Goodyear affirms his belief in evolution, goes on to say that evolution is a continuous process, then explains evolutionary process through adaptation. He may have done so clumsily, but that’s what he was doing — at least that’s how it seems to me.

A person has to separate Goodyear’s adaptation comments from their context in order to make the argument that he’s ignorant about evolution. Anyone who does so willingly is making a bad faith argument.

I’m sure some people didn’t recognize the context. It wouldn’t surprise me. That being said, I’m certain that others did, and I’m personally making sure they’re in for one fuck of a fight over it.

The biggest problem being, of course, that it’s considered awfully unscientific to use that in order to make the assumption that Goodyear is a “creationist”.

While you are correct, that still dodges the issue that creationists have no problem with adaptation: even the idiots at Answers in Genesis, who happen to be some of the most bone-headed YEC out there have a page explaining their acceptance of it: http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v14/i2/adaptation.asp . If a holocaust denier tries to claim he isn’t by saying he accepts WWII happened, that isn’t very convincing, is it?

I think you’re also getting overly bogged down in semantics. I’m not suggesting that Mr. Goodyear ought to be an evolutionary biologist to be science minister, just that he recognize the importance of evolution to science, and not make stupid comments like the ones he made. Our Heritage Minister doesn’t make statements like “there were no people in North America before the Europeans came in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries” because it’s flat out wrong.

Now, don’t you have a rock to crawl back under now that neo-conservativism is dying?

Adaptation occurs in segments of the population — masses of individuals — and spreads through the rest of the population vis a vis breeding advantage.

In other words, organisms with the advantage survive to procreate in greater numbers, organisms without the advantage survive to procreate in smaller numbers. In time those not blessed with the advantageous adaptations die off.

Furthermore, I’d point out that atheist darlings Brian Sapient and Kelly O’Connor echoed Goodyear’s ongoing-evolution sentiments very closely when they insisted we’re “just this year’s version of humanity”.

But I guess it’s somehow OK when they make that argument.

Familiar with natural selection?