Darwin's Evolution?

[AtheistArchon]

So we do not know that actual radiation occurred? If we do know then do we know the cause of this radiation? You say it is a blanket term. Is the word... radiation used in place of the correct name of God? Can we use radiation in our laboratory to alter goop into a fish?

- This isn't radiation as in radioactivity, this is radiation as in many rays radiate from a single point.

- For example, take your hand.  Your fingers radiate from your palm.  When Jerry uses this term, he means that there were many new species springing up in a short amount of time from a relatively small number of originals.  "Big radiation" in this case is just a measurement, really.

I will not question this point. I understand that the human mind would want to bridge gaps in knowledge.

- Okay, but remember that we still have evidence that these species existed, we just haven't seen any fossils yet.

But truthfully... can modifications add? Where does the additional genetic information come from that have never existed up into this point? We are not talking of cross breeding.

For example if an animal was able to developed the trait of invisibility. Where would he get the ability to change his DNA to allow this? I know this is far fetched, but not any more so then a lump of goop becoming a fish and onward into a human without any help from God. For If there was no where to gather the information to add to its DNA then it would seem to be just as impossible. No?

- Mutations happen randomly.  Most, in fact the very great majority, are not beneficial at all.  Some are never noticed (by evolutionary forces), and some are actually detrimental, like... being born with one lung.

- But to answer your question, the changes happen due to random mutations.  It's seldom a very large leap at one time... but the effects do accumulate.  They accumulate because the environment treats critters with better survivability gentler, and is more prone to kill off those critters who aren't as well adapted.  Over time, we see less and less of the original, and more and more of the new generation.  As such, the critters with beneficial mutations outbreed the others, and perhaps the originals even die out completely.  Our new breed is better at surviving (in their current environment), but it still is undergoing the same random mutations during reproduction, and so they continue to evolve... changes add up until you have a completely new species.

This would have to be wrong. Our world is orderly… not chaotic. Is this similar to the radiation that you do not have a name for. I will tell you ... it is God.

- Sure, maybe it's God.  But if so, then God is responsible for some real random, chaotic messes.

Transfer is not the answer. I cannot give that which I have not first received.

- Not 'give' as much as 'replicate'.  Single-celled organisms, remember?

Again all this summing up leaves me blank. Gene flow, genetic drift, random selection, nothing adds and ingredient that was not there before.

- Sure... genetic mutation does.  Sometimes it's beneficial, most of the time it's not.

You are saying ... 2= 1+1

I am saying... 1+1=2

But my question is where did you find your other one to add upon the original? Mine came from God.

- Other what?  Other genes?  It takes two people to reproduce.

I will check out this site again. But I have not found it to be a true search for truth.

- Keep an open mind... just because they don't mention God doesn't mean that they are wrong, or delusional.

Can genetic engineering add a trait that here to for has never existed in the natural world? If no... Then neither can natural selection. For natural selection to work the selection must be available.

- Natural selection doesn't refer to the selection of new traits, it refers to the selection of critters within their environment.

- A polar bear in Death Valley isn't going to be selected by nature to survive for very long.  A Toucan isn't going to be selected by nature to survive in the Antarctic.  Human beings aren't going to be selected to survive on the moon (without bringing our own atmosphere).

- Think of it this way.  Nature (the environment) is the judge of which animals live and die within it.  If the environment is hot and humid, then animals that evolve there are naturally not going to successfully evolve wooly coats and lots of fat deposits, like wooly mammoths.  They would be de-selected from that environment.  Nature selects the animals with the best traits for that environment.

Evolution without God does not stand up to reason.

- Sure it does... there are no miracles in evolutionary theory. 

 

[RufusAtticus]

Originally posted by Lanakila
Stormy you have hit the problem that causes many to reject chemicals to man evolution. Where did the new information in the DNA come from. This article talks about this: http://www.creationdigest.com/EvolutionTrainsAComin.htm

Lanakila,

Did we already go through this in this thread? That biologists do know what produces new information and that "no new information" claims are hardly relevant to real-world biology.

Here is my last post to which you never responded:

As best as I can tell this is Hubby's argument, feel free to correct as necessary.

1. DNA contains information.
2. Selection only works with information, it does not create it.
3. Mutation cannot add information.
4. Evolution requires the addition of information. (Not expressly stated, but it is implied.)
5. Thus evolution cannot explain the diversity of life.

1 & 2 are applicable to biology, no one disputes that.
3 & 4 & 5 are not.

3 has only been asserted but not shown. In fact, Hubby hasn’t really explained why gene duplication and divergence is not considered an addition of information in this scheme. He also hasn’t addressed the nature of information in a population, which is essential if there is an appeal to limits of selection.

4 neglects the fact that evolution still occurs whenever populations change, even if the total amount of information does not. Evolution even occurs with the loss of alleles, although I think you have admitted that.

5 is an invalid conclusion since evolution is more than mutation plus selection.

The biggest hole in the argument so far is 3. That is where Hubby should concentrate his efforts in applying theory to biology, if he wants to prove his argument.

Here is also part of an email I sent to Chase.


INFORMATION
Individuals don't evolve. Populations do. So in linking information theory to evolution, you must consider the information in the population, which you do not do. Biologically, information can refer to different things. Pseudogenes, contain information about evolutionary history but not information that can be selected for. In the context of this discussion, it would be better for us to consider the genetic information underlying traits, with an interest in adaptable traits. It is difficult to determine a way to measure the amount of this information, but one possibility is the size of the proteome. This is the number of unique proteins produced in the population and includes all loci and alleles. Whenever a mutation produces a novel allele, it adds information to the population. In other words, there is a new trait for selection to act upon. Here are two examples of the effects of information in a population.

Jeff knows something about Gina: "Gina is neat." Thus he has information about Gina. Before he leaves town, Jeff replicates this information by telling it to two people, Nick and Randy. Because neither of them pays attention, they don’t replicate the information exactly. Nick thinks "Gina is sweat," and Randy thinks "Gina is near." We can measure the about of information about Gina by the number of non-redundant attributes people ascribe to her. Here, the amount of information about Gina has doubled: from "neat" to "sweat and near." Clearly when we remember that it is the population that’s important to evolution, it is obvious how mutations can add information for selection to act upon.

Take this example retrieved from LocusLink [7], the only difference occurs in the 7th codon (6th amino acid because the first one, 'm,' gets cut off). The letters refer to amino acids [8].

Human Beta-hemoglobin (HBB)
  1 mvhltpeeks avtalwgkvn vdevggealg rllvvypwtq rffesfgdls tpdavmgnpk
 61 vkahgkkvlg afsdglahld nlkgtfatls elhcdklhvd penfrllgnv lvcvlahhfg
121 keftppvqaa yqkvvagvan alahkyh

HBB-S
  1 mvhltpveks avtalwgkvn vdevggealg rllvvypwtq rffesfgdls tpdavmgnpk
 61 vkahgkkvlg afsdglahld nlkgtfatls elhcdklhvd penfrllgnv lvcvlahhfg
121 keftppvqaa yqkvvagvan alahkyh

HBB-C
  1 mvhltpkeks avtalwgkvn vdevggealg rllvvypwtq rffesfgdls tpdavmgnpk
 61 vkahgkkvlg afsdglahld nlkgtfatls elhcdklhvd penfrllgnv lvcvlahhfg
121 keftppvqaa yqkvvagvan alahkyh

Each allele does not encode the same information since each one produces a distinctly different product. A single point mutation has enough effect on the information contained in the genome that it can determine whether an individual dies from malaria or not. In the presence of malaria, HBB-S is maintained because of heterozygote advantage. However, HBB-C also offers resistance to malaria, but the most fit genotype is the homozygote.[9] It is expected to become the most common allele in parts of Africa if the environment stays the same. These mutations have clearly added new information to the population. Selection then acts on this new information, changing the make up of the population. Thus, evolution happens.

It is important to realize that evolution occurs even if information is lost. It also occurs when information is gain or without any change in the amount of information at all. Thus no-new-information arguments do not actually address evolutionary theory. By focusing on individuals and not populations, no-new-information claims never even get close to disproving evolution. In fact, the actual claim, when applied to biology, is that the information capacity of an individual's genome cannot increase. However, this claim is false because there are known types of mutations that can increase the length of the genome and thus its capacity to hold information. Ernst Mayr discusses this origin of new genes in his latest book.

“Bacteria and even the oldest eukaryotes (protists) have a rather small genome. . . . This raises the question: By what process is a new gene produced? This occurs, most frequently, by the doubling of an existing gene and its insertion in the chromosome in tandem next to the parental gene. In due time the new gene may adopt a new function and the ancestral gene with its traditional function will then be referred to as the orthologous gene. It is through orthologous genes that the phylogeny of genes is traced. The derived gene, coexisting with the ancestral gene, is called paralogous. Evolutionary diversification is, to a large extent, effected by the production of paralogous genes. The doubling sometimes affects not merely a single gene, but a whole chromosome set or even an entire genome.” [10]

7. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/LocusLink/
8. http://www.chem.qmul.ac.uk/iupac/AminoAcid/AA1n2.html
9. Modiano D. et al. (2001) Haemoglobin C protects against clinical plasmodium falciparum malaria. Nature: 414 pp 305-308
10. Mayr E. (2001) What Evolution Is. Basic Books.

 

[Stormy]

AtheistArchon: I love you for taking the time and having the desire to explain to me. But if you re-read your post you have only covered either subtraction or scattering of information and Dna. You do not hit upon new creation.

Do you think an animal could develope the trait of invisibility?

If not why?

 

[Stormy]

The biggest hole in the argument so far is 3. That is where Hubby should concentrate his efforts in applying theory to biology, if he wants to prove his argument.

Mutation cannot add information

RufusAtticus: Then explain this to me. I will be indebted to you and love you forever. How can something that is not of this natural world become true. How can something be given that does not exist? How is it that a frog that has never even imagined a bird can grow wings and fly? While I stand hopelessly on the ground.

I really want those wings!

 

[Stormy]

Jerry: I will wait patiently for your answer. If it doesn't come easily... Try a prayer.

May God Bless us all!

 

[AtheistArchon]

AtheistArchon: I love you for taking the time and having the desire to explain to me.

- Hey, this stuff isn't easy.  I'm still learning it myself!

But if you re-read your post you have only covered either subtraction or scattering of information and Dna. You do not hit upon new creation.

- Ah, I understand.  Are you asking where the very first life forms came from?

- The 'creation' of life actually isn't a facet of evolution.  Evolution can only work incrementally... with parts and pieces already in existence, using minor 'new' mutations.  (This, by the way, is the difference between something being incrementally complex vs. irriducibly complex.  Evolution works in increments, styling new species out of 'old' ones, not all at once, with one animal giving birth to a brand new species out of thin air.)

- Now, I can hear what you're saying.  You're saying that evolution must come into play at some point when we talk about the first life forms, and in a sense you'd be right.  But evolutionary theory cannot tell us how those first, original life forms came about.  Only how they speciated... only how they evolved.

- Maybe God made them.  Maybe they traveled through space in the tail of a comet from another civilization (which doesn't really answer the question of where life came from, I realize).  Maybe they came about via the lucky combination of organic molecules in an ancient earth atmosphere.

Do you think an animal could develope the trait of invisibility?

- I don't see how.    Invisibility is probably impossible anyhow... you wouldn't be able to see anything if you were invisible because our eyes work by projecting images onto a visible surface.  If no part of our body had a visible surface, we wouldn't be able to see anything.

- Plus, I'm not sure if there's any elements we could ever be composed of that don't reflect light. 

[EDIT: Now that I think about it, nature has developed invisibility, if by invisible you mean 'not being seen'.  Simple camouflage does the trick, like a moth being brown like the color of a tree trunk.]

 

[RufusAtticus]

Originally posted by Stormy
RufusAtticus: Then explain this to me. I will be indebted to you and love you forever. How can something that is not of this natural world become true.

I'm guessing you are refering to my comments about applying theory to the real word. In modern science, doing "theory" involves coming up with mathematical or computation models of the world. These models can be analysed using mathematics and logic to make predictions about the real word. This allows them to be tested for appropriatenss and accuracy. Every theoretical model has a set of assumptions that set up the parameters for it to act in. The most important task of theoreticians is to insure that the assumptions reflect real world conditions. For instance, I can build a theory around how the atmosphere is 100% helium, but unless our atomosphere is 100% helium it's not going to have much application anytime soon.

How can something be given that does not exist? How is it that a frog that has never even imagined a bird can grow wings and fly? While I stand hopelessly on the ground.

I hope you get those wings some day.

 

[AtheistArchon]

How can something be given that does not exist? How is it that a frog that has never even imagined a bird can grow wings and fly?

- Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you're not talking about theory, but the actual evolution new species.  Right?

- Lots of things happen that were never imagined.  Firstly, amphibians (like frogs) didn't simply sprout wings one day and become birds.  The space between amphibians and birds is quite large, in fact, with many animals inbetween.  Also keep in mind that the first animals to fly with wings weren't actually birds at all. 

I really want those wings!

- And if a bird were intelligent enough to know better, he or she might want a bigger brain, like us.    We just didn't evolve with the ability to fly.  We don't need to in order to survive.

- Now, if our environment were somehow hostile to us, and survivability was enhanced by being able to fly, then there would be environmental pressure to evolve a way to fly (without machines).  However, fat chance there unless we had a few million years to let the changes happen, and even then the chance is huge that we'd simply go extinct rather than succeed in evolving a way to fly.  A far more likely result would be that some other animal that can already fly would survive instead of us, and it would continue to evolve until perhaps it gained intelligence enough to be sentient.  In that case, smart birds would rule the world, just like the dinosaurs once did.

 

[Stormy]

Evolution can only work incrementally... with parts and pieces already in existence, using minor 'new' mutations.

Exactly the point I am making.

- I don't see how. Invisibility is probably impossible anyhow... you wouldn't be able to see anything if you were invisible because our eyes work by projecting images onto a visible surface. If no part of our body had a visible surface, we wouldn't be able to see anything.

That is by the laws of this dimension. I know you will not grasp that the mind can travel and see what is not the surrounding that the body occupies. Don't worry I do not need you to understand.

[EDIT: Now that I think about it, nature has developed invisibility, if by invisible you mean 'not being seen'. Simple camouflage does the trick, like a moth being brown like the color of a tree trunk.]

Since you brought this up. Tell me how? If you tell me that the chameleon has developed this trait to protect itself. I will have to ask you how an animal that cannot see color would even know that this would provide protection.

Evolutionist Scientists look at things and travel backwards to discover their path. But I am asking you to test their theory by walking forward from the beginning of life.

You are telling me that a frog could in time become a creature that is not upon the earth…. A bird. Now if the bird existed and the frog learned to sing instead of croak maybe they could get together and swap DNA. But there is no such DNA to trade. The frog sits upon the rock and waits.

When I was a little girl I longed for my Prince Charming. One hot summer day while playing in a creek I found that big fat green frog sitting upon his rock. I closed my eyes and said the wish. After... I opened my eyes and I began to cry. I cannot explain the disappointment when my frog did not become my true love.

I have grown and I know that what I wanted was not logical. Only God can change a frog into a Prince… or a bird for that matter!

But this is a win win situation… For if you prove me wrong… I am going to get my wings!

Tell me what would humans have to do to develope wings?

 

[AtheistArchon]

Exactly the point I am making.

- Then you're interested in abiogenesis, not evolution.  You're interested in the first forms of life on earth, not the speciation of life.  Correct?

That is by the laws of this dimension. I know you will not grasp that the mind can travel and see what is not the surrounding that the body occupies. Don't worry I do not need you to understand.

- Um, okay.  But can we agree that invisibility is impossible in this dimension?    I usually don't argue with references to any others, personally.

Since you brought this up. Tell me how? If you tell me that the chameleon has developed this trait to protect itself. I will have to ask you how an animal that cannot see color would even know that this would provide protection.

- The animal doesn't know that it provides protection.

- A moth which is the same color of a tree trunk has no power over what color it is.  The environment selected it because it happened to match, and because of that it's harder to detect by predators.

- That means that moths that are the color of local tree trunks have a leg up on the other moths that do not!  More tree-colored moths are going to survive, and therefore more of them are going to be able to reproduce, overwhelming the others, and possibly pushing them into extinction.  Thus, nature has selected the moth that has camo over one that is bright orange and sits on a brown tree trunk.

You are telling me that a frog could in time become a creature that is not upon the earth…. A bird.

- No no.  I'm saying that amphibians evolved into more complex life forms over time, including, along the way, birds.  Yes, there was once a time when there were amphibians and no birds.

Now if the bird existed and the frog learned to sing instead of croak maybe they could get together and swap DNA. But there is no such DNA to trade. The frog sits upon the rock and waits.

- You still don't understand.  Evolution does not dictate that two species must breed with each other.

- Let me start over.  Let's say we have reptiles and amphibians, but birds have not evolved yet.  Evidence we see today suggests that birds evolved from dinosaurs (reptiles) which in turn are offshoots of amphibians.  These changes happen s l o w l y, never quickly, never within just a few generations.  Small changes add up over time to produce the species we see today.  Does that make sense?

 

[Stormy]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you're not talking about theory, but the actual evolution new species. Right?

You are right. Theory can only take you so far without facts to back them up.

Lots of things happen that were never imagined. Firstly, amphibians (like frogs) didn't simply sprout wings one day and become birds. The space between amphibians and birds is quite large, in fact, with many animals in-between. Also keep in mind that the first animals to fly with wings weren't actually birds at all.

When Darwin first talked of evolution we did not know too much if anything about genetics. We still have far to go and may never master this field. But you are trying to tell me that the fish developed legs and thus his DNA was changed. I am telling you ... NO! The DNA would first have to be altered so that the fish could grow legs.

For within the tadpole is the entire DNA that will one day turn him into a frog.

(But not a Prince) LOL

So am I to believe that all the DNA of the world was within that goop.

I think that thought … far too hard to fabricate.

 

[Stormy]

I am running one post behind you. I have to leave for now... work calls.

But I will get back with you all at the childrens nap-time.

Thanks!

 

[AtheistArchon]

You are right. Theory can only take you so far without fact to back them up.

- Actually, in science, theories all must be based on empirical evidnece (facts).  Scientific theories aren't guesses. 

When Darwin first talked of evolution we did not know too mush if anything about genetics. We still have far to go and may never master this field. But you are trying to tell me that the fish developed legs and thus his DNA was changed.

- No, I'm not saying this...

I am telling you ... NO! The DNA would first have to be altered so that the fish could grow legs.

- Yes!  Changed via mutations.

So am I to believe that all the DNA of the world was within that goop.

- Well, yes and no.  Yes, it held the same overall structure (as all life does).  No, it didn't have code in it for tadpoles, birds, and humans back then.  That coding had to evolve, slowly, over millions and millions of years.

 

[unworthyone]

Is abiogenesis a fact? Is there any empirical evidence of abiogenesis ever occurring?

 

[sampo]

I don't know that I can add anything to the brilliant responses presented already, but I am having a little trouble understanding what you are asking as well. It seems to me that you are challenging someone to prove you wrong. That can't be done. Science cannot show conclusively that life on earth evolved to the complexity that we see today from simple, single celled organisms in the sea, any more than you can offer proof of divine creation. Science can, however, make predictions based on observations, fossil records, etc. to come up with theories as to what might have happened. If you truly believed in evolution then you would not find it so hard to understand how a single-celled creature could diversify and eventually produce all the we know. It is possible, and it does not take a miracle for it to take place. Has it been observed? No, and it never will be. This would be a process that would take millions, nay billions of years to produce.

YOu seem to misunderstand evolution somewhat. Evolution does not deal with the origins of life, nor is it an attempt to make man out of monkeys. Further, evolution is no longer a theory, but a time tested and proven fact. It is taught in school because it is an undeniable fact. Evolution is a process that developed after the first life forms appeared.

This link may help you out a bit. http://www.biology-online.org/9/1a_first_life.htm

It seems to me that you are looking for answers to questions that you do not want the answers to. Talk.origins is an excellent website for information on all of this. Granted, it is not written by christians or those who think that it was all created by a divine entity. Most science you find will not be. If you truly want answers, then you will have to look for them without your preconceptions, and without being so firm in your beliefs in regards to life forming on this (or any other) planet. I am not saying give up your belief in god the creator, but unless you are willing to admit that your scenario is perhaps not the correct one then the answers you seek will remain elusive. Does that make sense?

BTW - I am not downing you or your beliefs. I don't know (for certain) how life emerged. No one does. Nor do I discount the possibility of it having been created. The truth is I don't know. I am open enough to allow any reasonable possibility however, and make my decisions based on evidence, testing and observation. It is impossible to derive any evidence at all, however, when invoking divine intervention to explain it all. Your belief in the creator is more a declaration of faith than anything. It is un-testable and un-falsifiable. If you are looking to be proven wrong it isn't gonna happen, because it can't happen. Just keep in mind that this simple fact does not make you right. If that is your belief, then there is no need for you to question. If you are not sure, then question away! You seem pretty convinced though. Why should it matter to you what other people think?

 

[Jerry Smith]

Originally posted by unworthyone
Is abiogenesis a fact? Is there any empirical evidence of abiogenesis ever occurring?

No, it isn't a known fact. The only evidence that it occurred is highly circumstantial. The reason many scientists believe it occurred is that it would explain more economically than other natural hypotheses how the first primitive life came to be. That doesn't make it fact though. It is still somewhat in the realm of speculation.

 

[Stormy]

I am not downing you or your beliefs. I don't know how life evolved. No one does. Nor do I discount the possibility of it having been created. The truth is I don't know.

Is this the way evolution is taught in the schools?

You ask me to look objectively. I admit that is not possible. I have seen and experienced the supernatural in ways that would be convincing to even the most adamant objector. But it seems that nothing satisfies my curious nature... when I have a light of truth I want a beam instead. For even though I believe God did it. It still leaves me with the hows and whys.

Plus I do not want man to rob from the children the truth of life. Is that what is happening to the youth of today? Are they learning of a world created by the thoughts of man… excluding the Truth of God?

Back to my original questions... they are still not answered.

 

[Chris†opher Paul]

Cant we see things like gnats or flies changing into other life forms, since they only live for a day or so? How come things that mate from different species will produce sterile offspring?

 

[sampo]

That last line pretty much sums up what I have said, and defines your problem in seeking answers. I am a curious person by nature as well, and being such, the only way my questions can be satisfied is with evidence. If you truly believe that god is the truth, then you are asking questions just for the sake of asking them, and not because you want any real and factual answers. You have your answer!

I am not sure how they teach evolution in schools. I have not been in a classroom in some time. I am quite sure that NO ONE would state as a fact any scenario involving the emergence of life on earth. Evolution is taught as fact, because it is a fact. Creation cannot be taught in school because other than words in a book written when mans understanding of the world around them was VERY limited, there is not a shred of evidence to support it. Would you want your children to be taught that Jack really did kill a giant who lived at the top of a beanstalk? I doubt it, yet there is as much evidence to support that notion as there is to support the notion that the universe and everything in it was created by a divine being.

 

[Chris†opher Paul]

"If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down."
--Charles Darwin, Origin of Species

I can think of many...