Taking apart the Modern Synthesis

PUBLISHER:

redshirt

Shaun Johnston:
In modern times we've made two revolutionary discoveries. One is, how changes in physical matter can be accounted for in terms of physical laws that can predict precisely what will happen next. Having given rise to science (how this can be studied) and industry (how it can be applied) this revolution is well under way.

The second revolution is, how emergence of species of living creatures can be accounted for in terms of them evolving from one another. This revolution, despite its promise of how much it could tell us about ourselves, remains stillborn through the mistaken application to it of principles coming out of the first revolution--reductive physicalism.

For this second revolution to advance it should be taken from under the wing of science and studied on its own terms. Tip: one recent product of evolution is creatures with minds. Minds are better studied through methods of the humanities than through those of science. Tell me, does this interest you?

Details: Written by Shaun Johnston Shaun Johnston; Published: April 9, 2011 April 9, 2011; Hits: 3303 3303

I'm embarked on a quest to come up with the briefest-possible account of why mutation plus natural selection can't be the primary mechanism of evolution. Here's my latest attempt:

The great majority of mutations are harmful*. Without natural selection, in every generation harmful mutations predominate, and generation after generation will accumulate, leading to increased disorder and eventual extinction.
Now introduce natural selection. An efficiency for natural selection of 1% may be assumed.* A 1% reduction in harmful mutations still leaves the great majority harmful (eg a reduction from 90% to 89%). For natural selection to drive evolution by favoring occasional beneficial mutations over harmful ones it would have to be close to 100% efficient, and for that by common consent you’d have to invoke the supernatural.
*from Evolution: The Modern Synthesis by Julian Huxley.

I'd welcome rebuttals.