Transterrestrial Musings

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I Know, I Asked For It...

I know I'm opening up not just a can, but a fifty-gallon barrel of worms, but Orrin Judd asked a number of questions about evolution on his web site. Here are my responses.

Here are some questions that make me at least question the faith of the Darwinists:

(1) If evolution is a continuous process requiring millions, billions, zillions, of tiny mutations as it progresses, why haven't we observed any of these mutations in any mammals in the thousands of years of recorded human history?

We have. In fact, we've caused them. Look at the wide variety of dog breeds, all of whom came from a common wolf stock. Chihuahuas and Great Danes have common ancestors. We've bred them for their characteristics. Most modern cattle were bred from their ancestors in the Middle East. If we were to scrupulously maintain some of them as separate, and never allow interbreeding, they'd eventually drift so far genetically that they would no longer be able to interbreed, and thus would by definition become different species. This hasn't happened because we continue to play games and interbreed them, seeking yet new breeds.

[Thursday morning update]

I mistyped. We don't (yet) cause mutations--we just select ones we like. Animal domestication is not natural selection--it's artificial selection. But the principle is the same--the organism becomes more adapted to its environment, in this case the environment of people who like certain traits in dogs.

(2) Why can't we find the fossil record that should reveal these gradual adaptations?

We can, but to the degree that there are gaps in the fossil record, it's explained mostly by the fact that very few fossils survive. There is this misunderstanding about "transition species." All species are transition species. All animals are transition animals. They are parts of a chain--they have ancestors different from them, and they'll have descendants different from them (humans may be an exception to this, since we have control over our own evolution).

(3) Once an eye becomes an eye, its helpfulness is obvious, but what is the graduated process by which the eye comes into being? Are there really distinct advantages each incremental step of the way?

Yes. A skin cell that is light sensitive is more valuable than one that's not, and is a protoeye. If its owner passes on the trait, and some of the offspring are even more light sensitive than others, they will be more successful. At some point, there may be a mutation that forms a primitive lense, in the form of some clear cells over the light-sensitive ones. It may not focus well, but it might protect the underlying cells, and thus be useful. It will then eventually evolve into a lense.

"In the world of the blind, the one-eyed man is King"

(4) And how many steps would be required? If we've been in a several thousand year pause in evolution and presumably such pauses occur with some regularity, plus all the tiny steps required, plus the die-offs from catastrophic events, has there really been time enough for man to rise from a single cell?

I don't know why you claim we're in a "pause" in evolution (as far as I know, we're not--the laws of nature have not been suspended) unless you're referring to humans specifically, but ten thousand years is the blink of an eye, particularly for a species with a generation time of a couple decades. We've had hundreds of millions of years to evolve. It seems like plenty of time to me.

If humans haven't evolved much physically, it's because we've eased the pressure to do so with technology. But there are still a wide variety of human breeds (like dog breeds). Compare an Inuit to a Bushman--they are both well adapted to their environments.

(5) If we developed those eyes because they gave us certain adaptive advantages, why didn't we develop wings too or claws or whatever?

Because there are costs of doing that. We were successful the way we were, wingless and clawless. It's harder to throw a spear, or fire a gun with a clawed hand...

(6) If we arose from the same chain as primates, why is that the only chain that produced human-style consciousness? Why aren't there really smart dogs and alligators, etc. Why did those species have ceilings while we don't seem to?

We don't know for sure that it is. Cetaceans may have "human-style consciousness." But we don't know that those species have "ceilings." Just because they haven't developed sapience doesn't mean that they won't in the future. We just happened (as far as we know) to be the first. Someone had to be. Intelligence isn't necessarily an inevitable by-product of evolution. It's possibly something that we just stumbled upon. Dennett has written some very interesting books on this subject.

(7) Now that we comprehend evolution can we any longer be subject to its forces or are we by our very understanding of it become an "unnaturally selecting" species, thereby removing ourselves from the process?

As described above, we have done exactly that. And in the future we will take it one step further with nanotechnology and genetic engineering (regardless of how many laws the U.S Congress passes against it).

(8) Why isn't there intelligent life anywhere else? If there is, what's the answer to Fermi's question : where are they? And, if we're alone, mightn't we be the point of the universe, the reason it exists?

We don't know that there isn't. But it's possible that the conditions for life are exceedingly rare. Whole books have been written on this subject, including the anthropic principle. And in fact, to the degree that I have a religion, I do believe that we (that is, life) are the point of the universe.

(9) If propagation of the species is the be all and end all, why do we slaughter each other in war, genocide, etc.? Why would we have developed the power (nuclear weapons, global warming, whatever) to end all life on Earth? How can this mechanism allow us to be such a threat to ourselves?

Because evolution is blind and dumb. It has no predictive capability. There's no way for our genes to know that the features that they've developed for the purpose of propagating individuals thousands of years ago might have an emergent property of killing vast numbers of other individuals in the future.

But you're overstating the problem. We don't even have the capability to end the existence of humanity, let alone life on earth. Earth will abide, no matter how stupid we are, though it may not be a pleasant place for our descendants.

(10) What came before the Big Bang?

Who knows? Who made God?

(11) Ozzy Osbourne?

Some questions are truly beyond understanding.

Posted by Rand Simberg at May 22, 2002 03:11 PM

Comments

A great reminder that producing ignorant people just requires a roll inthe hay but producing rational thinkers is vastly more work.

These silly questions were readily answered decades ago. Our knowledge is vastly deeper today and Darwin's work still stands strong but we still keep hearing the same dumb questions. They wouldn't be so dumb coming from children but it's chilling to hear them from supposedly educated adults for whom "My mythology can beat up your mythology!" carries more weight than anything testable in reality.

Posted by Eric Pobirs at May 22, 2002 04:45 PM

Question #9 and it's answer tell the tale...

How can this mechanism allow us to be such a threat to ourselves?

Because evolution is blind and dumb. It has no predictive capability.

Posted by Steve Quick at May 22, 2002 04:50 PM

Yours is the first blog I have the pleasure of reading every day and enjoy your perspectives.

However, now I must dissent. I believe your respond to the first question was in the form of several unsupported assertions...

...paraphrasing...

(1a) We cause mutations in the breeding line of species.
-- While we certainly can cause mutations, and observe mutations from other sources, this has absolutely no relationship to animal husbandry which involves no mutations at all. It is simply the combination of traits already preexisting in the bred animals.

(1b) Genetic drifting causes new species.
-- Examples please. AFAIK, all dogs are dogs. You could say there hasn't been enough time but... that's just an article of faith. All you need is one objective example to prove your assertion. A mule is sterile, but still a type of horse.

(1c) This hasn't happened because...
-- Isn't it the point that it hasn't happened?

Ok, so maybe you can't prove the negative, but why not acknowledge the intelligent and design in the genetic code that is life? As a programmer, it would be silly for someone to assert that my software code doesn't exhibit any evidence of intelligence (however small! ;-)) Why not a vastly more intelligently written code.

Two other points that should not be overlooked...

-- Mutations breed out. Give a fruit fly four wings and it's offspring (if viable) will have two. DNA is an amazing self correcting code.

-- Mutations must be passed on, be viable and produce something new to produce a new species. I'm not up to the math, but I'll bet the universe grows cold before that would result in a new species. (...or even the long neck of a giraffe, which they were still showing as videos to grade school kids long after they knew it was not a proof of evolution.

Posted by ken anthony at May 22, 2002 05:56 PM

Ken Anthony has raised some very good points that Rand really needs to address, particularly when it comes to the big gap between simple animal husbandry and the creation of entirely new species. If it were that simple, we would have created several new species by now. Moreover, the vast majority of mutations we see are maladaptive to the environment, not an improvement over existing capabilities found in others of the species.

Glossing over the gaps in the fossil record with a glib "only a few fossils survive" is the sort of sophistry normally associated with UFO enthusiasts. If certain "needed" data is missing from the fossil record, it is just as likely the data never existed in the first place.

I am not a creationist and, in fact, am an atheist. However, I am troubled by how many Darwinists resort to the sort of faith-based arguments ("we can't find support for our position in the fossil record, but we know it's there if we could find it") that creationist depend on.

Let me suggest that evolutionary biology is in the same fix that physics was in the late nineteenth century, when observational data not in accord with Newtonian physics started piling up. Eventually that data resulted in quantum mechanics and relativity. The available fossil record---which is all we have to go on---clearly suggests there have been awesome evolutionary leaps in relatively short periods of time sandwiched between periods of relative evolutionary stasis. This isn't evidence of the work of a diety, but it does suggest there are some revolutionary and exciting discoveries in the mechanism of evolution to be made.

Posted by Harry at May 22, 2002 06:21 PM

i only have problems with #1 , #3, and #5 though the guy above me beat me to two of them..

#1. wolf or chihuahua...its still a dog (unless you can put something in the genes to make the chihuahua fly..but thats design isn't it?)

#3 i thought mutants were usually sterile

#4 spear or gun? you are saying that evolution has a mind that can forsee what a species will need in the FAR future

like yer blog tho..read it whenever i get the chance..

Gupps

Posted by gupps at May 22, 2002 06:29 PM

In counter-comment:

In fact, the domestic dog is an artificially-produced example of a "ring species", in which the extreme forms cannot interbreed, although there are intermediate forms that can. Classic examples of naturally-occurring ring species are herring gulls, bullfrogs, some lemurs in Madagascar, and a Californian salamander.

Mutations do NOT "breed out", as Mr. Anthony implicity admits to in his reply immediately below. There are well-understood aerodynamic reasons why a two-winged fly is preferable to a four-winged fly (in fact, ALL flies technically have four wings; in a normal fly, however, two are reduced to club-like organs with a gyroscopic function).

Computer simulations indicate that natural selection is quite capable of conserving mutations in relatively short periods of time, This is because other natural laws limit the way in which chemical compounds can be formed and react (you cannot produce potassium hydride in either an oxiding or an aqueous environment no matter how hard you try -- as I can testify to from personal experience), and because compounds that are distingushable by our analysis in fact have the same function (hemoglobin is sometimes used as an argument against evolution -- but there is not one hemoglobin, but many tens of thousands of hemoglobins. In fact, there are six different types of hemoglobin in humans alone).

Anti-evolutionists (and liberals and college dropouts) like to claim that "anything is possible". In fact, very few things are possible, and most of them have already happened.

Posted by John "Akatsukami" Braue at May 22, 2002 06:37 PM

A bunch of comments showed up since I started writing this, but here goes anyway:

(2) Why can’t we find the fossil record?
Not only do few fossils survive, but the vast majority are currently out of reach. For all of the fossils the Leakeys found in the Olduvai Gorge, they (literally) only scratched the surface

(5) Why didn’t we develop wings, and
(6) Why did no other animals produce consciousness?
Mutations are random, and all subsequent development is dependent on the development that occurred before. We didn’t develop wings because (a) the necessary mutations did not happen to occur, and/or (b) the selection pressures were not there.

(8) Why isn’t there intelligent life anywhere else? Mightn’t we be the point of the Universe?
There probably is in some form, but the hurdles to contact (sheer distance and the speed of light) are immense. Even if intelligence is not common, it is nearly impossible for there to be no life elsewhere, based on experiments performed in the last 40 years. This question strays very close to the “strong Anthropic Principle” (see Stephen Hawking for details), and I don’t want to have to resort to metaphysticuffs (sorry, couldn’t resist).

(9) Why do we slaughter each other?
It is likely that our ancestors were selected based on this. Given two populations, one with genes for peace and one with genes for war, which one likely survives? Throw in intelligence, specifically that man is the only animal capable of reasoning on a level which allows him to recognize and kill potential competitors (as opposed to direct competitors), and you have a potent mix.

(10) What came before the Big Bang?
Liquor and foreplay.

(11) Ozzy Osbourne?
Ted Nugent (still intact)

Addendum: What a lot of people don’t realize is that the question of evolution was largely decided well before Darwin. Lamarck’s theories predated “The Origin of Species” by about 50 years. Darwin supplied the mechanism.

Posted by Ken Summers at May 22, 2002 06:45 PM

Actually, the answer to #1 is the one I always hope for, because in comparing evolution to our breeding of animals it implies that a consciousness guides the whole process.

Posted by oj at May 22, 2002 07:12 PM

To Ken Anthony:

I mistyped. We don't cause mutations, but we do take advantage of them. To think that all of the variations of present-day Canis domesticus were inherent in Canis lupus is, to me, an extreme stretch. We got all of those domestic variations because changes (naturally) appeared in various litters, and some of our ancestors found some of them to their liking.

To Orrin:

Just because a conscious entity *can* direct evolution, does not imply that a conscious entity *must* direct evolution. Natural pressures can suffice as well.

I'm not going to heavily involve myself in the fray here, because I've other tasks at hand (including, but not limited to, getting my Fox News column out for tomorrow). But I'm happy to contribute bandwidth and disk space to it.

Posted by Rand Simberg at May 22, 2002 07:24 PM

What I find hard to believe about the critics of evolutionary biology is that it seems that existing examples which illustrate the mechanisms of evolution and natural selection are insufficient for them.

Why is it we can believe that a human being can arise from a single cell in the course of nine months of embryonic development, and not comprehend the mystery of how all life on earth could arise from a single type of proto-cell given 4,000,000,000+ years of geologic time?

Or how can we observe the development of multi-drug resistant bacteria as they adapt to the selective pressure of our overuse of antibiotics, and not understand that selective pressures from the environment act on macroscopic species too?

Several species have gone extinct during recorded human history, and not all of them as the direct result of human actions. Others are today at very low numbers, and their probable extinctions have been delayed by human intervention. So clearly, extinction of species has been shown to occur. As others have pointed out, humans have extensively explored the variations possible in domesticated animals and plants.

Humans have even selected for plants like seedless grapes which likely couldn't survive without our help in propagating their cuttings.

Who can doubt that it would be relatively easy to intentionally breed an animal or plant that could no longer breed with the type we started with, given that we've got examples of organisms that can no longer reproduce without human intervention? It's much easier to speciate than to reverse the process. Combining the traits of two seperate species would require genetic engineering.

Posted by Ken Barnes at May 22, 2002 07:54 PM

(9) Why do we slaughter each other?
It is likely that our ancestors were selected based on this. Given two populations, one with genes for peace and one with genes for war, which one likely survives?

Right--exactly!
Consider this: every human on the Earth today is the descendent of hundreds or thousands of generations of survivors. Non-survivalist genes get bred out of the gene pool very quickly.

Posted by ray at May 22, 2002 09:19 PM

(5) If we developed those eyes because they gave us certain adaptive advantages, why didn't we develop wings too or claws or whatever?
and
(6) If we arose from the same chain as primates, why is that the only chain that produced human-style consciousness?
and
(8) Why isn't there intelligent life anywhere else?

These all have the same answer. As Buckeroo Banzai said: "Whereever you go, there you are!"
In some alternate parallel reality, #6 probably reads: "...why are only humans and cows the only animals with consciousness"
In yet another, #6 reads "Why are only us bovines the only animals with consciousness?---why not apes, too?"

Posted by ray at May 22, 2002 09:30 PM

The more the merrier so here goes....

(1) Lactose tolerance is a relatively recent mutation.

(2)This question assumes erroneously that the entire fossil record has already been dug up, which it hasnt, and probably never will be. That does not mean that the records do not exist. This same point debunks the notion of an incomplete fossil record.

(3) I think Rand covered this well enough.

(4) The steps required are as many as it took, assigning an arbitrary number from our vantage point in history is a waste of time.
12 step program to a better species....?

(5)Evolution is based off of prior adaptations, show me ANY mammal with wings..... wait, there arent any, if we evolved with wings, we wouldnt be humans but birds. It has nothing to do with spears and guns, it has to do with opposable thumbs for gripping and manipulation of all objects, not just weapons.

(6) Just because we think that no other animals do not have human style consciousness does not mean that they do not. To assume that one must be able to communicate with a spoken language in a hearing range available to humans (or with sound waves in general) is false assumption. Granted I do not think that such animals do not exist, but an argument based on that premise is fundamentally flawed.

(7)We can comprehend evolution, and we can manipulate it to our advantage. Knowledge does not make us exempt, it just gives us tremendous power, as well as responsibility.

(8)Once again, how can you prove that life in general only exists here, much less intelligent life. Worthless question/arguement. Fermi's paradox is flawed in that it assumes that any intelligent life MUST seek out humans and tell us they exist.

(9)We slaughter each other in competition for resources in order to perpetuate our own offspring. We've just gotten really really good at it being intelligent tool using humans.

(10)Once again, the Big Bang is only a theory, and as more and more information is learned about the universe in general, other competitive theories seem to have alot more credence.

(11)Drug abuse, he didnt evolve that way.

Posted by John D at May 22, 2002 09:34 PM

Well, actually, some mammals do have wings. They have evolved it at least twice, independently. One is the conventional bat (which are the order rodentia, like mice and rats, among other families) and the other are the flying foxes, which most of the evidence indicates are primates. or at least had primate ancestors.

Posted by Rand Simerg at May 22, 2002 10:11 PM

Time (and research) will tell how far you can stretch a Lupus. Considering the ten billion or so instructions in a chain of DNA and that only 3% account for species differentation... also the fact that very minor changes seem to switch on some macro variation... I imagine some really exotic breed of dog are still waiting to be discovered (and it still won't be evolution.) I see it as one of the millions of examples of magnificant design by a brilliant artist, engineer and craftman... and that humans alone reflect those qualities (although I wouldn't mind having an intelligent conversation with another species -- that snake in the garden would of caught me too!) Thanks Rand for providing the time and space for this forum.

Posted by ken anthony at May 23, 2002 08:07 AM

Well according to this article from Reuters, its possible that female choice went with brains over brawn when it came to selecting mates

http://www.madville.com/go.php?op=goo&lidd=8807

The X chromosome is largely responsible for the formation of nerve endings in the brain. It just maybe that human female instinct evolved to a point where they were inclined to carry the offspring of a male with a compatible X chromosome to foster a better brain for high level thinking. And that to me does make sense. Cause think about early woman in a primitive tribe. Way back when words and language were first being developed. A woman gets approached by one man and he says, "OOGA BOOOGA!" and then starts to do cart wheels and smash things with a stick. She thinks, well he's cute and all , but jeez is that the best pickup line he's got. Then, smarter man comes along and he says, "Hey there sweet thing" and then hands her a bouquet of meal worms. Well, then at that point she's head over heels and totally sold on his ability to observer, understand, and communicate.

Posted by Hefty at May 23, 2002 08:08 AM

Just because it's not a new species doesn't mean it's not evolution. Adaptation is adaptation, and selection is selection.

Posted by Rand Simberg at May 23, 2002 08:46 AM

The Big Bang is not necessarily, even in current theories, the beginning of it all. There's the whole idea of the multiverse (membranes, string-theory etc). There's even the widely accepted inflationary hypothesis, which occurs before the entire Big Bang. The Big Bang is more than anything is far back as the telescope can see.

I think the main difficulty in comprehension of evolution is not in how things changed in form but rather in the enormous changes like say, where did my spleen come from? Some of these evolutionary steps can probably be observed in contemporary animal life. Some of it can not, going back to the rapid evolutionary changes noted before. But when you think about this is not that amazing. Imagine the incredible increased survival potential of certain mutations, such as opposable thumbs, bicellular coordination (from which a step into multicellular is a matter of degree), and of course intelligence. A small group with such huge advantages would be able to propagate their genes at a tremendous rate, especially in a polygamous specie. This would explain the rapid evolutionary leaps. It probably wouldn't happen immediately: the offspring of the mutant, especially if its a recessive gene mutation, would be largely throwbacks. But many might carry the genes, reproduce, in a few generations their descendants mate and produce the mutation who has greater survival ability and greater reproductive success. The pattern continues, especially amongst a relatively small community, to the point where the dominant genetic mutation is dominant.

Posted by David Brown at May 23, 2002 10:22 AM

re: Ring Species.

Chihuahuas and Irish Wolfhounds can't interbreed. If they're still the same species becuase there are intermediate forms they can both breed with, would they suddenly not be if those dogs were all exterminated? That's nonsensical.

Also, note that Lions and Tigers can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. Are they the same species?

Posted by mike earl at May 23, 2002 11:49 AM

These examples just show that "species" is not as clean a concept as we'd like (though it's a lot better than "race.")

Posted by Rand Simberg at May 23, 2002 12:06 PM

Interestingly, the biblical kind tends to resolve these issues. Lions, and tigers and housecats are all of the same kind. Perhaps not scientifically rigorous, but perhaps understood in a conventional way.

Race, OTOH, is a ridiculous distinction (in most cases.) I've never met a white or black person (even an albino) they all seem to be shades of brown.

Posted by ken anthony at May 23, 2002 12:31 PM

The fossil record - most questions concerning it betray a gross misunderstanding of what what fossils are and how durable they are. We find then, generally (disregarding those cases when we're excavating for something else and stumble across them) for that brief time when they are exposed and before they erode. Fossils are extremely fragile and don't last long once geologic forces bring them to the surface. What's amazing is not how many "gaps" we find, but how many fossils we have recovered at all. If you want to play statistical games you could very well convince yourself that the odds of a specific fossil being discovered render it virtually impossible that it would be, in fact, discovered. To lengthen the odds further, try calculating the probability that a given organism will die intact in a location favorable enough that it will fossilize and remain instact for a few million years, and then be discovered by a human who recognizes it within the few months time it has before eroding away.

And as for "transition species," you could always claim some are missing, since evolution is a continuum and not a series of discrete steps.

Posted by Stephen Skubinna at May 23, 2002 01:26 PM

I have an intellectual issue with my minds acquiescence of evolution verses it just being continual adaptation. One of the premises behind the ?theory? of evolution is replacing long term adaptation with the word evolution by claiming the actual beginning. The primordial soup. Without the soup evolution is just extended adaptation. I know we have done many closed experiments trying to take elemental substances and duplicating the primal dawn of that soup but I cannot come to understand why we have touted such great successes. Only chemists that have also studied biology truly understand the results and we have a clear paradox to overcome. Every known attempt that was clearly guided by the sound science of geology says all matter decomposes into simple elements and or very simple compounds and I mean very simple literally. All the geological environmental models show the primordial soup would be under attack by decay and the break down of any complex molecules even if they had somehow appeared. I believe that this moment is yet undiscovered. We also have established that the harsher an environment is, the greater chances of that decay process to accelerate and have a ferocity all its own. In order for my mind to embrace evolution I must first embrace evolutions "creation". Why do we continually promote scientific theory as fact and accuse creationists of the same scientific heresy. Are we not guilty of the same acts of ?creationism? if we believe the primordial soup started everything? Is that not our ?GOD? of creation? If creationists challenge us and we hide, evade or lie they win over folks by the droves. Where are we in the great agora of great debate? Are we an Aristotle or a Judice?

Posted by Georgios at May 24, 2002 09:19 AM

What disturbs me most about Orrin Judd's questions is that several do not apply at all to random evolution, but only to an intelligent designer.

(5) If we developed those eyes because they gave us certain adaptive advantages, why didn't we develop wings too or claws or whatever?

Evolution is random. Why did God create man in his own image, and then give sharks a better immune system, better teeth, and longer lifespans? [Note -- by "better teeth" I do not mean "sharper." I mean that while while humans spent millennia suffering from abscesses, sharks had teeth which replaced themselves through life.]

Evolution is random. Why does God permit slaughter in His name?

Posted by John Nowak at May 24, 2002 09:26 AM

Three quick points:

1. Rand, doesn't your answer to question 1 suggest intelligent design? We choose which 'mutation' we want to keep and continue to breed it. We are in effect playing 'God' with respect to doggie evolution.

2. Shouldn't transition species be easier to find? Species moving from land-based to water-based would live in muddy, marshy areas which are from my understanding precisely the areas that are best for preserving remains and forming fossils. The argument isn't that not all transition species have been found, but that none have been found. One would be nice.

3. Made in God's image could have nothing to do with physical appearance, but has everything to do with emotional and intellectual capacity. Maybe that is how the range and depth of emotions are so much deeper in humans than in the rest of animal kingdom.

Just a couple of musings from a guy that thinks evolution works fine in theory, but communism works fine in theory too.

Posted by Joe at May 24, 2002 11:25 AM

No, breeding dogs is not intelligent design. It's intelligent selection. There are lots of selective evolutionary pressures. The fact that one of them (us) happens to be intelligent doesn't make it any less of an evolution. All living beings evolve in response to their environment, which includes other living creatures (including people).

Transition species *have* been found--anti-evolutionists just don't want to recognize them. ALL species are transition species. Think of amphibians. They're a transition species between a pure water dweller and a land dweller.

And it may be that our emotions are deeper than other animals 'cuz God made us, but there are evolutionary reasons for it as well, and "'cuz God made us" is an unsatisfactory answer if you're doing science.

Posted by Rand Simberg at May 24, 2002 12:42 PM

A one word definition of science is 'measurement.' Anything from speculation to theory does not qualify as science unless it is objectively measured.

Meaning no disrespect (and please forgive me my passion) to say that all species are transitional is an article of faith. For it to be scientifically objective, you need to make definitions, show mechanism and give examples.

IMHO, if we can connect Kevin Bacon to any other actor ;) We aught to have one example (and only one is needed for proof) of two different species and show, at least the potential of, one becoming the other (based on a sound statistical analysis if not direct evidence.)

People that trot out bacteria and resistance to antibiotics are not demonstrating evolution. They are demonstrating natural selection. This only shows the amazing diversity of genetic differentation already existing in the code for that species.

Natural selection is not evolution. It is only a *potential* mechanism (and only when combined with mutation) for evolution. Also, it's the only one ever offered, AFAIK.

As a matter of fact, this leads to a useful and simple definition of species. A species being unique if it can not be produced through animal husbandry.

Sincere people can be found on all sides of an issue, but there is rampant fraud surrounding this particular issue with those that claim scientific objectivity (which I suspect to be more related to prestige and dollars than science.) The worst part is it does a real diservice to others that are not experts in this field but would neverless like to have an informed laymens understanding of things. Blog on...

Posted by ken anthony at May 25, 2002 06:56 PM

Has anyone seen the news on these new computer logic patterns being compared to all things natural?

Posted by Georgios at May 31, 2002 09:34 AM

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