• OPEN DISCUSSION - For the first 30 minutes of the Thursday night forums we will have informal open discussion. This will allow for late arrivals, food & drink ordering, and new attendees to become acclimated.
• ANNOUNCEMENTS - Any events, news, or other items that you feel are of interest to the group can be announced at the start of Free Inquiry Forum.

TOPICS for Thursday (6/9/05) & Monday (6/13/05):

1. Two important principles of Darwinism are:  (1) Genetic variations randomly occur in nature, and (2) natural selection favors genetic combinations that thrive in a given or changing environment.  These evolutionary mechanisms MIGHT no longer apply because (a) science and modern medicine can ensure survival of even the unfittest, and (b) today's relaxed challenges for survival have altered earlier evolutionary trends, e.g., modern men are becoming "girlie-men" rather than warriors.  Has modern man lost his impetus for evolutionary change because of the comforts of modern life?  Or, do our greatest survival challenges (e.g., from toxic environments, hostile bacteria, and nuclear radiation) still lie ahead? Finally, can science effectively alter and direct human evolution in beneficial ways? (Submitted by Jack)
2. The human rights group Amnesty International has called the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay a failure and compared it to the Soviet gulag - a charge President Bush called "absurd". Should the prison in Guantanamo Bay be compared to a gulag? Senator Joseph Biden (D-Del.), and others, have said the prison should be shut down. Do you agree? This past Friday, the Pentagon waited until after the national news broadcasts and then confirmed the Quran abuse at Gitmo. How serious do you view the news of the mishandling of the Quran, the downplaying of this by the White House, and the deadly protests and other reactions that have resulted?
3. OPEN DISCUSSION.

Quote of the week: "Natural selection is the mechanism that drives evolutionary change. Put simply, it is a process whereby organisms best suited to their environment become the ones most likely to survive and leave descendants. It is also often referred to as "survival of the fittest", which conjures up images of the biggest, strongest individuals being the most successful, but in a biological sense, evolutionary fitness refers to the ability to reproduce in a particular environment as well as survive." [Source]

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