> In fact Dawkins does not say Evolution "*can't* go down"
> (which was my original question -- see above). He uses
> words "not allowed" and "forbidden".
Boy _that_ really destroys my position. Dumb-ass.
> Here is how he explains it in his very words:
>
> "I've stressed that going downhill is not allowed, but
> not allowed by whom? And can it _never_ happen? The
> answer to both questions is about the same as for the
> case of a river not being 'allowed' to run in any direction
> other than along its established watercourse. Nobody
> actually orders the water to stay within the banks of a
> river but, for well-understood reasons, it normally does.
> Just occasionally, however, it overflows the banks, or
> even bursts them, and the river may be found to have
> altered its permanent course as a result."
>
> Then he gives two situations when "relaxation" is likely to
> occur.
> "There may be bonanzas of opportunity and relaxation of
> selection when a virgin continent is first colonized after
> being cleaned out by a catastrophe. Perhaps after the
> dinosaurs became extinct, the remaining mammals had such a
> field day of opportunity that some of their lineages
> 'relaxed their guard', went temporarily downhill, and
> thereby found higher peaks of Mount Improbable from which
> they would normally have been debarred."
>
> The other case is "fresh genes from other places".
> Who is an idiot, David?
Dawkins is. Go back an read my original list, I gave Dawkins
credit for listing his exceptions. Going down hill occurs as
a natural part of evolution all the time. Evolution doesn't
care one wit. If you're fit enough to reproduce you can go down-
hill all you want.
> Good try. You can even call me X-Dawkins-ian. So far David McF was doing
> a pretty good job with your envy-driven hatred towards Dawkins.
David McF is having a great deal of difficulty in our little quest to
determine just how idiotic Dawkins really is. After many postings he has
only managed to take one bullet off the list, and not because it was wrong
(it wasn't) but because it's use in determining just how idiotic Dawkins is
was subjective. In that time, a new bullet has been added.
To give David credit though, he has a difficult task and I have the
infinite stupidity of Dawkins on my side. ;->
Tad, before its too late, free yourself from the Homo Vocare virus. Do
not worship the false-god Dawkins. He's not worthy.
-- David Leeper dleeper@gte.net Homo Deus http://home1.gte.net/dleeper/index.htm 1 + 1 != 2 http://home1.gte.net/dleeper/CMath.html