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Author Topic:   How long does it take to evolve?
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 121 of 221 (770600)
10-08-2015 8:42 PM
Reply to: Message 115 by Lamden
10-08-2015 9:51 AM


Re: Let's Get This Discussion Started!
edited to |add| some detail and change tone somewhat ...
Let us go step by step.
Great idea. It is only by exploring that we discover.
How are you addressing my first point?
quote:
Firstly, and most importantly, I imagine that even the most primitive light receptor is the result of a remarkable organization, be it natural or not. ...
The question really is whether it really is that remarkable.
If you remember I had said:
quote:
And as I noted before that a photosensitive cell isn't necessarily the starting point -- just a cell that can detect solar radiation, such as a skin cell sensing heat, and being able to use that sensation to know which direction the sun is.
A skin cell could easily be considered a very primitive eye, all it can detect is if it receives sunlight or not. |From there we can consider the skin to be a primitive retina which can be used to determine the approximate direction of the sun.| The point is that you can experience this primitive level of sensation yourself |and see that there would be benefit to having these sensations|.
As others have noted this easily reduces further to the action of sunlight on a protein that changes how the protein behaves in the cell.
Curiously I don't find this at all remarkable, as the cell is already a highly evolved system that reacts to its environment |and there are many single cell organisms that sense light and react to it|. Single cell life was around for a billion years or so before multicellular life and the development of organisms that would find more |developed| sense\reaction systems |to be even more beneficial|.
... My point is, according to my understanding, every one of those steps seems to exhibit IC.
And I think it would be better to use words than terminology that is a bit iffy to start with ... I get the impression "IC" is often tossed around as if it were a real thing, when at best it is ignorance of how something actually developed. Again you had said:
quote:
Message 114: ... I do not believe that NS could have aided such organization , as each piece to the puzzle is useless on it's own (let me know if explanation is needed, I assume you have all heard this argument, feel free to link to the discussion!) ...
|Yes you do need to explain, as what has been discussed so far on similarities to other known systems being used as intermediates are all useful stages of sensing light and benefiting from it.|
Everything living is a result of the DNA coding. If a human cell contains 6 ft of microscopic DNA coding, let us take an arbitrary guess at how much DNA would be needed to program for a simple light receptor- let's say 1/10 of a mm. (pick your own guess) That would be far, far, more organization than the word "monkey" right there. And less likely to happen than it is to have any word formed by shaking up a bunch of letters and pulling them one by one. ...
Others have already dealt with this.
... So maybe IC or ID is not the right word...
Never good to rely on |questionable| acronyms for explanations, so yes not the right words imho. Perhaps you should try to put them in your own words.
... let's call it a statistical improbability. ...
Oh good, that proves that it couldn't happen? Again we go back to the lottery: the "statistical improbability" of a single ticket winning is high ... but the the "statistical improbability" of the lottery being won is low.
Statistics really prove nothing, and worse, they are irrelevant unless you know ALL the possibilities.
... It is towards this first step that I do not see how NS could aid in organizing.
Life reacts to stimuli -- that is the first step ...
Enjoy
Edited by RAZD, : rewrote parts

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This message is a reply to:
 Message 115 by Lamden, posted 10-08-2015 9:51 AM Lamden has not replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 127 of 221 (770626)
10-09-2015 4:12 PM
Reply to: Message 125 by dwise1
10-09-2015 3:14 PM


Re: DNA as Magical Thinking
And as I recall, Dawkins' metaphor for genetic code was not that it contained instructions, but rather a blueprint specification. ...
Cake recipe.
Enjoy

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This message is a reply to:
 Message 125 by dwise1, posted 10-09-2015 3:14 PM dwise1 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 128 by Tanypteryx, posted 10-09-2015 4:43 PM RAZD has replied
 Message 129 by dwise1, posted 10-09-2015 7:43 PM RAZD has replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 136 of 221 (770642)
10-10-2015 10:30 AM
Reply to: Message 130 by dwise1
10-09-2015 7:46 PM


intermediate summary
Now let's apply that to the brain and to ganglia and neural networks.
Neural networks like we find in jellyfish, light sensors and the neural net allow the jellyfish to sense daylight and rise to the surface to feed and then during the dark night to sink away from predators.
So we have a protein that reacts to light.
We have single cell organisms that sense light and alter behavior.
We have primitive multicellular organisms with neural nets that sense light and alter behavior.
Thus the foundation for making eyes and their neural connections is well laid out. Each stage builds on what went before -- the jellyfish adapts the sensory asparagus of single cell organisms to be specialized cells for sensing light and it adds a neural net that triggers muscles to control the behavior based on sensory stimulus.
So the next stages are:
(1) formation of a retinal patch in lieu of single sensor cells, and
(2) formation of brain stem for signals to be switched on and off to control behavior.
Enjoy

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This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 144 by Faith, posted 10-11-2015 2:19 PM RAZD has replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 137 of 221 (770643)
10-10-2015 10:39 AM
Reply to: Message 128 by Tanypteryx
10-09-2015 4:43 PM


analogies use and misuse
Wouldn't you say that beyond just the recipe, parts of it (DNA) are also replicator/fabricator of raw materials and building blocks?
I think the point was is that it isn't a hard-wired program, but more like general directions\specifications. A pinch of this a scoop of that, mix and repeat.
Curiously I don't think there is a single analogy that fits all the ways DNA functions, and so we have to be careful in using analogies to specify how far we take them.
The airline fuselage repetition of segments is another, as there are strength issues as the fuselage gets longer that an engineer would consider. Evolutionary processes would have to go through some trial and error, with a happy mutation providing extra strength that then allows the further extension, for instance.
Enjoy

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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 138 of 221 (770644)
10-10-2015 10:42 AM
Reply to: Message 129 by dwise1
10-09-2015 7:43 PM


preadaptation and mutations
... you could then make a stretch version of the plane pretty much just by increasing the number of sections (though obviously there'd be repercusions on the entire design).
And if it were beneficial to increase length, then a mutation that offered sufficient structural strength would mean it was pre-adapted to develop multiple sections by repeating the segment recipe.
Enjoy
Edited by RAZD, : No reason given.

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This message is a reply to:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


(1)
Message 147 of 221 (770656)
10-11-2015 4:33 PM
Reply to: Message 144 by Faith
10-11-2015 2:19 PM


What is plausible, what can be tested
Just wondering, are ANY of these creatures considered to be in the evolutionary line to human beings? ...
That was not the question.
... In fact are the "primitive multicellular organisms" in the evolutionary line to jellyfish? Are those single-celled organisms in the line to the primitive multicellular organisms? ...
The question was how could primitive systems be beneficial, and thus subject to natural selection, for organisms without a complete (ie fully evolved) eye and brain ... and how would they function without the other parts (the "IC" perception). The fact that there exist today thousands of species that continue to function at primitive levels of light sensing, and continue to survive and breed because of their ability, shows that it is beneficial at these levels of development.
... SInce you don't say, I would guess they are not, that their visual capacities developed entirely separately, and in fact even uniquely in just a few organisms out of what, thousands or more? within their own genetic families.
Indeed. The evidence is that eyes evolved independently 10 or more times. Some of the evidence for this is:
  1. bug compound eyes, each with their own sensor (photoreceptor\retina)
  2. nautilus eyes with no lens, and focus is made by making a "pinhole" aperture,
  3. octopus eyes with nerves behind the retina that focus by moving the retina relative to a fixed lens, and
  4. mammal eyes with nerves in front of the retina that focus by changing the shape of the lens while the retina is fixed
And I'm sure you can find a few more.
Nor is there any claim that bug eyes evolved into mammal eyes or that octopus eyes evolved into mammal eyes.
The claim is that it is easy to evolve eyes because we start with light sensitivity and then add improvements in tiny modifications that improve the effectiveness of the eye and offer more benefit to the organisms with the new and improved models.
Enjoy

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Replies to this message:
 Message 148 by dwise1, posted 10-11-2015 6:18 PM RAZD has replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 162 of 221 (770685)
10-12-2015 7:03 PM
Reply to: Message 148 by dwise1
10-11-2015 6:18 PM


Re: What is plausible, what can be tested
... somehow constrained to restrict Herself to working with and modifying only that which already exists, to live with and work with every single wrong decision She had made from the very beginning, completely powerless to change even the slightest mistake.
My favorite argument in this line is that you can take the octopus eye and the mammal eye and combine them to create a zoom-lens ability, and never need glasses.
Enjoy.

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This message is a reply to:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


(1)
Message 164 of 221 (770688)
10-12-2015 8:33 PM
Reply to: Message 160 by Lamden
10-12-2015 2:38 PM


how do you validate concepts?
You guys really got me to use the noodle. Unfortunately, my time, biological education, and brain power are limited, but this is what I have come up with so far.
Stretching is good, except when mental gymnastics are required to make facts fit previously held convictions, rather than leading one to revise convictions that are ... inadequate.
The question is what paradigm do you use to determine what concepts are valid, and what concepts are invalid. How do you test your opinions? Your beliefs?
Regarding the eye:
...No matter how slight the improvement is, is that not an astounding chain of events? ...
Nope. As noted we have evidence of many many many organisms that exhibit all these intermediate sensory abilities, and this demonstrates unequivocally that those intermediate stages are both viable and beneficial in allowing these organisms to survive and breed.
... For example, imagine you are a manufacturer, assigned to making a car. You can take as long as you want, with as many stages as you desire, but each change you make must be incrementally better than the stage before. That would be a huge handicap, perhaps even crippling. ...
And yet every automobile corporation is engaged in just this process, year after year. Cars as an example, actually counter your argument, with this caveat -- your opinion of what is better doesn't count, what counts is whether the new model is successful.
D) Even if there is a beneficial mutation somewhere somehow, they are so rare that by the time it happened, the beneficial species would be outnumbered a trillion to one. ...
Do you understand what the differences are between a beneficial mutation, a neutral mutation and a deleterious mutation? I ask because I don't think you do.
... I have discovered a blurb from none other than Thomas Nagel himself ... Had I known about it earlier, I certainly would have drawn from such a celebrated name. ...
What a person says does not become true because that person says it, if it is true it is true independently, and a person saying it is just reflecting that truth, no matter who it is. To cite someone, as validation of a position, is known as the logical fallacy of the appeal to authority.
Enjoy

we are limited in our ability to understand
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This message is a reply to:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 180 of 221 (770764)
10-13-2015 6:30 PM
Reply to: Message 179 by Lamden
10-13-2015 5:54 PM


science is the pursuit of knowledge
I am not here to convince you of any screwed up science, but to learn what science says.
Science says follow the evidence, discard all preconceptions ... and follow the scientific method:
You will note this is an endless do-loop iteration process; that science is never complete, but it pursues completeness; each refinement of knowledge and theory builds on the previous knowledge and brings us closer.
Enjoy
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quotes are easy
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RAZD writes:
quotes are easy
or type [quote]quotes are easy[/quote] and it becomes:
quote:
quotes are easy
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we are limited in our ability to understand
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This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 181 by Faith, posted 10-13-2015 8:35 PM RAZD has replied

  
RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 189 of 221 (770799)
10-14-2015 8:38 AM
Reply to: Message 181 by Faith
10-13-2015 8:35 PM


Re: science is the pursuit of knowledge
See Message 66 on A New Run at the End of Evolution by Genetic Processes Argument, where you have a lot of unanswered replies.
One thread at a time is enough, imho, for you to be wrong on.
Enjoy
Edited by RAZD, : thread

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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1404 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 200 of 221 (770841)
10-14-2015 4:07 PM
Reply to: Message 194 by Lamden
10-14-2015 2:47 PM


philosophy and science and belief
Nagel writes:
I believe the defenders of intelligent design deserve our gratitude for challenging a scientific world view that owes some of the passion displayed by its adherents precisely to the fact that it is thought to liberate us from religion. That world view is ripe for displacement....
Curiously I read this as saying ID can liberate people from religion, which it demonstrably doesn't, and ... this doesn't challenge a scientific worldview ... because science is essentially (necessarily) agnostic -- it cannot test supernatural so it can neither validate it nor invalidate it. Personally I look at scientific knowledge -- the stuff we can test against objective empirical evidence -- as understanding how god/s did it and not answering why god/s did it.
Nagel writes:
Those who have seriously criticized these arguments have certainly shown that there are ways to resist the design conclusion; but the general force of the negative part of the intelligent design positionskepticism about the likelihood of the orthodox reductive view, given the available evidencedoes not appear to me to have been destroyed in these exchanges. ... "
The old god of the gaps grasping gasp argument ... the idea that it cannot be completely explained in every detail, therefore: god/s.
Nagel writes:
... At least, the question should be regarded as open. To anyone interested in the basis of this judgment, I can only recommend a careful reading of some of the leading advocates on both sides of the issue ...
There are many sides -- in fact you can consider there to be an infinite number of different scenarios. Condensing the discussion to only two is naive and incomplete.
If you are going to insist on two sides then you have science and not-science.
Nagel writes:
... Whatever one may think about the possibility of a designer, the prevailing doctrinethat the appearance of life from dead matter and its evolution through accidental mutation and natural selection to its present forms has involved nothing but the operation of physical lawcannot be regarded as unassailable. It is an assumption governing the scientific project rather than a well-confirmed scientific hypothesis.
My skepticism is not based on religious belief, or on a belief in any definite alternative. It is just a belief that the available scientific evidence, in spite of the consensus of scientific opinion, does not in this matter rationally require us to subordinate the incredulity of common sense. That is especially true with regard to the origin of life.
As was pointed out this is abiogenesis and not evolution, a common mistake for people that are undereducated in evolution science. The clue best is in the definition of evolution:
(1) The process of evolution involves changes in the composition of hereditary traits, and changes to the frequency of their distributions within breeding populations from generation to generation, in response to ecological challenges and opportunities for growth, development, survival and reproductive success in changing or different habitats.
In other words you have to have a breeding population -- life -- to have evolution.
Nor does it matter to the study of evolution whether life began with a molecule or a creation, the study is the same.
As I have said in my thread Is ID properly pursued? I think that ID is philosophy rather than a scientific pursuit. In another thread, Perceptions of Reality, I delved into how I see the differences between science, philosophy and belief:
If I were to draw a picture of this it would be something like this:
One could say that {all} science includes knowledge we that we are pretty sure we know, that {all} philosophy includes knowledge that we think we can know, and that {all} faith includes knowledge we cannot know that we know (hence we take it on faith).
There is nothing within science that is not also {included\accepted} in {some} philosophy or other, and there is nothing within philosophy that is not also {included\accepted} in {some} faith or other.
When it comes to testing concepts, only scientific concepts can be tested -- by definition. This gives us a way to validate scientific concepts, but not philosophical concepts or religious beliefs.
What we can do however is look at concepts that are [i]invalidated/i -- philosophical concepts and religious beliefs can be invalidated if they are contradicted by objective empirical evidence (ie - the belief that the earth is young is an invalid concept, because evidence shows it is very very old).
So concepts that are not invalidated are possible, but validation is not possible.
Enjoy

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This message is a reply to:
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