Humanism and Evolution

[micatala]

1John2_26, AlAyeti, and possibly others have made the statement that 'humanism equals evolutionism'.

To be clear, even though I don't think the term 'evolutionism' is very meaningful, let us take it to mean 'acceptance of or belief in the occurrence of biological evolution.'

For humanism, let us use Wikipedia.

Humanism is a broad category of active ethical philosophies that affirm the dignity and worth of all people, based on our ability to determine what is right using the qualities innate to humanity, particularly rationality. Humanism is a component of a variety of more specific philosophical systems.

Yes or no. ARe these two ideas the same? Why or why not?

Feel free to register your preferences on the poll.

[micatala]

I've been trying to work on the education angle. If everyone really knew what science is, and that it is inherently silent on theological issues, and that evolution is merely a logical explanation of data rather than an attack on religion, then, maybe, we could get past the arguing. Oddly, however, I've run into some interesting arguing against this from our local school system. They seem to insist that what they are doing is right, and that parents shouldn't be allowed to look at science teaching materials lest they find fault. My suggestions of minor changes, even, meet with strong resistance. Again, we need to find common ground and try to work forward from there...but this requires actually starting a dialog, which has been the challenging part.

I think yours is a worthy strategy.

I also think your experience with the school system should remind us that there are more than two sides to this arguement, as there is with many issues. It is not just 'the creationists versus the biologists.' There are those with no stake in this fight, and some whose stake has nothing per se to do with science or theology.

For many, the issue is control. Some scientists believe they should control the curriculum, while some in the educational community would disagree. Some fundamentalists believe parents or communities should control the curriculum. In some cases, maintaining control is more important than what one does with it. I think some in the educational community suffer from this. They want to maintain control, and forget that their main mission is to provide a quality education.

Anyway, I seem to be getting a bit off topic.

[rigadoon]

Anyway, I seem to be getting a bit off topic.

Interesting series of posts though.

To get back on topic, while it is certainly simplistic to equate humanism and evolution, nevertheless it could be argued that evolution and humanism go hand in hand. There are two sides to this: (1) evolution is a tenet of humanism today (easy), and (2) the idea of evolution might not be seriously considered apart from humanism (harder). A few notes on (2) historically: evolution didn't appear from nowhere in the nineteenth century. Ideas of evolution were widely discussed and fit well with notions of Progress. Philosophically, ideas of evolution are ancient and came with the renewal of classical education.

Since classical education is almost gone and faith in Progress is declining, the cultural background of evolution is now weak. That alone ensures that criticism of evolution will continue, if not increase.

[Jose]

hmmm....doesn't this mean that we're finally getting rid of the false notion that evolution is "progress"? It is "progress" in the same sense as time is--it moves linearly from one age to the next. But the ancient conception of evolution as necessarily moving toward "better" life forms, eventually creating George Bush and Bill Clinton, is clearly wrong. It seems to me that it is progress to give up the notion of progress...or something.

[Rob]

hmmm....doesn't this mean that we're finally getting rid of the false notion that evolution is "progress"? It is "progress" in the same sense as time is--it moves linearly from one age to the next. But the ancient conception of evolution as necessarily moving toward "better" life forms, eventually creating George Bush and Bill Clinton, is clearly wrong. It seems to me that it is progress to give up the notion of progress...or something.

As of 1992 E.O. Wilson, a hard core materialist, begs to differ with the dogmatic neo-darwinian statement above, based upon the dogma of strict extrapolationism found within the so-called "modern synthesis":

Darwinian Direction

There are actually two issues here. The first is whether it is reasonable for the Darwinian to believe in any kind of biological progress whatsoever. Is it acceptable for a selectionist to think that nature's path has been from monad to man? Then second there is the question of whether (appearances to the contrary) the Darwinian can claim that such progress comes about through selective mechanisms. (....)

Evolutionists, including Darwinian evolutionists, are badly split on the question of whether or not the path of evolution is progressive, from simple to complex, from the blob to the human. Gould (1988, 319) is scathing. He speaks of progress as "a noxious, culturally embedded, untestable, nonoperational, intractable idea that must be replaced if we wish to understand the patterns of history." It is a delusion engendered by our refusal to accept our insignificance when faced with the immensity of time (Gould 1996). Edward O. Wilson, at least as a distinguished a Darwinian, takes completely the other tack:

The overall average across the history of life has moved from the simple and few to the more complex and numerous. During the past billion years, animals as a whole evolved upward in body size, feeding and defensive techniques, brain and behavioral complexity, social organization, and precision of environmental control--in each case farther from the nonliving state than their simpler antecedents did. (Wilson 1992, 187)

He concludes: "Progress, then, is a property of the evolution of life as a whole by almost any conceivable intuitive standard, including the acquisition of goals and intentions in the behavior of animals."

(....)

[Besides the hypothesis about “arms races” providing a source of direction, there is the argument] … about constraints and channeled paths of evolution. This is an area where many different pieces of information are starting to come together, especially about the nature of the underlying molecular genetic basis of organisms on how this cashes out in development. It is becoming increasingly apparent that putting together a functioning organism means using parts--particularly genetic parts--which occur right across the range of living kinds. Famously (or notoriously), virtually the same genes code for eyes in house flies and mice (Carroll 1995). So if once you have got the basic organism up and running, perhaps there is already the potential for a humanlike being. And if you combine this with the fact that we do now have measures which show that organisms do not occupy all of the possible places in morphological space, but rather that they tend to cluster together at certain “hot spots,” one might say (Foote 1990), then perhaps the way is paved for evolution always going in certain set directions, no matter what the incidental contingencies.

So what should we conclude on the scientific side? As a Darwinian, you can build a picture that human emergence was more than chance. (….) And the delicious irony is that this is science endorsed enthusiastically by scientists. (….) But it is all a bit “iffy.” (….) One would also like to know why constraints would direct one upwards towards intelligence. Internal constraints (the somewhat contingent effects of the very mechanism of getting development to occur) seem no more directed upwards than downwards.

-- Ruse, Michael. Can a Darwinian Be a Christian? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2001; pp. 88-91.

[Wilson, E. O. (1992) The Diversity of Life. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.]

The main focus of Gould’s work, as exemplified by his Scientific American article[5] “The Evolution of Life on Earth” …, has been to curtail the thought that there is anything “progressive” about the evolutionary process.[6] In Gould’s worldview, random (contingent) events control evolution and render the process unpredictable. If one could rewind the tape of life and play it over again, says Gould, nothing like human life (or even intelligent life) would have much chance of evolving a second time. Gould has defined intelligent life as a life form capable of understanding its own evolutionary history, a definition with which I would agree. (McMenamin 1998: 239-240)

Gould’s view on contingency is a minority one, however, and others have spoken out against this rendering of life’s history. Simon Conway Morris, in his typically colorful language, argued that similar environmental conditions often cause unrelated organisms “to find the same biological solutions” because there are a limited number of ways that things can be done.[7] If the tape of life were to be rewound, the probability that any one of us would be here today is “infinitesimally small. But I’d say that the odds of an upright, two-legged, introspective organism are rather high.” (McMenamin 1998: 240)

Could such a scenario occur? To gain a fuller understanding of this question, I must first sketch out the background of evolutionary thought on the origins of animals. Yet again, we must turn to the scientific thought of German scientists. Otto Heinrich Schindewolf, in his 1950 book Der Zeitfactor in Geologie und Palaontologie (The Time Factor in Geology and Paleontology), spoke of how there were no forerunners of the Cambrian animals, but that they suddenly appeared as a result of Grossmutation, or rapid macroevolutionary change.[8] Seilacher in 1956 agreed with Schindewolf’s assessment of the evolution of the Cambrian fauna (not surprising, because Seilarcher was Schindewolf’s student), but Seilarcher went further, noting that the trace fossil makers of the Lipalian suddenly and simultaneously changed their behaviors and activities.[9] The petrogaeicum gives way to the Biogaeicum. (McMenamin 1998: 240)

Daniel I. Axelrod attacked the Schindewolf-Seilarcher rendering of the Cambrian lower boundry, saying that their ideas were not “acceptable because they do not conform to our present understanding of the evolutionary process.”[10] Here Axelrod was defending what is called the “modern synthesis” of neo-darwinian evolutionary thought. (McMenamin 1998: 240)

Neo-darwinian thought not only is at odds with the abruptness of the Cambrian evolutionary event, but also “excludes symbiogenesis except as an oddity of limited interest, mainly to cell biologists and biochemists.”[11] Now, thanks to our progress in understanding the Ediacarans, we can navigate past the Scylla of scerotic neo-darwinian thought and the Charybdis of denial of progressive evolutionary change.[12] (McMenamin 1998: 240)

[5] S. J. Gould, “The Evolution of Life on Earth,” Scientific American 271 (1997):84-91.
[6] cf. Francisco J. Ayala, “Ascent by Natural Selection,” Science[/i[ 275 (1997):495-496.
[7] See p. 125 in R. Gore, “The Cambrian Period Explosion of Life,” National Geographic 184, no. 4 (1993):120-135; S. Conway Morris, “Rerunning the Tape,” Times Literary Supplement, December 12, 1991:6.
[8] O. H. Schindewolf, Der Zeitfactor in Geologie und Palaontologie (Stuttgart: E. Schweizerbart, 1950).
[9] A. Seilarcher, “Der Beginn des Kambriums als biologische Wende,” Neues Jahrbuch fur Geologie und Palaontologie, Abhandlungen 108 (1956):155-180.
[10] Page 7 in D. I. Axelrod, “Early Cambrian Marine Fauna,” Science 128 (1958):7-9.
[11] See pp. xxii-xxiii in L. N. Khakhina, Concepts of Symbiogenesis: A Historical and Critical Study of the Research of Russian Botanists, edited by Lynn Margulis and Mark McMenamin (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992).
[12] “Progressive evolutionary change” is used here in the sense of complexification and encephalization.

-- McMenamin, Mark A. S. (1998) Discovering the First Complex Life: The Garden of Ediacara. NY.: Columbia University Press. Pp. 239-240.

[Jose]

hmmm....doesn't this mean that we're finally getting rid of the false notion that evolution is "progress"? It is "progress" in the same sense as time is--it moves linearly from one age to the next. But the ancient conception of evolution as necessarily moving toward "better" life forms, eventually creating George Bush and Bill Clinton, is clearly wrong. It seems to me that it is progress to give up the notion of progress...or something.

As of 1992 E.O. Wilson, a hard core materialist, begs to differ with the dogmatic statement above:

Darwinian Direction

<snip>

He concludes: "Progress, then, is a property of the evolution of life as a whole by almost by almost any conceivable intuitive standard, including the acquisition of goals and intentions in the behavior of animals."

Very insightful of you to refer to others' views as "dogmatic." But, you know, EO Wilson is plainly speaking of intuitive standards, not scientific. I infer, since you offer him as your example, that this is your view. You don't, after all, present your own view. Maybe this is just a Ruse?

Sure--there's no question that life began at zero and became more complex. Voila, progress from simple to complex. But tell me: could it have started at zero, and become less complex? It had nowhere to go but up. The appearance of progress does not prove actual progress, any more than the appearance of design proves design.

No one disputes the data (unless they dispute science altogether). The question is how to interpret it. As Wilson says, an intuitive interpretation--"what we know in our hearts to be true" if you extend the quote fully--is appropriate. He chooses to set data aside and listen to his intuition. Fine--there's a philosophical interpretation based only on the original observation.

What about alternative explanations? What about looking at some data? What about doing something as simple as looking more closely at the original data set to which Wilson refers? The majority of life on Earth, both in mass and in diversity, is bacterial. If the nature of evolution is "progress" to higher forms, why didn't most of life evolve according to this basic feature of evolution? Perhaps because the "intuitive sense" is merely intuitive.

What about collecting data from actual tests of the hypothesis? Introduce a species to an isolated environment, and ask whether its evolution proceeds in the direction of "progress" or in the direction of "backwards progress." [As I noted before, it will always be temporal progress, moving from day to day to day. For "progress" as imagined in evolution, we're pretty much stuck with "increasing complexity."] What is found [Gould presents the data in Full House] is that there's no preference for evolutionary progression, toward or away from "progress." Complex things lose complexity about as often as they gain complexity.

So, regrettably, Wilson's nice, from-the-heart intuition is at odds with the data. If we wanted to be scientific about this, rather than philosophical or religious, we'd have to go with the data: "Progress" is not a necessary property of evolution.

...unless, of course, you define "progress" to mean "capable of sufficient genetic diversity to allow a few individuals to survive environmental changes." By this definition, what is alive today has progressed from ancient ancestors; things that lacked such progress have gone extinct. But alas, that's not what they mean, and not what Wilson means with his invoking of "goals" in evolution. Besides, this re-definition of "progress" merely states that evolution works by natural selection.

[micatala]

Interesting articles Rob.

Here are a couple of thoughts.

Progress implies change, but change does not necessarily imply 'progress'. The evidence clearly indicates that life has changed a lot over the eons, and that it also has diversified a great deal. Certainly, one could also make the case that life has become more complex, in the sense that life as we know it today includes many examples which are larger, contain more cells, more interelated subsystems with more 'parts', etc. than life in its historical infancy.

It seems to me that as a particular species evolves, it will occasionally produce members of its population that exceed all of its predecessors on whatever particular scale you would like to measure, whether that be size, speed, visual capacity, or any of the many characteristics that go into what we call intelligence. In this sense, you could say 'progress' is being made.

However, this progress is not linear in nature, but rather, progress is being made all the time in all sorts of different ways. Some species will make 'progress' in some areas, others in different areas, some might not really progress at all.

There is no 'goal' in this process. Certainly we cannot speak of humans as being the goal or pinnacle of evolution, as if we were inevitiable. We may be unique in many respects, and perhaps the most intelligent creatures in creation, and we might be better at a lot of things than other species, but there are also many ways in which we could be viewed as highly deficient. Whether we have 'progressed' further than other species depends entirely on how one defines progress.

At any rate, I see Jose has already made some of these points, probably better than I have, so I will leave it at that for now.

[Rob]

Very insightful of you to refer to others' views as "dogmatic."

The "dogma of molecular biology" [based upon "strict extrapolationism" and the so-called "modern synthesis"] makes the genome the primary constuct and moves from genome to proteome to metabalome to physiome to phenome. The view outlined here indicates that the primary laws relate to phenotype and that the epistemic direction is the reverse of that outlined in the dogma. This would be a major paradigm shift and would lead to more effort on the hierarchy of phenotypic laws.

-- Morowitz, Harold J. et al. The Robustness of Intermediary Metabolism. In Microbial Phylogeny and Evolution: Concepts and Controversies (Jan Sapp, ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2005; p. 159.

Crick said in 1970 that there are three types of information transfer that are unknown and the central dogma postulates never occur: protein to protein, protein to DNA, and protein to RNA. At that time … prion disease, was beginning to interest and puzzle biologists, and Crick recognized that it might be a problem for the central dogma. Interestingly, in the last sentence of his article he wrote, “the discovery of just one type of present day cell which could carry out any of the three unknown transfers would shake the whole intellectual basis of molecular biology, and it is for this reason that the central dogma is as important today as when it was first proposed.” It seems that, according to Crick himself, the central dogma should now either be abandoned or modified. [See: Nature 227:561-563.]

-- Jablonka, Eva and Lamb, Marion (2005) Evolution in Four Dimensions: Genetic, Epigenetic, Behavioral, and Symbolic Variation in the History of Life. MIT Press.

Ah Jose, but it is not only I, but a rising chorus of evolutionary biologists, your fellow scientists, that are calling this form of "strict extrapolationism" you espouse on this site "dogma." But of course, like all good dogmatists, you refuse to look at the dissent within your own ranks, like Gregory, a fellow geneticist, and continue to parrot the party line as though no legitimate dissent existed within the scientific community.

Jose, you as a matter of routine parrot the strict extrapolationism which is based upon the dogma found within the so-called "modern synthesis," yet ignore the rising chorus within the scientific community, those who study evolutionary biology, who are pointing out the weaknesses and fallacies in this form of dogmatic "strict extrapolationism," which you so consistently espouse, but are unwilling to look at the voices of other scientists who raise legitimate questions.

So yes, the insights of these scientists are very informative indeed, as is your continued unwillingness (or inability) to consider their evidence

[Rob]

Interesting articles Rob.... Certainly, one could also make the case that life has become more complex, in the sense that life as we know it today includes many examples which are larger, contain more cells, more interelated subsystems with more 'parts', etc. than life in its historical infancy.

You have left out the Epigenetic and Behavioral inheritance systems, and therefore end up with a one-eyed perspective on the evolution of life, and hence lack that depth perception that leads to a balanced understanding of the true meanings and values to be found in the fact of organic evolution. The fact is that this one-eyed dogmatic refrain is based upon an a priori philosophical commitment, and within this materialistic framework there is no way of explaining the obvious facts that "During the past billion years, animals as a whole evolved upward in body size, feeding and defensive techniques, brain and behavioral complexity, social organization, and precision of environmental control," and therefore such materialists must resort to the rhetorical sophistry of shifting definitions and call such observations "apparent" progress, which is little more than a rhetorical trick of "science by definition" (scientism) rather than by facts and evidence. In truth, such an attempt to explain away the "apparent" intelligence required to craft such intellectual sophistry is proof itself that "intelligence" is a "force" in the universe that does have an impact upon the course of evolution itself.

The fact is that there is a diversity of views within the scientific community with regards to this question. Your claim "There is no 'goal' in this process," is answered differently depending on which scientist is answering the question. It only takes a few citations from a few world class scientists to point this out. The history of science is replete with such examples of how given such controversial questions scientists can come out on various sides of the debate.

You say, "Certainly we cannot speak of humans as being the goal or pinnacle of evolution, as if we were inevitable."

You might want to consider expanding your understanding of evolutionary Paths, Architectures, & Nonrandom Morphological Variation. That is if you value what the current scientific establishment has to say on this subject and what new evidence they are basing these ideas, concepts, and theories upon.

Are you aware of the fact that we now know that there are deeply conserved genetic pathways that were laid down over 450 million years ago, that provide the architectural framework upon which evolutionary organisms can be built? These genetic pathways and their architectural constraints mean that there are limits to "random" pathways, and that there is an underlying order and direction (constraints) based upon what some scientists are now calling "facilitated variation" and "nonrandom morphological variation." Of course, such theories cannot fit into the strict extrapolationist dogma espoused by the neo-darwinian modern synthesis, hence many of these biologists are speaking of "new" synthesis that takes into account these new scientific findings.

For an example of a recent effort at creating a framework for this "new" synthesis, see: Developmental Plasticity and Evolution.

[Jose]

Jose, you as a matter of routine parrot the strict extrapolationism which is based upon the dogma found within the so-called "modern synthesis," yet ignore the rising chorus within the scientific community, those who study evolutionary biology, who are pointing out the weaknesses and fallacies in this form of dogmatic "strict extrapolationism," which you so consistently espouse, but are unwilling to look at the voices of other scientists who raise legitimate questions.

Are you aware of the fact that we now know that there are deeply conserved genetic pathways that were laid down over 450 million years ago, that provide the architectural framework upon which evolutionary organisms can be built? These genetic pathways and their architectural constraints mean that there are limits to "random" pathways, and that there is an underlying order and direction (constraints) based upon what some scientists are now calling "facilitated variation" and "nonrandom morphological variation." Of course, such theories cannot fit into the strict extrapolationist dogma espoused by the neo-darwinian modern synthesis, hence many of these biologists are speaking of "new" synthesis that takes into account these new scientific findings.

Gosh, Rob, you seem to approach this with some degree of hostility. It might help, perhaps, to consider what micatala and I have actually said, rather than jump on it as if it is a given that we must be wrong. For example, I wonder how you reach the conclusion that I, at least, continuously espouse the "strict extrapolationism" of the failed "modern synthesis."

Your citation of Gregory is interesting. Much as I admire his work, I find his summary that you cited for us (thank you) to be more semantics than substance. Let's simplify it. He argues that the modern synthesis blended then-available knowledge of population genetics (and simple mathematical models applied to limited numbers of alleles) with the concept of selection, which as you say, no one disputes. He then points out that the then-available knowledge did not include understanding of how genomes change--i.e. the vast variety of mutations. At the time (as is still true today for many who absorbed the common misconceptions during the genetics unit in high school), it was thought that there are few alleles; it was generally unknown that regulatory sequences could also mutate. In the absence of knowledge of developmental mechanisms, there was little choice but to present the model on the basis of what was known.

To assume in knee-jerk fashion that a reference to selection or mutation or populations automatically refers to the ancient version of the modern synthesis is unwarranted. Of course there is more to it than was known then. Of course traditional "alleles" are not the only players in evolutionary change. Of course there are other means of achieving differential reproduction than selection. Of course there are constraints on evolutionary change. However, the fact remains that evolution proceeds through the basic process of parents having offspring, and some parents having more offspring than others, with the consequence that some genotypes become common and others become rare. You won't get evolution without parents having offspring. You won't get evolution without having populations. But, to mention these things does not automatically imply that one adheres religously to ancient models.

I presume that to insist that there is more to evolution than random variation followed by selection does not automatically imply that one believes the only possible option is presented in the UB. Rather, I'd wait until someone made this claim before I questioned it.

I will make only two comments on the links and quotes you provided.

When considering macroevolutionary patterns, the need for an expanded mechanistic view is even clearer. Mass extinctions, for example, may profoundly alter the course of evolutionary diversification and the resulting distribution of species yet have little to do with the usual process of selection among organisms within populations. Climate change, meteorite impacts, continental drift, and other large-scale external processes must also be taken into consideration if the patterns observed in the fossil record are to be understood, and these obviously lie outside the domain of microevolutionary study.

His argument here is that the modern synthesis and population biology are inadequate to explain The Whole Pattern; one must include the Chixulub impact, for example. Well, this is silly--he's quibbling with semantics. Changes in allele frequency occur in the context of populations. The surrounding environment influences the relative success of various genetic changes. Mass extinctions need not be named one by one to fit into this model; they are subsumed as part of the environmental conditions. They can work as selection agents, or as perpetrators of genetic drift. They can change the competitive landscape so that previously unsuccessful species can diversify (e.g. mammals didn't get very far as long as there were dinosaurs to eat them). Even with the ancient modern synthesis, there was no refusal to accept the idea that there might have been environmental changes, even if those changes weren't named.

To those of us attempting to unravel the mechanisms by which animals change form in evolution, the issues emerge in the guise of the tension between the demands of natural selection and the internal rules that govern the expression of genes and the development of embryos. The nature of the existing developmental system somehow constrains or channels acceptable change, so that selection is limited in what it can achieve given some starting anatomy.

Rudy is saying the same thing I do--and the same thing you do--but in his own Rudyesque phrasing. The high school science standards phrase it as "evolution occurs by modification of prior forms." It seems obvious, at least to me, that said modifications must not only be possible (the genes are there to modify), but also not lethal (mutations that screw up development don't produce live organisms).

Even Gregory says much the same thing:

an important contribution to organismal features is made by preexisting design limitations, correlations of growth, cooptions, and other such factors (e.g., Gould and Lewontin, 1979; Gould 2002). In order to understand these aspects of organismal evolution, it is necessary to consider factors operating at levels both above and below the individual organism, such as phylogenetic and developmental constraints.

The trouble is, he's made a jump that is either so badly phrased that I can't figure out what he's saying, or that is wholly unwarranted (and actually wrong). What are the factors that operate "at the level of developmental constraints"? Basically, development works the way it does, and it's really easy to screw it up. Well, mutations that lead to developmental screwups produce lethal phenotypes. That's how the constraint works. There's no other way--can the promise of development somehow mask certain bases from radiation? Good luck getting that hypothesis past the review panel!

And what do we call it when a particular mutation creates an individual that fails to survive, besides "lethal"? It's natural selection against that mutation. Contrary to Gregory's assertion, this Factor operates at the level of the individual organism. The effect is that of a developmental constraint. But there's no reason to invoke mysticism to explain it when it makes perfectly good sense already.

What factors operate at the phylogenetic level? Basically the same ones. Once you have two lineages, that inherit only what their parents give them, you've got a phylogenetic constraint. There are plastids in plants but not animals. Therefore, plants but not animals can have evolutionary changes that affect plastids. Arthropods have exoskeletons; vertebrates have endoskeletons. Therefore, arthropods aren't going to have mutations that change their endoskeletons, and vertebrates aren't going to have mutations that change their exoskeletons. Maybe vertebrates might have been able to have such mutations in the Silurian when there were placoderms...

...but we'd kinda have to conclude that those mutations that occurred removed what exoskeleton there was--so turtles and armadillos developed theirs by a different route...a route that was constrained by what genes they had, what their anatomy was, their embryonic development, and therefore their phylogeny.

But nowhere along here is there any notion of the fundamental changes not occurring at the level of DNA (mutation) or the notion that DNA changes would not affect the phenotypes of individuals, or the notion that organisms' success is often related to their phenotypes. Nor is there any notion that we're talking about strict extrapolation of the precise story told in the modern synthesis' description of allele changes via population genetics.

In other words, you actually are saying the same thing I am, despite your apparent desire to argue... ...except on the issue of semantics, where you seem much more concerned about pigeonholing beliefs according to philosophical definitions. I never remember the definitions, so such pigeonholing doesn't help me.

[Rob]

Your citation of Gregory is interesting. Much as I admire his work, I find his summary that you cited for us (thank you) to be more semantics than substance.

Why should one expect anything different from someone who is espousing a panselectionist ideology by parroting the dogmas of strict extrapolationism? Gregory pretty much sums up the state of the world for Strict Extrapolationists like Jose, when he states,

Though the protagonists have often been divided along these professional lines, the micro-macro debate is not between paleontologists and population geneticists per se. Rather, it is between strict extrapolationists who argue that all evolution can be understood by studying population-level processes and those who argue that there are additional factors to consider. Members of this latter camp may come from all quarters of evolutionary biology, from genome biologists to paleontologists, although the latter have been by far the most vocal proponents of an expanded outlook. For strict extrapolationists, there may be little value in pursuing this debate. But for those open to a more pluralistic approach who seek a resolution to the issue, there is much value in understanding the arguments presented in favor of a distinct macroevolutionary theory that coexists with, but is not subsumed by, established microevolutionary principles. (Gregory 2005: 686)

(....) [T]urning back to Darwin's writings, there were always some incredibly progressionist sentiments. Most notorious are the closing lines of the Origin, which go right back to Darwin's earliest writings, namely his Sketch of 1842 and his Essay of 1844 (Darwin and Wallace 1958).

Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, form so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved. (Darwin 1959, p. 490)

It is hard to imagine that these words are simply a rhetorical flourish. (Ruse 1988: 102-103)

(....) Darwin adopted some of the most sophisticated scientific thinking of his time, which argued that a tendency toward divergence and specialization is a mark of progress. Here, Darwin starts to sound remarkably like Spencer on heterogeneity, which is hardly surprising since they drew on the same sources. What Darwin did was to combine these two prongs, arguing that (in general) what competitive highness will lead to is precisely specialization. Hence, progress does indeed come out of a selection-driven evolutionary process.

If we look at the differentiation and specialization of the several organs of each being when adult (and this will include the advancements of the brain for intellectual purposes) as the best standard of highness of organization, natural selection clearly leads towards highness; for all phsiologists admit taht the specialization of organs, inasmuch as they perform in this state their functions better, is an advantage to each being; and hence the accumulation of variations tending towards specialization is within the scope of natural selection. (Darwin 1959, p. 222, 382.11:c)

(....) People who deny that Darwin was a progressionist -- and I was one of them (Ruse 1979) -- are just plain wrong. (Ruse 1988: 104)

To deride the hope of progress is the ultimate fatuity, the last word in poverty of spirit and meanness of mind. There is no need to be dismayed by the fact that we cannot yet envisage a definitive solution of our problems, a resting-place beyond which we need not try to go." -- Medawar 1972, p. 127

(....) [T]his paean to progression came in his [Medawar's] presidential address to the British Association, a point at which (by his own admission) he spoke "of and for science" (Medawar 1972, p. 9, his italics). I rest my case. (Ruse 1988: 122-123

-- Ruse, Michael (1988) Molecules to Men: Evolutionary Biology and Thoughts of Progress. In Evolutionary Progress. Chicago. Pp. 97-123.

Some so-called scientists seek to impose the values of mechanistic materialism upon all interpretations of the facts. They want to portray their value choices as not being subjective, but being objective, when in reality their value choices are just as subjective as those of anyone else.

A perfect example of this fallacious form of reasoning (that one value choice is "objective" while another is "subjective") is found in the diversity of responses to the question of whether evolution is progressive or not; some scientists look at the facts and claim it is with respect to some specific criterion, while others claim it is not with respect to different criterion, and both make subjective value judgments when choosing which criterion to use.

The progress of evolution appears to be obviously progressive. The earliest organisms were no more complex than some bacteria and blue-green algae. Three billion years later, their descendents include orchids, bees, peacocks and human beings, which appear to be more complex, advanced, or progressive than their ancestors. (Ayala 1988: 75)

Upon reflection the issue becomes less obvious, because what do we mean when we say there has been progress in the evolutionary process? Some evolutionary lineages do not appear progressive at all: living bacteria are not very different from their ancestors of two or three billion years earlier. In addition, extinction can hardly be progressive, yet most evolutionary lineages have become extinct. Still more, organisms may be progressive with respect to others. For example, bacteria are able to synthesize all their own components and obtain the energy they need for living from inorganic compounds; human beings depend on other organisms. (Ayala 1988: 75)

(....) The term "change" means alteration, whether in the position, the state, or the nature of a thing. Progress implies change, but not vice versa; not all changes are progressive. (Ayala 1988: 76)

(....) "Evolution" and "progress" can also be distinguished, although both imply that sustained change has occurred. Evolutionary change is not necessarily progressive. The evolution of a species may lead to its own extinction, a change which is not progressive, at least not for that species. (Ayala 1988: 76)

(....) The notion of progress requires that a value judgment be made about what is better and what is worse, or what is higher and what is lower, according to some axiological standard. (Ayala 1988: 78)

(....) Uniform progress takes place whenever every later member of the sequence is better than every earlier member of the sequence according to a certain feature. (Ayala 1988: 79)

(....) Net progress does not require that every member of the sequence be better than all previous members of the sequence and worse than all its successors; it requires only that later members of the sequence be better, on the average, than earlier members. Net progress allows for temporary fluctuations of value.... Some authors have argued that progress has not occurred in evolution because no matter what standard is chosen, fluctuations can always be found in every evolutionary lineage. This argument is valid against the occurrence of uniform progress, but not against the existence of net evolutionary progress. (Ayala 1988: 79)

(....) General progress is that which occurs in all historical sequences of a given domain of reality and from the beginning of the sequences until their end. Particular progress is that which occurs in one or several but not all historical sequences, or that which takes place during part but not all of the duration of the sequences. (Ayala 1988: 80)

Some writers have denied that evolution is progressive on the grounds that not all evolutionary lineages exhibit advance. Some evolutionary lineages, like those leading to certain parasitic forms, are retrogressive by certain standards; and ... have lineages have become extinct without issue. These considerations are valid against a claim of general progress, but not against claims of particular forms of progress. (Ayala 1988: 80-81)

[T]he notion of progress is axiological and, therefore, it cannot be a strictly scientific term: value judgments are not part and parcel of scientific discourse, which is characterized by empirically testable hypotheses and objective descriptions. (Ayala 1988: 81)

(....)

Human Consciousness: Climax of One Kind of Progress

Once one realizes that recognition of progress is only possible after a value judgment has been made as to which will be the standard against which progress is to be measured (and hence, that there is not a standard of progress, or one that is best for all purposes), it becomes possible to seek standards of progress that may yield valuable insights into the study of the evolution of life. (Ayala 1988: 90)

I shall now, by way of illustration, discuss progress according to a particular standard of reference: the ability of an organism to obtain and process information about the environment. I can see two reasons that make this criterion of progress especially meaningful (although not, I reiterate, the most meaningful, because no criterion exists that is best for all purposes). First, the ability to obtain information about the environment and to react accordingly, is an important adaptation, because it allows the organism to seek out suitable environments and resources and to avoid unsuitable ones. Second, because the ability to perceive the environment, and to integrate, coordinate, and react flexibly to what is perceived, has attained its highest development in mankind. This incomparable advancement is perhaps the most fundamental characteristic that sets apart Homo sapiens from all other animals. Symbolic language, complex social organization, control over the environment, the ability to envisage future states and to work towards them, values and ethics are developments made possible by man's greatly developed capacity to obtain and organize information about the state of the environment. This capacity has ushered in mankind's new mode of adaptation. Whereas other organisms become genetically adapted to their environments, humans create environments to fit their genes. It is thus that mankind has spread over the whole planet in spite of its physiological dependence on a tropical or subtropical climate. (Ayala 1988: 90-91)

Increased ability to gather and process information about the environment is sometimes expressed as evolution towards “independence from the environment.” (….) The notion of “control over the environment” also has been associated with the ability to gather and use information about the state of the environment. However, true control over the environment occurs to any substantial extent only in the human species. All organisms interact with the environment, but they do not control it…. The ability to control the environment started with the australopithecines, the first group of organisms which may be called human: some were able to produce devices to manipulate the environment in the form of rudimentary pebble and bone tools. The ability to obtain and process information about the conditions of the environment does not provide control over the environment but rather it enables the organisms to avoid unsuitable environmenents and to seek suitable ones. It has developed in many organisms because it is a useful adaptation. (Ayala 1988: 91-92)

Some selective interaction with the environment occurs in all organisms. The cell memebrane of a bacterium permits certain molecules but not others to enter the cell. Selective molecular exchange occurs also in the inorganic world; but this can hardly be called a form of information processing. Certain bacteria when placed on a agar plate move about in a zig-zag pattern, which is almost certainly random. The most rudimentary ability to gather and process information about the environment may be found in certain single-celled eukaryotes (= organisms with a true nucleus). A Paramecium follows a sinuous path as it swims, ingesting the bacteria that it encounters. Whenever it meets unfavorable conditions, like unsuitable acidity or salinity in the water, the Paramecium checks its advance, turns and starts in a new direction. Its reaction is purely negative. The Paramecium apparently does not seek its food or a favorable environment, but simply avoids unsuitable conditions. (Ayala 1988: 92)

Euglena, also a single-celled organism, exhibits a somewhat greater ability to process information about the environment. Euglena has a light-sensitive spot by means of which it can orient itself towards the light. Euglena's motions are directional; it not only avoids unsuitable environments but it actively seeks suitable ones. An amoeba represents further progress in the same direction; it reacts to light by moving away from it, and also actively pursues food particles. (Ayala 1988: 92)

An increase in the ability to gather and process information about the environment is not a general characteristic of the evolution of life. Progress has occurred in certain evolutionary lines but not in others. Today's bacteria are not more progressive by this criterion than their ancestors of three billion years ago. In many evolutionary sequences some very limited progress took place in the very early stages, without further progress through the rest of their history. In general, animals are more advanced than plants; vertebrates are more advanced than invertebrates; mammals are more advanced than reptiles, which are more advanced than fish. The most advanced organism by this criterion is doubtless the human species. (Ayala 1988: 92-93)

The ability to obtain and to process information about the environment has progressed little in the plant kingdom. Plants react to light and to gravity. The geotropism is positive in the root, but negative in the stem. Plants also grow towards the light; some plants like hte sunflower have parts which follow the course of the sun through its daily cycle. Another tropism in plants is the tendency of roots to grow towards water. The response to gravity, to water, and to light is basically due to differential growth rates; a greater elongation of cells takes place on one side of the root or stem than on the other side. Gradients of light, gravity or moisture are the clues which guide these tropism. Some plants react also to tactile stimuli. Tendrils twine around what they touch; Mimosa and carnivorous plants like the Venus flytrap (Dionaea) have leaves which close upon being touched. (Ayala 1988: 93)

A limited form of coordinated behavior occurs in the echinoderms which comprise the starfishes and sea urchins. Whereas coelenterates possess only an undifferentiated nerve net, echinoderms possess a nerve net, a nerve ring, and radial nerve cords. When the appropriate stimulus is encountered, a starfish reacts with direct and unified actions of the whole body. (Ayala 1988: 93)

The most primitive form of a brain occurs in certain organisms like planarian flatworms, which also have numerous sensory cells and eyes without lenses. The information gathered in these sensory cells and organs is processed and coordinated by the central nervous system and the rudimentary brain; a planarian worm is capable of some variability of responses and of some simple learning. That is, the same stimuli will not necessarily always produce the same response. (Ayala 1988: 93)

Planarian flatworms have progressed farther than starfishes in the ability to gather and process information about the environment, and the starfishes have progressed farther than sea anenomes and other coelenterates. But none of these organisms has gone very far by this criterion of progress. The most progressive groups of organisms among the invertebrates are te cephalopods and arthropods, but the vertebrates have progressed much farther than any invertebrates. (Ayala 1988: 93-94)

Among the ancestors of both the arthopods and the vertebrates, there were organisms that, like the sponges, lacked a nervious system. These ancestors evolved through a stage with only a simple network, whereas later stages developed a central nervous system and eventually a rudimentary brain. With further development of the central nervous system and of the brain, the ability to obtain and process information from outside progressed much father. The anthropods, which include the insects, have complex forms of behavior. Precise visual, chemical and acoustic signals are obtained and processed by many arthopods, particularly in their search for food and in their selection of mates. (Ayala 1988: 94)

Vertebrates are generally able to obtain and process much more complicated signals and to produce a much greater variety of responses than arthopods. The vertebrate brain has an enormous number of associative neurons with an extremely complex arrangement. Among the vertebrates, progress in the ability to deal with environmental information is correlated with increase in the size of the cerebral hemispheres and with the appearance and development of the "neopallium." The neopallium is involved in association and coordination of all kinds of impulses from all receptors and brain centers. The larger brain of vertebrates, compared to that of invertebrates, permits them also to have a large amount of neurons involved in information storage or memory. The neopallium appeared first in the reptiles. In the mammals it has expanded to become the cerebral cortex, which covers most of the cerebral hemispheres. The cerebral cortex in humans is particularly large, compressed over the hemispheres in a complex pattern of folds and turns. When organisms are measured by their ability to process and obtain information about the environment, mankind is, indeed, the most progressive organism on earth. (Ayala 1988: 94)

(....) Mankind is not the most progressive species by many criteria. By some standards, humans are among the bottom rungs of the ladder of life, for example, in the ability to synthesize their own biological materials from inorganic resources. (Ayala 1988: 95)

(....) "progressive" is an evaluative term that demands a subjective commitment to a particular standard of value. (Ayala 1988: 95)

-- Ayala, Fancisco J. Can "Progress" be Defined as a Biological Concept? In Evolutionary Progress (ed., Matthew H. Nitecki). Chicago: University of Chicago Press; 1988; pp. 75-96.

When brainy, motile animals appeared, the members of other kingdoms were driven into deeper water or slowly driven to extinticion.... Ediacarans were on the verge, by the end of the Lipalian period, of developing forms with cephalized bilateral symmetry: anterior sense organs and a brain fomed by cell family fusion. Spriggina and Marywadea are essentially encephalized versions of Dickinsonia. This evolutionary development was totally independent of metazoans.

-- McMenamin, Mark A. S. Discovering the First Complex Life: The Garden of Ediacara. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1998; c1998

It should be noted that we now understand more about the Hox genes and the genetic pathways comprising an ancient architecture laid down ove 450 million years ago which facilitated the evolution of the Central Nervious System.

Wilson's nice, from-the-heart intuition is at odds with the data. If we wanted to be scientific about this, rather than philosophical or religious, we'd have to go with the data: "Progress" is not a necessary property of evolution.

Mechanistic materialists, like Gould, Dawkins, Jose et al., impose their own value judgments upon the facts of organic evolution by valuing some facts (criterion) more than others, and then fallaciously attempting to claim that there own value judgments (choices of criterion) are "objective," while those who see progress based upon other criterion are making "subjective" choices, "nice from-the-heart intuition ... [which are] at odds with the data." In truth and fact, both require value judgments when choosing which criterion by which to evaluate the question of progress, except it is more honest to openly admit this is the case.

Jose's claim that his value choice is objective and according to the data is shown to be patently false by Ayala's statements above; the evolution of the Central Nervous System is just as much a fact and datum as any other criterion which one selects, and it requires a value judgment to determine which criterion one will use. The truth is that it requires a value judgment when addressing the question of progress, and whether one comes out con or pro, both require a subjective value judgment in choosing which criterion one will use to answer this question.

It is also fallacious to claim, or imply, as Jose does, that scientists don't make subjective value judgments in evaluating the so-called "facts" of science.

Such mechanistic materialists attempt to use the cloak of so-called "scientific authority" to claim the subjective value choices they are espousing are "scientific," when in reality they are espousing implicit value judgments and subjective philosophical and metaphysical choices, a viewpoint that is not science but scientism.

Philosophically, Morgan was not only an empiricist and a staunch experimentalist. He was also fundamentally a skeptic and materialist. His skepticism took the particular turn, as it did for many biologists of his generation, of strong antireligious feelings. Morgan was judicious (or diplomatic) enough never to write openly about his hostility to religion, but it emerged clearly in his personal conversation, and sometimes subtly in his writings. Religion was to Morgan, like Driesch's entelechy or other vitalistic notions, a form of mystery. The role of science, of biology in particular, was to combat mystery, and that meant, particularly in the context of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America, to combat religion. Morgan was militantly antireligious. As Dobzhansky, who worked with Morgan both at Columbia and Cal Tech, wrote: "Now, about his militant atheism -- his idea was religion feeds on mystery. The way to combat religion is to combat mystery, hence to show that the biological phenomena are not mysterious, but they are scientifically explicable. That was the reason why Morgan worked in biology, particularly in genetics and evolution" (1962, p. 255). Morgan's strong antireligious feelings may well be the source of much of his philosophy of science -- of his materialism, his experimentalism, his emphasis on physicochemical explanations. The bearing of this attitude on Morgan's evolutionary views may very well be that to combat religious views on creation, biology must be careful no tot fall into the same trap of inventing obscure or abstract "principles," "factors," or other nonentities to account for the diversity and adaptation of life. Scientists must remember that they are nothing more than priests of a new religion if they think that by naming something they have explained its existence. Even a term like selection could represent the error of explaining by naming if there were no empirical data to support its existence. Morgan's philosophy of science ... stood on an empirical foundation of its own, but the view may have been formed initially, and was certainly fed continuously, by his strong opposition to religion and mystical explanations of any kind.

-- Allen, Garland E. The Evolutionary Synthesis: Morgan and Natural Selection Revisited. In The Evolutionary Synthesis: Perspectives on the Unification of Biology. (eds., Ernst Mayr and William B. Provine). Cambridge: Harvard University Press; 1980; p. 379.

As the above quotation makes clear, science is not value free simply because science is an activity in the minds of scientists, and like all humans, we operate within an intellectual framework which in the end is subjectively value conditioned by philosophical choices of the individual scientist.

If one is a mechanistic materialist, and discounts the value of conscious minds which are able to discriminate meanings and values, than from this reductionistic framework it is rather easy to discount the data/evidence observed in the fact of the evolution of increasingly complex Central Nervous Systems in organisms, and the increasing role that conscious intelligence plays in evolution by allowing an organism to control its environment and to thereby increasingly determine the course of its own evolution.

But as anyone who reads the scientific literature widely and deeply observes, the fact remains, there is a diversity of views within the scientific community with regards to this question of whether or not the fact of organic evolution is in truth progressive, and it requires a value judgment in making the choice as to which criterion one uses in addressing it.

And I note that the perfect evidence that Jose is not motivated by an honest examination of the facts that there is a diversity of views within the scientific community, such as those of Ayala, McMenamin, Ruse, et al., or honestly willing to admit that Ayala is correct that evaluating this question requires a value choice, but rather resorts to the disingenious tactic of misrepresenting and distorting Ayala and McMenamin's arguments, implying that they argued there was an "Intelligent Force that, perhaps, covers certain bases in the DNA and makes them non-mutable." Such a claim is a philosophical one and beyond the ability of science to answer, but of course, Jose knows this, which all the more reveals his disingenous intentions, which tells us a lot what malicious and deceptive agenda is driving Jose.