Why modern synthesis can't work

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: November 6, 2013 November 6, 2013; Hits: 3717 3717

Writing on a friend's blog I came up with the following very simple account of why the modern synthesis couldn't work. I repeat it here.

Genetic mutation involves damage to genes. Damage to genes, left unrepaired, will impair a species’ performance, and as that damage accumulates generation by generation it will eventually lead to extinction. A species that repairs all damage to its genes will do better than one that doesn’t. And sure enough a very efficient gene-mutation repair process has evolved.

Now suppose someone points out it’s theoretically possible for damage to a gene to very occasionally result in an improvement, and that occasional improvements like that will offset all the harm the rest of the damage has caused, and that’s what drives evolution.

Crazy, right? But that’s exactly the basis of the modern synthesis. It’s what all evolutionists believe. It’s given as the mechanism of evolution in the National Academy of Science 80-page book for teachers, arrived at by a committee of 14 eminent experts. I've clocked 6000 visits to a page on this site making that argument and only this week had a reply--thanks Dan--and he gives me qualified support.