How should we view a falsified hypothesis

[sfs]

As for "No thread on this forum could possibly have touched on most genetic data." Of course not, and I did not say it did,

Me: "No thread on this forum has even touched on most genetic data relevant to common descent, much less exhausted it."
You: "Yes there is."
You, five hour later: "As for "No thread on this forum could possibly have touched on most genetic data." Of course not, and I did not say it did."

More to the point, I take it that you have no response to the evidence from biogeography.

 

[pshun2404]

There were, and are tetrapod fish such as the lungfish, which breathes both air and water,and whose gills have become vestigialHave appendages capable of being quantitatively modified by evolution into limbsDifferences in skin? That's not much for "totally different." A bit superficial, don't you think? They don't contain a zygote?

Still, it's a reasonable inference, unless one had some reason to prefer the idea of progressive special creation.

There were, and are tetrapod fish such as the lungfish, which breathes both air and water,and whose gills have become vestigialHave appendages capable of being quantitatively modified by evolution into limbsDifferences in skin? That's not much for "totally different." A bit superficial, don't you think? They don't contain a zygote?

Still, it's a reasonable inference, unless one had some reason to prefer the idea of progressive special creation.

Yes and there were and are reptiles that spend a lot of time in the water...so what?

As for lungfish again so what...they have varied slightly in 375 million years and are still lungfish not amphibians or land walking tetrapods...

As for the alleged vestigiality of their gills you must only be referring to the African because the Australian gills seem normal for lungfish, but again this is where speciation cause variety...

"appendages BEING CAPABLE OF being quantitatively modified"? Yes some later versions seem more like eels (maybe these devolved)...but if you mean becoming legs in the sense animals have not even close after 375 million years...its a projected possibility based on the hypothesis nothing more

And yes eventually "totally different" after all here we are analyzing such things...

As I see it there are other viable theories (hypotheses)...one is a multiple source theory...some creatures were created directly...the sea brought forth creatures...and the earth brought forth creatures as they were commanded to do (laws and principles were put in place that guide this process)...and I see this as equally viable and no less proven. Then as Ventor claims if you took the genetic material of archae and put them into bacterium it would be caustic and kill the bacteria, so they may be two different source life forms (Carl Woese expresses a similar concern...maybe archae, prokaryote, and eukaryote all are distinct lines with no LUCA)..in such a case a tree analogy is meaningless...maybe a bush or even a few interacting bushes BUT the point I was speaking about was...

IF the standard hypothesis (single cell becomes multicellular, becomes fish, which becomes ....all the way to humans) is allegedly true, and speciation and mutation are TWO OF THE mechanisms of the hypothesis, THEN what we have for evidence (after 150 years of research and interpreting evidence to fit the pre-supposed hypothesis) falsifies the hypothesis...or else these two alleged mechanisms are not part of the formula at all...

 

[pshun2404]

Me: "No thread on this forum has even touched on most genetic data relevant to common descent, much less exhausted it."
You: "Yes there is."
You, five hour later: "As for "N genetic data." Of course not, and I did not say it did."

More to the point, I take it that you have no response to the evidence from biogeography.

sfs your quotes are accurate and I thought I explained what i meant and I should have been more clear I apologize. The point being that "Viruses confirm Common Descent" cover many of the issues you mentioned about various alleged insertions and deletions...and we can speak about that later but that is not the point of THIS thread...and I did briefly address biogeography because biogeography gives no evidence that confirms the premise of the eventuality of say fish eventually becoming humans through many many gradual slight stages of adjustment. The Eurasian blackcap (an avian) that Jimmy D pointed out is a wonderful powerful examples of speciation at work but they are still Eurasian blackcaps...(biogeography is responsible for the adaptationally motivated anatomical changes...but they are merely a variety of the same creature...birds)

You mention marsupials yet I see no evidence of say non-marsupial kangaroos of old, or semi-marsupial creatures that are now fully marsupial...so why should I accept their great great grandaddy was a fish? Because I was taught that? I certainly believed it for 30 years and argued vehemently defending it! Were there fish long before mammals? Yes of course we have evidence, that it is a fact. Does that necessitate that one over millions of years became the other? NO!

That is a story...and explanation...a possibility...but the evidence does NOT confirm it and some actually negates it. IN the proper application of the scientific method what are we to do? Should we manipulate and re-interpret the actual evidence so it appears to fit the hypothesis or let the actuality shape the hypothesis? Which is good science?

Most studies and work done in biology have little of anything to do with evolution. It is not even a major motivating factor in most research, and how come we never see this ongoing battle in physics and chemistry forums? In those fields differences are considered exciting possibilities. There are no huge highly financed political lobbies to exclude any contrary ideas or opinions like in this case. They do not have to "reconstruct" convenient representations or hire artists to contrive images which we are inundated with year after year in schools...etc., etc.,

We must start teaching HOW to think not WHAT to think...

 

[pshun2404]

In C. Barry Cox, and Peter Moore’s, Biogeography : an ecological and evolutionary approach (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publications, 2005), they take the biogeographical data and add a historical narrative to it in order to support an evolutionary perspective. In other words they explain from the perspective but have no actual evidence for the broader conclusion.

They use a lot of “may be”, “it is likely that” and other such subjunctive terms because they are explaining the data in light of a hypothesis (which may or may not be true). But at least in using these terms they are being honest with their opinion by placing it in a speculative conceptual history. IMO it should not be taken as factual.

In this field we are talking about very real occurrences coupled with long term projections into a an unknowable past where even rates of change and environment varied as much as the number and type of species that occupied these various geographical niches at different times.

But do not get me wrong, biogeography is a marvelous field and unifies a number of sub-fields (which is why I love Anthropology as well) but I do not believe that the idea is written in stone (though they believe it to be highly plausible). So as I see it, it is not up to someone to prove it is NOT true, but up to those who make the claim to prove it is, and no one has really done that yet.

Now to claim it is, or to simply believe it on faith alone (faith in them, or in the interpretation), is fine so long as one knows that what it is. Theorizing and hypothesizing is a wonderful gift we humans have that separates us from apes, but in that, we have a responsibility. We must separate knowable reality from supposition even if we believe the supposition is inferred.

 

[sfs]

You mention marsupials yet I see no evidence of say non-marsupial kangaroos of old, or semi-marsupial creatures that are now fully marsupial...so why should I accept their great great grandaddy was a fish? Because I was taught that?

What does that have to do with the evidence that biogeography provides for evolution?

 

[Speedwell]

Yes, we should take science with the correct dose of salt, realizing that universal common ancestry may not be true. But it is plausible, and as there is no plausible competing explanation, why not let science run with it for a while? Yes, progressive special creation and extinction of species in what otherwise appear to be evolutionary series is possible, but you don't have a mechanism for it, as does universal common ancestry, nor any real reason why it is a better explanation. What's the point?

 

[sfs]

But do not get me wrong, biogeography is a marvelous field and unifies a number of sub-fields (which is why I love Anthropology as well) but I do not believe that the idea is written in stone (though they believe it to be highly plausible). So as I see it, it is not up to someone to prove it is NOT true, but up to those who make the claim to prove it is, and no one has really done that yet.

Biogeography reveals, over and over again, patterns that would be expected to result from common descent and that make no sense if species (or "kinds") were specially created. Therefore it is evidence in favor of common descent and against special creation. You have no explanation for these patterns, just as you have no explanation for the many patterns we see in genetic data, for the patterns that we can predict in advance, before we look at new data.

This combination -- the repeated success of evolution with multiple kinds of data, and the abject failure of creationism with all kinds of data -- is why scientists accept common descent and reject special creationism. Until you find some way of improving that situation, it won't matter how you dress up the comparison: creationism always loses.

 

[pshun2404]

What does that have to do with the evidence that biogeography provides for evolution?

You brought it up...

 

[pshun2404]

Yes, we should take science with the correct dose of salt, realizing that universal common ancestry may not be true. But it is plausible, and as there is no plausible competing explanation, why not let science run with it for a while? Yes, progressive special creation and extinction of species in what otherwise appear to be evolutionary series is possible, but you don't have a mechanism for it, as does universal common ancestry, nor any real reason why it is a better explanation. What's the point?

I am in 99% agreement with all you posted Speed and if it turns out there is a UCA or the less likely LUCA then fine, I am good with that. But as I see it now after a life of defending my agnosticism, there is just nothing there to make the claim as if it is true.

Yes most accept it it is because they have no other explanation and will not accept the POSSIBILITY of creation or even creation using evolution but what does that have to do with it? Extremes in these camps always have a faith based default...one makes God of the gaps arguments the other Ancestor of the gaps arguments but what I am talking about here (the idea of thread) is on this case

Speciation (we are taught) is one of the alleged forces at work changing lower taxa creatures into higher taxa creatures
We see speciation at work
Speciation produces various changes in a group of organisms (even anatomically like the length of beaks or the longness or wideness of feet) and we can see this
There are no demonstrable cases (even in the fossil record) of the premise actually occurring
We have OBSERVED and EXPERIMENTED (researching this for over 100 years) and the result is always the same (variation)

That is THE established fact not the story. So why is the story taught as if IT is the established fact? Rhetorical no need to answer...

Speciation as a cause for transmutation of lower taxa into higher taxa creatures is falsified (period).

 

[pshun2404]

Biogeography reveals, over and over again, patterns that would be expected to result from common descent and that make no sense if species (or "kinds") were specially created. Therefore it is evidence in favor of common descent and against special creation. You have no explanation for these patterns, just as you have no explanation for the many patterns we see in genetic data, for the patterns that we can predict in advance, before we look at new data.

This combination -- the repeated success of evolution with multiple kinds of data, and the abject failure of creationism with all kinds of data -- is why scientists accept common descent and reject special creationism. Until you find some way of improving that situation, it won't matter how you dress up the comparison: creationism always loses.

Only we are not talking about common descent vs creation as the subject matter of this thread, we are talking about a falsified hypothesis still being taught as an established fact.

Speciation factually produces variety (even anatomical changes) and all we can OBSERVE and all EXPERIMENTS done confirm ONLY THAT...as I just replied above there are no examples (after researching for 100 years) where speciation plays any role in changing lower taxa creatures into higher taxa creatures.

So we have all the actual evidence, vs no actual evidence (just sci fi to make the hypothesis appear to be correct). What is an objective scientist to do? Well if they are being objective they will go with the actual data even if it does not fit the story. But will they do that in Evolutionary Biology? No! They will insist on the story defining the evidence.

Okay! Brass tacks. You say speciation is one of the forces at work that cause this change. Show me ONE example where this actually happened?

 

[Speedwell]

That is THE established fact not the story. So why is the story taught as if IT is the established fact? Rhetorical no need to answer...

Rhetorical or not, I thinkit deserves discussion anyway. The only people I hear this complaint from are creationists. I have taught in public schools occasionally but have no personal knowledge of such a thing. Certainly it is possible and would not surprise me greatly. Biology is often a non-college prep "pass" class taught by a PE coach or some other marginally qualified person, and in the two weeks generally spent on evolution anything could happen. But the claim of "established fact" is certainly not a scientific claim, and no scientist makes it--except as misinterpreted by the popular science media.

Speciation as a cause for transmutation of lower taxa into higher taxa creatures is falsified (period).

I'm not sure what you mean by "transmutation of lower taxa into higher taxa creatures." Creatures are always classified as species, and they remain as members of species. They never, as individual creatures, belong to higher taxa except as members of species.

In any case, the repeated branching of species would be theoretically capable of producing the diversification which we observe--I must not have been around when you falsified it.

 

[pshun2404]

Dear Speedwell, you know this is what is taught or none of us would think about it. Snf yes it is spoken of in a 'matter of fact' way as if it is a matter of fact. Claiming you do not grasp what I am saying (when I know you do) or blaming the recognition of the factualness of what I am saying on "creationists" is demeaning. It does not change the fact. Do you believe that fish eventually became reptiles? Or that reptiles of old transformed into today's mammals and birds? Is that simple enough? Show me?

Does speciation, or does it not, play a role as a main factor in this change? If so, show me one example. If you cannot I must ask where you heard about this as what happens? I know it was public or private school as a kid and then over and over as you progressed but I will ask anyway...

Every where we have discussed this alleged slow gradual transformation process (on Evolution forums, Atheist forums, Christian forums, even an Anthropology forum) they always bring up speciation as one the primary factors in this process. When I ask for an actual example (whereas I can provide many for my view) they cannot and ALWAYS divert to other topics.

 

[Speedwell]

Dear Speedwell, you know this is what is taught or none of us would think about it. Snf yes it is spoken of in a 'matter of fact' way as if it is a matter of fact. Claiming you do not grasp what I am saying (when I know you do)

or blaming the recognition of the factualness of what I am saying on "creationists" is demeaning. It does not change the fact. Do you believe that fish eventually became reptiles? Or that reptiles of old transformed into today's mammals and birds? Is that simple enough? Show me?[/QUOTE]Show you what? I still honestly don't know what you mean by "transmutation of lower taxa into higher taxa creatures."

Does speciation, or does it not, play a role as a main factor in this change? If so, show me one example. If you cannot I must ask where you heard about this as what happens? I know it was public or private school as a kid and then over and over as you progressed but I will ask anyway...

I don't know why my answer would make any difference, as you already have claimed to have falsified it. Strange, as it would have to be a mathematical argument and I don't remember any math from you about it...

No, I didn't take HS biology and after HS I was a physics then a math major, and it isn't an issue for the church I belong to. I didn't really learn anything about the ToE until I started running into creationists.

Every where we have discussed this alleged slow gradual transformation process (on Evolution forums, Atheist forums, Christian forums, even an Anthropology forum) they always bring up speciation as one the primary factors in this process. When I ask for an actual example (whereas I can provide many for my view) they cannot and ALWAYS divert to other topics.

Do you really have evidence of creatures coming into existence without ancestry? That would be astonishing.

 

[sfs]

Only we are not talking about common descent vs creation as the subject matter of this thread, we are talking about a falsified hypothesis still being taught as an established fact.

We're talking about your claim to have falsified a hypothesis, and in particular your claim that research shows only evidence for evolution producing variation within the same kind of organism. Evidence that common descent is true is evidence that your claim is false.

Speciation factually produces variety (even anatomical changes) and all we can OBSERVE and all EXPERIMENTS done confirm ONLY THAT ...as I just replied above there are no examples (after researching for 100 years) where speciation plays any role in changing lower taxa creatures into higher taxa creatures.

As Speedwell has pointed out, this claim is meaningless as stated, since "changing lower taxa creatures into higher taxa creatures" is not a phrase that has meaning in biology, and you haven't defined it. Assuming you just mean something about larger evolutionary changes, we would not expect to see those changes in experiments that can be done on human lifespans, not if evolutionary biology is correct. You think failure to see these changes falsifies common descent, when common descent should not produce these changes. Thus your central claim in this thread indicates either that you don't understand falsification or that you don't understand evolution.

So we have all the actual evidence

You mean the irrelevant evidence you're citing?

vs no actual evidence (just sci fi to make the hypothesis appear to be correct).

i.e. all of the evidence from genetics, biogeography and fossils that you can't handle, and therefore ignore.

What is an objective scientist to do?

I'm not sure how to break this to you, but objective scientists -- atheists, Christians, Buddhists, whatever -- decided what to do a long time ago, and they decided that common descent was true. Objective scientists stopped caring about your kind of argument well over a century ago, and their confidence in that conclusion has only increased in the time since. Objective scientists don't waste time on creationism in their work because its useless. Since you can't change that fact, you have nothing to contribute to objective scientists.

 

[pshun2404]

"Is that simple enough? Show me?[/QUOTE]Show you what? I still honestly don't know what you mean by "transmutation of lower taxa into higher taxa creatures."

Sorry but I believe it was you who first framed it in those terms...so I will ask clearly once again for the third time...do YOU believe that single celled organisms became multicelled organisms that became fish and so on down the line to humans?

Can you not see that speciation as a mechanism for this process (which may or may not have happened) has been falsified by the observable facts?

You profess to be an Anglican and said "No, I didn't take HS biology and after HS I was a physics then a math major, and it isn't an issue for the church I belong to. I didn't really learn anything about the ToE until I started running into creationists."

So let me ask an off topic question? Do YOU believe in a creator?

 

[pshun2404]

We're talking about your claim to have falsified a hypothesis, and in particular your claim that research shows only evidence for evolution producing variation within the same kind of organism. Evidence that common descent is true is evidence that your claim is false.

As Speedwell has pointed out, this claim is meaningless as stated, since "changing lower taxa creatures into higher taxa creatures" is not a phrase that has meaning in biology, and you haven't defined it. Assuming you just mean something about larger evolutionary changes, we would not expect to see those changes in experiments that can be done on human lifespans, not if evolutionary biology is correct. You think failure to see these changes falsifies common descent, when common descent should not produce these changes. Thus your central claim in this thread indicates either that you don't understand falsification or that you don't understand evolution.

You mean the irrelevant evidence you're citing?

i.e. all of the evidence from genetics, biogeography and fossils that you can't handle, and therefore ignore.

I'm not sure how to break this to you, but objective scientists -- atheists, Christians, Buddhists, whatever -- decided what to do a long time ago, and they decided that common descent was true. Objective scientists stopped caring about your kind of argument well over a century ago, and their confidence in that conclusion has only increased in the time since. Objective scientists don't waste time on creationism in their work because its useless. Since you can't change that fact, you have nothing to contribute to objective scientists.

First off my point in the OP had to do with two of the previous held pillars of the HOW of this hypothesis...

Secondly I ignored nothing. I addressed your subject (biogeography) and the evidence there does not support the hypothesis either...and we have NOT discussed the fossils you claim I cannot handle or the genetics related to your position on this thread.

"Objective scientists don't waste time on creationism in their work because its useless."

Absolutely! That opinion or subject matter is outside the realm of scientific examination or demonstration...glad it was not me who has kept bringing it up...we are supposed to be talking about speciation at this point...

 

[DogmaHunter]

"I know that's what you're saying. I'm saying that you're wrong."

So okay let's say we go with that. Then you do agree that speciation does not support the hypothesis and we must rely on "phylogenetic, biogeographic, paleontological and genetic data" to arrive at the correct conclusion. Right? So aside from genetic data (which we exhausted on another thread that we could discuss again later) what does or how does biogeographic data confirm the hypothesis that speciation causes or leads to this transmutation? You may be correct but how do you think it supports the hypothesis I think it falsifies it even further.

Populations evolve where they are located.

Evolution theory explains why you only find kangaroo's in australia and not in any other part of the world.

If we would discover a naturally occuring population of wild kangaroo's in south america or northern europe, that would be really dificult to explain in context of an evolutionary past.

So you start. What about biogeography as support for the idea of one organism becoming totally different kinds of organisms over time?

Speciation is a vertical process. Populations never evolve into a "totally different kind" of organism.

Take a whale. That's not actually a "totally different kind" of animal then its landwalking ancesters. These landwalkers didn't turn into "fish". Whales are still mammals. They still have a spine like mammals. You can even see it in the way they swim: they move up and down - just like you would expect from a creature with landwalking ancestors.
Actual fish swim by swinging sideways - not up and down.

A whale is MUCH MORE similar to a landwalking mammal then it is to an actual sea dwelling fish.

 

[DogmaHunter]

As the premise defined this referred to the concept of say fish becoming changed over time into amphibians or amphibians into reptiles...etc.

Each of those a specialisation or sub-species of the ancestral population they evolved from.
They aren't, by any means, "totally different".

 

[DogmaHunter]

so now fish are not tetrapods

Both fish and tetrapods are vertrebrates. And Eukaryotes.

This is why you need to be carefull in your choice of words. "Totally different" is what you said. But both are vertebrates and eukaryotes. So there goes the "totally".

Also, you might want to keep in mind that the "fish" ambhibians evolved from are not the same fish you can see swimming around today. Nore are the ancestral amphibians the frogs etc that you can see today.

Extant fish are the result of hundreds of millions of years of evolution. And the same goes for extant amphibians.

Evolution is a gradual process that works through accumulation of micro changes over generations.

At no point did a "fish" give birth to a "frog".

Now in each case there are also some similarities...

Exactly. So not "totally" different.
And it's the similarities that are important here. If you map out all the similarities between any and all species... you'll start noticing a pattern after some time. A hierarchical pattern. A nested hierarchical pattern.

If you draw that pattern out, you get a nested tree of similarities. We call this a "phylogenetic tree".

Here's the kicker: you can draw this tree based on multiple independend lines of investigation.

You can do it by comparing anatomy. By tracing the similarities of a SINGLE bone or physiological feature. By mapping the similarities of a single gene, gene sequence, genetic marker, entire chromosomes,... Even by mapping out the geographic distribution of species.

Each and every one of these independend lines of mapping, gives us the same basic structure for that tree.

Why is that?
ps: if evolution is true, such a tree is predicted. If this nested hierarchy wasn't present in life, evolution would be falsified.

As for a series of tetrapodal oviparous vertebrates I see them also but do not see reason to assume lineage

How about conclude?

I do not believe reptiles BECAME either avians OR mammals. Yes we all share anatomical and even genetic similarities but that does not necessitate lineage (just what works).

Actually, it does... at least, if you understand inheritance of DNA works and what it means.

To say otherwise would effectively result in having to deny that things like paternity tests based on DNA, works.

 

[USincognito]

So you start. What about biogeography as support for the idea of one organism becoming totally different kinds of organisms over time?

Not sure if it's been pointed out since Mon., but your use of the phrase "totally different kinds" tells me you're couching your proposition in Creationist terms rather than scientific ones. Descendants never stop being what their ancestors were.

Terrestrial tetrapods never stop being sarcopterygians.
Whales and snakes never stop being terrestrial tetrapods despite losing their legs.
Birds never stop being archosaurs or theropods despite developing wings and flight.