Talk:On the Origin of Species/Archive 2

message: Just a slightly pedantic point - The Origin of Species is not a scientific theory in that it has not been definitively proven (although its postulations do appear to be accurate). In a truly objective article, this should be edited to hypothesis. (The same is true of physical 'theories' such as Quantum theory and the theory of relativity. Articles to this effect have appeared in such scientific journals as the New Scientist over the past couple of months. Ck lostsword 17:29, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To be truly pedantic, TOS is not a theory or hypothesis, it's a book.  But if you mean Darwin's theory, I would say that it meets the criteria for a theory, not an hypothesis.  Can you provide specific references to articles questioning this?  Thanks.  Guettarda 17:42, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Theories do not need to be (and frankly, are never) definitely proven to meet the definition of "scientific theory". See our article on theory. --Fastfission 19:39, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

text: "This is an encyclopedia, not a place for propaganda."  Exactly.  So why did you write three long paragraphs of propaganda, while only one-eighth of a paragraph is about improving the article?  You can remove things yourself, and this article is not about evolution--it's about Darwin's book.  --Bowlhover 17:22, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Theory or Hypothesis

message: What are these "favored races" Darwin talks about?
Seems pretty racist to me. I tend to dislike acts of racism.
*What is racist?  The fact that one race, for whatever reason, could have an advantage over another race, in whatever scenario (what Darwin argued) which is, essentially, the same as saying that one race is different than another race (true by definition).  Or the fact that some government still asks you to circle "White/Black/Hispanic/Etc" on their forms?  I think you have more of a beef with the latter defintion, which does not concern Darwin's work.  Cheers, Phil 209.10.89.3 16:15, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Darwin a Racist 

message: The following section from the lead
In it, Darwin makes "one long argument" for his theory that "groups" of organisms, (now called populations) rather than individual organisms, gradually evolve through the process of natural selection—a mechanism effectively introduced to the public at large by the book.
seems to suggest Darwin favoured group selectionism. Is this accurate? From what I remember of the Origin, Darwin always seemed to favour individual organisms as the units of selection. I might be wrong tho... Mikker ... 10:35, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Any more clarity on that section FF? Can I reword it? Mikker ... 18:41, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Darwin favoured group selectionism? 

message: The links under each section that go to main articles (such as history of evolutionary thought) are not capitalized properly. I tried correcting this capitalization, but this caused the link to no longer link to an existing article. I am rather new to this, so if someone could either tell me how to correct this or correct it for me, I would be eternally grateful. Thanks. Makeemlighter 20:08, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Capitalization Errors 

message: The article currently states: On Wallace's own first edition of The Origin of Species, he crossed out every instance of the phrase "natural selection" and replaced with it Spencer's "survival of the fittest."   Since Spencer did not introduce his phrase until 1864, Wallace could not have made this emendation until five years after the book's publication, a delay not hinted at in the current description.  --Blainster 21:32, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm, that's interesting, I hadn't thought of that. I'll try and figure out what edition it was in particular, if I can. I double-checked the picture of Wallace's copy from Janet Browne's book but the caption actually doesn't specify which edition it was; I may have mis-remembered it, but I have to check the text again myself. It would be very interesting to know when he did that to his book. --Fastfission 22:27, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

text: OK -- Browne's book says that it was Wallace's copy of the 1859 (first) edition. So who knows when he really went through and made the changes, in any case, though obviously clearly after the term had been coined by Spencer. Wallace wrote to Darwin many times that the latter should use "survival of the fittest" instead, and Darwin finally did include it in one of the later editions (fifth?) of Origin.  --Fastfission 00:53, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The article currently states: fifth edition published on 10 February 1869 incorporated more changes again, and for the first time included Herbert Spencer's phrase "survival of the fittest". ..dave souza, talk 07:09, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Wallace's modifications

message: Should we not put someting to the effect that the Darwins theories were widely accepted by 1900 among the general public and the church. Although ther was indeed controversy at the time I think the work was well established as the orthodoxy in 1900. The controversy may be overemphasised in the light of some recent moves in America from a minority seeking to resurrect the 'young earth' theory, and who get attention due to their sheer lunacy of argument.
*Darwin's theories, per se, were not widely accepted either by the general public or the church. Evolution in general was accepted by many of the "general public" depending on which "general public" you are talking about (it has most likely not been accepted widely by the general American public at any given time, though I'm not sure there is data on that), but Darwinian evolution was actually in a very low ebb in 1900 which it would not come out of until the 1930s. --Fastfission 23:13, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just for info, Moore here says that "This man Wallace, who was considerably younger, went to the United States for a lecture tour in 1886, and he started off in New York and he went to Boston and Washington. Then he made his way across by train through Kansas and Iowa and Nebraska, and he got to California. And during his trip, he lectured on Darwinism, but there was no problem. He was welcomed, and he got his lantern and slides out and explained Darwinism. That's what he called it, Darwinism. It shows that between 1886-87, when Wallace was trumpeting Darwin's cause in America, and 1926-27, 40 years later, a remarkable change took place in the way that ordinary Americans were prepared to look at evolution." I've also noticed that Vestiges of Creation was still selling well when The Origin was published, so there was already wide public interest in evolution. According to that page, the historian James A. Secord says that Vestiges out-sold The Origin of Species up until the early 20th century. .. dave souza, talk 10:00, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Public Reaction 

message: The Good article nomination for  has failed for the following reason: 
:This article needs a lot more sources. There are few, if any, in-line sources. Most sections, especially the historical ones really need to be cited. Use the   tags.
I will nominate this article as an uncited good article because I think that it is well written and informative.
--The Talking Sock talk contribs  15:47, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Good articles|Good Article]] [[Wikipedia:Good articles/Nominations|nomination]] has failed 

message: This article is about the book but the para 3 in the into states, ..."Although its ideas are supported by an overwhelming body of scientific evidence and are widely accepted by scientists today, they are still highly controversial in some parts of the world, particularly among American non-scientists who perceive them to contradict various religious texts (see Creation-evolution controversy).".  and I feel that this is not relevant to the book. The so-called Creation-evolution controversy is more focused on modern evolution theory not Darwins book. There is also the obvious anachronism as the issue is American non-scientists (people ?) today whereas America wasn't a coherent country as it was fighting a civil war around the time this book was published. I think the people had more to worry about then. Unless the Creation-evolution controversy is predominantly about Darwins book then it is being given undue weight and thus the existing link further into the article to the Creation-evolution controversy will suffice. I vote it's culled. Ttiotsw 03:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Undue weight given to a so-called controversy unrelated to the book in introduction para  3 

message: ===Contemporary Reviews===
Added reviews with links to three contemporary reviews and a links to Victorian Science texts.
* Fleeming Jenkin 'Review of Darwin's The origin of species' The North British Review, June 1867, 46, pp. 277-318.
* Richard OwenReview of Darwin's Origin of Species, Edinburgh Review, 3, 1860, pp. 487-532.]
* Samuel Wilberforce(Review of) ‘On the origin of species’, Quarterly Review, 1860, pp. 225-264.
DLH 00:08, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Reviews

message: Added reviews with links to three contemporary reviews and a links to Victorian Science texts.
* Fleeming Jenkin 'Review of Darwin's The origin of species' The North British Review, June 1867, 46, pp. 277-318.
* Richard OwenReview of Darwin's Origin of Species, Edinburgh Review, 3, 1860, pp. 487-532.]
* Samuel Wilberforce(Review of) ‘On the origin of species’, Quarterly Review, 1860, pp. 225-264.
DLH 00:08, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Contemporary Reviews

message: "a significant proportion of non-scientists in the United States and a few other countries disagree mainly on religious grounds"
 
Please keep "mainly on religious grounds" out, or cite a poll to justify the claim.
As one well-known counter-example, Ann Coulter is a non-scientist, and she enumerates many problems with Darwin's The Origin of Species that are not based on religious grounds (see "Godless:  The Church of Liberalism", ISBN: 1400054206, which argues that to accept Darwin's theory requires acts of faith and belief in miracles, as part of her argument that modern secular humanistic liberalism is itself a religion.)  As another example, see "Uncommon Dissent: Intellectuals Who Find Darwinism Unconvincing" (ISBN: 1932236317)  They are based on philosophical, scientific, and logical grounds.  
I could name other non-scientists who base their opposition to Darwin's theory on the Origin of Species on non-religious grounds.  That a majority of them might be religious does not prima facie demonstrate their logic, opposition, or skepticism is based on religious grounds.  You might argue that they are wrong, are relying on faulty logic, are ignorant, and conclude that since they are religious they are actually forming their opposition on religious grounds, but this argument is itself a fallacy.  They could simply be wrong and religious.  (Or they could be right, who am I to know?)
Citing a source that simply asserts "Most of those who reject evolution do so because of personal religious conviction, not because of evidence" does not make it so.  Assertions are cheap, especially on the Internet.  Cite a poll that asks those non-scientists who do not completely accept Darwin's theory why they do so, or keep your speculation out of the article. --- Vacuous Poet
:A quick google (Google is your friend - try it sometime !) gives me, http://www.religioustolerance.org/ev_publi.htm and picking out the November 1997 table,
Belief system	Creationist view	Theistic evolution	Naturalistic Evolution
Everyone     	44%             	39%               	10%
Scientists   	5%              	40%               	55%
Note the Everyone is the non-scientists and it clearly shows a bias towards either Classic creation or god-of-gaps style evolution. Ann Coulter's Wikipedia article has her as not being "impartial or balanced". The Origin of the Species came out over a hundred and fifty years ago and to date has survived. I do not think Ann Coulter's efforts are comparable and it would add undue weight to her apologetic to use it to revert text. It is also illogical to have a non-scientist refute Evolution as the non-scientist efforts would not be peer reviewed. Ttiotsw 02:46, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Darwin's theory was not on the origin of the original parents, right?  So the theistic evolution camp could be part of the evolution camp, no?  And, if my memory serves me, Darwin does not claim that there were only 1 set of evolutionary parents?  E.g., multiple original parents for various evolutionary branches would not contradict Darwin.  So, perhaps people who think they disagree with Darwin may not really (the theistic evolution camp).  The reference to Ann Coulter was not to refute Darwinism, but to challange that those who disagree with Darwin do so mainly on religious grounds.  Ann Coulter disagrees, and makes non-religious arguments.  Please don't mischaracterize my statements.  BTW, what did you use for your search terms in Google.  170.215.45.95 06:34, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There seems to be some mission creep here. We are arguing removing "mainly on religious grounds" from the statement... "a significant proportion of non-scientists in the United States and a few other countries disagree mainly on religious grounds". We cannot combine "Theistic evolution" with "Naturalistic Evolution" as "Theistic evolution" effectively posits a creator; this is a supernatural entity and as such is a pseudoscience not science. The search term was new scientist poll religion evolution (NOT in double quotes on google.com) and I picked the 2nd link down. Ann Coulter is just one person. We'd bloat the Wikipedia page with a shed-load of web links to the many who complain about Darwin for religious grounds. One "conservative" who (quote-mining Wikipedia)  says that "... Christianity fuels everything I write." isn't grounds to balance the Gallup poll data. Ttiotsw 21:43, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree she claims strong religious beliefs.  But are you suggesting that those who have religious beliefs should be barred from raising non-religious objections?  A religious test, so to speak?  170.215.45.95 18:40, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: So you say her objections are non-scientific and non-religious? What are they based on? The jacket cover design? --Michael Johnson 23:27, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think she would say logic.  06:40, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

text: She doesn't raise non-religious objections, frankly, nor do other creationists, who are universally religious, and wiith good reason - its the only reason to deny it. Titanium Dragon 01:36, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mainly on religious grounds