- #1
dron
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Hello. I have seven questions for neo-darwinists, supporters and readers of Dawkins, Dennet, Pinker and company, and sympathisers for the "selfish gene" theory.
1. I have read that "sperm can take up DNA" and that "new genetic and phenotypic features, unlinked to chromosomes, can thus be generated and inherited in a non-Mendelian ratio." Does this mean, or at least suggest, that the "selfish gene" is not the final arbiter of behaviour? Does any evidence (I'm thinking of investigations into inherited characteristics of rats and in the health and survival potential of children from stressed mothers) suggest a more Lamarckian view of "phenotypical power"?
2. Is it true that continental scientists are less interested in neo-darwinism than anglo-american biologists? If so, what theories do they favour?
3. Is it true that favourable mutations would soon be lost by interbreeding with non-mutated members of a species, that Darwin himself saw this as the biggest problem of his theory, and that neo-Darwinists have never convincingly solved it?
4. What is the survival value of looking up into the night and enjoying the starry sky?
5. I have read that mutations only occur at a rate of about one per several million cells in every generation, and that, since only a tiny number create beneficial traits which give a survival advantage, this is not fast enough to account for the extraordinary natural world, or for the rapidity that some species seem to change under environmental stress.
5. The consequence of a neo-darwinism is a non-altruistic, hierarchical and competitive world (cooperation only occurring between people likely to share the same genes). How can one explain the non-hierarchical, non-warlike and egalitarian behaviour of many hunter-gatherers, sedentary tribal people, and pre-ayrian cultures like Catal Huyuk, "Minoa" and the early Europeans described by Gimbutas and Campbell?
6. Pinker believes that we write poems and symphonies in order to achieve status. Does this effectively explain the behaviour and creations of artists?
7. Quantum physics is irrational, the neo-darwinist world is rational. Is there not a problem here? Why should the universe only exhibit irrational behaviour on the smallest scales? Is it not likely that if the fundamental units of existence are irrational that this might lead to irrational effects in the macro world - the kind of religious forces and experiences Dawkins dismisses out of hand (and I am not talking about the abrahamic religions here, which are easy targets, the only ones Dawkins aims at).
Thank you,
Darren
1. I have read that "sperm can take up DNA" and that "new genetic and phenotypic features, unlinked to chromosomes, can thus be generated and inherited in a non-Mendelian ratio." Does this mean, or at least suggest, that the "selfish gene" is not the final arbiter of behaviour? Does any evidence (I'm thinking of investigations into inherited characteristics of rats and in the health and survival potential of children from stressed mothers) suggest a more Lamarckian view of "phenotypical power"?
2. Is it true that continental scientists are less interested in neo-darwinism than anglo-american biologists? If so, what theories do they favour?
3. Is it true that favourable mutations would soon be lost by interbreeding with non-mutated members of a species, that Darwin himself saw this as the biggest problem of his theory, and that neo-Darwinists have never convincingly solved it?
4. What is the survival value of looking up into the night and enjoying the starry sky?
5. I have read that mutations only occur at a rate of about one per several million cells in every generation, and that, since only a tiny number create beneficial traits which give a survival advantage, this is not fast enough to account for the extraordinary natural world, or for the rapidity that some species seem to change under environmental stress.
5. The consequence of a neo-darwinism is a non-altruistic, hierarchical and competitive world (cooperation only occurring between people likely to share the same genes). How can one explain the non-hierarchical, non-warlike and egalitarian behaviour of many hunter-gatherers, sedentary tribal people, and pre-ayrian cultures like Catal Huyuk, "Minoa" and the early Europeans described by Gimbutas and Campbell?
6. Pinker believes that we write poems and symphonies in order to achieve status. Does this effectively explain the behaviour and creations of artists?
7. Quantum physics is irrational, the neo-darwinist world is rational. Is there not a problem here? Why should the universe only exhibit irrational behaviour on the smallest scales? Is it not likely that if the fundamental units of existence are irrational that this might lead to irrational effects in the macro world - the kind of religious forces and experiences Dawkins dismisses out of hand (and I am not talking about the abrahamic religions here, which are easy targets, the only ones Dawkins aims at).
Thank you,
Darren