The End of Evolution By Means of Natural Selection

There you go again, arguing that your arguments did too make sense. If you really made much sense you wouldn't have to keep arguing about how much sense you make.As if the problems I've mentioned aren't already fatal, another significant problem with your polyploid chromosome ideas is realized when one considers that some genes have a great many different alleles in the population. A single diploid (sexual) individual can have at most two alleles for each gene, one from each of its paired chromosomes. You're postulating that the additional alleles were there at creation stored away in polyploid chromosomes with the same genes but with different alleles of those genes.The human blood type gene (called ABO) resides on chromosome 9 and has 70 different alleles that produce the familiar blood types. Many of the alleles produce identical results, but they all differ in their nucleotide sequence and so must have a unique origin.Where did these 70 ABO alleles come from, Faith? The first two people could have at most four alleles between their two chromosome number 9's. Were there 35 additional chromosome pairs, more than doubling our chromosome pair complement from 23 to 58? And what of the 22 other chromosomes? We can safely assume that with the couple thousand genes on each chromosome that some will have at least as many alleles as the ABO gene, requiring at least an additional 35 chromosome pairs to store those alleles, and bringing the total to 828 chromosomes pairs. How would these 828 chromosome pairs fit in the nucleus, Faith?828 chromosome pairs is 1656 chromosomes, and if you look at List of organisms by chromosome count you'll see that the organism with the greatest number of chromosomes is a fern with 1200. Animals tend to have much smaller numbers of chromosomes, with the common carp having the record at 104. Does it really seem possible to you that humans at one time had 1656 chromosomes, far more than any known animal today?And where did those polyploid chromosomes go, Faith. You need those polyploid chromosomes to store all the extra alleles at creation that Adam and Eve had to have somewhere in their genomes since a single chromosome pair each can only represent at most four alleles. Where did the 805 polyploid chromosomes go, Faith? We've sequenced the entire human genome and they're not there. Did the last one disappear just before humans invented gene sequencing? My, how convenient! And the same is true for all other animals we've studied genetically, not a single polyploid chromosome left anywhere? They all disappeared before our scientific talents grew to the point where we could study them.And if other animals used these extra alleles to speciate then why didn't humans speciate, too?There's also the problem of expression. Going back to the ABO blood type gene again, if the first humans had 35 extra chromosomes with those extra ABO alleles, what would keep them from being expressed? A polyploid chromosome is just a copy of a chromosome. It is equal in status to all other chromosomes and would be expressed. Only half those alleles could be relatively recessive, right, and would have to be expressed.The reality is that new alleles are generated by mutation all the time. As Bluejay explained in the other thread, on average each new human being possesses one new allele through mutation, and as I explained, millions of babies born every year means millions of new alleles every year, year after year for generation after generation. Mutations are the origin of variation.--Percy

Unless, of course, we are talking about selection of the additions. "Blur the character of that population"? What the heck does that mean?You seem to start with the assumption that species can not change through mutation, and then discount mutations because they would change the species. Am I right here? You get 100-200 point mutations per person throughout the genome and the rarer insertion or deletion of DNA. From memory, about 2 to 3 result in an amino acid change in a known open reading frame. Also, there will be mutations in regulatory DNA as well which can produce change as well. Unless, of course, it is selected for in a smaller, isolated sub-population through a process called allopatric speciation. So why are humans and chimps different? It is due to the differences in their DNA, is it not? Those differences are also adaptive, are they not? Obviously, changing DNA can result in beneficial and adaptive function. Every living species is proof of that. If it were not possible for mutated DNA to be beneficial then there would be only one species alive today. That is completely false. A mutation in a regulatory gene can change the expression and function of several other genes. There is no arm gene, no eye gene, no leg gene. Features are the result of numerous genes interacting with one another. A mutation can change how multiple other genes interact with one another. What genes do humans have that chimps do not, and vice versa? From my reading we share more than 99% of our genes with chimps. The sense I get from the scientific literature is that the differences between humans and chimps is not due to different genes but different sequences within homologous DNA (be it genes or regulatory DNA).You want to claim that changing DNA can not result in a new species, and yet we have billions of species because the DNA is different. It is changed. How can you ignore this fact?Edited by Taq, : No reason given.

Speaking of blood types . . .A new hemoglobin allele is being selected for in areas with endemic malaria. This mutation allele is hemoglobin C. Carriers of this allele suffer a less severe case of malaria. They are fitter. The C allele differs from the widely known S (sickle cell) allele in that the C allele does not cause anemia in homozygous carriers. At the same time, the C allele does not confer the same resistance to malaria that the S allele affords, but the reduced fitness cost for homozygous carriers along with the attenuation of the disease makes the C allele the fittest. The C allele is actually expected to replace the S allele in some areas in Africa over the next 50 generations (assuming a cure is not found in the mean time).

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Estimation of relative fitnesses from relative risk data and the predicted future of haemoglobin alleles S and C.

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Hedrick P.

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School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AR

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Abstract
Epidemiological studies of genetic differences in disease susceptibility often estimate the relative risks (RR) of different genotypes. Here I provide an approach to calculate the relative fitnesses of different genotypes based on RR data so that population genetic approaches may be utilized with these data. Using recent RR data on human haemoglobin beta genotypes from Burkina Faso, this approach is used to predict changes in the frequency of the haemoglobin sickle-cell S and C alleles. Overall, it generally appears that allele C will quickly replace the S allele in malarial environments. Explicit population genetic predictions suggest that this replacement may occur within the next 50 generations in Burkina Faso.

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Hi, Faith. I think this is the best job you've done explaining your argument so far. I gave you a 5 for it.Still, the purpose of my Asteroids analogy was to explain to you that this simply doesn’t matter. I don’t care one bit about how you define or delimit species, so the mechanism by which speciation happens is of no interest to me: rather than trying to establish what process gets the credit for isolating two species, I’ve been trying to focus on the broader picture of the outcome.I only tried to point out to you that genetic divergence can happen before, during and/or after speciation, and it will have the same result (i.e. increasing genetic diversity), whether or not it is the actual cause of speciation.Even if speciation is accomplished only by isolation, as you suggest, mutations will still have an impact on future genetic diversity, and on the phenotypes of descendent organisms and populations. A mutation that is found at vanishingly small frequency in a parent population can become amplified in a splinter population through the Founder Effect, just as any other hidden allele from your scenario can.In this case, since the origin of the allele is mutation, and selection and/or drift work to increase the frequency of that allele in a population, debating about whether it was mutation or selection that caused speciation is a pointless academic exercise: the results are the same, either way (increased genetic diversity).But, for now, the bottom line is that, if an allele that arose by mutation becomes disproportionately prominent in a breakaway population or species through selection or drift, then mutation is an important component in the making of the new species. I don’t care whether you want to deny it the credit for causing speciation: I only care that you recognize that mutated alleles can do anything that putatively designed alleles can do, and that includes rising to predominate an offshoot population by drift or selection, and thereby coming to define important distinctions between two isolated populations.Therefore, mutation is an important source of the genetic diversity of life, whether or not it has any causative role in the process by which species are made distinct from one another. And, since it is the only source of genetic diversity for which we have even a scrap of evidence, I maintain that the current evolutionary models, which view mutation as the source of all alleles, are the only logically justifiable models to use.Edited by Bluejay, : I'm not telling.Edited by Bluejay, : None of your business

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

The processes that form new varieties, that is, the processes that reduce, will reduce even a population made up entirely of brand new mutations. Whenever you get a new variety you have a reduced population to start with, which has a reduced diversity for that reason. If speciation is necessary to macroevolution (as PaulK says, by definition it IS macroevolution) the ironic thing is that you only get it by reduction. Add all the mutations you want, add all the diversity you want, change the whole population from one collection of traits to an entirely new collection of traits by mutation, STILL the only way you EVER get new species is by reduction and reduction limits how far you can go down the line of creating species.This is my model. I'm glad if I finally succeeded in getting across some of it.Bye for now.

So, if I understand correctly your idea is that each species has an "essential character" which natural selection, acting like a human breeder strives to maintain. For this reason all mutations are removed from the gene pool, so that no increase in genetic diversity can occur.Have I got it right ? If not can you explain why adding variation WON'T counteract loss of variation ? It seems odd that such a counter-intuitive claim, central to your argument should be left so vague, especially given the length of the thread.

I don't think of it in those terms myself -- "for this reason" and "strives to maintain" -- or in terms of preserving the "essential character" of original species. I really do not start from such presuppositions although it could easily be assumed by someone knowing I'm a YEC I suppose.You are describing in teleological terms something I really am just thinking about in terms of the processes themselves and how they limit evolution.But simply DESCRIPTIVELY, leaving out the teleology, you've got a foot in the ballpark. I've been trying to do just this all through this thread, and am not doing a very good job of it apparently. It IS counter-intuitive, but its being so vague isn't for my lack of trying to put it into words, it's just that I can't find words that succeed at getting it across -- although I personally have thought I did a decent job a number of times -- but nobody else got it so obviously I didn't.I've tried many times to think up a way to graphically represent it and can't come up with one, certainly not one I could actually do myself using the Paint program. I did post a few back at the beginning to demonstrate a simplified idea of how selection and drift work to reduce alleles, the one on drift from Wikipedia, and included mutations as the source of variation as well. That was the best I could do at the time, not nearly specific enough about what I'm trying to argue.Just by your calling it "counter-intuitive" I know you are getting at least partly what I've been intending, and that is a relief. It IS counter-intuitive. It isn't just a matter of addition and subtraction offsetting one another.Best I can do for now I guess.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This goes back to my rain analogy a few pages ago. The only way you get rain is by reducing the amount of moisture in the air. According to your logic, we can only conclude that the Earth should run out of rain within a month or so. Add all the water you want from water evaporation, it doesn't matter. Rain still requires a reduction in atmospheric water vapor so it will run out. This is your argument.How can there be an end to the line when mutations, the source of new variation, never stops?

Darwin did a fine job of illustrating it in "Origin of Species", link. He showed a pattern of descent with modification leading to divergence between lineages. This is how it works at the genetic level. Populations that no longer interbreed accumulate different mutations leading to divergence over time. It is the same way that we have Romance Languages that diverged over time while sharing a common root language.

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I don't think of it in those terms myself -- "for this reason" and "strives to maintain" -- or in terms of preserving the "essential character" of original species. I really do not start from such presuppositions although it could easily be assumed by someone knowing I'm a YEC I suppose.

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No, I got it from your assertion that mutations would "blur the character" of the species Message 541 as if that were somehow an objection.

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I've been trying to do just this all through this thread, and am not doing a very good job of it apparently.

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Can you point me to something that is even an attempt at an explanation ? Because I don't remember seeing one.

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I've tried many times to think up a way to graphically represent it and can't come up with one, certainly not one I could actually do myself using the Paint program. I did post a few back at the beginning to demonstrate a simplified idea of how selection and drift work to reduce alleles, the one on drift from Wikipedia, and included mutations as the source of variation as well. That was the best I could do at the time, not nearly specific enough about what I'm trying to argue.

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The Wikipedia diagram in the OP begged the question. It only showed 1 mutation and therefore implicitly assumed that alleles were lost faster than they arrived. Without that assumption it showed nothing.

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Just by your calling it "counter-intuitive" I know you are getting at least partly what I've been intending, and that is a relief. It IS counter-intuitive. It isn't just a matter of addition and subtraction offsetting one another.

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You said that early in the thread too - but with absolutely no explanation.

OK, but I am only thinking that blurring the species interferes with the speciation that is needed to fuel macroevolution. I've been puzzled all along that evolutionists can think this is OK and go on insisting on processes of addition that interfere with the development of new varieties and speciation if their theory requires the emergence of new varieties as apparently it does. OK, but I'm writing this on the fly unfortunately and will have to track them down later. But every time I even tell someone No you aren't getting it I hope they'll stop and rethink what I said and give me the benefit of the doubt that I may have meant something other than they got out of it. Instead they just accuse me of moving goal posts or lying or something like that. It was intended to show only that drift alone CAN remove alleles completely. Because I'm hoping and assuming that you can construct it yourself from what I HAVE said.But obviously I need a different tack.

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OK, but I am only thinking that blurring the species interferes with the speciation that is needed to fuel macroevolution. I've been puzzled all along that evolutionists can think this is OK and go on insisting on processes of addition that interfere with the development of new varieties and speciation if their theory requires the emergence of new varieties as apparently it does.

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But that makes no sense at all. How can a genetic variation not present in the parent population interfere with speciation ? Isn't it more likely to help distinguish the incipient species from the parent population ?

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It was intended to show only that drift alone CAN remove alleles completely.

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No, that was a different diagram. I'm talking about the one that included mutation - or rather a mutation.

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Because I'm hoping and assuming that you can construct it yourself from what I HAVE said.

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I am very reluctant to try to reconstruct your thinking because too much of what you say seems nonsensical.

Hi, Faith. ...and the organisms in that population will subsequently mutate again....and again....and again....and again.Selection reduces... mutation adds.Simple subtraction. Think about it.Edited by Bluejay, : "...the organisms in..."

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Answering your assertion that I was wrong about 1 mutation and that I got it from this discussion, which started with your Message 544Percy's Message 556: Here's what Bluejay said in Message 24 on the other thread: which I later made into 1 in Message 45To which Bluejay replied in Message 50 : .6, 1, .5So yes, I got it from this discussion.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

You say Yet you quote And you conclude Please please say you've now spotted the obvious error...