The Altenberg 16 - núverandi útgáfa af þróunarkenningunni er dauð

Fyrir nokkru var gefin út bók af þróunarsinna sem fjallaði um sérstakan fund þar sem 16 virtir vísindamenn, allir þróunarsinnar auðvitað, fjölluðu um hvert ástandið væri þegar kemur að þróunarkenningunni. Fundurinn var haldinn í Altenberg í Austurríki árið 2008 og er vanalega kallaður Albernberg 16.  Það sem flestir þarna virðast hafa verið sammála um er að núverandi útgáfa af þróunarkenningunni, náttúruval plús tilviljanakenndar stökkbreytingar er ekki rétt og dugar ekki til að útskýra það sem við sjáum í náttúrunni í dag.

Hérna eru nokkrar mjög forvitnilegar tilvitnanir úr bókinni:

The Altenberg 16: An Exposé of the Evolution Industry by Suzan Mazur
“[W]hile the Altenberg 16 have roots in neo-Darwinian theory, they recognize the need to challenge the prevailing Modern Synthesis, because there’s too much it doesn’t explain [emphasis added]” (p. vii).

“The Altenberg 16 … recognize that the theory of evolution which most practicing biologists accept and which is taught in classrooms today, is inadequate in explaining our existence [emphasis added]” (p. 19).

“A wave of scientists now questions natural selection’s role, though fewer will publicly admit it” (p. 20).

“Evolutionary science is as much about the posturing, salesmanship, stonewalling and bullying that goes on as it is about actual scientific theory. It is a social discourse involving hypotheses of staggering complexity with scientists, recipients of the biggest grants of any intellectuals, assuming the power of politicians while engaged in Animal House pie-throwing and name-calling: ‘ham-fisted’, ‘looney Marxist hangover’, ‘secular creationist’, ‘philosopher’ (a scientist who can’t get grants anymore), ‘quack’, ‘crackpot’ …

Mjög hressandi að sjá þróunarsinna fjalla um sína uppáhalds kenningu á jafn heiðarlegan hátt. Þar sem viðurkennt er hvernig náttúruval virðist ekki vera að virka eins og búist var við og núverandi útgáfa af þróunarkenningunni, tilviljanakenndar stökkbreytingar og náttúruval er ekki að duga til að útskýra það sem við finnum í náttúrunni.  Sömuleiðis samfélagslega ástandið þar sem til að selja fólki þróunarkenninguna þá eru notuð mjög ósiðsamlegar aðferðir.

Höfundurinn, Suzan Mazur, þrátt fyrir að vera þróunarsinni þá var hún ekki að reyna neitt að fela vandamálin eða gera lítið úr þeim þegar hún spurði spurninga og fjallaði um svörin sem vísindamennirnir gáfu.

Um náttúruval þá sögðu menn t.d. þetta hérna:

We are grappling with the increasing feeling … that we just don’t have the theoretical and analytical tools necessary to make sense of the bewildering diversity and complexity of living organisms” (from the invitation to attend the Altenberg conference, p. 31).

“Basically I don’t think anybody knows how evolution works” (Jerry Fodor, p. 34).

“Oh sure natural selection’s been demonstrated … the interesting point, however, is that it has rarely if ever been demonstrated to have anything to do with evolution in the sense of long-term changes in populations. … Summing up we can see that the import of the Darwinian theory of evolution is just unexplainable caprice from top to bottom. What evolves is just what happens to happen [ellipsis in original]” (Stanley Salthe, p. 21).

“There are people spouting off as if we know the answer. We don’t know the answer” (Stuart Kauffman, p. 54).

“Darwinism and the neo-Darwinian synthesis, last dusted off 70 years ago, actually hinder discovery of the mechanism of evolution” (Antonio Lima-de-Faria, p. 83).

“Do I think natural selection should be relegated to a less import role in the discussion of evolution? Yes I do” (Scott Gilbert, p. 221).

“She [Lynn Margulis] sees natural selection as ‘neither the source of heritable novelty nor the entire evolutionary process’ and has pronounced neo-Darwinism ‘dead’, since there’s no adequate evidence in the literature that random mutations result in new species” (Mazur, p. 257).

“At that meeting [Francisco] Ayala agreed with me when I stated that this doctrinaire neo-Darwinism is dead. He was a practitioner of neo-Darwinism but advances in molecular genetics, evolution, ecology, biochemistry, and other news had led him to agree that neo-Darwinism’s now dead” (Lynn Margulis, p. 278).

Þetta ætti að vekja einhverja til umhugsunar, margir hérna á blogginu mínu eins og Matthías og Brynjólfur hafa látið eins og náttúruval leysi öll vandamál þróunarkenningarinnar og að þetta er allt saman slétt og einfalt, sama sem sannað en ég held að það sé nokkuð augljóst að svo er ekki.

Einnig fjölluðu nokkrir um ritskoðun í vísindasamfélaginu gagnvart þeim sem höfðu efasemdir eða nýjar hugmyndir, einn sagði þetta:

“The commercial media is both ignorant of and blocks coverage of stories about non-centrality of the gene because its science advertising dollars come from the gene-centered Darwin industry. … . At the same time, the Darwin industry is also in bed with government, even as political leaders remain clueless about evolution. Thus, the public is unaware that its dollars are being squandered on funding of mediocre, middlebrow science or that its children are being intellectually starved as a result of outdated texts and unenlightened teachers” (Mazur, p. ix). 

“Unless the discourse around evolution is opened up to scientific perspectives beyond Darwinism, the education of generations to come is at risk of being sacrificed for the benefit of a dying theory” (Stuart Newman, p. 104).

“[P]eople are always more loyal to their tribal group than to any abstract notion of “truth”— scientists especially. If not they are unemployable. It is professional suicide to continually contradict one’s teachers or social leaders” (Lynn Margulis, p. 275).

Þetta fannst mér mjög áhugavert og er hjartanlega sammála. Í staðinn fyrir alvöru fræðslu þá sér maður heilaþvott þar sem ein saga er sett fram sem heilagur sannleikur og allt gert til að selja hana og það skiptir engu máli hvernig það sé gert.

Miklu ýtarlegri umfjöllun um þessa bók er að finna hérna: Desperate attempts to discover ‘the elusive process of evolution’