A Breakthrough in Our Understanding of Evolution

[L Gilbert]

There are actually no hard and fast rule of defining a genus or a species,

lol For you, perhaps. But, there's no hard and fast definition of stupid either. People tend to be that way sometimes, though.
Your definition was vague, at best.

There is still no explanation within evolutionary logic as to how two comtemporaneous and completely exclusive humans developed, unable to mate with any members of the wider hominid 'genus', and then themselves spawned the entire human race (or 'species'). And why there have been no subsequent evolutionary 'forks' that have produced any new 'species'. (That points to the difficulty in the terms species and genus, once a genetic evolutionary parting of the ways occurs within a species, it then becomes a genus with two reproductively exclusive branches.. which have to be reassigned in the category of new species).

As for the argument that elephants or monkies have anything resembling the human facility for symbolic language.. that just doesn't exist. Animals have a rudimentary form of communication that contains no symbolism or abstraction and is really not comparable to that of humans. The same is true of human organization, conceptions of faith and morality. It just doesn't exist in the animal world.

BS We are still finding new info about the communication skills of cetaceans, for instance. Not into science much, are you?

No other species have developed anything similar to the human ability to understand and transform its environment.

The intelligent ones are intelligent enough to know they wouldn't be able to improve on nature.

If one chooses to assign that development exclusively to evolution one is left perplexed to how such higher level intellectual capacity developed. Only man has developed that ability to explain and transform his environment. The only 'species' amongst tens or hundreds of thousands. Pure random happenstance you say, i'm not convinced.

Explain partially. Transform definitely but mostly with devastating results.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

Accident and selection through survival of the fittest.. that is evolution.

That's not quite wrong, but it's an extreme oversimplification that appears to be misleading you. The point you seem to be missing is that "selection through survival" (actually it's selection through differential reproductive success) is not random, it's ruthlessly deterministic.

 

[Niflmir]

You see, all of the groundwork for evolution was done before Darwin ever came along. Heredity had been studied and was understood. What was not understood is how nature could do what humans were already doing, and guide the progress of genes.

They didn't understand because they thought that nature was random, and randomness is not coherent enough to breed effectively. Then Darwin came along and showed people how nature could do it in coherent fashion.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

You see, all of the groundwork for evolution was done before Darwin ever came along.

Not only ground work, Niflmir, but even evolution was almost discovered without Darwin. Alfred Wallace was working on evolution at the same time as Darwin (I don’t know if he also called it evolution), but Darwin beat him to it. To Wallace’s credit, he did not hold any grudge, he became a very enthusiastic follower of Darwin; he became a very vocal and effective proponent of evolution. But I think he almost beat Darwin in discovering evolution.

 

[Niflmir]

You see, all of the groundwork for evolution was done before Darwin ever came along.

Not only ground work, Niflmir, but even evolution was almost discovered without Darwin. Alfred Wallace was working on evolution at the same time as Darwin (I don’t know if he also called it evolution), but Darwin beat him to it. To Wallace’s credit, he did not hold any grudge, he became a very enthusiastic follower of Darwin; he became a very vocal and effective proponent of evolution. But I think he almost beat Darwin in discovering evolution.

That I did not know. If I wasn't already reading some history of science things, I would probably start reading that now.

 

[L Gilbert]

There were several people studtying evolution before Darwin and Wallace: Erasmus Darwin, Georges Cuvier, Jean Baptiste de Lamarck, and Etienne
Geoffroy Saint-Hillaire, for instance.

 

[petros]

There were several people studtying evolution before Darwin and Wallace: Erasmus Darwin, Georges Cuvier, Jean Baptiste de Lamarck, and Etienne
Geoffroy Saint-Hillaire, for instance.

Socrates even made mention.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

There were several people studtying evolution before Darwin and Wallace: Erasmus Darwin, Georges Cuvier, Jean Baptiste de Lamarck, and Etienne
Geoffroy Saint-Hillaire, for instance.

The idea that life evolved is not new, it is thousands of years old, it goes right back to Hindu mythology (and nobody can really say for certain how old that is).

According to Hindu mythology, God has appeared on earth nine times. He appeared on earth as a fish, a turtle, a boar, a half man half lion, a dwarf (but fully developed) man, and the last four incarnation of God were fully developed men.

Ancient Hindus were clearly aware that life evolved from simple to complex. Incidentally, Hinduism also believes that there will be tenth incarnation of God (this one on horseback), and he will destroy the earth. I think this is where Christians got their concept of Second Coming.

 

[L Gilbert]

So? Why tell me about a concept I already mentioned?

 

[SirJosephPorter]

So? Why tell me about a concept I already mentioned?

I did not tell you about it, I expanded on it You don't have to read it if you are not interested.

 

[L Gilbert]

I read the first sentence and decided you were just being redundant again.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

I read the first sentence and decided you were just being redundant again.

You may be right, Gilbert. Many times redundancy is a virtue, and often a matter of opinion. The post may have been redundant in your opinion, it certainly wasn’t in mine.

 

[coldstream]

lol For you, perhaps. But, there's no hard and fast definition of stupid either. People tend to be that way sometimes, though.
Your definition was vague, at best.

BS We are still finding new info about the communication skills of cetaceans, for instance. Not into science much, are you?

The intelligent ones are intelligent enough to know they wouldn't be able to improve on nature. Explain partially. Transform definitely but mostly with devastating results.

You really are a Glass Half Empty kind of guy aren't you, L. ;-). The underlying point which seems have completey evaded you however is that even ascribing Evolution the term 'theory' is far too complimentary of it, in scientific terms.

It exists as a solitude, without explanation of origins, utility, outcomes or an explanation of the development of laws to which it supposedly subscribes. It does however fit perfectly into the definition of a religion, or atleast a belief system, atheistic and deeply antagonistic to the human cause, entropic, devolving into chaos. So much for 'ruthless determinism'. It is infact at its source completely irrational. You seem to preach it with the passion of a true convert.

But at some point some reality must enter even the dark and foggy, pagan principality in which it reigns to point out it filled with holes.. a flat, deflated derigible of a faith.. without hope or a future. That truth includes that if you really want to ensure a collapse of the biosphere, then remove man from the equation, since that provides the entire purpose and pinnacle of Creation. :smile:

I'm all for the publicizing Evolution, since it is such a good foil for theories that sees both a Blueprint, and a Printer.. for Creation and its laws.. the evidence for which is overwhelming.. atleast for those with eyes to see. :roll:

 

[Cliffy]

I don't particularly subscribe to either theory, but it is fun watching you guys duke it out with such evangelical zeal. I do think that both sides are rather dogmatic in your beliefs. I think that it could be a few hundred years before the truth is known.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

I don't particularly subscribe to either theory, but it is fun watching you guys duke it out with such evangelical zeal. I do think that both sides are rather dogmatic in your beliefs. I think that it could be a few hundred years before the truth is known.

I disagree, Cliffy. The truth is already known, it is evolution. And I don’t think anything will have changed in a few hundred years, the evolution deniers will continue denying that evolution ever took place.

 

[Tonington]

I think you are going to have pick up your Darwin again Dexter, you're not giving the old boy his due. Accident and selection through survival of the fittest.. that is evolution.

No, not accident. It is not an accident. How does survival of the fittest mean accident? A mutation is a probabilistic outcome.

Darwins theory was and is a beginning. Your notion of two distinct animals of any species is not how this theory works. It also includes genetic drift, which is only part of the story you are missing. Over time the alleles in the population change. Over even more time separate populations become genetically distinct. Over even more time, they no longer resemble one another as a new trait appears. Now you have a new species. This is not two animals, but an entire population which moves farther away from the original population with the addition of this new genetic information.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

...that even ascribing Evolution the term 'theory' is far too complimentary of it, in scientific terms...

That whole post just underlines once again how little you understand of it, and strongly suggests you understand little of science generally. Sounds like you've been reading people like Michael Behe and William Dembski and think they're on to something. They're not. Your use of phrases like "atheistic and deeply antagonistic to the human cause" is hinting at the straw man of social Darwinism as a legitimate criticism of evolution. It's not. It has nothing to say about the human cause, whatever you think that might be, neither is it atheistic, it says nothing about deities at all.

Evolution is one of the most successful, best-attested, widest ranging scientific theories we have, it's as true as anything we know in science. It's the best explanation we have for the complexity and diversity of life, which I suppose doesn't leave much for a deity to do in that context, but to criticize it essentially because it doesn't satisfy your metaphysical leanings is to misunderstand both science and metaphysics.