Macroevolution Observed?

I recently had a discussion with my biology teacher, I discussed plants evolving specifically a plant, evolved to bloom at a different time, at night, for bats to come. Now we continued to talk and he displayed micro evolution, speciation. I named it as micro evolution, speciation, he was surprised that I knew on the subject and he sloppily described as macro before. Then he told me that macro has been observed and some people say it has never been observed, hinting at creationists, "The Grass Doctor" breeded a blue grass with another grass so soccer players in Orleans where grass is near impossible to grow, good enough for playing that is. Is that considered macroevolution since it is a new species of grass? I sense it is not because that change took place only because of man's intervention. He also mentioned the breeding of lizards and snakes in cages of course. I said if a snake had a choice he/she wouldn't mate with a lizard and the blatant fact that they were isolated with just each other made it obvious for me. He guessed it would have happened when he said:"You mean to tell me a snake somewhere in billions of years hasn't mated with a lizard?" I still didn't think this or the grass was macro evolution.Now this is where I think macroevolution is possible but I don't know. He (I think he knew his previous examples were wrong or at least sub-par to where you don't know).His last example was good. The product of a nectarine. Some people breeded two species and came up with this. Now this was done by human intervention like the others but here is where it makes sense he said "You mean to tell me pollen from one species didn't fall onto this other species ever?" This would mean a new species was created a nectarine, which is highly probable am I right? Isn't it highly probable that that situation can happen? So my question is has macro evolution occurred and what is the explanation offered by evolutionists and creationists.

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-chris

Before it is reasonable to discuss macro evolution it is necessary to have a clear, firm definition of the terms involved.The terms micro and macro evolution have been used by biologists for some decades as a convenient split during informal discussions (as I understand it anyway).Evolutionary processes go on all the time in all individual organisms. Biologists have used the term micro evolution for all such things below the level of species and macro for speciation and all levels above that.With this definition macro-evolution, both in the wild and 'in the lab' have been observed.However, creationists have picked the terms also but they don't have a single definition of it. Some still say a new species would be macro-evolution, some a new genus and some only a new family. I'm not aware of any that set it higher than that.Since new species and, I think, new genera have been shown to have arisen recently even many creationists would still have to agree that macro evolution has occured.If only a new family counts as macroevolution then I don't think that there has been an observed in current years of this occuring.What level do you wish to set it at?You need to be aware that if it is set at the family level as some creationists do to allow for a smaller number of animals etc. on the ark then you have to allow for a form of astonishing hyper evolution of new genera and species in a matter of something like 2,000 years.What are you going to pick?

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What are you going to pick?

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Heh. Well I'm not sure, is it fair to have different definitions of a single scientific term or word? I think the term macroevolution should be universally accepted as one definition. I'm going to look around, research, see what the figureheads say of course, look at all definitions and decide WHICH ONE? KPCOFGS.

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-chris

Not a bad approach there. In the meantime we can ignore the terms micro and macro evolution.What can be asked is what evidence do we have for evolution at various levels. Do we observe these changes directly or do we see fossil evidence which suggests them?That is:
Do we see speciation events?
Do we see new genera?
Do we see new families?
and so on?Now let's also try, from evolutionary theory, to predict what we should expect to see.Speciation events are, presumably a smaller changes than events at higher taxonomic levels. Today we see real differences between species that can't be seen just by looking at the animals or birds or plants or insects. Therefore we should expect it to be very difficult to "see" speciation (and probably genus level) changes in the fossil record.On the other hand, changes at the order class and perhaps the family level are much larger and we shouldn't expect to see a whole new class arising 'before our eyes'. ( I might be suspicious that is another reason why creationists have been forced to move the level up). However, these changes are larger and should be expected to take a very long time. These may well be visiable in fossils and have been spread over many millions of individuals that would be necessary for there to be any fossils found showing the changes.So, without worrying about micro and macro we can ask to see what evidence there is for various levels of changes and what the nature of the evidence is.As has been noted several times here speciation events have been observed in mammals, plants, and more. So that is handled.I'm not personally aware of unequivocal cases of new genera arising. I'll wait for others to tell us more.Birds (Aves) are a class (or a subclass depending on which scheme you pick). The fossil record has a number of intermediaries of the rise of this group.Mammels are a class (right?) too and we have clear fossil evidence of the rise of that class.I'm not aware of families specifically being tracked. If lower levels are shown to arise and higher levels are recorded I don't see how one can exclude the middle levels.After all the first species that is unequivically in a new class is also, by defnition, a new genus, family and so on. So the raise of mammals and birds support these levels as well.What does that leave? Well, even higher levels. Whole new phyla? The difficulty there is that these are going to occur even less often and much further back in time. We have very, very early cordates in the precambrian. They are, techinically, already of the phylum. What would we expect/accept as the precursor to this phylum? And would we expect to be fortunate enough to find the evidence? These are all very small, simple creatures. Their preservation is dammed lucky.However, by the time we are at this level there isn't much left of Y-E creationism and what's left is hardly what most of us would call creationism is it?[This message has been edited by NosyNed, 03-10-2004]

Another good example from the plants is the Hawaiian silversword -
Hawaiian silversword alliance, UH Botany
has several pages on these: Poke around there a bit, MessenJah, and see what you think.

Well before deciding anything I want to pose a question.Could macro evolution occur without man's intervention? If so, any naturally occuring ones you know off hand?Would the nectarine being produced really be as plausible as it sounds without man's intervention?[This message has been edited by messenjaH of oNe, 03-12-2004]

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-chris

Obviously, since it has.But if it's not happening in a situation where you can constantly observe it, what are the odds that you're going to catch it in the act?

I don't know if I can buy that, if it happens then why do we not see the products develop unless it is done by us. Shouldn't there be wild nectarines some place?

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-chris

Being that defining one species relative to another can be a fuzzy, grey area thing, I thought it time to throw out a couple of links to older topics. Definition of Species (started by Percy, back when this forum was about a month old)and what does something need to be a "New" Species?Probably quite a bit of redundancy between the topics.Moose

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Professor, geology, Whatsamatta U
Evolution - Changes in the environment, caused by the interactions of the components of the environment.
"Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will piss on your computer." - Bruce Graham

Why? What's the survival advantage of being a nectarine instead of a peach?If macroevolution is true, we should see some things - like many different species of organism based on one general body plan. (Check.) Or a fossil record showing transitional species. (Check.) Or adaption to environment. (Check.)If you want to see an "event" of macroevolution, it's called "speciation". But since evolution is a gradual change you can't expect to observe a lizard turning into a mammal. It's like asking where the foothills end and the mountains begin.

Why does it matter if Man is involved or not? Lets Take Domestic Dogs for instance.. We have SO many Breeds... If they each lived in the wild we would Most likely Classify them as separate species.
I Am NOT saying there isn't a difference between Natural and Artificial selection Because there is..Lets Define the 2Artificial Selection: is when Humans Select the Animals and or genes to have a specific result Occur.EX: At One time all Domestic dogs were one breed... we have even seen this occur recentlyNatural Selection: Animals best equipped to Survive are the ones that successfully breed and pass on genes.
Example: This is Very Simple example. Lets say there is a Population of Brown lizards Living in an area with very dark Blackish Soil. Some of the Lizards are born with darker Skin then Others. The Ones with the Darker skin are the ones most likely to evade Predictors therefore successfully breed... Over time the Lizard population is Blackish brown.What is the difference really? Its not like we are directly manipulating genes. I can't understand why people can't see how this can happen in the wild.

Oh yeah, That's an obvious one, but is brown to blackish brown macroevolution?

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-chris

how do you define macroevolution? On what scale? I mean a city I wasn't built in a day was it? Evolution needs time... you don't expect us to observe a reptile evolve into a mammal do you? Explain what you consider macroevolution please then we can continue.

The mechanisms that cause microevolution and macroevolution are the same, the only difference is the degree of difference between the results. Macroevolution would be hard to observe as it requires more differentiation between end results than speciation, so it would need to follow several speciation events ... definitely a time-limiting problem for a short lived species like Homo sapiens to undertake.

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A good site to look at for answers is
29+ Evidences for Macroevolution: Part 1
It is a long read with a lot of ground to cover.

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A simpler one is on therapsids at
http://www.geocities.com/...naveral/Hangar/2437/therapsd.htm
As it just covers the evolution of the mammal ear from the reptilian one and the associated changes to the jaw bones and hinges ... but reptile to mammal is about as macro as one should need to get to sink the "kind" issue.

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For creationists these terms tend to be moveable goal posts in the same way that "kind" has been used. They will state that they accept microevolution as it is only differentiation within a kind, but that macro has not been observed -- so whenever an observation occurs both terms get redefined to the next step in the ladder.

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Enjoy

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Could macro evolution occur without man's intervention? If so, any naturally occuring ones you know off hand?

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Kind of hard to answer without the definition of macro-evolution, but I think I can.New species: new species have evolved lots of times in nature.
Culex molestus evolved from Culex pipiens in London's sewer systems (and without man's help). 200 species of cichlids (a fish) have arisen naturally in Lake Malawi. I won't bother you with more because there are so many that, if you really search for them, you can find them very easily.But perhaps you do not define macroevolution as simply new species. Even then there are many, many examples I can give. Things like the 'nylon bug' show that [i][b]completely[/i][/b] new proteins can arise naturally. To me this is much more impressive than specification for two reasons:(1) It demonstrates that new information can arise.(2) According to creationists, things like this are impossible.There are many other example of similar things (like new metabolic pathways evolving. Search a site like nature.com.Anyways I would post much, much more but I will wait for your definition of macroevolution!