Evolution: Science, Pseudo-Science, or Both?

Because you asked for reasons not to do the experiment. You dismissed the animal rights angle, but you haven't even acknowledged the abhorrent human cost. Ridiculous. You're going to have arguably human products throughout the process. Certainly you're going to have half-human-half-chimp individuals, who may or may not be entitled to human rights and dignity. Who will determine their status? If they do turn out to be human, who will take care of them? They'll certainly possess significant mental and cognitive deficiencies stemming from their part-chimp genetics. What will become of these man-ape abominations? For that matter, who takes care of your final, end-stage, total human? Where did I say you did? I realize you're not taking that position. But for those that do, this disgusting experiment would confirm their view, and they would in fact be right - the only people who would dare attempt this "experiment" or think it was a good idea would be someone motivated out of a sociopathic love of cruelty. It's already been definitively verified. The genetic, biogeographic, and taxonomic evidence is more than conclusive. Your experiment tells us nothing we don't already know - less than nothing, because the proposition "humans evolved from chimpanzees" is not an evolutionary position. If you want to know how modifications to the genes of organisms are performed, just search the web. Wikipedia will lay it all out for you. Exactly what questions do you have for us?

In what way is a chimpanzee a "lesser primate"? What makes you think that a change from chimp to human is a step up anything?

You think there is good reason, but you don't actually have any good reasons.What you erroneously label "the fallacy of the inversed slippery slope" is actually a epistomological method called "induction", where generalities are generated from repeating specifics. It's not a slippery slope to suggest that what is happening now will continue to do so; it's an entirely valid induction, and the basis of scientific knowledge.Simply pointing out that induction doesn't guarantee an outcome is insufficient basis to propose a limit; that's a fallacious argument from ignorance. You'll have no success trying to build an argument on the holes in empiricism.

Did I say that? For one who constantly bristles that his arguments are being twisted around, you sure do a lot of it yourself. Cantius, in the early Eocene. Random mutation and natural selection. How else would it do it? Well, Homo sapiens is in Hominidae, so any time two people have a child, that's showing that humans arise from hominids.I still don't see how forcing a non-evolutionary outcome through means that bear no relation to evolutionary mechanisms proves anything about evolution. Closest extant species, yes. You're asking what steps you would need to take to perform your experiment. The techniques of genetic manipulation are immediately accessable to anyone who cares to look. It's no great secret.

Well, yes. Hence, scientific conclusions, based as they are on induction, are tentative. Well-known consequence of empiricism.But there's no factual conclusion you can come to from that other than "our scientific conclusions are tentative." Trying to build a factual argument on that - there's a limit to genetic change because we don't know for sure that there isn't - is the fallacy of argument from ignorance. Then we're all winners. Seriously. Isn't that the only meaningful accomplishment? We were listening. We just didn't agree. Don't you think that highly intelligent people can have all the facts and still disagree on something?

Look, I'm not trying to call you names, but if you're determined to call yourself a sociopath, well, go nuts. (Er, maybe you shouldn't follow that suggestion.)Your experiment has a catastrophic, abhorrent human cost. I'm comfortable ignoring that as part of a hypothetical thought experiment, but if you're convinced that this experiment has any practical value and that actually doing it would be a good idea, then you need to address that ethical aspect. Just so we're clear on that. If we are then we need not press on in regards to the ethics. And, again, the techniques of genetic manipulation in animals are no secret. The tools and chemicals and equipment you would need are publically avaliable. Via random mutation and natural selection. I mean, you do know how these processes work, right? It's no secret how mutation changes genes; it's no secret how selection changes allele frequency. I mean, are you trying to split some kind of epistomological hair about knowledge? If so I simply don't understand. Are you talking about the precise sequence of mutations, environment, and all-around general happenstance that led to the development of the species we observe today? That's something we won't ever be able to know, absent the invention of time travel. We can sometimes fill in the blanks thanks to fossil and genetic evidence, but much of what you want to know simply didn't leave any evidence when it happened besides the eventual result of what we have now. It could certainly be done, we can pretty much re-write animal genetics anyway we like. It's certainly hard to get any specific phenotypical outcome, but we can pretty much insert or delete any sequence we choose. What it should indicate to you is that you need to re-frame your question if you want a better answer. I've been trying as hard as I can to try to understand you. Why is it that you aren't interested in helping me with that? You didn't ask for details. Is that what you want? Details? How to use a micropipette? How to run a PCR-RFLP? How to order primers from a biotech supply house? I mean, what is it that you're asking? Step-by-step instructions? You can find those online. Do you want a more general overview of the techniques and tools of genetic manipulation? Also online.I keep asking you what you want, because your question is insufficiently specific. It's like you're asking me how to build a house. Well, you have to be more specific. Are you asking how to design a floorplan? Or how to lay a foundation? Plumbing/electrical advice? Or are you asking how to swing a hammer? Or are you just asking because you have literally no idea how houses are made?The fact that you can't, or won't, get specific about what you're asking for suggests to me that you don't know what you're asking. You don't know how genetic experiments are conducted. If that's what you're asking, then your first stop should be a graduate genetics program, not an internet discussion board.What are you asking for? How great for you.Now, could you actually address my statement? Since that's not in the least what I was talking about. Did you not understand my post? I could attempt to clarify if you like. They would have to have considerable new evidence for that position, because it's contradicted by the evidence we have. The evidence shows us that RM+NS is more than powerful and creative enough to generate the genetic changes required to derive all living things from a single ancestor. What current? There's no current. RM+NS operate because there's no other possibility. You can't escape mutation in a system that relies on chemistry; you can't escape selection in a system where death is possible. The laws of physics necessitate that mutation and selection will operate. There's no need to "drive" them anywhere. The laws of physics are more than sufficient explanation for the existence and influence of these forces. Well, it is. Natural selection is a description of the fact that organisms generally die and reproduce differentially; in other words that survival and success in mating are not random. Which genes are passed on and which are extinguished is not random. Natural selection is the name we give to that phenomenon, which results in changes in allele frequencies over time by eliminating or reducing some alleles.

With sufficient computing power and greater knowledge of proteinomics, we could perform the experiment virtually. I'm not sure that's something that would fit on a discussion board. We're talking about a significant amount of genetic data; sorting through that and annotating the needed changes is simply beyond the capacity of people to do in their spare time. You're talking about something it would take a full-time research geneticist to do. Just so you know. To say that the biosphere is considerably more complicated than your average calculation of moving Newtonian/relativistic bodies would be to engage in the understatement of the century. Nonetheless certain situations in population genetics are amienable to mathematical modeling. Hardy—Weinberg principle - WikipediaBut those greater claims are something we're able to know. It's the lesser claims, the micro-details, that simply don't leave the kind of evidence that is likely to survive. That said, our investigations get better all the time. Of course it's fallacious to rely on future knowledge, but who knows? Sure. That experiment would proceed as follows:1) Genetic sequences that have no phenotypical effect are not likely to be selected for or against, and therefore, are not affected by environmental influences.
2) These genetic sequences, therefore, are not likely to be outcomes of convergent evolution or of "common design" or somesuch.
3) Therefore we can safely conclude that two organisms will share these sequences if and only if they have inhereted them from a common ancestor.
4) Hypothesis: If humans and chimpanzees share genetic sequences that have no phenotypical effect, then they are decended from a common ancestor.
5) Method: Analysis/comparison of human and chimpanzee genetic sequences.
6) Result: Humans and chimpanzees share genetic sequences that have no phenotypical effect.
7) Conclusion: Humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor. Er, I don't see how this is true. If Homindae is monophyletic then it contains all decendants of the original Homindae ancestor, including chimpanzees. Members of genus Pan are not, to my knowledge, ever considered to be in any family but Hominidae.The oldest member of family Hominidae is not considered to have diverged from the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees. Rather that ancestor decended from the oldest member of Hominidae, because Homindae is monophyletic and contains all members of both genus Homo and genus Pan. Er, not so. The experiment I detailed above has been performed in the lab, and it not only demonstrates that humans and chimps could share a common ancestor, but that the do. Well, that's easily answered - evolution makes no claims that cannot be tested and falsified. There's no way to truly mathematically model all aspects and inputs and effects of evolution short of a model precisely as complex as the physical universe itself. That said sometimes we can simplify things or look at specific, narrow cases and derive predictive models. I think the area you're looking for is called "bioinformatics." Evolution is very not random. Environment exerts an enormous, determining influence on the development of species.

What kind of science could encorporate non-naturalistic causes of phenomena? Johnson acts like science's naturalistic basis is a bad thing. In fact, it's the only way to do science.You want to speculate about the supernatural? Knock yourself out, but it'll never be science.

A little epistomology is a dangerous thing.