Evolution and natural selection ARE the gods of this world!

[Aoi Magi]

Evolution is stupid and has screwed up several times and is proudly continuing it's tradition of creating random weird shit. It shows no intellect or any planning and doesn't possess any characteristics of "god" as per the common definition of the word. If said "god" is behind it, then that entity needs some serious schooling. Mankind is frustrated with it's goofups and had to take matters into their own hands to survive.

Natural Selection is how nature tries to clean up and do some damage control, but seeing how nature has let Evolution create "us", I believe it has failed at that.

[Longhorn]

Evolution and natural selection don't act in an intentional way, they're not entities but processes, so this analogy is flawed

They're also not synonymous with atheism, but I get the point you're trying to make about evolution being more awe-inspiring than creationism and the miracles of the bible

[IATIA]

Evolution is a natural process and there is no god involved. There is no design or intent in evolution. There is no goal.

A lot of misconceptions about evolution come from improper wording, even by mainstream scientists.

The bird did not evolve wings so that it could fly. The bird flies because it evolved wings. Even "survival of the fittest" is basically a misnomer. "Survival of the fittest" works at a species level (to a certain extent), but at the evolution level, it is only survival that counts, i.e., fit enough to survive. Good, bad or inert is irrelevant. Even at the species level, the biggest baddest lion may control his territory and females, to pass on his genes, but that does not prohibit a lesser lion from running off and finding his own territory and continuing his gene pool.

[Anomalocaris]

Actually, flight and wings coevolved.  Neither happened either for or because of the other.   Each happened along meandering paths in minute increments, feeding back into the other only as opportunities may arise.

Also, surviving of the fittest means survival of that which is the fittest to survive, not that which is most muscular or most cardiovascularly well endowed.    But survival of the fittest is indeed a misrepresentation of evolution by natural selection for a different reason.     Natural selection is not directly about the survival of the fittest because:

1.  It is not always that which is the fittest to survive that actually survives.   It is that which is the luckiest.   Fitness to survival only marginally skew the odds in favor of the fittest.

2.  Evolution is not about survival.  It is about passing on the trait.  Survival, up to a point, is essential, but not sufficient.    Any trait that helped the survivor to survive up to the point must also be heritable, and be successfully passed on.  It is actually easy to imagine scenarios in which excessive fitness to survive is actually counterproductive for the purpose of passing on the fitness trait.

[IATIA]

Actually, flight and wings coevolved.  Neither happened either for or because of the other.

Cannot fly without wings. Would not wings be necessary first then?

[ignoramus]

Comet, you're still a misguided little fool. Still full of woo.

[LastPoet]

Ok, now that i have read this thread, i know that i am drunk.

[Anomalocaris]

Actually, flight and wings coevolved.  Neither happened either for or because of the other.

Cannot fly without wings.  Would not wings be necessary first then?

The behavior now used by birds for flying most likely first appeared in embryonic form to serve some other purpose than flight.  For example a ground running bipedal dinosaur might flap its arms for balance while running.  The same with the first evolutionary step that would eventually convert dinosaur forelimbs into full fledged wings.   The elongation of feathers on the dinosaur forelimb might be for sexual display or for cushioning falls from trees.

So neither the first stage in behavior evolution towards flight, nor the first stage in physiological evolution towards flight, were individually driven by selection for flight.   It so happens that if these two Purely by chance occur in the same animal, the animal can also get an additional bonus of combining these development and repurposing them for taking the first step towards flight, in addition to fulfilling the individual purposes for which behavior and physiological changes were respectively driven to serve.

[abaris]

Natural Selection is how nature tries to clean up and do some damage control, but seeing how nature has let Evolution create "us", I believe it has failed at that.

It's mainly organisms responding to outside influences as far as I see it. But it isn't very tidy, given that we have about ten evolutional remnants, if I'm not mistaken, still in our bodies. Things that don't serve a purpose anymore, but are still present in our anatomy.

[ignoramus]

Correct? Don't xtards consider the brain to be a vestigial organ?