The Associated Press’ Seth Borenstein needs to learn the difference between dependent and independent events.
Sierra Rayne writes at American Thinker:
Here’s a novel concept for climate alarmists and journalists (and particularly the combination thereof). The odds of any one month being hotter or cooler than ‘normal’ (nevermind a rigorous discussion of what a ‘normal’ climate really is) is not an independent event. It is a dependent event, and it depends on the previous months, because the planet (and all its climate sub-regions) goes through cycles (having various lengths, magnitudes, areal extents, etc.) of warm and cool periods. That is basic science and statistics.
Howdy john dunn
It’s true that nucleic acids and Nature itself do not seem to have plans. Charles Darwin’s concept of natural selection was that normal variability, including some mutations, would lead to more successful organisms surviving and breeding while less successful organisms dwindled.
As branches of a biological family changed, they would gradually become less able and finally unable to breed. Although Mendel’s work on genes was in the future, Darwin certainly used the idea of heritable differences as others had before him.
Darwin did not mean to imply a plan when he used the term “natural selection.”
I appreciate the discussion because it emphasizes the problem that most people have with independent v dependent variables and the question of chance.
one of the implications of this immutable truth is that random genetic mutations involve an independent variable that does not exhibit a trend.
evolutionists will have to live with the fact that nucleic acids strung out on a double helix don’t think or have plans.
In addition to the note above, I’ll add that the average is a long-term measure around which events cluster. It is not the border between “good” and “bad”.