How do you define the word Evolution?

Well, not mutation, since that depended on some knowledge of genetics which Darwin did not have, and didn't come along for quite some time after Darwin. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I see. Interesting. Of course it DOESN"T arise from mutations, the alternative forms of the genes are built in; and of course although natural selection is sometimes the cause of the elimination of some variations to favor others, it happens more often from the new gene frequencies brought about by the simple splitting of a population into two or more subpopulations, and especially in the smaller population, with reproductive isolation.I guess I need to write my own book on evolution.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

It will be a short book, short but pithy, and of course I'll do it in two sections, the one on biology as just described, and the other on geology which will show the absurdity of the Old Earth interpretation of the strata. I'll be happy to send you a signed copy. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

According to what Dredge described the population did "evolve." There were already redheads in the original population, so there was already an allele for redheadedness in the original population (or perhaps more than one if the trait is governed by more than one gene),, and those individuals survived while all the others and their alleles died. They did not evolve, they survived. They were naturally selected from the total population. Then they multiplied, their numbers increased. So we can say that the population evolved, or changed character with respect to the original population, because there were only redheads and their alleles left and they increased in numbers from that point until there was a very large population of nothing but redheads.This is really a version of microevolution because really this is all that happens to bring about new phenotypes characteristic of new populations -- the selection by one means or another of some proportion of the parent population, its reproductive isolation, either because the others have been killed off or by some other means, and then its increase in numbers. That's really all that ever goes on in "evolution" anyway. (And of course I must point out that the survival and proliferation of redheads because all the others died means there was a drastic decrease in genetic diversity in the new population from the old, due to the enormous loss of alleles for the hair color loci, so a drastically reduced ability for any further "evolution.")Yes, of course Dredge is right, this IS an example of "human avolution," misunderstood as usual by evolutionists.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Oh here we go again. Except I don't want to go that far with this right now. No, this is the result of thinking about some known facts, it's not made up. The old fashioned methods of domestic breeding are sufficient to make the point: to get a new phenotype you eliminate all the other possible phenotypes and their genotypes too of course. A lot of the work of breeding is preventing the mating of your breed with other breeds of the same animal so as not to reintroduce the alleles for other phenotypes, that would interfere with the purity of your breed. This is so fundamental there's no way to deny it: you get new phenotypes by getting rid of the competitive phenotypes and their genotypes. And the old fashioned breeder also didn't want any mutations because they would just bring in genetic material that does not exist in the pure breed, and that's what you don't want if you are developing a purebred animal.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I didn't use the term speciation, I'm focused on the change which is what evolution is, getting new phenotypes, which requires the loss of genetic diversity. Speciation may or may not occur.I carefully said "old fashioned" breeding. The Scotch Fold, like the American Curl, is bred by crossing with non-fold/curl cats. The old-fashioned method was MOSTLY breeding only animals with the desired characteristics, which led to rapid genetic depletion. Cross breeding maintains the genetic variability. And today since it is recognized that genetic depletion IS the result of the old-fashioned methods, which lesds to genetic diseases, breeders avoid those methods even at the cost of the purity of their breed.The principle is the same as in the wild, as Darwin recognized.

Yes I understand the problem and have answered it before in terms of the possibility that there is or once was a process like mutation that created these alternatives. HOWEVER, it really depends on whether they are viable alternatives that actually do something to further variation, and since most mutations are not beneficial there's lots of room for doubt about that. If they at least succeed in not destroying the function of the gene perhaps most of them do no harm. In the current generation anyway.But it's possible all those "alleles" are nothing but useless mutations that contribute nothing to the health of the species, let alone evolution. This is the view I'm currently leaning toward.By the way I was watching an interview on You Tube earlier with Dr. J C Sanford, a creationist who wrote the book "Genetic Entropy" which argues that eventually human beings will die out because of gene death, due to all the mutations we all accumulate in every generation, some of which we also pass on to our children. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Dredge has a different approach to these things than I do but I understand what he's saying and agree with him even if I have my own different angle on it and some terminology needs to be sorted out to show our agreement.So, he's right to call this "devolution" because producing the population of redheads requires the elimination of an enormous number of other phenotypes, and not only hair color but a whole slew of genes that also have to get accidentally eliminated in the process just because they occur in the individuals with the other hair colors. (When you select a particular type all you get is whatever genetic material that type possesses, which leaves out tons of other possibilities.)When I call this "evolution" what I mean is that this is what is usually considered to be evolution, so it IS evolution as evolutionists think of it, but then I go on to point out that in reality what is conventionally understood to be evolution entails huge losses, which is the opposite of that the ToE requires to be true.It's microevolution and it illustrates what I keep claiming, that you only get a new population-wide phenotype by losing all the other phenotypes with their genotypes (severely decreasing genetic diversity), just as occurs in "old fashioned" breeding that is based on artificial selection rather than cross breeding.There's nothing wrong with calling this "devolution" because in reality that's what it is, it's just that evolutionists fail to see what's really going on.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Yes a hundred or more new ones in every generation I understand? A few of which get passed on to the next generation. But that doesn't make them viable alternatives that further variation, since most of them are "neutral" which really means only slightly deleterious, not at a level to be weeded out by natural selection... Well, the thing is, you ASSUME that they further variation because that's what the current ToE says. All variation is ASSUMED to be the result of mutations. There is no evidence that that is so, it is merely assumed. And yes there IS evidence of plenty of mutations, but no evidence that they are of any use to the organism.My creationist view is that the genome is complete without the addition of anything, that mutations overall are at least unnecessary and overall destructive rather than useful. All variation is the result of the many possible combinations of built-in alleles for all the different genes, many traits being governed by more than one gene. That's all it takes for the many variations in any species we see in nature. You need to show 1) that these are actually mutations and not naturally occurring variants and 2) if mutations, you need to show that all the variants actually DO something, since most mutations are neutral, not affecting the organism, to mildly deleterious, accumulating over time toward something undesirable.

I'm aware of maybe, what? five or six "beneficial" mutations that have been demonstrated, all of them a bit iffy.

I believe you have an obligation to back up your assertions about what I've been "shown." I'm "shown" a lot of stuff here that I nevertheless reject.Even geneticists can suffer from a doctrinal bias that causes them to see only what the doctrine tells them is there. In fact it's historically true that all sciences go through phases where they accept what later turns out to be false doctrine as a new paradigm comes along and is finally accepted.Recently I watched an interview with J C Sanford, a creationist who wrote a book titled "Genetic Entropy" which of course argues that we are not evolving but devolving, that life is deteriorating genetically rather than improving. His view seems to have a lot to do with the fact that we accumulate mutations in our bodies, which he doesn't see as a positive thing but a ticking time bomb for diseases.

Oh yeah, TWO, the peppered moth and the pocket mice. two, count em TWO. These examples imply that mutations just appear when needed, which of course in principle nobody accepts. Eventually this phenomenon is going to have to be explained some other way.

I'm not reading it right now, sorry. I'm sure you're up to giving the outline to make your point. One example isn't enough in any case.

You have ZIP support for your claim. ONE lousy example, Tangle. And I'm not going to read something off the board unless it's really really important.I thought I said beneficial mutations were extremely RARE and subject to doubts. Which your argument proves.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I hate to disillusion you, since you do so love your illusions, but even if a mutation is the cause of the switch in the peppered moths all you've proved is that very rarely a mutation does something beneficial, but in any case this is only an example of microevolution which has been known to occur for millennia, certainly no evidence for the ToE.