Darwinism "Has Pretty Much Reached the End of it's Rope"
Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2012 1:00 am
Source: Peer-Reviewed Paper Concludes that Darwinism "Has Pretty Much Reached the End of Its Rope"
An interesting paper was recently published by David Depew and Bruce Weber in the journal Biological Theory. The paper bears the title "The Fate of Darwinism: Evolution After the Modern Synthesis." Its abstract summarizes the article's contents:
Contrary to the Darwin lobby's oft-repeated assertion that there are absolutely no weaknesses in Darwinian theory, the paper offers the concession that the modern synthesis has never provided an account of "how major forms of life evolved" -- an omission that is not unsubstantial, to put it mildly.
Find the entire article here.
*End quote*
So this very much seems to be where all the evidence is leading us -- Darwinian Gradualism is just not capable of producing the diverse complex, integrated, information-rich biological systems that continue to amaze us day after revealing day of discovery. For all those without an invested interest in maintaining the status quo (funding, a pay cheque) many are realising that it is time the modern evolutionary synthesis received yet another major overhaul.
An interesting paper was recently published by David Depew and Bruce Weber in the journal Biological Theory. The paper bears the title "The Fate of Darwinism: Evolution After the Modern Synthesis." Its abstract summarizes the article's contents:
Notably, the paper's authors seem to share the view of the genome that ID proponents have been advocating for years: "There is probably very little 'junk DNA.' The entire genome, including its frequent repeats, plays a role in regulating gene expression." In support of this, they cite a 2011 paper by Pink et al. (Pseudogenes: Pseudo-functional or key regulators in health and disease?).We trace the history of the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis, and of genetic Darwinism generally, with a view to showing why, even in its current versions, it can no longer serve as a general framework for evolutionary theory. The main reason is empirical. Genetical Darwinism cannot accommodate the role of development (and of genes in development) in many evolutionary processes. We go on to discuss two conceptual issues: whether natural selection can be the "creative factor" in a new, more general framework for evolutionary theorizing; and whether in such a framework organisms must be conceived as self-organizing systems embedded in self-organizing ecological systems.
Contrary to the Darwin lobby's oft-repeated assertion that there are absolutely no weaknesses in Darwinian theory, the paper offers the concession that the modern synthesis has never provided an account of "how major forms of life evolved" -- an omission that is not unsubstantial, to put it mildly.
Find the entire article here.
*End quote*
So this very much seems to be where all the evidence is leading us -- Darwinian Gradualism is just not capable of producing the diverse complex, integrated, information-rich biological systems that continue to amaze us day after revealing day of discovery. For all those without an invested interest in maintaining the status quo (funding, a pay cheque) many are realising that it is time the modern evolutionary synthesis received yet another major overhaul.