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Natural selection v Intelligent design

Archaeopteryx

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Still not listening to what. Besides I think I know what you are on about.If your meaning that evolution has the ability to design through natural selection your missing the point. Many of the designs have nothing to do with evolution. You seem to not explain yourself properly so its hard to know what you mean.

Besides this continual your still not listening thing you keep saying is missing the point completely. I have shown you that I have heard and understood what you are saying but have said several times that I disagree and have explained why and linked support for this. But it seems because I am disagreeing you interpret that as not listening. It seems you have already decided that you are right no matter what and unless I agree with that then I am either wrong or not listening.
No, you really don't listen... Repeat back to me what you think I said to you earlier...
 
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Loudmouth

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The problem is the same numbers keep coming up.

Why is that a problem?

So its like having a random lottery machine with not just 6 numbers but with many numbers ie 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55, ect that keep coming up.

Not if those numbers are the best solution to the evolutionary problem. In that case, they would be selected for.

Thats the same for the patterns like in a cabbage, hurricane, galaxy, shell, flowers ect.

You think hurricanes are intelligently designed?
 
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stevevw

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No, you really don't listen... Repeat back to me what you think I said to you earlier...
Well if its to do with this forum you said that design in nature is not random and complexity as with the snowflake, codes, systems, patterns does not mean its designed. You also said that evolution is directed by natural selection and is not designed.
 
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bhsmte

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Well if its to do with this forum you said that design in nature is not random and complexity as with the snowflake, codes, systems, patterns does not mean its designed. You also said that evolution is directed by natural selection and is not designed.

What is your scientific definition of design?

What is the falsifiable test, to determine if design is present?
 
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stevevw

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Why is that a problem?
Becuase the same numbers keep coming up. Didn't you understand the example I gave with the lottery. If the same numbers kept coming up in a lottery especially when they are a sequence of numbers you would immediately think that someone is tampering with the numbers. the lottery is suppose to be random. So if it is millions to 1 on any set of numbers coming up then the same numbers coming up so often would be out of the ordinary and beyond a random event. How many times have the same numbers come up on many occasions in a lottery.

Not if those numbers are the best solution to the evolutionary problem. In that case, they would be selected for.
How was that best solution found. Was it found in one go or did it take a long period of time to find that best solution. You are assuming that because its a best solution then it couldn't have been designed. Design is all about the best solutions. You dont work out design for the worst solutions. Just because you can understand that nature has a design optimum mean that nature is able to work out how to find that design optimum. Thats the assumption and interpretation that a naturalistic view will take. That by explaining something and knowing how it works that this also give it some creating ability.

You think hurricanes are intelligently designed?
It seems the structures they take are conforming to a common pattern and order. Everything has a component of design in it. Its just some things have more ordered information than others. A hurricane itself may not be designed and acts randomly but the physics that cause them and the underlying physics that make weather patterns stems from set laws which are designed. So something designed can act randomly. For example a designed car can randomly become out of control and do damage.
 
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Foxhole87

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And the conversation come full circle back to Steve giving us the most ridiculously non-specific and impossibly broad concept of "design" which allows him to assign a value of "designed" to whatever he wants without discernment. He abandoned the conversation at least once or twice before, and I expect him to do it the same.
 
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Loudmouth

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Becuase the same numbers keep coming up. Didn't you understand the example I gave with the lottery.

Don't you understand that evolution is not random? If there is an optimal ratio for these structures, then evolution will settle on that optimal ratio through natural selection.

If the same numbers kept coming up in a lottery especially when they are a sequence of numbers you would immediately think that someone is tampering with the numbers.

If ice crystals kept forming hexagonal structures, would you think that someone was tampering with the humbers?


How was that best solution found.

Natural selection.

Was it found in one go or did it take a long period of time to find that best solution. You are assuming that because its a best solution then it couldn't have been designed. Design is all about the best solutions. You dont work out design for the worst solutions. Just because you can understand that nature has a design optimum mean that nature is able to work out how to find that design optimum. Thats the assumption and interpretation that a naturalistic view will take. That by explaining something and knowing how it works that this also give it some creating ability.

Please explain how natural selection would be incapable of finding the best solution.
It seems the structures they take are conforming to a common pattern and order. Everything has a component of design in it. Its just some things have more ordered information than others. A hurricane itself may not be designed and acts randomly but the physics that cause them and the underlying physics that make weather patterns stems from set laws which are designed. So something designed can act randomly. For example a designed car can randomly become out of control and do damage.

Then why can't species also be the product of these natural laws in the same way hurricanes are?
 
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Black Dog

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OK I'm back now, I had to pop out for a while as well. So I read the article you links which was interesting and informative thanks. The way I understand what the article was saying is that nature seems to have a certain way of creating the patterns in flowers for example which best optimizes their ability to live and thrive. For example flower seeds in sunflowers form circles which are the best structure for holding it together. leaves or petals form symmetrical patterns where they allow each leaf or petal to have maximum sunlight. In other words its only natural for these patterns to form because they have a logical reason which is all to do with survival and optimizing life.

The problem with this is that these patterns and numbers are also seen in non living things. They are found in physics from the quantum world to spiral galaxies. The planet ratios in our solar system and the ratios of our own moon to the earth. They are found in things such as hurricanes to meandering rivers and mountain ranges. They are also found from the design in our bodies and their proportions to the structure of our DNA in the double helix. So it seems this mathematics equation is seen in all aspects of things and is remarkably common to the point that you have to question whether its a coincident or has happened by random chance.

It is said that these patterns and calculation using math’s in nature were discovered rather than humans coming up with them. So maybe we have stumbled upon a great equation that all life and existence is based on. The article still doesn't address how these patterns and designs got there in the first place. All humans are doing is discovering these things and then trying to explain them in a naturalistic way. But that’s all they are doing. An explanation doesn't have creative power or solve the problem of how it happened. Math’s doesn’t create it only explains.

It is logical that a flower petal or seed will turn to the sun to get light. But that ability didn't happen at the flower face. It happened in its genetic programming down at the molecular level. What we see in a spiral galaxy is the end result of a greater design code from astrophysics and physics in general. The laws of physics didn’t just pop into existence from nothing. They didn’t just formulate as a result of random chance which culminated in those laws which govern everything ending up to be just right for everything to work so well and in order. The precise parameters for life didn’t just occur randomly. There are many physical constants that must be just right for life to happen.

There is evidence that the building blocks of life being the 20 amino acids are like the laws of physics. These basic protein folds are preset structural forms which may have been around all the time and are universal like the laws of physics. That they didn't form from evolution and adaptations or random mutations but are natural occurring forms that are a part of nature.
The protein folds as Platonic forms: New support for the pre-Darwinian conception of evolution by natural law
The folds are evidently determined by natural law, not natural selection, and are "lawful forms" in the Platonic and pre-Darwinian sense of the word, which are bound to occur everywhere in the universe where the same 20 amino acids are used for their construction.
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=14417556

What we end up seeing is just the end result of other things that create them. All mankind is doing is trying to under these patterns, mathematical languages, codes and order and their role in the greater scheme of things. But we will never understand this because we just havnt got the capacity to do so. But a world view will of course try to explain them in a natural way. When humans design something there is also a logical method to how it works but it is still designed. God is not going to design the DNA for a flower and the sun and then make the flower that needs the sun not be able to maximize the life giving energy of it. All plants need the sun and are designed to work with the sun. But like I said just realizing that there is a logical method to how they work doesn’t mean they created themselves.

I just have a few minutes, so I'll touch on one or two points now, and address the rest later.

I'm glad you liked the site. For a kid's math site, it was very cool even for adults, wish they had that when I was in school!

Could you please elaborate on the numbers, patterns, and ratios that keep repeating themselves, and where they are found? Thanks! I'll address the rest of the post later when I get home.
 
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stevevw

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Don't you understand that evolution is not random? If there is an optimal ratio for these structures, then evolution will settle on that optimal ratio through natural selection.
But these things are not just seen in evolution. They are seen in physics as well. They are seen in all things. What do you mean by an optimal ratio for natural selection. I thought natural selection only selected whatever was beneficial for survival. That doesn't always mean a great design or something that looks well designed and optimal.

I thought evolution states that to get something beneficial you have to go through a lot of non beneficial and even deformed stages. But thats what we dont see, we see well formed and designed living things. According to evolution we should see a whole lot of sick, diseased, deformed, weird, half formed creatures that are part of the steps towards the optimum and well designed.

Unless natural selection can get it right the first go and find those well designed features the we should see millions of deformed and sick creatures around. But what we end up seeing is a lot of well designed things in nature which amaze us to the point that we copy those designs in our world. Yet our greatest designers cant come near the design that is shown in nature such as the bird wing. Yet evolution which is basically a mistake in that well design process says that it can make something even better designed than it previously was. How much credit and creative ability do you want to give nature for what we see.

If ice crystals kept forming hexagonal structures, would you think that someone was tampering with the numbers?
There are many many different shapes in the ice crystals. Way more than the main numbers for fibonacci numbers. If we ended up with say only 10 main ice crystal shapes all the time then we could say that there may be some sort of pre set form that they are conforming to. But as I said there is a bit of design in everything at the basics. Ice crystals form from water molecules. Water molecules have certain shapes which are always hexagonal. So the basic shape of ice crystals are a reflection of the makeup of water molecules. The rest as far as size, and other shapes are subject to random forces as they fall through the air such as temperature and wind. But the foundation for building ice crystals is not totally random.

Natural selection.
The evidence doesn't support this.

Please explain how natural selection would be incapable of finding the best solution.
Because there wouldn't be enough time in most cases. Because tests done show that to change the function of a protein would take more time than evolution states let alone for all the complex variety that has ever been and is here now. Because adaptation through gradual evolution alone doesn't explain many of the changes we see in life. The evidence points to other forces that are beyond adaptation. They stem for forces such as HGT, cross breeding, epigenetics, endosymbiosis ect that can pass on large chunks of genetic info to make complex features that are beyond the capabilities of evolution. Because some of the complex features systems, information, codes, language we see needs a phenomenal amount of random mutations to create.

Considering that random mutations are by chance then there would be an even greater number beyond a phenomenal amount of mutations that didn't find the beneficial features. So as stated before there would be many sick and diseased creatures and features out there as they are weeding out these non beneficial mutation. Because tests done have shown that evolution through random mutations and natural selection is mainly a loss of information and a cost to fitness. Rather than an addition of information and an increase in fitness.

Then why can't species also be the product of these natural laws in the same way hurricanes are?
I think thats what the paper is saying. That these natural forms in proteins are like the natural laws in Physics. But as it states because they are like natural laws they didn't evolve through a darwinian process of adaptation and gradually finding that natural form. Their characteristics are natural in that they just are and have always been there. their forms are to precise and finely tuned to have been derived from evolution. This would explain that even the simplest of life forms needs these basic forms and that this needed to be there from the beginning.
 
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stevevw

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I just have a few minutes, so I'll touch on one or two points now, and address the rest later.

I'm glad you liked the site. For a kid's math site, it was very cool even for adults, wish they had that when I was in school!

Could you please elaborate on the numbers, patterns, and ratios that keep repeating themselves, and where they are found? Thanks! I'll address the rest of the post later when I get home.
Ok well you know about the fibonacci numbers in flowers and plants, as the site you linked showed this. Fibonacci numbers such as 1,2,2,3,5,8,13,21,34, and 55 are the main ones we see in the amount of flower petals and seeds such as in the sunflower. These ratios coincide within the golden ratio as well. The golden ratio is associated with (phi = 1.61803). This can be seen from the micro world in quantum physics to the macro scale, and right through to biological systems and inanimate objects.

Other examples in living things are pine cones, sea shells, cabbage, tree branches, insects with their body proportions, animal flight patterns. We see these ratios when we calculate the ratios of things such as a faces structure in the placement of the eyes nose and mouth to our chin, a limb in relation to finger, wrist and elbow joints, the distance between our toes to our belly button in ratio from our belly button to the top of our head falls within the golden ration.

An interesting example is honey bees, they follow Fibonacci in other interesting ways. The most profound example is by dividing the number of females in a colony by the number of males (females always outnumber males). The answer is typically something very close to 1.618. But it goes to a deeper level than that with bees which begins to make it very interesting and beyond random chance. The DNA molecule measures 34 angstroms long by 21 angstroms wide for each full cycle of its double helix spiral. These numbers, 34 and 21, are numbers in the Fibonacci series, and their ratio 1.6190476 closely approximates Phi, 1.6180339. But there are other ratios in the DNA which conform to Fibonacci numbers.

Fibonacci numbers and the golden ratio are seen in thousands of laces in nature. Ratios in butterflies and their shapes and even the ratios of the patterns on their wings. These same ratios are seen in flower dimensions, patterns of birds, tiger faces, leaf positions on branches, branch positions and numbers on trees. The reproduction of rabbits. It goes on and on. http://www.maths.surrey.ac.uk/hosted-sites/R.Knott/Fibonacci/fibnat.html#Rabbits

Then you move into the non living world with things like hurricanes and galaxies which conform to the golden ratio. The planets in our solar system in relation to each other follow the fibonacci numbers. The size of the moon to earth fits to the golden ratio, the rings on Saturn fit the golden ratio. Galaxies, meandering rivers, sound and light waves, rainbows, also fit the golden ratio.But fibonacci numbers and the golden ration are just a couple of aspects of how nature has a lot of mathematics and order in it. This video explains it best.
http://www.academia.edu/1782157/Geo...of_Nature_Architecture_Design_and_Engineering
 
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Loudmouth

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What do you mean by an optimal ratio for natural selection. I thought natural selection only selected whatever was beneficial for survival. That doesn't always mean a great design or something that looks well designed and optimal.

If the optimal strength for a snail shell is represented by the Fibonacci sequence, then why wouldn't natural selection select for a configuration that matched that sequence?

Also, you seem to be arguing that evolution is just as natural as the rest of the universe. Is that what you are saying?

I thought evolution states that to get something beneficial you have to go through a lot of non beneficial and even deformed stages.

Then you thought wrong. It has to go through sub-optimal designs which can still be beneficial. Walruses, for example, give birth on land, yet they have very suboptimal designs for moving about on land. Walruses represent a sub-optimal design, one that you seem to claim shouldn't exist if ID is true.

But what we end up seeing is a lot of well designed things in nature which amaze us to the point that we copy those designs in our world. Yet our greatest designers cant come near the design that is shown in nature such as the bird wing. Yet evolution which is basically a mistake in that well design process says that it can make something even better designed than it previously was. How much credit and creative ability do you want to give nature for what we see.

I found this interesting paper a while back:


Kalinowski ST, Taper ML, Metz AM. Can Random Mutation Mimic Design?: A Guided Inquiry Laboratory for Undergraduate Students. Genetics. 2006;174(3):1073-1079. doi:10.1534/genetics.106.061234.

Complex biological structures, such as the human eye, have been interpreted as evidence for a creator for over three centuries. This raises the question of whether random mutation can create such adaptations. In this article, we present an inquiry-based laboratory experiment that explores this question using paper airplanes as a model organism. The main task for students in this investigation is to figure out how to simulate paper airplane evolution (including reproduction, inheritance, mutation, and selection). In addition, the lab requires students to practice analytic thinking and to carefully delineate the implications of their results.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1667065/

As it turns out, evolution works just as well for finding optimal paper airplane designs as intelligent design. Blind changes informed by selection can find optimal designs.

There are many many different shapes in the ice crystals.

All crystals are hexagonal. Are you saying that every ice crystal has to be intelligently designed and can't be formed by natural processes?

The evidence doesn't support this.

Why not?

Because there wouldn't be enough time in most cases. Because tests done show that to change the function of a protein would take more time than evolution states let alone for all the complex variety that has ever been and is here now.

Reference?

Because adaptation through gradual evolution alone doesn't explain many of the changes we see in life. The evidence points to other forces that are beyond adaptation. They stem for forces such as HGT, cross breeding, epigenetics, endosymbiosis ect that can pass on large chunks of genetic info to make complex features that are beyond the capabilities of evolution.

Those are a part of evolution.

Because some of the complex features systems, information, codes, language we see needs a phenomenal amount of random mutations to create.

Humans and chimps are separated by 40 million mutations. With some rather conservative assumptions about population size, mutation rate, and generation times, there were over 1 trillion mutations that occurred in the human lineage since splitting with chimps, and the same for the chimp lineage. How can you say there weren't enough mutations?

So as stated before there would be many sick and diseased creatures and features out there as they are weeding out these non beneficial mutation. Because tests done have shown that evolution through random mutations and natural selection is mainly a loss of information and a cost to fitness. Rather than an addition of information and an increase in fitness.

Every human is born with 30 to 50 mutations. Do they suffer from 30 to 50 deformations and diseases? In just 10 generations in your family lineage, that would be 500 mutations that you are carrying. How many diseases and deformations have they caused in you?

I think thats what the paper is saying. That these natural forms in proteins are like the natural laws in Physics. But as it states because they are like natural laws they didn't evolve through a darwinian process of adaptation and gradually finding that natural form.

Evidence?
 
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Black Dog

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Ok well you know about the fibonacci numbers in flowers and plants, as the site you linked showed this. Fibonacci numbers such as 1,2,2,3,5,8,13,21,34, and 55 are the main ones we see in the amount of flower petals and seeds such as in the sunflower. These ratios coincide within the golden ratio as well. The golden ratio is associated with (phi = 1.61803). This can be seen from the micro world in quantum physics to the macro scale, and right through to biological systems and inanimate objects.

Other examples in living things are pine cones, sea shells, cabbage, tree branches, insects with their body proportions, animal flight patterns. We see these ratios when we calculate the ratios of things such as a faces structure in the placement of the eyes nose and mouth to our chin, a limb in relation to finger, wrist and elbow joints, the distance between our toes to our belly button in ratio from our belly button to the top of our head falls within the golden ration.

An interesting example is honey bees, they follow Fibonacci in other interesting ways. The most profound example is by dividing the number of females in a colony by the number of males (females always outnumber males). The answer is typically something very close to 1.618. But it goes to a deeper level than that with bees which begins to make it very interesting and beyond random chance. The DNA molecule measures 34 angstroms long by 21 angstroms wide for each full cycle of its double helix spiral. These numbers, 34 and 21, are numbers in the Fibonacci series, and their ratio 1.6190476 closely approximates Phi, 1.6180339. But there are other ratios in the DNA which conform to Fibonacci numbers.

Fibonacci numbers and the golden ratio are seen in thousands of laces in nature. Ratios in butterflies and their shapes and even the ratios of the patterns on their wings. These same ratios are seen in flower dimensions, patterns of birds, tiger faces, leaf positions on branches, branch positions and numbers on trees. The reproduction of rabbits. It goes on and on. http://www.maths.surrey.ac.uk/hosted-sites/R.Knott/Fibonacci/fibnat.html#Rabbits

Then you move into the non living world with things like hurricanes and galaxies which conform to the golden ratio. The planets in our solar system in relation to each other follow the fibonacci numbers. The size of the moon to earth fits to the golden ratio, the rings on Saturn fit the golden ratio. Galaxies, meandering rivers, sound and light waves, rainbows, also fit the golden ratio.But fibonacci numbers and the golden ration are just a couple of aspects of how nature has a lot of mathematics and order in it. This video explains it best.
http://www.academia.edu/1782157/Geo...of_Nature_Architecture_Design_and_Engineering

Evolution selects for optimal arrangements, and as that website showed, fibonacci sequence/golden ratio is often the optimal arrangement. The same thing happens with non-living things. If you shovel dirt into a box up to the top, the box is full of dirt. Give the box a shake, and the dirt achieves a more optimal stacking, the dirt settles and the box isn't full anymore. Or if you take a drop of water, it naturally tries to form a sphere because that is the optimal ratio of surface area to volume.
 
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stevevw

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If the optimal strength for a snail shell is represented by the Fibonacci sequence, then why wouldn't natural selection select for a configuration that matched that sequence?
Because the evidence doesn't show this. Evolution makes a theory out of what they already find in nature and then assume the conclusions or as you say build the target around the bulls eye. IE try to fit make the theory suit the observable end results.

If natural selection was at work then we should see all the less optimal strength snails with non Fibonacci numbers on the way to finding that optimal strength and number. The same with sea shells, flowers ect. We should see Nautilus shells with other patterns that are less optimal. Thats unless Natural selection can get it right in one go the first time mutations give it a try. But then that would be closer to ID than anything else as it indicates a pre existing knowledge and set instructions there before anything was worked out. Plus as I said these patterns, numbers, maths calculations and ratios are in non biological things which are not affected by natural selection.

Also, you seem to be arguing that evolution is just as natural as the rest of the universe. Is that what you are saying?
I think the paper is saying that it isn't by evolution in the first place. At least for these natural forms in proteins. They didn't form through adaptations where they had to adjust and find the precise forms for life. They have just been there form day one or at least it seems all the time. There is no indication of them evolving form something else. They are just there as part of natural forms in life like the laws of physics.

Then you thought wrong. It has to go through sub-optimal designs which can still be beneficial. Walruses, for example, give birth on land, yet they have very suboptimal designs for moving about on land. Walruses represent a sub-optimal design, one that you seem to claim shouldn't exist if ID is true.
This is what I mean by evolution goes looking for any example that will fit the theory but not look at the bigger picture or look at all the examples that dont fit. Yes we can find a walrus who moves awkwardly on land. But if this is the method you are saying evolution uses and proves it then we should see hundreds of these awkwardly , deformed and even sick creatures. Not just an example here and there. Plus you assume that the walrus is awkward. That maybe how they are for their particular environment of living on land and sea. They may be more at home in the sea but want to have their babies on land for some particular reason rather than in the water.
I found this interesting paper a while back:

Kalinowski ST, Taper ML, Metz AM. Can Random Mutation Mimic Design?: A Guided Inquiry Laboratory for Undergraduate Students. Genetics. 2006;174(3):1073-1079. doi:10.1534/genetics.106.061234.

Complex biological structures, such as the human eye, have been interpreted as evidence for a creator for over three centuries. This raises the question of whether random mutation can create such adaptations. In this article, we present an inquiry-based laboratory experiment that explores this question using paper airplanes as a model organism. The main task for students in this investigation is to figure out how to simulate paper airplane evolution (including reproduction, inheritance, mutation, and selection). In addition, the lab requires students to practice analytic thinking and to carefully delineate the implications of their results.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1667065/

As it turns out, evolution works just as well for finding optimal paper airplane designs as intelligent design. Blind changes informed by selection can find optimal designs.
I will have to read it to fully understand. But form the face of it this is what evolution says. It sounds good but is it workable in nature. Does the evidence in nature show this. Does the evidence from tests with living organisms rather than paper planes show this. From what I have read no. Mutations have a cost to fitness overall. One mutation doesn't make a change. You need many multiple mutations.

The chances of getting multiple mutations all going in the same right direction and adding functions that make something more complex and better equipped isn't shown with the evidence. There are limits to functionality and fitness. There is an overall fitness cost. Evidence shows that even beneficial mutations can have an effect or be effected by other mutations with negative Epistasis between beneficial mutation.
Negative Epistasis Between Beneficial Mutations in an Evolving Bacterial Population
We analyzed the effects of epistasis on fitness for the first five mutations to fix in an experimental population of Escherichia coli. Epistasis depended on the effects of the combined mutations—the larger the expected benefit, the more negative the epistatic effect. Epistasis thus tended to produce diminishing returns with genotype fitness,
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/332/6034/1193.abstract
Reductive Evolution Can Prevent Populations from Taking Simple Adaptive Paths to High Fitness
http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2010.2
The evolution of genetic networks by non-adaptive processes
http://www.nature.com/nrg/journal/v8/n10/abs/nrg2192.html

All crystals are hexagonal. Are you saying that every ice crystal has to be intelligently designed and can't be formed by natural processes?
No I'm saying the basic structure of them stems from water molecules. Water molecules will show themselves in hexagonal shapes in snow crystals because of the hexagonal way water molecules crystallize. Some people think snow flakes just form out of thin air and are made up from scratch without any reason through natural causes. But the basis for snow crystals is pre set and was already there in the physics of water molecules.

There are fourteen known forms of ice, but ice Ih, an abbreviation for "form 1 hexagonal", is stable between -100°C and 0°C and so it is the form seen in snowflakes. The hexagonally arranged water molecules stack in sheets with sides that are perfectly straight and angled at 120° to each other, called 'facets' The final form of the crystal will always have 6-fold symmetry because of the hexagonal way water molecules crystallize.
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/articles/article/science-of-snowflakes/

I have already posted this several times. From memory I think I have discussed this topic before with you. Refer to above links for some of this support. Natural selection can help creatures change in small ways to help them adapt to their environments but there are limits. Mutations are primarily a mistake in the copying process of something which is good already. So mutations overall take info away and have a cost to fitness rather that add info and make better , more fit and functional creatures.
Reference?
This has already been shown and implied by the links showing that there are difficulties and limits for evolving functional proteins. There are fitness costs as well. To get even a couple of small changes in function requires at least 7 new mutations. This has been shown to take more time than evolution has predicted even for these small changes let alone the massive amount of changes in functions and features needed to evolve all the variety of complex life that has ever been and all life that is here now. It would take more time than planet earth has been in existence.
Enzyme Families--Shared Evolutionary History or Shared Design? A Study of the GABA-Aminotransferase Family
But evolutionary innovations requiring that many changes would be extraordinarily rare, becoming probable only on timescales much longer than the age of life on earth.
http://www.researchgate.net/publica...n_A_Study_of_the_GABA-Aminotransferase_Family
Estimating the prevalence of protein sequences adopting functional enzyme folds.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15321723
Time and Information in Evolution

http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2012.4
Evolutionary layering and the limits to cellular perfection.
http://www.pubfacts.com/detail/23115338/Evolutionary-layering-and-the-limits-to-cellular-perfection.

Humans and chimps are separated by 40 million mutations. With some rather conservative assumptions about population size, mutation rate, and generation times, there were over 1 trillion mutations that occurred in the human lineage since splitting with chimps, and the same for the chimp lineage. How can you say there weren't enough mutations?
Its more that evolution gives mutations and natural selection more creative ability than there is. If anything there is an information loss and a fitness cost and not an adaption into something that is a new and fit creature with more complexity and better function. The majority if not all change seems to come from non adaptive forces such as HGT, cross breeding, endosymbiosis, developmental biology, epigentics. The evidence for animals getting new genetic material is supported by non adaptive interactions between living things and their environments in a co existing environment. Rather than through mutational changes that have to be sorted and adapted through natural selection. he evidence shows that most mutations even beneficial ones have a cost to fitness and dont make better and fitter creatures.

Robustness–epistasis link shapes the fitness landscape of a randomly drifting protein
once the stability threshold is exhausted, the deleterious effects of mutations become fully pronounced, thereby making proteins far less robust than generally assumed.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7121/full/nature05385.html
High genomic deleterious mutation rates in hominids
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v397/n6717/abs/397344a0.html

Every human is born with 30 to 50 mutations. Do they suffer from 30 to 50 deformations and diseases? In just 10 generations in your family lineage, that would be 500 mutations that you are carrying. How many diseases and deformations have they caused in you?
Many may be very small but deleterious and have no immediate effect on their own. But over time and in accumulation they will. They certainly wont add up to creating fitter and more functional creatures overall.
Diminishing returns epistasis among beneficial mutations decelerates adaptation.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21636771

Evidence?
I will get back on this one as its getting late and I want to add some related support to it to do with genetic info being around for a long time and even from the beginning. Some of this is to do with the Cambrian explosion and complex life forms that rival today's complexity even way back then.
 
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Loudmouth

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Because the evidence doesn't show this. Evolution makes a theory out of what they already find in nature and then assume the conclusions or as you say build the target around the bulls eye. IE try to fit make the theory suit the observable end results.

Prove it.

If natural selection was at work then we should see all the less optimal strength snails with non Fibonacci numbers on the way to finding that optimal strength and number.

Show that they don't exist.

We can show you sub-optimal middle ear designs in reptile to mammal transitionals, if you like.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section1.html#morphological_intermediates_ex2

I think the paper is saying that it isn't by evolution in the first place. At least for these natural forms in proteins. They didn't form through adaptations where they had to adjust and find the precise forms for life. They have just been there form day one or at least it seems all the time. There is no indication of them evolving form something else. They are just there as part of natural forms in life like the laws of physics.

They say? Where is the evidence?

Again, you need to actually back up your claims.

Its more that evolution gives mutations and natural selection more creative ability than there is. If anything there is an information loss and a fitness cost and not an adaption into something that is a new and fit creature with more complexity and better function.

Are you saying that humans are less complex than the common ancestor of chimps and humans?

The majority if not all change seems to come from non adaptive forces such as HGT, cross breeding, endosymbiosis, developmental biology, epigenetics.

Evidence? As already shown elsewhere, of the ~30,000 human genes only 3 have come from HGT since the common ancestor shared with all other primates. We have the same endosymbionts as other eukaryotes, so that is not a part of human evolution. Epigenetics does not affect long term changes, so that is out. Cross breeding is simply natural selection of mutations that have occurred in both populations. Developmental biology is controlled by DNA sequence, so it is squarely within the domain of mutation and selection.

You simply don't know what you are talking about.

Negative Epistasis Between Beneficial Mutations in an Evolving Bacterial Population
We analyzed the effects of epistasis on fitness for the first five mutations to fix in an experimental population of Escherichia coli. Epistasis depended on the effects of the combined mutations—the larger the expected benefit, the more negative the epistatic effect. Epistasis thus tended to produce diminishing returns with genotype fitness,

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/332/6034/1193.abstract
Reductive Evolution Can Prevent Populations from Taking Simple Adaptive Paths to High Fitness
http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2010.2
The evolution of genetic networks by non-adaptive processes
http://www.nature.com/nrg/journal/v8/n10/abs/nrg2192.html

Bare links aren't helpful. The first reference is a rather poor start since it wouldn't apply to species that reproduce sexually.

Many may be very small but deleterious and have no immediate effect on their own. But over time and in accumulation they will.

Sexual reproduction does away with this problem since these mutations can be replaced by the more beneficial allele.
 
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Black Dog

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No I'm saying the basic structure of them stems from water molecules. Water molecules will show themselves in hexagonal shapes in snow crystals because of the hexagonal way water molecules crystallize. Some people think snow flakes just form out of thin air and are made up from scratch without any reason through natural causes. But the basis for snow crystals is pre set and was already there in the physics of water molecules.

OK, this is a great answer. This answers your entire question about Fibonacci Sequences and the Golden Ratio.
 
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stevevw

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Prove it.
I already have posted evidence for showing this. Refer to the papers posted. I'm not going to keep going over the same thing. Scientists say that evolution by adaptation is if anything plays a minor role in contributing to how living things change and gain new genetic material. I have already posted the links for this. The evidence supports non adaptive driving forces. Other tests support evolution by random mutations cannot evolve multiple new functions and it would take to much time even for small changes.

Show that they don't exist.
By using the same evidences that evolution uses such as the fossil records and observational evidence we can see that there are none.

We can show you sub-optimal middle ear designs in reptile to mammal transitionals, if you like.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section1.html#morphological_intermediates_ex2
The example I think you are using is with the Liaoconodon hui found in China in 2011 that is claimed to be a transitional between reptiles and modern mammals. It seems this find is around 75 Ma after the appearance of the first fully formed mammal ear (Hadrocodium). So there is also speculation that the ear evolved at least more than once if not several times. Its very unreliable to use fragmented fossil evidence for building such a big claim of common decent. Even so common decent to a certain degree doesn't disprove ID anyway. There may be some element of common decent with groups of creatures. But this doesn't mean that all living things descended from one common ancestor.

The point is though its very speculative and assuming to use this evidence alone. There are many examples where the fossil records dont fit this claim and even point to contradictory evidence as noted above as one example where supposed transitionals are younger than the fully formed feature. Also it is interesting that certain occasional examples are referred to and yet we would think that there would be thousands of examples of transitional stages for every single part of a living thing scattered throughout the fossil records.

Is gene duplication a viable explanation for the origination of biological information and complexity?
All life depends on the biological information encoded in DNA with which to synthesize and regulate various peptide sequences required by an organism's cells. Hence, an evolutionary model accounting for the diversity of life needs to demonstrate how novel exonic regions that code for distinctly different functions can emerge. Natural selection tends to conserve the basic functionality, sequence, and size of genes and, although beneficial and adaptive changes are possible, these serve only to improve or adjust the existing type.

The totality of the evidence reveals that, although duplication can and does facilitate important adaptations by tinkering with existing compounds, molecular evolution is nonetheless constrained in each and every case. Therefore, although the process of gene duplication and subsequent random mutation has certainly contributed to the size and diversity of the genome, it is alone insufficient in explaining the origination of the highly complex information pertinent to the essential functioning of living organisms. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Complexity, 2011
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cplx.20365/abstract
They say? Where is the evidence?
Again, you need to actually back up your claims.
First off they are not my claims but those of the expert scientists. The support has already been given with other links to papers and articles I have already posted. Papers showing the difficulty of forming precise protein folds that are complex and 3 dimensional through chance mutations is one support I have already given in my previous post. The time factor is another that has already been given. Other supports are along the lines of complexity being around from a very early stage which doesn't give time for evolution to evolve these building blocks of life.

The Paradox of the “Ancient” Bacterium Which Contains “Modern” Protein-Coding Genes
http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/content/19/9/1637.long
Universal Genome in the Origin of Metazoa
Here I propose a hypothesis that answers the questions posed above, and offers experimentally testable predictions. This hypothesis postulates that (1) shortly (in geological terms) before Cambrian period a Universal Genome that encodes all major developmental programs essential for every phylum of Metazoa emerged in a unicellular or a primitive multicellular organism; (2) The Metazoan phyla, all having similar genomes, are nonetheless so distinct because they utilize specific combinations of developmental programs.
http://www.researchgate.net/publica...he_Origin_of_Metazoa_Thoughts_About_Evolution

The structure of the protein universe and genome evolution.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12432406

Researchers use Moore's Law to calculate that life began before Earth existed
Sharov and Gordon say that the evidence by this measure is clear. “Linear regression of genetic complexity (on a log scale) extrapolated back to just one base pair suggests the time of the origin of life = 9.7 ± 2.5 billion years ago,” they say.
http://phys.org/news/2013-04-law-life-began-earth.html

Are you saying that humans are less complex than the common ancestor of chimps and humans?
No If you read what I said it was more about mutations which are suppose to be the provider of new beneficial info that makes more complex and fitter creatures does the opposite. This shows that evolution cannot be the driving force for change because it cannot make the level of complexity and variety we see today.

Evidence? As already shown elsewhere, of the ~30,000 human genes only 3 have come from HGT since the common ancestor shared with all other primates. We have the same endosymbionts as other eukaryotes, so that is not a part of human evolution. Epigenetics does not affect long term changes, so that is out. Cross breeding is simply natural selection of mutations that have occurred in both populations. Developmental biology is controlled by DNA sequence, so it is squarely within the domain of mutation and selection.
The fact is the evidence for change supports non adaptive forces and not adaptive forces that are found in evolution. I have already posted this evidence. One interesting one is that all eukaryotes were suppose to come about as the result of endosymbiotic events. If micro organisms have such a large capacity to share genetic info horizontally and they make up 95% of all life then much of the genetic info for life is from micro organisms. Eukaryotes then only make up a very small twig on the tree of life which is actually been shown to be more like a forest of life. So Eukaryotes would make up a small branch in this forest and there would be many trunks that stemmed up and created life rather than one or two as stated in common decent.

The Endosymbiotic Origin of Domain Eukaryota
Symbiosis is ubiquitous among organisms throughout the tree of life, from the species level to the kingdom level, and even to the domain level. It is integral to evolution as cooperating organisms gain survival advantage by a quid pro quo between them.
http://www.fossilmuseum.net/Evolution/Endosymbiosis.htm
You simply don't know what you are talking about.
As I said I am not the one who is saying this. So you are saying that the scientists who state this dont know what they are talking about and you know better.

Darwinian evolution in the light of genomics
Evolutionary-genomic studies show that natural selection is only one of the forces that shape genome evolution and is not quantitatively dominant, whereas non-adaptive processes are much more prominent than previously suspected. Major contributions of horizontal gene transfer and diverse selfish genetic elements to genome evolution undermine the Tree of Life concept. An adequate depiction of evolution requires the more complex concept of a network or ‘forest’ of life. There is no consistent tendency of evolution towards increased genomic complexity, and when complexity increases, this appears to be a non-adaptive consequence of evolution under weak purifying selection rather than an adaptation.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2651812/

Networks: expanding evolutionary thinking.
A wide variety of evolutionary processes lead to mosaic patterns of relationships among taxa: sex in eukaryotes, recombination in its variety of forms, gene conversion between paralogs, intron retrohoming, allopolyploidization, partialnon-orthologous replacement, the selection of new genetic assemblages leading to modular entities as in
operon formation, the emergence of new families of transposons, independent lineage-sorting among alleles, an unequal rates of character loss between lineages, among others.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23764187

Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?
Living things do not evolve to fit into pre-existing environments, but co-construct and co evolve with their environments, in the process changing the structure of ecosystems.

The number of biologists calling for change in how evolution is conceptualized is growing rapidly. Strong support comes from allied disciplines, particularly developmental biology, but also genomics, epigenetics, ecology and social science. We contend that evolutionary biology needs revision if it is to benefit fully from these other disciplines.

The story that SET (Standard Evolution Theory) tells is simple: new variation arises through random genetic mutation; inheritance occurs through DNA; and natural selection is the sole cause of adaptation, the process by which organisms become well-suited to their environments. In this view, the complexity of biological development — the changes that occur as an organism grows and ages — are of secondary, even minor, importance.

In our view, this ‘gene-centric’ focus fails to capture the full gamut of processes that direct evolution. Missing pieces include how physical development influences the generation of variation (developmental bias); how the environment directly shapes organisms’ traits (plasticity); how organisms modify environments (niche construction); and how organisms transmit more than genes across generations (extra-genetic inheritance).
The frailty of adaptive hypotheses for the origins of organismal complexity.
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/suppl_1/8597.abstract
 
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stevevw

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Evolution selects for optimal arrangements, and as that website showed, fibonacci sequence/golden ratio is often the optimal arrangement. The same thing happens with non-living things. If you shovel dirt into a box up to the top, the box is full of dirt. Give the box a shake, and the dirt achieves a more optimal stacking, the dirt settles and the box isn't full anymore. Or if you take a drop of water, it naturally tries to form a sphere because that is the optimal ratio of surface area to volume.
But a naturalistic view assumes that the optimal is found by evolution. Evolution is made through natural selection sifting through non optimal outcomes until optimal ones are selected and fixed. Considering that mutations are random and blind then they will throw up many non optimal features before an optimal one is found. Therefore we should find and see way more non optimal results in the fossil records and around today. All we keep hearing about is isolated examples that are used to support evolution. Like a few examples holds great weight to support an entire theory.

The example with non living things is too simplistic. If you were to change the dirt to sticks the same thing wouldn't work. You would need to pack them in one by one to ensure you utilized every part of that box to create more space. thus optimizing the space in the box. Design requires the use of large amounts of info that is ordered into patterns, codes, languages. But nature can have patterns without design. The video I linked shows that life, the universe and all existence has a maths equation to it all. There is a lot of info, maths, codes, language and patterns that are consistent and uniform throughout. To much so to be products of a random blind naturalistic process.
 
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