Quote from: Momus on December 13, 2016, 03:45:45 PM

Quote from: DooMAD on December 12, 2016, 12:07:27 PM

This thread is indicative of the looming realisation that anti-vaxxers are losing the scientific argument, so they attempt to turn it into a moral freedom issue instead. Whatever it takes to promote the warped notion that it's okay to be a selfish egomaniac, even if your choices have a negative impact on other people. The good news is, Darwin is still the hardest working dead guy going, so if the anti-vaxxers want to willingly thin out their own numbers through sheer ignorance and selfishness, Darwinism will happily oblige. Just try not to harm other people in the process by infecting them with something, or dying at the wheel and causing an accident or whatever. The sooner you remove yourselves from the genepool, the better. Try not to reproduce. And don't force your idiocy on any offspring that are unfortunate enough to be brought into this world by you.

Well, Darwin was wrong. For example the powerful dinosaurs extinct and weak species survived. Grin

This would be a gross misunderstanding of Darwin's theory of evolution. 'Powerful' (or even 'strong') has nothing to do with it. It's all about being adapted to an environment, and most of the time being 'weak' is a better strategy on the inter-species level. The basic reason for this is related to thermodynamics. Being 'powerful' burns more precious energy which can be difficult to find consistently.

Within a species especially in the higher vertebrates grades there is a tendency for sexual dimophism and displays of 'strength'. The purpose is to impress a potential mate as an individual who is capable enough to exploit an environment and produce a surplus (to be burnt on bigger tail-feathers, corvettes, etc.)

Blind faith in a leadership and their propaganda organs can cut both ways for humans. It strengthens a group and lets them dominate other groups. But when domination of other groups is no longer possible (because it has been achieved, for instance) or a goal, a society starts to eat it's tail as competition within the group replace outward domination as primary driving force. At that point the leaders might try to weaken or kill off the followers and vice-versa. The Fabian Socialists understood these fairly basic dynamics rather well...and they were/are not big fans of 'democracy'.