Natural selection applies to species and not individuals

[mitchellmckain (Scientist and Christian)]

@sfmatheson

But the conclusion that it is thus “incorrect” to say that selection doesn’t apply to individuals isn’t even defensible on a tortured semantic basis. It’s just wrong, and it’s not even debatable.

I quite agree since I don’t say this is incorrect. In fact this is exactly what I say myself… that natural selection doesn’t apply to individuals. Hmmm… typo somewhere maybe?

[T_aquaticus]

@gbrooks9

Its sloppy thinking … and it leads to sloppy discussions.

I defer to Asimov’s “Relativity of Wrong”. I was merely pointing out the differences between a sphere and an oblate spheroid which are not as egregious as the differences between a flat and spherical Earth.

[sfmatheson]

@mitchellmckain

Hmmm… typo somewhere maybe

Yep, fixed now

[gbrooks9 (George Brooks)]

@mitchellmckain

quite agree since I don’t say this is incorrect. In fact this is exactly what I say myself… that natural selection doesn’t apply to individuals. Hmmm… typo somewhere maybe?

@mitchellmckain

Oh for goodness sake!

Natural Selection applies to ALL levels.

[mitchellmckain (Scientist and Christian)]

For me this is like the irrational leap that atheists often make displaying statistics that atheists are smarter on average than theists to some implication that they are smarter and we should agree with them because of that.

The more important point is this mistaken idea that if society protects its weaker members then they are therefore shutting down evolution. It is a bunch of social Darwinist nonsense. The species is becoming more able to survive even though its individuals are not becoming more able to survive on their own. Because in the bigger picture, it is not about the individual after all.