Is Evolution True? | Benzun's Perspective

[Monique]

Interesting example, but evolution is not defined as decreasing the genetic diversity of a population.

Maybe among all the roses you have got, there is one in which there is a mutations which causes the stamens to be converted into petals and carpels into floral meristem (due to a homeotic selector gene mutation).

There is also another mutation: a firefly gene has accidently been activated in another flower, causing it to light up in the dark.

You take these two mutated flowers and take them out of the general population and start breeding them. What you will get is a flower that absolutely doesn't look like a rose, just by two mutations.

Ofcourse evolution works over a fast timescale, where new mutations are allowed to arise and selected upon.

 

[einsteinian77]

The biggest, actually the only, problem I have with evolution is mutation. To have life change so much from the first very simple simple organisms that feed off of mainly sunlight and water to things like sharks that devour living animals.

 

[iansmith]

There is more to evolution than just mutation. Monique had a good list in this thread

 

[Monique]

Many genes are variations on a theme, them came about by duplication events and were specified for a specific purpose. Many of those gene clusters exist today.

Many of the receptors are of a certain type for instance, which are conserved all the way to plants. But within that type there is a lot of variation.

 

[einsteinian77]

what?

 

[Adrian]

First of all, hi everybody!

I think Monique is talking about the fact that many genes especially in higher organisms resemble each other, implying that they are all slight variations of an older gene that have only *slighty* been modified by mutations.

Take the genes coding for adrenalin, noradrenaline etc in the human body as an example of very similar yet different genes in humans. Or the use of phosphate groups on all kinds of substrates for activation. How do you suppose these enzymes evolved?

Such slight variations actually make up much of the complexity of the gene products of higher organisms.

As another example, consider the different kinds of chlorophyll - bacteriocholorphyll and the different kinds of plant chlorophyll, and even the other photosynthetic pigments. To me it makes sense that they should have developed by duplication, madification, and preservation of both variants of the gene, in that order.

 

[nautica]

Originally posted by Superman89
Evolution is FALSE! If we evolved from monkeys, then why do monkeys still exist? Think about it.

Brilliant piece of work. The theory of evolution has never implied we came from monkeys. That statement was made by religous leaders, who were trying to disprove evolutionary theory.

Nautica

 

[nautica]

Just an interesting quote I found from a book, which I had laying around.

"It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; inheritance which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the indirect and direct action of the external conditions of life, and from use and disuse; a Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life, and as a consequence to Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms. Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”

 

[einsteinian77]

Not only do we come from monkeys but we are monkeys, monkey.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by FZ+
Argg! Arghhh! NOOOO!

Don't use the b-word! The mechanism of evolution itself has been proven mathematically, yes, but because evolution is a science, it is nothing about belief and we cannot state it absolutely to be true. It is simply the best we have, and it works brilliantly well.

My apologies, FZ, but I "belief" in this context was meant to be taken weakly (as reference to lack of acceptance of the evidence, on the part of benzun).

 

[Mentat]

Even after all that has been presented here, there are still people that don't accept the obvious. To these, I suggest books like The Wisdom of the Bones (by Alan Walker and Pat Shipman), which examines the skeleton of a Homo Erectus adolescent, to understand primitive man...now, if we've got an almost complete skeleton of Homo Erectus...how the heck are you going to argue against the theory man's evolution from less advanced beings?

 

[Chemicalsuperfreak]

Originally posted by Superman89
Evolution is FALSE! If we evolved from monkeys, then why do monkeys still exist? Think about it.

I decended from my Granma but she still exists. So do all my siblings and cousins.

 

[Mentat]

Originally posted by Chemicalsuperfreak
I decended from my Granma but she still exists. So do all my siblings and cousins.

LOL! Excellent, CSF, pure genius.

 

[rapa-nui]

I'll avoid touching on the "G word" from now, on but suffice to say that I've seen a high correlation between religious fath and scientific ignorance.

Thanks for the welcome.

My story is simple: I'm a bio major, but I'm rather insecure about my own intelligence and suffer from a bad case of physics envy. Stamp collecting and all that rot (kudos if you know what the hell I'm talking about).

 

[Bernardo]

I really need help on this evolutionary view. I'm not a biologist and will admit the science of evolution soon looses me.

I have some struggles,

If all there is is the physical word, and the nature of this world is cause and effect - what is the first cause? My mind just reels at this question within this view. Where did matter come from? at some point there must have been nothing or is the universe eternal? (Please don't just say the big bang - even that event must have had some cause. I can't believe energy & matter could suddely explode from nothing on it's own.)

Where does all this matter & energy on Earth come from, is the Earth a closed system? If so where was all this matter that has been added to single cells to end up with me.

I really need some help here.

 

[chroot]

Originally posted by rapa-nui
My story is simple: I'm a bio major, but I'm rather insecure about my own intelligence and suffer from a bad case of physics envy. Stamp collecting and all that rot (kudos if you know what the hell I'm talking about).

Don't worry, us physicists get put down by the pure mathematicians all the time. In turn, the pure mathematicians get put down by women all the time. It's the circle of life.

- Warren

 

[chroot]

Originally posted by Bernardo
Where did matter come from? at some point there must have been nothing or is the universe eternal? (Please don't just say the big bang - even that event must have had some cause. I can't believe energy & matter could suddely explode from nothing on it's own.)

This is one of those questions that 99% of physicists will respond to by sitting calmly, hands folded, and explaining that "physicists do not concern themselves with metaphysics." In reality, we should be honest, slam our fists into the table, and yell "DAMN! I hate that too!"

There is currently no scientific answer to the question "What happened before the big bang?" Our theories simply have no bearings on the question. The question doesn't even exist within the bounds of existing models. It's a show-stopper, for sure. On the other hand, since nothing can ever get into our universe from the "outside," nor from the outside in, it really is a moot question.

It is entirely plausible, according to quantum mechanics, that a system can borrow a very small (nearly zero) quantity of total energy for a very long time (say, some tens or hundreds of billion years). No one's sure if our universe is just one enormous vacuum fluctuation or not, but our models do support the assertion.

Stay tuned -- the various developing theories of quantum gravity will likely have a great deal to say about the Big Bang -- their predictions and conlcusions are coming soon to a theatre near you.

Where does all this matter & energy on Earth come from, is the Earth a closed system? If so where was all this matter that has been added to single cells to end up with me.

Earth is certainly not a closed system. Look up at that big hot yellow ball in the sky!

The matter of which you are composed was all, ultimately, manufactured in the Big Bang. The stars have mixed up the pieces a bit in the time since, creating the heavy elements and so on.

- Warren

 

[Adrian]

"If all there is is the physical word, and the nature of this world is cause and effect - what is the first cause?"

There is no definite answer to this at the moment, although various approaches exist (I really like the vacuum fluctuation, too).

However, religion (or nay kind of metaphysical concept I know of, for that matter) doesn't answer the question either. If you say "God created the universe", I will ask "where did God come from?".

Now from a rhetorical point of view it is certainly easier to put the question of God's origin or creation off limits than the question of the first little tiny bit of matter. From a logical point of view, however, both questions are valid and must be asked.

For now, suffice it to say that science is really, really good at explaining what happened between the very first fractions of a second of the existence of the universe and now. What happened before is still beyond our grasp.

 

[Monique]

Originally posted by einsteinian77
what?

Ever heard of G-protein-linked receptors?

 

[Phobos]

Originally posted by O Great One
Evolution is defined as a change in allele frequency over time?
Ok, then let's say I have 7 white roses and 5 red roses and I kill all of the white roses. That would be considered evolution because the red roses increased from 41.67% of the population to 100% of the population. How can that be evolution when I started out with roses and I ended up with roses and nothing new has come into existence?

Ambitwister already responded well. So, let me just ramble on a bit more...

First, I assume we're all talking like the white & red roses are the same species. If not, then we have a bad example to begin with.

Some evolutionary mechanisms decrease genetic diversity (selection, etc.) and some increase genetic diversity (mutation, recombination, etc.) Extinction is not an evolutionary mechanism for the victims, but it does greatly affect the evolution of the survivors.

Your killing of the white roses would be artificial selection (if nature did it, it would be natural selection). The red and white roses groups did not have 100% identical genetic codes. Under normal circumstances, red & white interbred and their genes would have be distributed throughout the population. After your imposed extinction of all white roses, the genes associated with red would suddenly get the upper hand. If red was recessive, then any mutation on that gene may get diluted out in the overall population. But now that mutation can spread more freely.

The bottom line is that evolution includes both the creation of new species as well as changes in existing species (even without speciation). Speciation may represent the culmination of a series of smaller changes (e.g., a point where a sub-population no longer breeds with the parent population), but there is always a background of slow change. The make-up of human "races" (x percent black, y percent white, etc.) change from generation to generation, but we're still one species. If some event wipes out one race (e.g., disease), then the diversity within that group (e.g., hair type, particular bone structure, whatever) may be lost or marginalized. The evolutionary path has been redirected.

At the risk of further rambling...not only do such selection events redirect the evolution of the surviving population, but they can also open up previously filled niches that allow other species to adapt and change.

The idea that evolution is a specific "march of progress" toward a particular goal needs to be dropped.

 

[Monique]

Aint it interesting how human skin color has evolved? I think it is amazing how graded it is and that it is still preserved today. The very dark African skin tones, the middle Meditteranian one and the very fair scandinavians. Skandinavians actually lost the active gene that causes dark pigmentation, and they are at great risk for developing skin cancers when they move to regions close to the equator.

This could be an example how a niche is created, where very fair people get geographically isolated (although with all the SPF creams we have today, they could protect themselves artificially).

Genetic researchers in these days are very interested in isolated populations, I recently attended a conference on it in Italy. The genomes of these populations have special features that allow us to locate disease genes. In Finland alone there is a collection of 30 genetic disorders that has a high frequency in Finland, but which are almost non existent in the rest of the world (all the genes have been located because of the Finnish subisolates). Thus a very clear enrichement of certain rare alleles.

I wouldn't define this as evolution though, but it definitely is a mechanism of evolution.

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by Phobos
Your killing of the white roses would be artificial selection (if nature did it, it would be natural selection).

Naaaaa. Don't mean to rant, but humans are a part of nature. I hate the liberal/hippie/commie idea that things humans do are unnatural. Its BS. [/rant]

So deciding that white roses needed to die means that through the process of natural selection, red roses won out. They are "fitter" because by the virtue of being red, they survived.

 

[Monique]

Originally posted by russ_watters
So deciding that white roses needed to die means that through the process of natural selection, red roses won out. They are "fitter" because by the virtue of being red, they survived.

 

[einsteinian77]

I think that there are two worlds, a science world made up of truths and falsehoods, and a belief world made up of you. The science world exists now, and the belief world exists in the past and in the future. Science can only give you information it can't write the past or future since it isn't absolute. It is clear that evolution is a science and creation is a belief so what's the problem?

 

[Monique]

Science is not absolute ?? So science is relative? The exact opposite I believe :P

Anyway, it is scientifically valid to question whether evolution is true. The point is to come up with pro- and anti- evolutionary arguments and see which theory fits those arguments best.

 

[einsteinian77]

I don't mean science is relative what I meant was that science always changes and what it is a fact today may be a false tomorrow. Example, we once thought the universe would expand and eventually collapse now we think the universe is going to keep expanding, but then again it could collapse in itself. In science we can only see the information given we cannot make an absolute prediction nor tell an absolute about the past.

 

[Adrian]

"we cannot make an absolute prediction nor tell an absolute about the past."

I don't know about you, but for me, the same kind of healthy scepticism applies to all realms of life. Isn't one major problem of many religious beliefs their dogmatic and absolute nature -- the fact that they cannot be falsified?

The scientific method is not limited to natural science in the narrow sense.

 

[Monique]

Originally posted by einsteinian77
I don't mean science is relative what I meant was that science always changes and what it is a fact today may be a false tomorrow. Example, we once thought the universe would expand and eventually collapse now we think the universe is going to keep expanding, but then again it could collapse in itself. In science we can only see the information given we cannot make an absolute prediction nor tell an absolute about the past.

So science is a belief too then in your definition.

 

[einsteinian77]

"Isn't one major problem of many religous beliefs their dogmatic and absolute nature--the fact that they cannot be falsified."

But that's what makes it a belief, if you thought that it could be falsified it would be science.

 

[Monique]

Originally posted by einsteinian77
I think that there are two worlds, a science world made up of truths and falsehoods, and a belief world made up of you. The science world exists now, and the belief world exists in the past and in the future. Science can only give you information it can't write the past or future since it isn't absolute. It is clear that evolution is a science and creation is a belief so what's the problem?

So you have just contradicted your last sentence here :)