Creationists: Explain your understanding of microevolution and macroevolution

[Alan Kleinman]

Okay, no. I have no problem with overturning macroevolution. I'm skeptical about everything. But I have a fundamental problem with this argument.

The thing is that we're not looking for a specific outcome. If a mutation occurs, the probability that the mutation occurred is 1. If another mutation occurs, the probability that the mutation occurred is 1. You keep doing that until you have many mutations, and multiply the probabilities together, and you still get 1. We had to come up with some combination at the end. Doesn't matter what combination.

With evolution, we have a population of organism with an assortment of alleles. A selection pressure comes along (or just genetic drift even). The frequency of alleles changes. Barring extinction, we have microevolution. The probability is 1 that some kind of change happened. Adding up many changes over a great many generations, and you're going to end up with a large change. This is not a difficult concept.

This math isn't based on looking for a specific outcome. When a variant does 1/(mutation rate) replications, that on average will give some member of that population a mutation at every possible site in the genome. If the variant does about 4/(mutation rate) replications, every possible base substitution is randomly tried. There are no other possible outcomes that could occur (unless you want to consider frameshift mutations).

 

[Hans Blaster]

You are still not quite getting the math. There are two random trials in the microevolutionary adaptation process. There is the replication random trial and then there is the mutation which also is a random trial. Usually, when people talk about the mutation rate, it is the probability or frequency at which any mutation occurs at the given site in the genome. The beneficial mutation rate will be slightly less, probably somewhere in the range of 1/3 to 1/4 of the any mutation rate. Even if you want to use a higher mutation rate, it doesn't negate the multiplication rule when computing the accumulation of adaptation mutations on a lineage and that's where the huge population requirements come into play. If you want to use 1e-8 for the human mutation rate, fine, so it only takes 100,000,000 replications in a lineage to accumulate each adaptational mutation in a single selection pressure environment. Last I checked, the real world is not a single selection pressure environment.

Oh Alan, it's not the math that I distrust, it's the application of it to the problem.

You have a billion replications to work with for the number of humans that existed from 10,000 years ago to the first appearance of humans. For an any mutation rate of 1e-9, that's a sufficient number of replications to get on average 1 member in that population with a mutation at every possible site in the genome. It would take about 4e9 replications to get on average every possible base substitution. Use an any mutation rate of 1e-8 then those billion replications would give on average 10 members out of that billion population with a mutation at any given site in the genome. You would have to divide that number 10 by 3 or 4 to take into account that it can't be just any mutation at the given site but the base substitution that gives an improvement in fitness.

10 divided by 3 or 4. That's how many adaptive mutations showed up in the human genome from the dawn of man to the dawn of agriculture?

We have ancient DNA samples that bracket these times (or at least get close to the start of mankind). How many changes have been seen in these genomes? How many can be considered adaptive? What does the literature say about it?

You have the numbers to get variants with the sickle cell trait or a mutation that makes them better at digesting grain, but you simply don't have the numbers to get a lineage that can accumulate more than a tiny number of adaptive mutations.

Starch digestion is an issue *after* the beginning of grain growing, so you've placed it in the wrong time period. (Sickle cell may be as well, but I don't have the reference handy.)

 

[Alan Kleinman]

Then what was it?

Make a random guess.

 

[Alan Kleinman]

I think you'll find that the recommendation is to reduce unnecessary use of antibiotics, e.g. for viral infections.

Tell us, how common is coinfection of influenza with a bacterial infection?

 

[pitabread]

Make a random guess.

I'm not interested in guessing. What do you think it is?

Why can't you just give a straight answer?

 

[Hans Blaster]

Make a random guess.

That's not how this works. You made a claim that human intellect didn't come from random mutations (and selection). If you don't know, just say "I don't know."

 

[pitabread]

The math I've presented addresses a specific component of biological evolution, that of microevolutionary adaptation. If you want to introduce competition or recombination, you have to superimpose the mathematics. But students of dumbbell mathematics don't understand the concept of superposition in mathematics and how to do it.

I guess you're incapable of humbling yourself in that respect. Oh well, we've seen where it's gotten you.

What was that quote again about insanity and doing the same thing over and over?

 

[Alan Kleinman]

Oh Alan, it's not the math that I distrust, it's the application of it to the problem.

Why don't you check the literature a find any other explanation of the mathematics of the Kishony and Lenski experiments? Even Lenski is still muddling around trying to figure out the mathematics of his own experiment. He doesn't understand why competition slows adaptation in his experiment. He should read my paper if he wants to understand why.

10 divided by 3 or 4. That's how many adaptive mutations showed up in the human genome from the dawn of man to the dawn of agriculture?

That's the number of members that will appear with base substitutions at any given site in the genome, Some will be adaptive, others neutral, and others may be detrimental.

We have ancient DNA samples that bracket these times (or at least get close to the start of mankind). How many changes have been seen in these genomes? How many can be considered adaptive? What does the literature say about it?

You can see lots of changes, what was the number you used, 120 mutations/per replication? To be considered adaptive, they would have to increase reproductive fitness. The growth in the human population coincides with the dawn of agriculture. So what mutation(s) do you think allows humans to do agriculture and chimpanzees not?

Starch digestion is an issue *after* the beginning of grain growing, so you've placed it in the wrong time period. (Sickle cell may be as well, but I don't have the reference handy.)

Any of the single adaptive mutations would have occurred in the first 4/(mutation rate) replications. That's the number of replications for at least one occurrence of every possible base substitution in the genome in a population of that size.

 

[Alan Kleinman]

I guess you're incapable of humbling yourself in that respect. Oh well, we've seen where it's gotten you.

What was that quote again about insanity and doing the same thing over and over?

I'm not the one that thinks that bacteria can evolve into humans.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Why don't you check the literature a find any other explanation of the mathematics of the Kishony and Lenski experiments? Even Lenski is still muddling around trying to figure out the mathematics of his own experiment. He doesn't understand why competition slows adaptation in his experiment. He should read my paper if he wants to understand why.

'Cause I'm not the one pretending to be a biologist and making scientific claims about evolution based on my work. That's *YOU*.

 

[pitabread]

I'm not the one that thinks that bacteria can evolve into humans.

Okay. And?

 

[Alan Kleinman]

That's not how this works. You made a claim that human intellect didn't come from random mutations (and selection). If you don't know, just say "I don't know."

I don't have a scientific explanation but I can give you a story that sounds much more logical than this notion that life started in some primordial soup and then some simple replicator through a process of random mutation and natural selection evolved into people. Before macroevolutionists make those kinds of claims, they at least be able to explain the Kishony and Lenski evolutionary experiments.

 

[pitabread]

I can give you a story that sounds much more logical than this notion that life started in some primordial soup and then some simple replicator through a process of random mutation and natural selection evolved into people.

And that story is... ?

 

[Alan Kleinman]

'Cause I'm not the one pretending to be a biologist and making scientific claims about evolution based on my work. That's *YOU*.

Shouldn't biologists be able to explain the simplest biological evolutionary experiments? And you said I didn't address competition with my math. I gave a link to a paper that explains how this is done. It's really a very straightforward accounting problem.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Shouldn't biologists be able to explain the simplest biological evolutionary experiments?

Deflection.

And you said I didn't address competition with my math. I gave a link to a paper that explains how this is done. It's really a very straightforward accounting problem.

I'm looking at it, but I have much more important things to do. Science things.

 

[Alan Kleinman]

And that story is... ?

Don't be silly, you just want to change the subject because you can give us an experimental example of macroevolution. And when are you going to discuss Joe Felsenstein's "Theoretical Evolutionary Genetics" modern evolutionary biology text and explain macroevolution? Show us which equation explains why combination therapy works for the treatment of HIV.

 

[pitabread]

Don't be silly, you just want to change the subject

No, I'm just wondering why you can never give a straight answer.

Every time someone asks you to explain what you actually believe, *you* keep changing the subject.

Why is that? What are you so afraid of?

(If you're worried we won't take you seriously, I promise we're already well past that point. You've really got nothing to lose.)

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Tell us, how common is coinfection of influenza with a bacterial infection?

I have no idea. You tell me.

 

[Alan Kleinman]

Deflection

What makes someone a biologist? Do they have to believe that reptiles evolve into birds and fish evolve into mammals? What makes a person an engineer is that they can explain the physics and mathematics of engineering systems. Biologists should be able to explain the physics and mathematics of biological systems.

I'm looking at it, but I have much more important things to do. Science things.

Take your time. The Lenski paper may be easier to understand if you study and understand Haldane's "Cost of Natural Selection" paper.

 

[Alan Kleinman]

I have no idea. You tell me.

There's lots of literature on the subject, here's an example:
Secondary bacterial infections in influenza virus infection pathogenesis - PubMed
It is not unusual for those that die with influenza don't die from the virus but from secondary bacterial pneumonia and sepsis.