Potential falsifications of the theory of evolution

Just what did you think Shapiro was referring to when he used the phrase "highly non-deterministic?" He did use the phrase, you know, so it must fit in somewhere. Have you considered the possibility that Shapiro might have meant that the non-random processes that drive TE insertion might have highly non-deterministic outcomes with regard to both the precise loci and fitness? He did, you know. He was actually pretty explicit about it. Give it some thought. Allow me to quote the Wikipedia article on mutations: If you scan through the references for that article you'll probably find some that are helpful.--Percy

When you pop in only once a week it's easy to lose track of the argument trail. Shadow is trying to argue that Shapiro's research indicates that evolution is non-random and directed in a way that can't be natural, and so it is important to point out to Shadow that Shapiro definitely does not interpret his own research in this way.--Percy

Explaining this to you once again, you asked whether evolution was non-random regarding fitness.You did not ask whether mutations were non-random regarding fitness.Everyone here agrees that evolution is non-random regarding fitness, and this is because of natural selection. If evolution were random regarding fitness then there could be no adaptation, but exquisite adaptation is exhibited by all life throughout nature, so of course evolution must be non-random. It is this non-random adaptation that Darwin was attempting to explain when he originally developed his theory.--Percy

WK told you the same thing everyone else has been telling you. He was talking about probabilistic distributions, and that means there's something random going on.--Percy

If your intention is to exhaust and frustrate everyone by not understanding anything, you're doing a great job. Here we see yet another message responded to with no substance, no discussion, no examination, no indication that you've even read the message, just yet another question. How wonderful for you that you can respond in seconds to what took real time and effort to compose.The point is that you're making ID arguments, whether you acknowledge it or not. You don't understand what Shapiro is saying, so you interpret terms like non-random and sentient in a way that matches what you already believe, which is that life could not have come about through natural processes. I said I would tell you when you began engaging the discussion, something you have yet to do. You should be more considerate of the efforts of others and give their messages the attention and careful well thought-out responses they deserve. Your messages are short, and if you ignore the text that is actually quotes of other people then they're very short. The few statements you do make that contain any information are all just reformulations of other people's writings. And when you attempt to be original we get some real howlers, such as quoting yourself back to Molbiogirl as if it were something she wrote, and then responding to your own statement as "something you could live with."You know, you could look "creationist" up over at Wikipedia. It will instead bring up the article on "creationism," but the first paragraph will give you a pretty clear idea of the range and breadth of creationist belief.--Percy

First, about Shapiro and as was mentioned several times early on after he came up, there's nothing in his research that would falsify the theory of evolution. Shapiro isn't claiming the modern synthesis is wrong, just that it doesn't adequately cover everything we've learned since it's inception. He thinks of the modern synthesis in terms of what was known at that time over a half century ago, while most of the rest of biology demurs and thinks of the modern synthesis as inclusive of what we've learned since. The modern synthesis isn't a theory explaining what we knew in the 1930's about evolution and genetics. It's a theory combining what we learn over time about evolution and genetics.One could falsify the modern synthesis by showing that the work of the population geneticists in the 1920's was wrong, that they're not really complementary to each other. That's how they became combined in the first place, through mathematical demonstrations that varying allele frequencies over time were consistent with observed evolutionary changes in populations.One could falsify evolution by finding evidence of organisms that do not fit on the tree of life.One could falsify random mutations by finding evidence that they're not random with regard to fitness.One could falsify natural selection by finding evidence that adaptation does not occur.As Taq noted, there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding about how theories are falsified. Falsify means proving them wrong. To prove them wrong you have to know what they say. Both Bolder-dash and Shadow71 employed arguments that indicated profound misunderstandings. Bolder-dash misunderstood the evolutionary processes of random mutation and natural selection, while Shadow71 misunderstood Shapiro's admittedly hard-to-understand use of terminology. I expect that in their summaries we'll see the same misunderstandings.--Percy