What’s your problem?

[TexasSky]

No one has said that the theory hasn't changed at all. What we've questioned is that it's changed the way you've said it has.



Are you telling me that the big bang was portrayed as the process by which organisms evolve?



If this is the theory of evolution you were taught, I'm wondering if your teachers knew what they were talking about. What I would like to see is some evidence that the actual scientific literature at the time portrayed evolution like this, so that it can be determined whether this was teacher error or what.



This is something that happens when new evidence arises. It seems you are critiquing science in general and not evolutionary theory in particular. The theory of gravity has changed as well. Does that make you question whether or not gravity exists?



I don't know who's screaming at you. I would just like some evidence besides your personal testimony that this is indeed what was taught, and if it was I would like some evidence that what you were taught accurately reflected scientific opinion at the time.



Where are you getting this from? Who has said that evolution is infallible and perfect? Do you not see the irony of a creationist accusing someone of forming their opinion based on something they perceive to be infallible?



Even if it were true that the theory of evolution has changed as drastically as you've made it out to, I don't see how it is a problem. Yes, scientific theories change with new evidence. This is a strength of science, not a weakness. Evolution seems to be the best current explanation for the diversity of biological organisms. Pointing out that it has changed in the past doesn't affect that.

Big Bang was presented as the "beginning of evolution". The process that began it all.

To whoever said it is just "bad American schools" are you telling me that you don't remember the huge fuss that was made in 1974 when Lucy was discovered? Seems she was "better developed" and "older" than they were teaching that man was. They had to rush to adjust their time lines and text books.

 

[TexasSky]

And no - it isn't just that my memory might be off.

It that was the case there wouldn't be whole books and page after page after page on the web of people objecting to the very things I listed.

 

[JohnR7]

what caused those organs to form?

I have a friend that is doing research on premature lung development in babies. He is trying to trigger the DNA into producing lung tissue, but so far they have only been able to produce intestines. So it could be if you want to know where organs come from, then you need to take a look at the DNA.

 

[Jet Black]

The question now, is on the last part mentioned---How can two or more different organisms, resulting from the same ancestry, randomly mutate the same mutations?

there is nothing ever suggesting that they have to do so. the mutations in the ancestral organisms spread through the entire population.

See, I'm NOT talking about mutations that cause simple variation, in keeping with the same species---I'm talking about mutations that start to cause an entire population to become a different one.

right. imagine for a second there is a species of square hole organisms. the square hole organisms attack and eat square peg organisms. The square hole organisms can only breed with other square hole organisms that have roughly the same shape hole as them (not perfectly, since there will always be a bit of difference). same goes for the square peg organisms.

One day there is a big earthquake in square peg and hole land and a big rover forms, splitting the square pegs and holes into two pupulations - one lot of square pegs and holes on one side, and one lot of square pegs and holes on the other.

Now one of the square peg organisms on one side of the river is a bit mutated, since his edges are not perfectly straight. still straight enough to breed with the other square pegs though. The interesting thing, is that the slightly curved square peg is harder to eat than the other square pegs, since it doesn't fit in the hole perfectly. so that means that when he breeds with the other square pegs, his offspring are more likely to survive, since they won't be eaten quite as easily, and so this mutation spreads through the square peg population. Now one of the square holes has a mutation such that it's edges are slightly curved too, and this can eat more of these curved square pegs than the others, and so his mutation spreads through the square hole population. No such mutation in the square pegs happened on the other side of the river, so any square holes with that mutation would not do as well as the really square holes (though they might have other mutations, such as becoming a bit more rectangular, or rhombus shaped or something)

so eventually slightly curved peg dominates the population, and slightly curved hole does too. say there is a further muitation in the curvature of square peg, and follow the same logic as before. Over time, this curvature gets bigger and bigger until the square pegs don't look square anymore, and the square holes don't either. they look like round pegs and round holes. Each mutation only changed them a little bit, so they had no problem breeding. but those little mutations made them better at surviving, and so spread. each little mutation spread through the entire population on that side of the river, making all of them a little more curved than their ancestors several generations before.

Now there is another earthquake in square peg and hole land, and the river disappears, and the two populations can now interact. Now a square peg wanders up to a round peg, but they cannot breed anymore because they are so different now, same for the round and square holes - the differences are too great. however the differences due to the mutations in the round peg population were only small, so breeding was never interrupted.

 

[Edx]

Big Bang was presented as the "beginning of evolution". The process that began it all.

The big bang started all of our universes physical laws didnt it? Does that mean all of our scientific theories also include The Big Bang? Should atomic theory and germ theory include the Big Bang, and if we are wrong about the Big bang are those theories wrong too? Because that is what you're saying.

 

[Jet Black]

Big Bang was presented as the "beginning of evolution". The process that began it all.

no it wasn't the beginning of evolution. evolution, as you should well know, is a biological theory. The Big Bang is a cosmological theory. They are not the same thing.

To whoever said it is just "bad American schools" are you telling me that you don't remember the huge fuss that was made in 1974 when Lucy was discovered? Seems she was "better developed" and "older" than they were teaching that man was. They had to rush to adjust their time lines and text books.

good gosh, new discovery changes things. well that's never happened before has it? Better write to the newspapers about that one eh? I mean, the discovery of bacteria and viruses changed all those silly ideas about demon posession and ill humors.

 

[Edx]

It that was the case there wouldn't be whole books and page after page after page on the web of people objecting to the very things I listed.

Yea, and why dont you list a few examples? Oh that right, all those people are Creationists that I keep telling you have no idea what they are talking about. Learn science from a Creationists and it will guarantee you wont understand anything. You are the one of the best examples Ive seen to attest to that.

 

[Jet Black]

It that was the case there wouldn't be whole books and page after page after page on the web of people objecting to the very things I listed.

right, same goes for the holocaust, the moon landings, kennedy's assassination, the WTC attacks, Area 51 and a billion other things that show that an awful lot of stupid people on the internet have too much time. Sampling the internet for random views isn't going to help your argument really, since stupidity really is quite prolific.

 

[JohnR7]

an awful lot of stupid people on the internet have too much time.

Actually, no one has "too much time", they just make really bad use of the time they have and are given.

 

[JohnR7]

Learn science from a Creationists and it will guarantee you wont understand anything.

Are you trying to say you have a problem with "creation science" or that you have a problem with creationists?

 

[shinbits]

no no. The mutation that occurs in individual A will spread to the whole population at a later time as a result of sexual reproduction.

This is where the problem lies. We have to just take evolution's word for so much.

First, we have to believe that the initial mutations that resulted in macro-evolution even happened. Second, we have to believe that the offspring carrying those mutations didn't die from dieses, predators, natural disasters or simple accident.

Third---and this is what is tricky---we have to assume that each individual organism didn't have some other mutation that would begin a seperate evolutionary process; that enough of them remained similar enough to even be called a population.

Basically, you'd have to assume that each individual that recieved a new gene, didn't mutate something that would cause it's own offspring to be so different, that it isn't similar enough to be counted as part of a population.

I hope I'm making myself clear.

.

Lets say for simplicity that a monkey in a breeding group develops a gene for glow in the dark fur, and for some reason this helps that monkey survive and have more surviving descendants than average.

Okay, let's say this happens. How do u know it's offspring won't develop thier own separte genes that help it survive in some different way? And how do u know that the same didn't happen for each of that creatures offspring, and so on? You can't. U'd just have to assume that it didn't happen, otherwise, evolution can't work.

 

[AnEmpiricalAgnostic]

Gotcha. So far, you've been talking about survival of the fittest.

Kind of. I think a better way to describe it is differential reproductive success. “Fittest” sometime gives people a false impression that the physically strongest drive the evolution. In the AIDS example, “fittest” would be those resistant to AIDS (even if they were puny weaklings).

No, that's not it. I'm full aware of how long evolution says it takes.

But you may not be fully getting my question.

See, mutations are random.

Correct?

Pretty much, yes.

And random mutation is passed on to the offspring. Correct?

Right, and if it gives a reproductive benefit then it can spread to the rest of the population eventually. If inhibits reproduction then it will not spread.

Here's where it gets hazy. In theory, the next step, is that somewhere down the lineage, whether it's the very next generation or not, that another mutation will occur, and the prior mutation will be passed on in as well as the more recent one. Correct?

Right, if they are both beneficial. Or one is beneficial and one is neutral. Or the benefit of one mutation outweighs the detriment of the other one. (See where it starts to get more complicated)

The question now, is on the last part mentioned---How can two or more different organisms, resulting from the same ancestry, randomly mutate the same mutations?

This is where common ancestry comes in. If the mutation is beneficial and spreads throughout the entire population, any decendants from that common ancestral population will have those same mutations. It’s inherited. Like the AIDS example, any offspring from that population will carry that double delta 32 mutation forever unless something happens to mutate / break it (like our vitamin c psuedogene)

See, if the mutations aren't the same, then a population can't evolve simultaneously into the same new species---there'd be a bunch of different ones if the mutations aren't similar.

The beneficial mutations spread throughout the population when they reproduce. The most beneficial reproduce more successfully. The worse the mutation the less the organism reproduces. It’s like someone being born with a huge defect (physically or mentally). That person will be less likely to reproduce. We tend to want the best, most attractive, physically healthy partners to reproduce with. This helps the good genes spread and weeds out the bad genes. Over many, many years the best (most beneficial mutations) will spread throughout the entire population. It happens faster if the population is smaller.

See, I'm NOT talking about mutations that cause simple variation, in keeping with the same species---I'm talking about mutations that start to cause an entire population to become a different one. How do those mutations happen uniformly if they're random? The individuals would have to randomly mutate similar genes, and that would take unheard of luck.

As I described above. It’s not luck. It’s bred throughout the population over time.

Do u understand me now?

I think so. I hope that answers your question.

 

[JohnR7]

The square hole organisms can only breed with other square hole organisms that have roughly the same shape hole as them

Are there squares that are shaped different? If it were shaped different, then it would no longer be a square.

 

[AnEmpiricalAgnostic]

Are there squares that are shaped different? If it were shaped different, then it would no longer be a square.

There are lots of homo sapiens that are shaped differently. Are they not homo sapiens?

 

[Jet Black]

This is where the problem lies. We have to just take evolution's word for so much.

not preally, this is a pretty obvious principle

First, we have to believe that the initial mutations that resulted in macro-evolution even happened.

macroevolution is only accumulation of microevolution. There is no special kind of mutation that "starts macroevolution"

Second, we have to believe that the offspring carrying those mutations didn't die from dieses, predators, natural disasters or simple accident.

many - probably most - mutations that would have otherwise been beneficial will have died in their originators due to being eaten shortly after birth or been hit by a straight bolt of lightning or whatever.

Third---and this is what is tricky---we have to assume that each individual organism didn't have some other mutation that would begin a seperate evolutionary process; that enough of them remained similar enough to even be called a population.

It's only tricky because you're not really understanding what is going on. There are lots of paths that a population could take in evolution, as you seem to realise, but what we are looking at most fundamentally is the collection of genes in the gene pool. It might be that two individuals in a population have mutations that are beneficial on their own, but not when combined together, then we have a competition in the population for which one wins out, since they don't work together. for example in the square peg round peg thing, you might have one individual that becomes more rhombic, and another that becomes rounder. both of these are harder to eat by the square holes and so will spread, but if a rhombic and a rounded peg breed, their children might have some other problem, for example they might get stuck in trees more or something - so in combination they do not work. So which will win out in rhombic and rounded pegs? It could be either totally random due to statistics, or an unfortunate meteor kills off a load of rhombic pegs, leaving more round pegs, or whatever, but ultimately one will win out and the other will be eradicated (or the rhombic and round populations split and speciate again)

Basically, you'd have to assume that each individual that recieved a new gene, didn't mutate something that would cause it's own offspring to be so different, that it isn't similar enough to be counted as part of a population.

ok, but then nobody is expecting saltationary leaps anyway. they aren't a significant part of the ToE. That's basically what you are describing there. If an individual somehow did manage to have an offspring that was wildly different, it would probably die out, because it could no longer contribute to the gene pool. Those cases are not expected to contribute to evolution anyway.

I hope I'm making myslelf clear.

I think you are doing quite well in making your position clear That's quite commendable since our paradigms are so different. You still seem to have some misconceptions on how evolution actually progresses though.

 

[AnEmpiricalAgnostic]

This is where the problem lies. We have to just take evolution's word for so much.

Not really. Once you fully understand the mechanisms involved we can see them occurring today. The rest is just following the evidence to its natural conclusion. Looking at ERVs in general and the broken vitamin c psuedogene in particular is one of the best examples of common ancestry available.

First, we have to believe that the initial mutations that resulted in macro-evolution even happened.

Here is the time thing coming into play again. No one single mutation caused a “macro”-evolution to happen. It happens over time with the cumulative accumulation of small mutations.

Second, we have to believe that the offspring carrying those mutations didn't die from dieses, predators, natural disasters or simple accident.

Why? They could have. As long as they reproduced then theie genes were passed into the population.

Third---and this is what is tricky---we have to assume that each individual organism didn't have some other mutation that would begin a seperate evolutionary process; that enough of them remained similar enough to even be called a population.

They can each have 100 simultaneous mutations. The ones with the more beneficial set will reproduce more. The beneficial mutations will be spread. The detrimental ones will die off.

Basically, you'd have to assume that each individual that recieved a new gene, didn't mutate something that would cause it's own offspring to be so different, that it isn't similar enough to be counted as part of a population.

Since each mutation is small. It wouldn’t cause it to not be able to reproduce even if it had 100 mutations. Each mutation alone is not very significant. If one person is born with green eyes they will still be able to produce with a brown eyed person. If they have 100 differences (hair, skin, eyes, etc) they will still be able to reproduce together. It takes a lot of time to make a population different enough to be a new species.

Okay, let's say this happens. How do u know it's offspring won't develop thier own separte genes that help it survive in some different way? And how do u know that the same didn't happen for each of that creatures offspring, and so on? You can't. U'd just have to assume that it didn't happen, otherwise, evolution can't work.

It can happen. The more mutations that happen the faster they evolve. It never happens fast enough to cause a child to not be able to reproduce within it’s population.

 

[shinbits]

It's only tricky because you're not really understanding what is going on. There are lots of paths that a population could take in evolution

Okay, this will make it much simpler.

A entire population doesn't mutate simultaneously, or exactly the same, correct?

See, since each organism in a population has the ability to mutate a completely different gene---and so one for each of the offspring produced.

If this continues, there'd be no characteristics similar enough to say that one organism is the same type as another---each organism would be it's own seperate species.

But in order for evolution to work, we must assume that over time, each individual didn't mutate it's own separate genes, pass them, have thier offspring mutate thier own seperate genes, continuing the process until there is no semblance at all between the offspring, to even call it a population.

That's what I mean. Evolution assumes that some pattern was kept---which is ridiculous to assume, when we are talking about randomly mutating genes.

 

[Jet Black]

Okay, this will make it much simpler.

A entire population doesn't mutate simultaneously, or exactly the same, correct?

See, since each organism in a population has the ability to mutate a completely different gene---and so one for each of the offspring produced.

If this continues, there'd be no characteristics similar enough to say that one organism is the same type as another---each organism would be it's own seperate species.

But in order for evolution to work, we must assume that over time, each individual didn't mutate it's own separate genes, pass them, have thier offspring mutate thier own seperate genes, continuing the process until there is no semblance at all between the offspring, to even call it a population.

you have to remember that because of sexual reproduction, the genes are being mixed all the time. so while I have mutations, and my children will have their own, all these mutations must survive in the gene pool. It might be that my mutation dies out in two generations time, and the currently dominant gene maintains its hold, so in my great grandchildren, they all inherited that particular gene from their father, and not from my granddaughter (which is the only place they could get my gene from)

That's what I mean. Evolution assumes that some pattern was kept---which is ridiculous to assume, when we are talking about randomly mutating genes.

what pattern?

 

[Edx]

If this continues, there'd be no characteristics similar enough to say that one organism is the same type as another---each organism would be it's own seperate species.
.

Wha? A species is an organism from a population, you cant have a species of only one organism. Without reproduction there is no evolution, and no chance of speciation.

For some reason you seem to still be describing mutation as if it works a bit like X-Men.

 

[Jet Black]

A good example of this is Mitochondrial Eve. When Mitochondrial eve was around, there were lots of other women too. The thing about Mt Eve however is she is the only woman who has had an unbroken line of daughters, grand daughters, great grand daughters and so on to the modern day. Now all the mutations that Mt Eve had in her mitochondria will have been preserved, but all the mutations that all those other women who were around with her at the time have been eradicated.