Today the Cairns Post devoted an article (not a letter to the editor) to a crank and idiot who has somehow managed to get a degree in psychology from James Cook University. The idiot in question is under the impression that the failure of other species to become technologically advanced somehow disproves the modern synthesis.
According to the traditional theory of evolution, intelligence should expand over time, putting other animals on the same intellectual playing field as humans.
No, it does not say that. The idea that evolution is like a ladder with humans at the top and other organisms striving to climb up to where we are is a pre-Darwinian idea without merit. It is this bone-headed mistake that leads Mr Gobus astray. I can only assume that Mr Gobus never considered actually asking someone who knows diddly-squat about the subject matter.
“The facts are right, but our perspective on how we look at evolution and on intelligence and social behaviour is, in fact, completely skewed,” Mr Gobus said.
“It has nothing to do with random genetic mutations. In fact, it is a continuous process that is at work.
Random genetic mutations plus natural selection, aka evolution, is a “continuous process at work”.
“So, evolution is a holistic process rather than divided from the dinosaurs, mammals and the human era, which Darwinists see as separate events and not linked together.”
Um, what? I think someone needs to look up “common descent”.
Using the saltwater crocodile as an example, Mr Gobus said the predators originated during the age of the dinosaurs, about 240 million years ago.
“With such a significant time period to their credit, and a history in which they must have had innumerable environmental experiences, why haven’t crocodiles developed concepts of electronics and the like?
“A common response to that question is that crocodiles are less intelligent because they have smaller brains.
“But the question that needs to be answered is why the crocodile’s brain didn’t develop with its vast environmental experiences.”
Mr Gobus’s suggestion makes as much sense asking why humans didn’t evolve to spend their days lazing in the sun on riverbanks and eating an occasional wallaby, or, as Douglas Adams once put it:
Man has always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much – the wheel, New York, wars and so on – while all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time.
But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man for precisely the same reason.
Dolphins are superbly adapted to their respective niche. Crocodiles are superbly adapted to their niche. And E. coli bacteria, which have never developed anything like the iPod, are superbly adapted to theirs. These are all effective ways of earning a living and having descendants in nature.
Evolution is all about the differential survival of self-replicating entities – genes in the case of biological evolution. There is no actual drive towards increased complexity, increased size, or increased intelligence. Some niches will demand these things, while others won’t. Some niches will be better served by going in the opposite direction – being smaller, simpler or less intelligent. Organisms will become increasingly well-adapted to their niche, and sometimes species will be so well adapted that there will be a period of stasis. It all comes down to “do the genes get passed on”. Being a crocodile is a perfectly good way for the genes to continue their long voyage through time.
Mr Gobus’s argument reminds me of the old Creationist canard “If man evolved from apes, why are there still apes?”, to which I usually reply “If the English colonised Australia, why are there still people in England?” Populations split and diverge. They find new environments and niches, and adapt to them. Populations may undergo long periods of stasis punctuated by rapid change. It all depends on available niches, available mutations, and selective pressures.
In printing the article the Cairns Post just reaffirms that it’s a poor quality newspaper, that it doesn’t care about informing its readers, and that its reporters are talentless hacks who don’t care about journalism.
Mr Gobus: You are an idiot, and JCU should ask that you never again mention that you got a degree from there again.
