Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Overheard in a book review, one Darwinian to another: "Shhh! Don't say that!"

In an interesting review of several new books on Darwin in the New York Review of Books, Richard Lewontin has good things to say about Jerry Coyne's book, Why Evolution is True. But he criticizes him for what he feels is giving too much away to Darwin's critics:
Where he is less successful, as all other commentators have been, is in his insistence that the evidence for natural selection as the driving force of evolution is of the same inferential strength as the evidence that evolution has occurred. So, for example, he gives the game away by writing that when we examine a sequence of changes in the fossil record, we can
determine whether the sequences of changes at least conform to a step-by-step adaptive process. And in every case, we can find at least a feasible Darwinian explanation.
But to say that some example is not falsification of a theory because we can always "find" (invent) a feasible explanation says more about the flexibility of the theory and the ingenuity of its supporters than it says about physical nature. Indeed in his later discussion of theories of behavioral evolution he becomes appropriately skeptical when he writes that
imaginative reconstructions of how things might have evolved are not science; they are stories.
While this is a perfectly good argument against those who claim that there are things that are so complex that evolutionary biology cannot explain them, it allows evolutionary "theory" to fall back into the category of being reasonable but not an incontrovertible material fact.
The text here is hard to parse at points, but he appears to be saying that Darwinists should not permit the slightest speck of doubt (to borrow a Chestertonian phrase) on their spotless machine. Lewontin even puts "theory" in double quotes, just to emphasize the term's status as scientific dogma.

And Lewontin is right, as a Darwinian dogmatist, to be upset at what Coyne seems to be admitting here (I'm relying on Lewontin's account, not having read the book), which is that any set of facts, if it can be given a Darwinian interpretation, must be given a Darwinian interpretation. This seems to be a common procedure: if a Darwinian interpretation is feasible, it is also, therefore, imperative.

Some theories get all the breaks.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

"I'm relying on Lewontin's account, not having read the book"

AND Martin didn't do a very good job of reading the book review either. If you wan't to learn a thing or two about evolution, why don't you go over to the University of Kentucky science library (located in the old M I King Library) and read some of the journals in relevant subjects. This would certainly beat regurgitating portions of reviews of popular books you have not even read.

Lee said...

"It's quite simple, you right wing fascist creationist moron...."

Martin Cothran said...

So I can't even rely on a sympathetic Darwinist reviewer's account of what is in a Darwinist's book. It's a cruel world.

I'm trying to square your criticism here with the common scholarly procedure of quoting a source that is itself quoted from another source.

In any case, I'll remember your argument here next time a Darwinist quotes a critic of Darwin without having read the entire work from which it came.

Art said...

Lewontin (according to Martin): "While this is a perfectly good argument against those who claim that there are things that are so complex that evolutionary biology cannot explain them, it allows evolutionary "theory" to fall back into the category of being reasonable but not an incontrovertible material fact."Martin:"The text here is hard to parse at points, but he appears to be saying that Darwinists should not permit the slightest speck of doubt (to borrow a Chestertonian phrase) on their spotless machine. Lewontin even puts "theory" in double quotes, just to emphasize the term's status as scientific dogma."Martin, you should have just stopped at "The text here is hard to parse at points". Lewontin's statement is garbled enough; your wishful thinking as to what you want Lewontin to have said doesn't help at all.

Lee said...

FWIW, that's my reading too. And it is consistent with Dawkins' complaints about some of Stephen Jay Gould's admissions about Darwinism. Some things are for the evolutionists to know, and for the rest of us not to be burdened with.

Martin Cothran said...

Art,

You got a better interpretation?

Art said...

Martin, you seem to think that Lewontin is referring to Coyne’s statement:

“imaginative reconstructions of how things might have evolved are not science; they are stories.”

when he remarks that “it allows evolutionary "theory" to fall back into the category of being reasonable but not an incontrovertible material fact”.

But if one assumes a tiny bit of consistency on Lewontin’s part, then one realizes that the latter statement more likely refers to this statement of Coyne’s:

“determine whether the sequences of changes at least conform to a step-by-step adaptive process. And in every case, we can find at least a feasible Darwinian explanation.”

Read things properly, Martin, and your own take on this snippet is entirely the opposite of what Lewontin is actually saying.

Lee said...

The use of the phrases "fall back" and "gives the game away" pretty much spells out that Lewontin considers it to be a step backwards to relegate evolution to the status of mere plausible theory, and not incontrovertible fact.

I guess I'll have to read the whole article. It will be interesting to see if Lewontin has a *material* objection to Coyne's remarks.