Sorry Evolution Again

[The_Barbarian]

The only folks I hear saying that God wasn’t behind evolution are extreme fundamentalists and extreme atheists.

Most people who accept evolution think God did it. Notice the dead silence when I asked people to tell of of textbooks or schools that taught evolution is blind chance?

I believe they know better. Why they say such things is beyond me. The truth matters.

 

[edwest2]

"Ever since 1996, when Pope John Paul II said that evolution (a term he did not define) was ‘more than just a hypothesis,’ defenders of neo-Darwinian dogma have often invoked the supposed acceptance - or at least acquiescence - of the Roman Catholic Church when they defend their theory as somehow compatible with Christian faith.

“But this is not true. The Catholic Church, while leaving to science many details about the history of life on earth, proclaims that by the light of reason the human intellect can readily and clearly discern purpose and design in the natural world, including the world of living things.”

• Cardinal Schoenborn

Man is not the result of random mutation and natural selection working without guidance or purpose. Without God working as a direct causal agent, evolution is impossible as described in the textbook.

Science has been compromised and distorted.

Peace,
Ed

 

[The_Barbarian]

"Ever since 1996, when Pope John Paul II said that evolution (a term he did not define) was ‘more than just a hypothesis,’ defenders of neo-Darwinian dogma have often invoked the supposed acceptance - or at least acquiescence - of the Roman Catholic Church when they defend their theory as somehow compatible with Christian faith.

“They” would include Pope Benedict XVI, who has said it is virtually certain.

But this is not true.

It certainly is. He wrote it in the Report of the International Theological Commission.

All things, including evolution are impossible without God. But there is no sign of God the Tinkerer in nature. It all looks like creation, not design.

 

[ricmat]

Lets calculate how many chances homo erectus got to become homo sapiens or habilis or whoever.

2 million years @ 20 yrs per generation

5 generations per 100 yrs

50 per thousand, or, 50000 per million yrs

So we are looking at 100000 generations for 2 million yrs.

thenobes, thanks for your response.

Looks reasonable so far.

Each generation could produce, lets say, for sustaining the population, 10 offspring, of whom 2 would survive to maturity.

if 2 million people were in the total population, then approximately 1 million pairings would be available a generation.

But how many in each generation passed along the “new improved” DNA from the very last mutation? That would be a lot less than a million, just 2 in the second generation, 4 in the next, etc. according to your assumption above.

In general, it seems to me that a better way to analyze this is to determine how many separate mutations are required for the total transition, and what order is required (if any). I don’t know that number or what the mutations are since I’m not a biologist, but certainly those guys know (LOL).

Let’s say that there are (to make the example easy and demonstrate the method) 100,000 mutations all of which must occur in a particular order. That would mean 1 specific mutation in each of the 100,000 generations from A to B.

Since DNA is enormously complex, the chance of ANY mutation accidentally being beneficial is far less than it being accidentally detrimental. After all DNA represents a history of successful mutations leading to “being X.” Almost any mutation is likely to break something that already works, not add some new feature to make it better.

So the mutation process must not just provide the 1 essential mutation for that particular generation, it must not allow any destructive mutations in the same individual. Can you see this happening, by random occurrence, 100,000 times in sequence? A trillion chances, as you suggest doesn’t come close to being enough.

Now I actually can see a scenario in which the above occurs. It is similar to what happens in selective breeding, or genetic engineering. But selective breeders and genetic engineers don’t work by random trial and error, since this is not efficient time wise.

The scenario that works is the opposite of random - intelligent guidance per a plan.

 

[The_Barbarian]

But how many in each generation passed along the “new improved” DNA from the very last mutation? That would be a lot less than a million, just 2 in the second generation, 4 in the next, etc. according to your assumption above.

Yep. In 21 generations, about 2 million of them.

In general, it seems to me that a better way to analyze this is to determine how many separate mutations are required for the total transition, and what order is required (if any). I don’t know that number or what the mutations are since I’m not a biologist, but certainly those guys know (LOL).

We have some idea. One way is to take the total genetic difference between H. sapiens and H. neandertalis, and divide by half.

Let’s say that there are (to make the example easy and demonstrate the method) 100,000 mutations all of which must occur in a particular order.

But that’s not how it works. Many of these can happen an all sorts of order, since they aren’t tied to each other. In fact, they can be happening simultaneously in the population, with the “good” ones accumulating in various individuals.

That would mean 1 specific mutation in each of the 100,000 generations from A to B.

That would be a very conservative estimate. Each of us have several.

So the mutation process must not just provide the 1 essential mutation for that particular generation, it must not allow any destructive mutations in the same individual. Can you see this happening, by random occurrence, 100,000 times in sequence?

If it had to happen that way, it would never happen. Fortunately, it doesn’t. Remember millions of individuals, each producing many millions of mutations. The vast majority of them don’t do much. A few are harmful. And a tiny few each generation are useful.

Now I actually can see a scenario in which the above occurs. It is similar to what happens in selective breeding, or genetic engineering.

It’s called “natural selection.” And it works just like selective breeding.

But selective breeders and genetic engineers don’t work by random trial and error, since this is not efficient time wise.

Neither does natural selection. That was Darwin’s great discovery. No planning required.

It does require that the changes must be accessible in limited steps, and great changes requiring large numbers of mutations in specific order are rather unlikely. Which is what we see in nature.

 

[hecd2]

My lack of a compelling competing hypothesis does not de-facto make your speculation correct. What an interesting but absurd notion for a scientist to come up with.

You do seem to have difficulty in distinguishing between the process of speculation and the process of reasoning based on evidence. What I am doing, as a scientist, is to reach a conclusion based on strong evidence. That conclusion is made more secure by the fact that neither you nor anyone else is able to come up with an alternative explanation that fits the evidence. Here again is the evidence that I presented:

• a human and chimpanzee Vitamin C synthesis gene broken in exactly the same way in human and chimp,
• a large number of other olfactory genes broken in identical fashion in chimp and human,
• identical endogenous retroviruses in the same genomic location in human and chimp
• a large number of common transposons in the two species.
  This is the way science works. Our conclusions are based on the evidence. In this case, multiple lines of independent evidence confirm the hypothesis that humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor. The fact that neither you nor anyone else is able to propose an alternative explanation for the evidence, increases our confidence that the conclusion is correct. This is scientific reasoning, not speculation. The fact that you call it speculation and that you are unwilling or unable to engage in the specifics reveal your bias.

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[rossum]

But how many in each generation passed along the “new improved” DNA from the very last mutation? That would be a lot less than a million, just 2 in the second generation, 4 in the next, etc. according to your assumption above.

Not quite. Each couple has an average of ten children, of whom two on average get to maturity. With an advantageous mutation natural selection kicks in so they have slightly more than two children reaching adulthood while the other couples have very slightly less than two per generation to keep the averages the same. I did a quick spreadsheet to show how the advantage between 2.00 mature children per generation and 2.01 (a 0.5% advantage) grows over the generations:

Generation    2.00      2.01      Difference
--------------------------------------------
   1            2       2.01         0.01
   2            4       4.04         0.04
   3            8       8.12         0.12
   4           16      16.32         0.32
   5           32      32.81         0.81
  10         1024    1076.37        52.37
  20      1048576    1158567       109991
  50     1.13E+015  1.44E+015   3.19E+014
 100     1.27E+030  2.09E+030   8.20E+029
 500     3.27E+150  3.96E+151   3.64E+151
 700     5.26E+210  1.73E+212   1.67E+212

Even a small reproductive advantage grows larger, just like compound interest, as the beneficial mutation spreads through the population.

Let’s say that there are (to make the example easy and demonstrate the method) 100,000 mutations all of which must occur in a particular order. That would mean 1 specific mutation in each of the 100,000 generations from A to B.

No. One mutations could be spreading in East Africa while another is just getting going in Southern Africa. Mutations can occur simultaneously in different parts of the population. Some mutations might need to be in order, but many of them can run in parallel.

Since DNA is enormously complex, the chance of ANY mutation accidentally being beneficial is far less than it being accidentally detrimental. After all DNA represents a history of successful mutations leading to “being X.” Almost any mutation is likely to break something that already works, not add some new feature to make it better.

The great majority of mutations are neutral. Most (but not all) of the rest are deleterious. On average humans have around 100 to 150 mutations each. Of these only about five have any effect. Beneficial mutations may be rare, but with many mutations per member of the population and the number of generations involved even an unlikely mutation is going to happen, or even if it does not a different mutation with roughly the same effect can happen. For example humans have evolved various different ways to respond to malaria. Not just one single mutation but a number of different possible mutations can reduce our vulnerability to malaria. There is not just a single target to aim at but a number of similar targets, any one of which will do.

rossum

 

[hecd2]

But how many in each generation passed along the “new improved” DNA from the very last mutation? That would be a lot less than a million, just 2 in the second generation, 4 in the next, etc. according to your assumption above.

What you are trying to do is to refute the formal calculations of population biology and since these are based on a far deeper understanding of genetics and statistics than you seem to have, you won’t do it. You seem to think that some schoolboy analysis of the case based on various misinterpretations of the science will undermine the case of the professionals. That is not going to happen. To begin with, the rate of observed mutations in complex living organisms, including humans, is entirely consistent with the difference in the genomes between living organisms such as humans and chimps, if one applies the statistics of population biology to the preservation and fixing of mutations of various degrees of fitness and if one accepts the palaeontological evidence for the divergence of the chimp and human lineages at about 6 million years BP. So there is no fundamental inconsistency in terms of generation and fixing the differences between human and chimp genomes in 6 million years.

In general, it seems to me that a better way to analyze this is to determine how many separate mutations are required for the total transition, and what order is required (if any). I don’t know that number or what the mutations are since I’m not a biologist, but certainly those guys know (LOL).

No they don’t with regard to H erectus, since there is no source of H erectus DNA. But we have sequenced Homo sapiens and Pan troglodytes, and so we know what the difference in those genomes is: 40 million in 3 billion nucleotides. That’s about 20 million in each lineage since the common ancestor 6 million or about 400,000 generations ago, or about 50 fixed mutations per generation in the entire genome. (Note that many of these mutations are synonymous, or otherwise neutral and many occur in non-functional regions of the genome and so are not essential to the difference between chimps and humans) Every ape (including humans) carries about 100 mutations in their entire genome (about 4 mutations in the protein coding part of the genome) compared with its immediate parents, and the typical population size would have been between 100,000 and 1 million individuals, making between 10 million and 100 million mutations available per generation of which about 100 or between 0.001% and 0.0001% of the total available were fixed per generation.

All of this is entirely consistent with well understood population biology.

You accused me, quite irrationally and incorrectly of indulging in speculation. I wasn’t doing so, but that is precisely what you are doing now.

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[edwest2]

“They” would include Pope Benedict XVI, who has said it is virtually certain.

It certainly is. He wrote it in the Report of the International Theological Commission.

All things, including evolution are impossible without God. But there is no sign of God the Tinkerer in nature. It all looks like creation, not design.

See the article “Finding Design in Nature” by Cardinal Schoenborn.

Peace,
Ed

 

[Namesake]

See the article “Finding Design in Nature” by Cardinal Schoenborn.

Peace,
Ed

This guy doesn’t seem to have credentials in biology.

 

[edwest2]

This guy doesn’t seem to have credentials in biology.

I find him a credible spokesman on the issue. As the Church has taught for a long time, man, through his own natural reason, can detect God. But science is caught in the throes of idolatry - the mind of man is the ultimate.

If truth cannot contradict truth between science and religion, it must flow in both directions, not just one. As Cardinal Schoenborn wrote in that article: the Church is in the position of having to defend reason itself.

Peace,
Ed

 

[ricmat]

You accused me, quite irrationally and incorrectly of indulging in speculation. I wasn’t doing so, but that is precisely what you are doing now.

Alec

You and others have frequently said things like “If you want to prove evolution is wrong, you need to put forth a better theory of your own.” My response was primarily to that line of thinking. If you weren’t “going there” (or if it actually wasn’t you that said it) then I apologize.

Yes, I was speculating. The difference here is that I admit that I’m speculating.

You say that DNA is the carrier of all information from one generation to the next (and I also say that this is true). And you claim that mutations to the DNA is what causes change. Again, I agree.

But you claim, with authority, that e.g. homo erectus (and back much further) are antecedants of homo sapiens but have no DNA from erectus to compare. And you don’t know what DNA mutations must take place to go from erectus to sapiens, nor do you know in what sequence the mutations must occur. You actually didn’t observe ANY of the changes, but you know that evolution did it, somehow. This Alec, is speculation.

In a court of law, cases can be made on circumstancial evidence. But everyone knows that there is a chance that he/she is actually not guilty, even if they find he/she guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt.” You have a circumstancial case for evolution but that’s not the same as Truth. Your problem is that you won’t say it’s a circumstantial case. You insist that it is Truth.

I’d like to remind you that I agree with almost every aspect of evolution (more or less as you present it), my primary concern being only the amount of time that you claim it to be done in. It is obvious that manipulation of DNA by an intelligent agent could bring about the “observed” A to B changes in a much faster fashion than random mutation. As I said previously, I’m open to arguments that can convince me that it can happen in the claimed time frame using only random mutations.

 

[hecd2]

I find him a credible spokesman on the issue.

But you are not competent to judge Schoenborn from a scientific point of view. Not only does he misunderstand the fundamentals of biology (at least in this article and his First Things article), he also fails to understand and contextualise the various meanings of the term “random”, he ignores demonstrable randomness in human reproduction while condemning the concept of randomness in evolutionary biology, he selectively criticises biology while giving the physical sciences a biased pass, and he utterly fails to grasp the methods and purpose of science. What results is a confused and ill-supported thesis that has been thoroughly refuted. You might find him credible, but knowledgeable commentators do not. His ideas, as expressed in those two articles have zero influence amongst the scientific community (including the Catholic section of that community). And it might well be that he has moved on from those naive and ill-considered views, leaving you behind to repeatedly and tediously quote his muddled thesis.

Alec
evolutionpages.com/Schoenborn_critique.htm

 

[hecd2]

You and others have frequently said things like “If you want to prove evolution is wrong, you need to put forth a better theory of your own.” My response was primarily to that line of thinking. If you weren’t “going there” (or if it actually wasn’t you that said it) then I apologize.

In science, if the evidence compellingly supports a particular hypothesis, and there is no alternative hypothesis that fits the evidence, then the conclusion is that the hypothesis supported by the evidence is correct. That is how science works.

Yes, I was speculating. The difference here is that I admit that I’m speculating.

But I wasn’t. I was presenting compelling evidence for the common ancestry of humans and chimpanzees that you are not willing to engage in whatsoever. You have not said a single word about any of the evidence that I presented, which is merely a sub-set of all the evidence that exists, that shows that humans and chimps share a common ancestor. Don’t feel too bad about not being able to present even a glimmering of an alternative hypothesis that fits the evidence. No-one else can either. That’s how we know, beyond reasonable doubt, that the concept of common ancestry between chimps and humans is correct. You are best advised not to call it speculation - it shows your bias too blatantly.

You say that DNA is the carrier of all information from one generation to the next (and I also say that this is true). And you claim that mutations to the DNA is what causes change. Again, I agree.

But you claim, with authority, that e.g. homo erectus (and back much further) are antecedants of homo sapiens but have no DNA from erectus to compare

Well DNA is not the only evidence that we have - in fact we have only been able to sequence complete genomes for a few years - are you suggesting that evolutionary biology was unable to make any claims until the last few years? That’s nonsense - there is other evidence including anatomical, physiological and biochemical homology, nested hierarchies, biogeography (and in the case of Homo, technologies and tools).
.

And you don’t know what DNA mutations must take place to go from erectus to sapiens, nor do you know in what sequence the mutations must occur. You actually didn’t observe ANY of the changes, but you know that evolution did it, somehow. This Alec, is speculation.

No - and the fact that you repeatedly call it speculation shows your creationist bias (which I am sure you will deny, but which is plain for all to see). Your argument boils down to an assertion that all historical sciences (evolutionary biology, palaeontology, geology, cosmology) are mere speculation and that assertion is nonsense.

Furthermore, you are the one who introduced H erectus, not me. I was talking about the common ancestry of chimp and human. Both have had their genomes sequenced and the sequences have produced absolutely compelling evidence of common ancestry (a common ancestry that was already fully accepted for many other anatomical and physiological reasons). With regard to H erectus, it is very probable that it is an ancestor of modern humans for palaeantological, anatomical and geograhic reasons - H erectus gives way to archaic H sapiens in the fossil record and it is postcranially almost modern with some primitive cranial features and a smaller brain.

If your criticism is that there is not enough time for the human genome to evolve from the human/chimp ancestor, I have pointed out the the genomic difference between chimp and human in the time since the divergence is completely consistent with known mutation rates and population biology - more evidence which you have ignored rather than discussing (or at least acknowledging)

I’d like to remind you that I agree with almost every aspect of evolution (more or less as you present it), my primary concern being only the amount of time that you claim it to be done in. It is obvious that manipulation of DNA by an intelligent agent could bring about the “observed” A to B changes in a much faster fashion than random mutation

Of course. It could bring it about instantaneously. But a) there is no need to call on this hypothetical intelligence because there is quite enough time to achieve the genomic difference between chimp and human assuming random mutations and natural selection; and b) if an intelligent agent was involved, we need to know, from a scientific point of view, how that agent evolved, what his DNA sequence was etc… Oh!! I get it - you don’t mean an intelligent agent at all. What you really mean is that God, who has no evolutionary history nor DNA, magicked humans into existence - a hypothesis that is neither required by the evidence nor admissible in science.

As I said previously, I’m open to arguments that can convince me that it can happen in the claimed time frame using only random mutations.

I gave you some. You ignored them completely. Par for the course.

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[edwest2]

But you are not competent to judge Schoenborn from a scientific point of view. Not only does he misunderstand the fundamentals of biology (at least in this article and his First Things article), he also fails to understand and contextualise the various meanings of the term “random”, he ignores demonstrable randomness in human reproduction while condemning the concept of randomness in evolutionary biology, he selectively criticises biology while giving the physical sciences a biased pass, and he utterly fails to grasp the methods and purpose of science. What results is a confused and ill-supported thesis that has been thoroughly refuted. You might find him credible, but knowledgeable commentators do not. His ideas, as expressed in those two articles have zero influence amongst the scientific community (including the Catholic section of that community). And it might well be that he has moved on from those naive and ill-considered views, leaving you behind to repeatedly and tediously quote his muddled thesis.

Alec
evolutionpages.com/Schoenborn_critique.htm

And a complementary statement from Pope Benedict:

“Ultimately it comes down to the alternative: What came first? Creative Reason, the Creator Spirit who makes all things and gives them growth, or Unreason, which, lacking any meaning, strangely enough brings forth a mathematically ordered cosmos, as well as man and his reason. The latter, however, would then be nothing more than a chance result of evolution and thus, in the end, equally meaningless. As Christians, we say: I believe in God the Father, the Creator of heaven and earth. I believe in the Creator Spirit. We believe that at the beginning of everything is the eternal Word, with reason and not Unreason.”

insightscoop.typepad.com/2004/2008/10/pope-benedict-xvi-defends-the-faiths-understanding-of-creation.html

Science is incomplete. It requires other areas of reason that we still need.

Peace,
Ed

 

[The_Barbarian]

Science is incomplete.

So is plumbing. Except for the purpose for which it was made by men. So it is with science. It’s fine, if you don’t try to extend it beyond it’s place.

It requires other areas of reason that we still need.

So does plumbing. Is there a point?

 

[edwest2]

Yes. The point is the biology textbook theory of evolution is being swallowed whole by a gullible public. It is grossly incomplete in that the information the Church has tells us it does not happen by itself. It can’t.

Both Cardinal Schoenborn and Pope Benedict have been trying to explain it for a while now. Too many have been fooled into believing something that leaves out critical information.

Since most leading scientists reject God, and the current fad is anti-theism, too many people think human beings are just bags of biological material, nothing more. This is nihilism.

Peace,
Ed

 

[The_Barbarian]

Yes. The point is the biology textbook theory of evolution is being swallowed whole by a gullible public. It is grossly incomplete in that the information the Church has tells us it does not happen by itself. It can’t.

Neither can chemical reactions or weather. But for some reason, it doesn’t offend you that we teach chemistry or meteorology.

Both Cardinal Schoenborn and Pope Benedict have been trying to explain it for a while now.

Benedict had it right from the beginning. Schoenborn needed a little educating, but his “revised” statement seems to have it right.

But that isn’t evolutionary theory. You seem to be displacing your anger here.

 

[Namesake]

Yes. The point is the biology textbook theory of evolution is being swallowed whole by a gullible public.

That just isn’t true. Most surveys show less than half of people in the USA accept evolution theory. That is one reason why we have to keep educating people. It isn’t a good thing to have a nation of people who reject valid and valuable science. It would be quite destructive to have creationism or ID taught in science classes.

 

[reggieM]

Certainly if the right mutations were forced to occur at the right place and time, and perhaps even in fortuitous combinations (none of which is random), then such an evolutionary process would have a much better chance of happening in a limited time (such as a million years). This is where I currently stand.

Evolutionists restort to arguments from ignorance and arguments from incredulity in those cases.

Identical features, supposedly, can appear by either:

Convergent evolution (same features, different ancestries).
Self-organization (same features are created by self-organization and not Darwinian process)
… or Standard Evolution (same features from common ancestor).

What are the mathematics behind the probability of each of those? Is there a level a improbability beyond which it can be said that “it was impossible for evolution to create such a thing”?

The answer to that depends on what the evolutionist wants to prove.

In some cases, evolutionists will accept no improbability that is too much for evolution to work with. In other cases (as the same features appearing in chimps and humans), it is considered “too improbable” that the same features evolved in both species independently.

Again, this is not hard science but rather speculation, bluffing, conjecture and story-telling.

When all else fails, the multiverse theory explains everything.

We just happen to live in a universe where everything happened the way it did. There is an infinite number of universes so nothing can be said to be outside the limits of the probable. That theory was developed precisely because many of the claims of evolutionary theory are too improbable to accept if there is “only one universe”.

Thus, evolution cannot be falsified. “Evolution of the gaps” has already explained everything, including those aspects of nature that we know nothing about.

The molecular development of my brain has enabled me to reject many of the claims of evolutionary theory, while the molecules in evolutionists brains force them to accept those claims.