Talk:Counterexamples to Evolution

Archive 1

My plans for this article

I plan on organizing this article into groups, so there would be a group for the statistical counterexamples, and a group for the counterexamples that rely on functions that do not come from the evolutionary mechanisms, or maladaptive characteristics. I am open to suggestions. I also archived the page as it was when I came here. I would also like someone to rewrite the end of the intro paragraph, it doesn't make much sense how it was and only makes a little more how I wrote it. Thanks' --SamF 22:27, 21 January 2010 (EST)

First of all, God bless you for archiving and clearing up this page! It makes the discussion better.

I'm all for better organization of the entry, but without any dilution. So please have at it!--Andy Schlafly 22:35, 21 January 2010 (EST)

I've categorized, and reworded one poorly worded point. I'll look for resources over the weekend and on Monday morning I should be able to life most of the citation needed tags. Some of these seem like they would be impossible to prove to me. Having looked at consciousness as a subject I feel pretty confident in saying that it is a mystery no matter what, and that it should probably be left off of this list, as a for instance. --SamF 18:06, 22 January 2010 (EST)

Consciousness - No animal displays self-awareness (such as clothing), morality, tool-making, or self-sacrifice to the same extent that man does. It is unclear how a random mutation could have arisen which accounts for humanity's significantly higher cognitive ability.^{[Citation Needed]}

What do you mean by "it is a mystery no matter what"? It seems to me that what the article's saying is precisely that it is a mystery - so no natural process could have created it; since atheistic evolution allows only natural processes, but consciousness exists, atheistic evolution can't be all there is. --EvanW 18:20, 22 January 2010 (EST)

It is just as unclear how a supernatural power might generate consciousness. It is a whole big can of worms and thousands of people in philosophy and neuroscience are working on it. The Evolutionary psychology people have a pretty neat little story about how something that manifests itself exactly like consciousness is beneficial and might come about, I think that if we ever do crack the consciousness puzzle then they will swoop in and claim to have an answer. I think that the bit in that counterexample about consciousness can be axed just fine and the rest left standing. Consciousness is its own big philosophical question, and I have serious doubts as to how accurately an argument about it can be contained in one paragraph, let alone one line. --SamF 18:28, 22 January 2010 (EST)