From: zerucha@shell.portal.com (Thomas E Zerucha)
Subject: Re: Origins
Organization: Portal Communications Company -- 408/973-9111 (voice) 408/973-8091 (data)
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 02:45:00 GMT

>Article: 4289 of bit.listserv.catholic
>From: scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu (scharle)

>In article <C16nAF.BIE@unix.portal.com>, zerucha@shell.portal.com (Thomas E Zerucha) writes:
>    [...I'm going to delete a lot here from time to time.  I'm trying to

I also deleted the original article to save space.

>	 save bandwith and everybody's time and patience...]
>|> Also look up tautology.  The definition of species is a group of organisms
>|> that can interbreed...
>
>    OK, there was a suggestion that this would be better carried on in
>talk.origins, so I refrained from entering in on this for a while.  But
>when I see such an outrageous offense against logic, I can't resist.

>Let's see, if it is logically proved, then it's a tautology.  If it
>isn't logically proved, then you can deny it.
No logic was involved in the original post.  It was not shown how mutation
would result in a new species, just (from memory> "Lets also assume that
this group is no longer able to breed...", then "forms a new species".
No evidence was given that this actually happened.  Just the assertion that
the populations were apart long enough that they DID lose the ability to
interbreed.  Not how they would lose it, though this might be implied, no
case histories where this happened, just that:
A. X is a mutated form of Y.
B. X no longer able to breed with Y.
C. X is now a different species than Y.

A is isolated and B and C state the same thing in different ways.

IF mutations occur in a subgroup, and IF the subgroup is no longer able
to interbreed with the original, THEN the subgroup is a new (different)
species.

I can try to find the original post.

>|> Let me summarize.  You believe that we arose because of evolution.	This has
>|> implications for the nature of man, and public policy applied to man, and
>|> the expected results of evolution as applied to the human race.  Do you
>|> simply reject that evolution applies to humanity, or do you accept it but
>|> not follow it to the logical conclusions?
>
>    You seem to be saying that unless a field of inquiry rejects, for
>example, eugenics, its conclusions are false.	Once again, I find it
>difficult to believe that anyone is so deficient in logic that he
>doesn't see the fallacy here.  But let me again show by an example.
>"The law of gravity does not reject eugenics.  In a mechanistic
>universe ruled by gravity there is no good or evil.  Therefore the
>law of gravity is false."

The problem is that eugenics does seem to follow from evolution, not from
gravity.  Even Darwin wrote some blatantly racist pieces to the effect that
the nonwhite races were not subject to the same stresses etc.  I do not think
anyone is exempt from gravity, but I am pointing out that if evolution and all
it implies is a scientific law, that humanity should still be affected by it.

Therefore, if eugenics is implied by evolution, but is rejected by those who
believe in evolution, they have difficulties with their own theory because
they don't like some of the conclusions.

Perhaps there is a problem of definition.  As I define eugenics (in this
context), it is the attempt to improve man using the principles of evolution
and natural selection.

Let me restate it clearly (I thought I did above, but apparently not):
1. X believes in evolution, specifically a mechanistic explanation for
   the origin of life and man, and in particular, natural selection as
   expressed as the survival of the fittest.
2. X believes that the human race is exempt from the items noted in (1.).
   i.e. human populations aren't "selected", nor do they evolve, or that
   if they do, arbitrary attributes can be declared exempt for the sake of
   political correctness and not on a scientific basis.

I am not asking the evolutionist to, for moral reasons, reject eugenics.

I am asking how they *CAN* reject eugenics on a logical basis.

---
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