joe{at}removethispart.gs.washington.edu (Joe Felsenstein)wrote:

> >MAYR: George Wald's claim was based on strict reductionism, and
> >reductionism is dead. [...]

> >TT:
> >From this quote, Ernst Mayr does not understand what reductionism is :-(

> >MR:
> >Why Tim. Certainly one of the greatest evolutionary biologists of the
> >20th century deserves an explanation:) even if he is dead.

> JF:-
> It is a reasonable inference that, since Ernst Mayr was 93 some years ago
> when that quote was made, that he is now dead.
> However, one would be wrong.  Last I heard, Ernst Mayr was alive,
> at age 100, and a couple of centennial celebratory symposia have
> been held for
> him this year.
> (George Wald is dead, and reductionism may or may not be).

JE:-
Reductionism is not dead it is just, misused.
When reductionists divorce themselves from
the big picture in order to make a smaller
picture clearer, they can loose the plot. Sadly,
this has happened in evolutionary theory. Dr O'Hara
and Dr Hoelzer (both professionals in the field)
admit hat that the use of "frequency" as in
"gene frequency" constitutes an ongoing population genetics
"misuse" such that every application of "frequency"
should be substituted with the word, "proportion".
What they are finally admitting to is that population
genetics is entirely Post Modern it is epistemology,
i.e. "everything is relative". Population genetics
can only see a relative comparison it cannot see what
was being compared. However, almost all of testable
evolutionary theory is contained in the totals that
were being compared that remain invisible to population
genetics. This is why Hamilton's rule cannot
distinguish between c as an investment and c as a donation.
To be able to do so requires the deleted baseline fitness
m to be included and not deleted. When this missing fitness
is included organism fitness altruism can only be proven
when rb-c>m.

Prof. Felsenstein is on record as suggesting that models
such as Hamilton et al are not testable.  He has also
stated that he will never discuss cause and effect.
Combining these two declarations it is easy to see that
Prof. Felsenstein wishes to place himself in an irrefutable
position. Does Prof. Felsenstein (like Dr Hoelzer)
throw out Popperian refutation? If not, does Prof. Felsenstein
have a refutable theory of evolution? If so, would he please
supply taxpayers (who fund his work) with such a theory?

Regards,

John Edser
Independent Researcher

PO Box 266
Church Pt
NSW 2105
Australia

edser{at}tpg.com.au
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