What did it all started with?

FrumiousBandersnatch

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as above here is the quote in larger context;

"For example in the Cambrian strata of rocks, vintage about 600 million years, are the oldest ones in which we find most of the major invertebrate groups. And we find many of them already in an advanced state of evolution, the very first time they appear. It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history."

If anyone claims that Dawkins actual intended meaning was 'we find a nice gradual process of evolution leading up to these fossils' rather I think that would be the misleading interpretation!
The relevant context follows the quote:

"Evolutionists of all stripes believe, however, that this really does represent a very large gap in the fossil record, a gap that is simply due to the fact that, for some reason, very few fossils have lasted from periods before about 600 million years ago."

He goes on to say that both Punctuationists and Gradualists agree on this.

That was 25 years ago. The gap in the fossil record has since been partially filled by finds of a variety of soft-bodied precursors.
 
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Guy Threepwood

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When a variation occurs that 'destroys a functional design', that individual is, by definition, less 'fit', so less likely to contribute those genes to the next generation. So the destructive variant genes do not persist long enough to go to fixation in the population.

Not true at all.

In fact that is one of the principle processes in mutation derived resistance of bacteria- the LOSS of the ability to digest and absorb what would otherwise be poison. It's not a gain of function but a loss of it.

And this is what we generally observe empirically in evolution- birds lose flight, fish lose sight, some organisms lose pigment or digestive capabilities through mutations.

We all understand how random errors create destruction, decay, degradation, aka entropy- nobody is debating that.

We all understand how you turn dinosaurs into muddy puddles- drop a huge rock on them

The opposite occurrence is a little bit trickier to explain by random error..
 
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Guy Threepwood

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The relevant context follows the quote:

"Evolutionists of all stripes believe, however, that this really does represent a very large gap in the fossil record, a gap that is simply due to the fact that, for some reason, very few fossils have lasted from periods before about 600 million years ago."

He goes on to say that both Punctuationists and Gradualists agree on this.

That was 25 years ago. The gap in the fossil record has since been partially filled by finds of a variety of soft-bodied precursors.

Well exactly- the observation is so well supported that not only Punctuationists and Gradualists but skeptics of all stripes, all agree there is a pronounced gap in the record. (many of them in fact) In stark contrast to the smooth graduated progression that Darwin predicted would be found.

Of course he presents his own excuse for the direct evidence not supporting Darwinism, it was also Darwin's reasoning that the Cambrian explosion must be simply an 'artifact of an incomplete record'

But as the record has become more complete, the explosions have become ever more explosive.

As Raup again noted- "ironically, we have even fewer examples of evolutionary transitions than we had in Darwin's time"
 
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tas8831

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The relevant context follows the quote:

"Evolutionists of all stripes believe, however, that this really does represent a very large gap in the fossil record, a gap that is simply due to the fact that, for some reason, very few fossils have lasted from periods before about 600 million years ago."

He goes on to say that both Punctuationists and Gradualists agree on this.

That was 25 years ago. The gap in the fossil record has since been partially filled by finds of a variety of soft-bodied precursors.
Prepare yourself for the Raup out of context quote any minute now...
 
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tas8831

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As Raup again noted- "ironically, we have even fewer examples of evolutionary transitions than we had in Darwin's time"

AND THERE IT IS!!! Hilarious - like clockwork...
 
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tas8831

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tas8831

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I'd agree; all the physics- chemistry- biology that makes life possible, requires information, and that this information is best accounted for by creative intelligence.
Quite a few leaps of creationist logic, there.
Can anything truly novel, ever come into existence without the creative power of a mind?
A creative human mind?
 
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Subduction Zone

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sticks and stones once more

I never read past personal accusations- there's not much point

'Insults are the most graceless form of conceding defeat'

If you have any substantive counter argument I would be interested in that.
Corrections are not necessarily insults. The "insult" comes from the person interpreting them.

Quote mining is never a wise debating technique. It makes the person that used a quote mine look like a liar and none of us want to look like liars.
 
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tas8831

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To evolve a single celled bacteria-like organism into a human being, new information is required, in the form of quaternary digital code- that part is hardly controversial is it?. Where that information comes from.. it is always difficult to entirely rule out random chance, as we cannot rule out a gambler playing 4 royal flushes in a row by chance . But I'd say there are less mathematically improbable explanations.
But you just employ magic.
Quite a cop out.
 
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tas8831

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sticks and stones once more

I never read past personal accusations- there's not much point

'Insults are the most graceless form of conceding defeat'

If you have any substantive counter argument I would be interested in that.
But you don't offer an actual argument.

Out of context quotes are DISHONEST, especially when you have been called on it dozens of times. So stop whining, and stop using dishonest antics.
 
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Subduction Zone

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Quote mining is a technique that only convinces the most ignorant of people. Dishonest people that agree with the quote miner will like it. But they are not convinced. People that understand the argument will not only laugh at the quote mine, and they now know that their opponent is not that bright, or is more than a bit dishonest. Yes, there is a very very slight chance that one will convince an ignorant person. But if the dishonesty is obvious enough to an honest believer it may backfire in that case. It is the sort of arguing that very very rarely helps one's position in any way and almost always causes one to lose the debate when one takes in what one's goals were into consideration.

Recap: Will it convince anyone? Maybe a few, but only temporarily. Those people are almost always lost when the quote mine is exposed. Does it help the miner's reputation? Only among Kool Aid drinkers.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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Not true at all.

In fact that is one of the principle processes in mutation derived resistance of bacteria- the LOSS of the ability to digest and absorb what would otherwise be poison. It's not a gain of function but a loss of it.

And this is what we generally observe empirically in evolution- birds lose flight, fish lose sight, some organisms lose pigment or digestive capabilities through mutations.

We all understand how random errors create destruction, decay, degradation, aka entropy- nobody is debating that.

We all understand how you turn dinosaurs into muddy puddles- drop a huge rock on them

The opposite occurrence is a little bit trickier to explain by random error..
In evolutionary terms 'functional' means contributing to fitness, i.e. having a selective advantage. It is certainly common that genes and pathways that cease to have a selective advantage degrade over time - but the mutations that degrade them are not 'destroying functional designs' as far as evolution is concerned; there is no disadvantage to losing them. Whether a gene is advantageous, disadvantageous, or neutral, is entirely contextual, and can vary over time - even in a single individual.
 
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tas8831

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Enough time for random errors to explain all the observed phenotypic novelty? in a few hundred generations!?
Tell us all about how you know that there must be some large number of "random errors" to produce it.
 
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tas8831

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When a variation occurs that 'destroys a functional design', that individual is, by definition, less 'fit', so less likely to contribute those genes to the next generation. So the destructive variant genes do not persist long enough to go to fixation in the population.
We have to remember that this guy is a "DNA operates exactly like computer software" creationist.
 
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Guy Threepwood

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In evolutionary terms 'functional' means contributing to fitness, i.e. having a selective advantage. It is certainly common that genes and pathways that cease to have a selective advantage degrade over time - but the mutations that degrade them are not 'destroying functional designs' as far as evolution is concerned; there is no disadvantage to losing them. Whether a gene is advantageous, disadvantageous, or neutral, is entirely contextual, and can vary over time - even in a single individual.

That's why it is important to focus on the more objective information problem v the more subjective 'function' problem:

Of course losing the ability to digest certain chemical compounds means a bacteria can 'gain fitness' to survive it's competition, at least in the short term in a niche environment... as a bear losing it's ability to produce pigment in it's fur might do likewise in the Arctic.
But you see the problem here in extrapolating losses into macro-evolutionary gains:

Clearly you cannot get from a bacteria to a human by merely destroying existing functional information! Unless that bacteria comes preloaded with higher functions that merely require activation- removal of 'locks' and this is certainly increasingly considered as a possible solution to the problem, but Darwinism it aint!

Again the problem is not how random error destroys functional information (advantageously or not), that's very easy to test and observe.
The problem is how random errors could ever possibly create vast new volumes of functional information at the quality & quantity needed to account for events like the Cambrian- even in a trillion years, far less a few million.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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Well exactly- the observation is so well supported that not only Punctuationists and Gradualists but skeptics of all stripes, all agree there is a pronounced gap in the record. (many of them in fact) In stark contrast to the smooth graduated progression that Darwin predicted would be found.

Of course he presents his own excuse for the direct evidence not supporting Darwinism, it was also Darwin's reasoning that the Cambrian explosion must be simply an 'artifact of an incomplete record'

But as the record has become more complete, the explosions have become ever more explosive.
I already dealt with these points. Repetition doesn't make them more persuasive.

As Raup again noted- "ironically, we have even fewer examples of evolutionary transitions than we had in Darwin's time"
Again, the selective quoting; did you get a copy of the Bumper Book of Creationist Quote-mines?

Raup followed that quote with, "what appeared to be a nice simple progression when relatively few data were available now appear to be much more complex and much less gradualistic".

Raup was questioning how well Darwin's mechanism of evolution by natural selection was reflected in the fossil record - he said, "We must distinguish between the fact of evolution -- defined as change in organisms over time -- and the explanation of this change."

IOW what we have discovered is not the simple lineages the limited fossil record suggested, but a more complicated picture of cross-breeding and hybridisation that means we now have multiple potential routes from ancestor species to descendent species, and we can't be sure that the particular species we thought were directly transitional actually are. This is particularly true for human evolution. It just means we have less certainty of the specific relationships between descendent species or sub-species and ancestral species. But for the more recent ancestral relationships, we have a better tool than the fossil record - genetics.
 
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Guy Threepwood

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Again, the selective quoting; did you get a copy of the Bumper Book of Creationist Quote-mines?

Actually it is from a bulletin Raup wrote titled "Conflicts between Darwin and Paleontology' and I would recommend anyone read the whole thing if there is any confusion about the context.

Not surprisingly it turns out to be about conflicts between Darwin and paleontology.


Raup followed that quote with, "what appeared to be a nice simple progression when relatively few data were available now appear to be much more complex and much less gradualistic".

Raup was questioning how well Darwin's mechanism of evolution by natural selection was reflected in the fossil record - he said, "We must distinguish between the fact of evolution -- defined as change in organisms over time -- and the explanation of this change."
.

^ again, I couldn't agree more. I've also been accused of 'quote mining' for posting this exact quote! So I'll quote your 'quote mining' here in future :)

we can't be sure that the particular species we thought were directly transitional actually are. This is particularly true for human evolution. It just means we have less certainty of the specific relationships between descendent species or sub-species and ancestral species.

^ ditto
 
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tas8831

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The problem is how random errors could ever possibly create vast new volumes of functional information at the quality & quantity needed to account for events like the Cambrian- even in a trillion years, far less a few million.
Kimura, M. (1961). Natural selection as the process of accumulating genetic information in adaptive evolution. Genetical Research, 2(1), 127-140. doi:10.1017/S0016672300000616
 
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Hans Blaster

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Enough time for random errors to explain all the observed phenotypic novelty? in a few hundred generations!?

Seems to be.

It's my understanding of the "punctuated equilibrium" model that variations and mutations build during the long equilibrium periods with modest or little pressure to change, but when hard stressors occur to a population, the accumulated variation is rapidly selected from based on the usefulness of some genetic forms rather than others and rapidly change the balance of the surviving population.

But, it's been along time since I read anything about it...
 
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