What is the difference between the verbs "to duplicate" and "to replicate"?

Interesting: I've had discussions about this before. Both are used in a variety of situations, they're unlikely to be exact synonyms in any situation, and I can't see any one clear meaning to assign to each that explains their differences.

You duplicate a piece of paper -- I can't imagine how you'd replicate it. (Type it up again from scratch?) You can duplicate or replicate an object, such as a sculpture. Duplicating a sculpture to me sounds like just making another copy from the mould whereas replicating it might be creating a lookalike from, say, photos of the original -- but with a caveat that artists have special distinctions between words like 'copy', 'replica', 'facsimile' that the rest of us don't normally have. Or: a duplicate painting/sculpture might be intended to be mistaken for the original (e.g. for fraud or theft), whereas a replica painting/sculpture is intended to depict it exactly without claiming to be it.

In biology, duplication would leave the original untouched: something might read off the DNA and build another copy; whereas replication is the process where one becomes two, possibly with splitting of the original.

Nice distinctions, Aput. You are right, they really aren't synonyms, but it is difficult to see how they differ unless you give examples, as Aput did.

Very interesting distinctions and examples, Aput. Are there other fields of study where this difference is clearly seen?

The one I am most familiar with is what Aput already posted about, and that is the replication of DNA. Here is how MedicineNet.com defines that "replication": "Replication, DNA: A wondrous complex process whereby the ('parent') strands of DNA in the double helix are separated and each one is copied to produce a new ('daughter') strand. This process is said to be 'semi-conservative' since one of each parent strand is conserved and remains intact after replication has taken place."

Yes, in biology replication is a complex process, much more than merely duplication or copying. And it's also very different from reproduction: a point that is sometimes overlooked (as the words are liable to be confused). Organisms reproduce, genes replicate; and only genes go on to future generations.

This is important to why organism-level and group-level ideas of evolution don't work: no matter what happens to the individual or group, it doesn't replicate so can't pass on its improvements. Only gene-level changes get through (long-term).

Yes, as far as I know, "duplication" isn't even used in biology.

Of course, here in the U.S. "evolution" is merely a theory to be debated with the likes of "intelligent design."

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Of course, here in the U.S. "evolution" is merely a theory to be debated with the likes of "intelligent design."

The recent resurgence of this old argument has caused much wry amusement over here. The refutation of Darwin's theories is now confined to a very small minority and schools certainly never suggest that "intelligent design" has any scientific basis whatsoever.

Strangely enough, in one of Europe's least religious countries, the only compulsory subject in English schools is some form of religious assembly - enshrined in English Law since 1942 (from memory).

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Originally posted by Richard English:
The recent resurgence of this old argument has caused much wry amusement over here. The refutation of Darwin's theories is now confined to a very small minority.

I'd say that's also true on this side of the pond, and that Kalleh was speaking ironically. However, since much curriculum is at the discretion of the local school board, a very small group of people can insert a local idiocy into their school's program.

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Strangely enough, the only compulsory subject in English schools is some form of religious assembly.

I had thought the British schools system was subject to much greater central control than is ours. arnie, can you comment?

Here's an example of what is happening here.

RE is right. All schools must have a regular religious assembly. Some newspapers recently noticed that in the majority of schools it is more honoured in the breach than in the observance, and have been making a fuss about it.

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Here's an example of what is happening here.

From this article:

"...Most polls show that 40 to 55 percent of Americans favor a strict biblical creationist view of evolution..." *

If these polls are even remotely accurate that is extremely worrying. That around 100 million residents of the world's most powerful country believe that the Earth was "created" 6000 years ago by some unidentifiable super-being, bodes very ill for those of us who believe in scientific logic and provable facts.

* (Young Earth Creationism, the fundamentalist Christian belief that the world is but 6,000 years old and that Noah's flood shaped the earth)

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If these polls are even remotely accurate that is extremely worrying.

I would agree wholeheartedly, adding only that report of the polls is greatly divergent from my admittedly-incomplete experience.

Mine, too.

Richard, I have talked to you about the weaknesses of polls via email.

Indeed, and I agree. However I quoted these figures simply because they were the ones quoted in the article. However, as I tend not to trust the unsupported statements of journalists I did some checking of my own and found the following:

1. A Gallup poll of November 2004 amongst 1016 American adults found that 45% believed that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10 000 years or so.

2. That same poll found that 38% believed that human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God guided this process.

3. Only a modest 13% believed in a wholly evolutionary process, where human beings developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, and God had no part in this process.

4. A CBS poll at around the same time found that even more Americans supported Creationism as defined in 1. above (55%)

On the basis of these two polls it would seem that the WP's suggestion is probably not too far out.

Once again my inner mathematician feels compelled to point out that without knowing the sampling strategy these figures are entirely meaningless. I'd wager that you'd get rather different results were you to poll the people exiting a creationist church on a Sunday morning and a random cross section of the population. (Whatever "random" means in this context!)

That said though Gallup have a lot of experience and their sampling techniques are usually quite reliable.