h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"Most evolutionists view minor genetic changes and one species evolving from another as basicly the same thing."
One contributes to the other, but they are not basically the same thing. Speciation is a complex issue, there are many different ways a species can become two (or more). Genetic changes (by "minor" I assume you mean at the DNA base-pair level) are a lot simpler. I personally think that Darwinian Transformation is obsolete, modern species concepts are a lot more involved and descriptive nowadays it seems.

Can I say something about the mule please?
A mule is sterile, yes. But the fact that two species (horse and donkey) can produce offspring at all shows that they were once the same species. Their DNA (more specifically chromosome number differences in this case) has diverged so much so that they are now incompatible with each other. The sterility of the hybrid offspring means that it cannot reproduce and cannot evolve, as you noted. However this also means that the horse and the donkey are *reproductively isolated*, hence different species.

Josh, what do you understand the "blind watchmaker thesis" to be?, out of interest...

What if there were single genes that switch on or off the "hundreds of genes" that you describe Josh? Imagine one of the controlling "master genes" supressing a hundred other genes. A simple mutation in this master gene, disabling it, would allow all these genes which were previously repressed to become switched on. This is a very basic example, but these master genes exist. They are called "Homeotic genes" and we have talked about them before. A lot of study has been put into the insect body plan and homeotic genes. I posted a link a few weeks ago to an article and a nature paper. Also, my article on evolution goes into a tiny bit of detail on them.

Why would a beneficially mutation also have to have a "maladaptive" mutation? I don't quite understand...



Ste

Damn you server! Damn your eyes!

(bookmark to get my conversations updated)

Ste,

Allow me to introduce myself. I am Josh's cousin, Josh (aka PhantomWriter). Pardon me for butting into the conversation, but I was reading through it (as I talk to Josh a lot and he speaks highly of your debates), and I noticed that your argument concerning mules indicates evolutionary relation between horses and donkeys. While I can see, to a certain extent, the possibility of this as a relation, it seems to me to be a somewhat weak argument. Perhaps you could elaborate a little on WHY this would seem to prove anything other than they are closely related species.

Ever the curious writer,

Josh, Mighty Keeper of the Towels

Ste, please allow me ....

Ste is the one with all the credentials, but as more of a lay person in the fields under discussion (with basically a scientific background in other fields), maybe I can offer a workable and understandable explanation.

First we need to back track. You seem to have accepted that a small degree of mutation occurs quite naturally and that this is an entirely natural phenomena. This is good, because as I understand it this is "the" fundamental requirement for evolution to occur. Without mutation of any kind there could be no evolution.

So we have "micro-mutation".

Next lets look at the concept of "survival of the fittest". Again this is not really a large concept and it is one with which you should be fairly comfortable. Basically we are saying that traits that ensure survival become reinforced within a sample population in a sample environment. So for instance lions usually have remarkable eyesight and an excellent sense of smell because the ones with poor eyesight and sense of smell are ill equipped to hunt and therefore have a lower survival rate. Consequently the lions that survive to breed are usually well equipped to hunt other large animals.

Okay, do we have agreement?

So how are these traits spread? Through reproduction.

This requires a large enough gene pool and some movement of the animals concerned so that dominant traits are spread and reinforced throughout the population. Again this is no big deal and can quite readily be observed in the natural world.

So a micro-mutation occurs, then what happens? Well ordinarily if it is a hinderance to the animal concerned it reduces its opportunity to reproduce and therefore it literally dies out. If it is of benefit to the animal concerned, then the mutation will spread through the gene pool. If it is of no consequence then it is 50:50 whether it will spread. The rate at which it spreads is governed by a number of factors such as litter size, overall population size and the time for each generation to develop. Some species for example reproduce within weeks of birth, others take very much longer (like us).

Okay, now what? How does this relate to the horse and the donkey?

Well lets consider what happens if the population grows and expands from a relatively small group occupying a small area of the planet, in much the same way that we can track the human population spreading out from Africa/Arabian Peninsular to encompass the globe.

Now because the population has increased (because it is a successful species), it takes much longer for a micro-mutation to spread through the gene pool. Furthermore at any point in time there is the possibility (in fact it is almost a dead certainty) that some part of the larger population will become "permanently" separated from the main group, for example volcanic eruptions, drought, herd migrations, etc.

So we will have a situation where "divergence" can naturally occur. We have a sub-population of the original group that can develop an entirely different set of micro-mutations and as we have already noted, because it is separated from the original population, it is almost certainly in an entirely different habitat and thus the micro-mutations that occur in the sub-population will ensure the "survival of the fittest" that best suit the different environment.

This is exactly what happened to the horse and the donkey.

At some point there was only a single species of animal. Whether it was a horse or a donkey or something else entirely is a moot point. But the population became divided and evolved separately over time in two different environments.

The degree of compatibility between the two species (horse and donkey) is a good indicator of the recentess of the point of divergence. Species that can interbreed and produce fertile offspring have only recently diverged. The best example of this that I can think of is man. Each race represents a divergence from a migrating population, and thus different characteristics have been enhanced in each race. However we can all pretty much interbreed with only a few problems. Part of the reason for this is of course the incredibly slow reproductive rate of humans. The time lag between generations is enormous when compared to other species (like rats say). Furthermore the opportunities for racial interbreeding are now very much greater (due to technology) than they could ever be for say the horse and the donkey.

Meanwhile the horse and the donkey have a faster reproductive rate and can have young after just a few years. Their divergence may be more recent than for man but the faster rate means more generations have passed over that time period, so the genetic difference between the two species is greater. This means that cross-breeding will produce infertile offspring.

Now we can take that a step further and try cross-breeding horses with other animals that are related just more distantly. The result will almost certainly be abortive.

How did I do Ste?

I think you have a really good grasp of the details Madent, and a far greater talent for writing than I have.

So, Josh's cousin, are you really called Josh too? Or is it just to confuse us? Welcome to the debate anyway



If that is who you really are!
*tries to pull head off*
Oops.



Ste

Hi, Ste. Thanks for the compliment

Josh, I'd like to pick up on something you said earlier.

"True, the Bible has been translated many times, and perhaps lost some of it's original meaning. But if we assume that the writers of the Bible were divinely inspired, why can we not assume that the translators of the Bible were divinely inspired."

If we accept that the Bible (and its translation and interpretation) is divinely inspired then we must also accept that any document claiming to be the word of God, is exactly what it claims.

I don't think you entirely meant that, because to do so would basically open up a whole debate as to the validity of any religion. After all virtually every religion is based around some sort of document or teaching that self proclaims its authenticity.

My own view is that there is much in the Bible, leaving aside any dubious interpretation, that does present a true historical record.

For example I am prepared to accept that the Bible is right over which pharaoh ruled in Egypt when Moses sought to free the Israelites from slavery. A fact which is in complete contradiction with the accepted chronology of Egyptian rulers according to the "science" of archaeology.

Personally I tend to view the early books of the Bible as the result of centuries of oral traditions and embellishments of a tribal and nomadic group, coming into contact with a number of developing cultures (Babylonian, Egyptian, et al), learning writing and so capturing their limited understanding of the natural world.

These writings have so much in common with the beliefs of other contemporary cultures in style and content that to accept one as truth and to discard the others just because one is published as "the word of God" seems a little shortsighted. On the other hand to discard all of the early writings of man because they teach that the world is other than it evidently is, is equally obtuse.

Instead if you look at the common stories you can piece together a fair account of early civilisations.

The key thing to me, Josh, is to remember that whatever inspiration God could provide he would always be limited to the understanding of the man through which he was communicating. Do you really think that God could have explained evolution to someone who while no doubt intelligent had less education than you had by the second grade?

The key thing then is to realise that the Bible had already been interpreted BEFORE it was written down. To compound these errors by further translation and subjective interpretation and then accept the result as the literal truth is in my view a little naive.

Far better to learn as much as you can about the world and review the Bible on the basis of your better understanding of reality.

I hope this is not too preachy, I've cut and carved this for the last hour and a half and now have less than half the first draft, but I'm tired and need my bed - having 2 kids tends to prevent me from having more than 1 lie-in each week

TTFN and

Dear Group (Ste, Madent, and the OTHER Josh),

I am indeed another Josh (and, in fact, an older Josh). The other Josh, who is my cousin, was named after me. OK, perhaps that is taking it a bit too far...

Now that we have established my name, we can move right out into the battlefield.

Fundamentally, I think that there is a major difference between micro-mutation (and/or other forms of mutation) and evolution as science views it. We see a revision of unhealthy traits that happens to occur from generation to generation, and we automatically assume that it must be a form of evolution. But consider the presumption that might be involved there.
We (the scientific world, of which I am not technically a part, but which I claim anyway) do not know for sure what the behavioral traits of animals in the past were. The earliest accurate records of animal behavior probably did not start coming out until far into the midieval period; perhaps later. I mean, on the bookshelf of ancient works, we don't have The Iliad, Beowulf, and Lady Catherine Goodall's book of Primate Behavior.
The point I'm driving at is that we don't know what animal behavior has been like, beyond what we can assume from archaelogical finds. Now, I don't want to refute archaelogy; I have great respect for the field. But how many times have things like carbon dating been proved inaccurate? Not to mention serious embarrassments to the field like the Java Man incident. Really, we assume more than we could possibly hope to back up.
Hence, we can only go on what we see today. And anyone who claims to see evolution in progress...well, I'd certainly like to see the evidence.
More on this will follow, but for now I must sign off.

Josh, Mighty Keeper of the Towels...

P.S. Nice to meet you folks (except for Josh, whom I've met entirely too many times. lol)

Whoa, there Josh MKT (sorry but I can't help thinking that should be MkII).

That's a side-step if ever I saw one.

"Fundamentally, I think that there is a major difference between micro-mutation (and/or other forms of mutation) and evolution as science views it."

I have not equated micro-mutation with evolution. I have merely suggested that micro-mutation is one mechanism that is known to exist, that can in combination with other factors (of which there are many) lead to the evolution of a new species from an existing species.

"We see a revision of unhealthy traits that happens to occur from generation to generation, and we automatically assume that it must be a form of evolution. But consider the presumption that might be involved there."

What presumption? I make none, mutation occurs. It is your presumption that mistakes mutation for evolution, not mine.

"We (the scientific world, of which I am not technically a part, but which I claim anyway) do not know for sure what the behavioral traits of animals in the past were."

In the full and certain knowledge that this is the only lever that the creationist argument has on science, I am forced to agree. Science cannot "know" anything for sure. However science can deduce an awful lot about animal behaviour in the past from observing animal behaviour now. But so what? The theories are qualified, it doesn't make them right or wrong either. You can't disprove them only raise sensible questions about them or offer reasonable alternatives.

To take our earlier example, the difference between the horse and the donkey would most likely result from impact of differences in the environments experienced by the two groups that evolved into these creatures.

Animal behaviour will have an impact but the behaviour of these two animals is similar anyway.

Now, why bring up carbon dating? Carbon dating is a modern development but the issue you raise is one of calibration. Yes carbon dating can be unreliable but its range of application is also limited. There is not that much that can be carbon dated when you are looking at fossils!

And why bring up Java Man? Is this another dodgy argument. Sounds like, lets find something that was once claimed to be true and has since been proven false and use it to prove all scientific arguments as false.

You can do better Josh MKT.

I'd like to back up here just a minute. I've been doing some research on probability and I have discovered an error in the MarieandSte principle. A coincidence by definition is when a low probability happens as opposed to a high probabitlity.

In your example, assuming that there are, say a billion elidgible bachelorettes, you Ste, have a 1: a billion chance of marrying Marie. We now have a low probability. But the chances for every other girl are roughly the same: 1 in a billion, so there is no high probability to offset the low probability.

Ste, you also say that micromutations are the same thing as one species changing from one to the other. So you think divergence of species are just a lot of different micromutations? If so, a mutation is first required, then it must have no other accompanying mutations, especially bad mutation. And mutations, as a rule, are generally bad. The mutation also has to be a dominant trait so as not to be lost in the next generation and the mutation must raise the probability of survival of the creature enough that it becomes a factor. Even then, it is certainly possible that the creature will die before mating anyway. The mutation must also be beneficial enough that those with the mutation begin to take over those who do not and there is no guarantee that the mutation will be carried on in the offspring. After this the process must be repeated with yet another mutation meeting the same criteria. This, I think, is where the blind watchmaker thesis falls short.

On carbon dating
I have recently discovered an interesting theory on carbon dating and the age of the Earth. It is the concept of artificial oldness, that if a universe is created ex nihilo, it will appear older than it really is. There's a story in the New Testament where Jesus turns water into wine. Afterwards the people that drink it comment on how good the wine is. To be good, the wine must be old, but this wine had just been created. Some have suggested that this is why the Earth appears billions of years old, though the Bible indicates a somewhat smaller expanse of time. This is mere speculation, but it's interesting speculation.

I'm glad you noticed why the "MarieandSte-ic principle" is fundamentally flawed because that was precisely the point I was making .

Josh the G, look at what I wrote in post 101:
"One contributes to the other, but they are not basically the same thing."

But then you claim that I "also say that micromutations are the same thing as one species changing from one to the other" in your most recent post. I clearly did not say this, sorry . But I'll address the points you have raised anyway. See, I'm a nice guy really...

I think divergence is the two ancestral species adapting to their respective different environments in different ways. Mutation is merely one small facet of this adaptation.

"Mutations as a rule are generally bad". Yep, agreed. The "bad" mutations when they arise are selected out by natural selection. The "good" ones are preserved by natural selection. Therefore "good" mutations cumulate and "bad" mutations are present at low levels in the population.

The mutation does not have to be a dominant trait to be inherited.

"...mutation must raise the probability of survival of the creature enough that it becomes a factor." Yep, agreed, that's natural selection.

"it is certainly possible that the creature will die before mating anyway" Yep, you always need a bit of luck. But the majority in a population make it to breeding age.

"The mutation must also be beneficial enough that those with the mutation begin to take over those who do not and there is no guarantee that the mutation will be carried on in the offspring." Again, natural selection along with gene flow and genetic drift are responsible for this. It has been observed and documented.

All of your points are easily explained using natural selection, a bit of luck and other evolutionary forces.

You really have to think of evolution at the population level, not the individual level. It isn't called "population genetics" for nothing. The chances of a beneficial mutation occuring and surviving down the generations is low when you look at it from the small-scale (individual to individual) but on the population scale and with the time-scales we're dealing with the probabilites become not-too-great.

And you still haven't given me your understanding of the "blind watchmaker thesis" Josh the G .

Re: Carbon dating. Do you consider this to be science?

Oh, and Java Man was an embarrasing mistake, nothing more. It was mentioned somewhere else on this site when Josh first bought this up that only science would hold its hands up and go "oops! yeah you're right, we messed up!" Science is flexible. I agree with Madent, using one example to show that all science is flawed is a very weak argument.

I hope you can all read this. Monday morning has taken its toll .

Ste

Madent, What did you mean by the Pharoah thing? The Bible never says which Pharoah it was that enslaved the Isrealites. It doesn't contradicts archaeology because Pharoah is referred to as merely "Pharoah"

"If we accept that the Bible (and its translation and interpretation) is divinely inspired then we must also accept that any document claiming to be the word of God, is exactly what it claims."

I accept the Bible as truth, but I do not accept all translation and interpretation. I plan to study much of the languages that the original scriptures were written in so that I can read them first hand. However, to say that since some translations are skewed and some interpretations are convoluted, that the Bible can't be trusted is no different than saying that evolution is worthless because Kettlewell faked the moth expiriment. When the Bible was translated, it was not done by a solitary priest with an agenda, but a large group of people, and it was peer reviewed by Christians everywhere just as any scientific fact would be peer reviewed by scientists.

Josh

On the Pharoah thing, a considerable amount of work has been done in the field of Egyptology and since the Jews spent some time in captivity in Egypt, a lot of effort has gone in to reconciling the accounts of the Bible with archaeological evidence.

On the one hand while the Bible may not name names, it provides a good deal of information about the period of the captivity and allows for its point in time to be reasonably well established.

On the other the "accepted" archaeological evidence indicates that the period of the captivity occurred in a different timeframe and therefore under a different pharoah.

The difference isn't great, only a few hundred years, but then the accuracy of the methods used to establish the "accepted" Egyptian chronology are not accurate enough in my opinion to indicate that the accounts of the Bible are wrong.

On your quotation from my earlier post it helps to remember that I also said that I didn't think you meant that interpretation of what you had written earlier. I then explained my own view.

Have you ever played "Chinese Whispers"? This is partly what I mean. I think that the Bible has been distorted at source by centuries of oral traditions. This is further compounded by later errors in editing and interpreting the documents that comprise the Bible. It is also compounded by the limited knowledge of the early Jews. This is not a denigration of the Jews but merely an acceptance that their understanding and knowledge of science was less than our own.

What is presented in the Bible maybe the truth as understood by someone from the 3rd or 4th millenium BC. Perhaps God did indeed cause the world to be, but the mechanisms are not described by the Bible. The big bang, evolution, dinosaurs, et al. especially 14 billion years of history would all be difficult to explain to someone living in the bronze age. Why instead is it not reasonable for the explanations of the Bible to reflect the contemporary understanding of the world?

Dear Madent,

I seem to have spoken slightly, in a way, out of turn. Your argument has effectively shot mine down. This much I will concede. However, I believe that it is merely a matter of research. I wrote what I wrote on the spur of the moment, collecting my thoughts for a brief statement which, through the use of ever-present adjectives, turned out to be longer than I had expected. However, despite its length, it was essentially just my rantings on a subject with which I am entirely too unfamiliar (according to my standards). Thus, I shall have to buckle down a bit and research my subject before daring again to stand in your awesome literary presence, and voice my opinion.
Can you forgive me, master.

I do hope it's not a case of once bitten, twice shy



Ste

How you doing, Ste?

Not at all. I don't mind being told when I'm wrong.

Out of curiosity, though, (back to Java Man {latte, anyone?}) I wonder how many mistakes make up a fallacious theory. I don't mean to nag, but we all know that Java Man has been just one of many unexplainable mistakes in evolutionary theory. Now, unlike so many people today, I am not refuting evolution; just because I don't believe it happens doesn't mean that I will turn a deaf ear to arguments for it. So, I am wondering, how can these little glitches be explained? And if these mistakes have slipped through the scientific world's collective fingers, then how can we be assured that there aren't more mistakes to be uncovered?

Yours in Literature (and as much as possible in science),
Josh, MKOT

also Madent, but a

The ratio of errors to good scientific research is surely so hugely tipped towards science that any mistakes are kind of averaged/ironed out?

Just using examples of when science has slipped up really doesn't say a thing because science takes all that kind of stuff in it's stride.

Out of interest Josk MKT, have you read the backlog of this thread?

Who fancies writing a collaborative entry with me on the flaws in the theory of gravity?

Ste

Ste, the Ste and Marie thing only proves that your marriage was not a coincidence. Coincidences still exist, you just have to have a high probability to offset the actual way things are. Your denial of the existence of coincidences seems bizarre to me.

With "the blind watchmaker" I mean Dawkin's theory of evolution through genetics. It seems that you disagree with him. You think genetics is only a small part of evolution, is that correct? I'm assuming this because you said, "I think divergence is the two ancestral species adapting to their respective different environments in different ways. Mutation is merely one small facet of this adaptation."

So if mutation is merely a small part of it all, what other factors contribute to the divergence of species? It seems to me that genetic transformation is necessary if the traits are to be carried on to the next generation.

Carbon Dating
Are you asking me whether I think carbon dating is science or that the theory of artificial oldness is science?



Josh

Still not sure about the Egypt thing, Madent, but I have little research to back myself up. The Bible says this about Egypt (please help me with anything I've forgotten):

1. Pharoah had at least one son (his firstborn died)
2. It was a lousy crop year when the Isrealites left (the plague of locust, etc.
3. Brick in that time were made without hay to punish Isrealite slaves
4. Pharoah had a daughter (she rescued Moses from the Nile)
5. There was great sickness
6. Abraham's great grandson Joseph was the first mentioned Isrealite in Egypt. He was prime minister.
7. After several generations, the Isrealites grew to a great multitude, scaring the Egyptians who enslaved them.

Are these facts archeologically contradictory? Or are you referring to some other information? Could you give an example?