Why evolution is not possible.

Great Debates
161

Actually, I think H should be praised. Thanks for taking the time to listen to us, and read our arguments and respond. You’re doing quite well so far. Most people who disagree with evolution don’t bother to do more than post links to creationist websites. In contrast, you’ve provided some theories of your own, you’ve read and responded to some of your critics, and you’re still here.

H, if some people are rude, just ignore them. Only respond to people who argue politely. There’s no need for frayed tempers in a scientific discussion, after all.

Actually, H’s theory that similar species are derived from an ancestral archetypal species has a lot going for it. For instance, all members of the dog family…what biologists would term the family Canidae…originally came from one single species, that had the potential to transform itself into all the other kinds of dogs, foxes, wolves, dholes, dingos, bush dogs, jackals, racoon dogs, fennecs, etc.

And there was once a species of cat that had the potential to become all the species of cat out there…lions, jaguars, servals, cougars, ocelots, snow leopards, and lynxes.

Likewise, there was one species that developed into all the bears, one that developed into all the hyeanas, one that developed into all the weasels/mustelids, one that developed into all the procyonids, and one that developed into all the mongooses/viverids.

But what H doesn’t consider is what those ancestral archetypal species were like. Back a few million years ago when those ancestral species were running around, we would notice something intersting about them. The ancestor of dogs would look a lot more like the ancestor of cats than the typical dog today looks like the typical cat today. And the same with the ancestor of the bears, procyonids, weasels, hyaenas and mongooses. While the cats and the dogs seem very distinct to us today, their archetypal ancestors were not.

In fact, if we had been around that long ago, we might have guessed that all those ancestral archetypal species THEMSELVES had an ancestral archetypal species. A sort of archetypal carnivore, one that had the potential to become the ur-dog, ur-cat, ur-bear, ur-weasel, ur-procyonid, ur-hyaena and ur-mongoose, since at that time these ur species were much more similar than they are now.

And if we went even further back we might notice something else. That ur-carnivore would be very similar to the ur-insectivore and the ur-primate and the ur-rodent and the ur-artiodactyl. And this very interesting mammal would have lived very very long ago. In fact, it would be the ancestor of all mammals alive today.

And if we went further back, we might notice a whole group of creatures that had some characteristics that we associate with reptiles and some characteristics that we associate with mammals. In fact, our ancestral mammal would be part of a whole group of creatures that were very similar, combining reptile and mammal features. These creatures are paradoxically known as the mammal-like reptiles. And we might imagine, if we were alive then, that all these mammal-like reptiles derived from an archetypal mammal-like reptile.

And of course, the same process could be observed for mammal-like reptiles and true reptiles, for reptiles and amphibians, for amphibians and fish, and for all vertebrates.

It seems amazing that every fish, bird, mammal, amphibian, or reptile at one time had a common ancestor…a little fishy sort of creature living hundreds of millions of years ago, that had the potential to change and adapt to become all the vertebrates that are alive today. And that all higher level divisions between species…the differences between families, orders and classes…at one time were merely the difference between similar sister species, as trivial as the difference between a wolf and a fox, or between a lion and housecat, or between a donkey and a horse.

162

People, a request first. We have a new poster who disagrees with our views, but is at least willing to discuss his views. We’re all dogpiling on the poor bloke (sheila? :smiley: ), which is fair enough since we’ve done this to death amongst ourselves. However he has done us the favour of stimulating discussion and , IMHO, done an admirable job of responding given that he has had to respond to umpteen simultaneous lines of questioning on what is on of the busiest threads I’ve seen on these borads in a long time.
Can we cut him a little slack please?

Erislover,

The possible implications of this are far reaching. The actual imlpications are unknown. Because of the way genes work it’s possible that simply having the capacity to trigger a change back to the utilisation of a gene that would normally have been selected against is a huge advantage in itself. For example most humans have presumably lost the gene that codes for adult lactase, hence the prevalence of lactose intolerance. If in truth this gene has simply been ‘switched off’ in some distant ancestor, and stress can cause the prion conformational change that turns it back ‘on’ then the trigger will be as useful to a human as it would be for a cat or a fly if they were to suddenly have access to large quantities of milk. I’m not syaing that this is possible and it certainly hasn’t been demonstrated, but it does suggest how Lamarckian mechanisms could just possibly exist in natural systems.

Any mutation has the potential to be harmful, but one of the implications of this proceess is that a mutation can occur that is harmful, yet be overcome by activating a previously functional gene (again we have little proof for this). Similarly a harmful mutation may be switched off and buried until a string of other mutations have also accrued. If they are all switched on together it is possble they will work in concert even if any given one is useless in isolation. This is of course pure specualtion, but theoretically a mechanism exists.

Does that answer your question?

Oh and this "Sure there is. Choose a small pack of animals and drastically change their environment. Observe the next few generations. This can be accomplished in your lifetime, even. " is rather ironic when you read hte link below. Someone did exactly what you proposed here, and found out that prexisting diversity was suddenly expressed.

Zaphod,
I can’t provide an online link unless you have a subscription to Ovid, but if you can get hold of the following papers you’ll be well on your way:
Brookfield, J.F.Y. 2001, Evolution: The evolvability enigma. Current Biology 11:3

True, H.L. & Lindquist, S.L., 2000. A yeast prion provides amechanism for genetic variation and phenotypic diversity. Nature 407

This site gives a basic outline of a slightly different subject being reserched by one of the authors above.
Darwin’s Finch,

This is a bit of a WAG on my part OK, but I’ll play Devil’s advocate and suggest one mechanism.
Firstly the process may not just work on atavisms. It is potentially possible fro this process to allow genetic matter that has never been expressed to suddenly be expressed. Of course we have no evidence for this, but absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence. All we know is that a change in protein confirmation brought about by environmental stress causes can cause genetic information not normally expressed by that species to be expressed. As one example if I took a Drosphila and spliced the gene for lucifrease into the middle of a sequence between two normally functional stop codons the information wouldn’t actually be atavistic because the species never expressed it ever. I could then breed from that fly, and n generations down the tract heat treat the eggs and suddenly the flys would glow in the dark (well probably not but you get my point). Of course this simply assumes such a gene exists, it doesn’t question how it got there. If I wish to propose that God put such a gene in all organisms but deliberately rigged it so that it would only be expressed in response to sustained light stress then I can. Of course to date there’s no evidence that such a gene exists in all organisms and considerable evidence against it, but still atavism isn’t a prerequisite. In Hiyruus example with the pigs I think he’s suggesting that God has put genes that potentially code for tusks into all pigs, but in domestic pigs the functional copies have been prefaced with a stop codon in a non read section of the chromosome. If we stress the pig enough a change in prion structure will allow the gene to be read and voila we have a tusked pig in one generation.

Now I suspect we could do a gene analysis of domestic pigs and find that the gene in question is still being read, but has mutated to produce non-functional proteins, or perhaps mutated to a series of nonsense codons, but until we can prove that then there is one possible mechanism for exactly the type of Lamarckian mechanism Hiruu is talking about that fits with current scientific knowledge.

Now as for how the pig knows it’s suddenly wild, if you read the link I posted above you will note that there is evidence that certain proteins produced in response to stress. In this case the stress was presumably heat, but I’ve seen other cites saying they are also supressed in response to stress hormones and oxygen shortages. Just as one example if a domestic pig gets lose without functional tusks it will almost certainly suffer food shortages because it can’t dig for food and extra stress from long drawn out standoffs with predators. This causes the HSPs to be suppresed and suddenly we get a massive kick in for previously unexpressed genetic signals for body shape. Or to quote from the article “environmental stress may uncover pre-existing genetic variation that provides a means for animals to quickly adapt to shifts in environment”. This seems awfullly close to saying that “new traits simply appear because they are needed” provided that the gentic code for such traits already existed in the ancestors of the individual being stressed. Pretty much what Hiryuu is saying if I read him right.

Obviously we still need some sort of selective process to wipe out the non-tusked pigs etc. We also probably need some interplay between the prion switches and the HSP induced changes, but it remains an essentially Lamarckian mechanism. Of course it doesn’t seek to explain where the genetic material came from in the first place, and there is an underlying assumption of a Darwinian basis of the prexisting diversity but couldn’t we equally make an assumption of a divine basis for such diversity even if it is based on faith and not science?

GIGObuster,
I can’t believe I’m arguing Hiyruu’s case, but what the hell, it’s an intellectual excercise.

Well I’ve basically done this above. There is at least some evidence that genetic material for a diversity of phenotypes is built in to every organism. Of course this doesn’t detract from the indisputable evidence that changes in DNA structure also result in new phenotypes. The answer is obviously that the two act in concert.

Ok I’ve just got to Hiyruu’s post about a helical DNA antenna/switch. I don’t think I’m arguing his case at all. I’m no longer certain what he’s arguing. :confused:
Hiyruu, while I almost sympathise with what you’re suggesting I would be very interested in knowing what exactly this signal might be. I’ve presented some cites for a chemical trigger for induced phenotypic chnaged from pre-existing genetic diversity, but I’d be evry interested in heraing your theorya bout what this ‘signal’ is. Since it can be recieved by a heliacl reciever I assume it’s some sort of electromagnetic radiation.

163

I’m still here…Thank you to those who took the time to give this hypothesis some consideration, it is not my personal hypothesis, but is held by a number of people out there. I have been busy today so I haven’t had the chance to reply, but I have read all the new posts and will try and get to them.

BTW, this is not Lamarkism, what I am proposing is pure and simple built-in variety.

I am preparing some more examples, that I want you to consider, that show how ‘built in variety’ seems more probable than ‘variety by trial and error’. Stay tuned.

164

The question remains: Built in by whom?

165

Gaspode:
Your link didn’t work - you seem to have gotten some SDMB stuck in it :smiley:
Here is the corrected link.

As for the article: it is one interpretation (the one supoprted by Lindquist and Rutherford, and possibly Hiryuu) that the Hsp90 functions to release pre-existing genetic diversity. But, another is that the breakdown of Hsp90 unleashes the Genie of Diversity, so to speak. With the chaperone molecule (which serves to aid the proteins in folding correctly) pretty much out of order, mutations happen with much greater frequency, thus increasing overall variation upon which natural selection can act. If the resulting mutations are non-lethal, as evidenced in the article, then there is no reason for them to be selected against; indeed, they can be selected for, and occur with greater frequency in the population.

The real question, then, is: which interpretation is correct? And how do we differentiate between them?

As for the discussion in general, hey, I’m enjoying it :slight_smile: And I hope I haven’t been condescending or ridiculing in this thread…if so, I apologize.

Anyway, on to Hiryuu:
As you can probably tell, Hiryuu, your hypothesis raises many questions. Here are some bare-minimum questions which I would want reasonable answers to before I throw current evolutionary theories out the window (note that these are not all of the objections, just the ones I can think of off the top of my head, and I’m sure others could come up with more).
On Archetypes
[ul]
[li] What, exactly, are the Archetypal Species?[/li]Note that I’m not asking for a definition, but what specific forms constitute the original pool of Archetypes?
[li] What is the origin of these Archetypes?[/li]If these are the original template forms from which all others descended, how did they come into being?
[li] How do you reconcile the Archetype concept with the fossil record?[/li][/ul]
Er…actually I had more earlier, but I forgot what they were :confused:
This should be a good start, anyway :slight_smile:

166

Built-in by default, a way that nature balances it’s self out.

167

Why is this so hard to answer? Built in by whom?

I can’t argue genes and DNA, I’m not a microbiologist. What I do know is that the Theory of Evolution has a fairly straightforward point of origin.

Simply stating that something has such-and-such a “built in” attribute, begs the question that, if one does not subscribe to the thought of Evolution, then who or what “built in” that attribute?

168

How about

Does this built in variety mean that every gene that now exists in my body and in the body of each and every other living creature on this planet has existed somewhere since the beginning whereever you feel that is?

Also, in your concept, are we related to chimpanzees? Do we have a common ancestor?

169

But this is assuming the same thing that an Evolutionist “assumes”. You’re just calling it something else. If it’s built-in by default, wouldn’t that suggest a sort of order, that came from disorder?

Your conclusion is violated by your argument. Much like a man with a bee on his dick, that’s a lousy position to be in.

170

Should be simple enough in theory. All we have to do is run an a analysis of all the DNA of both parents that is known to affect antennal development (or at least the corresponidng proteins). I gather the Drosophila genome is completely mapped now. Then we select all the offspring that show mutations of antennal structure and run an analysis on the corresponding genes. If the genes are exactly the same as at least one parent then we can safely say that a non-genetic shift in phenotype has occured. I have no idea how many different genes could possibly influence antenna growth, or how long something like this would take, but it should be possible.

171

Thank you for the references, Gaspode.

172

I think I understand your concept, let me paraphrase: The plans and blueprints for variations of a particular species are built in, and just need an outside trigger to evidence themselves. Correct?

Let’s look at an example from the fossil record: About 60 million years ago, terrestrial animals known as mesonychians roamed the earth. We know these wolf-like creatures from their teeth and bones. About 9 million years later, we find pakicetids have supplanted mesonychians, exhibiting nearly all the same features save for the teeth which are distinctly those of an early whale. The next fossil in the series would be Ambulocetus Natans literally ‘walking whale that swims’. One would hope to find evidence of the reduction and eventual disappearance of the hind limbs, and that is where Rodhocetus fossils come in. By this time we are at 38 million years ago and Eocene Era proto-whales are in abundance. Would you really have us believe that a wolf-like land dweller has the ‘built in variety’ allowing it to become a whale over the course of 60 million years? If so, explain please.

And one more request: Please cite one single study (not supposition) that supports ‘built-in variation.’

173

Hiryuu:

Your premise is flawed. In the era of large-scale genomic sequencing, we have not found any of this built-in diversity on the level that you hope. We do, however, see numerous examples of inactivation of genes, gene duplication and divergence, exon shuffling, gene fusions, gene splitting, and even viral-mediated transduction in complex eukaryotes.

I am at this moment conducting a genetic screen. This means I have induced mutations throughout the genome of my model organism, Drosophila melanogaster. When the adult flies start to come out, I will induce a very powerful selection – me. I will toss all flies that do not have the phenotype that I want and keep all of the ones that do. It is evolution on crack. You had better believe that I am affecting their genotype (by feeding the flies ethyl methanesulfonate, which alkylates the genome). There is no built-in diversity at that level – I am inducing diversity with a mutagen. Similar things happen in nature all of the time – natural radioactivity, UV light, chemicals in the food supply, viral infections, DNA copying errors, stochastic factors all induce mutations at a low rate. We know the direct molecular action of many of these natural mutagens.

A related point that I would like to address is this “we can’t add genetic information by natural means of mutagenesis.” This is also totally unsupported. First, “new” genetic information is highly overrated. Studies have shown that something like 2/3 of protein classes that exist in humans also exist in yeast. Secondly, as I mentioned above, we see gene duplication with divergence, we see exon shuffling, we even see chunks of viral genome being used for host function throughout nature. These all can lead to “new” genetic information.

Hiryuu, your pseudo-Lamarckian views are totally unsupported by scientific observations of the past 120 years. The Darwinian ones are. Please give me one piece of evidence which you believe shows this built-in diversity.

174

As an aside, do you think that Jonathan Well’s “flies treated with ether” were really treated with ethyl methanesulfonate?

-Ben

175

Those poor fruit flies. Always getting picked on by geneticists.

176

Too much free time on my hands. :smiley:

177

You have it backwards. Lactose tolerance is the mutation. From http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mutations.html:

My emphasis.

178

The quote being :

from http://www.trueorigin.org/homology.asp, from Jonathan Wells’s spouting off about homology being bunk.

We used to use ether to stun the flies. Now we use carbon dioxide. To the best of my knowledge, ether is non-mutagenic. The mutation in questin is in the homeotic gene Ultrabithorax (Ubx, flybase record here). I suspect the exact allele of Ubx that Wells is alluding to is one that causes a homeotic transformation of the halteres (thoracic appendages involved in balance) to the wing, although there are 429 reported alleles. There are other alleles of Ubx which may causes things like partial duplications of the thorax, to form a 4 winged fly.

Looking at a list of the alleles, though, shows that there are none induced by “ether.” Most are spontaneous or induced by X rays, gamma rays, or the two common chemical mutagens ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS) and ethyl nitrosurea (ENU).

Oh, and Wells is wrong in another point. He spends some time on Ubx flies and says that they are an “evolutionary dead end” because the extra wings are not attached to muscles. This is not always the case. In Ubx[sup]abx-1[/sup], Ubx[sup]bx-3[/sup], Ubx[sup]pbx-1[/sup] triple mutants, which have 4 wings due to an partial abdominal->thoracic homeotic transformation, most of the flight muscles are present.

His conclusions about homeotic transformations and homology in genetics are all wrong, IMHO. While this is not the appropriate thread, I will just say that his little dig in about eyeless in the paragraph above is totally wrong and only shows that suppressors of eyeless can be isolated. This is very, very close to the genetic screen which I am performing at this very instant.

179

jab1,

Thanks for that. More ignorance terminated with extereme prejudice. (Well with extreme politeness and consideration actually).

180

Ok guys, I’m back.

What I want to do before I go in-depth on this topic is to present a series of scenarios for you to consider, to get your mind on the right wavelength.

You can think of the ‘built-in’ hypothesis like this; It is like playing different tunes on the same piano. In other words you are impressing different conditions on the same genetic-type, and getting different expressions as a result.
Let me give a real world example:

Let’s take the example of the “Cave Fish”.

Now the cave fish lives in the dark, so it doesn’t have any eyes. So you are telling me that after millions of years of evolution it lost it’s eyes? Hmmm…I mean do you realize how ridiculous this sounds in the context of evolution, which says things are supposed to get better over time?

How does ‘built-in’ variety explain the Cave Fish? Well It says that the genes for those eyes are still there, but have been switched off because the fish has no need for eyes in the dark. So it is a question of turning things on and off that are already there.

The same with flightless birds, did the birds lose their wings after millions of years of evolution? Or is it simply that the genes for wings are still there but because of their environment wings are not needed. In the context of natural selection it is a marvel that flightless birds survived at all.