Can you explain this for me?

[steen]

Please explain morphology and geographic dispersal.

Does evolution consider the entirety of biology?

Pretty much. Or rather, all of biology leads back to Evolution.

Now, if you don't know the basics of biology and evolution, how can you speak against it?

 

[pastorkevin73]

Pretty much. Or rather, all of biology leads back to Evolution.

Now, if you don't know the basics of biology and evolution, how can you speak against it?

I have not spoken against it on this thread. Only asking question and I appreciate all who are taking time to answer my questions.

 

[steen]

I have not spoken against it on this thread.

But you have elsewhere. An now you are saying you don't even know what it is?

 

[gluadys]

Please explain morphology and geographic dispersal.

Does evolution consider the entirety of biology?

Morphology refers to the structure of the body; how many bones, how they are linked to each other, placement of muscles and their attachments, nerve pathways, etc.

Geographic dispersal is the study of how a species dispersed from its point of origin. Before he became famous for his studies of human sexuality, Dr. Alfred Kinsey was an entomologist who specialized in a sort of wasp that makes galls in tree bark. One puzzle he solved was the original place of origin of the wasp. He knew that they seldom travelled more than a few feet from their place of birth, and by collecting and collating samples from all around the world he was able to trace them back to their point of origin.

Yes, evolution covers the entirety of biology, as nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.

 

[Mallon]

Yes, evolution covers the entirety of biology, as nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.

You speak sooth, gluadys. Without evolution, biology would just be one big field of scattered, unrelated ideas. That's the strength of the theory. It is the glue that holds biology together. Creationism will have to do something similar if it is to move any further.

 

[pastorkevin73]

Morphology refers to the structure of the body; how many bones, how they are linked to each other, placement of muscles and their attachments, nerve pathways, etc.

Geographic dispersal is the study of how a species dispersed from its point of origin. Before he became famous for his studies of human sexuality, Dr. Alfred Kinsey was an entomologist who specialized in a sort of wasp that makes galls in tree bark. One puzzle he solved was the original place of origin of the wasp. He knew that they seldom travelled more than a few feet from their place of birth, and by collecting and collating samples from all around the world he was able to trace them back to their point of origin.

Yes, evolution covers the entirety of biology, as nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.

Thanks.

 

[pastorkevin73]

How does evolution explain symbiotic life?

 

[Mallon]

How does evolution explain symbiotic life?

I did some Googling for you, and here's what I found:

http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/S/Symbiosis.html#Evolution

http://invert.mlml.calstate.edu/evolution_55_9_1781-1794.pdfhttp://invert.mlml.calstate.edu/evolution_55_9_1781-1794.pdfhttp://invert.mlml.calstate.edu/evolution_55_9_1781-1794.pdf

http://www.biolbull.org/cgi/content/abstract/208/3/200

Relevent quotes:

It seems plausible that what begins as a parasitic relationship might over the course of time evolve into a mutualistic one as the two organisms evolve to minimize the damage to the host.

But it doesn't always work like that. There are other examples where a mutualistic relationship seems to have evolved into a commensalistic or even parasitic one. Some parasitic fungi seem to have evolved from ancestors living in the mutualistic partnership of a lichen.

Some of the bacteria living in our large intestine supply us with vitamin K, thus evolving from commensalism to mutualism.

 

[pastorkevin73]

How does evolution account for emotions and how did living creatures and humans evolve to have emotions?

 

[Mallon]

How does evolution account for emotions and how did living creatures and humans evolve to have emotions?

More Googling turned up this:
http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research/cep/emotion.html
Looks like it will answer these questions and more.

 

[pastorkevin73]

I did some Googling for you, and here's what I found:

http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/S/Symbiosis.html#Evolution

http://invert.mlml.calstate.edu/evolution_55_9_1781-1794.pdf

http://www.biolbull.org/cgi/content/abstract/208/3/200

Relevent quotes:

I read the above links. They don't seem to give an explaination for how creatures who are dependant upon another living thing in order to live (without symbiosys live being is unable to survive) were able to live before becoming dependant on another living thing. Also there doesn't seem to be an explanation for how these creatures ended up being being dependant on symbiosys. What answers might there be for this?

 

[Mallon]

I read the above links. They don't seem to give an explaination for how creatures who are dependant upon another living thing in order to live (without symbiosys live being is unable to survive) were able to live before becoming dependant on another living thing.

There's an example given in the first link:

In 1966, K. W. Jeon discovered a culture of amoebas that had become infected with bacteria (60,00 to 150,000 per cell). The infection slowed their rate of growth and made them much more fragile. But five years later, the amoebas still were infected but now no ill effects could be seen. Most interesting for our question, the amoebas — or at least their nuclei — had become dependent on the bacteria.

• When the nucleus was removed from an infected amoeba and replaced with one from a uninfected strain, the combination worked fine.
• But when the nucleus from an uninfected cell was replaced with one from an infected cell, the combination usually failed to survive.

Also there doesn't seem to be an explanation for how these creatures ended up being being dependant on symbiosys. What answers might there be for this?

From the same summary:

Evidently, after 5 years, the nuclei had become dependent on a bacterial function (an enzyme produced by the bacteria but no longer by the host). What started as parasitism had evolved into mutualism (the bacteria could not be grown outside their host).

If you have more questions, there are all kinds of references worth checking out at the end of some of those papers. Symbiotic relationships aren't my specialty.

 

[chesslord243]

evolution never said it got it right on the first try. what you're thinking of is spontaneous generation which is the explanation of how living organisms came into existence from non-living material.

 

[Dannager]

evolution never said it got it right on the first try. what you're thinking of is spontaneous generation which is the explanation of how living organisms came into existence from non-living material.

In modern scientific context, this is known as abiogenesis. The idea of spontaneous generation is a little out-dated, and now usually refers to the (falsified) concept of life coming from decaying biomatter (i.e., that maggots come from rotting meat).

 

[pastorkevin73]

evolution never said it got it right on the first try. what you're thinking of is spontaneous generation which is the explanation of how living organisms came into existence from non-living material.

If evolution didn't get it right the first time where would the "life" have come from additional attempts?

 

[pastorkevin73]

Where does life get the information to evolve inorder to improve what is need in order to survive?

 

[Mallon]

Where does life get the information to evolve inorder to improve what is need in order to survive?

Mutation and recombination worked on by natural selection. It's basic biology.

 

[pastorkevin73]

Mutation and recombination worked on by natural selection. It's basic biology.

I think I understand what you are saying. It seems that this has to do what what needs to change. How does mutation and recombination get the information for how to change?

 

[The Lady Kate]

I think I understand what you are saying. It seems that this has to do what what needs to change. How does mutation and recombination get the information for how to change?

Information for how to change? Mutation is change. Species pass on their genetic material when they reproduce...sometime, they don't pass it on perfectly, and something comes out differently. Those changes are mutations.

 

[gluadys]

I think I understand what you are saying. It seems that this has to do what what needs to change. How does mutation and recombination get the information for how to change?

To add to what Lady Kate said:

Mutation is change. Mutation happens whenever the genome is not copied perfectly. Mutation is the source of variation in various traits.

How does the genome get information on which changes to keep and which to discard? From the environment in which it finds itself. IOW through natural selection.

Recombination is a different matter. It does not deal with the variation in traits, but with the variation in individuals due to differing combinations of traits.

Here is the difference:

Suppose there is a population in which everyone has brown eyes. Then a mutation in the pigment-producing genes causes one person to have blue eyes and this is passed on to his/her descendants.

Now this trait (eye colour) exists in two variants.

That is genetic diversity due to mutation.


Suppose a population has two eye colours and two hair colours (black and red).

From the independent combination of these two traits one can get four unique individuals.

black hair + brown eyes
black hair + blue eyes
red hair + brown eyes
red hair + blue eyes

However such recombinations can only happen if there is already variation in the individual traits (hair colour, eye colour). If, as in our first example, the population only had brown eyes, then only two combinations could occur: black hair + brown eyes, red hair + brown eyes. It is only when mutation adds the new choice of blue as well as brown eyes that more combinations become possible.

Now suppose that a mutation occurred that affected hair colour, allowing for blonde as well as black and red. Now there are six possible combinations of hair and eye colour.

So mutation is fundamental to introducing variants in the first place. Natural selection comes into play when one of the variants is more adaptive than the others.