Did Darwin Believe in Today's "Evolution"?

[whois]

Yes! Mendel discovered genetics.

wait a minute.
wasn't you up there a minute ago saying genetics was unknown to darwin?
let's see:
darwin: 1809-1882
mendel 1822-1884
it seems fairly obvious to me that darwin would indeed be aware of genes and genetics.

 

[whois]

whois, it's unlikely that Darwin was a secret Lamarckist or someone who knew him would have told the story.

why are you telling me?
take it up with the people that are publishing this stuff.

 

[bhsmte]

wait a minute.
wasn't you up there a minute ago saying genetics was unknown to darwin?
let's see:
darwin: 1809-1882
mendel 1822-1884
it seems fairly obvious to me that darwin would indeed be aware of genes and genetics.

"Darwinian principles now play a greater role in biology than ever before, which we illustrate with some examples of studies of natural selection that use DNA sequence data and with some recent advances in answering questions first asked by Darwin."

Sounds like these researchers agree with Francis Collin's and his take on how Darwin's principles have only been strengthened with the discovery of DNA.

Darwin and Genetics

 

[essentialsaltes]

it seems fairly obvious to me that darwin would indeed be aware of genes and genetics.

That seems sensible and obvious, but it is not the case.

"Mendel's work was rejected at first in the scientific community, and was not widely accepted until after he died."

"When Mendel's paper was published in 1866 in Verhandlungen des naturforschenden Vereins Brünn,[17] it was seen as essentially about hybridization rather than inheritance and had little impact and was cited about three times over the next thirty-five years."

 

[Split Rock]

wait a minute.
wasn't you up there a minute ago saying genetics was unknown to darwin?
let's see:
darwin: 1809-1882
mendel 1822-1884
it seems fairly obvious to me that darwin would indeed be aware of genes and genetics.

Mendel's research was not widely known or thought of as generally applicable during his lifetime. Those that did read his research, tended to think it was a specific case for certain traits in a specific species (garden pea). It didn't seem to explain traits like height in humans that we now know are polygenic traits dependent on multiple genes, for example. Also, Mendel's research was statistical in nature and most biologists at the time didn't use statistics.

I read that Darwin had the paper in his possession, but never had it translated into English, but I don't know if that's true.

*it wasn't until the early 20th century that his work was "re-discovered" and shown to be applicable in other systems by Hugo de Vries and others.

 

[Loudmouth]

You do not need to demonstrate any more than the fantasies used to "demonstrate" the common "theory of evolution". But you could offer much mathematical and genomic evidence why "evolution as we know it" is just a fabricated mythology.

Once again, you make an accusation and back it up with nothing.

Plus there is more evidence for human devolution, I mean look at the animals mankind have BECOME, not "evolved from", what an insult to such a mighty beast as a Lion, to be equate with the moral retrograde, and self deception, that is "Home sapien". No wonder they believe "evolution", its very concept of getting better and more advanced tickles their fancy, but it flies in the face of what is the human reality: slow physical and spiritual decay into decadence, like boiling a frog, worse and worse and worse, downhill, not "evolution".

There is no such thing as devolution, just as flying back home after a trip is not detravelling. Change in any direction is evolution just as travelling in any direction is travelling.

The reason we accept evolution is the twin nested hierarchies of morphology and DNA. The shared and derived features in complex life fall into phylogenies as predicted by the theory of evolution, and inexplicable in a separate creation or design scenario. While cars share features, they do not fall into a nested hierarchy. On top of that, DNA sequence is independent of morphology, and it correlates with the phylogenies based on morphology. DNA sequence is independent of morphology in the same way that computer code is independent of what you see on the computer screen. For example, Google Chrome looks almost identical on a PC and an Apple, yet the code that underlies each is very different. The same for life. You could produce two identical looking cats, yet have very, very different DNA sequence underneath. One of the simplests ways of doing that would be to change the anticodons on tRNA's so that different codons result in the same amino acid.

As long as one stays with hard genomic data and some insightful angles, to base the non-evolution thesis upon, it will have more than evolution theory which has NO DATA, but pure creative writing.

Like I show above, evolution is the only explanation we have for the DNA data. Perhaps you should look into it.

For example, evolution explains genetic equidistance:

Molecular clock - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

How does separate creation and design explain why there is as much distance between whale and fish DNA as human and fish DNA?

The principle is over extended and it is assuming a "closed system", and that is also why evolution is just fantastically mythical. There are so many holes in evolution, it isn't funny, it could be a 4000 page book, but I think 400 would be a target.

Look at all of the hot air you use without naming one hole.

 

[sfs]

You do not need to demonstrate any more than the fantasies used to "demonstrate" the common "theory of evolution". But you could offer much mathematical and genomic evidence why "evolution as we know it" is just a fabricated mythology.

Right. You could present lots of mathematical and genomic evidence against evolution. You've just neglected to do so while writing these walls of text because, um, why exactly?

You've never even read a genomics paper, have you?

 

[Loudmouth]

darwin himself was a lamarckist and he wrote his treatise.

How so?

It seems that Darwin was arguing against Larmackism. In Lamarckism, the environment produces all of the changes in the offspring so that the offspring are adapted to that environment. In Darwinian evolution, inherited traits don't change and there is variation in the population. The population changes over time because those who are already adapted are selected for.

It seems like Darwinian evolution argues directly against Lamarckism.

In fact, this played out in the middle of the 20th century where Russia rejected Darwinism, and instead accepted Lysenkoism which was a re-imagniation of Lamarckism.

"Lysenkoism was built on theories of the heritability of acquired characteristics that Lysenko named "Michurinism".[1] These theories depart from accepted evolutionary theory and Mendelian inheritance."
Lysenkoism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Heritability of acquired characteristics" is Lamarckism.

 

[whois]

That seems sensible and obvious, but it is not the case.

"Mendel's work was rejected at first in the scientific community, and was not widely accepted until after he died."

"When Mendel's paper was published in 1866 in Verhandlungen des naturforschenden Vereins Brünn,[17] it was seen as essentially about hybridization rather than inheritance and had little impact and was cited about three times over the next thirty-five years."

okay, 2 things.
1. i can quote every post on this page (20 per page) except yours.

2. it seems highly unlikely that mendels work would not be accepted as a reasonable vehicle for darwins theories

 

[Loudmouth]

2. it seems highly unlikely that mendels work would not be accepted as a reasonable vehicle for darwins theories

Scientists agree. It just took a little while for them to realize that.

 

[bhsmte]

2. it seems highly unlikely that mendels work would not be accepted as a reasonable vehicle for darwins theories

It would appear, you chose to ignore the sources posted in regards to how Mendels work was accepted at the time.

 

[sfs]

2. it seems highly unlikely that mendels work would not be accepted as a reasonable vehicle for darwins theories

It was accepted as a reasonable vehicle for Darwin's theory -- decades after Darwin's death.

Really, why do you think you can just guess at things and assume your guesses are true?

 

[Split Rock]

2. it seems highly unlikely that mendels work would not be accepted as a reasonable vehicle for darwins theories

Scientists agree. It just took a little while for them to realize that.

Exactly. Hindsight is always 20-20.

That is the way history worked itself out, whether or not you think (with your 2015 hindsight) that it is "highly unlikely."

 

[Split Rock]

It was accepted as a reasonable vehicle for Darwin's theory -- decades after Darwin's death.

Really, why do you think you can just guess at things and assume your guesses are true?

Because its all about developing the paradigm first, and then making the facts and history fit into the paradigm. Another good example is the insistence that Deep Time is the result of applying "evolutionary assumptions" to the geological record. This despite the fact that Deep Time became the paradigm in geology before Common Descent was accepted among biologists.

 

[Willtor]

wait a minute.
wasn't you up there a minute ago saying genetics was unknown to darwin?
let's see:
darwin: 1809-1882
mendel 1822-1884
it seems fairly obvious to me that darwin would indeed be aware of genes and genetics.

I know, right?! But few people knew of Mendel's work during his lifetime. It wasn't until the early 20th century (after Mendel, himself, had long since died) that his ideas were rediscovered and his work was appreciated. His work was largely ignored during his lifetime.

why are you telling me?
take it up with the people that are publishing this stuff.

You're here. You've brought their ideas to the table. They aren't. They haven't.

 

[whois]

Textbook descriptions of the foundations of Genetics give the impression that besides Mendel's no other research on heredity took place during the nineteenth century. However, the publication of the "Origin of Species" in 1859, and the criticism that it received, placed the study of heredity at the centre of biological thought. Consequently, Herbert Spencer, Charles Darwin himself, Francis Galton, William Keith Brooks, Carl von Nageli, August Weismann, and Hugo de Vries attempted to develop theories of heredity under an evolutionary perspective, and they were all influenced by each other in various ways. Nonetheless, only Nageli became aware of Mendel's experimental work;

 

[Loudmouth]

Textbook descriptions of the foundations of Genetics give the impression that besides Mendel's no other research on heredity took place during the nineteenth century.

My textbook mentioned Lamarck and others. Perhaps you should read up on it?

However, the publication of the "Origin of Species" in 1859, and the criticism that it received, placed the study of heredity at the centre of biological thought. Consequently, Herbert Spencer, Charles Darwin himself, Francis Galton, William Keith Brooks, Carl von Nageli, August Weismann, and Hugo de Vries attempted to develop theories of heredity under an evolutionary perspective, and they were all influenced by each other in various ways. Nonetheless, only Nageli became aware of Mendel's experimental work;

All that Darwin proposed is that the emergence of variation was independent of selection. That is, the process that produced variation produced changes that were bad and good, and it was the good variation that was selected for. Darwin did not understand what the mechanisms of heredity were. In fact, he worried that his theory would fall apart if it was found that new variations were diluted out after several generations like adding more and more water will lower the proof of a whiskey. The rediscovery of Mendel's work actually saved Darwin's theory in that new traits were passed on as units and were not diluted out with each generation. Peas didn't become less and less wrinkled with each generation as they were mated with unwrinkled peas. Instead, you got the same number of wrinkled peas in each generation when you mated them with unwrinkled peas.

 

[PsychoSarah]

the fact of the matter is though, Darwin's hypothetical opinion on modern evolutionary theory is irrelevant.

 

[crjmurray]

the fact of the matter is though, Darwin's hypothetical opinion on modern evolutionary theory is irrelevant.

That's pretty much the main point. Darwin could have secretly thought that some subatomic particle (evolutionatron?) was behind selection. He would be wrong and it wouldn't matter. What he thought based on the limited information he had back then has no bearing on the wealth of information we have now.

 

[Ophiolite]

Several flawed, and some downright wrong, statements have been made by several posters. For those who prefer facts, here are some:

1. Darwin remained uncertain as to the source of variation upon which natural selection operates, until his death. He dabbled with the role of Lamarkism to various degrees, as is evident in changes from edition to edition of Origin. However, to suggest that he adhered to Lamarkism demonstrates a failure to understand either Lamarkism or Darwinism.

2. A copy of Mendel's paper on genetics was found in Darwin's library, but the pages were uncut. i.e. the paper could not have been read by him.

3. Mendel's work was misunderstood, ignored, then forgotten. It was the near simultaneous rediscovery of it by de Vries, Tschermark and Correns at the turn of the century that led to the recognition of its importance. Naegli was aware of it, but failed to grasp its relevance to evolution.

4. de Vries also introduced the idea of mutations as the source of variation in genes. This concept largely supplanted natural selection as an explanation for evolution for the next three decades: Darwinism was all but dead.

5. Then the population genetics work of Sewell Wright, Fisher and Haldane led to the synthesis of genetic concepts, with Darwinism, by Dhobzansky, Mayr, Simpson and others.