I don't think anybody has denied that species is a level of selection (actually, I would guess that selection occurs at a level more general than species as well since different species share the same traits). This whole pseudodispute started when Miles said that selection does not take place (at all) on the level of the individual.
I think Miles hates the idea that individuals are important. This theme is present in this, in the notion that beliefs don't matter, AND in the "animals don't have empathy" position. It's a clear common thread. ;)
--- On Fri, 5/15/09, Matthias Wasser <matthias.wasser at gmail.com> wrote:
> Irrelevant nitpick: most mutations have no effect on
> fitness whatsoever.
>
> I don't believe anybody (except perhaps Dawkins, & al.)
> is disputing the
> individual level of selection. But it would seem weird to
> deny that species
> is a level of selection in evolution, which is just the
> change in allele
> frequencies over time. If changes in the environment lead
> to humans, wheat,
> and cattle increasing in prevalence relative to trees,
> beavers, and
> star-bellied snitches, this is a meaningful change, even if
> it does not
> result in or arise from evolution within those species, ie,
> individual-level
> selection. This level of selection operates on a different
> logic -
> Lamarckian and, ignoring HGT, asexual - and so I think it's
> useful to treat
> it as more than simply the aggregate of individual-level
> selection; just as
> chemistry is different from quantum physics.
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