Sunday 17 April 2016

New Darwinian Moth Tale Without Head or Tail


Yponomeuta cagnagella. Image courtesy of Sarefo, Creative Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0).





Joel Kontinen

While Darwinists tend to think that evolution is real, one thing that has definitely not evolved is their less than meticulous use of the word 'evolution'.

They use it so carelessly in a wide variety of meanings that one might suppose they do it on purpose to muddy the waters.

A recent example features a study on the behaviour of ermine moths (Yponomeuta cagnagella) published in the journal Biology Letters.

An article in Science puts an evolutionary spin on the results:

Moths from high light pollution areas were significantly less attracted to the light than those from the darker zones … Overall, moths from the light-polluted populations had a 30% reduction in the flight-to-light behavior, indicating that this species is evolving, as predicted, to stay away from artificial lights.”

So, what the article does is to equate a change in behaviour with evolution. The moths have not changed physically; they are still moths of the very same species than before.

Darwinian evolution (i.e. in its molecules to man definition) would probably head towards a speedy extinction, if its adherents were a bit more cautious – and honest – in their use of terms.

Now it lies in the emergency ward, kept artificially alive through fact-free storytelling and speculation. (You can read about some examples here, here, here and here.)

Source:

Morell, Virginia. 2016. Your porchlight is causing moths to evolve. Science (12 April).