Evolutionary Science, not Darwinism

[T_aquaticus]

@Eddie

Yes, I’m aware of this statement. But it doesn’t contradict what I said. If organisms can to some extent control their own evolution by controlling their own genomes, then “supernatural intervention” would not be required, while neo-Darwinism in its classical form would be false (since from Weismann on, changes in the genome were thought to be independent of any needs of the organism generated by environmental pressures).

Why do you feel the need to use the term “neo-Darwinism”? Why not use the term “the modern theory of evolution”?

@Eddie

So the question is whether the Third Way people, in stressing the ability of organisms to rewrite their own genomes, are advocating some form of vitalism or of “Lamarckian” inheritance. Maybe they aren’t, but talking about organisms being able to “engineer” their genomes leaves them open to that interpretation. And while that doesn’t endorse ID (and I’m not claiming that Third Way people do), self-engineering organisms are not inherently incompatible with ID thinking; they would make the designer the organism rather than God – but that’s OK, since ID theory can’t specify the designer anyway.

What they write are random mutations with respect to fitness.