Lee Spetner, author of The Evolution Revolution, responds to a Darwin-in-the-schools lobbyist at Evolution News & Views :
In his review, David Levin seems to have set out to perform a hatchet job, and this required dispensing with truth. Before going into that, however, I must describe briefly the major point of my book, which he neglected to address. One would expect a review of a book to include a discussion of its major point. Perhaps he didn’t understand it or else he felt unable to refute it. Either way, he ignored it.
The major point of the book is that current evolutionary theory is a failure. It is a failure because it has never been shown that the probabilities of the alleged evolutionary events, according to the theory, are anything but negligibly small. A scientific theory cannot be established as valid unless the consequences that follow from it correspond to reality. For example, Newton’s theory of the inverse-square law of gravitation could not have been established without calculations showing that its predictions correspond quantitatively to observations. Current evolutionary theory is based on random mutations producing variation that is acted upon and directed by natural selection. Its predicted consequences are therefore random events, which are describable only by probabilities. For the theory to be properly established, these probabilities must be shown to be reasonably large. Because it has never been shown, the theory is a failure and the principle of common descent, which is based on that theory, is without support. Levin did not address this most significant point.
In the book, I present my nonrandom evolutionary hypothesis (NREH) that accounts for all the evolution that has been actually observed and which is not accounted for by modern evolutionary theory (the Modern Synthesis, or MS). Levin ridicules the NREH but does not refute it. More.
If Spetner’s book still sells, people are still talking. Good sign. Just as rethinking evolution would have been if the Royal Society had not gotten scared of asking tough questions.
The Darwin-in-the-schools’ lobbyist’s review is here.
Note: The tough questions are the only important ones.
See also: Critic of Lee Spetner’s Evolution Revolution continues debate at Amazon
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