Questions on "Random" Mutations

I think you're confusing "random" with "uncaused".The mutations are random in two closely related senses: first, as you say, with respect to the fitness of the organisms, and secondly, because we can't predict which mutations will occur.By analogy, the fall of dice in a casino has underlying physical causes, but they do not favor any particular gambler, nor can we predict how they're going to come down.

Well, again, that's not what "random" means. The sum of two dice is random, but not all outcomes are equally likely; and this means that I can predict that 7 will come up a lot more than 12, on a statistical basis; but it still doesn't allow me to predict the outcome of a particular fall of dice.

Which is true by definition. Nope. Yes we can. Look at the systematic breeding of tigers with the albino mutation. St Bernards exist, and are the result of selecting desirable mutations, whether or not anyone ever tied a barrel to one.But dogs are hardly the best example of artificial selection. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Brassica oleracea. Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

Please demonstrate the "massive" genetic diversity of undomesticated Canis lupus as opposed to other species or stop making stuff up. Yes, it's been done several times. Why do you keep attributing your delusions to "breeders"? Since you don't understand it, it can't be that simple. And all biologists have a different opinion, which is backed up by actual data rather than making stuff up.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I'll tell you what else they hadn't noticed by Darwin's time:"Ask, as I have asked, a celebrated raiser of Hereford cattle, whether his cattle might not have descended from long horns, and he will laugh you to scorn. I have never met a pigeon, or poultry, or duck, or rabbit fancier, who was not fully convinced that each main breed was descended from a distinct species. Van Mons, in his treatise on pears and apples, shows how utterly he disbelieves that the several sorts, for instance a Ribston-pippin or Codlin-apple, could ever have proceeded from the seeds of the same tree. Innumerable other examples could be given. The explanation, I think, is simple: from long-continued study they are strongly impressed with the differences between the several races; and though they well know that each race varies slightly, for they win their prizes by selecting such slight differences, yet they ignore all general arguments, and refuse to sum up in their minds slight differences accumulated during many successive generations." --- Darwin, Origin of Species, ch. 1.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

Conservative selection is where NS wipes out new mutations 'cos the old ones are better, as opposed to adaptive selection. So either MartinV is wrong about biology or he's wrong about biological terminology. Or both.

Could I first of all say that what follows is an answer to your post, but it'll take me a while to get round to the point. Sit down, take the weight off your feet, be patient. Let me tell you a story.There's a chap called Tom Ray who designed a programming language called TIERRA. He used this language to write a program which copied itself.A self-copying program undergoes reproduction which is one of the key elements of evolution. Another is mutation. Tom Ray built this in by specifying his programming language so that programs written in it would screw up occasionally, which simulates copying errors.The third important element of evolution is selection. He didn't have to do anything in particular to simulate that, because a computer only has a finite memory, so programs trying to copy themselves are de facto in competition for a finite resource.So he started off with one program which copied itself, with occasional copying errors and a selective pressure. The results exceeded his wildest dreams: the various "species" of programs which evolved from this one precursor showed behaviors analogous to predation, parasitism, and even sex. "Sex?", you ask. Yes: two programs co-operating to produce a third.Now, here's the point. (I told you there was a point, didn't I?)The point is that you can't imagine how this "digital sex" evolved. If you're thinking that maybe that's 'cos you don't know much about computer programs, let me tell you that I do, and that if anything that makes it even more baffling. I cannot imagine the specific pathways which led to the development of such a feature, within the confines of TIERRA. But I know for a fact that this happened.Of course, in the case of TIERRA we could find out how it happened by looking in close detail at what happens when the simulation is working. But with evolution in the real world, the nearest we get to this is the fossil record, and by and large this only tells us about the development of bones.Still, we can look at that. Consider, for example, the bones of the mammalian inner ear. This is about my favorite example of evolution, because it is the development of a complex (indeed, irreducibly complex) structure which we can see happening in the fossil record. We don't have to imagine the process, we can look at the bones.When we can check up on evolution in this way, it's clear how it happened and it makes perfect sense. When we can't see all the stages, then I agree that they are difficult to imagine, but that says more about our powers of imagination than it does about evolution. As the example of TIERRA shows, our difficulty in imagining something doesn't make it impossible or even improbable.I hope my comments on this thread have been helpful to you.

However, I was not talking about "most programs", but about one which does copy itself. Of course. In order to know whether a program is the result of a quasi-evolutionary process, or of design, we need to know whether it was in fact produced by design or by reproduction, variation, and selection. And so of course I have not done so, as you would know if you'd actually read my post instead of wittering on about the first thing that popped into your head when you noticed that I'd mentioned evolution and programming languages in the same post.The English language is not a Rorschach inkblot, it actually conveys specific ideas.

Oh, for pity's sake.It's got nothing to to with heterozygosity. He's talking about how recombination and selection produces set of genes --- different genes, DIFFERENT GENES --- which are suited to one another.Of course you don't see the point. You never see the point of anything. This is because, as you admitted, you don't bother to read the things you're pretending to reply to. As I said, it's not a Rorschach test. The point of what Dawkins wrote is not the subconscious ideas it stirs up in your head after you skim-read it and pick out a few words.Could you just try to be right about something, just for once?

So, first you tell me that you don't read my posts, then you tell me that you are not interested in my opinions --- and then, in an attempt to refute me, you babble out a load of garbage that has nothing to do with my opinions or my posts.This is consistent, certainly. Don't you worry that it is also frickin' stupid?If you can't be bothered to find out what I think, you will never, ever, be able to find an error in my thinking. In particular, your latest babble has nothing whatsoever to do with anything that I said, or that Dawkins said, or that anyone has said. It's just your lonely raving about something you haven't bothered to read.

Yes, absolutely. But this observation doesn't change the point I was making, which is that we cannot imagine the precise processes which went on to produce sexually reproducing computer programs. Up to a point. However, looking at the differences between a chimp genome and a human genome don't reveal to us how (for example) true grammatical speech evolved, nor allow us to imagine how it happened.

This supposed critique of my posts would be so much more relevant if you'd bothered to read my posts, or if it had anything to do with my posts. But as you have admitted, you can't be bothered to read my posts before replying to them. This is why your babble has no relevance to my posts, or to anything else.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

I was going to explain to you further the difference between the real world and the magic delusional fantasy fairyland in your head, but then I noticed that I've already done so in post #70: Let me know when you are capable of understanding that, and then I shall continue your slow and painful introduction to reality.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.