proving evolution as just a "theory"

[DogmaHunter]

I'm pretty sure you don't know what it means, since you think copies in different orders didn't copy what already existed, just in a new order. You know, like what happens with dogs, or finches that are interbreeding? Oh my fault, finch variety is because of natural selection, not because they are interbreeding under their noses.

Remind me again why interbreeding dogs and finches apparantly pose a problem for evolution theory?

 

[Justatruthseeker]

Depends on the genetics of these hamster colors. What you are talking about sounds like incomplete dominance, which is fairly common in color genetics.



I sincerely hope that you don't think all traits are inherited as incomplete dominance. Human eye color is a good example of inherited color that doesn't always fit incomplete dominance. For example, let's say a child's father is homozygous for brown eyes (represented as BB), and their mother is heterozygous for brown eyes and carries a blue eye allele (represented as Bb). That kid has brown eyes, regardless as to whether or not they inherited that blue eye allele from their mom, because the brown eye gene is dominant. That is, in the presence of both alleles, the brown eye allele will be expressed and the blue eye one won't. Their mom has brown eyes, not an intermediate between brown and blue.

Just for you, I actually looked up recently registered dog breeds. One of the most recent ones is the Alaskan Klee Ki, which resembles a miniature husky. This was the result of a breeding project between 1970 and 1988, a mere 18 years to produce a new dog breed, which was recognized by the UKC since 1997. So, feel free to count that as "extra time", that's still a new dog breed within 27 years. And I am fairly sure you've been alive from start to finish for that.

This is why I take such issue with you bringing up dogs so much. This is why I cannot stand you claiming that we don't produce new dog breeds ever. It can be done easily in a human lifetime. Plus, the Triops that will be my test subjects breed a lot faster than dogs do. 18 years is less than 30 generations of responsible dog breeding. The Triops will experience more than 30 generations within 2 years.

Dont play coy. They insinuated skin color was the result of mutation. Whether its full dominance or partial dominance is irrelevant to the point being made.

No new dog breeds ever? Where in the world did you ever get that idea? I simply point out that there was no evolution from the Husky and Mastiff to the Chinook. It is all simply interbreeding, and if they applied that to the fossil record instead of using the PR of mutations, when mutations cant even get past the breed barrier....... it was interbreeding which led to that new breed 27 years later, not mutations, not evolution. And its still the same Kind. It may be a different breed in that Kind. Id use the word subspecies as would be proper, but they are afraid to classify them correctly as it would show the lie to evolution, like they refuse to classify humans correctly.

Please get what I said correct. I said mutation cant even get past the breed barrier, not that interbreeding can not create new breeds. I fully accept interbreeding can do just that, and is the cause of the variation we also see in the fossil record. Not mutation.

 

[DogmaHunter]

Where did the eukaryotic cells come from? what did they diverge from?

https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/_0/endosymbiosis_03

Article called "From prokaryotes to eukaryotes"

 

[PsychoSarah]

Where did the eukaryotic cells come from? what did they diverge from?

Eukaryotic cells have a strange history, given that at least 2 of the organelles that are in those cells (mitochondria in all eukaryotic cells and chloroplasts that are in those that photosynthesize) were once independent organisms and to this day have their own DNA and independently reproduce themselves within cells. I'd say that eukaryotic cells are a sort of hybrid cell type of a large cell with linear DNA that engulfed (but could not digest) some prokaryotes, and as the cell reproduced those did as well, and they formed a symbiotic relationship over time. Given that eukaryotes do have linear DNA while prokaryotes have circular DNA, I think it is reasonable to question the extent of shared ancestry between the two groups.

 

[Justatruthseeker]

It's called "learning" and "making progress".

There's nothing in there that poses a problem for evolution. It's not like they found a rabbit in pre-cambrian strata.

Why would I expect to find a rabbit in the pre-Cambrian? If you did, Creation would be falsified.

 

[HiEv]

What is a common ancestor? If we have always been human and a spider has always been a spider then how can we have come from a common ancestor?

You're not listening to what I'm saying.

"Human" or "spider" isn't a switch that gets turned on in the genes. It's a human-invented distinction to describe a group.

A group of organisms which were similar to modern humans gave birth to many offspring, some of which were closer to modern humans, and those are the ones that tended to survive. Then those offspring had offspring that were closer still. And so on. After many, many, many generations, they crossed over a fuzzy man-made distinction that allowed us to describe them as more into the modern human category than not. Then they continued to evolve to become what they are today. And even today, we continue to evolve towards something else.

This isn't "X gave birth to Y", this is "over many generations group X slowly changed to look more like more modern group Y".

Were there millions of common ancestors or was there just one?

Both. There were lots of common ancestors to both modern humans and modern chimpanzees, for example. These were entire species that led to other species, not one single individual that led to a new species.

But if you're talking about common ancestors to all life, it might be one, but we don't really know.

You have to understand that there are "most recent common ancestors" between different species, and then there is the "common ancestors" to all life. The phrase can refer to either.

Is evolution saying one thing had all the genetic make up of all things?

Nope. Not at all.

Features that exist in one species could have evolved in that species, and not have existed at all in earlier species, though often there was some precursor it evolved from which had a different function.

If one thing had the genetic make up of all things, that would be evidence for creationism. But the evidence points to that not being the case at all. Evolution has demonstrated that it's remarkably good at evolving some new traits without that trait already being "built-in" somehow.

If that is so then a spider was not always a spider and a human was not always a human.

Well, it's not so. And, again, and I shouldn't have to say this, but a spider is, by definition, a spider. You keep getting hung up on this, and not being able to see that it's just a human categorization, which in reality has some very fuzzy edges.

We evolved all separately from one thing a common ancestor. Hence we evolved from something that we were not from the start.

You're using the word "we" wrong here. "We" are the end result of this process. Other species are what evolved from other species, right up until those other species actually became "us", but that boundary is fuzzy. There is no clear cut off between "us" and "not us" because this is such a gradual process.

And there is no way to test or reproduce that.

Sure there is. Run simple breeding experiments and then extrapolate from the evidence. Or look at the DNA for markers that would show that this is what is happening. Or look at the fossil record to see if it matches this pattern. Or look at the distribution of species and see if it matches what you'd expect if this were true.

And we do do these things, and all of them support the scientific theory of evolution.

And that really cool animation you gave is an assumption because there is no evidence that actually occurred.

I don't think you understand what "evidence" is. The fossils themselves, the order that they appeared, the physiological similarities, all of these things and more are the evidence that that actually occurred.

What exactly do you think evidence looks like? This isn't a rhetorical question, I'd really like to know your answer to this.

We don't have a fossil record of spiders being anything but spiders.

That's because, by definition, spiders are spiders. If something wasn't a spider, then it wouldn't be a spider, now would it? You really need to stop getting hung up on using this incorrect language to describe evolution, because it's hampering you from understanding what it really says.

Now, let me ask you a question, what is this?

Is that a spider? A scorpion? Something else?

And what about this?

Is that a tick? A crab? A spider? Something else?

How about this?

The fact is, all of those organisms have features of both the things they evolved from and the things they evolved into, so how would you categorize them?

I could go further back in their lineage, and as I did, they would look less and less like spiders, but they are still likely ancestors of the modern arthropods.

Once again similarities are not evidence of evolution unless you assume they are.

It's not merely "similarities", its similarities which are expected and predicted within the evolutionary model. This isn't merely an "assumption", it's the most likely conclusion from the evidence. Evidence which, were we not able to find any, would disprove that model.

Similarities are evidence if common design.

No, they're not. In order to be evidence for a model, there has to be a way to falsify the model. If the model cannot be falsified, such as the creationist model, then nothing can be evidence for it, because nothing could be evidence against it.

Evidence of evolution would be actually having something transforming into something else.

Things aren't "transforming" into other things in the evolutionary model, so you're using incorrect language again. Evolution doesn't happen at the individual level, it happens at the species level, usually over many, many generations.

That being said, the fossil, genetic, and geographical evidence of various species evolving into other species is in great abundance.

Like actual evidence of whatever it was slowly over millions of years transforming from something that didn't look like a spider into a spider.

We have that. I gave you some examples above.

All we have is fully formed fossils of millions of different things all existing at once.

You say "fully formed" as though evolution predicts there would be half-formed creatures or something. That's not what evolution says.

The species is "fully formed" at every step of evolution. There are no non-functional "half-wings" or whatever it is you're alluding to there in the way evolution works.

Also, they most certainly weren't "existing all at once". We find species appearing and disappearing throughout the fossil record, most species never meeting the others from other time periods.

All the testing we can do is only to show similarities. All the testing we can do is to show how a particular thing like a virus or a bird or moth can adapt and change to survive and yet still remain a bird or a moth or a virus.

That's just completely wrong. We have tons of evidence. You rejecting that evidence or being unaware of it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I think you just don't understand what the word "evidence" means in this context. Allow me to quote Wikipedia:

"Scientific evidence is evidence which serves to either support or counter a scientific theory or hypothesis. Such evidence is expected to be empirical evidence and interpretation in accordance with scientific method. Standards for scientific evidence vary according to the field of inquiry, but the strength of scientific evidence is generally based on the results of statistical analysis and the strength of scientific controls."

Thus, for example, finding fossils which appear in a sequence which supports the evolutionary model is, by definition, scientific evidence for that model.

In the light of that, can you at least admit that there is a lot of scientific evidence for the theory of evolution?

EDIT: Also, I'm going to repeat to you the same question you keep dodging: What exactly would evidence of evolution look like to you? (And please, make sure what you're asking for is something that evolution actually predicts would occur.)

It's rather telling that you keep avoiding answering this question.

 

[xianghua]

It's called "learning" and "making progress".

it's not what you said here:

"Except the logical progression of the fossil record, with no exceptions"

so we indeed found exceptions.

 

[Justatruthseeker]

Eukaryotic cells have a strange history, given that at least 2 of the organelles that are in those cells (mitochondria in all eukaryotic cells and chloroplasts that are in those that photosynthesize) were once independent organisms and to this day have their own DNA and independently reproduce themselves within cells. I'd say that eukaryotic cells are a sort of hybrid cell type of a large cell with linear DNA that engulfed (but could not digest) some prokaryotes, and as the cell reproduced those did as well, and they formed a symbiotic relationship over time. Given that eukaryotes do have linear DNA while prokaryotes have circular DNA, I think it is reasonable to question the extent of shared ancestry between the two groups.

I'd question their shared ancestry totally, not just to an extent.

So in essence no one really knows where they came from????? Some people just believe a certain way, right?

Are you saying those eukaryotic cells just popped into existence? Surely they evolved from a simpler form of life?

 

[Justatruthseeker]

Both. There were lots of common ancestors to both modern humans and modern chimpanzees, for example. These were entire species that led to other species, not one single individual that led to a new species.

So in other words you don't have any actual evidence at all that humans and chimps share a common ancestor?

Would that be like saying there were many common ancestors that led to the Chinook? I might buy your theory if you'd quit ignoring the definition of species when you talk about species mating with other species..... And quit claiming mutation and natural selection was the cause instead of simply shared genomes through interbreeding. Ahh, but ignoring that definition is the only way you can get new species.....

 

[PsychoSarah]

Dont play coy. They insinuated skin color was the result of mutation. Whether its full dominance or partial dominance is irrelevant to the point being made.

The issue with suggesting that variations in skin color in any organism isn't the result of mutation is the fact that we STILL see new variations in skin color occur as the result of mutation. I showed you one before, and all you said was "but they still the same "race" though"... even though human races have always been arbitrary.

No new dog breeds ever? Where in the world did you ever get that idea? I simply point out that there was no evolution from the Husky and Mastiff to the Chinook.

Sigh, the problem with this claim is that evolution isn't just a matter of new mutations. It's also a matter of genetic drift. Even in a hypothetical population in which mutation does not occur, as long as that population had variation in the genes to begin with, there will be trends on the frequencies of various genes within that population, and future populations will reflect those genes best suited to living in the environment that population lives in. So, if I start out with 30 green hamsters, 30 red hamsters, and 30 blue hamsters, and the green hamsters have the biggest advantage because they blend in with the grass, the trend over time will be that green hamsters will become more and more common, while blue and red hamsters become less and less common. That type of population trend is evolution as well; it's the impact natural selection has on the variation within a population.

You see, the biggest problem with disregarding mutation is that you are disregarding the only mechanism by which more variation is introduced within evolution. That is, if it's not a source of variation within traits for natural selection to act upon, then the other components of evolution will simply lead every population into becoming less and less diverse. We don't actually observe that, though; populations usually only become notably less diverse if there are bottleneck events.

It is all simply interbreeding, and if they applied that to the fossil record instead of using the PR of mutations, when mutations cant even get past the breed barrier....... it was interbreeding which led to that new breed 27 years later, not mutations, not evolution.

Not sure if interbreeding is the word you want to use, as it heavily implies that you think new dog breeds are only produces by crossing different breeds together... which is demonstrably not the case.

And its still the same Kind. It may be a different breed in that Kind. Id use the word subspecies as would be proper, but they are afraid to classify them correctly as it would show the lie to evolution, like they refuse to classify humans correctly.

Kind has no solid definition, so I'd rather you no use that term. Say genus or whatever you think marks the line mutation doesn't cross.

Please get what I said correct. I said mutation cant even get past the breed barrier, not that interbreeding can not create new breeds.

Oh, so you do think new dog breeds are only produced via crossing already existing breeds. Guess you've never taken a good look at a family tree of dog breeds? The Irish sitter, for example, descended from the English sitter... without crossing it with other dog breeds. There are a lot of dog breeds that weren't the result of crosses between already existing breeds.

 

[Ada Lovelace]

In case this hasn't already been posted on one of the 124 pages of this thread:

Evolution Resources from the National Academies
and
"Just a Theory": 7 Misused Science Words

2. Just a theory?
Climate-change deniers and creationists have deployed the word "theory" to cast doubt on climate change and evolution.
"It's as though it weren't true because it's just a theory," Allain said.
That's despite the fact that an overwhelming amount of evidence supports both human-caused climate change and Darwin's theory of evolution.
Part of the problem is that the word "theory" means something very different in lay language than it does in science: A scientific theory is an explanation of some aspect of the natural world that has been substantiated through repeated experiments or testing. But to the average Jane or Joe, a theory is just an idea that lives in someone's head, rather than an explanation rooted in experiment and testing.

 

[xianghua]

In case this hasn't already been posted on one of the 124 pages of this thread:

"A scientific theory is an explanation of some aspect of the natural world that has been substantiated through repeated experiments or testing."-

and how we can test the belief that banana and human shared a common descent? we cant. so evolution isnt a scientific theory even according to that source.

 

[PsychoSarah]

So in essence no one really knows where they came from?????

Why would we entirely know that? There aren't any fossils of "proto-eukaryotic" cells that are distinguishable as such. When single celled organisms fossilize, they are just a shape in the rock. We can't tell what was inside.

Some people just believe a certain way, right?

There are legitimate reasons to view prokaryotes and eukaryotes as sharing ancestry, such as the shared metabolic pathway of glycolysis, the fact that both utilize DNA as their genetic material, and a bit more genetic similarity than can be reasonably waved away as coincidence. However, I don't think that this evidence is nearly as conclusive as, say, all vertebrates sharing ancestry. But, I'm actually a bit of a wingnut on this matter, fyi.

Are you saying those eukaryotic cells just popped into existence? Surely they evolved from a simpler form of life?

I don't claim otherwise. Rather, I think that life may have more than one lineage, one with circular genetic material, and one with linear genetic material, and that the development of the glycolytic pathway in the eukaryote lineage was a result of the improper digestion of the bacteria that would later become chloroplasts and mitochondria. I'm not suggesting that my idea has more evidence supporting it than the idea of a universal common ancestor, only that it is plausible and that the evidence for UCA is not conclusive.

 

[pitabread]

I'm pretty sure you don't know what it means, since you think copies in different orders didn't copy what already existed, just in a new order.

A novel DNA sequence is by definition something new. If you want to pretend otherwise, by all means. But there is clearly a disconnect between how you think DNA works and how it actually works.

 

[Ophiolite]

To dismiss what it says and say it isn't accurate in what it says and that it means something else than what it says IS an interpretation. I merely believe what it says plain and simple no interpretation required.

You have interpreted the creation account in Genesis as being literal. This is in opposition to the views of other denominations, individuals and Biblical scholars. You are free to believe your interpretation of the passages. You are not free to deny that you do have a specific interpretation, though I imagine you will continue to do so.

 

[Ophiolite]

Maybe not in your dictionary but we use a different dictionary than you do.

When someone stole my dictionary I couldn't find the words to say how it made me feel.

 

[Justatruthseeker]

Not if they were created independently from one another.

Why not? If I create a vase and a bowl from the same basic substances, just different proportions, even if created independently would share similarities yet be vastly different.

But if they share ancestry and evolved gradually over time, it couldn't be any other pattern then the one we observe.

I beg to differ. If monkey and man were created both from the same dust, then over time through interbreeding within each species specific traits, the similarities would still be there with the accumulated differences. Yet man and monkey need not share a common ancestor, just the same basic DNA building blocks that all life shares. After all, as countless on here have agreed trying to lessen the empirical data..... e coli remain e coli...... dogs remain dogs..... fruit flies remain fruit flies.
It is evolutionists that admit this, then want fish to become man.

Breeding for traits = artificial selection = application of the evolutionary process.

It's also how we breed both broccoli and brussel sprouts from the same wild gabbage plant.

I agree they are all the same Kind. Its them that cant seem to follow their deffinitions very well.

I thought that was natural selection. We are after all just a product of nature and not artificial are we not? So the difference in outcome between say man bringing a Mastiff and Husky together and famine doing so and the offspring result would be what exactly?

Off course. Descendends of canines will always remain canines. Dogs don't produce cats. They produce more dogs (and sub-species thereof, eventually)

Yet supposedly the descendants of some fish species became man and monkey. I thought fish always remained fish? I'm not sure your able to comprehend your inconsistencies, so used to being able to hide behind changing stories every three posts.

Indeed, because in natural selection, only survivability and reproduction counts.
Not "fluffyness" or "cuteness" or "hardest bite" or "longest tail" or "best drugs sniffer".

Most of the breeds of dogs actually wouldn't survive in the wild at all. Some of them are even no longer capable of natural reproduction, because the evolutionary effects of the artificial selection simply changed their anatomy so much that they literally became physically incapable of reproducing I'm.

Again a nice example of why such species would not evolve in the wild. They require human assistance and care to survive.

Agreed, which is why you see so few breeds (oh sorry, subspecies) in those species in the fossil record, man wasnt there to interfere. Nor was man there to see the breeding going on, and in his zeal to get his name in the books named everything slightly different a separate species. But apparently dogs still havent taught you anything. I have no doubt without mans interference there would only be two or three breeds (ooops, youd call them species then) of wild dog.

The only difference are the selection parameters, which aren't of the "natural" kind in breeding programs.

But have no problem calling laboratory e coli natural selection or flies or peas. Hmmmm, imagine that.

 

[gaara4158]

Dont play coy. They insinuated skin color was the result of mutation. Whether its full dominance or partial dominance is irrelevant to the point being made.

No new dog breeds ever? Where in the world did you ever get that idea? I simply point out that there was no evolution from the Husky and Mastiff to the Chinook. It is all simply interbreeding, and if they applied that to the fossil record instead of using the PR of mutations, when mutations cant even get past the breed barrier....... it was interbreeding which led to that new breed 27 years later, not mutations, not evolution. And its still the same Kind. It may be a different breed in that Kind. Id use the word subspecies as would be proper, but they are afraid to classify them correctly as it would show the lie to evolution, like they refuse to classify humans correctly.

Please get what I said correct. I said mutation cant even get past the breed barrier, not that interbreeding can not create new breeds. I fully accept interbreeding can do just that, and is the cause of the variation we also see in the fossil record. Not mutation.

So let me get this straight.

You think scientists just walk around looking for skeletons, happen upon them from time to time, and if one skeleton looks similar enough to the next, they conclude "Wow, so I guess these animals evolved into these other animals!"

Seriously, I want you to answer this. Please tell me you do not have such a caveman-level understanding of how science works.

 

[Justatruthseeker]

Yes. The Bible is as clear as it can be on this subject. And it's not just me. You make it sound like I am some sort of lone wolf in this but I am not. Genesis has been trusted through the centuries as an accurate account of creation. And once again it is not an interpretation. It IS what the Bible says happened. To dismiss what it says and say it isn't accurate in what it says and that it means something else than what it says IS an interpretation. I merely believe what it says plain and simple no interpretation required.

There is no overwhelming evidence. It is all assumption. As evolution from a common IS squarely set against what God says it is a product of the human mind which is set against God. To disbelieve and dismiss what God says is a clear representation of the ungodly mind of humanity who serve the devil in their ungodly ways. Christians can be duped by worldly ungodly influences. And many are.

The Bible? Or mans English translation? Last I was aware the Bible was given to us in Hebrew.

But lets for example look at the second word of the second verse of the Bible.

Hayah which means to fall out or to become.

So where does one get was formless and void, when the word hayah clearly means a state of becoming, or did it become formless and void from a state of formlessness and void?

Or was the earth already created with life and it simply became desolate and waste when the dinosaurs died out from the darkness and water that it became submerged in?

 

[Justatruthseeker]

So let me get this straight.

You think scientists just walk around looking for skeletons, happen upon them from time to time, and if one skeleton looks similar enough to the next, they conclude "Wow, so I guess these animals evolved into these other animals!"

Seriously, I want you to answer this. Please tell me you do not have such a caveman-level understanding of how science works.

No, I think they walk around, looking to see differences so they can call them separate species and get their names in the book. Then when they cant find any intermediaries claim evolution.

I say they aint got a clue what is what. That they cant even get babies and adults correct, let alone breeds, i mean subspecies correct.