Evolution would've given us infrared eyesight

Thanks Parasomnium, Yes, it is the "hole" in the retina for all these things to connect to the rest of the organism behind the retina. Here's a little test:

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Not only that, but these nerves, veins and arteries all enter and leave the eye near the center of the retina in prime vision territory:

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Close your right eye and look at the right side green spot, move in or out and you will find a point where the left side green spot disappears, but the grid is still visible - this is because your brain assumes continuity over the blind spot, but is blind to the reality.

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Notice how the pattern suddenly "fills in" the grid where the spot was (is).And yes I intended that the blind spot was part of the interference with the retina. Perhaps sufficiently that RickCHodgin wouldn't bump his shin on the furniture at night pretending to be nocturnal.Enjoy.

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Hey RickCHodgin, perhaps I can help. If there is a net benefit to the trait for the organism to survive and breed (one that survives but doesn't breed is not going to pass on genes), then the trait will survive in following generations. As long as they do not affect survival and breeding, they will continue to exist in the population, however they will also be subject to variation and random changes as selection will no longer work to preserve the feature in it's original form. They may also become adapted to some new use, one that would not be possible without this preadaptation. Mutations do provide a wide array of variation in all species. This is what produces the variations you see in all populations of all species. Each specific variation is also mixed with other variations of other traits in the overall phenotype of each individual, and selection operates on the individual phenotype as a whole.But you seem to think, or imply, that there should be larger scale variations than we actually see. Changes from nails to claws in one generation, for instance, and this is just not the way it works. Yes, we call those neutral mutations, they don't affect the phenotype one way or the other, so selection does not eliminate or promote them. They spread through the populations by genetic drift.Any feature that had evolved in ancestor organisms, but which is not necessary now, and which are now phenotypically neutral, would be subjected to such mutations that don't affect selection, and thus the genetics for those features would "drift" in following generations. There would be no selection to maintain them in their previous form. Well, as you have previously demonstrated, your understanding is not much of a measure, especially for the validity of a process that has been observed.Cavefish - Wikipedia

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The cavefishes (commonly: blindfishes, swampfishes) are found in caves and adapted to life in the dark, notably lacking fucntional eyes and pigmentation, as a result having a pale or whitish color. They are found only in the midwestern and south-eastern United States.[1] There are more than 80 known varieties of cavefish. Although some species have tiny, vestigial, eyes, three have no eyes at all. Cavefishes do, however, have rows of sensory papillae on their skin, which they use to help navigate their lightless environment. The majority of cave fish have little to no pigment in their skin.

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The vestigial eyes are often buried under the skin where they couldn't function the way they originally did if there was light. This skin covering is due to genetic drift - mutation to cover the eyes and no selection mechanism to remove it from the population.There are also spiders and crickets that have evolved to live in caves without eyes. Curiously, your opinion once again proves incapable of preventing nature from proceeding according to evolution. Strangely the evidence that it does happen is not hard to come by. Organisms are not programmed. Biology is not programmed. Life is not programmed.Organisms today have the features that have been adapted by descent with modification and natural selection to enable them to live within their ecologies. Evolution is a response mechanism to ecology, changes in ecology, and the opportunity provided by variation and nearby ecologies. Those organisms that survive and breed, pass on hereditary traits to following generations. Some are more capable than others and thus contribute more to following generations.The next generation may face an entirely different ecology, with reverses the previous selections. There is no program, no direction, other than survival and reproduction. Again, this is your (ill-formed and ignorant) opinion, and it is incapable of altering reality. The fossil record is a reality, and - sadly for you - it shows a gradual progression of life on this planet from single cell life, to multicell life, to fishes, fishibians, amphibians, quadrupeds, reptiles, dinosaurs, birds, and mammals, often overlapping for long periods of time in multiple forms and in many different ecologies. All showing relationships in nested hierarchies. Man's ancestors, the various hominids, are late-comers to the party, a mere blink of the infra-red blind eye in geological time and the time-span of life on earth. What is the mechanism that makes it stop?Would it help you if I said microevolution is all that is needed in evolution? That once you have accepted that microevoluiotn occurs you have accepted that "macroevolution" occurs? All "macroevolution" amounts to is the record of the descent of new species from common ancestor species.Evolution is the change in hereditary traits in populations from generation to generation, speciation is caused by evolution in reproductively isolated populations, causing divergence between the isolated populations that can result in reproductive failure should they meet later.Ring species show that very little difference is necessary to result in reproductive isolation:Greenish warblers

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Greenish warblers (Phylloscopus trochiloides) inhabit forests across much of northern and central Asia. In central Siberia, two distinct forms of greenish warbler coexist without interbreeding, and therefore these forms can be considered distinct species. The two forms are connected by a long chain of populations encircling the Tibetan Plateau to the south, and traits change gradually through this ring of populations. There is no place where there is an obvious species boundary along the southern side of the ring. Genetic data show a pattern very similar to the pattern of variation in plumage and songs. The two northern forms viridanus and plumbeitarsus are highly distinct genetically, but there is a gradient in genetic characteristics through the southern ring of populations.

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Dogs also show that small variations can accumulate rapidly in reproductively isolated populations when selective pressure is high - for that is all dog breeds are, populations isolated by humans while selecting for survival and reproduction based on some arbitrary human criteria. Perhaps you would like to participate in the dogs will be dogs thread.Of course the descendant of dogs will always be descendant from dogs, just as dogs will always be descendant of canis (wolf genus) and canis will always be descendant from canidae (descendants of canids) and canidae will always be carnivora, etc.Foxes are also canidae, genus vulpus instead of canis. Are foxes prevented somehow from developing the features of dogs (or something different)?What about squirrels and possums?The problem I have with this claim is convergent evolution. Consider these fellas: Berkeley - evolution 101 (one of those links I posted for you initially):

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However, these animals also have some key differences:

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Sugar gliders live in Australia, and flying squirrels live in North America.

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Sugar gliders have a pouch (like a kangaroo does), which provides shelter and safety for their tiny babies ” at birth, a baby sugar glider is smaller than a peanut! Flying squirrels, on the other hand, have much larger babies and no pouch.

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By studying their genes and other traits, biologists have figured out that sugar gliders and flying squirrels are probably not very closely related. Sugar gliders are marsupial mammals and flying squirrels are placental mammals.

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From this (and many other examples) I would conclude that there is no barrier that prevents a marsupial from evolving to be virtually identical in behavior, size, appearance, etc, to a placental mammal. ROFLOL, you do keep them coming don't you? Now we have DNA programmed to self-destruct? The ID of undesign. Cue the mission impossible theme. If they are not needed then the feature will not be selected to be preserved. If there is a selective advantage to not preserving an unnecessary feature, selection will act to remove it, though this can occur in varying degrees - once the feature has been reduced to a neutral feature in the population it can remain as a vestige of it's former glory.Snakes have lost all evidence of legs, whales only have vestigial remnants. Some cave fish have no eyes at all, while others have eyes buried under skin. How about: "Features that are no longer used for their original purpose, but that may remain in diminished form due to secondary functions that evolved later to use part of the feature that (then) existed, or because they have become a neutral feature (neither beneficial nor harmful)."Or one can cite sources for what biologists call vestigial features and why:Vestigiality - Wikipedia

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Vestigiality describes homologous characters of organisms which have seemingly lost all or most of their original function in a species through evolution.

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http://www.evolution.berkeley.edu/...1/IIIE5Adaptation.shtml

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A vestigial structure is a feature that was an adaptation for the organism’s ancestor, but that evolved to be non-functional because the organism’s environment changed.

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Now you can argue that the pelvis of a whale is still used for A function, but you cannot argue that it is used for walking, and you cannot argue that your definition is one used by science.Curiously when you use different definitions for things than the scientists do, then you suddenly stop talking about the science and start talking about your fantasies of what science involves.Humorously, vestigial structures and features are precisely what you were claiming should be plentiful at the start: They would become vestigial structures, no longer used for their original purpose.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : clarity and grammarEdited by RAZD, : spEdited by RAZD, : punc

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Okay think of it this way. Our vision system is based on two types of cells, rods and cones. Cone cells are responsible for our colour vision and in humans there are three types, responding to short, medium, and long wavelengths of light (which correspond to blue, green, and red light respectively). Now the majority of mammals with colour vision have only two types of cone cells, are dichromatic. As far as we know only humans and some closely related primates (and interestingly at least two species of marsupial) are trichromatic, so we're already doing quite well
Now if infrared was to be added to our repertoire of visible wavelengths, it is likely that another type of cone cell would be required. For example, birds can see the same wavelengths as us, but can also see ultraviolet, since they have four types of cone cells. By contrast bees have three cone cells like us and can see ultraviolet, but cannot see light from the red end of the spectrum that we can see.Rod cells differentiate between light and dark, and are more sensitive to light than cone cells. In animals that are nocturnal, rod cells predominate on the retina. Don't assume that just because you stumble about in the dark, other animals have the same problem, since you are a diurnal animal so will have far fewer rod cells. Of course with fewer cone cells, nocturnal animals have poorer colour vision, and rod cells slower response to light means they are less accurate and less sensitive to movement. Note that rod cells are sensitive to light in the blue-green wavelengths and do not respond to red light.So for IR vision to function requires an increase in these IR responsive cells would reduce either the number of cone cells, so reducing colour vision during the day, or reducing the number of rod cells and impeding general night vision. Of course it would be more likely both, since as others have said infrared wavelengths have very low energy, and any IR light from the environment will have to compete with IR in the form of heat produced by the animal. This isn't helped by the fact that the retina is backwards, so there is a network of capillaries carrying warm blood between these IR cone cells and the environment.

I think you mean 750nm and 1000m.Edited by Mr Jack, : No reason given.Edited by Mr Jack, : No reason given.

You are quite right. I'll fix that typo

Hey fallacycop ANd we can correlate wavelength with temperature:Google Answers: Mapping Table from IR Wavelength to Temperature of source

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The general formula for the peak wavelength of blackbody radiation
emitted by a warm body is as follows:

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Lambda [microns] = 2900 / T [deg K],

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where Lambda is the wavelength of the light in microns, and T is the
temperature in Kelvin. To convert from Kelvin to Celcius, Kelvin =
Celsius + 273.15, so the equation becomes

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Lambda[microns] = 2900 / (T [celsius] + 273.15).

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I generated an Excel spreadsheet to chug through the numbers and
create the following table:

Temperature   Peak Wavelength
(Celsius)          (Microns)
----------------------------
30.0                9.56622
...
35.0                9.41100
...
40.0                9.26074

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35°C would be 95°F or roughly body temp.Color vision - Wikipedia

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For humans, the visible spectrum ranges approximately from 380 to 740 nm, and there are normally three types of cones.

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So you need to evolve from 740 nm (mx10^{^-9})up to ~9.4 μm (mx10^{^-6}), with (erm) no visible benefit in between. From 740 to 9,400 nm.AND block the infra-red coming off the arteries etc inside the eye (see Malcolm's excellent post Message 153) ...Yeah, evolution works like that.Enjoy.

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Even though he appears to have left us for pastures filled with easier marks: One of the deceptions that creationists employ is to confuse terms, such as "mutation". As you are here, they restrict the term to gross (ie, large-scale) changes in the body. Ie, the change has to be large enough and distinctive enough to be noticed and logged in as a mutation. The real mutations, the ones of interest, are rarely so noticable.In evolution, the only mutations that are of any interest are the ones in germ cells (cells that produce eggs and sperm, as opposed to somatic -- body -- cells that make up the rest of the body). This is because a mutation must be capable of being inherited for evolution to be able to use it. If under radiation (eg, UV irradiation) a body cell mutates, then that is of no interest to evolution because it will never be inherited by the offspring. But if a germ cell is caused to mutate, then that would be of interest because it could be passed on to offspring.At this point, we should also note that many of the mutations that you view as typical are of absolutely no interest to evolution (even though they can be of interest to genetic scientists, because they help them to map out what genes perform what functions). Many, if not most, of them are developmental mutations rather than genetic mutations. Ie, they occur because of something that happened during embryonic development. Thalidomide babies, for example, who were born with stumps for limbs (phocomelia) or with extra appendages (polymelia) because their mothers had taken thalidomide, a sedative-hypnotic, during pregnancy.Furthermore, the types of mutations which of interest in evolution are genetic in nature, in that they are descriptions of how the genotype is changed. Ernst Mayr listed four such types of mutations (listing them here from memory, since my book is at home). Bear in mind that most genes transcribe for a protein, so I'm writing in terms of the resultant protein; also keep in mind that groupings of three bases form a codon which encodes for a particular amino acid. Also, the assessment of the effect of each one is my own opinion:
1. Base substitution -- replacing one amino acid in the protein with another. Most amino acids in a protein can be replaced with a different amino acids -- either with any amino acid or with an amino acid of a certain type --, as is evidenced by the same protein in different species having different amino acid sequences.
This type of mutation is very likely to be neutral, but with the potential of producing a different protein.2. Base insertion (frame-shifting) -- the insertion or deletion of a base. Since this causes the rest (or remainder) of the sequence to change, it's causing a really big change all at once.
I cannot see how this could not prove harmful in the vast majority of the cases, such that it would destroy that gene (giving rise to a pseudogene, such as we find in related species).3. Gene duplication -- the splicing in of extra copies of a gene. This creates the multiple alleles that we find, multiple pairs of genes. This is why our hair isn't just black/white, but rather all possible shades inbetween, because we have multiple alleles that encode for hair color. This is also how a gene can mutate to produce a different protein and yet we can still produce the original protein (eg, lysozyme -> alpha-lactalbumin), because this mutation had first produced multiple alleles for the original protein before one of those mutated to produce the new protein.
I cannot think of any situation in which this could prove harmful.4. Transposition -- the reversal of portions of a base sequence.
Again, as a large change, I would think that this would more often than not destroy the gene's functionality and produce a pseudogene.So, of the four basic kinds of mutations that actually matter, two of them are most likely harmful while the other two are not. A far different picture than creationists try to paint.BTW, the Wikipedia article on "Mutation" (Mutation - Wikipedia) expands on these basic four and provides more details and some examples. The article also distinguishes between "germ line mutations" and "somatic mutations", though they point out that if the organism reproduces asexually by budding or cutting then that distinction becomes blurred.Rick, your friend was right to advise against you visiting us, though for the wrong reasons. Let me explain by quoting from a different scripture:

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31. Therefore I say: "Know the enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles you will never be in peril.
32. When you are ignorant of the enemy but know yourself, your chances of winning or losing are equal.
33. If ignorant both of your enemy and of yourself, you are certain in every battle to be in peril."
(Scroll III (Offensive Strategy), "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu, translation by Samuel B. Griffith, Oxford University Press, 1963)

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You view evolution and those who accept it as the enemy. But you are ignorant of that enemy, as you have amply demonstrated. OK, you might have still had a chance to hold your own. But you also demonstrated that you are ignorant of yourself -- you don't know about the glaring errors, lies, and outright deceptions of "creation science" and its current stealth-faade, ID, as evidence by your posting of creationist PRATTs that were soundly refuted nearly 30 years ago -- , so you have no chance of success whatsoever here. The only place where you have any chance of "succeeding" is against those who themselves know neither you nor themselves. We know you (ie, creationists) because most of us have been observing and studying this entire "issue" (ie, purely a fabrication by the anti-evolution movement in the wake of Epperson vs Arkansas, 1968) for several years, even decades. And even if only as a result of that study, we have also know ourselves. We also have the advantage of having the evidence on our side. Most creationists do not last anywhere near as long as most of us do, especially the honest creationists, because as they discover the truth about their side's claims they will either retreat from the fray so that they don't have to face the truth, adjust their beliefs to better fit the evidence in which case they'd drop from the creationist rolls (even sometimes to the point of coming over to the evolution side), or they will become even more fanatical and succeed in isolating themselves even more from reality.Rick, if you really want to fight against evolution, then learn it! Learn everything you can about evolution itself, not the grossly misrepresentative caricature that the creationists teach you. Also start to research into those creationist claims; they really are lying to you. TalkOrigins Archive: Exploring the Creation/Evolution Controversy has an excellent archive with many aricles and links that will help you both in learning about evolution and related sciences and in learning the truth about creationist claims -- correcting that leap-second deception that you had regurgitated barely scratches the surface of their deceptions.Oh, and to dispell one of the really big lies that they've taught you: no, you do not need to choose between God and evolution. Rather, you need to choose between God and creationist lies.PS
Rick, you've been put into the same situation as Scott Rauch (see bold portion at end of his quote). Also-former-creationist Glenn Morton posted the question on a newsgroup ( the complete questions and responses are posted on Morton's site at No webpage found at provided URL: http://home.entouch.net/dmd/whocares.htm):

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On another listserve, the issue came up as to who cares about Genesis being history. I mentioned that there are lots of former Christians, who are now atheists who did care that Genesis didn't seem to concord with science and history and because of this left the faith. What I would like to do is test that assertion. If you are an atheist, who was a Christian in the past, I would like the answer to a couple of questions.

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1. How important were the problems between Genesis and Science to your decision to leave Christianity?

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To this, Scott Rauch responded:

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About a year and a half ago, I was a firm special creationist. I am now a believer in evolution; not even sure if God is required. In 1995, Glenn Morton wrote to Stephen Jones about Stephen's provisional acceptance of common descent (as quoted by SJ Sunday, January 11, 1998 5:16 PM), "I know exactly how difficult a paradigm shift like that is." Well, let me tell you, the shift is absolutely devastating. I'm still struggling with all this. I still hold some anger because I believe the evangelical Christian community did not properly prepare me for the creation/evolution debate. They gave me a gun loaded with blanks, and sent me out. I was creamed.

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Rick, you have yourself experienced what it's like for evangelical Christian community to have given you a gun loaded with blanks and then sending you out to do battle. Now, after having been creamed, what are you going to do about it?Edited by dwise1, : Added Scott Rauch quote

Thank you. As a long time lurker on this site, having read many of your excellent posts, that means a lot

Hi there. Hi dwise1. Wow. What can i say? i generally don't read posts or any docmentation of any sort to be impressed but i must confess that i'm impressed by the long post you wrote in answer to Rick.It is true, shifting from one conviction to another must be a tough change. We all drive on a road that is not only made with straight lines. What i always say is that if one day god comes up before me one day and show me the truth, i will say "ok". But until now science, and not pseudo-science and lies have showed that there might be a way of answering our questions. At least we can keep ourselves from being jubilant when we have demonstrated that the other side is wrong. what is useful in humbleness and respect (no matter how hardheaded the opponent is) is that it allows these conviction shifts.Thanks again! I guess i will learn many things on this forum.

Bonjour, olivortex, and welcome to the fray. As long as you employ open-minded skepticism and try to recognize and eliminate confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance from affecting your pursuit of knowledge you will do fine. One does not need a PhD in biology to understand evolution or the geology of an old earth. A healthy understanding of logic helps.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.

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thanks!

Actually, regardless of your belief or disbelief in the Theory of Evolution, some people already have the ability to see Infrared. In fact, it was first written about in a science-fiction book several years ago, and the author did not know it was possible at that time.He later discovered that it is indeed possible and that some people already have this ability, which is probably a fluke of nature, rather than an evolutionary trait at this point.

Can you please supply some info on this? Love to read some more about people that see in infrared.

Not sure if its infrared, but here's something that's just as good.

More details, please?Infrared is a very wide band of the spectrum; if you mean near infrared then, yeah, you're certainly right but it's not of any great significance - it won't let you track footprints by their heat impression or anything.