Questions about evolution

[ian90]

I would be interested on the accuracy of the following paragraphs:



"Mutation is the pillar and the only defense of macro-evolution. However, the problem with this is that the net effect of all mutations is harmful. Good mutations are vey, very rare - the probability of a single mutation appearing in one generation is between 1 in 10 thousand and 1 in 10 million, and well over 99% of all mutations are bad. This is just for one gene - it would take far, far more then 1 gene to mutate for a species to 'evolve' into another, or grow wings for example.

Taking wings as an example, they have 'evolved' independantly 4 different times (birds, insects, bats, lizards). Since there have been no intermediate species found, to explain this the genome would have to be remapped in one generation... in effect a monkey would have to give birth to a human being purely by genetic mutation. One human on their own wouldn't get very far, so this would need to happen at least twice, at the same time and in the same location so they could breed, and all this every time a new species 'evolved'. There are millions and millions of animals all said to have evolved from common ancestors. The probability of such a thing happening is beyond comprehension."

 

[Karl - Liberal Backslider]

I would be interested on the accuracy of the following paragraphs:



"Mutation is the pillar and the only defense of macro-evolution. However, the problem with this is that the net effect of all mutations is harmful. Good mutations are vey, very rare - the probability of a single mutation appearing in one generation is between 1 in 10 thousand and 1 in 10 million, and well over 99% of all mutations are bad. This is just for one gene - it would take far, far more then 1 gene to mutate for a species to 'evolve' into another, or grow wings for example.

It is absolutely false. The vast majority of mutations are neutral, and far from one mutation appearing every 10 thousand or 10 million generations is nonsense; most people actually carry one or more novel mutations themselves. Mutation is commonplace, even in the germ cells, and usually neither beneficial nor deleterious.

Taking wings as an example, they have 'evolved' independantly 4 different times (birds, insects, bats, lizards). Since there have been no intermediate species found, to explain this the genome would have to be remapped in one generation...

False premise - there are many intermediates in the case of wings. And even if the intermediates had not been found, this would not be evidence that they never existed. There are no manuscripts in French before the archaic Old French of approximately the ninth century - does that mean that Vulgar Latin changed into Old French in a single generation?

in effect a monkey would have to give birth to a human being purely by genetic mutation. One human on their own wouldn't get very far, so this would need to happen at least twice, at the same time and in the same location so they could breed, and all this every time a new species 'evolved'.

Straw man. There are in fact many transitional species between anything we'd recognise as a monkey and anything we'd recognise as being human. It seems that this particular objection is a strawman version of Punctuated Equilibrium, that suggests that speciation events often happen relatively very quickly - and the key word is relatively - it means in a few thousand or tens of thousands of years. Not in a single generation.

There are millions and millions of animals all said to have evolved from common ancestors. The probability of such a thing happening is beyond comprehension."

It is according to the version of evolution posited by these paragraphs, but these bear little to no resemblance to the real version.

Where did you get this from anyway?

 

[Maccie]

Mutation is the pillar and the only defense of macro-evolution. However, the problem with this is that the net effect of all mutations is harmful. Good mutations are vey, very rare - the probability of a single mutation appearing in one generation is between 1 in 10 thousand and 1 in 10 million, and well over 99% of all mutations are bad. This is just for one gene - it would take far, far more then 1 gene to mutate for a species to 'evolve' into another, or grow wings for example.

Taking wings as an example, they have 'evolved' independantly 4 different times (birds, insects, bats, lizards). Since there have been no intermediate species found, to explain this the genome would have to be remapped in one generation... in effect a monkey would have to give birth to a human being purely by genetic mutation. One human on their own wouldn't get very far, so this would need to happen at least twice, at the same time and in the same location so they could breed, and all this every time a new species 'evolved'. There are millions and millions of animals all said to have evolved from common ancestors. The probability of such a thing happening is beyond comprehension."

I have never heard such an unscientific, false and totally misleading load of rubbish!! Even on this Board!!

Like Karl said, where on earth did you find this???

 

[gluadys]

I would be interested on the accuracy of the following paragraphs:

I don't think it could be more inaccurate if it was trying to be.

"Mutation is the pillar and the only defense of macro-evolution. However, the problem with this is that the net effect of all mutations is harmful.

The author is assuming that all mutations accumulate and that harmful mutations will have a greater effect than beneficial effects. He is wrong because he is totally ignoring the impact of natural selection. Harmful mutations lower an organim's level of fitness and make it less likely that the organism will reproduce. So harmful mutations are regularly weeded out of the species' gene pool. But beneficial mutations raise an organism's level of fitness and make it more likely that the organism will reproduce and pass the beneficial mutation to its offspring. Compared to their peers, these offspring will also be more likely to reproduce and beome parents to a larger proportion of the next generation--and so on and so on.

With natural selection in the picture the net effect of all mutations is beneficial because only neutral or beneficial mutations accumulate, while harmful mutations are rejected.

Good mutations are vey, very rare - the probability of a single mutation appearing in one generation is between 1 in 10 thousand and 1 in 10 million, and well over 99% of all mutations are bad. This is just for one gene - it would take far, far more then 1 gene to mutate for a species to 'evolve' into another, or grow wings for example.

Absolutely ridiculous. On another thread we have been discussing a paper on the evolution of the human brain. Researchers have found thousands of mutations on thousands of genes within a relatively short framework of less than 5 million years. All directed to increased brain size and complexity.

Taking wings as an example, they have 'evolved' independantly 4 different times (birds, insects, bats, lizards). Since there have been no intermediate species found, to explain this the genome would have to be remapped in one generation... in effect a monkey would have to give birth to a human being purely by genetic mutation. One human on their own wouldn't get very far, so this would need to happen at least twice, at the same time and in the same location so they could breed, and all this every time a new species 'evolved'. There are millions and millions of animals all said to have evolved from common ancestors. The probability of such a thing happening is beyond comprehension."

Absolute nonsense again. The author apparently has no conception that evolution is a process which affects populations, not individuals.

 

[Vance]

It is difficult to believe that people writing stuff like that are not knowingly being deceptive. I suppose I should give them the benefit of the doubt and say that when you want to believe something strong enough, it becomes easy to distort things incredibly to fit your viewpoint, and actually believe it.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

It is interesting that google doesn't hit any particular sentence in this OP. as a matter of interest, if you are trying to google to find the source of a quote online, look for misspellings....

independantly---
but even with this i can't find the quote.
did anyone else find it? in the absence of the OP making the source available.

...

 

[statrei]

False premise - there are many intermediates in the case of wings. And even if the intermediates had not been found, this would not be evidence that they never existed. There are no manuscripts in French before the archaic Old French of approximately the ninth century - does that mean that Vulgar Latin changed into Old French in a single generation?

False analogy. Language does not have to always be reduced to writing. Wings have to exist physically for them to exist, unless they are designs in the mind of a designer.

 

[statrei]

Absolute nonsense again. The author apparently has no conception that evolution is a process which affects populations, not individuals.

But if you accept singularity as a premise how could evolution have occurred since there was no population on which it could work. Singularity makes evolution impossible unless someone seeded a population deliberately.

 

[seebs]

False analogy. Language does not have to always be reduced to writing. Wings have to exist physically for them to exist, unless they are designs in the mind of a designer.

I'm a little stupid this morning, so bear with me.

Do flying squirrels have wings? How about flying fish?

There's two possibilities I see. One is that the flying squirrel has things which, we don't know what they are, but they're not wings. In this case, however, it seems pretty clear that they're "partial wings".

Another is that it is asserted to have wings, in which case, we find that we have a pretty good tie-in from "no wings" to "wings".

 

[statrei]

I'm a little stupid this morning, so bear with me.

Do flying squirrels have wings? How about flying fish?

There's two possibilities I see. One is that the flying squirrel has things which, we don't know what they are, but they're not wings. In this case, however, it seems pretty clear that they're "partial wings".

Another is that it is asserted to have wings, in which case, we find that we have a pretty good tie-in from "no wings" to "wings".

Of course you have made a few false assumptions which you go on to disprove. Does fllight always require wings? Do wings always indicate flight? Even if we can hypothesize an intermediacy between two forms an evolutionary process is only one explanation. It is only a possible explanation. It is not conclusive.

 

[Robert the Pilegrim]

False analogy. Language does not have to always be reduced to writing.

Imperfect analogy, but still decent.

I think you would be foolish to suggest that the intermediates between Latin and Old French were never written down.

Wings have to exist physically for them to exist, unless they are designs in the mind of a designer.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1081677.stm
describes feathered dinosaurs including one that likely could glide.

http://www.stephenjaygould.org/library/gould_functionalshift.html
describes protowings found on insects also describes how at the small end increasing wing size increases the ability of wings to provide insulation and at the larger end increasing size moves wings from gliding to true flying.

 

[gluadys]

But if you accept singularity as a premise how could evolution have occurred since there was no population on which it could work. Singularity makes evolution impossible unless someone seeded a population deliberately.

Without a population, evolution doesn't exist.

What singularity are you talking about?

 

[Vance]

Of course you have made a few false assumptions which you go on to disprove. Does fllight always require wings? Do wings always indicate flight? Even if we can hypothesize an intermediacy between two forms an evolutionary process is only one explanation. It is only a possible explanation. It is not conclusive.

No, nothing is conclusive 100%, but it is consistent with the evidence. Not only is it VERY consistent with the evidence, but it is the only theory going which has not been falsified by contradicting the evidence.

Whether or not the theory of evolution is the proper explanation of the mechanics of evolutionary development, we are still stuck with the evidence showing evolutionary development over billions of years. Almost every Intelligent Design scientist agrees with this. While they dispute the mechanics of the development (arguing that the evolutioary process can not have happened without an active designer), they do not dispute that such a process took place (with the exception, possibly, of Johnson, who is not a scientist).

 

[gluadys]

False analogy. Language does not have to always be reduced to writing. Wings have to exist physically for them to exist, unless they are designs in the mind of a designer.

And species do not always have to be fossilized to show us all the intermediates in the transition to wings.

 

[statrei]

Without a population, evolution doesn't exist.

What singularity are you talking about?

This is where those who propound evolution confuse me. Some say it all began with one cell, but others hedge when it is pointed out that one cell is not a population.

 

[statrei]

No, nothing is conclusive 100%, but it is consistent with the evidence. Not only is it VERY consistent with the evidence, but it is the only theory going which has not been falsified by contradicting the evidence.

Let me first warn you that I am not a Creationist. That said, please explain how the notion that an intelligent, eternally existing Creator created thei universe and all life within it has been "falsified by contradicting the evidence."

 

[gluadys]

This is where those who propound evolution confuse me. Some say it all began with one cell, but others hedge when it is pointed out that one cell is not a population.

Apparently you are confusing "one cell" with "a population of one-celled organisms". I don't know of any scientist who has actually upheld the idea that life began with a single cell. I have seen creationists make this error.

 

[Vance]

Let me first warn you that I am not a Creationist. That said, please explain how the notion that an intelligent, eternally existing Creator created thei universe and all life within it has been "falsified by contradicting the evidence."

Oh, that has not been falsified, and never can be. What has been falsified is every other attempt so far to describe exactly how He did it. A young earth has been falsified, as you would agree. The evidence shows that species were not created specially all at once as well, since we have species which died off before other species came into existence, so that won't work either.

I suppose one could argue that a form of progressive creation has not been positively falsified, since you could assert that God created a series of species over billions of years in what would seem to be an evolutionary progression, just without the evolutionary mechanics. This would seem an odd position, though, since that would mean the person accepts the progression of species development, but rejects the mechanics, when we have actually observed that the mechanics works even to the level of speciation.

This is very close to what some of the ID guys say, though.

 

[statrei]

Oh, that has not been falsified, and never can be. What has been falsified is every other attempt so far to describe exactly how He did it.

Thank you.

 

[statrei]

Apparently you are confusing "one cell" with "a population of one-celled organisms". I don't know of any scientist who has actually upheld the idea that life began with a single cell. I have seen creationists make this error.

How did we suddenly come to have this population of one-celled organisms?