Artificial Selection - Is the term simply convenient?

There's basically two ways to dichotomize the word "natural".One is the natural vs. supernatural dichotomy.Another is the natural vs. artificial dichotomy.For the natural vs. artificial dichotomy, artificial means "man-made" while natural means that it was not man-made.So, when a selective pressure is referred to as artificial, that just means that it was caused by man.There's really nothing more to it than that. Its just a distinction that we've created for our own purposes. Human intention is still a natural process, in the sense that its not supernatural, but we do separate it from processes that we have no hand in because, well, because we're the ones making the rules and that's how we want to do it. I think you're applying more to the distinction than is intended.Say you found an a sharp triangular stone in the dirt, like an arrow head. As a geologist, you may be interested in determining if unintelligent geological processes could have formed it, or if it was made by a person on purpose. To distinguish between those options, you may refer to the first as a natural process and the second as an artificial process. But calling it an artifact only means that it was made by man, not that it was some supernatural process.Or we could look at something like the banana. Regular old naturally occurring bananas are full of seed and have very little fruit. The bananas at the grocery store are the result of a long line of man-made selective pressure (and cloning).The purpose of referring to that as artificially selected is just to distinguish is from the process that occur in nature without our help. There's really nothing more to it than that.

Damn ninjas... So I work in the chemical industry.Occasionally I'll get some hippy-dippy customer call me to ask if the chemical product they have is natural or not.Sometimes I'll joke: "I assure you, none of the chemicals that we use are supernatural."After they explain that's not what they meant, I'll challenge them to explain exactly what they are asking. And they really don't know. So I'll tell them that some of the surfactants we use are petroleum derived, so they are artificial. But, snake venom is 100% all-natural so if they want that in there instead maybe we can look into it.Even worse though: "Are your chemicals organic?""Uh, mam, you do know that organic chemistry is a thing, right? And that it has nothing to do with farming, yeah? So that product contains both organic and inorganic chemicals. But that has nothing to do with how we grew them..."

I think we should leave the artificial qualification to those that are intentional.That counts the sheep out.That also counts the pigeons out.But the corn, that stays in 'cause we did that shit on purpose.For the sheep, I suppose you could ask: What is the desired trait that we are selecting for?There really isn't one, is there? We just don't want the wolves eating them.With the corn its obvious.

Oh, yeah, sure. For that stuff its definitely artificial selection. I was trying to keep my assessment within the parameters that the OP set out:

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I have a herd of sheep, and kill off the wolves in order for my herd to survive. This allows more successful survival of sheep. This provides more food and utility for myself than if I did not kill the wolves.

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In that case, since he's not selecting for any particular traits, I'd reserve calling that artificial selection.But yes, if your breeding sheep to have more wool then that's definitely artificial selection. Yup, disease tolerance too. Did you read/see "Guns, Germs, and Steel"?If not, the video is available online for free:Attention Required! | CloudflareI thought it was pretty cool.