Darwin's Bald Spot

Music written and generously provided by Paul Jernberg. Find out more about his work as a composer here: pauljernberg.com
Spanish translations by Vélez Translations, www.veleztranslations.com
I think most people can sympathize with the experience of apprehending some weird trait about our biology and then wondering, “why does that exist”? Maybe it’s something like hair in a weird place, or the shape of a toenail or something like that.
Or maybe it leads to more complicated questions, like why do our bodies undergo changes like male pattern baldness? What is the reason?
Some of these kinds of questions seem to have obvious answers like why do we have eyebrows? Obviously to more easily facilitate the act of flirting. But male pattern baldness doesn’t have an explanation that is so immediately available.
In times that were more unanimously religious, people might have responded to that question by explaining that it helps us grow in humility in opposition to pride which is the root of all sin and evil.
As a man ages, he acquires more wealth and status and if he kept his youthful good looks, temptations towards lust and pride would overwhelm him. So, as a mercy and aide to his sanctification, God saw fit to see to it that his sexual appeal should decline to help him keep his commitments to his family.
But today, we’re far more scientific than such speculations, so we would prefer to have a natural answer to a question like that: one that resolves to keep things at ground level rather than up in the clouds.
And of course, the answer we’d expect would come through a Darwinian framework. And since Darwin himself suffered this fate, he may have asked the question himself as he fumbled with his combover each morning.
Whatever the explanation is, for anyone with any familiarity with Darwinism, evolution, or survival of the fittest, we know that it would be some attempt to explain how it encourages the survival of the species.
But when a naturalist or a Darwinist says that the reason a trait exists is for the survival of the species, they’re just begging for the very obvious next question which is, “what is the reason the creature has traits that help it survive?” or “why is survival of the species a good thing?”
Saying “survival” is the reason is just kicking the can further down the road.
It seems to me that when we attempt to answer the question, “what is the reason for…[fill in the blank]”, we’re admitting, we’re conceding that there is purpose and meaning behind the way a thing is or the way all things are.
These kinds of question arise when we perceive something that seems like it shouldn’t be. We expect things to be a certain way as compared to how they are and when those things contradict, we are faced with a feeling that reality is unreasonable when it ought to be reasonable.
Read the whole transcript at brianholdsworth.ca

[@BrianHoldsworth]

I see a lot of comments saying that what I've described isn't Darwinian evolution. I do see this approach to dialogue/debate about evolution employed a lot. Any criticism is often met with the same reply and a LOT of backtracking from the way that it is usually popularly explained and used as a mechanism for explaining other phenomena. I've even heard one expert backtrack it all the way to saying that all evolution means is that, "things change." Thanks! I don't think we needed modern science to tell us that. With all that said, note that I didn't describe what the theory of evolution or natural selection says. That wasn't my intent with this video, so when people say I've misrepresented it, they are misrepresenting me. What I am doing is criticism the way Darwinists take that theory and try to explain more with it than it does. That's exactly my point. Whenever someone asks a question like, "why do we go bald?" a biologist will reply with some far-fetched theory about how natural selection explains it and that all you need to know is the natural mechanics. But, as I argued, that's not what is being asked. We're asking what the purpose or reason is for something and if there is no reason (which implies a mind which willed that reason), then the only valid natural explanation is, "there is no reason." But Darwinists, don't answer with that. They try to reduce everything to a natural phenomenon. That's my criticism. The fact that Darwinists and Naturalists attempt to answer a "why" question at all with anything other than "there is no reason", they are conceding that it's a valid question and then trying to explain it with evolution when the theory and explanation is woefully inadequate to that task. Only an answer that appeals to a higher reason can suffice and that gets us into the realm of appealing to God.

[@TheFeralcatz]

I was about to criticize you for strawmanning evolution, but I think this clarification makes a bit more sense. Evolution doesn’t make moral claims, however I see your point that people do try to make the “is” claims into “ought” claims without even realizing it. I think the real question is: “Can life have meaning or transcendent purpose without God.” I would say no.

[@CheddarBayBaby]

The other commenter doesn’t want to object to you stawmanning Evolutionary science, but I will. A video that requires an annotation this convoluted wasn’t worth making in the first place.

[@robertedwards909]

They speak of God of th god of the gaps I see Darwin of the gaps

[@LOZandKHfreak]

@@CheddarBayBaby The need for annotation can indicate as much a problem for those receiving his message as for his sending it, as communication problems can occur on one, the other, or both sides of the channel. More to this, I was able to independently figure out that he wasn't critiquing evolution prior to this clarifying comment, as evidenced by my comment the day before, as well as a few other comments I made both to you and others expressing what I took him to be saying, all written before Mr. Holdsworth made this post, if I could figure out what he meant then his video can't have been quite so unclear.

[@francisrussell6831]

What always seems to be missed with Darwin is his motivation behind his theor. When he was youg, Darwinn was an Anglican and considered becoming a priest. However when his daughter died in childhood he wanted to get back at God. His theory of evolution was the means.

[@eileen1820]

My teenage son and I were talking this morning. He said Brian's video about Harry Potter and the necessity and value of not discounting anyone ever was a watershed moment for him. It's been a large part of our philosophical and spiritual discussions since. Fascinating. SO appreciate Brian sharing his insights and certainly in our shared opinion, wisdom.

[@Mn14785]

God bless you for having philosophical talks with your son! It will help him grow in his faith and talk out his possible doubts he may encounter along the way

[@illumoportetcresceremeaute887]

Careful, Brian. Don't get vain just because you get to keep your glorious locks Edit: btw, happy to see the Douay-Rheims Challoner edition from Baronius in the center of your bookshelf.

[@alexandreferraro]

I teach evolutionary medicine at a school of Med in São Paulo, Brazil. I consider your reasoning very good. Thx.

[@gill426]

I'm so happy that someone else thought about this and had the same questions. Funnily enough, I got dumped into those questions when my severe anxiety issues began and I realized that what I've been taught wasn't actually that sound and wasn't actually that safe a construct for this world to live in. So I went on asking questions and modern science failed miserably to answer them. Not because they couldn't but because they would fight tooth and nail to not include part of the world we live in and that is transcendence. Materialism alone is bound to not get further when it denies half of reality. Same goes for transcendence obviously but my point is that it was such a relief to know that you thought about this too and I also appreciated your further thoughts around it, very interesting! I'll watch this video again later because I want to fully get into the perspective you present and explore it. Thanks for this video! ♡

[@mikemccarthy6719]

I'm a huge Christopher Nolan fan but this video says far more concisely than I could around why "Interstellar" was such a let down. "We belong among the stars"...why? "We must survive we will not go quietly into that cold dark night"...until the heat death of the universe and then you do. If our highest calling is jumping from planet to plant or dimensions simply for the sake of survival it seemed like a pretty unsatisfactory and unfulfilling endeavor.

[@MissPopuri]

There is a poem with the line “Do not go gentle into that good night.” It has every hint of survival while couching it in some religious context. We are told to fight death because it is what will keep us alive. Too bad fighting for your life is what loses your soul, I think the gospels have already said such in a different context perhaps. You see it in that dripping romanticism of Peter Gabriel’s In Your Eyes where he “is working so hard for our survival.” I can’t remember who sang the song Heartless, but the lyrics “somewhere along the road, he lost his soul to a woman so heartless” has a similar survival instinct. The virtue of Justice tends to correspond with how innocence works. A society that corrupts the innocence of children and young people to think they have to do anything in order to survive should not be surprised when these same children don’t want to be held to account for what their parents foisted upon them without reasonable consequences.

[@verdespickles]

@@MissPopuriKanye West sings that song.

[@daniel8181]

Youre missing the point, we live on a planet without mystery. Thats it, thats why space is important. Of course theres still the ocean, but because of the limitations there, it makes exploration a bit like floating in blank space hoping to find some place to make camp. Space is about other planets is about exploration, and space is finally big enough that no one could ever take our hope away from us, there will always be room for one more expedition.

[@Bicicletasaladas]

@@daniel8181 and why should we explore and expand? What is the purpose of exploration and discovery?

[@plusbonus1165]

Keeps us busy though .

[@DoctorFrogger]

"Survival may be the mechanism that supports the purpose, but the purpose is the answer to the question." That is a pretty good summary. Survival/evolution is an answer to the question of how, but it is only a poor answer to the question of why, the question of meaning.

[@tonyisnotdead]

who says there is meaning?

[@justinward3218]

Couldnt a Darwinian be just as consistent in saying that survival is neither good morning bad per se, but that the creature exists, therefore has survived, therefore has traits that have contributed to its survival?

[@tomhasson9483]

@@feedthewhale4266 But it does. And it probably does for the most part consist of rocks and a bunch of inanimate stuff. There is no contradiction with entropy or the fundamental laws of physics as they are understood to be. Life also exists on a scale, viruses are kinda alive, virions less so, we are definitely, but what about bacteria? Simple rules can create very complex patterns and structures, simply look at Mandelbrot Sets. There is no violation. Occam's Razor does not counteract this, and would support an evolutionary understanding. Parsimony is used constantly in Biology at any rate.

[@KEP1983]

And how do male pattern baldness and down syndrome contribute to survival? Also, intelligence contributes heavily to survival. A more intelligent chipmunk is more likely to survive than a stupid chipmunk. So why aren't all (or at least most) species extremely intelligent?

[@bobbyboljaar7513]

@@KEP1983 High intelligence comes at a cost, it takes a lot of energy and a lot can go wrong with complex brains. A fish does not need to solve puzzles, so there is no selective pressure to become more intelligent. Also, not every trait you perceive has to "contribute" to survival. As I've stated, every trait an organism has comes at a cost. When the contributions outweigh the cost than it has a way of spreading through the population. Baldness in men is caused by a side product of testosterone. Testosterone has a lot of downsides (weaker immune system, thrillseeking, etc), but has also proven it's worth.

[@robinbernardinis]

They could and do. Survival has nothing to do with purpose or morality, it is just another facet of randomness. In fact, survival isn't enough to fully explain evolution. A fitting example is the fiddler crab. Male fiddler crabs have asymmetric claws, with one being much larger than the other. That is because females choose mates based on (though not exclusively) the size of their larger claw. Males with larger claws will have more opportunities to mate and pass on their genes, making the next generation of fiddler crabs have, on average, bigger claws. However, this does not give the fiddler crabs an advantage in terms of survival. In fact, it actually hinders it in that department, because having such a large claw is unwieldy. So if a crab happens to mutate to have an even bigger claw, they'll just die and not pass on their genes, even though they would have reproduced easily if only they had managed to survive. Conversely, if a crab mutated to have a slightly smaller claw, they would be better fit to survive, but likely wouldn't pass on their genes to the next generation because they would not be chosen by a female. Clearly here survival is not the whole picture. The reality is that survival really doesn't have that much to do with evolution. It is all about reproductive fitness. What propagates to next generations is not survival itself, but any and all features that make it easier for members of the previous one to reproduce multiple times. Survival fitness just increases the amount of time an individual animal has to find mates and produce one or multiple sets of offspring. You can be immortal, but if you never reproduce that's just it, you will never pass that trait on to your offspring. That is the one and only reason that evolution applies to living organisms and not rocks. They don't mutate and don't reproduce. Apart from that, there is fundamentally nothing else different between animals and rocks as far as evolution is concerned.

[@TheRealShrike]

@@robinbernardinis Exactly. You nailed it. Very good point.

[@danielkelly8369]

Hey man, cheers from an Irish Catholic. Another great video! Just wondering, have you ever done a video on distributism and if not, would you consider doing one? No pressure or anything. Keep up the thought provoking content!

[@miguelsemidei7619]

As a child I thought God let men go bald so that wearing a hat would not mess up their hair and of course so they could be candidates for bishops or monks.

[@BertoldSzekeres]

Is that not the real reason??? You just ruined my world dude!

[@windsongshf]

My husband started balding when he was in his late teens! Lol! I love his bald head. :)

[@johannaquinones7473]

I love the way you present arguments.

[@seanhallissey4796]

There were spouts of more simple humor in this video that this channel to my knowledge hasn’t really done before. Seems a bit odd. I love it.

[@mariamorinello7047]

I was pleasantly surprised

[@goodmorning6827]

Nihilistic despair is not the necessary consequence of uncertainty.

[@gill426]

I don't think he meant uncertainty but senselessness rather.

[@szu2d]

Excellent explanation! Enjoyed it as always! 👍

[@coolintentions7131]

Hi Brian. What's your opinion on Hagia Sofia being converted into a mosque?

[@franciscosantana6355]

One of your better intros, and really very good video. Why would survival be a good if everything is headed for destruction? Excellent question, and only a moral good gives the answer.

[@eileen1820]

Mind blowing content. Just incredible.

[@piercekelly20]

I never thought about it that way. Incredible video.

[@joshuacooley1417]

This all revolves around a fundamental distinction that is one of the defining points of the switch from ancient/medieval thought to modern thought. The distinction in question is between the question Why? and the question How? How is a fundamentally mechanical question. How did this happen? how does this work? How relates probably most closely to the efficient cause in Aristotle's four causes. Why, on the other hand, is not a mechanical question. It is a question of purpose and meaning. Why did this happen is a fundamentally different question that How did this happen. Why, relates not to efficient cause, but to final cause. Ancients asked both How and Why questions, but they generally saw the why as the more fundamental and important, because it answered the question of meaning and purpose, while how only answered mechanism or process. This notion is not only reversed in modern thought, but why questions become completely lost in many cases. This difference runs so deep in modern thought that the very purpose of knowledge itself has changed. Francis Bacon's famous quote "Knowledge is power" is an idea that would have been rejected by most of the classical philosophers. The first line of Aristotle's Metaphysics is "All men, by nature, desire to know." He goes on to state that this desire is not one of utility, but rather it is desired for its own sake. In other words, men do not desire to know, because knowledge is powerful, because knowledge gives them control, etc, but rather they desire to know because knowing, in and of itself, is its own reward. It is good and beautiful and true. If knowledge is its own end, then why questions are always more fundamental than how questions. How questions explain one small piece of nature. Why questions explain the grand big picture of nature. If, however, knowledge is only a means to exploit and control, then how questions are all important and why questions actually become irrelevant at best, or an impediment at worst. If you intent to gain knowledge of something so that you can control it and use it to your own end (IE power) then knowing that there is a higher purpose to which that thing was intended only gets in the way and contradicts what you want to do. Few people ever seem to have made this connection, but our modern view of knowledge has made it a corrupting influence rather than a positive influence. Consider what happens when "Knowledge is power" and "Power tends to corrupt..." It is no coincidence that the modern age has been hallmarked by exploitation of everything. We exalted How questions and denigrated why questions because we wanted control. That desire played a significant role in the corrupting of our whole culture, but perhaps worst of all, it made knowledge itself a corruptive influence on us. There are two purposes of knowledge, which are ultimately one. The first purpose is relationship. We know things and people so that we may be in proper relationship with them. The second is to know purposes, the meaning behind things, this ultimately is the same purpose, relationship... but rather than relationship with things, it is relationship with the ultimate reality, the source of all meaning, and all existence, within which all things live and move and have their being.

[@levisando]

THOSE EYEBROWS

[@mikip3242]

Let me get this straight. The central point of this entire video is that the Darwinian theory of evolution by natural selection might explain how survival occurs but not why does survival matters or why it is a good thing. The important thing to note here is that Darwinian evolution has a clear-cut answer to that, that Brian might not be aware of: the answer is that it doesn't matter if you consider subjectively or objectively if survival is a good or a bad thing, it might be one, the other or neither. The important thing that Darwin pointed out is so simple that is often missinterpreted; and this is the idea that we have an observational bias: we only see what remains throught time, we only see what survives, we only talk about what we see (more precisely: we make only scientific inquiries on empirical matters), and biology talks about the life that we can see, not the one that does not exist but could in principle (without violating physics). Potentially life could have any plausible imaginable physically possible form, but of all the possibilities we only observe a very specific set of organisms (the fact that we only see a subset of all possible forms that life could take is the thing that the theory of evolution tries to explain). That is the bias. We don't care if it is good or bad or neutral. Survival is relevant (let's say "matters") to the theory of evolution only because this is the property of an object that obviously we will see maximized in any sample taken from a population of potential objects that are prone to be destroyed with time. A crude example: We don't see humans without functioning hearts around us. This is a simple observational fact, not a theory or an explanation. Darwinians explain this fact as an observational bias: potentially there might be humans without functioning hearts, but they don't live enought to be seen (to be complete: they don't live enought to perpetuate that trait in time), and that explains the disproportionate quantity of humans with operating hearts we actually observe. Darwinians don't have a fetish with the concept of survival, is just that survival is the bias imposed on any sample of living organisms we can study (if they don't survive then we will be unable to find them, a.k.a. sample them). In this video Brian asks us to adress why survival is good for evolution but the answer that it is really not, or at least its value as good or bad is irrelevant to the theory of evolution to operate and perfectly explain biological change without any purpose, plan, project or teleological insight from any anticipatory agent. And the entire thing boils down to a philosphical issue many pseudoscientists seem to ignore: the difference between necessity and contingency. Natural selection is a mechanisms that explains the observed properties of the biosphere because of survival as a contingent element, not as a necessity for life to be what it is. An organism doesn't really need to survive, it just can survive or not, and if it survives it will be observed, and if not it won't. In that sense this is the same mistake mad, ironically, by social darwinists and other grotesque non-scientific perspectives on the matter when they posit that we must survive for some purpose and that the theory of evolution asks for that. The truth is that, according to natual selection, we don't fundamentally need to survive, but if we do, we will mantain our presence in time (wheather we consider this important, good or not ,or whatever), and if we don't, Darwinism simply states that we will be less predominant in a sampling of the biosphere across geologic time (since we literally diminished our chances to survive and thus dissapear from the population). But again, no coherent scientist considers suviving as a goal taken from the theory of evolution, but only as a contingent property of the only organisms we can observe, which are, unsurprisingly, the ones that survived or descended from ones that survived. Which again, unsurprisingly will have their properties tunned for survival, whether we like it or not.

[@CasaBonita1018]

As a Catholic and biology nerd, it's not necessarily "to survive", it's "to reproduce." Organims accomplish that by, for example, surviving long enough to reproduce a few times, or having lots of offspring before dying immediately after, like many insects. "Survival of the fittest" measures "fitness" by ability to pass on genetic material.

[@Elizabeth-pc2yx]

😂🤣 eyebrow jokes made me crack up, have no idea how you did that with a straight face

[@goodmorning6827]

“Religion is the daughter of hope and fear explaining to ignorance the nature of the unknowable.” Ambrose Bierce -

[@javiervonsydow]

Excellent presentation of implicit underlying philosophical principles, such as the "principle of causality" of Gottfried Leibniz and the "efficient cause" of Aristotle. You can't do Philosophy nor Logic without it. Heck, you couldn't even build a bridge without it!

[@korbendallas5318]

As I understand it, Aristotle's causes require an agent. That's something you'd need to demonstrate to be true.

[@LOZandKHfreak]

If I'm understanding you correctly, you're not really criticizing evolution so much as a certain way evolution is used to give the right answer to the wrong question; people seemingly blind to the question of 'why' things are and instead substituting it always for the question of and answer for 'how' things are. Is this accurate?

[@BrianHoldsworth]

Yes, I'd say that's an accurate summary of part of what the video touches on.

[@tomhasson9483]

@@BrianHoldsworth But the problem is that I think the way in which you talk about evolution seems to infer a lack of understanding as to how it actually functions. I think this point could be made in a better way which talks about evolution in a less fallacious way. You're content is usually fantastic and I am a big fan. God Bless

[@TheRealShrike]

@@BrianHoldsworth Could you provide examples of "people seemingly blind to the question of 'why' things are and instead substituting it always for the question of and answer for 'how' things are?"

[@Oskartothemax]

Thanks for the video! It should also be pointed out that Charles Darwin himself was not an atheist, and that he did not believe the idea of natural evolution to be incompatible with theism. Many people do not seem to know this and therefore sometimes act overly hostile towards him as a thinker. Good day to you :)

[@peterbreedveld1595]

You should watch the video 'Correcting Darwin's Critics' by AronRa, its a great video that tells you everything you need to know about if Darwin was really an Atheist.

[@katem6589]

Intelligent and thoughtful discussion of this very theme: "A Meaningful World: How the Arts and Sciences Reveal the Genius of Nature" by B. Wiker & J. Witt.

[@tecktonic88]

Hey Brian, I've recently come across your channel and have been watching your videos very frequently since then, catching up on your old work. I think you are an exceptional teacher and thinker and I really enjoy your videos. You are adept at applying reason to things and I really appreciate seeing that from a creator that isn't an atheist. I do take issue with something in this video of yours though. You said that assuming survival is good is begging the question and that believing that is a trait of evolution shouldn't be taken as self-explanatory. The issue I have here is it seems you are making a rather common mistake in interpreting how evolution is purported to work. It is not believed that evolutions occur with a continuous desire to improve survival. Natural selection is the theory that mutations that do improve survival will last and mutations that hinder survival won't. This is necessarily self-evident. To give a radical example, if a mammal formed a mutation that caused it to no longer have any stomachs, such that it could not digest any food, that mutation would die off due to it not being able to survive longer than it takes for it to starve to death. Conversely, if a mutation gave the same mammal an extra stomach, allowing it to better extract nutrients from fibrous foods, that mutation gains an advantage and the mutation lives on. It's not that survival is somehow uniquely good or that living entities unconsciously seek to improve survival through biological processes they lack control over, it's just that mutations occur and as long as they don't hurt in an immediate sense, they will prevail.

[@bachman8]

I am not an evolutionist so don't get the impression that I'm defending evolution because I'm not, I'm only suggesting that your argument is based on a misunderstanding. Even though there are plenty of evolutionists who do believe some element of destiny is involved whether they'd like to admit it or not, more correctly evolution doesn't see survival as a value but more as a law. The idea is that the organisms with certain traits that arise out of chance genetic mutations just happen to be the ones that survive while the others eventually die out. In the evolutionary view it's not a matter of destiny or design, it's just that the odds of survival happened to be in favor of organisms with certain traits that the others lacked. Not a matter of "must," only that "they do."

[@tomhasson9483]

Why are you not an evolutionist? DO you believe it is incompatible?

[@NoobMaster-or5ub]

His reasoning totally overlooks common sense

[@eileen1820]

Brian...just don't question why you have that glorious hair! 🤗 😊

[@billanderson1606]

Great, as usual!

[@mattduin7144]

Which version of Alleluia is this at the start of the vid? Around 2:05

[@fr.thomasherge3504]

Brian, your videos are so good and can appeal to such a wide audience that you deserve a lot more subscribers. Speaking of Darwin, have you heard of the work of the Kolbe Center?

[@CoreyStudios2000]

Oh god, creationism. That has no place for it within true Catholicism. We’re not Evangelical Protestants here. I respectfully insist that you look at the fossil evidence and read from peer-reviewed science papers written by experts in evolutionary biology rather than rely on those creationists cultists. I fear for your soul. “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”- Matthew 7:15

[@fr.thomasherge3504]

@@CoreyStudios2000 I hold no definite opinion on the matter, nor has the Church given a definitive judgment.

[@rotorblade9508]

“Why is survival a good thing?” It’s not good or bad except the patterns that fit well survived and those that were not or encountered an unexpected problem simply disappeared

[@AeneasReborn]

Brandon, have you looked into stoicism on this channel yet? I think it would be great to hear your perspective on this.

[@rickmorgan1038]

Hey Brian let me have some of your hair

[@schechter01]

Brian - You made some interesting points, but the main drawback here is that you didn't realize that not every "why" is the same. (For the record, I consider evolutionary theory to be mostly true. I say "mostly" because it is not the final word set in metaphorical stone. Science is all about discovery & experimentation, & if someone ever finds rabbit bones dating to the Precambrian Era, the whole theory would need to be revised. Religion-wise, I am a hopeful agnostic) When someone asks why men eventually go bald, a naturalistic answer ("progressive loss of testosterone after one's physical prime/breeding age", etc.) _does not address_ the question of purpose. The reason for individual survival is so an organism can find a mate (if it reproduces sexually) & make more of its kind, because in evolution that is the mark of success. But that answer is a functional one, not an answer that deals with purpose or meaning. Asking why something is as it is doesn't always imply an appeal to meaning or justice; just as often, it is an inquiry into what function that something performs in relation to other things. If your answer to the question "why do we survive" is that we must serve God, great. But that is an answer that addresses meaning, not function. Which is just fine! Meaning is a human need, after all...in another video you discussed the growth of trad churches & the steady erosion of modernized/commercialized churches. The desire for meaning is certainly a major factor in those trends.

[@LaserVelociraptor]

I Like your thinking

[@archangelsfeast9384]

Love that he touched on a profound and relevant question, where do we get our non-scientific values from? (And whether or not he straw-manned Darwinism doesn't detract from this overall point) I am curious if this could have been presented slightly differently for evangelical reasons... for example, by putting atheists/ agnostics/ Darwinists into a few separate buckets? Let's say, Bucket A: most people who don't philosophize too much about where their values come from Bucket B: secular people who think our values are the result of evolution, and that's more or less a good thing Bucket C: secular people who think evolution gets us to feel certain ways about the universe, but that we shouldn't derive our values from evolutionary principles And present arguments differently to the different Buckets? Or maybe make separate arguments entirely depending on the type of atheist? (I know a lot of the critical comments below are hung up on whether Brian straw-manned evolution/Darwinism... but I have a hunch if he presented it like "if you believe XYZ, it's wrong for these reasons", instead of "Darwinists believe XYZ and its wrong for these reasons"... he could have basically made the same point but there wouldn't be as many detractors.) Anyways, if you got this far, hope all is well with y'all

[@kubasniak]

I'm turning 30 this year and my hairline moved quite a bit and I'm thinning at the front. It's been a very humbling process reminding me of aging and a lot of things I haven't done but should've and also made me swallow my vapid pride of making my looks pretty much the best feature of myself... I know it's pathetic but it is what it is. I have precious blond hair and trust me, I looked into prevention and hair transplants... I'm not doing it. I can still grow hair and keep it but choose to buzzcut it and in couple years or next decade will start shaving. I did experiment wet shave throughout lockdown and I don't look bad, people told me I look like a russian mobster breaking knees for money LOL but yeah it's a very humbling process. This and other things that happened lately made me believe in God and come back to Catholicism. I used to be agnostic and aggressive atheist like Hitchens for example for more than a decade but I've rest my arms off and let the Gods love pierce through me. It was exhausting fighting and being angry and hateful focused on negativity and bad things. I still struggle with my old ways once in a while but it's nothing compared to what I used to be. I trust in Lord. God Bless.

[@RetepOdaged]

Good job!

[@sammathai761]

I was told growing up that eye brows were meant to keep sweat from dripping into your eyes 🤔

[@ventnrage4851]

Welp I guess it just started raining Haahhaha

[@BrianHoldsworth]

The sweat happens due to the flirting.

[@mattymuso2108]

@@BrianHoldsworth That's how the use of eyebrows while flirting began. Boy sees girl, legs shake, girl sees boy, sweat beads drip start running down forehead, boy makes eyebrows dance the sweat away!

[@nickkraw1]

1) The reality is this: grace typically builds on nature. A natural explanation doesn’t mean God doesn’t have a reason for bringing that trait into being in His framework of predestination. Seeking a natural explanation does not invalidate this principle, but rather often enriches it, and sometimes it is a great blessing because it brings light to a false notion that is simply erroneous, and oftentimes dangerous false doctrine. 2) There are a great many men who do not suffer male pattern baldness as they age, are they somehow in less need of having their pride and lust curbed? Of course not. Male pattern baldness is genetic, are pride and lust merely genetic and unavoidable too? Of course not. 3) A large number of young men suffer from male pattern baldness too. 20 is not an unusual age to start going bald*. Should we accuse a young man going bald at 21 who hasn’t even had the opportunity to get married and start a family of pride and lust and how his desires should be curbed? Of course not. Let us not grow complacent in our religion and stop pursuing the truth, for Jesus is the Truth, and honest, un-politicized science reveals the truth of His majesty and the plan behind His creation ever more as we continue to collectively learn. Now I am not saying that God doesn’t allow these sorts of things to happen to people to curb pride, He certainly does, but it is more complex than that and to limit it to that is unsatisfactory and akin to the ancient Jews ostracizing those with illnesses or who were sterile because they thought God was punishing them. How many barren couples did God choose to be the parents of legendary figures in salvation history? Go and see what our Lord Jesus Christ says in Luke 13:1-5. *stats for ages regarding onset of noticeable hair loss in men: www.bosley.com/blog/what-is-the-average-age-people-start-losing-hair/ 4) I say this with the utmost respect, but as far as I am aware, you are a philosopher, theologian, and artist, and an exceptional one at that, but you are not a scientist. Your grasp of the mechanics of evolution are severely lacking. The following statement is a gross oversimplification and technically is not true in a literal sense, but it will probably serve to clarify your thinking: Evolution is not geared to the optimum, but rather to what is possible in a particular environment, and often to the minimum necessary. Moreover, natural selection (which has more to do with survival) is not the only driver of evolution. There is also sexual selection, which often has little to do with and sometimes contradicts survivability. If large numbers of prehistoric or even pre ensouled human women still found men who had lost their hair, or were losing their hair, attractive enough to mate with and have children with, the genes for male pattern baldness will not be bred out. For something to disappear completely from the gene pool, it needs to be detrimental to survival and mating. Male pattern baldness isn’t the optimum, but it isn’t detrimental either. Moreover, there are a plethora of confounding variables. Here’s just one: male pattern baldness is associated with high levels of or high sensitivity within hair follicles on the head to a hormone called dihydrogen testosterone. More DHT or sensitivity to it also contributes to higher levels of aggression, strength, and so on. Athletes will often take performance enhancing drugs that are derivatives of DHT to make then more aggressive or stronger for competition. From an evolutionary standpoint, in a very primitive society, a more aggressive, bold, and strong male might be inclined to engage in more and win more conflicts with other males and thus have greater access to mates. Even if the byproduct is male pattern baldness, unless the male pattern baldness actually inhibits them from mating compared with their peers who have full heads of hair, it won’t be bred out of the species. 5) The general philosophical points you make are excellent, and I hate to burst your bubble, but the naturalistic answer to why a creature should have a trait that helps it to survive is as simple as this: if it didn’t, it would die out very quickly. Survivability and desire to survive have been heavily selected for by natural selection, because something that isn’t very interested in surviving or isn’t very good at it, won’t outcompete something is trying very hard to survive and is good at it. Thus, survivability and desire to survive are selected for and over millions of generations you have creatures who are good at and interested in surviving. The first life which God ignited on this planet was fragile and simple. Look at it now. Therefore, that survivability or desire to survive isn’t taken for granted as much as it is a completely self fulfilling statistical process. Neither is it characterized with words like “good.” It simply is the case because of the process I explained above. Now, none of that diminishes God’s glory but rather, in my view, adds to it. God is so brilliant that He created and sustains systems that actually work and produce the results He wants with consistent and natural operating principles that achieve His will. That being said, this is still a nihilistic answer and doesn’t satisfy the human heart, which longs for something greater, as you have stated. 6. Good evolutionary biology or physical anthropology doesn’t really ever tackle “why” something exists, and is relatively incapable of doing so, but rather how something might have came to be. Evolution can explain the means of God’s creation, not its purpose. That being said, it is exceptionally effective at explaining the means of just about every phenomenon we experience, aside from the faculties of the soul, like free will to go against our nature or a real concept of right and wrong ethics that goes beyond instinct, conditioning, or our very selves. Evolution is the genius of God. Let us pray for all our scientists, and may our blessed, glorious, ever virgin Mama Maria cover them all in her mantle, the most precious blood of Jesus, and angels wings, guide them with her Divine Spouse the Holy Spirit, and protect them from perverting the knowledge they uncover for evil designs. And may she and her Holy Son always defend us and all others from any and all evil and retaliation. Amen. Glory be to Jesus Christ forever. Thanks for all the videos you make Brian! May God bless you and your family forever! And thanks be to God for the wonderful insights which He gives you!

[@tomhasson9483]

Excellent comment, I'm glad I'm not the only one thinking on these lines in this section. This is a fantastic explanation

[@melissaford6867]

Amen...

[@ToaPohatuNuva]

I have to agree overwhelmingly with point 4. I'm not a Catholic anymore, but when I was I was often dismayed about Catholic leaders speaking confidently about scientific things --- but very incorrectly. I was especially dismayed in this video about the mention of entropy. It is true that the whole universe on average is tending towards "chaos", but the Earth and life on earth doesn't necessarily tend towards "chaos" because we are exporting "order" from other places, i.e. the sun. (At least, that's my gross oversimplification of how evolution doesn't violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics).

[@janeogrady7125]

It’s not that evolutionists just say it’s ‘ for survival’. Traits arise by the mechanism of natural selection. Organisms that have genes that code for helpful characteristics (acquired by random mutation) will be more likely to survive and find more food, better shelter ect. So they will be more likely to have more offspring who will inherit the helpful gene coding for the helpful characteristic. So the characteristic will become more common over generations. There doesn’t need to be any objective meaning to existence.

[@kimfleury]

Beautifully reasoned. 3 Hail Marys for you 🌹🌹🌹🙏

[@DanielRoyals]

Hi Brian I love the channel. I wonder if you have heard the teleological argument by Richard Taylor. I have put my rendition of it here: Imagine you wake up on a train. You have no idea how you got here or where you are going. You look out the window and see the green rolling hills. On one of these hills you observe a sign written in great big boulders. It reads ‘WELCOME TO WALES’. Now upon reading this sign you would instantly suppose that you were entering wales, that the sign was placed there by humans for the sole purpose of welcoming people to wales. It also seems it would be rational to suppose these things. Now of course you could hypothesise that this sign was not formed by humans but by asteroids that fell from the sky and just by random chance happened to form the sign that reads ‘welcome to wales’. It seems unlikely, but it is afterall a possible explanations. If however you were to believe that the sign was formed by asteroids falling from the sky, then it would be irrational of you also to suppose that you are entering wales. That is, if there is a natural explanation for this sign, then it is irrational to suppose it also tells you truth outside of itself. Similarly, imagine you are walking through the forrest. You see a gravestone that reads ‘Here lies John Smith, died 1981’. Now you would immediately suppose that John Smith is buried here and that he died in 1981. You could however suppose that this gravestone has a natural explanation. Such as the rock was generated by some geological process that made it shaped as a gravestone and a bird came along and by chance happened to peck into it ‘Here lies John Smith, died 1981’. Again if you were to accept this natural geological explanation then it would be irrational to suppose that John Smith is buried there. That is, it would be irrational to suppose that this naturally generated stone tells you some truth. These two thought experiments give rise to the following premise. If some phenomena has a natural explanation then it is irrational to suppose that this phenomena tells us truth. Now according to a naturalistic and biological explanation of humanity our sense organs have a natural explanation. Our ability to see has a natural explanation. If we combine these two premises together we get the following argument: P1: If some phenomena has a natural explanation then it is irrational to suppose that this phenomena tells us truth. P2: Our sense organs have a natural explanation C: Therefore it is irrational to suppose that our sense organs tell us truth. This argument is a valid modus ponens so if the premises are true then the conclusion is necessarily true.

[@BrianHoldsworth]

I haven't heard that before, but my first impression is that the first premise is false because it's derived from very specific examples of artificially made artifacts; that is, those whose purpose is to state an explicit fact like a sign or writing on a grave. How would you arrive at that premise if you found a sword or an arrowhead? You would still be faced with two alternatives: either it was artificially made or made by natural phenomena. That is the scope of truth conveyed by the artifact. You've only lost an additional fact from the other two which is that it doesn't tell you anything in written form. In the first two examples, you had truth which could be derived from the artifact but an additional fact about the artifact based on its messaging, but most artifacts don't have a declarative message. It seems that the conclusion to be drawn from either alternative limits the scope of truth but doesn't abolish it. You can still deduce conclusions about the artifact either way.

[@DanielRoyals]

@@BrianHoldsworth Yes, I see your point and have clarified the argument. The key point of the argument is that our sense organs are like the sign in that we assume they tell us something explicitly outside of the existence of themselves. With the case of an arrowhead we can make inferences regarding its origin, but it does not make an explicit declaration in the way the sign or our sense organs do. Our sense organs do provide us with a declarative message. It seems to me the argument holds if I clarify the first premise. P1: If some declarative phenomena has a natural explanation then it is irrational to suppose that this phenomena tells us truth outside of itself P2: Our sense organs are declarative phenomena and have a natural explanation C: Therefore it is irrational to suppose that our sense organs tell us truth outside of themselves.

[@demetriossoutsos8515]

Seeing a lot of discussion on whether or not Brian was misinterpreting evolution or attacking the straw man... I got that impression as well. Evolution, properly understood (I think. correct me if I'm wrong), is a mechanism and doesn't answer the question "why". However I think the point the Brian was trying to make was that we shouldn't use evolution to answer the question of "why" and that modernity often mistakenly does that. I would agree with that point. I think we have a flawed understanding of the difference between the question "what" and "why". They are two very different questions but we tend to answer them as the same question. For example: What makes a volcano explode? Answer: pressure under the surface building up (could be more technical but close enough). Why does a volcano explode? Answer: Aquinas would say to remind us of the fires of Hell. Or, to put it in the context of this video, what makes a man bald? Evolution and the passing down of traits. But why does a man go bald? To give him humility etc. In short I think ultimately the point Brian is making is correct in that we shouldn't use what causes things to answer teleolgical questions. However I would kindly say that Brian is capable of better presentation.

[@boku5192]

good one

[@NotAFeminist976]

Haha! I thought eyebrows were to keep sweat out of our eyes

[@BrianHoldsworth]

The seat is caused by the flirting...

[@ericbursey6950]

I'm waiting for you to reach up and pull off that glorious wig ! Your head alone is sufficient reason to effectively demolish Darwinism ! God's a pretty good Designer and Programmer.

[@brendanryan1852]

I have more hair in my 40s than I ever had in my 20s , it's just not on my head .

[@MrMfcurren]

interesting that Darwin in "Origin of the Species" spends an entire chapter on the "Cambrian Explosion" about 570 to 530 million years ago, ...an evolutionary burst of life forms occurred then, at a rate that most scientists feel was, in a relative way, not attributable to natural selection processes that preceded it. Darwin admitted in the book that it was a bit of a hiccup in his natural selection premise.

[@Thestuffonmainstreet]

Brilliant

[@lifewasgiventous1614]

You can always explain away anything of biology so long as you have a good enough reason as to why it helps you survive.

[@bujinkanatori]

Beginning is a great example on how people can make rational explanations that have NOTHING to do with reality.

[@Gwyll_Arboghast]

if someone asks why it rains, and you answer that it is in order to benefit our crops, you havent answered their question, you have only equivocated. they werent asking why it is good, they are asking about its physical cause. in the case of some human bodily trait, the assumption of your hypothetical asker is that it is good for us (or at least is the lesser effect of something good), so i dont know why you are arguing as if they have left out good. they arent questioning the nature of good or whether god exists, they are just asking the cause of baldness.

[@timrichardson4018]

As much as I find darwinian evolution convincing, natural selection, in its most basic articulation is tautologic. It cane be reduced to the statement those creatures best equip to survive, survive. Or, those that survive, survive. I know there's more to evolution than it's mechanism. There are the mutations which are the substrate natural selection acts upon. I believe the theory is basically correct, although I think there must be more to it than random mutations that occasionally are beneficial to survival and reproduction. Anyway, I like your point. It doesn't really explain or answer the why question.

[@korbendallas5318]

Natural selection is not about survival, so it apparently is not as easy as you think.

[@codyhunt1838]

Purpose is subjective, and Brian is right in saying something intelligent had to give it that purpose. “A sunset is beautiful”.... maybe a blind person wouldn’t see it like that. We give our own purpose to things, I don’t see this as an argument for god. I believe the question of survival being a driving factor is important to address. I would say that if you randomly selected one person, that person would say on the whole they want to live. That same person also probably wouldn’t know what the heat death of the universe is. These systems can act independently of one another. Life came into existence, then wanted to live. Ask an atheist about their views on purpose and how they can still maintain it without believing in a god. They will tell you their own subjective purpose even in knowing this will all come to an end one day. I would say that an atheist may have MORE purpose in life because they know they won’t be saved by an afterlife, and that they must make the most of their time here on earth. Thoughts?

[@pottingsoil]

Over time as cells divide they occasionally mutate and thus they do not create perfect replicates which leads to the aging process.

[@BrianHoldsworth]

Why don't they mutate in such a way that gives us more vitality instead of less?

[@michaelflores9220]

@@BrianHoldsworth Why must they? Besides these are questions for a biochemist, not Joe Shmoe.

[@pottingsoil]

@@BrianHoldsworth That is what they try to do and do for several years as someone of your age may be starting to notice. However, our genes are flawed and these flaws (occasionally brought on and or intensified by environmental factors) lead to mutations. Upon division cells are often able to catch these gene mutations and correct course, but because they are imperfect it cannot always be done. Eventually, these mutations become more prominent in our bodies and we become less adapt. These changes are evident in examples such as the balding you mentioned. Which could be argued is survival mechanism for elders. Like an individual on a conveyor belt performing the same duty eventually a mistake will be made and that mistake could potentially be compounded with additional mistakes down the line. As we know from our everyday consumption factories are not always able to catch these mistake. Does this make sense?

[@joekraimer5379]

Genetic entropy, by John C. Sanford, PhD

[@coldforgedcowboy]

Nicely done Brian, only you should have called Darwin's Blind Spot!

[@7274184]

I see people bothering too much with "why this thing is like this?" but I'm sure that if they try answering the question "why it shouldn't be like this?" they would find the answer for the first

[@KickTheFramaLamaLama]

Well, Darwin himself was at no point an Atheist to begin with. for natural science, it is integral not to take god into the account, for god is nothing that has any empirical value, i would like to underline that from a theologic perspective as well. this is crucial. Natural science does not ask itself the question "why?", but "how?". the value of its knowledge comes to be because of the fact, that every theory could be overthrown with the next discovery, but until then we can, to a certain degree, be pretty sure, that thats how things work. But again, this does not have anything to do with god directly, you can not try to understand the world by putting god in any place where your science does not quite know for the moment what to do. Neither could you with empirical methods proof that god does not exist. Metaphysical questions and empirical questions are by definition different things. And yet theres both: Atheists who seemingly use natural science to proof their worldview, and Theists who do just the same. Of course can you interpret the scientific understandings of nature in the world view that you have, but its important to never get that mixed up. If you completely loose the methodical difference between philosophy/metaphysics/theology and empirical natural sciences, both loose their functionality. From the old church to the medieval ages, people have always understood that. It was only to a certain point in time where science became seemingly "threat" to faith, but spoilers: Its not.

[@MozwGamer]

Hearing about thermodynamics 2nd Law, gave me serious ptsd. Next semester it's my round 2.

[@stevedoetsch]

I studied the errors of evolution for years and I'll give you my core synopsis: the genome is a physical information storage device that must degrade over time the same as every other storage device. The reason? Because ALL structures degrade over time including the genome of course. There's nothing magically special about the genome compared to anything else. Evolution is just a description of time.

[@syphaxafricanus]

I think that when someone says "we have this trait for survival" the correct interpretation is that actually people who have certain adequate traits (lighter skin in areas with less sun for example) tend to have more survival chances and they pass their genes to the next generation more efficiently. After some centuries, we will notice that this trait became prevailing and say that it happened to make the survival of the species possible. This explanation doesn't need the concept of "God". By the way, most of your videos are interesting, keep up the good work.

[@joegibbskins]

Yeah, I believe in God; and accept science, and this video is a pretty poor representation of both.

[@joegibbskins]

Liam Cameron oh no, I got that and completely agree. It’s more that I don’t think his description of Darwinism is fair, and as a result his argument for Theism falls a little flat. I’m sympathetic to the idea that human beings have a need for meaning and order and that the universe as we currently understand it does not provide those things, but I don’t find the argument that our need for meaning and order means they objectively exist to be compelling. In general though, I don’t know anyone who believes in God because it is the best answer to an argument. People believe in God because they have an experience of God and then start with that as their underlying assumption

[@charlesudoh6034]

Liam Cameron , I couldn’t have said that better. That was a good and intelligent response.

[@ToaPohatuNuva]

Though I disagree with you on many things, I know you to be a very intelligent man, so I'm confused about your apparent confusion about why "survival" is important in the theory of evolution, and I think I must be misunderstanding you there.

[@stevedoetsch]

He's asking why is it philosophically meaningful that life survives at all.

[@Gwyll_Arboghast]

if we are putting it in terms of declining sex appeal, then the actual question is not 'why male baldness', but rather ' why do women have the worse deal regarding loss of sex appeal'

[@kaxior]

This guy reads Aquinas ;)

[@verdespickles]

He probably does!

[@thegoblin957]

2.35 their's is no reason the universe does not have this type of agency. Some traits reduce the chance of a creature dying so its a mathematical certainty it will reach fixation

[@ibperson7765]

I did a deep dive into neo-darwinism. Two big shocks. First, evolutionary biologists have an implicit (and sometimes directly stated) commitment to finding a naturalistic explanation regardless of evidence. They define science as finding naturalistic explanations. Second, and even bigger, is many and probably most current mainstream evolutionary biologists reject neo-darwinism. They are scrambling to find other naturalistic explanations by proposing various “extended synthesis” models. They also are more and more rejecting a common ancestor due to the prevalence of “orphan genes” which are genes present only in a single creature. One said we have a forest of life rather than a tree of life. Neo-darwinism is as far from *settled* science as one can get. If anything, they are *settling* into it being false. And many more things. Antibiotic resistance is always a fortuitous LOSS of function; it is not even micro-evolution. Human evolution is the single most dishonest field of science. The scopes exhibit was fake; they all agree now that Lucy was simply a pygmie chimpanzee (a particular species of chimp). And they have discovered that humans have around 10,000 germline mutations, and have ~50 more every generation. Similar is true about all complex life. Natural selection exists, but it is a weeding out, not added form or function. Species are running down not up. And all observations say the germ-line mutation rate has probably been linear. *This means perfect, un-mutated humans existed just 200 generations ago, five to ten thousand years. Due to the feedback mechanisms where less mutation makes dna repair easier, such people could have lived not just a little bit longer but a lot longer. Secondly, they could have safely procreated with relatives because the modern risk of doing so is due to the chance of getting similar mutations from both parents. This is also true of animals, ala Noah’s ark.*

[@gingerherringtonSTMM]

Beautiful! Thank you, Brian, for pointing to the underlying, often unspoken truth behind questions, questions which science seeks to answer in the absence of God. But God is the answer! And His love for us is such a beautiful answer! What is science afraid of, that it hides from this ultimate Truth?

[@peterbreedveld1595]

If science would answer every question with God, there wouldn't be science.

[@schechter01]

You would be well suited for life in 9th-century Europe.

[@tomarchelone]

It's a lot more complicated than just 'the fittest survive'. For example, the peacock's tail does not help him survive, even hinders him. It has evolved to a modern state thanks to the so-called 'sexual selection'. There are also several explanations about baldness. About thermodynamics: life increases entropy in the universe more than if it did not exist. Our bodies emit a lot of heat, so life is actually beneficial in terms of increasing entropy. Also, the Earth is not a closed system, we have the Sun - a massive source of energy, that life actively uses. Study the subject before throwing statements. It is sad when uneducated people, instead of studying the subject, think that they are smarter than everyone else and boldly proclaim that science does not work. Such behavior is the pride that your own church condemns.

[@stefanheinzmann7319]

Brian, you definitely need to read Dawkins: The selfish gene. You wouldn't ask those questions if you had digested and understood this.

[@ObyMom1967]

This is so funny. Every thing in the universe doesn't have a purpose. I'm no scientist but just Biology 12 tells me the answer to your question. Offspring often have "mutations". We see this all the time. Some of our kids come out super tall, super short.... bald. If this mutation increases chances of survival, the creature with this mutation lives longer and has more offspring. Many of the offspring will have the same "mutation: and they will also live longer and have more offspring. Over a long period of time new creatures evolve. So for example creatures with really long necks that can reach high branches live longer than their short necked counterparts and eventually a whole new species of long necked creatures exists. Some mutations are harmful and those creatures don't survive long and die out. Some mutations don't help or hurt.... baldness. These "mutations" just are. Everything doesn't require a purpose.

[@thedisintegrador]

I am an evolutionary biologist. And I can tell you two things. 1] Darwinism in theoretical biology is pretty much obsolete by now. However it isn"t looked at as if it were false. It is just not the entire picture. That also doesnt mean that Darwin wasnt a genius, which is what he was. 2] That darwinism is obsolete doesnt mean that evolution isnt real. To be honest, its the most real thing we have in theoretical biology. But darwinism and survival of the fittest doesnt equate evolutionary theory. It is just one of the explanations. But its not false, its just one of myriad of factors PS As I understand it, you just applied Aristotles teleology here. But that is just not a legit thing in science since its birth. Teleology is more at home in the traditional sciences like alchemy or astrology (and I am not bashing those)

[@thegoblin957]

3.20 The sun doesn't want anything your describing basic chemical reactions and your puting human agency in something that that doesn't have anything.

[@Jujoji]

Okay, you're entering into your understanding of the Darwinian perspective of things like baldness and cancer from a false premise. Baldness and cancer aren't considered beneficial to differential reproductive success,; they are expressible traits or diseases that generally only appear in a person some years after their prime child bearing/child-fathering years. Other than people who get cancer or go bald in their teens or early 20's, most people don't get cancers until their mid-life, a good ten to twenty years after most people have procreated, had children. Diseases or genetic anomalies that kill you before you have children, those have a negative selection. Diseases or traits that appear long after you've had children, and passed on those genes don't have a strong negative selection. Naturalists and Darwinian evolutionary theorists don't talk about a binary positive/negative, we also talk about neutral traits, things that don't affect your differential reproductive success (or at least don't prevent you from having procreated and successfully raised your offspring sufficient that they themselves can procreate their next generation). So using baldness as your example. Baldness is linked to increased skin cancer risks, but skin cancers generally show up in your 40's, 50's, or 60's long after you most likely have had children. Baldness is an x-linked trait, so baldness in women is very rare (a woman would need two copies of the baldness gene, one on each x-chromosome), most people who have pattern baldness are XY males/men. A man would have to see what his proscpective mates maternal uncles look like to determine whether their offspring will have a 50-50 chance of pattern baldness. A man would have to check his maternal and grandmaternal uncles to determine whether he will develop pattern baldness in his 40s to 60's.. Speaking potentially to truth of biblical accounts of advanced aged figures, ala Methuselah, Aaron, or Moses; it's possible over tens (even hundreds) of thousands of years that humanity has accumulated a great many diseases and propensities toward genetic disorders that have radically shortened our maximum lifespans: cancers, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, dementia, atherosclerosis, age related hypertension, strokes, aneurisms, etc.because so many of them afflict us long after we potentially have had children. Those people that had versions of these genetic diseases and disorders that would have killed them off before they had offspring didn't survive long enough to pass on their early onset genes.

[@chairde]

A male gorilla gets a silver back with age. Maybe male pattern baldness is a sign of maturity.

[@chairde]

Elizabeth Kraszewski , But 50 is not “old” to me because I’m 73. It may however signal something else. Silver and white hair would signal maturity. Since male pattern baldness is tied into hormone levels it may signal just that. In any case I find these things to be interesting because we are still just primates after all. We do have another eyelid tucked away into the corner of our eyes that is left over from early stages of evolution.

[@myrddingwynedd2751]

I guarantee you, if man loses his looks, puts on some weight and loses his hair, but attains wealth, he will, I assure you, keep his sexual appeal.

[@daniel8181]

We live in an age where european men are unable to attain wealth, baldness happens younger and more frequently, but women delay marriage until their 30s, being fat is essentially not a choice if you have not been informed that your food is poison, and to be traditionally handsome despite any of that is a pointless trait because attractiveness is less important than how much you can signal to the rest of a world that you are a good woman for marrying a man who looks like someone stepped on his face as an infant. The media says you want a drug dealer covered in fake gold chains with fecked up teeth and a car he rented for his music video from a guy at least 100 iq points above him? Then thats what you want. This has zero to do with wealth, evolutionary, or God given traits, its literally: "Does the media applaud me for this relationship?" Thats it.

[@myrddingwynedd2751]

@@daniel8181 What has anything you said got to do with my comment? It sounds like a bitter rant. You can attain wealth, providing you have no physical or mental impediments, and if you accuire it you will always be attractive to women since they value it before looks.

[@Catholic-Redpilled-Spaniard]

Well said lol.

[@daniel8181]

@@myrddingwynedd2751 where the hells me reply gone? Ireland 2040 plan/europe in general: Africans replace irish laborer Indians replace irish doctors Poles replace irish everything else America (incl canada) right now: Mexicans replace labor Indians replace everything else How do you expect to attain wealth, fella? NO ONE is getting rich, we are in a global collapse, there is only temporary wealth to be made stealing from the mouths of the poor. You live in a dystopia, stop trying to cope, because it only lengthens the amount of time the looters have to dry us up before they move on. If you seriously see bald 20 year olds with no muscle definition playing with anime dolls while girls their age opt out of family life to get fat and die surrounded by cats as "okay so long as you have money" you need yer head checked.

[@astrol4b]

Survival matters because if you don't survive you don't replicate, if you don't replicate your genotype is wiped out from the gene pool, so species and individual that aren't able to replicate disappear and only species that are able to survive enough to procreate remains. This seems pretty logical to me.

[@whitewolf1298]

4:30 Obviously, the story about Adam and Eve solves many problems. Now we can explain why the lowest principles (such as making grass and sky a different color) are out of man's control while the highest principles (such as being able to tell the truth all the time- at least to the extent of conscience) are easily within his grasp.

[@RogerAckroid]

The "why" to which Darwinism answers to is just the origin, not the purpose. Darwinism just tells us that the traits of the currently living animals and humans come from random mutations that were beneficial (or neutral) to the individual for his/its survival. It doesn't say that it's good or bad. Atheist mostly believe that the world follows some scientific rules that are immutable, they just don't think that those rules have a purpose. Atheists don't have an answer to "why do scientific rules exist?" just like we don't have an answer to "why God exists?"

[@goodmorning6827]

“Since belief in the Devine is the origin of all dictatorship, one must dissociate the idea of faith from virtue.”

[@josiahkronk6846]

Noting that lack of reasoning for survival sounds like an excellent opportunity to offer reasoned faith.

[@bedrosnersesyan6975]

At 7:50, I think, you touch on something Chesterton said. "Evolution seems to be true, but it's just been blown out of proportion by the adherents to the materialist theory". And it has been blown. It's an end all be all theory, but in reality it's very narrow and kind of boring...

[@ogpete1393]

How do you reconcile original sin and evolution if man was not fully evolved yet to understand the spiritual/transcendent than how could have natural disasters and bad things happened before it because that was a results of the spiritual disconnect of God and man through the fall

[@jgone4856]

Is survival a half baked answer for why a triat exists in some species? Yes. Then again no one is claiming to have reached the root of all that is (except for theists). Our answers are contingent on what we know. Since we can't know everything, our answers focus on describing, not speculating the big why. I think you're confusing having a complete answer with having a good answer. A potential answer to the bald spot: Many current human traits aren't beneficial for survival but are a "by product" of the development of other traits that do benefit for survival. If the by product trait does not impede survival, there is no pressure to eliminate it and so it becomes prominent.

[@peterbreedveld1595]

I think the question of why thing or people have purpose is stupid. What would your answer be to the question: 'why does this rock exist?' Exactly not everything has or needs a purpose.

[@martialartistism]

Hmm, it seems like asking "Why should we survive?" is nonsensical. Early lifeforms either survived or didn't. It wasn't that they stopped and pondered moral reasoning, rather they simply lived or did not.

[@stevedoetsch]

Evolution is one of my favorite fallacies in modern thinking and I've studied it for years. But I'd rather explain what life really is doing rather, than try to clear up every tangled concept: life is devolving, life is degrading, life is falling apart over time, the genome like all physical information storage devices degrades over time, and it is this degradation that they label as the evidence for evolution. That's pretty much the sum of it.

[@samanthastudios618]

Brian: Don't look through the comments XD

[@reddrabbit5056]

Thank you for producing these talks. Darwinism proves troublesome for orthodoxy, but Monsignor Georges LeMaitre mathematics on the Big Bang are just as troubling. Once one comes to understand that there are billions of stars, the concept of an omniscient God further strains credulity.

[@PrivateSi]

Baldness is due to the invention of the hat, one of the earliest male accessories. Women were banned from wearing hats by law for most of prehistory hence not so many go bald.....In fact, the difference between men and women are due to their different clothes that they evolved with. In the beginning men and women had large, milk-fillled breasts but men started wearing armoured breast plates that flattened them down to what we have today. Women had large external testes until centuries of tight knickers shrunk and internalised them. This is all well known. Look it up.

[@josephososkie3029]

Not just the individual to survive but the herd.

[@justinrolfe9134]

Life survives to reproduce and produce more life, so of the organism can reproduce in those 80 seconds and it’s offspring can survive another 80 seconds to survive than the length of survival fits the need of the organism.

[@csadler]

The augment from ignorance at 10:00. Mortality really frightens the religious mind hence the need for a god / heaven. It's all about them - ego. An exception will be made in THEIR case.

[@alexanderhamilton6370]

Male Pattern Baldness is neither positive nor negative. It's not a mutation or a genetic flaw in any sense (and it's interesting to note how many women find bald men more sexually appealing -- which discredits any claims that MPB is to teach you humility, of all things). It's something that simply happens. And in nature sometimes things just... happen. There is no deeper why. There is no evolutionary function for MPB any more than there's an evolutionary function for a flightless bird's wings. There's an explanation, a deeply biological one, but MPB doesn't serve any purpose per se. It just is. A peacock's plumage serves a purpose, a beaver's tail serves a purpose, but this does not pressupose that all things in nature therefore have some purpose. You could call it a glitch in the genetic code but it's not really even that. It's just a process that happens as a result of various genetic and environmental factors. FYI I believe in God and am a Catholic but can still see this topic through a scientific lense.

[@gill426]

The underlying question here is if things having a reason and things having a purpose is mutually exclusive and what we know about purpose in general. I personally don't like bald men, btw. ;) Edit: I just thought - maybe the question is "Where does purpose come from?" Because the tail of the beaver was something that was supposed to ensure survival but the balding wasn't exactly directed by the person to have a certain beneficial consequence, which doesn't rule out that it has a purpose though and we don't necessarily know where that purpose comes from.

[@nicolanewlove4839]

Are you a young earth creationist, or a billions of years man?

[@ethanjensen661]

At least you have lots of hair.