Getting Rid of Darwinism; Couldn't Agree More!!

[HOZ]

NYT Article

I’d like to abolish the insidious terms Darwinism, Darwinist and Darwinian. They suggest a false narrowness to the field of modern evolutionary biology, as though it was the brainchild of a single person 150 years ago, rather than a vast, complex and evolving subject to which many other great figures have contributed. (The science would be in a sorry state if one man 150 years ago had, in fact, discovered everything there was to say.) Obsessively focusing on Darwin, perpetually asking whether he was right about this or that, implies that the discovery of something he didn’t think of or know about somehow undermines or threatens the whole enterprise of evolutionary biology today.

So true in so many ways.

[T@T]

Dumb article, lets destroy Darwin because he was the first to say that species evolved instead of the way the bible says it happened.

I like this part:

“Darwinian” evolution, is like calling aeronautical engineering “Wrightism,” and fixed-wing aircraft “Wrightian” planes, after those pioneers of fixed-wing flight, the Wright brothers."

Nice slam on the pioneers of manned flight, would someone else have done it.. yes! actually some say Bell did it first but it wasn't documented but the facts are they are the documented pioneers of manned flight and this author thinks it's nothing

The way i see it you have 3 choices on how life flourished on earth.

1) God created all life and destroyed his mistakes (dinosaurs for example) and so far to let mankind thrive.

2) The Sumerian way, aliens from planetX come here every 3600 (so-called cycle/orbit of planetX) years and create and destroy the species that populate earth

3) Darwin, natural selection, fluke of life and the strongest/smartest survive.


Not sure about you guys but i pick door number 3.

[RougeUnderoos]

She's an evolutionary biologist and I am most certainly not, but it does seem like a petty thing to gripe about.

If we were to back in a time machine and fetch Henry Ford or Walt Disney, like she does in her editorial with Darwin, they'd be just as flabbergasted at robots on the assembly line or a computer-generated donkey talking to an ogre as Darwin would be with a double-helix.

I know I know, automobile production isn't called Fordism and animation isn't called Disneyism, but still.

Really though, good luck to her and her idea. What's the difference?

[killer_carlson]

this was probably her thesis.n (tongue firmly in cheek)

she couldn't add anything more to the theory of evolutionary biology but had to write about something, so she came up with this.

[stuck_in_chuk]

Originally Posted by T@T

Dumb article, lets destroy Darwin because he was the first to say that species evolved instead of the way the bible says it happened.

Did you read the article? This article is not criticizing Darwin - she praises him as a person who revolutionized evolutionary biology. He was a man years ahead of his time, and his theories have been vindicated by advances in knowledge (i.e. DNA and genetics).

The complaint is that the term "Darwinian" and "Darwinist" are very narrow, and do not sufficiently cover the grandness and power of the theory of evolution. By concentrating on the "Darwin" part of evolution, you ignore the advances that have been made in the 150 years since the publication of Origin of Species. Darwin had nothing to say on DNA, for example - because it wasn't discovered for many years after his death. Today, we realize that DNA plays a vital role in evolutionary theory.

Evolutionary biology has long outgrown the narrow label of "Darwinism".

[killer_carlson]

I don't really care what it is called to be honest. I see where she is coming from but I think she might be a bit off base.

I don't think the reference to the Wrights is all that appropriate. I would think that references to other theory based thinkers would be better. In economics for example, you still here references to Keynesian economics, or Adam Smith, or whatever. The topics have been dissected for decades or centuries and have certainly evolved or been tweeked. You would have to rename all of them as well and I just don't see it happening.

Another example comes from the comments on the article - Freudian psychology. Again, no big issues there.

I think this was someone writing an article because someone else she knows has hurt feelings.

[Azure]

Is she off base?

How many people dismiss evolution simply because of the 'Darwin' name attached to it?

How many people refuse to even TRY and understand it because of that name? I wasn't around in the 70-80's, but I have read and heard lots of the religious attacks on evolution that focused on 'Darwin'...and not on the actual science behind it.

[llama64]

Article is dead on and anyone who has studied any part of evolutionist history would know why.

Darwin was not the originator of evolution, but it was his book that became a lightning rod for social discussion of the concept. Ever since then he's become more of a symbol then anything else.

It would be like hating Canadians because you hate the British Monarchy.

[octothorp]

It's probably more appropriate to use Darwinism to refer to a simplified state understanding of evolutionary biology, in the same way that we talk about newtonian physics, or as killer says, freudian pyschology.

And hey, Christianity takes a lot from theological texts written both long before and long after that Christ guy, but he gets all the credit.

[mykalberta]

Fact is Darwin was the first to go on record and say it.

When you are the first at something it matters, its not that no one would have figured it out, people probably had but were to yellow bellied to say anything. Darwin had at least the truth of his conviction to be the first at a time when that truth wasnt popular.

Also, he isnt the father or whatever of human evolution, he simply states that living things evolve to adapt to their surroundings which they obviously do.

[Ozy_Flame]

I don't know about you guys, but the only time I hear the word "Darwinism" or "Darwin" is when I'm hearing a about wretched, yet spectacular death. That is about the only time it is used in pop culture, and about the only time anybody cares these days what that word even means.

Maybe in the scientific circles it holds more merit (or lack thereof), but certainly not to the average, non-concerned citizen.

[onetwo_threefour]

I can't believe the responses here. Hardly anybody is getting the point.

The problem is that Darwin- (ist, ism, ian) has become a politicized term used by opponents of the Theory of Evolution to denigrate the field of Evolutionary Biology. She's making a completely valid argument.

As for the counter-examples, the entire theory of economics isn't called Keynsianism, the entire field of psychology isn't called Freudianism, and in fact, only a limited subset of economists would refer to themselves as Keynsians, ditto for psychologists. The pejorative use of Darwinism to discuss a rich field of biological science is simply wrong. If I had gone on to get my doctorate in psychology and people started calling all psychologists Freudians as a politicization of the field I would be offended as well. It's frankly a ridiculous term to use.

The study of quantum theory isn't called Planckism, and for good reason. Although Planck is essentailly the individual that defined quanta in physics, the field is not bounde by his insights. The exact same is true of evolutionary theory.

As for T@T's statement that there are only three choices to explain the fact of flourishing life on earth... wow. Where do you even begin?

EDIT: Okay a few more people got it while I was composing my post, but still...

[troutman]

Destroy Darwin? The city in Australia?

[Daradon]

Both Azure and onetwo_threefour have the point.

It's not about glossing over what Darwin started or his contributions, its about coming up with a term that best describes the theory and might be less devisive for both people who study that theory, and the ones who attack it.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by troutman

Destroy Darwin? The city in Australia?

Where do I sign up?

[CaptainCrunch]

I agree

Dwarfism is a social blight all of those little people running around with their little fingers and toes.

[photon]

I don't really know how much the term Darwinism is used in science circles, mostly when I see that stuff talked about it's theory of evolution, evo-devo, natural selection, etc, so my first impression was she's making a big deal about a non-issue, but I don't move in science circles.

I guess I'm a bit torn.

On one hand I onetwo_threefour you make a good point and I think I agree with your post. I don't say Einsteinism, I say general and special relativity. I don't say Newtonism. Holding to Darwinism does give the impression to a lay person that things haven't changed in 150 years (a common thing among those who argue against evolution forget or choose to ignore).

On the other hand changing the name would seem like changing the name of the political right in Canada.. people aren't going to hear the new name and just accept it when they didn't before. The problem of acceptance of evolution is one of education; many people who reject it actually reject their idea of what evolution is, which is typically wrong.

Coming up with a new name for the purposes of more accurately describing the collection of theories is fine I guess, as long as it's for the right reasons.

[photon]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

Fact is Darwin was the first to go on record and say it.

When you are the first at something it matters, its not that no one would have figured it out, people probably had but were to yellow bellied to say anything. Darwin had at least the truth of his conviction to be the first at a time when that truth wasnt popular.

Also, he isnt the father or whatever of human evolution, he simply states that living things evolve to adapt to their surroundings which they obviously do.

That's not really true, the morphological similarities between humans and great apes was discussed before Darwin, though Darwin of course brought the mechanism which explained the similarities. Even into the 1700's there was people classifying animals and placing humans and apes into the same groupings.

And people in Darwin's time reading his work fully understood the implication behind his work; that the origin of the human species is no different than any other. He said himself "light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history", and much of the discussion after his book about it involved human evolution.

Darwin himself wrote The Descent of Man later on, but by the time he did many others had taken Origin and applied it to humans.

[arloiginla]

Originally Posted by T@T

Dumb article, lets destroy Darwin because he was the first to say that species evolved instead of the way the bible says it happened.

I like this part:

“Darwinian” evolution, is like calling aeronautical engineering “Wrightism,” and fixed-wing aircraft “Wrightian” planes, after those pioneers of fixed-wing flight, the Wright brothers."

Nice slam on the pioneers of manned flight, would someone else have done it.. yes! actually some say Bell did it first but it wasn't documented but the facts are they are the documented pioneers of manned flight and this author thinks it's nothing

The way i see it you have 3 choices on how life flourished on earth.

1) God created all life and destroyed his mistakes (dinosaurs for example) and so far to let mankind thrive.

2) The Sumerian way, aliens from planetX come here every 3600 (so-called cycle/orbit of planetX) years and create and destroy the species that populate earth

3) Darwin, natural selection, fluke of life and the strongest/smartest survive.


Not sure about you guys but i pick door number 3.

Why could 1 and 3 not both be correct?

Say God created the first organisms to live on this earth but allowed them to evolve through natural selection and survival of the fittest. Evidence is around us every day to prove that evolution exists, new species are being created (and destroyed) every day. All it really comes down to deciding then, is whether the very first species (likely far less complex than the ones we have now) were created or just came into existence by themself.

[Table 5]

Olivia Judson wrote a ton of articles for the magazine I used to art-direct. She was basically there to rant and rave about small details like this. Never found them that interesting myself.