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Author Topic:   Evolving New Information
Percy
Member
Posts: 22389
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 16 of 458 (508923)
05-17-2009 8:47 AM
Reply to: Message 14 by slevesque
05-17-2009 2:51 AM


slevesque writes:
I believe that evolutionary biologist L. Harrison Matthews wrote that the peppered moth case was simple natural selection, but not evolution in action. Am I missing something here?
Evolution is descent with modification and natural selection, but Harrison is correct that it is primarily natural selection at work in the case of the peppered moth studies. But the passage you cite from him says that it isn't evolution because the peppered moth did not evolve into a new species, and that's incorrect.
Evolution proceeds in tiny steps. A change from one species to the next occurs through the accumulation of many tiny evolutionary steps, of descent with modification followed by natural selection over and over and over again through the generations. Each generation is one step. Saying that the small amount of change observed in the peppered moth studies was not evolution is like saying that you're not really going for a walk unless you walk all the way to the next city.
Just as you can go for a short walk and change your location a little, or you can go for long walks and change your location a lot, we can watch evolution for a short while and observe a little change, or we can watch evolution for a long while and observe a lot of change. But there's a problem watching evolution for a long while. Except for organisms with very short lifetimes like bacteria or even mosquitoes to an extent, the number of generations any scientific study can observe is very small.
The slow pace of evolution is paralleled by the slow pace of the erosion of mountains. We know that mountains typically erode by a few inches per year, but we're never going to observe mountains eroding all the way down to plains because it takes millions of years. We just have to rely upon the fact that once a mountain erodes a few inches this year, there's nothing to prevent it from eroding a few more inches next year, and the year after, and the year after that, and so on for eternity.
Each generation brings about a tiny amount of evolutionary change because reproduction is imperfect. Every generation contains new mutations not previously present in the population. Natural selection operates on these differences, and individuals with the more favorable changes contribute disproportionately to the genes of the next generation. And there's nothing to prevent this from happening in the next generation, and the one after that, and the after that, and so on for eternity. Changes can accumulate to the point where a species actually becomes a different species, and this is especially true when there are changing environmental conditions which increases selection pressures.
--Percy

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slevesque
Member (Idle past 4640 days)
Posts: 1456
Joined: 05-14-2009


Message 17 of 458 (509006)
05-18-2009 1:39 AM


Thanks for the answer, although I had that understanding of evolution, its always good to explain it as you did just to make sure.
Although I would have thought 'evolution in action' would have been an addition of information in the peppered moth population. Harrisons seems to be saying that the moth population just alternated from light to dark to light again, which isn't really new information, if those color were already there ...

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Michamus
Member (Idle past 5157 days)
Posts: 230
From: Ft Hood, TX
Joined: 03-16-2009


Message 18 of 458 (509016)
05-18-2009 4:37 AM
Reply to: Message 17 by slevesque
05-18-2009 1:39 AM


slevesque writes:
which isn't really new information
Information is too vague a term to be used in scientific discussion. Care to divulge what exactly you are talking about when you say 'information' in reference to biology?

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Coyote
Member (Idle past 2105 days)
Posts: 6117
Joined: 01-12-2008


Message 19 of 458 (509017)
05-18-2009 4:38 AM
Reply to: Message 17 by slevesque
05-18-2009 1:39 AM


New information
Although I would have thought 'evolution in action' would have been an addition of information...
Evolution doesn't require new information, only a change in information.

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

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slevesque
Member (Idle past 4640 days)
Posts: 1456
Joined: 05-14-2009


Message 20 of 458 (509027)
05-18-2009 5:38 AM


Yeah we better not use the term information, or it will not end.
Let's just say that it is not a new trait in the population.
Coyote: depends on what you mean by evolution. If you mean descent with modification sure you don't need new information. But if you mean bacteria-to-elephant evolution, then at some point you will need new information. (or rather new traits)
Edited by slevesque, : No reason given.

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Michamus
Member (Idle past 5157 days)
Posts: 230
From: Ft Hood, TX
Joined: 03-16-2009


Message 21 of 458 (509076)
05-18-2009 1:18 PM
Reply to: Message 20 by slevesque
05-18-2009 5:38 AM


slevesque writes:
Let's just say that it is not a new trait in the population.
What are the upper and lower limits of what you would qualify as a trait?
Once again, you are using a vague term.

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onifre
Member (Idle past 2950 days)
Posts: 4854
From: Dark Side of the Moon
Joined: 02-20-2008


Message 22 of 458 (509077)
05-18-2009 1:22 PM
Reply to: Message 20 by slevesque
05-18-2009 5:38 AM


But if you mean bacteria-to-elephant evolution, then at some point you will need new information.
This is a bad example of evolution, actually, it seems like a creationist's opinion of evolution.
Evolution means descent with modification, period.
This "gap bridging" that you feel *new* information is needed for is not anything expressed in the theory of evoution.
It seems like a strawman.
It took billions of years to go from "bacteria" to "elephant" by means of descent with modification.
No one means evolution as in "bacteria-to-elephant".
(or rather new traits)
What new traits do you see in todays birds that didn't exist in dinosuars?
What traits do you see in modern vertebrates that you don't see in early vertebrates?

"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

This message is a reply to:
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Huntard
Member (Idle past 2295 days)
Posts: 2870
From: Limburg, The Netherlands
Joined: 09-02-2008


Message 23 of 458 (509086)
05-18-2009 3:38 PM
Reply to: Message 20 by slevesque
05-18-2009 5:38 AM


Slevesque, would you say being able to digest food you couldn't digest before qualifies as a new trait?

I hunt for the truth

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slevesque
Member (Idle past 4640 days)
Posts: 1456
Joined: 05-14-2009


Message 24 of 458 (509145)
05-19-2009 2:05 AM


Yes it would qualify as a new trait. I have the feeling your are refering to the Lenski experiment, which would be a prime example to discuss this.

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slevesque
Member (Idle past 4640 days)
Posts: 1456
Joined: 05-14-2009


Message 25 of 458 (509146)
05-19-2009 2:16 AM
Reply to: Message 22 by onifre
05-18-2009 1:22 PM


Maybe I misexpressed myself.
What I wanted to say is this. If you show me a population of pinches, who's beeks change in size and shape depending on the environment and the food they have access to, and say this is descent with modification, then I will readily approve with you.
But if, after having shown me this, you tell me that such a mechanism, extrapolated to vast amounts of time, could turn a pinch into let's say, a horse, then I will not agree with you. I will simply say that ''maybe we are actually seeing a small part of the process of the pinch becoming a horse, but then again, maybe we are not, and are simply watching a characteristic of the population vary back and forth according to selective pressure.
If you want to use the former (descent with modification) to prove the latter (dinosaurs are the ancestors of birds, modern apes and humans have a common ancestor, etc.) you will need much more than that.
This is why it would be interesting to discuss the Lenski experiment, since when I read the article back in 2007, it was actually the very first time that I said to myself: maybe they finally have it, maybe they do have a recorded example of a new trait evolving in a population. Which is what is needed to go from the descent with modification to vast scale evolution of bacterias to microbiologists.

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Replies to this message:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 26 of 458 (509155)
05-19-2009 3:04 AM
Reply to: Message 25 by slevesque
05-19-2009 2:16 AM


Dumb Creationist Strawman
If you want to use the former (descent with modification) to prove the latter (dinosaurs are the ancestors of birds, modern apes and humans have a common ancestor, etc.) ...
No-one does use the former to prove the latter. Descent with modification is the explanation of how the latter occurred. The proof that it occurred would lie in the fossil record, comparative morphology, embryology, molecular phylogeny, et cetera ...

This message is a reply to:
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Percy
Member
Posts: 22389
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 27 of 458 (509157)
05-19-2009 3:09 AM
Reply to: Message 25 by slevesque
05-19-2009 2:16 AM


Have you read the book The Beek of the Pinch?
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
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slevesque
Member (Idle past 4640 days)
Posts: 1456
Joined: 05-14-2009


Message 28 of 458 (509159)
05-19-2009 3:16 AM
Reply to: Message 26 by Dr Adequate
05-19-2009 3:04 AM


Re: Dumb Creationist Strawman
Sorry, i should have said:
''If you want to use the former (descent with modification) to justify the possibility of the latter (dinosaurs are the ancestors of birds, modern apes and humans have a common ancestor, etc.) you will need much more than that.''
I acknowledge it is not the same thing. But my original idea was this one.
You'll have to give me a little chance people, although I consider myself good in english, it is not my first language and where I live you never get the chance to even speak english other than 2 hours a week in school. Stuff like this will happen, me using the wrong vocabulary doesn't mean I'm trying to pull a strawman (nor that I'm dumb, mind you )

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slevesque
Member (Idle past 4640 days)
Posts: 1456
Joined: 05-14-2009


Message 29 of 458 (509160)
05-19-2009 3:19 AM
Reply to: Message 27 by Percy
05-19-2009 3:09 AM


No I haven't. must not be very popular since I can't even find it on google

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Huntard
Member (Idle past 2295 days)
Posts: 2870
From: Limburg, The Netherlands
Joined: 09-02-2008


Message 30 of 458 (509166)
05-19-2009 3:37 AM
Reply to: Message 29 by slevesque
05-19-2009 3:19 AM


slevesque writes:
No I haven't. must not be very popular since I can't even find it on google.
That's probably because Percy was making a joke. It should be beAk of the Finch. You misspelled Finch as Pinch.

I hunt for the truth

This message is a reply to:
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