Re: [asa] Altruism and ID

On 6/6/07, Gregory Arago <gregoryarago@yahoo.ca> wrote:
> Let's get the obvious off the table first: concepts do not 'evolve' into
> existence!! Just the fact that the sentence reads "A. Comte COINED the
> word..." is an indication that evolutionary theory is unsuitable to discuss
> its origins. We can speak of human intervention, invention, discovery,
> creativity, articulation, signification, etc. but we simply CANNOT use the
> word 'evolution.' It simply doesn't make sense!

Concepts indeed evolve into existence. Is evolutionary theory
unsuitable to discuss its origins? I have no idea what you are trying
to argue here. What origin?

The closest thing I said which seems to have any relevance to your
comments seems to be

<quote>Contrary to early expectations, concepts like altruism and
reciprocal altruism may very well have evolved.</quote>

> Even if you say, as I understand your argument, that the concept/percept of
> 'altruism' has changed-over-time, this does not change the FACT of its
> origins.

Your point being? What I am simply arguing is that evolutionary theory
is quite capable of addressing concepts like altruism.

> Can this be agreed before any rant about how ID is or isn't applied Pim?

Rant? Hard to refute I assume?

To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
Received on Wed Jun 6 20:36:00 2007