# Jenson on Survival of the Fittest



## RamistThomist (Jun 19, 2014)

Robert W. Jenson is a slightly conservative Amero-Norwegian Lutheran. I don't always agree with him but he is utterly brilliant. I just saw this gem.



> "Survival of the fittest can only select after the new structure is there, and in fully viable form. It would precisely deselect the supposed intermediate forms."


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## CharlieJ (Jun 19, 2014)

There he just shows he has no idea what he is talking about. "Intermediate forms" is a taxonomic concept that has no relevance to natural selection. 

A good, easy work, at least in disentangling taxonomic from biological ideas, is The Accidental Species by Henry Gee. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17673909-the-accidental-species

But the real gold standard is this description of decades of research in the Galapagos. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1148459.How_and_Why_Species_Multiply


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## Nate (Jun 19, 2014)

Well said, CharlieJ.


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## Peairtach (Jun 19, 2014)

CharlieJ said:


> There he just shows he has no idea what he is talking about. "Intermediate forms" is a taxonomic concept that has no relevance to natural selection.
> 
> A good, easy work, at least in disentangling taxonomic from biological ideas, is The Accidental Species by Henry Gee. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17673909-the-accidental-species
> 
> But the real gold standard is this description of decades of research in the Galapagos. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1148459.How_and_Why_Species_Multiply



How far do you think natural selection can go in producing new species, Charlie? Can dinosaurs become a birds, land dwelling mammals become whales, fish become reptiles, cars become non-cats etc?

Sent from my HTC Wildfire using Tapatalk 2


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## RamistThomist (Jun 19, 2014)

At the least I can say for myself that I was quoting an Oxford University book.


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## MW (Jun 19, 2014)

Peairtach said:


> cars become non-cats etc?



As in a Jaguar?


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## Peairtach (Jun 19, 2014)

armourbearer said:


> Peairtach said:
> 
> 
> > cars become non-cats etc?
> ...



A type of cat.


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## CharlieJ (Jun 19, 2014)

This is just a definitional problem. Natural selection is a factor driving change _within a single population group of a given species_, not between species. Thus, there are no intermediate forms to speak of. Now, if more context were provided, it may turn out that Jenson does know what he's talking about, and that this particular sentence is just using some terms loosely. But I don't know. I haven't read Jenson in years and don't remember running across anything by him on this topic.


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## RamistThomist (Jun 19, 2014)

CharlieJ said:


> This is just a definitional problem. Natural selection is a factor driving change _within a single population group of a given species_, not between species. Thus, there are no intermediate forms to speak of. Now, if more context were provided, it may turn out that Jenson does know what he's talking about, and that this particular sentence is just using some terms loosely. But I don't know. I haven't read Jenson in years and don't remember running across anything by him on this topic.



I looked up some of those titles you referenced. I didn't know that "intermediate forms" presupposed a "chain of being" ontology. One of the authors actually rejects that idea, but for the moment I hold to it. Jenson mentioned these comments in a footnote and not in a sustained argument. I have to leave it at that.


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## Free Christian (Jun 20, 2014)

Sometimes I am baffled by those who don't believe in God and believe in evolution and the survival of the fittest who try to save a species that is going extinct.
If it is survival of the fittest and if that is the way for things to become better then why don't they let that species go seeing as it is weak and not going to survive and let something else take its place. Isn't that their natural order? Why try to save a weak animal that in the wild has been abandoned, take it in to an animal shelter, raise it and then release it back into the wild? That would be counter productive to the theory in my eyes. Shouldn't they let the weak die?
People find birds that have fallen from the nest and do that, but going by their theory are they not raising a weak bird to then go on and breed and give rise to more weaker offspring amongst the gene pool?
"As in a jaguar?" Don't forget the Ford Cougar too!


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## One Little Nail (Jun 20, 2014)

Baroque Norseman said:


> Robert W. Jenson is a slightly conservative Amero-Norwegian Lutheran. I don't always agree with him but he is utterly brilliant. I just saw this gem.
> 
> 
> 
> > "Survival of the fittest can only select after the new structure is there, and in fully viable form. It would precisely deselect the supposed intermediate forms."






CharlieJ said:


> There he just shows he has no idea what he is talking about. "Intermediate forms" is a taxonomic concept that has no relevance to natural selection[




I think what he means or should have said is;



> "Survival of the fittest can only select after the new structure is there, and in fully viable form. It would precisely deselect the supposed transitional (life) forms."



& he is absolutely correct, even apart from the *FACT* that they have never as yet discovered a _*Transitional Life Form*_ or a _*Fossil of a Transitional Life Form*_ , that is it has *never* existed.

a transitional life form is an absurdity & delusional abstract & a figment of the evolutionary imagination.

if the theory of survival of the fittest is true, a transitional life form if it were possible;

i would be considered as a threat & would be despatched by a member of its original species or 

ii would be considered a disfigured monster & would be shunned by its original species and die out alone or

iii as a mutation it would be weak or damaged & thus not survive & become extinct or

iv a transitional life form or intermediate life form would be a montrous hybrid that not only would not be able to replicate due to genetic corruption & biological deformity but would not be able to mate as it would be a one of a kind genetic chromosomal mutant.

it would be deselected as Jensen has stated.

variation within kind can only happen to the degree that the original genetic programming will allow!


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