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Author Topic:   Disadvantageous Mutations: Figures
jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


(2)
Message 5 of 93 (794460)
11-16-2016 8:49 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Gregory Rogers
11-16-2016 5:33 AM


too many basic errors.
Way too many errors or misstatements or incorrect terms in there.
Examples:
1. The percentage of failed mutations is not in fact 90 percent, but a lot lower.
Not at all sure what a failed mutation is.
3. Further to this, although a mutation may be neutral and not immediately benefit the organism in the intended way, an alternate positive use may be found for it.
Nothing "finds" uses. Nor is there any intent involved. This sounds like the old nonsense that evolution involves some goal; it does not.
4. Furthermore, as the evolution-mutation process wore on, year after year, DNA learned from its mistakes, and so made fewer mistakes than it did in the earlier stages of the evolution of life. Thus we would expect to find a lower rate of failed mutations now and in recent evolutionary history.
DNA never learns anything and does not make fewer mistakes. In fact DNA does not make anything by choice. Nor is there any evidence of any changes in the rate of mutations failed or otherwise.
Rather, the first question I have in mind runs as follows: if a great many mutations fail (whatever the percentage of disadvantageous mutations, it is still, I presume, rather high, or at least it was at the beginning of evolutionary history), then would we not expect to find a high degree of examples of these failures in the fossil and skeletal records?
There is no reason to expect to find any examples of failed mutations (whatever that means) in any fossils.
Simply, then, what is the percentage of fossils and skeletal remains unearthed so far where clear negative, that is, disadvantageous, mutations, are in evidence?
I would expect that to be close to zero.
So some real basics.
There is no goal involved in evolution; no goal towards better or more fit or any other directed result on the mutational side of the process.
Changes happen. Copy errors happen. Duplicate copies get made.
The environment exists and it involves terrain, temperature, abundance of food, presence of predators, storms, volcanic events, meteor impacts, time, personal tastes (ain't she a looker); everything that describes the surroundings and period when a critter lives. But those factors constantly change.
The measure of success or failure of an organism (not of DNA) is whether or not that individual lives long enough to breed and reproduce; that's it. It really is that simple.
If something lived long enough to become a fossil then its a sign that it was fit enough to live at least that long. Now sometimes you might be able to tell why it died but I can see no way to tell anything about any mutations from fossil bones. We can tell things like infections or fractures or abscesses and but unless you have a large enough sample of bones from a particular critter it would be hard to identify any mutational abnormalities.
Now back to the environment.
Imagine a pack of protodoggies. Some are born with a genetic abnormality that causes them to have webbed feet. All the other protodoggies might make fun of them and call them duck-foot-doggies and refuse to play with them. But that is something that is unlikely to show up in fossils. It isn't a serious enough mutation to keep the duck-foot-doggies from living long enough and even hooking up with other duck-foot-doggies to mate and reproduce.
But conditions change; the land is subsiding and soon the area that once was a plain is now a marsh. The duck-foot-doggies find the new environment great and it's easy for them to catch fish and so they become more successful there and then than the other doggies. The other doggies though hate the water and so move to higher dry ground.
Now you have two populations that are isolated, that go down to different paths. They are both equally evolved. They are both so similar that the only way people can tell the two apart from fossils is not the difference in the fossils but rather in the evidence of the environment where each lived.
What we would see superficially from the evidence would be the sudden appearance of two species of protodoggies, one that lived on the plain and one that lived in the swamp. The period when all the protodoggies lived together would show only one species, plains doggies.
Major mutational variations that might be seen are few simply because the odds of anything born with some major mutation that is disadvantageous is unlikely to live long enough to get big enough to become a fossil. Consider some such things we see today, two headed critters, things with extra limbs, things with missing organs. Unless special care is given such critters even today don't live long and are rare enough to be an oddity. Minor mutational mistakes like having an extra finger or toe or eyes with different colors seem to do pretty well but even there they are the oddity and so many such examples are things that just would not show up in the fossil record.
Edited by jar, : appalin spallin

My Sister's Website: Rose Hill Studios My Website: My Website

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Gregory Rogers, posted 11-16-2016 5:33 AM Gregory Rogers has not replied

  
jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 24 of 93 (794617)
11-18-2016 10:47 AM
Reply to: Message 23 by Dr Adequate
11-18-2016 10:34 AM


who do you trust
It is particularly true when you also factor in the trust consideration. One side belongs to your club while the other side does not; one side comes from sources you have been taught to trust while you have been taught not to trust the other side.

My Sister's Website: Rose Hill Studios My Website: My Website

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by Dr Adequate, posted 11-18-2016 10:34 AM Dr Adequate has not replied

  
jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


(2)
Message 27 of 93 (794783)
11-25-2016 12:26 PM
Reply to: Message 26 by Gregory Rogers
11-25-2016 10:33 AM


Creationism is simply a con job.
Uncomfortable as it may be ‘on the fence’, I am Trying to be as Open-Minded as I can on the matter. I would like to think that a totally honest, open-minded Christian in these matters is not so foreign to one’s worldview that one sees hidden agendas in my postings.
Speaking as a Christian the very idea of an honest creationist seems an oxymoron almost as large as the concept that there might be a Creation Scientist.
The subject really has been settled for hundreds of years and Creationism is DOA.

My Sister's Website: Rose Hill Studios My Website: My Website

This message is a reply to:
 Message 26 by Gregory Rogers, posted 11-25-2016 10:33 AM Gregory Rogers has not replied

  
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