I am new to these boards, so forgive me if this has already been asked.
I have searched high and low to find any evidence supporting a beneficial mutation. All I have ever seen is mutations where it seems as though it would hinder the creature, not help it. Also, I have never seen any evidence of a creature gaining anything new, which be required for the evolution theory. This really makes me question evolution, since it's based completely off mutations.
Don't we already have two threads currently in progress talking about this, let alone all the old ones?
There's whatsisname's ongoing "Bacteria Diet" liefest and then there's the stuff in the "Questions About Evolution" thread, both of which threads are current, and then the EvC forum as a whole has been operative for going on for a decade, and I believe the subject must have been discussed now and then.
I have searched high and low to find any evidence supporting a beneficial mutation.
If this was true, you would not be implying that you haven't found any.
Also, I have never seen any evidence of a creature gaining anything new ...
Then it is certain that either you are lying or that you have never looked.
A search of these forums using the forums using the search function, let alone a search of the entire internet using google, would have provided you with an abundance of data if you were really looking for it.
I am new to these boards, so forgive me if this has already been asked.
I'm new myself, but you get used to the place after reading the threads for a week or two. You'll figure out what has and has not been discussed or mentioned or explained.
I have searched high and low to find any evidence supporting a beneficial mutation. All I have ever seen is mutations where it seems as though it would hinder the creature, not help it.
There have been specific experiments designed to induce a beneficial mutation in bacteria; a bacterium that was known not to possess any capability of lactose metabolism was cloned, and placed in a medium that selected for precisely that metabolism. After a few thousand generations, the majority of the population had developed it.
The only way that ability could have arisen was through mutation. And since it clearly increases the ability of that organism to survive, it is beneficial.
This in particular was described in a recently active thread, somewhere in this forum as well. You might be able to find it; pay special attention to posts by Wounded King explaining the matter to us others.
Also, I have never seen any evidence of a creature gaining anything new, which be required for the evolution theory. This really makes me question evolution, since it's based completely off mutations.
Nylon-eating bacteria and oil-eating bacteria are two clear examples of a new trait developing. Then there's these beneficial mutations which provide a definite advantage to survival; the CCR5 delta32 for example meant a higher probability of getting through plague or serious infection. Then there's plenty of evidence in the fossil record and in genetics for the existence of them.
When it comes to it, only a minority of mutations actually have any effect. A majority of them are neutral; something like 70% don't actually change the protein structure in any meaningful way and so they aren't selected for or against. Of the rest, quite a few are obviously bad. They kill the organism no matter what, so they're definitely harmful and for this reason harmful mutations are simply more likely than beneficial ones. But for many, it's about context: what's good for one thing in one place might be bad for another or in another place.
So, when all things are considered, there's plenty of evidence for this part of evolution, and for evolution in general.
I have searched high and low to find any evidence supporting a beneficial mutation.
I don't believe you.
Xstar writes:
All I have ever seen is mutations where it seems as though it would hinder the creature, not help it.
Really? After all that high and low searching?
Mutations that effect fitness basically means mutations that are anything other than neutral. Detrimental mutations are far more common than beneficial ones.
In this paper, however, they found that a surprisingly high proportion of the fitness effecting mutations in their yeast experiment were beneficial (5.75%).
Had your high and low searching led you to the idea of typing "beneficial mutations" into Google Scholar, you could have found this in a few minutes, and a lot more besides.
Xstar writes:
Also, I have never seen any evidence of a creature gaining anything new, which be required for the evolution theory.
Again, your high and low searching seems to have let you down. Where have you been looking? In your closet?
Let's start with a pretty monkey, and an easy to read article.
Here, the researchers have identified a gene duplication that has mutated to create a new and useful enzyme, thus adding a new feature to the digestive system of a leaf eating monkey. That's something new, and such examples are easily found.
I'll give you some more when you've digested the paper and the article.
Xstar writes:
This really makes me question evolution, since it's based completely off mutations.
I don't think that's what makes you question evolution, and I don't think you're really searching high and low, but that's another subject.
I get the feeling from your Opening Post that you are not really familiar with what the Theory of Evolution says. So maybe it would help if we started with some of the basics.
I have searched high and low to find any evidence supporting a beneficial mutation. All I have ever seen is mutations where it seems as though it would hinder the creature, not help it.
Whether something is beneficial or not depends on the environment the critter (plant type critter or animal type critter) is in. What is beneficial in one environment may well hinder the critter in a different environment.
Let's look at some basics. If the critter lives in a snow covered area, then a mutation that makes the critter whiter is beneficial. BUT... if the weather warms up and the snow melts, the critter that is brown will have the beneficial mutation.
The Fact of Evolution only involves Change over Time and we can see from the records that critters have changed over time.
Also, I have never seen any evidence of a creature gaining anything new, which be required for the evolution theory.
No, that really isn't quite true. There is nothing in the Theory of Evolution that says critters have to gain anything new. It does though explain how they can gain new things.
This really makes me question evolution, since it's based completely off mutations.
Again, not quite right. Mutations (and there are many different types of mutations) are just part of the Theory of Evolution. Another part is mentioned above, and that is Selection. Natural Selection is the environment that the critter lives in. Some critters (and remember we are talking about plants too as critters) will be better suited to a particular environment then others. Those critters will be more successful reproducing and so their genes will over time become the population.
Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
I think you're asking a fair and reasonable question. Everybody is in a bad mood about it because it's been the focus of several recent, very irritating threads, so don't let the strong negative feedback turn you off to this site.
There is a large amount of evidence for beneficial mutations. The best examples come from bacteria, because they can be easily manipulated, and can reproduce extremely rapidly, making it easy to watch mutations and evolution happening on short time scales.
This is my favorite example of mutations, which I've been tossing around a lot recently:
To summarize, here is what Hallet and Maxwell did:
Acquired a colony of bacteria with known genotype for a gene called gyrA. This bacterium is known to be susceptible to a type of antibacterial called quinolone
Induced random misrepair mutations in the gyrA gene using a substance that is known to create random mutations
Applied quinolone to the colony
Discovered that some of the bacteria were not killed by the quinolone, even though the colony was susceptible to quinolone. This showed that something had changed
Sequenced the gyrA gene of some of the bacteria that survived the quinolone
Discovered that one resistant bacterium had a gyrA genotype that was different from the original colony’s genotype (where the original genotype’s 317th nucleotide was an A, the resistant genotype’s 317th nucleotide was a G); i.e., it's gyrA gene had mutated.
Discovered that the gyrase protein produced by the mutant gyrA allele was also different from the original protein of the colony
Isolated the gyrase protein that was produced by the mutant gyrA allele
Tested the function of this mutant protein under varying levels of quinolone
Discovered that the mutant protein could tolerate 10 times more quinolone than the original protein, and still function properly
I like this study because it is very complete: it tested every possible step in the process of mutation, so there is no room to argue that something other than the processes proposed by the Theory of Evolution happened.
They showed that random mutation created a new allele (i.e., added information that did not previously exist), that the new allele produced a novel protein, and that the novel protein outperformed the original protein. Thus, the mutant bacteria were selected for by the quinolone regime.
There is no way to credibly explain this data other than with a beneficial, information-adding, random mutation.
To lift a post of my own from a different forum, where the canard of "no new information" is actually the subject of the thread, but the example is one of my favorites. I think of Hemoglobin C as sort of a "sickle-cell lite." ------------ Ref: Nature, vol 414, pp 305-308 (2001) - "Haemoglobin C protects against clinical Plasmodium falciparum malaria" , by D Modiano et al. It's not online, to my knowledge, except by paid subscription. Normal human hemoglobin ("HbA") is coded for by DNA which reads, as the 16th through 18th positions of a certain gene, GAA. This codon tells a cell's protein factory to put the amino acid glutamate at the sixth spot along the peptide that will become the beta chain of your or my hemoglobin. However, in a large number of West Africans, particularly the Mossi of Burkina Faso, this speck of DNA reads AAA. The distribution of folks with this variant looks like a bull's-eye: lots of the gene in one area of Burkina Faso, and fewer and fewer people with it as you move away from that center. The distribution is consistent with the idea that one person had the mutation about a thousand years ago, and that it spread through his or her descendants since. (Most people weren't terribly mobile in that area until nearly modern times - at least until the slave trade started.)
Now this DNA change alters that sixth amino acid on the beta chain of hemoglobin to lysine, making HbC. Most people with hemoglobin C never know it - some have mild anemia, gallstones, or spleen problems. But Modiano's paper documents that Mossi children that have both genes for HbC are 7% as likely to develop malaria as their classmates who have boring old HbA. 7% as likely to get the disease that kills a couple of million kids in West Africa every year. And that's because their genome has the information to make a protein that has one amino acid that's different from the one in their neighbors, and in their ancestors, too, if you go back a ways. New information. Useful new information. (You will agree that being able to make two different proteins is "more information" than being able to make only one, won't you? Kids in the study that had the AC genotype - that had both HbA and HbC in their blood - had a 29% reduction in their chance of getting malaria.) New, useful, "information" from a mutation.
Now a footnote: if your DNA reads GUA instead of GAA in this position, you get a valine in position 6 and have sickle-cell trait - the result of a different mutated hemoglobin called HbS. This protects against malaria, too, but the side effects can be severe, including fatal, especially if you have both genes for HbS. This, too, is "new information" - a different protein is being made.
First of all, pardon the implied hostility from me. It's just that both you and I know which way you're leaning based on your post.
Any dumbass who's ever worked with antibiotic-resistant bacteria will tell you that "beneficial" mutation that allows bacteria to be resistant to antibiotics happen all the time in the lab. In fact, it's an inevitability that this will occur.
im guessing you missed out on the swine flue then a small mutation in a virus alowed it to jump from swine to man. if you look a little back in human history you would see that ppl living in africa gained alot more melanine to protect them from the suns rays, and ppl arround the north pole lost alot of it because they dint need as much. (im not trying to be racial here im just proving apoint abbout mutation). and dont forget ponies you can start making your own breed take a few small horses and breed them then take the the smallest ofspring and breed them continue on till you get a hors the sisze of a fox.
in nature it goes a bit slower but it still goes if let say a bear is born whit a property that gives him an edge over other bears it is reasnoble to asume he will do better in life have more baybies and live longer some of his ofspring will also have his traits and do better than other bears offspring and in time when enough mutations have accured this new bare species wil not be able to mate whit the earlier vareiety of bares and produce a healthy offspring at that time whe have a new species and if its trtaits make it alot better than the old variety they vill probably outcompeate the old one and make it go exstinct.
sorry abbout the spelling english is my 3d language.
If everyone who thinks that bacteria are good examples of evolution in action, how do you explain the fact that we have studied billions upon billions of generations of bacteria, and they haven't evolved at all, they are still the same old bacteria, over and over and over again. if it takes billions of generations and nothing changes, what makes people so readily fantasize that with enough time anything is possible-we have already seen enough time.
If everyone who thinks that bacteria are good examples of evolution in action, how do you explain the fact that we have studied billions upon billions of generations of bacteria, and they haven't evolved at all, they are still the same old bacteria, over and over and over again.
First, they aren't the same old bacteria, they are new bacteria. They have evolved.
Second, they are useful because they are relatively simple and reproduce quickly so it allows the methods and procedures to be studied.
Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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