E
edwest2
Guest
I’ll stick with Humani Generis (1950). I invite you to read the last paragraph of this article:
tnr.com/article/books/seeing-and-believing
Peace,
Ed
- Status
tnr.com/article/books/seeing-and-believing
Peace,
Ed
I
itinerant1
Guest
I gave my collection to a cousin who was a biology major. I didn’t have the time for everything when I ventured off into philosophy studies. Now I have time for nature studies again, along with philosophy, and I sort of regret having given away my collections. I just started nature photography and I’m seriously considering starting new insect collections. I have always had a love for entomology and microbiology. I recently bought a fairly powerful microscope and a microbiology text that cost me over $120. It seems well worth the price, though.
If any one is interested in microscopy and photography, check out SA’s Illuminating the Lilliputian: 10 Bioscapes Photo Contest Winners Revealed Simply amazing!. Don’t forget to scroll down on the page with the Spirogyra photo to see video of algae having sex. It’s sort of an X-rated film for biologists.
I have no more info about Drosophila. I may be able to follow up on it. In any case your response to everything, including about the Drosophila, is helpful.
I
itinerant1
Guest
Okay. I will certainly read the article.
H
hecd2
Guest
So have I, and I can’t help but point out the irony of this. Just in the last few months you have posted the following false statements about scientific research in an attempt to persuade your fellow-Catholics that there is something wrong with evolutionary theory:
- All antibiotic resistance in bacteria is pre-existing and is simply shared round species by lateral gene transfer - antibiotic resistance does not evolve (ignoring the fact that the reason soil bacteria are naturally resistant to antibiotics is because those antibiotics are present in the soil, and that antibiotic resistance and other fitness traits have been shown to evolve in bacteria, and completely misrepresenting the paper by D’Costa et al)
- Interstitial telomeric sequences in chromosomes should be at speciation breakpoints, but their actual genomic locations are evidence against common descent (your misunderstanding of this Farre et al paper is monumental)
- The evolutionary link between theropod dinosaurs and birds has been disproven (a factually false claim that you repeated even after having been corrected)
- Scientists claim that modern apes descended from humans (a bizarre misinterpretation of the extensive publications on A ramidus)
- Dawkins has written a book on how to raise your kids without God (he hasn’t)
- A rather technical paper on galactic luminous and dark matter surface density exploded your baloney detection meter (even though you had no idea then and have no idea now what the paper is about).
Alec
evolutionpages.com
H
hecd2
Guest
Indeed so - and Hawks et al claim to show that the only possibility of a bottleneck in the ancestry of modern humans is 2 million years ago at the emergence of Homo erectus and no such bottleneck has occurred more recently in Homo sapiens or in the hominim species which are ancestral to Homo sapiens sensu stricto; and thus there is no possibility of literal Adam and Eve.
Other work shows that the lineage leading to modern humans cannot have passed through a bottleneck of two since our divergence from the chimp lineage. The exact time for the emergence of fully human cognition is irrelevant because the argument stands regardless of when one regards fully human individuals as appearing.
Alec
evolutionpages.com
S
StAnastasia
Guest
It’s also very disheartening that Ed continues to lie about those of us both who are Roman Catholic and who accept the cogency of the theory of evolution. He repeatedly and uncharitably portrays us as atheists or unbelievers merely masquerading as Catholics in order to mislead other Catholics. This calumnious behaviour is despicable.
StAnastasia
S
StAnastasia
Guest
Nor need it have passed through such a bottleneck, Alec. Many Catholic theologians emphasize the symbolic nature of the “Adam and Eve” story, without insisting on a woodenly literal interpretation of it.
StAnastasia
I
itinerant1
Guest
This greatly concerns me. If Ed West disagrees with evolution theory he should present facts only, or at least reasonable arguments on his behalf. But he should certainly not make statements that are obviously false. That’s just not acceptable. I think Ed should address this complaint.
V
vjtorley
Guest
Hi everyone,
I’d just like to discuss the Catholic position on monogenism before I respond to some of Alec’s comments on the subject.
For Catholics, the Church’s teaching is clear enough. There was a real Fall, and there was a first man, Adam. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church puts it:
374 The first man was not only created good, but was also established in friendship with his Creator and in harmony with himself and with the creation around him, in a state that would be surpassed only by the glory of the new creation in Christ.
375 The Church, interpreting the symbolism of biblical language in an authentic way, in the light of the New Testament and Tradition, teaches that our first parents, Adam and Eve, were constituted in an original “state of holiness and justice”. This grace of original holiness was “to share in. . .divine life”.
376 By the radiance of this grace all dimensions of man’s life were confirmed. As long as he remained in the divine intimacy, man would not have to suffer or die. The inner harmony of the human person, the harmony between man and woman, and finally the harmony between the first couple and all creation, comprised the state called “original justice”.
416 By his sin Adam, as the first man, lost the original holiness and justice he had received from God, not only for himself but for all human beings.
417 Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called “original sin”.
418 As a result of original sin, human nature is weakened in its powers, subject to ignorance, suffering and the domination of death, and inclined to sin (this inclination is called “concupiscence”).
Some theologians have proposed reinterpretations of the teaching that there was a first man, in order to accommodate recent scientific findings that seem to indicate that the human population never fell below 1,000 (or at the very minimum, 500) at any stage in human history.
For instance, it has been suggested that Adam was simply the first hominid to have been infused with a rational soul, and that over a period of time (say, a few centuries), other hominids living in the same population as Adam were infused with rational souls following Adam’s Fall. Thus on this scenario, Adam, Eve and their descendants would have always been part of a larger population who were biologically of the same species as themselves, but who lacked rational souls. Over the course of centuries, God could have gradually infused more and more of these hominids with rational souls, until the entire population consisted of rational individuals. This process of ensoulment would have been unnoticeable to a biologist, as the rational soul is immaterial.
Another suggestion is that Adam was simply the designated leader of a tribe of hominids, all endowed with rational souls, and that the members of his tribe, by acquiescing in his decision, brought the consequences of Adam’s Fall upon themselves. Any noble individuals who may have disagreed with Adam and Co. would have been promptly bludgeoned to death, so that there would be no living descendants of sinless individuals in the world today.
In both scenarios, Adam’s genes could certainly have spread to the whole human race by now - just as Genghis Khan’s are supposed to have done throughout Asia.
Both scenarios preserve the key notions of a first man, a Fall which affects everyone living today, and our inheritance of original sin from Adam.
I would be extremely loath to call either scenario heretical, but both are skating on very thin theological ice, especially the first. The problem with the first scenario is that it involves lots of hominids in the larger population, who were perhaps related to but not descended from Adam, suddenly receiving rational souls from God (making them people) and automatically becoming liable to death, suffering and the other effects of the Fall, even though they were not descendants of Adam and therefore could not have inherited anything from Adam (such as original sin). Such a view falls foul of Pius XII’s condemnation in Humani Generis:
For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents.
The second scenario seems to propose the condemned view that “Adam represents a certain number of first parents.” But since it could be argued that insofar as only Adam, the designated leader made the fateful decision we refer to as the Fall, the others merely acquiescing in it later, I guess I’d have to regard it as a theological possibility.
But there’s a scientific catch with the second scenario: tribes back in those days were fairly small. As far as I know, none of them numbered 1,000 individuals (which Alec maintains is about as low as we’ve gone at any time in the past).
Anyway, enough theologizing. In my next post, I’d like to return to Alec’s comments.
Best wishes,
Vincent
I’d just like to discuss the Catholic position on monogenism before I respond to some of Alec’s comments on the subject.
For Catholics, the Church’s teaching is clear enough. There was a real Fall, and there was a first man, Adam. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church puts it:
374 The first man was not only created good, but was also established in friendship with his Creator and in harmony with himself and with the creation around him, in a state that would be surpassed only by the glory of the new creation in Christ.
375 The Church, interpreting the symbolism of biblical language in an authentic way, in the light of the New Testament and Tradition, teaches that our first parents, Adam and Eve, were constituted in an original “state of holiness and justice”. This grace of original holiness was “to share in. . .divine life”.
376 By the radiance of this grace all dimensions of man’s life were confirmed. As long as he remained in the divine intimacy, man would not have to suffer or die. The inner harmony of the human person, the harmony between man and woman, and finally the harmony between the first couple and all creation, comprised the state called “original justice”.
416 By his sin Adam, as the first man, lost the original holiness and justice he had received from God, not only for himself but for all human beings.
417 Adam and Eve transmitted to their descendants human nature wounded by their own first sin and hence deprived of original holiness and justice; this deprivation is called “original sin”.
418 As a result of original sin, human nature is weakened in its powers, subject to ignorance, suffering and the domination of death, and inclined to sin (this inclination is called “concupiscence”).
Some theologians have proposed reinterpretations of the teaching that there was a first man, in order to accommodate recent scientific findings that seem to indicate that the human population never fell below 1,000 (or at the very minimum, 500) at any stage in human history.
For instance, it has been suggested that Adam was simply the first hominid to have been infused with a rational soul, and that over a period of time (say, a few centuries), other hominids living in the same population as Adam were infused with rational souls following Adam’s Fall. Thus on this scenario, Adam, Eve and their descendants would have always been part of a larger population who were biologically of the same species as themselves, but who lacked rational souls. Over the course of centuries, God could have gradually infused more and more of these hominids with rational souls, until the entire population consisted of rational individuals. This process of ensoulment would have been unnoticeable to a biologist, as the rational soul is immaterial.
Another suggestion is that Adam was simply the designated leader of a tribe of hominids, all endowed with rational souls, and that the members of his tribe, by acquiescing in his decision, brought the consequences of Adam’s Fall upon themselves. Any noble individuals who may have disagreed with Adam and Co. would have been promptly bludgeoned to death, so that there would be no living descendants of sinless individuals in the world today.
In both scenarios, Adam’s genes could certainly have spread to the whole human race by now - just as Genghis Khan’s are supposed to have done throughout Asia.
Both scenarios preserve the key notions of a first man, a Fall which affects everyone living today, and our inheritance of original sin from Adam.
I would be extremely loath to call either scenario heretical, but both are skating on very thin theological ice, especially the first. The problem with the first scenario is that it involves lots of hominids in the larger population, who were perhaps related to but not descended from Adam, suddenly receiving rational souls from God (making them people) and automatically becoming liable to death, suffering and the other effects of the Fall, even though they were not descendants of Adam and therefore could not have inherited anything from Adam (such as original sin). Such a view falls foul of Pius XII’s condemnation in Humani Generis:
For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents.
The second scenario seems to propose the condemned view that “Adam represents a certain number of first parents.” But since it could be argued that insofar as only Adam, the designated leader made the fateful decision we refer to as the Fall, the others merely acquiescing in it later, I guess I’d have to regard it as a theological possibility.
But there’s a scientific catch with the second scenario: tribes back in those days were fairly small. As far as I know, none of them numbered 1,000 individuals (which Alec maintains is about as low as we’ve gone at any time in the past).
Anyway, enough theologizing. In my next post, I’d like to return to Alec’s comments.
Best wishes,
Vincent
G
grannymh
Guest
Tim190,
I’m lost. What is the it that you are referring to? What exactly has been disproved?
Thank you.
G
grannymh
Guest
Personally, I think that just about anything could have happened in the ancestry of modern humans or in the lineage leading to modern humans because both these periods are concerned with anatomy.
V
vjtorley
Guest
Hi everyone,
I’d like to address some of Alec’s remarks about an earlier post of mine on monogenism.
If you are going to accept Hawks et al as an authority, then you have to give up the idea that there is a minimal bottleneck at any time in human ancestry after 2 million years BP (and there is no direct evidence for a minimal bottleneck then - merely that the evidence, in their view, doesn’t preclude one).
You then have a number of problems to deal with if you are going to associate this bottleneck with a literal Adam and Eve:
With all due respect, Alec, I don’t think Homo ergaster/erectus was as dumb as you make him out to be. Homo erectus seems to have had a humanlike Broca’s area in his brain, and no physical impediments to speech. (One specimen formerly found to have been incapable of speech, the Turkana boy, is now known to have suffered from stunted vertebral growth, which restricted its breathing and therefore its ability to produce speech.) According to the Wikipedia article on Homo ergaster:
It is certainly recognised by endocasts that H. habilis had a significant mode of communication (though its hyoid and construction of the ear do not support spoken language), and that *H. ergaster *had a more advanced form of this communicative neurology. It is therefore certainly conceivable that H. ergaster had the ability to use what could be called language.
Don’t forget, too, that Homo floresiensis, who was closely related to *Homo erectus * but whose brain size was a mere 417 cubic centimeters, was capable of building boats that could travel 50 kilometers, as there was no other way of getting to the island of Flores.
Glenn Morton has argues that *Homo erectus *was capable of planning ahead at least four days in advance (see Planning ahead – article in PSCF at home.entouch.net/dmd/planningahead.htm ) – unlike chimps who can only plan 20 minutes ahead.
Morton also argues that Homo erectus fed, and took care of totally immobilized individuals who were suffering from an excess of vitamin A, and kept them warm at night (see *The Compassionate Homo erectus * by Glenn Morton at home.entouch.net/dmd/compass.htm ). Chimps never show this kind of compassion.
As regards lithic technology, the reluctance of Homo erectus to innovate might simply be due to living in small groups (sometimes two heads are better than one, when it comes to innovation). For that matter, I remember reading that Neanderthal man’s tools stayed pretty much the same over a 50,000-year period at one site in France, and I’m sure you’d consider him human.
In any event, the key question for religious believers is: did Homo erectus have the intellectual wherewithal to believe in God? Well, why not?
I should add that many authorities (including Hawks et al.) classify Homo erectus as belonging to the same species as Homo sapiens.
Best wishes,
Vincent Torley
I’d like to address some of Alec’s remarks about an earlier post of mine on monogenism.
If you are going to accept Hawks et al as an authority, then you have to give up the idea that there is a minimal bottleneck at any time in human ancestry after 2 million years BP (and there is no direct evidence for a minimal bottleneck then - merely that the evidence, in their view, doesn’t preclude one).
You then have a number of problems to deal with if you are going to associate this bottleneck with a literal Adam and Eve:
- The emergence of individuals that you must regard as fully human are able to do nothing more advanced than use their predecessors’ Oldowan lithic technology for half a million years.
- You then condemn them to a further million years of barely changing Acheulean lithic culture
- You pre-date the emergence of anatomically modern humans with modern human brains by 1.8 million years
- You pre-date the emergence of modern human behaviour (and, by implication, human cognition) by 1.95 million years.
With all due respect, Alec, I don’t think Homo ergaster/erectus was as dumb as you make him out to be. Homo erectus seems to have had a humanlike Broca’s area in his brain, and no physical impediments to speech. (One specimen formerly found to have been incapable of speech, the Turkana boy, is now known to have suffered from stunted vertebral growth, which restricted its breathing and therefore its ability to produce speech.) According to the Wikipedia article on Homo ergaster:
It is certainly recognised by endocasts that H. habilis had a significant mode of communication (though its hyoid and construction of the ear do not support spoken language), and that *H. ergaster *had a more advanced form of this communicative neurology. It is therefore certainly conceivable that H. ergaster had the ability to use what could be called language.
Don’t forget, too, that Homo floresiensis, who was closely related to *Homo erectus * but whose brain size was a mere 417 cubic centimeters, was capable of building boats that could travel 50 kilometers, as there was no other way of getting to the island of Flores.
Glenn Morton has argues that *Homo erectus *was capable of planning ahead at least four days in advance (see Planning ahead – article in PSCF at home.entouch.net/dmd/planningahead.htm ) – unlike chimps who can only plan 20 minutes ahead.
Morton also argues that Homo erectus fed, and took care of totally immobilized individuals who were suffering from an excess of vitamin A, and kept them warm at night (see *The Compassionate Homo erectus * by Glenn Morton at home.entouch.net/dmd/compass.htm ). Chimps never show this kind of compassion.
As regards lithic technology, the reluctance of Homo erectus to innovate might simply be due to living in small groups (sometimes two heads are better than one, when it comes to innovation). For that matter, I remember reading that Neanderthal man’s tools stayed pretty much the same over a 50,000-year period at one site in France, and I’m sure you’d consider him human.
In any event, the key question for religious believers is: did Homo erectus have the intellectual wherewithal to believe in God? Well, why not?
I should add that many authorities (including Hawks et al.) classify Homo erectus as belonging to the same species as Homo sapiens.
Best wishes,
Vincent Torley
G
grannymh
Guest
If I may, I would like to add a wee bit to the theologizing above.
In order to understand the connections between Adam who is a fully complete human person, original sin, and human procreation, one should also read *Catechism *paragraphs 402 - 406.
For those who are interested in Catholic teaching, this is a link to the Catechism www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm
Blessings,
granny
Human life is sacred.
V
vjtorley
Guest
Hi Alec,
I’d like to discuss the paper by Hawks et al. (2000) at mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/17/1/2 . I consider it to be important for two reasons.
First, it makes a good case for the sudden emergence of Homo erectus in the fossil record. Given the abrupt anatomical changes involved, this could have been a case of divinely guided evolution.
Second, the modesty of Hawks’ language is evident throughout the paper:
We have no way of directly estimating with any certainty the size of the human species immediately after the bottleneck at its origin…
…Because we must base our interpretations on the present pattern of genetic diversity, which is a product of multiple competing demographic and selective forces, our choices about which factors are important will influence our conclusions and may render them inaccurate at best or meaningless at worst…
…studies of microsatellites contradict each other in several ways…
For these reasons, we conclude that in practice the long-term average Ne [effective population size] for the human species, even if it could be validly determined, cannot be taken as an estimate of actual past population sizes.
A population size bottleneck early in the evolution of the *H. sapiens *lineage, perhaps at its origin some 2 MYA [million years ago], has significant explanatory power in resolving some of the **contradictions between different sources of data **addressing past human population size…
The limited amount of genetic variation reflected by this small Ne [effective population size]implies that ancient population size changes, predating 1 Myr, will be difficult to detect using genetic methods…
If we do not assume neutrality, these [autosomal] loci do not give us information about past population size.
All emphases are mine.
You then fault me for not quoting this excerpt:
As it turns out, retention of a large number of ancestral HLA alleles precludes effective population sizes of much less than 1,000 at any particular point in time during human prehistory (Ayala 1995 ; Ayala and Escalante 1996 ; Takahata and Satta 1998 ). This minimum bottleneck number, 1,000, also seems to be the minimum effective population size compatible with the maintenance of species viability and adaptability (Lande 1995 ).
*Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. *Actually, I didn’t quote it, for two reasons:
(i) the preceding quotes from Hawks et al. give a sample of the massive uncertainties involved in population modeling for two million years ago, as well as the sometimes questionable assumptions that have to be made;
(ii) the excerpt doesn’t talk about *actual *(i.e. census) population sizes, which is what I’m interested in, but effective ones instead.
Regarding Ayala’s 1994 paper at pnas.org/content/91/15/6787.full.pdf+html , allow me to quote a brief excerpt from p. 6791 - the notes accompanying Table 1, which lists the minimum size of the bottleneck:
The two columns on the right give the minimum number of individuals required for passing either 40 (out of 50) or 60 (out of 70) alleles, with a 95% probability. The initial bottleneck is always 10 generations. In some cases it is assumed that the population grows at a rate R per generation before reaching the equilibrium size N.
I have to say that this kind of argument leaves me cold. For what I want to know, in plain layperson’s English, is this: how small could the founding population of the human race have been, without requiring a miracle (i.e. an actual violation of the laws of nature) to keep it from dying out?
Improbable occurrences don’t bother me. Improbable events happen all the time. Just look at the origin of life. Accepting the massive improbability of abiogenesis while rejecting a founding population of less than 458-490 individuals for the human race because of some 95% probability cutoff strikes me as a case of straining at gnats and swallowing camels.
The other assumptions Ayala makes (no. of generations in the bottleneck; growth rate) don’t seem to be based on any laws of nature, either statistical or absolute. The numbers he uses for his growth rates are simply based on observations. But an observation, or even a set of observations, is not a law. So I can’t share his overweening confidence about the size of human populations in time past.
Here’s an illustration. All the lumps of gold I’ve ever seen have a volume of less than one cubic kilometer. That’s an observation. However, there’s no law saying they must be. The situation is different with lumps of uranium. Here, there is a law, because we know uranium has a critical mass.
I’m not a scientist, but I do know the meaning of these simple words:
impossible, possible, improbable, probable. That’s how I think.
Perhaps I’m uncommonly dense, but I certainly don’t see anything in Ayala’s paper showing that a small founding population of less than 100 individuals, 2 million years ago, for the human race, would be impossible. Improbable? Well, OK. But how improbable? Please, give me a number. If we’re talking astronomically improbable (say, 10^-30), then I guess I’d accept that as equivalent to impossible, for practical purposes.
One last thing, Alec. I believe your Ph.D. is in physics, right? I cited two authorities - Dr. Norman Nevin (a Professor Emeritus of Medical Genetics) and Dr. Jonathan Wells (who has a PhD in Molecular and Cell Biology from UC Berkeley) - who believe that monogenism is scientifically possible in the case of the human race. I have no idea what their scientific reasons are, but that’s what they believe. Dare I say that their biology credentials exceed your own. Has it ever occurred to you that there may be something they know, that you do not?
Best wishes,
Vincent Torley
I’d like to discuss the paper by Hawks et al. (2000) at mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/17/1/2 . I consider it to be important for two reasons.
First, it makes a good case for the sudden emergence of Homo erectus in the fossil record. Given the abrupt anatomical changes involved, this could have been a case of divinely guided evolution.
Second, the modesty of Hawks’ language is evident throughout the paper:
We have no way of directly estimating with any certainty the size of the human species immediately after the bottleneck at its origin…
…Because we must base our interpretations on the present pattern of genetic diversity, which is a product of multiple competing demographic and selective forces, our choices about which factors are important will influence our conclusions and may render them inaccurate at best or meaningless at worst…
…studies of microsatellites contradict each other in several ways…
For these reasons, we conclude that in practice the long-term average Ne [effective population size] for the human species, even if it could be validly determined, cannot be taken as an estimate of actual past population sizes.
A population size bottleneck early in the evolution of the *H. sapiens *lineage, perhaps at its origin some 2 MYA [million years ago], has significant explanatory power in resolving some of the **contradictions between different sources of data **addressing past human population size…
The limited amount of genetic variation reflected by this small Ne [effective population size]implies that ancient population size changes, predating 1 Myr, will be difficult to detect using genetic methods…
If we do not assume neutrality, these [autosomal] loci do not give us information about past population size.
All emphases are mine.
You then fault me for not quoting this excerpt:
As it turns out, retention of a large number of ancestral HLA alleles precludes effective population sizes of much less than 1,000 at any particular point in time during human prehistory (Ayala 1995 ; Ayala and Escalante 1996 ; Takahata and Satta 1998 ). This minimum bottleneck number, 1,000, also seems to be the minimum effective population size compatible with the maintenance of species viability and adaptability (Lande 1995 ).
*Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. *Actually, I didn’t quote it, for two reasons:
(i) the preceding quotes from Hawks et al. give a sample of the massive uncertainties involved in population modeling for two million years ago, as well as the sometimes questionable assumptions that have to be made;
(ii) the excerpt doesn’t talk about *actual *(i.e. census) population sizes, which is what I’m interested in, but effective ones instead.
Regarding Ayala’s 1994 paper at pnas.org/content/91/15/6787.full.pdf+html , allow me to quote a brief excerpt from p. 6791 - the notes accompanying Table 1, which lists the minimum size of the bottleneck:
The two columns on the right give the minimum number of individuals required for passing either 40 (out of 50) or 60 (out of 70) alleles, with a 95% probability. The initial bottleneck is always 10 generations. In some cases it is assumed that the population grows at a rate R per generation before reaching the equilibrium size N.
I have to say that this kind of argument leaves me cold. For what I want to know, in plain layperson’s English, is this: how small could the founding population of the human race have been, without requiring a miracle (i.e. an actual violation of the laws of nature) to keep it from dying out?
Improbable occurrences don’t bother me. Improbable events happen all the time. Just look at the origin of life. Accepting the massive improbability of abiogenesis while rejecting a founding population of less than 458-490 individuals for the human race because of some 95% probability cutoff strikes me as a case of straining at gnats and swallowing camels.
The other assumptions Ayala makes (no. of generations in the bottleneck; growth rate) don’t seem to be based on any laws of nature, either statistical or absolute. The numbers he uses for his growth rates are simply based on observations. But an observation, or even a set of observations, is not a law. So I can’t share his overweening confidence about the size of human populations in time past.
Here’s an illustration. All the lumps of gold I’ve ever seen have a volume of less than one cubic kilometer. That’s an observation. However, there’s no law saying they must be. The situation is different with lumps of uranium. Here, there is a law, because we know uranium has a critical mass.
I’m not a scientist, but I do know the meaning of these simple words:
impossible, possible, improbable, probable. That’s how I think.
Perhaps I’m uncommonly dense, but I certainly don’t see anything in Ayala’s paper showing that a small founding population of less than 100 individuals, 2 million years ago, for the human race, would be impossible. Improbable? Well, OK. But how improbable? Please, give me a number. If we’re talking astronomically improbable (say, 10^-30), then I guess I’d accept that as equivalent to impossible, for practical purposes.
One last thing, Alec. I believe your Ph.D. is in physics, right? I cited two authorities - Dr. Norman Nevin (a Professor Emeritus of Medical Genetics) and Dr. Jonathan Wells (who has a PhD in Molecular and Cell Biology from UC Berkeley) - who believe that monogenism is scientifically possible in the case of the human race. I have no idea what their scientific reasons are, but that’s what they believe. Dare I say that their biology credentials exceed your own. Has it ever occurred to you that there may be something they know, that you do not?
Best wishes,
Vincent Torley
G
grannymh
Guest
E
edwest2
Guest
Facts only? Let’s see. I send a scientist back to closely observe Jesus performing miracles. What data is acquired? What facts?
Man raised from dead. Completely examined. Conclusion: No explanatory data.
Boy raised from dead. Completely examined. Conclusion: No explanatory data.
Man blind blind from birth given sight. Completely examined. Conclusion: No explanatory data.
Fact: God did it.
Links between birds and dinosaurs:
Here is the original article I posted. Read it yourself:
sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090609092055.htm
And here is a related article, which I am posting now:
sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/10/051010085411.htm
I was wrong to say that Dawkins published a book telling parents how to raise children without a belief in God. I found that he was only promoting this book but did not write it. I posted a correction, and I’m glad I was corrected.
Regarding bacteria. It is common for evolution promoters to say bacteria can eat a synthetic like nylon and that this somehow proves evolution. Here is the original article I posted about bacteria found in dirt in Canada that was already resistant:
sunstar.com.ph/static/ceb/2006/02/22/life/soil.grows.drug.resistant.bacteria.html
“Two especially resistant strains were not vulnerable to 15 drugs.”
I understand your concern about false information. I invite further corrections. I would also ask you to consider the current situation regarding science and evolution as described here:
Peace,reggieM said:
Ed
I
itinerant1
Guest
True, but I am missing seeing the relevance of this to the current matter being discussed.
Okay, doubts are raised about the links. Nothing wrong with that… I haven’t gone back to your original post, but didn’t you introduce the article as saying the link has been disproved? Hecd2 says you claimed that, “The evolutionary link between theropod dinosaurs and birds has been disproven” and that “you repeated even after having been corrected.”
The article you linked to clearly speaks for itself and it does not present, or claim to present, sufficient evidence to disprove the evolutionary links.
So, what say you about that?
It’s certainly consistent with Dawkin’s militant atheism for him to write such a book, or just plan to do so, but I wasted my time looking for such a book.
Okay. But perhaps your article presents what is actually further evidence for evolution, rather than a counter-indication? In your perspective on it, is that possible?
“All antibiotic resistance in bacteria is pre-existing and is simply shared round species by lateral gene transfer - antibiotic resistance does not evolve (ignoring the fact that the reason soil bacteria are naturally resistant to antibiotics is because those antibiotics are present in the soil, and that antibiotic resistance and other fitness traits have been shown to evolve in bacteria, and completely misrepresenting the paper by D’Costa et al)” (hecd2)
Do you think you may have misrepresented the paper by D’Costa as you did the Science Daily article?
I think that is a slightly different track and merits an entire thread unto itself.
What about the following comments from hecd2’s post?:
“A rather technical paper on galactic luminous and dark matter surface density exploded your baloney detection meter (even though you had no idea then and have no idea now what the paper is about).”
“Scientists claim that modern apes descended from humans (a bizarre misinterpretation of the extensive publications on A ramidus)”
“Interstitial telomeric sequences in chromosomes should be at speciation breakpoints, but their actual genomic locations are evidence against common descent (your misunderstanding of this Farre et al paper is monumental)”
E
edwest2
Guest
Do you think that if a sufficiently large human population were given a diet of wood that we would evolve the ability to digest it?True, but I am missing seeing the relevance of this to the current matter being discussed.
Okay, doubts are raised about the links. Nothing wrong with that… I haven’t gone back to your original post, but didn’t you introduce the article as saying the link has been disproved? Hecd2 says you claimed that, “The evolutionary link between theropod dinosaurs and birds has been disproven” and that “you repeated even after having been corrected.”
The article you linked to clearly speaks for itself and it does not present, or claim to present, sufficient evidence to disprove the evolutionary links.
So, what say you about that?
It’s certainly consistent with Dawkin’s militant atheism for him to write such a book, or just plan to do so, but I wasted my time looking for such a book.
Okay. But perhaps your article presents what is actually further evidence for evolution, rather than a counter-indication? In your perspective on it, is that possible?
“All antibiotic resistance in bacteria is pre-existing and is simply shared round species by lateral gene transfer - antibiotic resistance does not evolve (ignoring the fact that the reason soil bacteria are naturally resistant to antibiotics is because those antibiotics are present in the soil, and that antibiotic resistance and other fitness traits have been shown to evolve in bacteria, and completely misrepresenting the paper by D’Costa et al)” (hecd2)
Do you think you may have misrepresented the paper by D’Costa as you did the Science Daily article?
I think that is a slightly different track and merits an entire thread unto itself.
What about the following comments from hecd2’s post?:
“A rather technical paper on galactic luminous and dark matter surface density exploded your baloney detection meter (even though you had no idea then and have no idea now what the paper is about).”
“Scientists claim that modern apes descended from humans (a bizarre misinterpretation of the extensive publications on A ramidus)”
“Interstitial telomeric sequences in chromosomes should be at speciation breakpoints, but their actual genomic locations are evidence against common descent (your misunderstanding of this Farre et al paper is monumental)”
Even if you have a billion bacteria, do you think they survive through evolution (whatever that may be) or because they have the built-in ability to deal with potentially harmful chemicals they come in contact with? A pre-existing ability?
I am highly skeptical that man and apes had a common ancestor:
apologeticspress.org/articles/2070
I don’t know which article you read, but I stand by the plain English interpretation and the illustration showing the fundamental differences between the positioning of bones in birds and the text describing those differences as regards dinosaurs. Whether they evolved in parallel or not, is not clear.
I would remind you that the average person reads Science Daily as opposed to scientific papers, if they read anything at all.
Peace,
Ed
I
itinerant1
Guest
I don’t think this question is relevant to the dynamics of adaptation as explained in evolutionary theory. Otherwise, you need to explain what relevance its has, if any.
This sort of begs the question. If you assume bacteria have a “built-in ability to deal with potentially harmful chemicals they come in contact with,” the question still remains as to how they acquired that ability. Was it through evolutionary processes? Was is by special creation of individual species? Or, is it at this particular time in history an uncertainty?
I don’t have time right now to read that article, but perhaps you can explain the reasoning behind your skepticism. Can you justify your opinion with reasonable argument and facts?
I read this article. It presents some interesting research of which I had known something about previous to the article.
A quote from the article: “The implication, the researchers said, is that birds almost certainly did not descend from theropod dinosaurs, such as tyrannosaurus or allosaurus. The findings add to a growing body of evidence in the past two decades that challenge some of the most widely-held beliefs about animal evolution.”
I would say that is a fair implication by the researchers. However, I think that implication still needs more supporting research to make it conclusive. It’s a little too soon to say that the evolutionary links have been disproved, which is what you seemed to have originally claimed.
What your other comments that you have not replied to here?
I
itinerant1
Guest
Addendum:
Ed,
You may disagree about evolution theory in regard to bacteria but in that process did you “completely misrepresent the paper by D’Costa et al?”
You may disagree that apes and humans have a common ancestor, but how do you respond to this?: “Scientists claim that modern apes descended from humans (a bizarre misinterpretation of the extensive publications on A ramidus)”
Ed,
You may disagree about evolution theory in regard to bacteria but in that process did you “completely misrepresent the paper by D’Costa et al?”
You may disagree that apes and humans have a common ancestor, but how do you respond to this?: “Scientists claim that modern apes descended from humans (a bizarre misinterpretation of the extensive publications on A ramidus)”
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