Re: Evidence of "evolution," sensu Sagan: Where should I go to see?

"david ford" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Where should I go to see evidence of "evolution," where
> "evolution" is defined using Sagan's definition:
> "Only nine percent of Americans accept the central finding of
> modern biology that human beings (and all the other species)
> have slowly evolved by natural processes from a succession
> of more ancient beings with no divine intervention needed
> along the way."
>
That is not a definition of "evolution."  Evolution is the change in the
frequency of inheritable traits in populations over time, and, for purposes
of  this discussion, common descent with modification.  Sagan's statement
concerns the tempo, mode, and mechanisms of evolution.  Actually, the part
that seems to especially interest you is a statement about Agents or
mechanisms that add no explanatory power.  So what you really mean to ask, I
think, is "where is the evidence that no divine intervention was needed
along the way?"

Please note that Sagan does not claim that modern biology has found that no
divine intervention occurred; he states than none was *necessary*.  Now, I'm
pretty sure that Sagan held that in fact there was no God to intervene, and
that divine intervention was not merely unnecessary but ontologically
impossible.  His "9%" is pretty much the atheist portion of the U.S.
population.  OTOH, there are theists (Kenneth Miller, author of _Finding
Darwin's God_ comes to mind, who believe that God exists, and is behind
evolution, but that this theological statement adds nothing to biology as a
science.

Compare the possible statement, "only X% of modern Americans accept that
storms and drought result from natural meteorological phenomena, and no
divine intervention is needed to explain California's dry spells or East
Coast blizzards."  There's an implicit statement about theology in there,
but the only portion that the supporters of mainstream science need to
address is the claim that hypotheses of divine intervention add nothing to
the predictive or explanatory power of meteorology.  God isn't hiding in
some gap where atmospheric scientists, or biologists, will uncover Him with
some crucial observation.
>
> Should I go to a museum?  If so, which ones?
>
> Should I go read peer-reviewed/ refereed papers that appear
> in the scientific literature?  If so, which ones?
>
> Should I go read a book?  If so, which ones?
>
I would recommend various works by intelligent design advocates, especially
the parts where they disclaim any possibility that design "theory" could
tell us when, or where, or how, or why the Designer intervened in natural
processes.  Their standard argument is some dressed-up form of the god of
the gaps, in which they try to find some phenomenon that can't be explained
in terms of known mechanisms.  To the extent that they are correct, they
establish that *something* not considered by current theories must be
necessary, but to make a case that it is divine (excuse me, "intelligent")
intervention, they would have to show why divine intervention explains why
some aspects of biology are the way they are rather than some other way.
>
> (Before you reply "Darwin's _Origin_," note that _Origin_
> closes with the speculation that an intelligence created the
> first lifeforms, and further note that if an intelligence(s) created
> the first lifeforms in a manner such that those first lifeforms
> would develop into all of biology, then that doesn't constitute
> "evolution" as Sagan defined it.
> And it is "evolution" in the sense of Sagan's definition that I'm
> inquiring about.)
>
> The Sagan quote citation is in
> Feynman on giving all the information; Dobzhansky, Mayr,
> Wilson, Gould, Futuyma, Dawkins, Sagan, Simpson
>
http://www.google.com/groups?selm=Pine.SGI.3.95.970912002214.12893C-100000%40umbc8.umbc.edu
>
-- Steven J.