What Would We Expect If Humans And Chimps Shared A Common Ancestor

[The Cadet]

We don't need to believe that the Darwin fairies transformed humans into different types of creatures over time in order to confirm DNA relations of different humans. This is the fundamental Darwinian assumption you always have to hide and pretend isn't there but it is plain to see.

Here's an interesting question. Imagine humans shared a common ancestor with Chimpanzees. What would we expect to find? What predictions could be made and tested for this hypothesis?

 

[whois]

Here's an interesting question. Imagine humans shared a common ancestor with Chimpanzees. What would we expect to find? What predictions could be made and tested for this hypothesis?

with the modern discovories of transposable genes, gene duplication, and HGT, we can expect something quite unlike the common ancestor.
epigenetics throws up an even bigger cloud.
like koonin said, "just not to mince words, the modern synthesis is dead".

 

[sfs]

with the modern discovories of transposable genes, gene duplication, and HGT, we can expect something quite unlike the common ancestor.
epigenetics throws up an even bigger cloud.
like koonin said, "just not to mince words, the modern synthesis is dead".

That's a spectacular non-answer. If humans and chimpanzees had a common ancestor, say 6 million years ago, how many transposition events would we expect to see in that time? What would they look like? Could we detect them? How many gene duplications might we expect? Could we detect them? Given the observed rates of HGT in mammals, how many instances of that would we expect to see? What fraction of the genome would that represent? What effect would epigenetics have on what we'd see?

 

[Loudmouth]

with the modern discovories of transposable genes, gene duplication, and HGT, we can expect something quite unlike the common ancestor.

My reply is the same as sfs.

epigenetics throws up an even bigger cloud.

In what way?

like koonin said, "just not to mince words, the modern synthesis is dead".

"The comparative infrequency of HGT in the eukaryote part of the biological world means, however, that in this case the conceptual implications for the TOL might not be as drastic: the evolutionary histories of many eukaryotes appear to produce tree-like patterns (e.g., 27])."--O'Malley and Koonin
http://www.biologydirect.com/content/6/1/32

 

[whois]

That's a spectacular non-answer.

actually it's very good answer, and it fits with what is known about the record.

 

[Loudmouth]

actually it's very good answer, and it fits with what is known about the record.

How does it fit with a comparison of the chimp and human genome? To repeat the part of sfs' well written post that you appear to have ignored:

"If humans and chimpanzees had a common ancestor, say 6 million years ago, how many transposition events would we expect to see in that time? What would they look like? Could we detect them? How many gene duplications might we expect? Could we detect them? Given the observed rates of HGT in mammals, how many instances of that would we expect to see? What fraction of the genome would that represent? What effect would epigenetics have on what we'd see?"

 

[The Cadet]

with the modern discovories of transposable genes, gene duplication, and HGT, we can expect something quite unlike the common ancestor.

Seeing as you don't seem to have an answer to any of the obvious follow-ups sfs posted (and honestly, this doesn't answer my question at all), if I do your homework for you and actually look into what effects transposons, horizontal gene transfers, and gene duplication tend to have on genomes, will you care? I'm sure it would be quite interesting and teach me a fair bit about biology; however, I'm also quite sure it could take quite a long time and/or involve asking someone whose time is considerably more valuable than my own. So with that in mind, I'd rather not spend all that time unless you actually care about the answer.

like koonin said, "just not to mince words, the modern synthesis is dead".

Did you ever look into what Koonin actually meant by that statement? I think it might surprise you.

 

[whois]

Seeing as you don't seem to have an answer to any of the obvious follow-ups sfs posted (and honestly, this doesn't answer my question at all), if I do your homework for you and actually look into what effects transposons, horizontal gene transfers, and gene duplication tend to have on genomes, will you care? I'm sure it would be quite interesting and teach me a fair bit about biology; however, I'm also quite sure it could take quite a long time and/or involve asking someone whose time is considerably more valuable than my own. So with that in mind, I'd rather not spend all that time unless you actually care about the answer.

are you now saying punctuated equalibrium isn't an accepted fact?
do you have any idea why science would have accepted this hypothesis?

Did you ever look into what Koonin actually meant by that statement? I think it might surprise you.

i have the paper on my hard drive where he said what he did.
yes, he explained why he said it.

 

[The Cadet]

are you now saying punctuated equalibrium isn't an accepted fact?
do you have any idea why science would have accepted this hypothesis?

Hey, now that you're here, you want to try to make any testable predictions about what we might expect of humans and apes shared a common ancestor?

(And, for the record, I have no idea where I implied anything of the sort.)

 

[whois]

Hey, now that you're here, you want to try to make any testable predictions about what we might expect of humans and apes shared a common ancestor?

no, i cannot give any predictions on what "kind" of organism will turn into another "kind".

(And, for the record, I have no idea where I implied anything of the sort.)

the things i mentioned fit quite well into punctuated equalibrium (PE).

 

[The Cadet]

the things i mentioned fit quite well into punctuated equalibrium (PE).

...Are you telling me you accept punctuated equilibrium... But not common descent?

And okay, so you can't make any predictions.

How about this one: given that chimps have 48 chromosomes and humans have 46, we would expect to find some point where two chromosome pairs merged. Is that a fair prediction?

 

[sfs]

the things i mentioned fit quite well into punctuated equalibrium (PE).

The things you mentioned have nothing to do with punctuated equilibrium, which is a theory about how evolution happens.

 

[AV1611VET]

Imagine humans shared a common ancestor with Chimpanzees. What would we expect to find?

Sibling rivalry?

 

[USincognito]

no, i cannot give any predictions on what "kind" of organism will turn into another "kind".

Can you provide is with a scientifically workable definition of "kind" that has both explanatory and predictive power?

the things i mentioned fit quite well into punctuated equalibrium (PE).

Actually you're just tossing sciency words up against the wall and hoping one of them will stick.

 

[USincognito]

Here's an interesting question. Imagine humans shared a common ancestor with Chimpanzees. What would we expect to find? What predictions could be made and tested for this hypothesis?

Let's see if whois can get away from the vague, sciency sounding gibberish and address a point directly.

If humans and chimpanzees shared a common ancestor, we would expect to find hominid transitional fossils that were not easily classified (colloquially) as "fully ape" or "fully human". Long after human/chimp relatedness had been proposed and tested a nearly complete hominid was unearthed in 1984 that fit such a prediction. Whois, is this skull "fully ape" or "fully human" and why?

 

[whois]

...Are you telling me you accept punctuated equilibrium...

you need to understand why PE was introduced, to explain what the record shows.
the record does not show a "gradual change".

. . .But not common descent?

not in the darwinian sense.
the items i mentioned above are the reasons why.
i accept what the record shows.
the record does not show "small accumulating changes".
this has been pointed out numerous times.

How about this one: given that chimps have 48 chromosomes and humans have 46, we would expect to find some point where two chromosome pairs merged. Is that a fair prediction?

i believe that since all life is composed of DNA and the same 4 base pairs, it's fairly obvious to me that you can find almost any correlation that you want to find.

 

[The Cadet]

i believe that since all life is composed of DNA and the same 4 base pairs, it's fairly obvious to me that you can find almost any correlation that you want to find.

But this is nonsensical. Do you reject that DNA testing works? That you can use genetic similarity to determine things like paternity and family ties?

 

[Loudmouth]

you need to understand why PE was introduced, to explain what the record shows.
the record does not show a "gradual change".

Even Darwin proposed Punctuated Equilibria.

"Only a small portion of the world has been geologically explored. Only organic beings of certain classes can be preserved in a fossil condition, at least in any great number. Widely ranging species vary most, and varieties are often at first local, -- both causes rendering the discovery of intermediate links less likely. Local varieties will not spread into other and distant regions until they are considerably modified and improved; and when they do spread, if discovered in a geological formation, they will appear as if suddenly created there, and will be simply classed as new species." [Charles Darwin, Origin of Species 1st Edition 1859, p.439]

Darwin had no problem with evolution taking a different tempo through time. Although he leaned towards a steady pace, he never said that evolution must run at a steady pace.

not in the darwinian sense.
the items i mentioned above are the reasons why.
i accept what the record shows.
the record does not show "small accumulating changes".
this has been pointed out numerous times.

You have demonstrated no such thing. Here are the questions that you still haven't answered.

"If humans and chimpanzees had a common ancestor, say 6 million years ago, how many transposition events would we expect to see in that time? What would they look like? Could we detect them? How many gene duplications might we expect? Could we detect them? Given the observed rates of HGT in mammals, how many instances of that would we expect to see? What fraction of the genome would that represent? What effect would epigenetics have on what we'd see?"--sfs

i believe that since all life is composed of DNA and the same 4 base pairs, it's fairly obvious to me that you can find almost any correlation that you want to find.

Care to back that up?

 

[whois]

But this is nonsensical. Do you reject that DNA testing works? That you can use genetic similarity to determine things like paternity and family ties?

yes, i've heard of such things.
OTOH, i've also heard of lie detectors which isn't legally admissible as evidence,and urine tests which isn't infallible.

 

[lasthero]

yes, i've heard of such things.
OTOH, i've also heard of lie detectors which isn't legally admissible as evidence,and urine tests which isn't infallible.

And your point is...what? That lie detectors and urine tests aren't reliable doesn't mean that DNA testing isn't That's a non sequitor..