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30th June 2009, 08:02 PM
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Reps: 44,404,246,110,554,912 (power: 44,404,246,110,568) | | Originally Posted by Bombila  Juvenissun, Northern peoples have indeed evolved various physical adaptations that have helped them thrive in extreme Northern climates.
Everything evolves 'forward' because there's no other option. The individual lives to reproduce, or it dies without reproducing. There are many successful offspring or few.
There are.
When the environment changed one way, life evolve toward one direction. Then when environment changed back, life should evolve accordingly, may be evolve back to what it was. Environment changed in cycles, so should evolution. And when environment does not change, there should be no extinction, and no evolution.
We do not see a single example of that. |
30th June 2009, 08:09 PM
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Reps: 3,725,685,714 (power: 0) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun There are.
When the environment changed one way, life evolve toward one direction. Then when environment changed back, life should evolve accordingly, may be evolve back to what it was. Environment changed in cycles, so should evolution. And when environment does not change, there should be no extinction, and no evolution.
We do not see a single example of that.
What? We don't see examples of that because that's not how evolution works, and it doesn't predict anything like that. Could you please either try to read up on evolution and how it works, or accept that you don't know anything about it and shut up?
The biggest problem with your reasoning is that you assume that evolution has a direction. It really doesn't. The chance of something "evolving back" into a previous form is so insignificantly small that it just can't happen. A changing environment will cause life to change as well, but not by degressing to earlier forms, but rather by adapting again to the new environment. We have many examples of this in the fossil records.  |
30th June 2009, 08:15 PM
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Reps: 44,404,246,110,554,912 (power: 44,404,246,110,568) | | Originally Posted by gaara4158 Actually, there is no such level. If you fail to answer my questions, I must assume you do not know the answer.
You try to say the same to your instructor in class, and to see what will happen. |
30th June 2009, 08:17 PM
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Reps: 3,725,685,714 (power: 0) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun You try to say the same to your instructor in class, and to see what will happen.
I would assume that if the instructor is intellectually honest he would either answer the questions or say "You are right, I do not know the answer". |
30th June 2009, 10:38 PM
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Reps: 228,193,399,886,833,536 (power: 228,193,399,886,840) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun You try to say the same to your instructor in class, and to see what will happen.
if my instructor is unable to answer my questions, I should hope he has the integrity to admit it rather than fabricating "another level" and demand that I ask questions on that level.
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30th June 2009, 11:03 PM
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Reps: 295,212,687,427,838,720 (power: 0) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun I know all the arguments you intend to engage. What I am talking about is one level above those.
Sorry if you think you're on a better level -- you're not. So, make your argument accordingly. (you may assume I know the answer of your question and press for the next one!)
Seeing as how you've answered everything wrong so far, that would be a foolish assumption. |
30th June 2009, 11:05 PM
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Reps: 295,212,687,427,838,720 (power: 0) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun There are.
When the environment changed one way, life evolve toward one direction. Then when environment changed back, life should evolve accordingly, may be evolve back to what it was. Environment changed in cycles, so should evolution. And when environment does not change, there should be no extinction, and no evolution.
Weren't you just saying before that the environment never changes? I do wish you'd get your story straight. |
1st July 2009, 12:43 AM
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Reps: 15,346,878,439,292 (power: 15,346,878,448) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun There are.
When the environment changed one way, life evolve toward one direction. Then when environment changed back, life should evolve accordingly, may be evolve back to what it was. Environment changed in cycles, so should evolution. And when environment does not change, there should be no extinction, and no evolution.
We do not see a single example of that.
It does not work that way, as you should know by now.
For example, imagine a small muskrat like mammal that lives mostly in fresh water, swimming around eating clams, living in burrows on the banks, bearing six kits a year. Then the climate begins to change, get colder. One season comes that is very cold, and two or three kits die: not enough food, froze to death. Maybe the surviving kits had a small mutation for thicker fur, or to put on more fat.
Generations go by, it's colder and colder, the fresh water is frozen for longer parts of the year. The kits that survive are the ones adapted for cold weather, and maybe they begin to eat things that don't live in water sometimes. By the middle of this ice age, the descendents of the original little muskratty critter are bigger, have a thicker coat, maybe a double coat, as that is a common mutation in many mammals. They don't live in fresh water anymore because it's almost always frozen.
Their descendents survive through the ice age, and the climate begins to warm again. But these cold adapted land dwelling animals will not suddenly 'evolve back' into water dwellers. There is no going back, in that sense.
They may move farther North, where they still have an advantage. They may stay in the warming climate, and maybe have descendents with thinner coats, or bigger paws for losing more heat, or they may become specialized insect eaters because of the abundance of insects in this warmer climate.
What they will not do is 'revert' to the same kind of animal they were before the ice age. Their muskratty days are over. |
1st July 2009, 01:38 AM
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Reps: 273,058,856,457,603,328 (power: 273,058,856,457,625) | | Originally Posted by juvenissun There are.
When the environment changed one way, life evolve toward one direction. Then when environment changed back, life should evolve accordingly, may be evolve back to what it was. Environment changed in cycles, so should evolution. And when environment does not change, there should be no extinction, and no evolution.
We do not see a single example of that.
And so we shouldn't, since evolution doesn't work like that. It can't go 'backward', and neither does the environmental niche in which life finds itself. Yes, the temperature changes, but there are more things than just climate that affect a species' evolution.
Consider the extinction of the dinosaurs: after the catastrophy calmed down, the Earth was back to how it was. But dinosaurs didn't re-evolve: their successors took their place in the niche they left behind.
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1st July 2009, 08:18 AM
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Reps: 44,404,246,110,554,912 (power: 44,404,246,110,568) | | Originally Posted by Bombila It does not work that way, as you should know by now.
For example, imagine a small muskrat like mammal that lives mostly in fresh water, swimming around eating clams, living in burrows on the banks, bearing six kits a year. Then the climate begins to change, get colder. One season comes that is very cold, and two or three kits die: not enough food, froze to death. Maybe the surviving kits had a small mutation for thicker fur, or to put on more fat.
Generations go by, it's colder and colder, the fresh water is frozen for longer parts of the year. The kits that survive are the ones adapted for cold weather, and maybe they begin to eat things that don't live in water sometimes. By the middle of this ice age, the descendents of the original little muskratty critter are bigger, have a thicker coat, maybe a double coat, as that is a common mutation in many mammals. They don't live in fresh water anymore because it's almost always frozen.
Their descendents survive through the ice age, and the climate begins to warm again. But these cold adapted land dwelling animals will not suddenly 'evolve back' into water dwellers. There is no going back, in that sense.
They may move farther North, where they still have an advantage. They may stay in the warming climate, and maybe have descendents with thinner coats, or bigger paws for losing more heat, or they may become specialized insect eaters because of the abundance of insects in this warmer climate.
What they will not do is 'revert' to the same kind of animal they were before the ice age. Their muskratty days are over.
Thanks for the elaborated description.
The first question is: why not evolved back to what they were? What would stop it? I don't see a single reason not to do that. I know they don't. But this poses a big question to the mechanism of evolution.
Second, let's assume it does not go back to the same animal before. But it will evolve to something new, BUT, with equivalent functions. I don't see any reason that it will evolve into a very different "kind" of animal.
The main point is: there are only a few ways that environment can change. Under this major control, lives may evolve to here and to there, but they should not do any runaway type of evolution and brought out monsters like the big dinos. The type of mutant described in movies just do not happen. | | |
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