Willful Ignorance of Evolution?

[_Trevor]

It's like you are unaware of even the basics. Like you think evolution is random. It isn't. The input to the process is random but it is anything but random which ones survive to have of spring. It is a natural algorithm. Natural selection is a sifting process saving any little tiny tiny bit of accidentally useful changes, all small. It does this countless times. Even if a child only grows a hair each day he will still get big- and if one has Milennia to work with then things add up tremendously.

And this is why I need to change tracks here. He clearly does need to learn the basics. I only disagree when you say he is not interested in learning them. I believe him when he says he is.

[_Some Schmo]

I suppose, given this new data, I need to amend my original thesis to include not only willful ignorance, but also willful misinterpretation (with a measure of learning disability thrown in for good measure).

[Guest]

You can't randomly grow wings instead of fins. *sigh*
Why must you form these cartoonical pictures?

I am simply going by what silentkid said. I asked for clarification so if I misunderstood, I suspect he will correct it.

You keep saying you are trying to figure out how this or that. Your not!!

Sorry you feel that way, but I am. Score one for Schmo's influence. Maybe he just killed another thread. Too bad. It was his own.

If you were, you would read a detailed book on evolution or one designed to explain the concepts like Dennett's book or Ken Miller's book.

Dennett is a functionalist and a materialist who is on the fringe. As Searle once said about Dennett, "If you are a functionalist, you don't need an explanation, you need help." This is the same guy who says we are merely computers and zombies, even if they existed, and robots, if properly programmed, would have "consciousness" simply because they have the same human functions.

It's like you are unaware of even the basics. Like you think evolution is random. It isn't.

Again, Silentkid brought up the "random" mutation, not me. I am asking questions here, not making assertions. Please keep that in mind.

The input to the process is random but it is anything but random which ones survive to have of spring. It is a natural algorithm. Natural selection is a sifting process saving any little tiny tiny bit of accidentally useful changes, all small. It does this countless times. Even if a child only grows a hair each day he will still get big- and if one has Milennia to work with then things add up tremendously.

But there is no problem with a child gradually growing hairs over time. That doesn't jeapordize his survival. There is, however, a problem with a sea creature completely changing its atmosphere from water to air. There begs and intelligent explanation as to how any organism can overcome the laws of aerodynamics and obtain flight without some kind of intelligence at play. If it isn't random mutation, then what is it? Natural selection? And what happens in the inbetween stages during the billions of years? How does it even begin to survive as it begins to rely less and less on the water and learn to breathe air? At some point in its mutation it would need to be a replicating organism that relied on both air and water for breathing. Are there any fossilized bones that would provide evidence that such a creature ever existed? A bird with a blowhole maybe?

Simply saying it takes a long time to happen doesn't even begin to explain how it makes sense. During the developmental stages it is hard to imagine how something could survive like that, let alone continue to replicate. A sea organism leaving its atmosphere in favor of land or air seems to be a threat its survival, not a benefit.

No, we have created self replicating molecules.
http://w3.mit.edu/newsoffice/tt/1990/may09/23124.html

Which is a far cry different from creating life from dead matter. Hell, I can create something from non-organic compunds that replicates. Its called a computer virus, which is no more "alive" than these molecules.

But, we have not seen canyons forming from erosion either or mountain forming either. No one has seen it! How silly to think that way.

Good point. Although I would say volcanic activity pretty much shows us how some mountains are formed. We experience earthquakes and presently sense and monitor the activity of plate shifts. With life from dead matter, there is simply no evidence that such a thing ever took place. It doesn't happen on the moon or on any of the other planets in our solar system. Why not? Didn't it all originate from the same "stuff" that exploded out of the big bang? Why does only earth contain life? It went through the same cosmic hurricane as the rest of the stars and planets.

We need to first ask what is possible chemically and probabilistically and see what can be explained.

I have no problem with that. But to argue probability depends on the set of assumptions you choose to work with.

Are you going to read one of the books with an open nondefensive mind or not?

Yes, but I cannot promise you it would be with a noncritical mind.

[_dartagnan]

I suppose, given this new data, I need to amend my original thesis to include not only willful ignorance, but also willful misinterpretation (with a measure of learning disability thrown in for good measure

This, coming from someone who simply rides on the coat tails of our resident scientists, and never dares step foot outside his safety zone of consensus obedience, to make an original argument of his own or to have it exposed to criticism.

[_Some Schmo]

I suppose, given this new data, I need to amend my original thesis to include not only willful ignorance, but also willful misinterpretation (with a measure of learning disability thrown in for good measure

This, coming from someone who simply rides on the coat tails of our resident scientists, and never dares step foot outside his safety zone of consensus obedience, to make an original argument of his own or to have it exposed to criticism.

Hey man, you already proved you willfully misinterpret what you read, several times in this thread alone (assuming you actually read anything at all). There's no need to keep proving it over and over. That you misunderstand me is hardly surprising.

Do you actually have anything to add to the topic of this thread, or are you just going to continue to demonstrate your misunderstanding of that as well?

[Guest]

I'll reply to some of the stuff that has been written since I last read, but first I want to make a quick comment. The evolutionary history of different species and traits is in some cases extremely well understood, in others partially understood, and in still others barely understood at all. As time goes on, scientists understand more and more about the evolutionary history of earth. Since the ID-creationist Behe published Darwin's Black Box, we have developed a significant amount more knowledge on the evolution of the vertebrate immune system. However, it is unrealistic to think we'll ever have a complete picture of the evolutionary history of life on earth including the role of ecological pressure and chance anymore than we should expect a complete history of the earth's climate down to understanding how butterflies flapping their wings influenced weather 2000 years ago. When evolutionary scientists "admit" there are holes in evolution, what they are talking about - and sometimes naïvely assume their audience will understand - is the gaps in understanding of evolutionary history that exist. However, people also talk about "holes in evolution" as in problems that make it hard to accept, often in reference to classic antievolution arguments popular among creationists. People mistakenly, or in the case of some dishonest people, purposefully, conflate the two.

As it happens, a great deal is known about human evolution mainly because human evolution is uniquely interesting to us humans.

[Guest]

So the mutation that caused fish to become birds had nothing to do with natural selection or adaptation? It was just a result of "random" mutation?

Start from the beginning. You're making illogical leaps based on some simple misunderstandings. Mutation is the first step. Random mutations occur during DNA replication all the time. Sometimes those mutations affect phenotype, sometimes they don't (silent mutations). Sometimes a single mutation will cause a drastic change in phenotype or alter a chemical pathway in a significant way. Sometimes it takes many mutations to do this. Sickle-cell anemia, for example, is a drastic change in phenotype caused by a single nucleotide change in DNA. That single change causes a single amino-acid change in the polypeptide chain, yielding a malformed protein that is not efficient at transporting oxygen. One simple, random mutation can cause a change in phenotype. Now look at it from a population perspective. Natural selection acts on populations, not on individuals. Mutations that cause changes in phenotype may be beneficial or detrimental at the population level depending on environmental pressures. Now account for systems of mating, gene flow/genetic drift, isolation events, natural selection, and millions of years.

What I don't understand is how a sea creature can develop wings without some kind of intelligence at play. You can't expect to find that intelligence in genes, so where does it come from? There are laws of aerodynamics that must be met before flight is possible. How does a sea creature stand a better chance of survival in a completely different environment like that? It seems to me that if a fish randomly grew feathers instead of fins, it would serve no benefit whatsoever to the fish inthe water, so the feathers would eventually go away via natural selection. They would get eaten by the bigger fish because they would no longer be able to escape.

You're compressing time and the sequence of events as described by the fossil record. Birds didn't evolve directly from fish. Amphibians and fish share a common ancestor. That ancestor had fins that were adapted for life on land. Take a look at the lobe-finned fishes and lung fish, fish with adaptations better suited for life on land than in the water. We're not talking about one fish mutating into one amphibian here. Look at things from the population level. Next, move from amphibians to reptiles, a branch of reptiles to birds, etc. Follow the process.

I don't see how intelligence cannot have something to do with it. Would flying creatures, conceivably be able to mutate to the point that they could leave our atmosphere, and adapt to our orbit? Maybe develop a respiratory system like whales, where they could dive into our atmosphere for a deepth breath of air and go back up and munch on cosmic debris?

Constraints exist in our world. Those constraints play a significant role in natural selection. The most diverse group of vertebrates is the bony fishes. Look at all the different forms they take, the myriad adaptations. Why? Examine the constraints put on them by their aquatic environment. Some are better suited for fast swimming (tuna, mackerel) while others are better suited for bottom-feeding (cat fish).

Wouldn't you suspect there was some intelligence behind that acheivement as well?

No.

We are talking about a creature accomplishing flight as a way of life. If you clip a few feathers at the ends of the wings of most birds, they can no longer fly.

See Kenneth Miller's response to Michael Behe's irreducible complexity argument.

So theoretically, for millions of years, as they were becoming less dependant on water and their respiratory systems developed lungs, and for another million or so years, as they were "mutating" into fully feathered creatures capable of flight, they must have been something akin to dodo birds or chickens. Assuming this is true, there just seems to be have been some intelligent means at work, trying to get to a specific end: getting these creatures in the air.

The organisms weren't "mutating" with a goal in sight, as you suggest. For the same reason that bacteria don't mutate to become resistant to antibiotics. The mutation occurs and is either accepted or rejected due to natural selection. Those bacteria that have a mutation that yields resistance are more likely to survivie in an antibiotic environment and pass that beneficial trait on to their offspring, yielding more resistance. They don't intelligently decide to mutate.

You're saying this is just an act of random mutation that, by sheer chance, ended up developing creatures that had the exact requirements for flight?

It's more complex than that, but yes, an organisms ability to fly initially started with random mutation.

Maybe is there was only one flying creature onthe planet, but there are thousands. This suggests a means to an end.

Why? I see it as an advantage that some organisms have inherited through natural selection. Flying organisms can fill a niche that very few other organisms can inhabit. A great example of the power of natural selection.

I mean if one tiny thing is off, the bird doesn't fly. It must have extremely strong chest muscles, it must be designed a specific way, it must have high powered vision, etc. All of this is just random mutation?

Again, see Kenneth Miller's response to Michael Behe's irreducible complexity argument.

Actually they kinda glide.

Semantics. Flying Squirrels glide as well.

And there is a huge gap between tiny rubberish fins and an eagle's ten foot wingspan of feathers. I am trying to figure out some kind of plausible scenario that could explain how birds came from the sea. Random mutation you say?

Yes, there is a huge gap. There is also a huge gap between birds and sharks in evolutionary history. Birds didn't come directly from the sea. See my explanation at the top of this post.

Edited for spelling errors.

[_silentkid]

Again, Silentkid brought up the "random" mutation, not me. I am asking questions here, not making assertions. Please keep that in mind.

There is a huge difference between random mutation and random evolution...notice I never claimed the latter.

[_EAllusion]

The majority view within evolutionary biology is that birds evolved from a branch of theropod dinosaurs. There are competing views within the realm of legitimate debate, however, and it would be wrong to present this as a settled issue. No one thinks that birds evolved from fish directly, if that is what was implied.

Also, while TD is a nice person, I wouldn't put much stock in her wildly implausible speculation on human evolution. To her credit, she presented it as just her musing, though.

[_EAllusion]

There is, however, a problem with a sea creature completely changing its atmosphere from water to air. There begs and intelligent explanation as to how any organism can overcome the laws of aerodynamics and obtain flight without some kind of intelligence at play.

Unintelligent spooky action that has a property such that it makes sea creatures turn into birds. There you go, no intelligence at play. On the downside, I invented a magical explanation that merely defined itself to explain the properties I'm seeking to explain without any independent evidence of its existence. True, just like "The designer did it."

I'm not sure if you get there are supposed to be a lot of intermediate steps here. As for fish evolving into landdwellers, I do recommend Carl Zimmer's exellent book "At Waters Edge." I mentioned him before. Funnily enough, he wrote it right before the discovery of Tiktaalik. You may have read about it.

e.g. http://tiktaalik.uchicago.edu/

A co-discoverer wrote an awesome, awesome evolutionary pop-science book called "Your Inner Fish." Come to think of it, you should read that.