Why evolution is true

What Hacker News says

1. luuuzetaDec 2022
   >It’s one thing when magazines like Scientific American go all catawampus on science, but another entirely when a good scientific journal itself succumbs to wokeness. >The article below, from July’s American Naturalist [...] shows two things. First, it’s one of the more ludicrous examples of science policing I’ve seen. Second, it shows how the American Society of Naturalists [...] has gone down the same woke road as the other ecology and evolution societies.

   As someone once said, "everything woke goes to shit". There are few ideologies as pervarsive and corrodive as Wokeness. At the end of the day, it's ultimately about power and ruling over people's thought process.

   >The piece’s hectoring tone, which tells us what we MUST do, pervades the entire paper, especially the final section, “A path forward.” Oh, and here’s part of the acknowledgments—the obligatory self castigation

   That's par for the course:

   1. Point out a non-existent problem (or amplify it to gigantic proportions if it does).

   2. Pontificate how it affects some marginalized group(s) and how the problem's day-to-day existence mortally affect the livelihood of said group(s). It's important you're talking on behalf of the group(s) and that you don't provide any evidence.

   3. Try to introduce some methodology and/or framework to solve the problem. It's important this new framework be the only "path forward", and morally justified to bully others to accept it even if it has no merits.

   >(I have yet to understand what unlived experience is! And what do white settlers have to do with ableism?)

   Neither do I!

   >The paper, as you’ll see, is really an indictment of biology and undergraduate genetics for not using sufficiently woke language.

   It seems that ship unfortunately sailed a long time ago. Nowadays it's about denying reality, and being forced to participate in some individuals' theatrics and self-image or else you'll be labeled a -phobic or -ist.

   ---

   On a different note, give Coyne's books (Faith vs Fact and Why Evolution Is True) a read. Highly recommended.

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2. bedersFeb 2020
   If you believe in microevolution, what do you think happens if "microevolution" continues for millenia?

   And why do all the creatures (you claim were created out of thin air) as if they had common ancestors? Both physiologically as well as genetically?

   To quote Dobzhansky: Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution.

   Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne might help you resolving that last part of the puzzle.

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3. larlDec 2019
   Why evolution is true. Coyne.
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4. david-gpuJan 2019
   > It is not rational to "believe" that an object, a thing, a complex structure, can come into existence without being intelligently designed in some manner.

   Would you describe a dolphin as a complex structure? It wasn't designed, it evolved through natural selection.

   I suggest reading a short book titled "Why evolution is true", or "The blind watchmaker".

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5. nitrogenMay 2018
   Also interesting is Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne
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6. nitrogenJul 2016
   For example, many consider objective morality (race based slavery is bad, say) to be a case for absolute good, which is hard to explain by pure randomness.

   I just want to clarify some incredibly common misconceptions here. There are lots of claims on these issues, so it can be difficult to get a clear picture of which claims are actually supported by evidence.

   First, from an empirical perspective, all signs point to morality being an evolved phenomenon. This is studied scientifically by surveying different cultures, conducting game-like experiments, and testing for moral behavior in other species. You can find videos of monkeys who appear to have a sense of fairness, for example, and lots of other species (dogs, crows, other primates, etc.) all display varying levels of behaviors we call moral. This is what we would expect to find if these behaviors evolved as adaptations.

   Second, "randomness" is not an accurate word to use to describe evolution by natural selection. Mutations are mostly random, but those rare mutations that survive DNA repair mechanisms and produce a reproductive and survival advantage persist and spread. Something similar occurs with cultural memes, including those layers of morality which do not come from instinct.

   Finally, though you didn't mention this specifically, it's important to point out that scientists did not decide there was no God and then set out to prove it (a common misconception with some people I know). Most historical scientists were religious, but over time as more and more evidence was collected, scientists in aggregate found that what they had been taught about God was unnecessary for and often contradictory to their scientific discoveries. Thus, despite some scientists remaining religious, science itself is an atheistic process, as that is what has been proven to work.

   It's this track record of epistemological success that leads people to accept metaphysical materialism, not an a priori assumption.

   If you want more detailed summaries of the empirical support for these arguments, I recommend the book Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne.

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