Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!yale!husc6!caip!sri-spam!nike!lll-crg!lll-lcc!qantel!ihnp4!houxm!hjuxa!petsd!cjh From: cjh@petsd.UUCP (Chris Henrich) Newsgroups: talk.origins Subject: Re: Dead Brain Weight - reply to 'Stuart' 24 Jun Message-ID: <817@petsd.UUCP> Date: Fri, 19-Sep-86 14:54:44 EDT Article-I.D.: petsd.817 Posted: Fri Sep 19 14:54:44 1986 Date-Received: Tue, 23-Sep-86 01:36:23 EDT References: <5387@decwrl.DEC.COM> Reply-To: cjh@petsd.UUCP (C. J. Henrich) Organization: Perkin-Elmer DSG, Tinton Falls, N.J. Lines: 54 [] In article <5387@decwrl.DEC.COM> arndt@lymph.dec.com writes: >... Can someone give a >SINGLE fact in support of the Theory of Evolution???? This reminds me of an *old* joke: the guy who wanted to sell his house, and carried a brick around as a sample. Biologists' ideas about evolution are supported by lots and lots and lots of facts. It takes a lot of facts to support a big, complex, audacious idea. If you want to come to grips with the ideas, as they were developed over a period of 100 years or so, I recommend Ernest Mayr's _The Growth of Biological Thought_. (Or very similar title. Very recent book.) 900-page books from Harvard University's Belknap Press are not my idea of recreational reading; but this one managed to usurp the place of detective stories and science fiction until I finished it. Other books by Mayr, and by Gaylord Simpson, also explain what biologists think about evolution. > >Remember, "vertibrates evolved from invertibrates", and "thumbs evolved to >make it easier to handle toilet paper" are tautologies, not 'facts'. > The statement that vertebrates evolved from invertebrates entails that certain invertebrate organisms were ancestors of you and me. That's not a tautology, but a substantive statement. So substantive, in fact, that I can readily imagine a person to whom it would be unpalatable. Such a person would, however, assert that it was "untrue", not that it was "tautologous". As for thumbs, they evolved to make it easier for small mammals to hold on to tree branches. Is this a tautology? No. It is an assertion of a final cause, operating in the context of a population of organisms over a long time (many generations). As E. Gilson pointed out in his book about Darwin (by the way, Ken, thanks for recommending it) final causes make perfectly good sense when one is talking about individual organisms. Genetics provides an intelligible way for final causes to operate on individual organisms. "Natural selection" is Darwin's idea of an intelligible way for final causes to operate on species. Regards, Chris -- Full-Name: Christopher J. Henrich UUCP: ...!hjuxa!petsd!cjh US Mail: MS 313; Concurrent Computer Corporation; 106 Apple St; Tinton Falls, NJ 07724 Phone: (201) 758-7288 Concurrent Computer Corporation is a Perkin-Elmer company.