Evolution

[haunted]

Slayer... not believing in the things you listed is YOUR choice. It has absolutely NOTHING to do with your ideology, other than you're meeting the negative stereotype that gives conservatives a bad name to a T(there are people who give democrats a bad name as well). No offense, but you REALLY need to do some research instead of letting other people think for you, because when you have a set of facts in front of you (they are undeniable facts) all you're saying by disagreeing with them is 'You're wrong because I said so'. But we're not wrong.....

For example. Evolution is real, sorry to break it to you. If you think differently, then you honestly don't know what evolution is, let alone understand it. If you're thinking "humans didn't come from monkeys, so evolution doesn't exist" then you are totally ignorant to the concept of evolution. So, I'm going to explain evolution to you, so you understand it from now on and don't look like a dum-dum to anyone who you discuss it with.

'The theory of evolution'

First, the definition of evolution in my own words: 'the theory that living things evolve over time'--or a more specific definition 'the process of all living things going through genetic changes when passing DNA to the next generation'. Now that you know what evolution is, lets define theory, so you don't make any discrediting assumptions in regards to it: 'a scientific theory is the 'BEST', uncontested, explanation we as humans possess in order to understand some kind of natural phenomena'. That being said, a theory isn't just a guess, or an educated guess, it is a TOTALLY plausible explanation for the scenario being observed, plausible meaning possessing facts/evidence and logic/reason to back it up.

Moving on. We know that genetic information can change, or 'mutate', when going from one generation to the next. How else would people be born with certain diseases and disorders?--there's no denying this. But diseases/disorders aren't the only example of 'genetic mutation'. Genetic mutation is responsible for advantageous changes as well. Lets say you have a group of monkeys on an island. One male monkey was born a few years ago, and has grown into the largest, fastest, most fit monkey on the whole island. Consequently, our muscular monkey friend is going to have the most off-spring, for two reasons: 1) He can kick every monkey's ass on the whole island and 2) as a dominant individual of their population, the female monkeys WANT him to father their little monkeys--they have brains, and they _know_ that their children will have a lot better chance of survival if he fathers them (instinct, humans have it too..kind of like how all humans are naturally weary/afraid of snakes, EVEN without being educated about them). Being that our big male monkey produced the most off-spring, this also means that he passes on the most genes. The result is some SLIGHTLY healthier, larger, and more fit monkeys. It's honestly not much of a change though, it's the same thing as a human inheriting advantageous traits from his or her father/mother (height, muscles, etc). HOWEVER, imagine if this process occurred... lets say, one million times over the course of one million years(this is just an example, the number would actually exponentially increase because there would be more monkeys to reproduce; population increases exponentially). Then, these slight changes start adding up. We would have very large, fit, and muscular monkeys compared to what we had before. BUT, muscular and size advantages aren't the only thing this applies to. What about brain size? What about deformities in joint structure that turned out to be advantageous some way? What about healthier organ systems, that enable an individual to live longer? The list goes on and on! All of these things would enable an individual to produce more offspring, therefore enabling evolution to work.

So, the concept of evolution is nothing more than a demonstration of the random genetic mutations (everything from deformities, cancer, disorders/diseases, to advantageous things such as height, fitness, and health) we already know to exist. And if you're asking yourself, why doesn't evolution work for the aforementioned negative genetic mutations? The answer is that it DOES--except in reverse. People born with trisomy 21 (an extra chromosome on the 21st our of 23 human chromosomal pairs aka 'down syndrome') will produce less offspring therefore enabling healthier people to reproduce more, which in turn makes a better gene pool for the next generation.

Now that we know how evolution works, lets talk about it's application to mankind today--are we evolving now? The answer is yes, but there's a catch. Civilization has slowed down evolution tremendously, just as it would to any species. Civilization is defined as the development of complex society and culture, characterized by things such as agriculture, trade, government, language, urbanism, occupational specialization(people beginning to adapt actual professions), and social classes. Obviously, a 'civilized' group won't be competing to reproduce like individuals would in the wild. Therefore this was the first time that the biggest and best guy stopped getting his way with the ladies as a rule. This applies even more so to contemporary society(today) being that we are a highly civilized culture group.

Additionally, does the theory of evolution disprove God? Of course not. This is a common misconception that many people have.... it's just really foolish to say "I believe in God so evolution doesn't exist"--when it does. It makes many religious people seem fairly ignorant when debating it(how stereotypes start....). Anyway, I hope you understood everything I said slayer, and I hope the same that you shove this information in the face of whoever told you that evolution doesn't exist, because he or she is wrong. If you have any questions just ask.

[|iR|Focalor]

Two words:

Carbon dating.

When something is completely encased in rock, it's hard for it to decompose even if there is carbon or water present in the material. Oxygen is the key ingredient in decomposition.

I'm not too terribly sure if this is pertinent to the subject at hand seeing as how I was too lazy to read all of it.

[haunted]

First I'm already familiar with the examples you're using... every HS bio class learns about drosophilia haha. Anyway..

Finally, I was never able to discover how evolution could explain information being added to the gene pool. The argument was always: "See all these slow changes in finches? If you gave it a million years, an entirely new bird like a hawk would appear. If you gave it a billion years, humans or cows would appear." My confusion was this: You are REMOVING genetic information to form the larger beaks on finches. (The information being removed is the information for smaller beaks.) You then go on to say that if you remove enough genetic information, you will end up with a hawk? And then if you remove even more, a human or a cow? The result was always, "Mutations add the information!" To which I would reply, "So if you corrupt enough information, you will end up with BETTER information?" There was never any satisfactory reply to this, only, "Evolution is a scientific fact. To deny it means you are stupid and know nothing about science. I won't bother my time with you." Now that just seems to me to prove that evolution has no answers.

That is part of my position. I hope you understand why I believe that Creationism explains the universe today better than evolution.

Dude.... I still don't think you know what a genetic mutation is though. If you're using that sort of logic, you definitely don't. 'Adding information' is only ONE of the ways that genetic information can be altered (mutated) then passed down to the next generation. First, lets look at how DNA is coded, and perceived by our bodies (specialized coding enzymes....).

DNA is "read" in codons. Codons are the closest thing to a genetic "word" and they carry instructions on how to make proteins. So, if codons can be used as an analogy to describe words, then a group a sequence of codons can be compared to a sentence, right? Right. There are many ways a gene can mutate, just as there are many ways to make typos in a sentence. Some mutations/typos in this genetic code have MUCH more drastic changes than others. And it so happens that 'adding information', the only mutation you are aware of, usually demonstrates the LEAST change.

Lets say you have the codon sequence  AGA GAA TAT GAG AGG GTA.

Now lets add an extra codon to the sequence: AGA GAA TAT GAG AGG GTA GAA.

Doesn't change much.

However, what if a deletion occurs of a single letter... lets say that G in the second codon is removed.

You would then have AGA AAT ATG AGA GGG TA - something that is 85%+ entirely different than before, which an incomplete codon on the end! And of course, this is applicable to adding a single letter as well. Codes can be inversely read, DNA can be accidentally added in places where it shouldn't, as well as a handful of other types of mutations.......

Hundreds of quadrillions of genetic mutations happen every day. Actually, SQUARE that estimation and you might have a FRACTION of the genetic mutations that occur in one day. Now multiply that by billions and billions of years. We already know that the beneficial mutations assist with producing offspring('microevolution'), and to suggest that these mutations couldn't add up to form something entirely different when 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,... to be continued genetic mutations have happened in the past few billion years, is COMPLETELY absurd. 'Microevolution' and 'macroevolution' is the same thing... just a prefix to describe the amount of time covered.

Also... just because Evolution is true, and a real thing, doesn't verify that everything in taxonomy is true. You can't disprove evolution just because you don't think a finch could turn into a hawk................. What taxonomy says is 'We know that evolution exists. That being said, lets research and try to find our best bet to how certain animals evolved and what they evolved from'..... A lot of times there's very solid evidence to back up taxonomy, sometimes there's not.


And yes, focalor is right. Carbon dating references decomposition on the atomic level(radioactive decay) therefore other factors of decay are obsolete. Oxygen, nitrogen, etc. does NOT affect this number. In other words, we 100% know how old something is, if it contains carbon-14. Fortunately all living things do contain it.


[Edit: broke long number into multiple lines to prevent scrollbars]

[[BTF] Reflex]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_notation 

[haunted]

The length and manner of the number was involved in the point I was trying to stress.... Not using scientific notation was a conscious choice

[|iR|Focalor]

Stephen Colbert: 2
Richard Dawkins: 0

OWNED

[quadz]

Stephen Colbert: 2
Richard Dawkins: 0

OWNED

Haha.  Colbert didn't pose any conundrums that Dawkins hasn't patiently and meticulously destroyed in countless debates.

Colbert 'owned' him on the it's-my-show-and-i'll-ask-you-a-question-then-interrupt-you-before-you-can-answer factor, though.

[|iR|Focalor]

Stephen Colbert: 2
Richard Dawkins: 0

OWNED

Colbert 'owned' him

I'm glad you agree.

[quadz]

Give me ONE SINGLE EXAMPLE of information being added that has resulted in a new feature in ANY organism. That's all I ask for: just one example. However, that information must be readable and not be a loss of information, such as that which occurs when bacteria lose the ability to produce a non-essential enzyme which has the side effect of reacting with antibiotics to kill the bacteria. That would be a loss of information, not a net gain.

Give me some examples of one kind of animal changing into another. (I know that wolves can "evolve" into poodles, but they are all dogs.) I do not care if the examples of macroevolution come from the fossil record or from living observations.

In the talk given by Jerry Coyne last Saturday at AAI '09, he acknowledged that it's rare that we're lucky enough to find a fossil of an animal precisely at the branching point where species diverged.  But, he indicated that we have indeed been fortunate enough to have unearthed some of these transitional fossils.  He showed slides of a few, and the species into which they diverged.

I imagine this is probably covered in his book:


http://www.amazon.com/Why-Evolution-True-Jerry-Coyne/dp/0670020532


Regards,

quadz

Edit: fixed broken link

[quadz]

For object over 4,000 years old the method becomes very unreliable for the following reason:  Objects older then 4,000 years run into a problem in that there are few if any known artifacts to be used as the standard. Libby the discoverer of the C14 dating method was very disappointed with this problem. He understood that archaeological artifacts were readily available. After all this what the archeologist guessed in their published books.

How does this relate to the dating of the rocks that were found right next to the fossils?  For ex:

Potassium 40 to Argon 40 (half-life = 1,300,000,000 years) - used to date rock less than 60 million years old
Rubidium 87 to Strontium 87 (half-life = 47,000,000,000 years) - used for dating rocks older than 100 million years

etc.

We believe all the dates over 5,000 years are really compressible into the next 2,000 years back to creation.

You must realize, you're not doing science when you start with a predetermined conclusion (i.e. the earth is X years old), and then only select evidence biased toward the existing conclusion.

That's not now science works.

Isn't it striking, that nobody who studies the evidence first, and then theorizes and draws conclusions based on the evidence ever comes up with this 6000^* year figure?  That the only people coming up with this 6000 year figure are those who started out with that figure in mind beforehand?

The current 13 billion year estimated age of the universe doesn't derive from some number decided upon beforehand.  No homogenous group of scientists has had a vested interest in the universe being 13 billion years old, as opposed to 10 billion or 18 billion or 200 billion or whatever.  The number is derived from the evidence.

Again, because it bears repeating, nobody arrives at the 6000 year figure, except when they started with that figure in mind beforehand, and have been selecting evidence based on whether it supports that preconceived conclusion.  Which, again, isn't science.


Regards,



(*) Or 7000 years or whatever.

[quadz]

Link doesn't work

Oops, sorry, fixed.

[quadz]

BTW, 6000 years is only one Creationist estimate for the earth's age. 5000-10000 years old are all within acceptable bounds.

Either figure is off by six orders of magnitude, so, same differnence.  It's like believing the distance from New York to Los Angeles is 12 feet.

1) Galaxies wind themselves up too fast.
2) Too few supernova remnants.
3) Comets disintegrate too quickly.
5) Not enough sodium in the sea.
7) Many strata are too tightly bent.
11) Too much carbon 14 in deep geologic strata.

How do these stack up against the Baloney Detection Kit?

1. How reliable is the source of the claim?  (...are the errors biased in one direction, slanting toward a particular belief?)

3. Have the claims been verified by somebody else?  (..."You make a bold claim, somebody else has to be able to go out and test it.")

5. Has anyone tried to disprove the claim?  (..."It's one thing to pile up a bunch evidence, go, 'Look I have this radical new idea. Here's my arguments in support of it.' OK, interesting - but, what are the counter-arguments? Have you thought about that? What else could be explaining this?")

6. Where does the preponderance of evidence point?  (..."Anybody can make a claim and then pile up a few points in favor of it. The question is: what about all the other evidence? Is it also leaning toward this? Or is it leaning toward that other theory that you're trying to challenge?")

9. Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory?  (..."Anybody can find a few anomalies that the current prevailing theory doesn't seem to account for. In other words, in science it's OK to say, 'I don't know.' You have a few anomalies, a few mysteries, and so on... But what pseudo-scientists tend to do, is they tend to take those few handful of mysteries, and say, well, that's my whole new theory. ...But the question is, can this new theory explain all the other things [that are currently explained by the theory it is attempting to supercede?]")

10. Are personal beliefs driving the claim?  (..."Do the personal beliefs and ideologies and world-view of the person making the claim - is that what's driving their research, or is it the other way around? ... So in science, at some point, you have to remove politics and ideology and say: WHAT IS THE DATA?")


I suspect these creationist claims will run afoul of all of the above.  But I'd like to focus on #9 in particular: Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory?

Remember, the "old theory" is more than just an isolated number that indicates the age of the universe.  It's theories built on theories, each having both descriptive power, and predictive power such that they not only explain existing phenomena, but allow the generation of predictions which can be tested.

So #9 presents a major problem.  We can't just change the age of the universe without breaking numerous theories that have extremely broad descriptive and predictive power.  If we say the earth/universe is 10000 years old, we've completely broken the current theories that are providing predictions like this:

Remember, the above data was predicted FIRST.  And then confirmed by experiment.

I suspect the people making the creationist claims above are truly not thinking through the implications.  It's like they believe one can just change the age of the universe without invalidating relativity, quantum theory, basically the last century worth of interlocking, testable, predictive theories in the whole field of cosmology.  And what new theories do they propose to replace relativity, quantum theory, etc., which will provide equivalent explanatory and predictive power as the "old" theories they are invalidating?  Well, they don't provide new theories, do they?  Which is a giant FAIL on the Baloney Detection Kit.

2) Too few supernova remnants.
According to astronomical observations, galaxies like our own experience about one supernova every 25 years. The gas and dust remnants from such explosions expand outward rapidly and should remain visible for over a million years. Yet the nearby parts of our galaxy in which we could observe such gas and dust shells contain only about 200 supernova remnants. That number is consistent with only about 7,000 years worth of supernovas.

This one seems too bizarre not to comment on.  Again, what are the implications?  If the galaxy was created 7000 years ago, either stars must live a fraction of the length of time current theory predicts in order to already be exploding; or, the galaxy was created with pre-existing young and old stars, some stars being born, others all the way through their billion year lifetime and about to supernova?

If the implication is that stars are exploding after 7000 years because their lifetimes are much shorter than we thought, then this not only breaks numerous existing theories which allow successful predictions about star formation and sequence, but it also seems to suggest we ought to be concerned our own sun will be heading toward its red giant phase in 1000 years instead of 1,000,000,000...

But if the implication is that the whole galaxy was created with pre-existing young and old stars 7000 years ago, including having been created with light from the stars on the other side of the galaxy 90,000 light years away already in transit toward earth, then in effect this would suggest the Milky Way was created in such a way as to give the appearance of being billions of years old (as it should be, if we accept that stars have billion year lifetimes...)

In the first case (shortened star lifetimes) we break a big chunk of physics and have to worry about our own sun dying soon, while in the second case we have the contradiction that the galaxy was created 7000 years ago but made to appear billions of years old.

Neither of which makes sense.  Once again, this is a situation where people are trying to insert this bogus 7000 year number without providing any explanation for everything that breaks as a result.


Seems like a real "Hello, McFly!???" situation.


Regards,

[haunted]

@Slayer- I don't understand what reason you have backing your claims. You say the C-14 is flawed after 4,000 years.. OK...... Well being that we know the exponentially changing rates-of-decay(radioactive decay is dependent on mass and while decaying mass changes) of many materials on the atomic level, how is what you're saying remotely possible?

[DaHanG]

Same old creationist just copying and pasting stuff from a fundamentalist site. He's not trying to learn or investigate.

Some people prefer fantasy facts over reality based findings.

[sinner]

I always find these discussions sad...

I think there are 2 kinds of people, the ones that have a pre-defined idea, nothing can prove them wrong, even if they have the truth in their face that prove their argument is erronous, and the ones that will accept a fact that beat their argument to progress to a collective agreement of best plausible answers.

I just dont understand this crap of wasting time debating on subjects that are, without a doubt, old and counter-progressive for human kind. Ive wasted time and energy arguing on such things with creationists/atheists, and it was the same old conclusion: THEY WONT ACCEPT THE FACTS, THEREFORE, FOR MY PERSONAL PROGRESSION, IT IS A STICK IN MY WHEELS. I use to argue a lot like you with %&&*#& ideologists to enforce mt own theory, but now im starting to approach these condescendingly.....

The creationist will say "hey you got the answer right here in the bible, no need to ask all the silly questions!!!! God loves you!" and the atheists will say "Without a doubt, there is no way a god exists or any divine energy of power, and this is the only truth". Both these are simply WRONG. As quadz was mentionning, it is jumping to the conclusion, then doing the research with a pre-defined conclusion.... WTF

Some people choose to set camp along the road of knowledge while other choose to go on in search of answers until they die. The best way to learn is to listen to new ideas, not old fashioned theories that makes our lazy asses confortable and feel secure in a narrow mind ... thats my opinion