quotes – video remix
    http://www.metacafe.com/watch/6287271/

    further note:

    Darwin’s diabolical delusions – Ellis Washington – September 2011
    Excerpt: Tragically, for over 150 years since the publication of Darwin’s diabolical, anti-scientific book, “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life,” nonpartisan science, truth, logic and deductive reasoning have been ruthlessly suppressed and replaced with state-funded Darwinist propaganda, groupthink, education atheism, liberal fascism and Machiavellian tactics as demonstrated in the Sewell case representing the ongoing battles between the Darwin Gestapo and Intelligent Design scientists.
    http://www.wnd.com/index.php?f.....eId=343445

    “Certainly, my own research with antibiotics during World War II received no guidance from insights provided by Darwinian evolution. Nor did Alexander Fleming’s discovery of bacterial inhibition by penicillin. I recently asked more than 70 eminent researchers if they would have done their work differently if they had thought Darwin’s theory was wrong. The responses were all the same: No.
    Philip S. Skell – Professor at Pennsylvania State University.
    http://www.discovery.org/a/2816

    Music and verse:

    Evanescence-Lies- Origin
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ml7JSG2KC44

    Ephesians 5:6
    Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

  2. 2
    PetrushkaOctober 8, 2011 at 12:52 pm

    …in which every adult pair produced on average a hundred offspring, but the father always killed all of them very young, except one which was chosen by some random process…

    I have a GA that I wrote that kills off the most fit individual every fourth generation. It actually improves performance.

    so I’m not sure what the point here is. Scenarios like this can be tested. Does the author think biologists never ponder these kinds of scenarios?

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