THE END OF EVOLUTION?

Oh come on, be my first EvC stalker.It's cool, man, I like reading your post.

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"I smoke pot. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your mouth."--Bill Hicks"I never knew there was another option other than to question everything"--Noam Chomsky

I googled and looked under a number of sites and they put greenish warbler in Phylloscopus trochiloides. Is there new information that is not yet posted? What other species are there in this ring series that greenish warblers have become?Trying to get back to the original thread and my previous submission it still seems to me that because
a) the number of homo sapiens that have existed I believe is larger than the number of homo habilis or homo ergaster or homo heidelbergenisis that have existed (I tried to find numbers for these but couldn't. I'm infering that since they were limited geographically and had no agricultural techniques their numbers were small. Anyone know?)
b) there are far more mutanogens today
c) the competative stresses are stronger on sapiens than any other homo group
d) the environmental stresses are stronger
e) there have been no new homo species in the last 100 000 yearsthat we are the end of evolution. If it was going to happen, it should have happened by now.

You are confusing evolution with speciation.In language that may make more sense to a creationist, you are confusing micro-evolution with macro-evolution.And your assumption that "it should have happened by now" is baseless.

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

I think a lot of your questions about ring species were addressed by Percy in Message 164. Since the warblers are in the process of speciation as a ring species there are many sub-species within Phylloscopus trochiloides. As to whether they can't interbreed at the overlapping 'ends' of the ring, this is a hard thing to explore experimentally, I don't think there have been any attempts to test this with the warblers. This is where the different definitions of species come into play as for many biologists reproductive isolation is the important point in defining distinct species, not genetic incompatibility/lack of interfertility.In terms of human evolution, I don't think there is any reason to accept at least 2 of your premises, specifically C and D, I'm also unconvinced that B is necessarily true. But even if they were all true there would be no reason to presume that those conditions must lead to speciation. Indeed one of your points, a large population, will tend to act against speciation, especially when there is a large capacity for travel and gene flow between geographically distant populations.You also seem to assume that humans are the be all and end all of everything. Even if there were no further evolution of humans that wouldn't be the end of evolution in other animals. There is plenty of evidence that humans are still evolving though, just not speciating as Coyote pointed out.TTFN,WK

I believe that was infered in the question "End of evolution." We have been talking about whether new homo species will emerge. Do you think they will? If so, why? Here is the base for my assumption:
"a) the number of homo sapiens that have existed I believe is larger than the number of homo habilis or homo ergaster or homo heidelbergenisis that have existed (I tried to find numbers for these but couldn't. I'm infering that since they were limited geographically and had no agricultural techniques their numbers were small. Anyone know?)
b) there are far more mutanogens today
c) the competative stresses are stronger on sapiens than any other homo group
d) the environmental stresses are stronger
e) there have been no new homo species in the last 100 000 years"With a smaller evolutionary potential the homo genus created three new species if you accept the habilis to ergaster to heidelgenisis to sapiens model. Why haven't new homo species appeared? I think that we are a dead end. (present company excluded)

Yes, I saw the subspecies but again, no new species. Science basically asked two questions: What is it called and how does it work? Those scientists making a career in taxonomy have established a maze of rules for KPCOFGS. I'm not an expert in taxonomy but I think their setup is reasonably sound. I know that there is still argument but there always will be when you put scientists in a room. I am just talking about humans. I don't think humans are the be all and end all. Sometimes, looking at our current crop of sapiens, I feel like we devolved from Pan. (tic) I don't see any evidence of further speciation in homo sapiens. Change - yes. Speciation - no.

I think your answer is in a) above.You correctly state that there was geographic limiting of early populations. That is one of the quicker ways to get speciation. The lack of isolation that we currently have is preventing speciation based on geographic isolation. But we still have changes occurring throughout the human population, and we are gradually drifting apart from earlier human species as time passes. At some point it will become a large enough difference that then current humans and archaic humans will not have been able to interbreed. That will most likely take time, selection pressure, genetic drift etc., but there is no reason to believe that evolution has stopped. Just be patient!

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

Really? Who do you think had it harder, the H. ergaster who had to hunt and forage for food or the H. sapiens who can just walk down the block to the megamart? Really? Who do you think had it harder, the H. ergaster who lived in a crude shelter by a small fire or the H. sapiens who lives in a modern home? Really? when did you complete your exhaustive survery of all humans past and present? I admit that it is very very unlikely that there is another species of Homo out there but until each and every human past and present is examined it can't be 100% ruled out.

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soon I discovered that this rock thing was true
Jerry Lee Lewis was the devil
Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet
All of a sudden i found myself in love with the world
And so there was only one thing I could do
Was ding a ding dang my dang along ling long - Jesus Built my Hotrod Ministry
Live every week like it's Shark Week! - Tracey Jordan
Just a monkey in a long line of kings. - Matthew Good
If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On
*not an actual doctor

I think it was probably somewhere earlier in this thread where I mentioned that there is research indicating that human beings have been evolving at an increasingly rapid rate over the past 10,000 years, and that we're evolving at a more rapid rate today than at any time in our evolutionary history.Speculation is that it's because modern living is considerably different from before 10,000 years ago and the invention of agriculture, and later large urban areas and shopping malls. As more and more of the world joins the modern era the percentage of human beings subject to its unique environmental pressures (both new ones and the absence of old ones) increases. Even creationists must concede that our environment no longer selects against human beings too slow to outrun a Tyrannosaurus rex. --PercyEdited by Percy, : Grammar, and improve clarity.

You don't have to outrun the T. rex, you just have to outrun the guy next to you!

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

Wow, well your inane repetition really won me round. Your argument seems to consist of simply ignoring the actual research that has been performed and sticking slavishly to the fact that all of the greenish warblers are not distinctly classified as separate species in some Linnean cladistic system. That isn't what this is. There are a massive number of diverse organisms and populations on the planet. It is an ongoing process for scientists in any number of disciplines, old fashioned taxonomy, molecular genetics, behavioural ecologists and others to try and understand the complex relationships between different organisms. To think that one can simply lump all familiar looking birds into one species and leave it at that suggests that you would have been quite happy if taxonomy had finished after Linnaeus' first draft. It isn't arguing the details, it is continuing to actively research and find out new things or just to settle and give up because what we have is good enough for government work.I mean we know where babies come from right? So who needs the entire field of developmental biology? Your whole argument seems totally antithetical to science.TTFN,WK

Almost seven billion people currently on the planet. 1.4 billion in China and 1.1 billion in India. Around 70 % of the world's population don't have enough to eat. Just because we can enjoy the marvels of the West Edmonton Mall, doesn't mean it's available to the rest of the world. By environmental pressures I meant changes in diet, immunizations, changes in weather, changes from nomadic to settlements, changes in the water we drink, changes in the composition of the atmosphere. No, it can't be 100 % ruled out but it seems unlikely since nobody has found a fossil record and it should be easier to find than habilis, ergaster, and heidelbergenisis.How's the weather out there? We still have snow in our backyard!!!

Rainy weather out there making you a little grumpy?Let me attempt to annoy you further with more inane repetition.
I posit that no new species will come from homo sapiens. Hit me with the actual research that I've been ignoring and convince me otherwise.

Is this the "kind" or "baramin" belief that you're pushing? The belief that micro-evolution is fine, but macro-evolution is verboten?If so, perhaps you can provide the mechanism that prevents all of those micros from adding up to a macro.Otherwise, your insistence that genus Homo is finished evolving makes no sense in light of millions of years of evidence.Even some of the most ardent creationists accept evolution and speciation! For example, Lubenow and "Woodmorappe" accept rapid speciation! In his essay The non-transitions in ‘human evolution’—on evolutionists’ terms "Woodmorappe" writes:

quote:

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Homo ergaster, Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, and Homo neanderthalensis can best be understood as racial variants of modern man—all descended from Adam and Eve, and most likely arising after the separation of people groups after Babel. Source

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And as I have noted elsewhere in response to this claim:

quote:

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The change from modern man, i.e., Adam and Eve, to these four species of fossil man took place since the Babel incident, which is usually placed after the global flood and in the range of 4,000 to 5,300 years ago. The change from modern man to Homo ergaster would require a rate of evolution on the order of several hundred times as rapid as scientists posit for the change from Homo ergaster to modern man! This is in spite of the fact that most creationists deny evolution occurs on this scale at all; now they have not only proposed such a change themselves, but see it several hundreds of times faster and in reverse!

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So if you accept the "kinds" or "baramins" belief, how can you reconcile your belief with a fairly common creationist belief that several species of Homo evolved in just a couple of thousand years?And if you accept an old earth and the fossil record, how can you reconcile your belief with the obvious speciation that has occurred in genus Homo and its ancestors going back millions of years?In other words, what is your evidence that evolution has halted?

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

How many of those are living in situations that are still far better than H. ergaster could hope for? How would you test a fossil that looks like modern H. sapiens for inter-fertility with modern H. sapiens?

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soon I discovered that this rock thing was true
Jerry Lee Lewis was the devil
Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet
All of a sudden i found myself in love with the world
And so there was only one thing I could do
Was ding a ding dang my dang along ling long - Jesus Built my Hotrod Ministry
Live every week like it's Shark Week! - Tracey Jordan
Just a monkey in a long line of kings. - Matthew Good
If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On
*not an actual doctor