Why is evolution unbelievable?

[frogman2x]

Hi Resha-

Since gluadys and I appear to be trading off on some of these, I'll offer a response.

In general, convergent evolution usually applies to smaller branches of the tree of life, and works within the larger finding of UCA. Thus, CE and UCA are usually not alternatives to each other. (such as gluadys' classic example of fish, and whales). However, in this paper, as you point out, they are.

UCA cannot be a cause for a change of species. The offspring of a bullldog and a husky will have a common ancesry, but the offspring will always be a dog, no matter how man gnerations are involved. Thee is no biological evidence that fish and whales have a common ancestry. In factd if you look at wha the "experts" say, whales evolved from a dog-like land animal.

The paper, and the review, are yet another clear case of support for UCA.[quote[

I know I have jumped in late in thisdiscussin but how did they support UCA?

If someone has pointed to them saying they cast doubt on UCA, and singled out that sentence, it may be a case of the creationist quote mining practice I mentioned earlier, where creationists resort to dishonest means - taking quotes out of context- to fool people. If you were fooled, I'm sorry that happened to you - we can all be fooled.{quote}

It also may not be the case. You see to imply that creation scientist are willing to be dishonest in quetioning the "evidence" presented by evolutionists. If you want to examine some dishonesty, check what i s presented as evidence in whale evolution.

Thanks for pointing that out. Clarifying our terms always helps discussion, and that's especially true with evolution (which is a common word that can mean many things in popular usage). UCA is a better focus because I think it is UCA, not evolution, that some Christians have problems with. In fact, I'd narrow that down to vertebrate UCA. I think that very few YE creationists would agree with VUCA. I narrow it down to VUCA because even though UCA itself is an established fact, there is even less room for disagreement, and the evidence is even more clear, with VUCA.

IMO most creationists have problem with all of the opinions of evolution, not just UCA. The evolutionist like to say somethng has b een proven but they do not provide the method used to prove it. To concude that a species wwwihout a vertebra could produce a kid with one, is biologially impossible as far as real science is concerned and the fossil record will not only not support such a conclusion, if anything, it will support "after its kind."

Regarding "assumptions", that word is often used to avoid looking at the conclusions based on the evidence, which show UCA to be most likely correct.

No, we call it an assumption when the evidence does not support he conclusion and "most likely" indicatreds the evidence is lacking to confirm the conclusion.

That was for gluadys, but I'll answer too in case you are interested. I have no formal training in biology. That means I have no basis to disagree with the experts. The experts are clear in their consensus in support of UCA, and every discussion and piece of evidence I can find makes me agree with them (not that it matters).

It is not necesary to have a formal educaion in biology to understand a few basic facts: Parents cannot pass on to their offspring a chracteristic for which neither have the gene for. Also, there are Christins with just as good credentisla ss the evolutionstbiologisst whw reject evolution, including UCA.

As for Genesis, it makes perfect sense to me that it describes the fact that God did the creating, using allegory and poetry to set that out. Genesis does not claim to describe "how" God created, and with Jesus primarily using allegories (parables) in his teaching, and the Holy Spirit using allegory in the opening of John's Gospel, it's hardly a surprise that the Holy Spirit starts out with allegory and poetry at the start of Genesis.

In Christ-

-Papias

It makes more sense to take Genesis literally. WE can prove "after its kind" which is more than anyhing offered as the explanation of the evolutionists. In fact they cannot tell us what the first life form was and they have no idea if it ever produce a different species.

Sme with matter. They cannot explain how all the matter we have in the universe got here. Using the BB is of no value because it does
not explain either how the matter and the energy need to go bang got here.

kermit

 

[frogman2x]

Clarivoyance wrote:



OK. And hey, did you see my note to you at the end of post #11?

-Papias

Imagine a population of our theropod dinosaurs living in a valley. A volcano rises up, and separates the valley into two similar halves, so now there are two theropod populations, separated by a volcano. The Northern valley happens to be near a forest, which slowly grows into the valley over thousands of years. So now the northern theropods live in a forest, while the southern ones don’t. Imagine that when predators come around, they can catch and eat some of the theropods – in the southern valley, the theropods escape as they always have, by running. However, now in north, with all the trees, running doesn’t work as well (you run into a tree), so some theropods escape by climbing the trees. Most are pretty unsuccessful, (after all, they are mainly runners, not tree-climbers) and many are eaten. The theropod population is greatly reduced, for a while. However, a theropod happens to have a better claw for grasping, and that theropod survives by grasping branches and climbing trees. Her children of course have the slightly better grasping claws, and soon the entire population is descended from her (the others were eventually eaten as the predators ran out of the easy-to-catch kind of theropod). This kind of competition continues, with any mutations for grasping claws surviving, and mutations for fast running being useless (and therefore being eaten). So after many generations, the northern theropods are a little different from the southern population, and they live more up in the trees. A few of them have a little webbing in their armpits – they survive a little better because this can slow a fall from a tree, so when they fall, if the fall is from a moderate height, they have a slightly better chance of surviving the fall. Some mutations cause more webbing, some less – but the mutations for less webbing cause death by falling, while that for a little more webbing is more likely to survive by gliding. After a while the theropods are tree dwellers who now have webbing between their arms and their bodies, like bats or pteranodons, and can glide from tree to tree. Imagine that around this time the volcano crumbles back into the ground. The two theropod populations meet, but now they are too different to interbreed – they have become two different species. The two species live side by side in the valley from then on.

Lizards remaining liizards is not evolution. Both groups you mention are still lizards and some are sub-species.

This is the same way languages develop. Think about Latin, French and English. Early on, there was a language similar to Latin. People who spoke this moved to France and England. Over time, small changes (mispronunciations = mutations) occurred in their speech, and the people France sounded a little different from the people in England. They still both spoke “Latin” but it was a little different – kinda like the difference between the “English” you’ll hear in New York compared to the “English” you’ll hear in rural Alabama. Over time, it became more and more different, like the “English” in Alabama versus the “English” in London. Then more and more differences accumulated, until a person in France would not be able to understand a person in England at all – the language had evolved into two different languages. Thus, saying that “a mutation couldn’t make a new species because then the new animal would have no one to mate with.” is like saying that “French could not have evolved from Latin because then the first Frenchman would have had no one to speak in French to.” This is how speciation occurs – with entire populations changing over time, not individuals.

You cannot transfer biologial truths to non-biological truths. Biology has proven lines of what happensn and how. Languages do not. Of course there are similarities in languages because at one time all spoke the same language, but God changed all of that at the tower of Babel.

kermit

 

[frogman2x]

Papias thanks for the great example. It's really easy to understand once someone breaks it down like that. However, I really want to hear it from someone who doubts evolution because I'm sure if they actually understood it they wouldn't deny it.

I understand it and reject it.

UCA will not allow a change in species. Common ancesry willl not allow them to jump proven biological facts---parents cannot produce a kid with a characteristic for which neithr has gene and mutaqtions cannot be the mechanism for that kind of change.

Mutations do not add chracteristics,. They change exising onens. For example the gene for skin pigmantation is present and the gened mutates. The mutation does not give the offspring skin, it changes the characteristic of the skin.

Common ancesry cannot be proven. Only characterisics within a species can be passed on. There is no known common ancestry between sea life and land life. Thee is not common ancesstry between apes and men.

In fact the "experts" in whale evolution say whales evolved from a dog-like land animal. But they can't explain biologiically how the land animal lost its legs and developed fins or how it lost its nose and developed a blowhole.

That whales evolved from a dog-like animal is a necessary opinion or evolution is exposed for the fraud it is.

Don't just look at what evolutionists say. Look at wht Christians scienetis say also. If yhou ar really interested try The Institute for Creation Research and put "universal common ancesry' in the info block and get another more scientific explanaion.

kermit


kermit

 

[gluadys]

I'm sorry to disappoint you, but understanding doesn't always equate to acceptance. And I'm afraid the well has been poisoned. Now that an example of what you want has been posted, what kind of example could someone provide that wouldn't just seem like a copy?

gluadys,

I'm going to ask something that might seem rather strange. You haven't responded to my question yet, so I don't know if you have a degree in biology. If you do, could you evaluate something for me?

If you saw in one of my previous posts, I deleted a citation. It was one I only found recently, and I hadn't properly vetted it, so it was a mistake to post it. As I checked into the background of the author, he started to come off as a bit of a nut case. At the same time, I didn't find any responses to his paper ... it seems no one has actually called him out ... maybe because they've decided it's not worth it.

Still, supposing you were a reviewer for some biology journal and this paper showed up on your desk, and you had no reason to suspect the guy's credentials, what would you say about it? I know that's a hard thing to ask. It would be hard to stay objective, but I'm curious. How much of what he says is based in proper biology? Does he raise any good questions?

http://arxiv.org/vc/arxiv/papers/0811/0811.3653v1.pdf

Yes, as you see from my now posted responses, they were delayed by the down-time of CF. So now you know I am not a professional biologist by any means: just a well-read layperson who has devoted some 2 decades (admittedly in spare time) to getting a handle on this issue.

Nevertheless, I will give a response to your question.

It is basically junk science relying on a lot of typical anti-evolutionary canards. It consists of "refuting" much that is not even claimed or inferred from evolutionary theory.

e.g. "Gradual evolution is not backed up by fossil records" Actually, in many cases it is. There is a remarkable study (I'll have to see if I can find it again) covering some 60 million years of foraminifera evolution that shows the gradual evolution of over 300 species. Where we don't have fossil records of all or most intermediate steps there are good reasons for that and we know what the reasons are. Gould clarified a lot of the confusion here through his thesis of punctuated equilbria, but that is typically misrepresented in anti-evolution sources.

"2. Evolutionary progress is not a random process."
The very use of the word "progress" is suspect, suggesting a targeted end point as a "goal" of evolutionary change.
And, of course, evolution is not a random process and its proponents have never claimed that it is, but rather asserted the reverse.

This tactic of refuting a so-called claim of evolutionary theory which is not actually a claim of evolutionary theory at all is akin to the lawyer's tactic of asking "When did you stop beating your wife?" when it has not been established that the witness ever did.

"3. Gene mutation is not the main overall mechanism of evolution."
Again, listing as a "flaw" in evolutionary theory something never claimed in evolutionary science. Mutation is the source of standing variation and is not, per se, a mechanism of evolution. Though it is a necessary pre-requisite to it.

I could go through the whole paper noting more samples like this. All in all its a mish-mash of several topics covered in talkorigins Index to Creationist Claims.

One of the things that bothers me is that sometimes even legitimate scientific papers invent pseudo-problems. I already remarked on the assertion that evolution "... anticipates only one optimal combination of trait values in a given environment,..." I am not at all surprised by their findings, but I don' t think they have discovered anything earth-shattering, but have rather investigated a pseudo-problem.

Unfortunately, this may be a consequence of needing to seek funding for one's research.

I found another example in example in "Looking for the Last Common Ancestor" . Here is the relevant section from the introduction.

Though inconclusive, the body of evidence for the common descent of all life seems overwhelming.
However, we wish to point out that the notion of a single common ancestor is conceptually confusing
since it places some one individual organism on a special pedestal. It is as if LUCA were the first one
to depart in some significant way from its ancestors to be crowned as the earliest living being.​

The rest of the paper goes to show that the earliest life form was not significantly different from its pre-biotic ancestors and that there is an unbroken continuum between non-living and living matter, .

However, it is not really relevant to LUCA at all, because they have erroneously identified the last universal common ancestor with the earliest living being.

These are not the same entities at all. The differention is made clear in the concluding section of the Yonezawa paper, and I quote:

Darwin seems to have discarded multiple origins of life on Earth. However, as Theobald [2] correctly noted, the theory of UCA allows for the possibility of multiple independent origins of life [23, 24]. The UCA hypothesis simply states that all extant life on Earth has descended from a single common ancestral species. There must have been a huge amount of extinctions during the course of the history of life, and there is no way to know what kinds of life became extinct during the early evolution of life. Still, it seems likely that a huge amount of trials and errors of different forms occurred during the emergence of life and that UCA if existed was just one of them. Further, as argued by Raup and Valentine [24], the probability of survival of life is low unless there are multiple origins. Even if the UCA hypothesis holds, the survival of the particular form of life does not imply that it was unique or superior.​

So the objection raised in the Koskela paper in misleading as what they are describing really pertains to the earliest form(s) of life of which there were probably many and not to LUCA at all. The notion that LUCA represents the boundary between life and non-living matter is not part of the the theory of UCA in the first place.

 

[gluadys]

I understand it and reject it.

Everything you post shows you do not understand it.

UCA will not allow a change in species. Common ancesry willl not allow them to jump proven biological facts---parents cannot produce a kid with a characteristic for which neithr has gene and mutaqtions cannot be the mechanism for that kind of change.

Mutations do not add chracteristics,. They change exising onens. For example the gene for skin pigmantation is present and the gened mutates. The mutation does not give the offspring skin, it changes the characteristic of the skin.

And if that pigmentation did not exist prior to the mutation, then the mutation added a new characteristic.

Common ancesry cannot be proven.

Scientists seem to agree with you on that, at least as far a the universal common ancestor goes. But it is still very well supported by the evidence and a rational conclusion from the data.

There is no known common ancestry between sea life and land life.

Yes, there is. Look up "early tetrapods" and especially "Tiktaalik"

And, in a different time-frame "Pakicetus" and "evolution of whales".

Thee is not common ancesstry between apes and men.

The data actually show that we are part of the ape family (Family: Hominidae)

In fact the "experts" in whale evolution say whales evolved from a dog-like land animal. But they can't explain biologiically how the land animal lost its legs and developed fins or how it lost its nose and developed a blowhole.

I don't know where science is in the detailing of the whale genome, but I expect that the biological explanation is soon forthcoming. It is amazing how much history is sitting in genes. Once the genetics are understood, all you need is natural selection to preserve the new characteristics.

Don't just look at what evolutionists say. Look at wht Christians scienetis say also.

You mean Christian scientists like Loren Haarsma, Francis Collins, Denis Lamoureux and Kenneth Miller (to name just few)? They all support evolution.

 

[Resha Caner]

Like Papias, I have no formal qualifications in biology.

Bummer ... not that I'm discounting your opinion but I was hoping to leverage the conversation for some other questions. There are some degreed biologists in the secular science forum, so I might try my question there as well. Hopefully that doesn't offend you.

I assume you are referring to the creation accounts in particular and possibly to the account of the flood. Once we get to Abraham, the setting is clearly historical even if the story is not.

Yes, I meant the creation account. I'll put aside my comment about veracity for now, and focus on the non-determinism I mentioned. What is your answer to God's ability to prophesy in the face of a non-deterministic process?

I would consider that a friendly amendment, as long as it is understood that the observed data are data of evolutionary change. ...

Does that take the circularity out of it?

No, but I think you got my point. I don't want to make a big deal of it, but I can explain more if you want.

Yes. That is a good way to put it. Btw have you ever taken a look at Bayesian reasoning? Essential, I think, to understanding much scientific discourse today.

Yes. I'm an engineer, so I use a lot of statistics in my job. Bayesian ideas are pretty cool, but suffer from the same problem that all such ideas have. And, again, I'm not trying to denigrate anyone, but I think this is where lay people really struggle. They don't seem to understand why it's so hard to connect a theory or a mathematical technique to the real world. It seems to be one of those things you have to do to understand.

I think one has to accept some "self-evident" truths in any field.

I prefer "assumptions" as it seems to be the more general term, and in that regard I agree. "Self-evident" IMO, has a more specific meaning - a more philosophical one. For example, the I AM from the Bible is God's claim of self-evident truth. He is God because he is God. He contains within himself justification for what he is. No human endeavor rises to that level.

There was an interesting challenge raised by Hawking on that subject in regard to the theory of everything. He said that the theory of everything would have to include proof of why people reject it. But if there is proof of why people reject the theory, why is it a valid theory? Or, on the flip side, if that proof invalidates their rejection, then why do they reject it? He's pointing out some interesting oxymorons about the self-evident.

But, yes, from a pragmatic vantage whereby we have to live our lives, we proceed with certain things even though they are not proven.

Well, since formally nothing in science is established, that applies to UCA as well. Given the evidence, however, and the lack of any alternative so far, it deserves provisional confidence.

Maybe I haven't been explicit, but that's what I've been talking about all along - the alternatives. And there are some. Koonin seemed like a good place to start because he comes across as such a strong supporter of UCA. It may not be "scientific", but it is often more persuasive when the supporter of idea A admits idea B is an alternative.

I certainly don't think the science of evolution will fall apart if it is ever established that archaea and bacteria did not have a common ancestor.

Smile. No offense, but I'm sure it wouldn't. We would just move the goalposts. In fact, I think that's already happened. As Papias pointed out, "evolution" has a spectrum of meanings, but ... shrug. It is what it is.

For some reason it is a common perception that circumstantial evidence is sub-par.

Well, that's because it is. Your example is true. In forensics it would probably be preferable to eyewitness testimony. And if it's all you've got, then it's the best you have. But evidence that doesn't require these inferences is more convincing. Some fields of science have access to harder data. Biology often doesn't, and that's a problem. I don't mean to say it's insurmountable, but it is a problem.

That's why I often break evidence into categories. In legal cases, eyewitness testimony is often all you have, and so the legal system is set up to deal with that ... or at least it tries. At the other end, physics rarely, if ever, deals with eyewitness evidence. Cosmology aside, it is probably the best science at collecting hard data.

That's one reason I prefer to speak of "populations".

Well, some speak of species, some speak of populations, and I've even heard some say we should only speak of organisms or gaia. This is the vagueness I refer to.

With reference to the comments in your other post on Yonezawa, I think what I quoted is representative. It came from a brief summary written for an exchange between him and Theobald. Again, I used the word "moderate". Yonezawa is obviously qualifying his statements to leave open a possibility of UCA. But, toward the end of that summary he says:

"To reject the separate origins hypothesis of the domains of life, it would be indispensable to develop a more ‘biological’ test to show that even by improving the model of the separate origins by taking into account biological factors such as the possibility of convergent evolution due to selection, the UCA hypothesis is still supported by the AIC. To do this, it is necessary to develop an entirely new methodological framework of molecular phylogenetics that is different from the conventional framework that neglects convergent and parallel evolution. Notably, there have been many reported cases of convergent and parallel evolution misleading molecular phylogenetic inference, and such a method is needed for molecular phylogenetics in general."

 

[Resha Caner]

It is basically junk science relying on a lot of typical anti-evolutionary canards. It consists of "refuting" much that is not even claimed or inferred from evolutionary theory.

I appreciate the detail of your reply. It's maybe a little more dismissive than is fair, so let me say a few things about my own impressions, and then I'll explain why I asked the question.

1) The paper doesn't meet standards for professional writing. We don't need to hear the author whine about not being properly recognized or self-denigrating about whether his questions are stupid.

2) The paper seems derivative to me. He claims to present something new, but all he really does is summarize the work of others. If he had simply presented this as a summary paper, he would have been better served.

- - -

With that said, it appears he did obtain a degree for which he wrote a thesis. Further, it appears he has some limited publication exposure. I was planning on trying to obtain his other papers to see if they're better.

My curiosity arose because biology is indeed a vast field, so I don't claim to know everything that's going on. I'm aware several alternatives have been proposed (and by credentialed biologists), but I got the impression most of them were fringe ideas - just a few papers. What surprised me here was his 100 references. They're not all on the same subject, and yes, I realized you would reject some of them as creationist claptrap, but I didn't realize so much had been written on these topics.

So, I took one of your comments to heart - namely that many biologists are not viewing convergent evolution as an alternative to UCA. I had taken Koonin's word for it, and again there's that vagueness, but regardless I need to be more careful when reading in that area.

As such, I was curious about what you thought of how he was summarizing the different topic areas in the main body (not the introduction).

 

[gluadys]

As such, I was curious about what you thought of how he was summarizing the different topic areas in the main body (not the introduction).

OK, I 'll take a closer look at that section.

 

[frogman2x]

Everything you post shows you do not understand it.]

Right, if I disagree with you it is because I don't understand it. Let me suggest there are Christian scientists more qualified than you and they understand it and reject it also.

And if that pigmentation did not exist prior to the mutation, then the mutation added a new characteristic.

It did not. The person was going to acquire skin even if the mutation did not occur. The mutation only altered the skin characterisstic. It did not give it a new charaqcteristic. Even if what you say was true, it could not be the mechanism for the change needed for a species to become a different one. If the mutaion happened in a homo sapian, the kid would be a homo sapian and would contune to produce after its kind.

You can't provide one example where a mutation produced a different species. You can only speculate that if you had enough time it would happen, but time will not change biological facts.

Scientists seem to agree with you on that, at least as far a the universal common ancestor goes. But it is still very well supported by the evidence and a rational conclusion from the data.

What evidence. If it was well supported, it would be a proven fact and it is not.

Yes, there is. Look up "early tetrapods" and especially "Tiktaalik"

And, in a different time-frame "Pakicetus" and "evolution of whales".

See this is the game evolutionist try to play. They say it happened, so it must have but they NEVER produce the biological evidence tha made it possible.

Can you explain how a land animal lost its legs and developed fins or how it lost it nose and developed a blowhole. Dogs dont have those genes so i aint' gonna happen.

The data actually show that we are part of the ape family (Family: Hominidae)

See, you just did it. You say the data shows it but you do not provide the data.

I don't know where science is in the detailing of the whale genome, but I expect that the biological explanation is soon forthcoming. It is amazing how much history is sitting in genes. Once the genetics are understood, all you need is natural selection to preserve the new characteristics. <<

A leg cannot biologically become a fin. Natural selection is another thing that has never been proven. Even if it was true, the rabbit with a stronger leg would still be a rabbit. He might live longer but he would but he would still be rabbit.


>>You mean Christian scientists like Loren Haarsma, Francis Collins, Denis Lamoureux and Kenneth Miller (to name just few)? They all support evolution.

There are some very good Christiasn scientist who support evolution, but there are more like those at the ICR and Answers in Genesis, who reject it and reject it on scientific evaluation.

My main problem with evoluion is first of all, "after it kind" refutes it and to date no one hs shown scientificlly how the biology works to make it happen.

kermit

 

[gluadys]

Everything you post shows you do not understand it.]

Right, if I disagree with you it is because I don't understand it.

No, it is because when you try to describe evolution and what is wrong with it, your descriptions are not accurate.

Let me suggest there are Christian scientists more qualified than you and they understand it and reject it also.

To be sure, since I am not a qualified scientist in any field at all; however only some Christian scientists reject evolution -- and usually for non-scientific reasons. Other Christian scientists, such as those I named, accept and even defend evolution. And they are a lot more qualified than me too.

What I see is that Christian scientists who accept evolution do so on the basis of the positive scientific evidence, while those who reject it do so on the basis of a commitment to non-scientific dogma.

My disagreement with the latter group is theological and hermeneutical. And given the many years I spent in Christian education, I dare to say that in that field I am more qualified than them.

And if that pigmentation did not exist prior to the mutation, then the mutation added a new characteristic.

It did not. The person was going to acquire skin even if the mutation did not occur. The mutation only altered the skin characterisstic.

And a skin characteristic is a characteristic, so if it is a new one (a new pigment) that is a new skin characteristic.

You can't provide one example where a mutation produced a different species.

Why would I even try to? Anyone who understands evolution (as you claim to) would not expect one mutation to produce a different species. You are holding up as a "problem" for evolution something that actually supports evolution. That is how far off base your understanding of evolution is.

Scientists seem to agree with you on that, at least as far a the universal common ancestor goes. But it is still very well supported by the evidence and a rational conclusion from the data.

What evidence. If it was well supported, it would be a proven fact and it is not.

Now you are indicating that you don't understand the logic of science. Facts don't need to be proved. They simply are, and they are observed. Facts need to be explained. That is what a theory does--puts facts into relationship with each other so that we can understand why those facts are what they are. Common ancestry makes sense of many facts in biology that have no other reasonable explanation.

Can you explain how a land animal lost its legs and developed fins or how it lost it nose and developed a blowhole. Dogs dont have those genes so i aint' gonna happen.

Not in detail. It would take a geneticist with access to the genome of many different species of whale as well as its surviving terrestrial relatives such as the hippopotamus to nail down exactly which genes changed and when.

I don't have either the access to that data, not the expertise to analyze it. And neither do you.

But this much I can say. The cetacean ancestor did not "lose" its legs (at least not its front legs). It was the legs themselves which were reshaped and adapted into flippers. So the legs are still there, bone for bone, just as in the ancestor (and for that matter, just as in your own arm), just modified a bit to be more useful in a marine environment.

Same goes for the nose. It was never lost---just moved. In fact it still does. If you watch a whale embryo developing you can see the nostrils emerging at the end of the snout and then migrating to the top of the head and joining to form the blowhole. So this migration happens everytime a new whale is conceived.

The data actually show that we are part of the ape family (Family: Hominidae)

See, you just did it. You say the data shows it but you do not provide the data.

Oh, I will let you do that work yourself. It's easy to find. You might like to start with human chromosome #2. Then you can go to ERVS. And don't forget the whole genome comparison of chimp and human.

There are some very good Christiasn scientist who support evolution, but there are more like those at the ICR and Answers in Genesis, who reject it and reject it on scientific evaluation.

Well, I don't want to get into a numbers game, but I expect you haven't actually taken a survey of Christian scientists on that.

My main problem with evoluion is first of all, "after it kind" refutes it

There you go again. You state that "after its kind" refutes evolution when it actually supports evolution. If you really understood evolution, you would understand why evolution requires reproduction of each species after its kind and how that leads directly to the nested hierarchy of the universal phylogeny.

You might like to check out the scientific terms "taxon" and "clade". I think of them as the scientific equivalents of "kind".

 

[Dunban]

It's much easier to deny everything in the real world and just accept whatever story you were told when you were 4, by your parents. No thinking involved. Easy.

 

[Resha Caner]

It's much easier to deny everything in the real world and just accept whatever story you were told when you were 4, by your parents. No thinking involved. Easy.

You had an evolution storybook from your parents when you were 4?

 

[gluadys]

OK, I 'll take a closer look at that section.

So here is my more extensive commentary on that article. Btw, I found today the link would not work any more. I don't know if that is a temporary glitch or if it has been removed.

May as well complete commentary on the intro, then look at the rest of the paper.

You will recall that his first 3 “flaws” in Darwinism were
"Gradual evolution is not backed up by fossil records"
“Evolutionary progress is not a random process."
“Gene mutation is not the main overall mechanism of evolution."

These are all standard creationist canards frequently found in anti-evolution literature (including the frequent use of “Darwinism” instead of referencing “theory of evolution” to convey the notion that evolution is not science at all.) They are all, to say the least, misrepresentations and distortions of evolutionary theory and hence they are all examples of strawman fallacy.

His remaining three “flaws” are:
“Natural selection is a vague term and should be better replaced with a concrete physico-chemical mechanism.”
“The notion of “common origin” from a last common ancestor cell may be the most erroneous guess.”
“Current mainstream evolutionary theories separated the evolution of Earth from the evolution of life.”

The first two are new to me, but make no sense at all.

Natural selection refers to the statistically preferential survival and/or reproduction of organisms whose traits provide a benefit in current ecological conditions as compared to other members of the population group with a different variant of the trait (or lack it altogether). How statistics can be replaced with a physico-chemical mechanism mystifies me. Understood as a statisical phenomenon, the term is precise, not vague.

The next “flaw” boggles my mind. At first I couldn’t believe he really meant the last common ancestor was a single individual cell, but apparently that is exactly what he means. I can’t fathom where he got such a ridiculous idea. LUCA has always been thought of in evolutionary theory as a population, not one cell. Also, he conflates LUCA with earliest life form as if they were the same thing, and as we will see, this vitiates the “new perspective” on evolution he presents.

The last is the old Kent Hovind ploy of equivocating the general meaning of “evolution” with the theory of evolution. “Evolution” can refer to any sort of gradual change over time, e.g. the evolution of democracy or the evolution of computers. It is so used in other fields of science. Astronomy speaks of stellar evolution and chemists of chemical evolution. But the theory of evolution is specifically about the appearance and changing distribution of genetic alleles in a self-reproducing population. There is no self-reproduction in chemistry or stars so the theory of evolution is not relevant to them.

OK, so I am coming now to the central thesis of the paper. Mostly it is about thermodynamics and energy exchange (which I guess is really much the same thing). In any case it is physics, and physics is so mathematical that it is mostly beyond me.

What is clearly evident is that the bulk of this section doesn’t refer to Darwinian evolution at all, but to abiogenesis i.e. the emergence of biotic entities from the abiotic environment. This confusion of the evolution of species with the original origin of life is again typical of much anti-evolution literature. The origin of life from an abiotic environment falls primarily into the area of chemistry. You can’t get any Darwinian evolution until chemical processes produce a self-replicating molecule. And it is a long way from there to the first cellular life.

The absence of comment on the constraints imposed by inheritance is to be noted.



Section 1 I have no problem with, so long as one doesn’t confuse the various levels of evolution or their mechanisms. I understand that the properties of sub-atomic particles in a favorable environment would inevitably produce atoms. I know about heavier atoms needing a nova or super-nova to bring them into existence. The properties of atoms, in turn, generate chemical reactions, and again, for most chemical reactions (certainly those needed in life) an appropriate environment, often including a catalyst is needed. Chemical bonding of atoms in patterns dictated by their physical, electrical, etc. properties gives us a world of molecules which in turn interact and can produce highly complex molecules—molecules of the sort that become important in abiogenesis.

All this is a given for biology. But none of this is Darwinian evolution, because there exists at this stage, no mechanism of self-replication. So it is basically irrelevant to the theory of evolution and UCA issues.


The second section mystifies me. I can’t figure out what point he wants to make. The headline is non-controversial. Biological evolution obeys not only biological but also chemical and physical laws. That includes the laws of thermodynamics. He correctly states that biological evolution is not rendered impossible by the second law of thermodynamics, (as many ill-informed anti-evolutionists have contended), but then he concludes by saying: Thus, I still firmly believe that “any theory claiming to describe how organisms originate and continue to exist by natural causes must be compatible with the first and second laws of thermodynamics.” as if there were some doubt that either abiogenesis or biological evolution does.

Sections 3 & 4 seem to me to be uncontroversial though that may be an indication of how little I know of chemistry and abiogenesis. I would love to see what a person doing research on abiogenesis would make of this paper.

Section 5 is where the paper starts really going off the rails. The heading seems to be non-controversial: . “Life forms had originated at multiple places and may have arisen multiple times.”

I think it is almost a given among scientists that once self-replicators existed, life probably originated many times, but in most instances failed to survive.

The author goes on to claim: “Life forms, even the same form of life, can be formed at multiple locations on Earth as long as the environmental conditions that favored their formation are the same.”

As long as he is restricting this to the context of abiogenesis, no problem. Sure, since chemistry is chemistry, any particular molecule, including a self-replicator, is going to be formed whenever and wherever conditions favour its formation. But things get a little stickier as more complex biochemical processes emerge. Could the same hypercycle (a proposed intermediary step between simple self-replicators and cells) also emerge whenever and wherever the environmental conditions favour it? Maybe, but it’s less probable. What about simple virus-like levels of organisation when some RNA or DNA molecules are enclosed in a proteinaceous or bilipid membrane. At this stage we definitely have inheritance, mutation and natural selection affecting outcomes. So the possibility of a new life form with the same genetic makeup as an inherited and mutated genome drops rapidly to near zero.

So I was astounded when I got to the concluding section in which he asserts that this principle applies not just at the interface of abiotic and biotic communities at the origin of life, but throughout the whole history of life, including complex, multicellular organisms.

No way—that just ain’t gonna happen.

That is why it is significant that he makes no reference to inheritance. Nor to comparative analysis of genomes.

Again, sections 6 & 7 seem uncontroversial to me, except for phrases suggesting strawman refutations.

So, contrary to his assertions, as far as I can see he hasn’t presented any new perspective on evolution (at least not on Darwinian evolution), though he may have made some contribution to work on abiogenesis. The lack of attention to his paper would suggest otherwise.

I don’t doubt he sees his thesis contradicting fundamental assumptions of the theory of evolution, but his initial presentation of Darwinian theory was riddled with fundamental errors. So what he is really contradicting is a straw man of his own construction.

His remarks on “evidence contradicting Darwinism” is more creationist claptrap. He even repeats the old “missing links are still missing” mumbo-jumbo. CC200: Transitional fossils (I haven’t seen the acronym for a while, but it used to be common to refer to such claims as PRATTs or Points Refuted A Thousand Times because they were repeated so frequently—often by the same person who had received the refutation earlier but just blithely ignored it.) It also appears that he thinks co-evolution and parallel evolution are the same thing. Sheer ignorance


His final word is this:
The central position of this new perspective on evolution is that cellular life forms might have multiple independent origins that were rooted in different acellular forms. The formation and evolution of life is not random but abides some physico-chemical principles. Each independently originated cellular life form may evolve under separate phylogenetic lineages and may also interact with each other to form more complex higher order life forms. Thus, the images of the life history as reflected by the later reconstruction efforts may appear as “mosaics” and show some pattern pluralisms.

I don’t think anyone would have a problem with a thesis on the multiple origins of life forms and/or cellular life. And as he says, each of these may evolve under separate phylogentic lineages and interact with each other.

The problem is that the actual phylogenetic data points to such separately originating lineages as being restricted to the earliest era of life on earth. He seems to be suggesting that these separate lineages continued for much longer and may even still be present today. But there are many indications that of the several lineages that may have appeared as life emerged from the abiotic environment only one survived to beome the progenitor of all extant life.

If this is the case, the appearance of genetic mosaics and pattern pluralisms as investigation approaches the LUCA is not an indication of the non-existence of the LUCA, but merely of the contemporaneous existence of other populations whose lineages did not survive to the present.

So, what it looks like to me is that he may be on to something regarding the conditions under which life originated in an abiotic environment—there is no way I am competent to judge that one way or another. But he chose to wrap that around with a lot of meaningless and erroneous drivel about Darwinian evolution. His understanding of biological evolution is fundamentally flawed so most of his commentary in the introduction and conclusion consists of strawman arguments against invented assertions he wrongly attributes to evolutionary theory. He also seems to be completely ignorant of the case for universal common ancestry as he makes no reference to the evidence and no attempt to show how his new perspective would account for it.

I am not at all surprised that this level of incompetence was ignored by the scientific community; indeed I am surprised it got published at all, and wonder if it was published in an unorthodox manner (which would explain the difference in time between his thesis and the publication date).

 

[Resha Caner]

Thanks for taking a look at this. From the length of your summary, it seems you must have spent a lot of time putting that together. Hopefully you're not disappointed, but it will take me some time to absorb, so I don't have much to say right now.

 

[Dunban]

You had an evolution storybook from your parents when you were 4?

No, I actually broke away from my programming, examined the EVIDENCE and found no actual reason to accept a creation myth from Bronze Age men who knew nothing about science, germ theory or how the world came about.

Most religious people are simply unwilling to do this.

 

[frogman2x]

No, I actually broke away from my programming, examined the EVIDENCE and found no actual reason to accept a creation myth from Bronze Age men who knew nothing about science, germ theory or how the world came about.

What evidence did you look at? How did you verify it waa accurate?

Most religious people are simply unwilling to do this.

Do you have some facts to back that up or are you just offering your opinion?

 

[Resha Caner]

No, I actually broke away from my programming, examined the EVIDENCE and found no actual reason to accept a creation myth from Bronze Age men who knew nothing about science, germ theory or how the world came about.

Are you saying people in the Bronze Age weren't smart?

 

[frogman2x]

It's much easier to deny everything in the real world and just accept whatever story you were told when you were 4, by your parents. No thinking involved. Easy.

It is easier to accept by faith alone what the evos preach without examining the biological truths that refute evolution.

k

 

[Clairvoyance]

Are you saying people in the Bronze Age weren't smart?

I don't know... They thought the earth was a flat disk covered by a crystal firmament suspended in an eternal ocean...

 

[gluadys]

Are you saying people in the Bronze Age weren't smart?

Sure, they were smart. Just as smart as us.

But they were also ignorant.

Our knowledge base, after all, was built up over many, many generations. As Newton said "If I see farther, it is because I stand on the shoulders of giants."

The shoulders they had to stand on in the Bronze Age were much lower.