Celebrate Darwin Day!

Today is the 201st birthday of Charles Darwin. As both a celebration of his life and ideas, and as a means of scientific public outreach, I gave a talk last night entitled:


I got the first part of the title from the question and answer session after a presentation on creationism that P.Z. Myers gave in Manitoba. One audience member charged P.Z. with the task of explaining how evolution red in tooth and claw could have resulted in a "molecules to morality" transformation. P.Z. rather tactfully responded:

"...he's demanding a bit much for a short answer. Forget the molecules part, since they don't exhibit morality; all you need to know is that a population of apes found it advantageous to regulate their activity to promote cooperation, and voila, here we are, apes who say that rape is a bad thing."

After seeing the same inane question pop up again during a debate between Frank Turek and Christopher Hitchens (i.e. "How do you get morals from an carbon atom?"), I felt obligated to take this opportunity to give other materialists an answer.

My presentation gave a brief overview of some of the ways we understand how altruistic behavior can evolve in natural systems, and rebuts the idea that morality can have only been a gift from a higher power and is therefore proof of that higher power's existence. You can view the slides below:

From Molecules to Morality: The Evolution Of Altruism

View more presentations from MolecularFossils.

I was pleasantly surprised that my presentation was standing room only. I wish I had actually counted, but the room holds ~18 chairs so there were probably around 25 people that showed up. I wish I had been a bit more entertaining (everyone loves a good sight gag) and presented less but did it more clearly. Some of the details about kin selection and reciprocal altruism could have been cut back, and I wish I had done a better job explaining the examples of altruistic behaviors observed in animals. Still, I think it was a great turn out and hopefully the people there went home a little more informed than they were when they came.

I'm also having a Darwin Day party tonight at my house, so call me if you're in the Kent area with nothing to do. Since I'm a huge nerd, I'm making it a theme party: come dressed as your favorite adaptation! I blatantly ripped that idea off from another party, but it is so good I couldn't resist. My amazing fiance also made me some delicious "electrophoresis" cookies, which I will definitely have to post pictures of later. Happy Darwin Day everybody!