20070629

Creationists, Neo-Darwinists, and the 'Evolutionary Dichotomy'

The slug fest between creationists and neo-Darwinists is a wonder to behold, complete with name calling and ignorance aplenty (http://www.amazon.com/Fair-Treatment-Evolution-Begins-Definition/forum/FxZ58KVEERYS5E/TxZ3SMZJCF16UR/1/ref=cm_cd_dp_rt_tft_tp/002-1053518-3647210?%5Fencoding=UTF8&cdAnchor=0595392458). It seems that some creationists might accede to “micro-evolution,” but not to “macro-evolution,” while neo-Darwinists seem unsure on where to draw the line. Of course, there is absolutely no dichotomy to be had in evolution. Evolution involves the motion of all things with respect to all other things. As I explained in "The Scientific Worldview," the universal mechanism of evolution is univironmental determinism (UD), the proposition that what happens to a portion of the universe is determined by the infinite matter in motion within and without. Nevertheless, I can sympathize a bit with the creationists. The presently accepted mechanism of evolution is "neo-Darwinism" (natural selection plus genetics). So in conventional thinking there indeed is a dichotomy: between the biological world and the rest of the universe. Once we remove this distinction by replacing neo-Darwinism with UD, the dichotomy disappears. This already has been done to some extent in the study of biopoesis (the origin of life from inorganic chemicals), which is a well-established theory whose efficacy is seldom debated by any scientist who has studied it in any detail. Countless scientists have stretched neo-Darwinism even further outside its bailiwick with the vague feeling that evolution is universally applicable. Neo-Darwinism, however, is only a special case of UD, and not an especially good one at that. As I showed in the book, it is gloriously incomplete—the biological microcosm consists of much more than just genes. We need to scrap neo-Darwinism as obsolete. UD removes the last vestige of the dichotomy hoped for by the rear-guard in the creationist camp. Only then can evolution assume its rightful place as the guiding paradigm of all science.

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