4 ms·

The understanding of evolution in the title of this article is appalling... They didn't evolve large spleens so they could dive.. they dove a lot which resulted

• jessaustin 8y ago
  Replace "so" with its synonym "therefore" and the ambiguity is resolved in a more pleasing way.
  • schrectacular 8y ago
    Fair enough. When I see "so" used in this way I generally see it as meaning "so that", which is also a perfectly valid inference. Perhaps it's an Anlgo/American grammatical difference?
    • jessaustin 8y ago
      Well it is ambiguous, so that is a headline-writing failure. Especially since this is a common misunderstanding of evolution anyway! In some sense this would be a logical ambiguity even if the writer meant to say that adaptations are goal-driven. Headlines simply shouldn't be written like this. Perhaps we're looking at this the wrong way, however. One gets the sense that most journalists don't really concern themselves with logic and clarity of thought anymore, since their intended audience is similarly unconcerned.
• forgotmypw 8y ago
  Isn't this how evolution works?
• lgessler 8y ago
  While it might be confusing for a layperson without a solid grip on evolution, I don't think it's uncommon for people who understand selection bias to nevertheless speak like this. It's just so much quicker to say "they evolved larger beaks so they could crack the new island's bigger nuts" than "on arriving to the new island, the birds with bigger beaks had more success taking advantage of the generally larger nuts and thus were better able to survive and pass on their genes..."