|
Register | Sign In |
|
QuickSearch
EvC Forum active members: 64 (9164 total) |
| |
ChatGPT | |
Total: 916,787 Year: 4,044/9,624 Month: 915/974 Week: 242/286 Day: 3/46 Hour: 0/0 |
Thread ▼ Details |
Thread Info
|
|
|
Author | Topic: How do you define the word Evolution? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
See my reply to Dredge, Message 424 by CRR, posted 23-04-2017 5:17 PM
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
A theory that attempts to explain the origin of species without explaining the origin of the first species is incomplete.
I think Darwin got a lot right in his book. However he fell into error when he extrapolated beyond the evidence.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
Here's one example of a secular trained geologist who made the switch to YEC.
Dr Ron Neller - creation.com There's a longer interview here http://www.creationmagazine.com/...on/2017_volume_39_issue_1
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
I've read Dobzhansky's paper
Nothing in Biology Makes Sense except in the Light of Evolution Author(s): Theodosius Dobzhansky Source: The American Biology Teacher, Vol. 35, No. 3 (Mar., 1973), pp. 125-129 It was written 40 years ago so we shouldn't be too critical of it.It mis-characterizes YEC's as believing in special creation for each species and fixity of species which does not represent current thinking. This invalidates about 1/2 the paper. His comments about the universal genetic code, cytochrome C, human gill slits, and some bad theology, make it rather out of date. His title "Nothing in Biology Makes Sense except in the Light of Evolution" is wrong. A lot in biology makes perfect sense without evolution. E.g. the physical adaptations of the giraffe to cope with its height are functional requirements; while variations in the genetic code don't make sense in the light of evolution. I also note this quote supporting abiogenesis and universal common ancestry."They suggest that life arose from inanimate matter only once and that all organisms, no matter how diverse in other respects, conserve the basic features of the primordial life. (It is also possible that there were several, or even many, origins of life; if so, the progeny of only one of them has survived and inherited the earth.)"
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
"God did it" is not an argument. It is an excuse for intellectual laziness. Unless of course God actually did it, in which case excluding the possibility before examining the evidence is intellectual laziness and materialistic conceit.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
"Dredge confesses that his understanding of the definition of speciation was flawed."
Don't worry, Dredge, Even Mayr's Biological Species Concept has its problems as the following Wikipedia article shows.
Attempts at definition Species - Wikipedia Biologists and taxonomists have made many attempts to define species, beginning from morphology and moving towards genetics. Early taxonomists such as Linnaeus had no option but to describe what they saw: this was later formalised as the typological or morphological species concept. Mayr emphasised reproductive isolation, but this, like other species concepts, is hard or even impossible to test.[60][61] Later biologists have tried to refine Mayr's definition with the recognition and cohesion concepts, among others.[62] Many of the concepts are quite similar or overlap, so they are not easy to count: the biologist R. L. Mayden recorded about 24 concepts,[63] and the philosopher of science John Wilkins counted 26.[60] Like Linnaeus, Darwin was using a morphological species concept rather than Mayr's Biological Species Concept. Darwin wrote in On the Origin of Species: No one definition has satisfied all naturalists; yet every naturalist knows vaguely what he means when he speaks of a species. Generally the term includes the unknown element of a distinct act of creation. Species - Wikipedia Not only can hybrids form between recognised species, they can form cross genera, although as far as I know, only genera within the one family. This actually is consistent with the idea that the kinds from the Ark have subdivided into sub-groups that we have later classified as different genera and species.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined:
|
I've made a summary of all definitions offered so far. For brevity I've edited a few while trying to retain the meaning. If the author thinks I've made a mistake I will revise as necessary. Have I missed any?
======================================= @Percy 2 (and @deerbreh 3) Darwin's definition: The change in species over time due to descent with modification and natural selection. More modern definition: The change over time of the genetic makeup of species through natural selection operating on accumulated genetic variation and mutations. @arachnophilia 4the variation in frequency of heritable features in a population between generations. @AK-7 5Changes in the makeup of a population through hereditary attributes which allow that population to survive in a given environment. @nwr 7In a biological context - common descent and change over time between generations. @Minnemooseus 8Changes in the environment, caused by the interactions of the components of the environment. @Cal 9Change in a population over time as the result of differential competitive success among imperfect replicators. @bkelly 10When a descendant's inheritable characteristics differ from those of its parent(s). This includes when a trait changes from dominant to recessive or the reverse. @U can call me Cookie 11It is change in allele frequencies between successive generations, sometimes leading to phenotypic change. Nb. Natural selection is not the only mechanism (eg. sexual selection, genetic drift also apply). @New Cat's Eye 12Biological evolution is a change in an allele frequency of a population. @Ben! 13Evolution is change over time due to some interaction. In biological evolution, the units of analysis is usually a species, with change due to mutation and the interaction of species with environment which must allow them to continue to reproduce (i.e. natural selection) But not all biological evolution has these units of analysis, and other things that may usefull be called evolution have different units of analysis. @Lammy 18Evolution is a drastic physical change in many individuals of a population or species within one or two generations resulting in the birth of a new population or species and the extinction of the parent population or species by some unknown or unidentifiable mechanism. @EZscience 24Evolution is simply a character change in a population over time. *Biological* evolution requires that this change have an underlying, heritable (genetic) basis. @dwise 58Basically, biological evolution is the total sum of what happens when populations of living organisms do what living organisms naturally do. Consume resources to survive long enough to reproduce. Produce the next generation who are very similar to the previous generation, yet slightly different. Those who survive long enough to reproduce then generate the next generation who are very similar to them yet slightly different. Rinse and repeat ad infinitum. @RAZD 67The Theory of Evolution (ToE), stated in simple terms, is that the mechanism of anagensis, and the mechanism of cladogenesis, are sufficient to explain the diversity of life as we know it, from the fossil record, from the genetic record, from the historic record, and from everyday record of the life we observe in the world all around us. anagenesis - The process of lineal change within species is sometimes called phyletic speciation cladogenesis - involves the division of a parent population into two or more reproductively isolated daughter populations @Dr Adequate 80Heritable changes in a population. @CRR 87Evolution is the theory that all the living forms in the world have arisen from a single source which itself arose naturally from an inorganic form. @Davidjay 97Luck and Chance @Tangle 101CHANCE and SELECTION. @Dredge 119the theory that complex life as we know it today evolved from less complex life - a single-cell organism, to be exact @jar 282Evolution is simply change over time. The Theory of Evolution is the explanation for the reality of change over time seen. @Pressie 377After all of this, I gathered that the word evolution means change over time.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
I was under the impression that ToE included the theory that all life evolved from a common ancestor You're not wrong about that, Dredge. The theory of evolution does include the Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA) unless the person you're talking to doesn't want that. See Evolution - Wikipedia
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
Perhaps part of the problem is that there is a difference between the definition word Evolution as used in Biology and the definition of the Theory of Evolution.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
And that's why we can have definitions ranging from
@Pressie 377After all of this, I gathered that the word evolution means change over time. to @CRR 87Evolution is the theory that all the living forms in the world have arisen from a single source which itself arose naturally from an inorganic form. and they are all correct in some sense and all wrong in some sense. Hence the confusion. I think it suits some people to leave it that way then they can say "Behold the Peppered Moth! That is an example of evolution. Hence we have proved that humans evolved from apes which evolved from LUCA."
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
So, PaulK, where's your definition?
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
I agree, Taq, universal common ancestry is inseparable from both Darwin's theory of evolution and the modern synthesis. E.g. Theodosius Dobzhansky concedes that there could have been more than one original form of life but that only one survived as the universal common ancestor. Charles Darwin was building on the tree of life idea that preceded him and published by Erasmus Darwin.
Common ancestry is a core of the definitions given by both Kerkut and Coyne that I previously quoted. Dredge is right. There is more than one definition of the theory of evolution. This leads to people claiming evolution has been proved when they are only talking about minor changes in allele frequencies, not even speciation let alone common ancestry.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
Dredge, the lack of correlation between phenotype complexity and genome size is known as the C-Value Paradox. This has not been resolved yet but remember we are still learning about the genome. The ENCODE results were published in 2003 and there has been a lot of progress since then but there's still a long way to go. There is still no satisfactory evolutionary explanation for the c-value so we will probably have to wait for more research.
Like you I believe that eventually we will find that a human contains more genetic information than an amoeba. [edit] This is probably an issue that is peripheral to the thread topic and should be addressed elsewhere. Edited by CRR, : No reason given.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
In a 2007 PNAS paper, Robert Hazen and colleagues, including Szostak, mathematically defined functional information as follows:
I(Ex) = -log2[M(Ex)/N] Equation (1) where, N = total number of possible configurations or sequences (both functional and non-functional), M(Ex) = total number of configurations or sequences that satisfy the functional requirements, I(Ex) = functional information (the number of bits necessary and sufficient to specify a given function). Entropy = Information Mistake Kirk Durston gives examples in the linked article.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
CRR Member (Idle past 2269 days) Posts: 579 From: Australia Joined: |
Kirk Durston gives examples in the linked article.
|
|
|
Do Nothing Button
Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved
Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024