guys, I meant “newt” as in 1st land vertabrate, our early ancestor, but you knew that.
That’s right, and we’re pumping iron so our kids don’t have to!
capacitor, if I may:
Yes, and they most likely did prove catastrophic, such that said organisms did not live to reproduce, and thus aren’t seen so much any more. (I didn’t touch the first part of your question, since I don’t know thing one about abiogenesis, to which I believe you were alluding.)
Is that so? I’d like to see your lists.
Evolution is not heirarchical. Progress is a human invention. There is no unbroken line such as you demand. I’m pretty sure that reptiles did not evolve from plants, though some reptiles are indeed green. And humans are mammals. As far as speciation, others here can deal (and have dealt) with that far better than I.
Given the entire list of parts you provide which make up our metaphorical tree, I then find it odd that you’d go on to focus on just one rotten fruit.
I didn’t address number 4 'cause it’s beyond the scope of my knowledge.
I don’t have time to address all of capacitors mistakes right now, but once again, what will it take to get through to you that social Darwinism is not part of evolution? You say you don’t separate it, but the point is you should. Evolution is a biological science. Social Darwinism is not. Yes, people may claim that social Darwinism is based off of Darwinian evolution, but as we’ve explained numerous times already, that’s like saying the Crusades were based off of Christianity. Does that mean Christianity is automatically wrong because of the murders committed in its name? You have consistently avoided these points and continued to repeat your nonsense about social Darwinism. You’re making yourself look more than a little dishonest by these tactics.
aren’t whales and dolphins examples of “devolution”?
Animal life began in the sea, gradually moved to the land, then mammals evolved on land, and then the ancestors of whales returned to the sea and evolved to the point that they look like fish at first glance?
According to Webster:
Reflex: an automatic and often inborn response to a stimulus that involves a nerve impulse passing inward from a receptor to a nerve center and thence outward to an effector (as a muscle or gland) without reaching the level of consciousness
Instinct: a largely inheritable and unalterable tendency of an organism to make a complex and specific response to environmental stimuli without involving reason
Feeding is not a reflex, fighting is not a reflex, fleeing is not a reflex, reproducing is not a reflex. These are all responses to stimuli resulting in complex and specific responses. Blow air in a rabits eye (receptor) and the nictating membrane instinctively covers it (effector). Simple muscular response. Put a male and female rabbit in a cage, and what you get is complex and specific. Please don’t make me explain this one.
And what is a “reflex choice”. By definition, a reflex is not a choice.
I don’t really see the point of these evolution debates; people like capacitor pick and choose what to respond to and don’t bother to familiarize themselves with the relevant background material. It’s the classic “I don’t get it, so it can’t be true” response.
But occasionally trolls put their foot in it, and you can point it out, showing how their assertions are unfounded in some way or other. To wit:
To name one instinctive behavior: When a heterosexual human male reaches puberty, he begins to do everything he can to find a female and get laid. (I’m not saying this isn’t true for females; I’m just limiting the example for clarity.) He watches the females, he follows them around, he tries to figure out how to please them, all with the ultimate goal of having sex with a female. If you stop to think about it, it’s impossible to justify the behavior other than by instinct. You can’t say it’s pursued so avidly simply because it feels good, because we can all think of a number of things that also feel good but that don’t result in such single-minded obsession. You also can’t call it a reflex, because the behavior is drawn out, and can be hidden through rationalization, but is still inescapable.
Other human instincts: Rearing and protecting infants, following the directives of a more dominant human, actively subverting and opposing the work and beliefs of humans in easily-identified nonlocal tribal groups, and so on. A lot of human behavior can be classified as instinctual, with a thin veneer of a posteriori rationalization laid on top.
This gets away from the central point, though, about the viability of evolution as a working theory of biological diversification. (I personally would shy away from calling evolution a “fact,” merely because it’s logically impossible to prove a positive. A theory may be negated by a counterexample, or it may be strengthened and reinforced by supporting evidence and experimentation. Evolution in its broad strokes falls into the latter category, to the degree that no reasonable scientist feels it necessary to believe in or seek an alternative. Ditto for Bohr’s model of the atom; it may be refined, but most scientists believe the likelihood of its being overturned altogether is next to nil. If you want to call that a fact, fine.)
The bottom line, as I see it, is this: Assuming no preconceptions, no a priori conditions or necessary factual or philosophical inclusions, if you look purely at the available physical evidence, there is no explanation of the grand-scale operation of biology that works as well, that answers as many questions and makes as many accurate predictions, as evolution. Period.
However, where most evolution-questioners get into trouble is in being unable to set aside those preconceptions, those required initial premises. If you’re bound to the idea of having to make room for a supreme creator, some supernatural being or force from which the energy of life divinely sprang, then none of the fundamentals of evolutionary theory will ever sink in, because you’ll constantly be looking for a way to fit whatever information you come across into a pre-existing worldview.
I’m not saying scientists can’t be biased for or against pre-existing ideas; they are human, after all. When Wegener proposed his notions of continental drift early in the 20th century, he was laughed out of the lyceum. But when the evidence started piling up, from a variety of disciplines, the whole of geology (and associated disciplines) picked up its skirts and moved to accommodate the new understanding, in a quantum shift that took a little over a decade. New interpretation, new theory, and overwhelming evidence – and science (as a method of understanding, not as a body of knowledge; important distinction) adjusted to fit. Although biases are a natural part of human thought, the cold methodology of science will eventually expose and eliminate them.
Because of its controversial implications, evolution has been subjected to some of the harshest scrutiny of any notion since the modern application of the scientific method. And, aside from the strident discomfort of the chronically unreachable deniers, it’s come out smelling like a rose. So I’ll say it again: Absent any preconceptions, looking purely at the available evidence, no model better explains our observations and the overall phenomenon of biological diversification than does evolution.
Side note: I just finished reading Privileged Hands, the autobiography of Gary Vermeij, a paleomalacologist at UC Davis. Fascinating book; he wrote it (1) to express in layman’s terms some of his findings and theories in shell evolution, and how they apply to evolutionary questions at large, and (2) to give perspective on his being blind from the age of four, and how that has both influenced the way he has conducted his scientific inquiries as well as proved a stumbling block not so much for him as for other people’s perception of what he’s able to do. It’s not an earth-shaking tome, but it’s warm, consistently engaging, and very well balanced between personal anecdotes and broad scientific discussion. His chapter on how the changing shape of the oceans, due to continental drift, allowed species from the Pacific to periodically invade the Atlantic is a masterpiece of clarity, with both specificity and breadth. Anyone reading these threads who’s “on the fence” about evolution would be well-advised to check out Vermeij’s book and see a clear, non-technical description of how evolution (including, yes, speciation) works in the real world.
And that’s all I’m going to say in this thread, as long as it keeps circling back around over the same points, again and again. No matter how much you cram into them, trolls never seem to need the Heimlich.
[hijack][nitpick]
The model usuallyl referred to as “Bohr’s model of the atom” had electrons orbiting the nucleus very much like planets orbiting the Sun. It was useful, but had a taint of classical mechanics that led to serious problems, and was replaced many years ago. See Bohr Model of the Atom
[/hijack][/nitpick]
JonF: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I should have expected a careful (and correct) nitpick on the SDMB, and shouldn’t have tossed off a quick and imprecise example. The general point is still relevant, though; this is from the link you posted:
…Which is basically the gist of it. As a general means of thinking about the system, it’s a useful model, and will remain with us for some time. The specifics, though, are subject to refinement. Similarly, Darwin’s Origin of Species has a few minor details wrong, and there are a couple of places where he skips over some things, saying, essentially, “Um, not sure about this bit.” The essential mechanism he was describing, however, still remains sound. Of course, Bohr’s essential mechanism relies too heavily on Newtonian mechanics, which of course don’t hold up at the subatomic level, and his particle interactions aren’t based on much of anything, so the comparison isn’t entirely…
Oh, screw it. You know what I was getting at, right? 
I don’t believe anyone explained this from the START of evolution.
Instinct did not develop rapidly.
The first form of life on this planet was single celled organisms. They had no instinct. All they did was respond to stimuli. They worked like a simple program. If X=Y Then do XXXXX.
Now, the first true “animals”, ones with Neural tissue and muscle tissue. Probably didn’t have instincts either. But eventually neural pathways evolved in such a way that a certain stimulus causes certain reactions, reflexes, hormonal changes. Basically a action impulse traveling through a set of GENETICALLY determined set of Neurons and synapses. THat is instinct. These instincts of course would be inherent to all those offspring that come forth from that animal. Eventually those instincts would mutate, and new ones will be formed.
For your modern examples, they an example of coevolution. one species evolves to adapt to another. A lion becomes more aggressive and faster. A deer learns to run from birth.
Thus these changes in instinct are in no way radical.
~2sense
I never stated if Darwin said that “survival of the fittest” or not. I simply made a statement.
Personally I have not read Origin of Species, but I have learned of the concepts of evolution and almost all that I know I infer by logical thought through the application of these fundamental mechanisms of Evolution.
True enough. I do realize that evolution is NOT directed, but rather the survivablity of randomness.
But I was alluding to the fact that Lions ARE more aggressive. The extrapolated thought that lions became MORE agressive over time. Somewhat hard to explain, but I think you’d understand.
uhh yea.
~JonF
See above. I use history to back my statements up. I apologize for not making my response more concise. I did not expect such nitpicking
~El gaupe
What about the differences in humans themselves? If we all descended from Noah and the ark people, then how do you explain the vast differences in the human race other than evolution. For example, Asians have distinctly unique facial
features and very little body hair while Africans have have dark skin and very curly, dense hair. In 300 generations (I’m using very general numbers here, 6,000 years at 20 years a generation), you can account for all the varieties of people in the world without evolution in the time frame given? Mind you, this is from a small group of humans and a very short amount of time spread out over a vast area.
[/quote]
.
I can only think of 1 explanation for this.
They developed quickly simply because a once diverse group of homo erectus(or was it the species one after this? Btw, if I remember correctly homo erectus spread out across the continents and then later all the groups convergently evolved into Cro-mangons. this was facilitated by interbreeding between groups of course.) lived in asia and all those without those features simply died off(the slanted eyes are to keep dust from the desert out of the eyes).
oh yea, technically there are 3 sub-species of man. Yellow, black and white(I don’t remmeber the scientific names) and they are based on the physiological and anatomical differences, not just purely on skin color. I.e mexicans are considered white.
Capacitor
[quote]
- Then where did the original instinct, the 4f’s, come from? Was it a random amino acid mixture from the primordal ooze that triggered the whole thing? Or was it engineered? Remember, there are many more DNA mixtures that can prove catastrophic to the organism possessing it, than those that can rigger the 4f’s of instinct.
[quote]
See above. No that may not be the exact answer, but it is the explanation held up by observing the instincts of animals of today.
Err as someone said before, We DO have those instincts.
Go watch a tarzan flick. It has been documented that there are people who do act like that.
Speciation requires no radical changes. In fact species classifictation is a totally artifical concept. There are in fact many different species that DO mate with each other. Anyway, back to speciation. It occurs in two situations.
-
First lets set up the conditions. There is a unchanging environment for millions upon millions of years(this is highly unlikely due to the changing geo-climate and evolution of other species). Gradual changes in bone structure and tissues via mutations occur and create a continuous, GRADUALLY changing species. In this case you will be able to observe the GRADUAL changes. This means there IS an intermediate species–so to speak anyway. It is really not an intermediate species since it can probably still breed with the orignal species IF that species still existed(We see this alot really. As previously mentioned there are 3 sub-species of human and they interbreed all the time since they are genetically similar). This gradual change has been observed in the fossil lines specie-lines such as the Horse.
-
Again, lets set up conditions. Environment changes quickly. This scenario is called puncuated equalibria evolution. Basically Population A in environment A gets split into Population A in environment A and Population B in environment B. Population A stays the same, and may follow the course of scenario 1, but it is more likely that it will follow this scenario sometime in the future.
Population B changes is not in a new environment. Since the species if not adapted to live in this new environment many many of the population will die out prior to the next generation cycle. Now, the remaining animals are those with different advantageous mutations along with the main features that define that species. Obviously some of the “middle of the bell curve” animals will still live, but they will eventually shift toward one extreme of the bell curve as they eventually die out. They will mate and all the new advantageous mutations will become aggregate withen Population B in a rather short time to create a remarkably
different animal. Intermediate species? Nope.
You do realize that everything is made of the same BASIC atoms right?
Do you understand how DNA works? Aggregate a buncha few simple mutations(deletions, insertions… and such) and you can change a human skin cell to a reptile skin cell.
~Cervaise
Just to clarify we use the wave-mechanical model now =)
~Bored2001
Hey… not to brag, but I think my speciation lecture is pretty good Ask questions, please. Stimulate thought!
Humans have basic instincts, fewer than any other animal. Two other instincts that humans have is hiding and seeking. What we lack in the quantity of instinct we make it up in refining the intincts that we do have to such a high level that we don’t call it instinct anymore. We turn fighting instinct to advanced weaponry and tactics. We turn the instinct of hiding into lawyering–oops, that’s part is debatable so let’s skip that. We turn reproduction into romance. We turn seeking for food into seeking for knowledge, and call the process of seeking knowledge rational thinking. So: are we really over our instincts?
Or are our original instincts evolve into something else entirely?
Hello,
I believe that my posts here demonstrate the limits of my knowledge of this subject. I saw this thread start and I figured since y’all were going to demonstrate to a creationist the problems of arguing the Creationism view scientificly, I might as well come along for the ride and learn something. You need not worry about me arguing against your points, I am merely seeking clarifications.
I also have never read Darwin’s work. I did read somewhere that the phrase “survival of the fittest” can cause misconceptions, but I do not remember what they might be. I was not implying anything about your post, it just happened to be the 1 that I quoted the phrase from. I would appreciate any thoughts on this question.
I am glad. Now I also am certain of this. Again my post was not a disputation of your understanding, but rather an attempt to confirm my own.
In response to my questioning the existence of devolution you stated:
It appears that I do not understand this point. I read David B’s reply to me on this topic as saying that I was correct in my assumption.
I would really appreciate a further explanation and perhaps an example. jti’s cetacean example doesn’t seem to me to involve devolution. The species evolved into land walkers and then evolved into sea dwellers.
Am I missing something?
On a side note, I don’t think that capacitor is acting like a troll. I haven’t seen him throwing around insults. I hope that he will recognize that this debate is strictly about evolution. He has shown some indications that he is willing to learn. Perhaps he can see that his position is untenable. If so, I am sure that his lesson here will be a painful 1 and I would heartily commend him for having the courage to learn it.
Capacitor, still not responding to most of the points posted here, said:
You know, you keep saying that, no matter how much information is presented to the contrary, but you have yet to back it up. So I’m calling you on it. Back up your claim.
Are you now agreeing with evolution?
Folks,
New here, Can rarely stop laughing long enough to actually get around to posting something.
A cry for Help:
I have been having some restless nights recently thanks to a discussion similar to this.
I wonder if some of you good folks might find the link below interesting and by all means jump in if youve got something to say.
I do hope I’m not overstepping the mark as a newbie by posting a link to another message board. If I am let me know.
I believe that I have addresses some of the issues raised here and raised a few more.
Perhaps together we might just get to the bottom of this or at very least talk ourselves in circles until the next evolutionary advance happens in our species whereupon we will lament the fact that we wasted so much time discussing and not evolving.
Damhna: It’ll take some studying of the thread before I decide whether or not to jump in, but here are some links that you may find interesting:
Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences
Frequently Encountered Criticisms in Evolution vs. Creationism
The General Anti-Creationism FAQ
Creationism and Pseudo Science
On the Peppered Moth, which I see has been mentioned in your thread:
NMSR Debates Intelligent Design proponent Jonathan Wells
Some of these sites show a definite bias, so continue to be a skeptic while you’re reading them, and evaluate what you read.
Damhna: In re the probability questions that seem to fascinate DoctorDoom, these two links to talk.origins seem to be relevant:
Lies, Damned Lies, Statistics, and Probability of Abiogenesis Calculations
I always love these debates.
Without stepping off into astrophysics just yet (yes I did read that thread, or parts of it from that other message board)…why do folks always assume evolution and god are mutually exclusive. Why couldn’t the gentle hand of god be acting THROUGH evolution?
As far as the poster on that other message board, she displays proof of the statement that “a little bit of knowledge is dangerous” There is nothing patently false in her claims about science…yet not necessarily true either.
Keep in mind I am not certain to what she was always responding but:
1.)Ah, DNA and that lovely double helix. Again, I question why this is mutually contradictory with a “god/gods”. If you were god, wouldn’t you make life forms this elegant and functional?
2.) The Universe is decaying? Wow, if she has proof of this (as she claims) she better get in touch with Nature or Science right away, because this is still just a theory. In fact the “evidence” of this is fairly slim and is typically explained in light of the theory, though alternative explanations exist. I am not saying it AIN’T decaying (actually spreading out I think is what she means), it may or may not be. Astrophysics has some neat ideas, but most of them are far from “proven”, Big Bang theory among them…incidently the “pockets of organization” are INDEED an anomaly to the 2nd law of thermodynamics (other theories exist to explain them). These sorts of anomalies fascinate physicists, they do not pretend that they do not exist in order to somehow speciously disprove religion.
3.) I have no idea what she is responding to here. That is a wierd quote. I would generally agree we, as a species, are probably not intelligent enough to understand the “secrets of the universe” but such is the steady march of science. Personally, given the poor scientific quality of her post, I doubt this woman had anything to do with the Human Genome Project except perhaps filing papers from one side of the desk to another. Ask her in which journal the mapping of the 21st chromosome was published…I doubt she’d know (ANY scientist ought to know that)
4.) I think she stops ennumerating but I shall continue…inanimate chemistry? I assume she is referring to non-organic chemistry. This is a strange argument…if a god would want a complex beautiful world, would he/she not need to use some complex chemistry. Ironically most atheist/scientists argue that the universe is to SIMPLE for their to be a creator…it is strange to hear someone argue the opposite. Guess a creator can’t win.
5.)ah yes, the infinite time approach to the odds of life. The fact is we’re here right, so we beat the odds. I think the astronomical odds against life raise some serious questions…even if simply scientific. This dismissal of hers is not scientific at all. Also we must ask, why did a bunch of chemicals form into life at all. Scientifically speaking, what is the purpose of life…and why did life evolve into consciousness?
Also it is is funny to hear a “scientist” complain about statistics since all sciences (at least offhand I can think of) use statistics to some degree.
4.) Oops, sorry, she was still numbering. Uh it suddenly strikes me that this girl is not only probably not a scientist, but also probably not from the UK. Although she manages to put the U in colour, she leaves out the AE in Anaemic…as an American might do. In fact most of her spellings are American. Also evolution continues to put pressure on the human species, lions or no lions. Sexual competition as well as predation by bacterial and viral species continue to help humans evolve.
In summation: This girl is an idiot.
Also someone made mention to humans and instincts. Although humans do still have instincts, with the advent of the forebrain (part of the purpose of which is to override instincts) instincts do have less power in humans than other animals. For a colloquial reading of this topic I suggest Carl Sagan’s Dragons of Eden.
Excuse me, I have been accused of being a troll when all I am requesting is a clariication on the gaps that impede the total certainty of transpecies evolution. I resent that.
My previous comment shows that I believe evolution can explain development within an species.
There are also some things positive that came about as a result of these theories. Evolution helps explains why we can’t so easily genetically engineer a Hitler. Randomness in environment and relations is a factor.
What I really contend, come to think of it, is the exclusivity of randomness as the only factor in the evolutionary process. Life organisms are way too complex, even more so than anything humans make, to just leave it to randomness. Then it should follow that every discovery, and everything that is planned is totally random as well.
Which brings me to another question: Can we make a new species outside the womb/incubator? How about anybody else?
capacitor wrote:
Gee, capacitor, do you realize that you are in total agreement with evolutionary biologists on this one issue?!
Evolutionary mechanism theories do NOT claim that randomness is the only factor in the evolutionary process. Darwinian theory posits the very important – nay, dominant – role of Natural Selection in the evolutionary process, and Natural Selection is anything but random.
Bored2001 wrote:
What makes you think that “responding to stimuli” is a difference in kind (rather than a mere difference in degree) from more complex instincts?
And did you know that single-celled organisms called Paramecia can be trained through classical Pavlovian conditioning? If you shine a bright light on a paramecium, it will normally swim away from the light source. If you pass an electric current through a paramecium, it will flatten out and be temporarily paralyzed. But if you shine a bright light on a paramecium and pass an electric current through it at the same time, and do it over and over, eventually you can shine a bright light on the paramecium without passing an electric current through it and it will still flatten out, rather than swim away!
True, Paramecia are eukaryotes and not simple bacteria, but they’re a far cry from being multicellular organisms.
What I mean is that the origin of the species itself is what I don’t leave exclusivively to randomness. I am almost certain that we disagree on that part.