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Author Topic:   How novel features evolve #2
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 22 of 402 (663393)
05-24-2012 5:42 AM
Reply to: Message 19 by zaius137
05-24-2012 12:30 AM


Creationists never disputed any particular advantage of random insertions in gene sequences used for adaptation; but only if regulated by genomic programming.
Would the same random insertions, then, have no particular advantage if they were not regulated by genomic programming?
Why not? They'd be the same mutations.
Creationists have always maintained that random mutation with out regulation is disadvantageous or antithesis to an organism.
Again, why? A mutation has the same value, for good or ill, no matter how its produced. If a mutation would be good if produced by random mutation with regulation, then it would also be good if produced by random mutation without regulation.
If I win a million dollars in the lottery, the money is just as valuable to me if the lottery wasn't rigged in my favor as if it was.
In other words, the mutations are to provide adaptation of the genome. This rules out mutations as a mechanism for evolution but promotes the viewpoint of mutations for adaptation.
This barely means anything. What do you think "adaptation" means?
It is contrary to the evidence that these types of mutations are capable of a speciation event in an organism.
Which evidence would that be, then?
This principle is obvious in the immune defense mechanism of higher mammals to anticipate infections ...
Er, what? Do white blood cells have a power of precognition now?
---
P.S: If you wish to be honest, do not use phrases such as "Creationists have never disputed ..." and "Creationists have always claimed..."
Creationism does not constitute a homogeneous body of thought. What you personally have always asserted and never disputed is one thing, but creationists as a whole have very little in common besides a belief in a god (not always the same one) and a preference for magical explanations for things.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 19 by zaius137, posted 05-24-2012 12:30 AM zaius137 has not replied

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


(1)
Message 43 of 402 (663681)
05-26-2012 5:20 AM
Reply to: Message 40 by zaius137
05-26-2012 2:30 AM


It's hard to know exactly how you're trying to be wrong, because it's not clear what you think the technical terms you're using mean. I know, of course, what they actually mean, but it seems very unlikely that you're using them in that sense. The effect of your posts, then, is pretty much that I sit here wondering: "what in the world can he think adaptation means?" and "what the blue blazes can he mean when he says recombination?" and "did he compose his posts by cutting a genetics textbook into its constituent words and then drawing them at random out of a hat?"
Consequently, I end up puzzled. For example, when you write:
Your statement implies that these existing alleles just magically appeared in the first place. They are in the right place at the right time to accept moderate modifications to create novel functionality. I have seen no evidence from you or anyone else demonstrating any new novel phylogenic functions arising in the genome except by genetic recombination.
... surely when you say "recombination" you can't actually mean recombination, can you? Can you clarify this by telling us what you think the word "recombination" means?

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


(2)
Message 49 of 402 (664013)
05-28-2012 3:40 PM
Reply to: Message 48 by zaius137
05-28-2012 2:04 PM


Have you ever noticed that creationists only know what they've been claiming "all along" just after evolutionists tell them what the facts are?
One pictures the scene at Creationist HQ.
BJ: Hey, Jim-Bob!
JB: Yes, Bobby-Joe?
BJ: You'll never guess what we been claimin' all along this time!
JB: Reckon you're right there, I never does know what we been a-claimin' all along.
BJ: Well, we all do have been claimin' ... wait, I got it written down right here ... seems like this week we been claimin' all along that ... uh ... if scientists investigate the genetic changes underlying the phenotypic adaptations laboratory fruit-flies have undergone as a result of their lineage being kept in a laboratory environment for sixty years or so, they will find that few if any of those changes will be attributable to a classic selective sweep.
JB: Do you know what all them big words are a-meanin'?
BJ: Naw, but it don't matter. Jus' remember that we been claimin' it all along.
JB: Since when?
BJ: Startin' right now!
JB: Praise Jesus!
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

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


(1)
Message 61 of 402 (664211)
05-29-2012 11:46 PM
Reply to: Message 58 by Taq
05-29-2012 5:28 PM


Evidence please.
No, he's quite right. Environmental stresses and stimuli cannot exercise the creative causation of highly complex pre-coded genetic information that underlies irreducibly complex systems of adaptation. Nothing can exercise the creative causation of highly complex pre-coded genetic information that underlies irreducibly complex systems of adaptation. Nothing can exercise an invisible pink unicorn either.

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


(3)
Message 62 of 402 (664212)
05-29-2012 11:48 PM
Reply to: Message 54 by zaius137
05-29-2012 4:04 PM


Unfortunately, you mix up what comes first in selective pressure. You see there must be certain coloration of mice first before there is any kind of selection to take place. Therefore, if you talk about sexual selection then the mutation or alleles are already expressed in the population and all the predators have to do is select those individuals that do not express the beneficial coloration (Concentration of specific alleles).
You see mouse coloration is pre —existing so you cannot say it has arisen because of natural selection. Remember, survival of the fittest is not creation of the fittest.
Let’s see some ware in this thread one of has claimed that the genetic structure was pre-existing. Who was that?
Now you have a population of selected individuals with concentrations of beneficial alleles for camouflage. Was the development of beneficial coloration a new and novel trait? No because it had to show up before selection could even work on it. Is other populations of this species devoid of these alleles? No again, because other members occasionally show up with the desired coat color under lower selective pressure (or neutral pressure) because of Mendelian genetics.
Again the crux of your argument must consider fixation of these mutations in a population before you can actually say these Novel Traits arose and are not just deformed individuals.
By the way, when I refer to molecular mechanisms it is not sexual reproduction.
You seem once more to be composing your posts by drawing words at random out of a hat.
Would it be possible for us to speak to the hat directly?

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


(1)
Message 73 of 402 (664303)
05-30-2012 9:59 PM
Reply to: Message 71 by zaius137
05-30-2012 9:18 PM


You are actually saying that mutation alone is generating mice coloration; then it is somehow fixed in a population to be recalled later by natural selection.
But again this is meaningless. "Fixed in a population to be recalled later by natural selection" is so meaningless as to be not even wrong, it's just gibberish.
First you must deal with the consequences of fixation in a population (see Haldane). Then you must preserve these changes against sweeps of phenotypic variation but be able to expose these changes to the organism under selective pressure.
Again, this is not a description of anything. "Sweeps of phenotypic variation"?
And this makes it very hard to correct your misapprehensions, because your fundamental misunderstanding of the content of genetics is obscured by your superficial misunderstanding of the language of genetics.
The process you describe above seems very simple on the surface and very Darwinian. The only problem is that such propositions are highly problematical and have not yet been described by the evolutionist in terms of molecular mechanisms.
The molecular mechanisms are reproduction and mutation.

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


(2)
Message 75 of 402 (664311)
05-30-2012 11:30 PM
Reply to: Message 74 by zaius137
05-30-2012 11:08 PM


Re: Getting off topic here
Your scenario is right in line with most evolutionists’ beliefs (that is the good news) but those suppositions do not hold up under scientific investigation (that is the bad news).
Well, scientists think they do. If you, who manage to make about one serious blunder per paragraph do not, maybe the problem is with you.
The problem is it has never been observed
Well again scientists, the people who make the observations, beg to differ.
Do you know who Haldane is? Major evolution calculations are based on Haldane’s work.
Yes. Also major creationist mistakes.
Gather round children, a creationist's going to be wrong about Haldane again! They're so cute when they do that.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 74 by zaius137, posted 05-30-2012 11:08 PM zaius137 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 76 by zaius137, posted 05-30-2012 11:49 PM Dr Adequate has replied

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


(1)
Message 77 of 402 (664315)
05-31-2012 12:09 AM
Reply to: Message 76 by zaius137
05-30-2012 11:49 PM


Re: Getting off topic here
Was. Of course I do.
I am also familiar with his work in population genetics, and with the stupid fatuous mess creationists make when they try to misunderstand it.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 86 of 402 (664379)
05-31-2012 2:05 PM
Reply to: Message 84 by Taq
05-31-2012 11:12 AM


Re: Getting off topic here
Do you know the problems with Haldane's work?
Haldane knew the problems with Haldane's work.
But the major problem with creationist gibberish about Haldane is, in my opinion, more fundamental than that. They take Haldane's original calculations as gospel. Then they say that based on these calculations there can't be more than (IIRC) ~1600 adaptive mutations between more basal apes and modern humans. Then they maintain without any evidence that this would not be enough adaptive mutations to make the difference, and that therefore this couldn't have happened.
Now this is just something that they've pulled out of their hind ends. As with every creationist attempt at a quantitative argument, one of the figures involved is just something that they've made up. Or, indeed, not even specified. They don't even say how many adaptive mutations they think would do the trick, they just naively apply Haldane to set a maximum on how many have occurred, and then declare for absolutely no reason that it must have been more than that.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 84 by Taq, posted 05-31-2012 11:12 AM Taq has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 89 by Taq, posted 05-31-2012 4:17 PM Dr Adequate has replied

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


(3)
Message 91 of 402 (664409)
05-31-2012 5:11 PM
Reply to: Message 89 by Taq
05-31-2012 4:17 PM


Re: Getting off topic here
Quite so. They keep jumping up and down shouting: "All the evidence may show that it's true, but it's impossible in principle!"
They don't grasp that if this is so, then this falsifies their principles.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 89 by Taq, posted 05-31-2012 4:17 PM Taq has not replied

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


(2)
Message 105 of 402 (664713)
06-04-2012 1:16 PM
Reply to: Message 102 by zaius137
06-04-2012 12:22 PM


Re: Which came first?
That's not artificial selection. Artificial selection is where the experimenter decides which organisms should reproduce. The unguided adaptation of an organism to an artificially created environment is natural selection. The "selective pressure" was not artificial, the environment was.
As to whether it was "very strong", no probably not. The fruit flies were coddled. They were given everything they wanted, the experimenters did everything they could to ensure the survival of every mutant strain they managed to come up with. The artificial environment relaxed selective pressure on the flies, thus insuring the survival of strains which we know do not exist in the natural environment.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 102 by zaius137, posted 06-04-2012 12:22 PM zaius137 has not replied

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


(1)
Message 116 of 402 (665535)
06-14-2012 4:59 PM
Reply to: Message 114 by Tangle
06-14-2012 4:32 PM


Science has rightly been convinced beyond doubt of the fact of evolution to the extent that I'm prepared to bet (a small beer) that virtually nobody is researching an empirical proof for evolution.
Or gravity. But we would notice if it didn't work.
The research happens by default. When people went looking in Canadian rocks for early tetrapods, they'd have noticed if they'd found a giraffe.
But given the political impact of creationism in the USA, it would make a lot of sense to spend a few million finding the smoking gun.
We found the smoking gun. Creationist won't admit that it's a gun, or that it's smoking, but that doesn't change the fact that it's a smoking gun.
Anyway, where do we look next?
Anywhere you please. Look anywhere in the fossil record, and you'll find evidence consistent with evolution. Creationists themselves know this, that's why they're not actually doing any work right next to paleontologists with their own picks and shovels.

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 118 of 402 (665589)
06-14-2012 11:44 PM
Reply to: Message 117 by Tangle
06-14-2012 5:58 PM


How can any example be "uncontroversial"? All you need is one creationist to be wrong about it and you've got a controversy.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 117 by Tangle, posted 06-14-2012 5:58 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 119 by Tangle, posted 06-15-2012 4:35 AM Dr Adequate has replied

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


(1)
Message 120 of 402 (665605)
06-15-2012 5:09 AM
Reply to: Message 119 by Tangle
06-15-2012 4:35 AM


What we've seen in this thread is that we haven't quite been able to prove to our own satifaction that a mutation of a gene has produced a beneficial change that has consequently been selected for and caused a population change.
Oh, there are lots of those. As a first instance, let me direct you to the Ames Test. The initial state is known, the final state is known, and the mutation keeps the bacterium from dying of malnutrition.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 119 by Tangle, posted 06-15-2012 4:35 AM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 122 by Tangle, posted 06-15-2012 7:47 AM Dr Adequate has replied

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


Message 123 of 402 (665612)
06-15-2012 8:09 AM
Reply to: Message 122 by Tangle
06-15-2012 7:47 AM


I'd have a couple of complaints if I was a creationist.
Also, you'd be wrong.
1) It's artificial - it starts with a deliberately faulty lab-bred bug.
2) The mutation that occurs (if it occurs) simply takes it back to the bugs normal functioning (ie the way god intended) - not a new trait.
What of it? It fulfills the criteria, it's a beneficial mutation being fixed in the population. If you want an example of something else, you should ask for it. Lenski's experiments come to mind.
3) You haven't isolated the actual mutation and proved that it is genuinely new. I think it was there all the time ...
Haven't you read the article? We do know exactly what is happening to the genome. The his operon is broken in the initial population.
and occasionally gets switched on when the bugs are starving.
Would you care to explain why this is more likely to happen in the presence of mutagens?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 122 by Tangle, posted 06-15-2012 7:47 AM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
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