What is evolution?

Thanks, coyote, for connecting with me.This thread is entitled "what is evolution?" The author however is not precisely correct in his choice of a title, because he is after the wrong ideas about the theory of evolution from the opponents of the theory.The correct title should be misconceptions of the theory of evolution; then he should start right away with his definition of terms and his own statement of what he knows to be the theory of evolution.And from that point onward proceed to state what he knows to be misconceptions from opponents of the theory, and clear up their minds in accordance with what he knows to be the correct ideas about the theory of evolution.Why? Because in accordance with the rules of clear logical exposition as I can gather them from stock knowledge, if you want to set something straight you start with what you know to be straight, then point out what you notice to be wrong in how others think about its being straight but to you it's not straight; and how? of course by comparison with what you know to be straight.Allow me to give a concrete illustration from another area of human quests, since all human quests follow the same productive procedure if we would be clear-minded instead of proceeding without any ideas of exactly what we want to arrive at. Anyway, since the title as it stands is "What is evolution?" And the author wants to read about the misconceptions of opponents to the theory of evolution, it is incumbent upon people of good will and honest curiosity to help both proponents as opponents of the theory to draw up a list of terms which are crucial to the resolution of their controversy, like as I would presume your good self and myself, yours truly, are interested in.I look up your page and found this definition of fact: My own definition of fact is the following (which I have already stated above): So, if we would collaborate, then our definition of fact should be the following: I did not find any definition in your referred to page on what is change. Can you please proffer a definition of change?I understand that you are a proponent and exponent of the theory of evolution, so it should be to the advancement of your proposition and exposition of this theory to establish the definitions of terms that you will use time and again in your discourse; so also the author of this thread, subbie, can avail himself of your list of definitions in order to formulate his own idea of the theory, by which he will judge that the opponents of the theory are not getting the theory correctly -- which accounts for their irrelevant if nothing else opposition to the theory.To everyone else, it is not too late to salvage this thread, please spend some time and trouble to contribute your definitions to what is a fact and what is change, in re theory of evolution.I am sure that when we get a mutually acceptable list of definitions of terms, then the whole controversy will clear up: we will know what proponents are talking about and what opponents are mistakenly in opposition to, or they are correct in their ideas about the theory of evolution but they have reasons to reject it.Yrreg

You missed the point of my post.Science has pretty good definitions for all of these terms. Students learn them, implicitly or explicitly, during their undergrad and grad years, both from professors and from technical journals and texts.We don't need to redefine these terms with every newbie that comes along. It is up to you to learn the terms as used in the various fields of science, and if you want to be understood you need to use those terms correctly.You have a lot of studying ahead of you.

Let's see if I've got this straight. IAmJoseph, a man who communicates, or rather fails to communicate, in a private language invented by himself which no-one else in the whole world understands ... is complaining about jargon?

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Let's see if I've got this straight. IAmJoseph, a man who communicates, or rather fails to communicate, in a private language invented by himself which no-one else in the whole world understands ... is complaining about jargon?
  —Dr Adequate

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See? are we now convinced that however we want to presume and assume that everyone has the same ideas about the terms used in writing about evolution theory, nonetheless for the sake of being ascertained and not to waste time later on in squabbling about jargon, it is incumbent upon honest and sincere discussants to first set the terms straight?Anyway, I have already said that for me fact in re evolution theory is a singular concrete event that is observable by anyone, now I will propose the definition of change as the following:

If no one takes exceptions to my definition of change, then I will next just briefly mention the kinds of change I know in science, and see whether it is also acceptable to everyone.When everyone has accepted or does not care to object to my definitions of fact and change, then I will state my own definition of what is the theory of evolution which I will invite people to examine whether it is the correct one as understood by the prominent proponents of the theory of evolution.Yrreg

The example you state, a fish becoming a bird, is quite definitely a "change," however I could see that example leading to a potential conflict further down.

Possible, but we wouldn't call it a bird ... What about a flying frog?Enjoy.

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Unless you are submitting this to a peer reviewed journal you are wasting your time.Science and scientists aren't much impressed by folks on internet chat rooms "redefining" what they do. Nor are they going to change their use of terms to accommodate those posting on internet chat rooms.

Well, if they don't care to know what we are about here in re evolution the pro and the con aspects of the theory, that is their privilege.I am not going to be inhibited from voicing out my own opinions of what I think is the correct idea of evolution theory as I know from my reading in the net.But you know what, if you can dig out from the learned prominent proponents of evolution theory a good glossary of terms which include what is fact and what is change and what is random and what is non-random, then I will award you with the Yrregian award of distinguished connoisseur of the theory of evolution, notwithstanding that owing to your anonymity here in this forum I am at a loss to ascertain what publications you have put in peer review periodicals.Addressing people like myself, what do you think of my definitions of fact and change, here again I will reproduce them below:

And by the way, for posters here who are conversant with writings in peer review magazines, suppose you tell us in a hundred words or less what is evolution, as to do justice to the learned authors of peer review writings on theory of evolution?Yrreg

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The Sumerians were one of the earliest urban societies to emerge in the world, in Southern Mesopotamia more than 5000 years ago. They developed a writing system whose wedge-shaped strokes would influence the style of scripts in the same geographical area for the next 3000 years.....For 5000 years before the appearance of writing in Mesopotamia, there were small clay objects in abstract shapes, called clay tokens, that were apparently used for counting agricultural and manufactured goods.

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http://www.ancientscripts.com/sumerian.htmlMy bold.So, unless you are going to claim language came after writing, you have your evidence.

No evidence - that article only makes leaps of imaginative plots. The evidence tended for 5000 years pre-sumerian is laughable. Give a simple name more than 6000 instead` - the factor evidencing speech and language. This is recallable, and is not reliant on writings. It is also not plausable that an unrecorded 5000 year period, has no transit imprints in that region.In fact, there is no evidence of history per se prior to 6000, and all alledged evidences are based on flimsy premises. Think of population and mental prowess cencus marks along the way: these only allign with a 6000 year verifiable conclusion. It is too vital an issue to accept anything but firm, scientific hard proof, and not even one or two stray examples.

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In fact, there is no evidence of history per se prior to 6000, and all alledged evidences are based on flimsy premises.

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Are you claiming that there is no evidence for anything older than 6,000 years? Or just "history" -- whatever that is?If it is the former, you are arguing from a narrow interpretation of scripture not even shared by most Christians, and certainly refuted by scientific evidence.Try this article for some good background into radiometric dating: Radiometric Dating: A Christian Perspective, by Dr. Roger C. Wiens

Why is it laughable? You appear to hand wave away evidence without providing any of your own.What leads you to doubt the evidence I tender? How about a place name?Eridu (or Eridug, modern Tell Abu Shahrain, Iraq) was the earliest city in southern Mesopotamia, founded ca. 5400 BC.Eridu - Wikipedia Well I'm sorry, I confess I have no idea what this sentance means if you want something not reliant on writing. Now this is an interesting thing to say don't you think? You have the site of Eridu dated prior to 6000 years ago but as you have said all evidence is based on a flimsy premis.This begs the question: why are you on this site? You seem to show talent only in refusing to see what other wiser people have tried really, really hard to show you.I mean, the surface of the sphere thread: a perfect example. It is obvious to anyone accept you that there is no center. Yet you keep insisting that everyone else is wrong accept you.So I ask you: if you are not here to learn or debate, what are you here for?

Yrreg, look: we only get about 300 posts in a thread, as per board regulations, and we could easily use up all 300 posts trying to agree on just two or three terms that are involved in the debate. In fact, if you go to the "Is it Science?" forum, you'll find about half (exaggeration, obviously) of the threads exhausted on back-and-forth assertions that "faith" does or does not entail "blind" or "evidenceless" belief. If you read over all the threads on this website about "faith," "fact," "theory," etc., you would come to a very easy understanding as to why your idea of defining extra terms is getting a very hostile welcome in this thread.Science has a set of terms that it uses regularly, and if you (generic "you") want to discuss whether or not the science of some topic is valid/factual/proven/etc., you have to use science terms to do it {AbE: and Coyote has provided you a location to find these terms}. If we're discussing religion, we'll use religious terms; if we're discussing comparative literature, we'll use comparative literature terms; if we're discussing ballet, we'll use ballet terms. If you want to discuss terminological issues, do so in your own thread about terminology.This thread was started because anti-evos continuously come onto the website making off-the-wall claims about evolution that leave us science types baffled. Note that every creationist responding to subbie's challenge so far has included abiogenesis and Big Bang cosmology as parts of evolution. And, on other threads, they routinely provide "evidence" against these concepts, thinking that, if they can disprove, e.g., the Big Bang, they have successfully disproven evolutionary theory. Then, we have to go through this entire explanation of "what is evolution?" yet again. Now, though, we can just direct people to this thread (or others like it) when they bring up stuff like that again, instead of wasting another 300 posts explaining what evolution is and never getting to the topic that the OP wanted to discuss.So, subbie put this thread out so we can see what the misunderstandings are, and try to correct them. Now, you want us to use up this thread defining other terms like "fact" and "change," when this forum was not started to discuss whether or not evolution is a fact or to engage in an infinite regression of definitions. Who cares if Bluejay calls it a theory while Coyote or Rahvin calls it a fact? How would that change what the fact/theory says? And, if you noticed, what it says is the topic of this thread.If you really think "what is a fact?", or "should evolution be considered a fact or a theory?" should be discussed, and you don't see the matter having already been discussed thoroughly enough on other threads, propose a topic for it in the "Proposed New Topics" forum.Edited by Bluejay, : Addition

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I'm Thylacosmilus.Darwin loves you.

That is all very good, Larni, and Coyote, and IamJoseph.Now, let us all work together to establish some peer review glossary of in re evolution theory that will make the task of peer review exponents of the theory more accessible to private investigators like yours truly -- seeing that they are so busy debating among themselves and very conveniently but indolently not taking the care that is an intelligent course of action to establish their concepts and terms, so that they can discourse intelligently instead of debating endlessly.So I said that a fact is a singular concrete event observable by anyone, and a change is an event of transformation undergone by anything whereby it becomes different from what it was before.What is the fact of evolution then? Why, nothing else than that it is a change in an organism which in turn, namely, the change, is a singular concrete event observable by anyone.Now as a private investigator I am going to find out what exactly is the change in an organism that makes the organism different from what it was before, which is supposed to be the fact of evolution.Then I will examine whether there are enough singular concrete events of the change in an organism, namely, several instances of such changes in organisms, so that the several turn out to be many as to merit the description of innumerable, as to deserve a theory of evolution.In the meanwhile I will leave you gentlemen, Larni and Coyote and IamJoseph, to your citations of peer review articles when you have nothing from your own thinking that is of any insight from your own faculty of intelligence whereby you might be 'citable' in peer review publications.Yrreg

Are you just trying to say that you can't understand the scientific literature? There is no endless debating of terms in the peer reviewed literature but plenty of facts.The most common and fundamental 'change' is genetic mutation at the level of single nucleotides.These events are readily observable in the laboratory, as are numerous further levels of genetic change above that of single nucleotides.It is harder to easily demonstrate phenotypic change as the frequency of phenotypic change is considerably lower than that of genetic change, since not all genetic mutations have phenotypic effects. There are still a large number of well documented phenotypic changes in the scientific literature, both from spontaneous mutations and from mutations induced by exposure to environmental factors such as radiation or mutagenic chemicals.Exactly what arbitrary number of observations will you need before 'several turn out to be many as to merit the description of innumerable, as to deserve a theory of evolution', whatever that means.TTFN,WK