The question was-what scientific proof do we have for NS being the great cause of the evolutionary cycle that makes up the diversity of life as we know it (an inference that I think was fairly obvious).
Which was answered. Or at least the part that was obvious and applicable to actual evolution, as actually used by scientiests ...
Have you figured out what "evolutionary change" is yet? Please let us know eh?
To answer this question, you need to explain NS more fully, not just in terms of making some beaks sizes more common at one time of the year, and less common at other times- but how can it make this complete package. Can it combine with RM, with genetic drift, without some other forces to do what we see? You can believe that it can if you wish, but can you really show that it has. That IT is the thing responsible for making eyes. That IT is what makes us attracted to tall Swedish girls in small bikinis?
Once again you are using natural selection to replace all of evolution, from process to science. All of this can be explained by the theory of evolution, ToE, which involves natural selection and mutation and etc etc etc, ... but not by natural selection alone, because NS ≠ ToE, and ToE > NE.
Have you figured out what "complexity" is yet? Let us know eh?
So this was a chance for some people to explain some incredible scientific studies they had seen, which really convinced them, that there is no other way to explain what is going on around us. I say to first prove this, you have to prove that the mutations are indeed random, because if they aren't then it really isn't NS making the decision at all, it is some other force. But alas, there isn't much, and what there is is open to interpretation in any number of ways. So that in itself is an answer.
Ah yes, we failed to explain every little thing to your satisfaction with natural selection, therefore evolution is a total failure? Sorry, the logic of this eludes me.
Cheers.
Does this mean that you have decided to declared victory and are now taking your leave .... before actually dealing with the questions of what you mean by "evolutionary change" and "complexity" .... one wonders why?
Does this mean that you have decided to declared victory and are now taking your leave .... before actually dealing with the questions of what you mean by "evolutionary change" and "complexity" .... one wonders why?
Hopefully not. Hopefully it means this thread is dead, and he is going to start individual threads on the individual subjects as has been suggested to him.
It wasn't a declaration of anything other than an acknowledgment that what some people who believe in the ToE call evidence, others who have a different mindset might see otherwise.
For instance, one of the "tests" presented to show NS is real was the study of the kuru resistance in New Guinea. However, the test didn't show a slow gradual process of evolution as Darwin claimed, it showed a rapid change to an environmental pressure-the exact opposite. Now this is the test that someone wanted to use to show the theory IS true, even though it didn't show what the theory says at all. Now of course, they said, well it MIGHT have been occurring over a long period of time, and we just didn't know about it.
So the tests shows a short time frame, which would CONTRADICT tenets of the theory instead of supporting it, but just because someone can say well IT MIGHT HAVE been over a long period of time, they are going to choose to believe this instead. They prefer to rationalize an artificial idea about what MIGHT be, instead of simply accepting that the test doesn't show that. That to me shows a fundamental lack of objective thought, and sort of defeats the purpose.
Now, I can certainly understand why so many people WANT to believe in NS, because it is the only theory that can protect their believe in atheism. No other theory will do that. So even if a test shows otherwise, its best to still believe it MIGHT be true. Because once NS is not enough to explain things, all hope is lost. There is no other theory that is going to give you the random mutations you need to believe in atheism. Once the randomness is gone, your entire world view is gone, and that is not something most people will readily accept, so they will interrupt all data the way they want it.
So since I am not really going to get much unbiased thought here, there is not really much more to be gained. I believe one person said, the scientific community is more open minded about accepting flaws in the theory of gravity than they are in the theory of evolution. That is not very scientific in my opinion.
However, the test didn't show a slow gradual process of evolution as Darwin claimed, it showed a rapid change to an environmental pressure-the exact opposite.
For instance, one of the "tests" presented to show NS is real was the study of the kuru resistance in New Guinea
Proffessor John Collinge writes:
"It's absolutely fascinating to see Darwinian principles at work here. This community of people has developed their own biologically unique response to a truly terrible epidemic. The fact that this genetic evolution has happened in a matter of decades is remarkable."
Professor John Collinge, Director of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Prion Unit
Oh, but you know better than this professor, right?
Now, I can certainly understand why so many people WANT to believe in NS, because it is the only theory that can protect their believe in atheism. No other theory will do that. So even if a test shows otherwise, its best to still believe it MIGHT be true. Because once NS is not enough to explain things, all hope is lost. There is no other theory that is going to give you the random mutations you need to believe in atheism. Once the randomness is gone, your entire world view is gone, and that is not something most people will readily accept, so they will interrupt all data the way they want it.
1: Atheism is not a belief
2: Have you ever heard of a theostic-evolutionist? The Catholic Church? Is the Catholic Church an atheist group? I guess one of our own (catholic scientist) is actually an atheist, huh?
3: Natural Selection is but one mechanism in the study of evolution.
4: Evolution has nothing at all to do with atheism, atheism nothing to do with evolution.
Until you can come to grips with at least those 4 things, you are forever lost. Carry on my wayward son, there'll be peace when you are done.
I believe one person said, the scientific community is more open minded about accepting flaws in the theory of gravity than they are in the theory of evolution.
...the test didn't show a slow gradual process of evolution as Darwin claimed, it showed a rapid change to an environmental pressure-the exact opposite.
How do you know that the process wasn't gradual? If the environmental pressure wasn't there then the change wouldn't take place, would it? That the end result was rapid really says nothing about the rate of the process.
..I can certainly understand why so many people WANT to believe in NS, because it is the only theory that can protect their believe in atheism.
This statement is ridiculous. I don't need ToE to be an atheist or agnostic or whatever and I don't believe most people who reject the Creation Myth do either.
There is no other theory that is going to give you the random mutations you need to believe in atheism.
Mutations are not the only source of genetic variability. Crossing over during meiosis, population isolation and hybridization (in plants) are some other sources.
Edited by Admin, : Hide contents of message that wasn't a summation.
For instance, one of the "tests" presented to show NS is real was the study of the kuru resistance in New Guinea. However, the test didn't show a slow gradual process of evolution as Darwin claimed, it showed a rapid change to an environmental pressure-the exact opposite.
Typically the advantage of a mutation is usually small and the challenge of the environment is reasonably surmountable so the replacement of the old with the new will take ages. (AbE: This should read closer to "Typically the advantage of a mutation is minuscule and the challenge of the environment is easily surmountable so the replacement of the old with the new will never fully take place but both alleles will survive side by side in the population in proportion to their value.") However, the ToE would predict that if an advantage is great enough and the challenge is severe enough the evolution will happen without even showing up on the books. Say there is a mutation that cause the heart to be three sizes too small. Contrary to popular belief, one does not grow up to be an ill tempered hermet peering enviously down upon the denizens of Whoville but dead in the womb. So, there is no prediction that the kind of evolution you're talking about here will be necessarily gradual. You made that up.
Now this is the test that someone wanted to use to show the theory IS true, even though it didn't show what the theory says at all.
No. What the study didn't show was your ill concieved notion of what the ToE would predict. Their studiy has proven your hypothisis wrong. Will you accept the evidence or ignore it?
Now of course, they said, well it MIGHT have been occurring over a long period of time, and we just didn't know about it.
No they didn't. As you yourself said in an earlier post, that mutations always show up like the cavalry is beyond reason. This gave cause for biologist to suspect that, as the ToE predicts, mutations show up at random and become useful or harmful when NS demands it. That could take ages. It's not a wild speculation, but a prediction of the ToE.
What is wild speculation is that the mutation did pop up just in the knick of time and, therefore, must have been done on purpose.
Now, I can certainly understand why so many people WANT to believe in purpose, because it is the only theory that can protect their believe in theism. No other theory will do that. So even if a test shows otherwise, its best to still believe it MIGHT be true. Because once purpose is not enough to explain things, all hope is lost. There is no other theory that is going to give you the misconceptions you need to believe in theism. Once the purpose is gone, your entire world view is gone, and that is not something most people will readily accept, so they will interrupt all data the way they want it. Not that I would want to impune your motives, of course. I'm sure you have perfectly sound reasons for the blatant expression of misconception throughout your posts.
Edited by lyx2no, : Sp.
Edited by lyx2no, : Hide OT.
Edited by lyx2no, : Weaken one statemnet and strengthen another.
Edited by Admin, : Hide non-summation, it's actually a reply to Bolder-dash.
It's not the man that knows the most that has the most to say.
Hi Balder-dash, I see that summary time is upon us (threads are often limited to 300 posts, and if you think this is harse, then please review your own posts to see how few addressed your topic).
You have been asked several times to answer these questions to help define your position:
Could you tell me what you mean by "evolutionary change"?
Could you tell me what you mean by "complexity" in organisms?
The first one was asked in Yes. (Message 5) and has not been answered yet, even though Balder-dash has made 66 posts that are mostly complaints about being misunderstood. Instead we get additional comments that raise more questions than they answer, such as:
However, the test didn't show a slow gradual process of evolution as Darwin claimed, it showed a rapid change to an environmental pressure-the exact opposite. ... So the tests shows a short time frame, which would CONTRADICT tenets of the theory instead of supporting it,
This shows a typical failure to understand the mechanism of natural selection and the difference between natural selection and evolution.
First off, this raises the question, why is this a contradiction? The same process occurs just in a different time frame from the one you have fixed in your mind as being Darwin's.
Second, Darwin wasn't committed to a slow time frame, he predicts "punk-eek" after all, can you show where he absolutely requires natural selection of be slow and occur over many generations? See http://darwin-online.org.uk/ for all his works in searchable text.
Third, you are talking about natural selection in this specific example, and not evolution, Dawin's theory of Descent with Modification through Natural Selection was that the descent with modification usually took a long time, but that natural selection was virtually instantaneous when death occurred in an individual organism before it reproduced.
Why should an example where a whole bunch of people died NOT occur rapidly by comparison to the time it took for the (one of several ways) mutation to occur in the ancestral population (where it had to have been several generations in the past to spread as far as it did) -- why should death be unexpectedly rapid?
A contradiction would mean that it was not natural selection at all but something else, and this is patently false.
By the way, natural selection operated in two different modes in that example: it selected people with the beneficial mutation to survive and breed, and it selected the people with the behavioral modification (don't eat the dead person) to survive and breed. The second instance of natural selection was more complete and even faster than the mutation selection. Note that for this second selection, no mutation was needed, just natural selection of a different behavior pattern. Behavior patterns can change in a population in a generation, and if you want I can furnish examples where this was observed and documented.
If you see a film at high speed and at slow speed you still see the same frames, the same movements and scenery.
Certainly if something can happen in a short time, then it can also be spread out over a longer time.
Now, I can certainly understand why so many people WANT to believe in NS, because it is the only theory that can protect their believe in atheism.
Please stop insulting my intelligence: I am no atheist, I am a deist, and deism has absolutely no problem with evolution in general and natural selection in particular -- it would be the method that was set up with the creation of the universe for the formation of life as we know it, putting in place the "natural laws" that govern evolution and other aspects of the universe as we know it.
Science is agnostic. It explains how things happen, not why. Why do you think you need to discuss atheism in order to discuss natural selection?
So since I am not really going to get much unbiased thought here, there is not really much more to be gained.
Of course science is biased. Reality is not up for vote, and so it is biased to what the evidence actually shows rather than any - ANY - a proiri assumptions.
When you refuse to define what it is you are really looking for, you will reap what you sow eh? It seems you generate more questions for you to answer than you resolve by your failure to answer the previous questions. I started with one, now we have at least four on my book that are not answered (including the first one still unanswered), and several other questions by others.
Summary - unanswered questions (rather than resolutions of issues):
Could you tell me what you mean by "evolutionary change" so we don't waste another hundred posts on missing a dodging mark?
Could you tell me what you mean by "complexity" in organisms?
Can you tell me why natural selection cannot operate in one generation on a breeding population?
Can you show where Darwin absolutely requires natural selection of be slow and occur over many generations?
Can you tell me why an example, where a whole bunch of people died, NOT occur rapidly by comparison to the time it took for the (one of several ways) mutation to occur?
Can you tell me why you think you need to discuss atheism in order to discuss natural selection?
You reach resolution by answering questions, not ignoring them.
From my perception Balder-dash has ignored several corrections to his posts, refused to answer basic questions about explaining his position that would lead to a more informed debate, and behaved in a rather childish manner. In the end he concludes that he is "right" because nobody has been able to change his mind by providing something he has refused to define. Personally I am glad that this farce of a thread is put to bed.
Enjoy.
Edited by Admin, : Hide non-summation, it's actually a reply to Bolder-dash.
A summation isn't a rebuttal that happens to be your last post. Think of summations more as what a lawyer does in his closing arguments, which are made to the jury and not to the other side. Refer to the other side in the 3rd person.
What I was disputing was not your claim that they hybridized but that the hybrids were fitter than the parent species. If this was so, then surely they'd have displaced them?
Do you say that because thats what the theory of evolution tells you?
also, i dont think i mentioned the word 'hybridized'
what I said was that the Grants showed that the different 'species' of finches could still breed together. Perhaps this shows that they are not really different species at all. Couldnt this be evidence that the 13 different species of finches are really just 1 species of finch with variying features?
We know that dogs come in great variety, but we dont say that a bulldog and a poodle are a different species....they are one species and, even though they are very different, can still breed together.
Cant the finches on galapogas be experiencing the same genetic variety which is found in dogs/cats/horses/cows/sheep/humans etc etc
Since it's still not entirely clear to me what the topic of this thread was supposed to be about, I'll just keep this summation to NS (Natural Selection), which was the original question asked in the OP.
Throughout the thread we've been trying to make clear that NS works regardless of whether there are changes to the DNA or not. And that this has absolutely nothing to do with RM (Radnom Mutations). There have been examples given of NS at work in the wild, so clearly it has been demonstrated to work.
The most important thing to remember perhaps is that evolutionary change (something the OP wanted to see if NS had any effect on), is indeed effected by NS. Extinction is also evolution, so even if there were no RM and every species would go extinct, that would still be evolutionary change, and it would be accomplished by NS alone.
I hunt for the truth
I am the one Orgasmatron, the outstretched grasping hand My image is of agony, my servants rape the land Obsequious and arrogant, clandestine and vain Two thousand years of misery, of torture in my name Hypocrisy made paramount, paranoia the law My name is called religion, sadistic, sacred whore. -Lyrics by Lemmy Kilmister of Motorhead
Balder-Dash's conflation of natural selection together with evolution has done no one any good. Upon repeatedly being informed of the mistake BD was none the wiser at the end of the thread as at the start. BD would do well to simply take the little time needed to learn the basic biology behind his many fully false ideas concerning and surrounding evolution and the ToE. It would even seem he has a penchant for clear thinking and could well profit from his efforts; although his stubbornness and arrogance is self defeating to a great extent.
Selection is clearly unequivocally taking place in nature. Some individuals are better able to reproduce than others especially within their own populations. These are facts easily determined to be true.
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