[renewiltord]

I am curious about the people who upvote this comment (which is currently the top comment). Do they believe that it is adding useful information, is insightful, or is otherwise helpful to someone or themselves?

It's quite obvious that article is claiming that the process of artificial selection that involves leaving tuskless elephants alive is resulting in generations with more elephants that are tuskless. That is what the article says two paragraphs in.

But perhaps it is not that obvious to others. Will someone who found parent comment enlightening please share?

[sdwr]

This is one of those bell curve memes.

Left side: Evolution took their tusks away.

Middle: Acktually it's selection pressure acting on the population combined with random mutations that...

Right side: Evolution took their tusks away.

More charitably, pedantry is a stage of learning. Practicing until the concepts get reinforced enough that you can substitute the rule of thumb again.

It's the same pattern as the hero's journey. Start at home (the naive view), do righteous battle with the concepts, return home (to the naive view) but changed.

I was into all this stuff when I was 13, reading Dawkins and Hitchens. Blind watchmaker, selfish gene. What's interesting is that the fuel for that kind of learning is part intellectual exercise, part making sense of the world, and part superiority (other people are wrong and I'm right). And now we're doing the same thing one level up.

[renewiltord]

Indeed. I suppose those a level up on us are simply wise enough to not have these discussions. I understand. It's like playing in the sandbox with children. Those smarter than me would simply not do this. Okay. Lesson learned.

[cnity]

The upvotes are from other pedants who dislike the wording, I presume. It's entertaining, and I understand the argument, but I do wonder if such people also avoid sentences like "primates evolved opposable thumbs so that they could be more dextrous". This kind of language is clearly a proxy for an overly verbose articulation of the process of evolution over and over again. It's an approximation.

[WastingMyTime89]

> primates evolved opposable thumbs so that they could be more dextrous"

I for sure do. It’s extremely wrong. It implies the very incorrect idea that there is a purpose to evolution.

[cnity]

It's shorthand for "primates with a genetic mutation that resulted in opposable thumbs were more dextrous. Those primates proliferated due to natural selection". I guarantee that even evolutionary scientists do not talk like that over dinner and regularly reach for such shorthands.

[WastingMyTime89]

Don’t worry I know biologists do it. The field is plagued by a general lack of rigour and a strong bias towards finality.