Evolution? How?

rl, it is arbitrary, irrational, and counter to observation to posit evolution as driven soley by any single factor, or to posit other than that myriad factors, both independent and interconnected, do and always have impacted evolution, and even moreso absurd to posit that in "many cases" habitats might have remained "unchanged" for "millions of years" - think butterfly effect - try it. Just try thinking, period; who knows, you might find it refreshing, energizing, even liberating, despite the peril of the excercize.

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rl

Quote:

It does seem arbitrary to invoke the environment when it is convenient to do so, but then turn around and assert that other causes are more than adequate to drive evolution if there is no environmental change.

sorry to be a scold but, you seem to only wish to engage in the arguments that critique evolution without having demonstrated any real knowledge of the arguments.
Edaphics is a collective term of everything the environment presents to n organism. We can infer that some species didnt make it through masss extinction event because they have left no further fossils beyond a given point in the sed /strat record. You, on the other hand, wish to argue that the leaving of fossils is not critical to the inference of existence. How can anyone argue beyond that piece of religion.

You maintain a belief DESPITE contrary evidence.To me Thats irrational thinking, but consistent with factless dogma.
Its not "CONVENIENT" to invoke environment, its deductive reasoning . Neither is it convenient to not consider environment in evolutionary mechanisms that clearly display a "red Queen" model. (where the predators get faster and the prey stays up, and the genetic variability imparts small but meaningful benefits into the "fast little fellas " that escape, (or conversely) the cats whose mitochondria are showing distinct changes that benefit the oxygen metabolism of , say, cheetahs, in a National Park environment where herds arent as massive nor are they as diverse
Edaphics , as timber began listing, can all impart some evolutionary changeWe deduce this based upon evidence Evidence is the only commonality in evolutionary synthesis. Therefore you have many of us at a clear disadvantage.

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farmerman wrote:

.....theyve found a number of features on tiktaalik that, while a coelecanth and a mudskipper may share a few, they dont contain all the features each.

That's what I was wondering, how it changed things, thanks!

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rosborne979 wrote:

The transition was already plain to see even without Midskippers or Coelecanth or recent discoveries. Evolution is obvious. The transitions are obvious. All the discoveries do is just bring more and more detail.

I did not intend to infer that transitions were not in evidence prior to the beasts I referred to, only what the latest find meant, thanks very much for the clarifications.

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farmerman wrote:

rl
Quote:
It does seem arbitrary to invoke the environment when it is convenient to do so, but then turn around and assert that other causes are more than adequate to drive evolution if there is no environmental change.

sorry to be a scold but, you seem to only wish to engage in the arguments that critique evolution without having demonstrated any real knowledge of the arguments.
Edaphics is a collective term of everything the environment presents to n organism. We can infer that some species didnt make it through masss extinction event because they have left no further fossils beyond a given point in the sed /strat record. You, on the other hand, wish to argue that the leaving of fossils is not critical to the inference of existence. How can anyone argue beyond that piece of religion.

You maintain a belief DESPITE contrary evidence.To me Thats irrational thinking, but consistent with factless dogma.
Its not "CONVENIENT" to invoke environment, its deductive reasoning . Neither is it convenient to not consider environment in evolutionary mechanisms that clearly display a "red Queen" model. (where the predators get faster and the prey stays up, and the genetic variability imparts small but meaningful benefits into the "fast little fellas " that escape, (or conversely) the cats whose mitochondria are showing distinct changes that benefit the oxygen metabolism of , say, cheetahs, in a National Park environment where herds arent as massive nor are they as diverse
Edaphics , as timber began listing, can all impart some evolutionary changeWe deduce this based upon evidence Evidence is the only commonality in evolutionary synthesis. Therefore you have many of us at a clear disadvantage.

So, still a simple question:

If there were no change, would the creature still evolve?

Is evolution driven by changes in the creatures environment or not?

An answer of 'It is and it ain't ' allows for having one's cake and eating it too. You can be as arbitrary as you wish in assigning causality and still be right. It is not falsifiable.

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real life wrote:

aperson wrote:
The answer to this topic seems simple to me. How come, even when stacks of evidence are piled up infront of them, some stubborn people still refuse to believe. Like I said earlier, you can believe in God and evolution. Is it possible that Genesis' description of the creation of Earth is metaphorical?

It is possible. I don't think it likely.

Even if it were, that doesn't answer the 'how' of evolution, which is the topic.

Simply stating that something evolved doesn't explain how it did.

Evolution, as stated in my post to Ros, seems to me to be filled with lots of contradictory assumptions.

If you believe that evolution is the process by which life on Earth got to the stage we see it in today, then perhaps you'd like to address the question I asked Ros about.

Most evolutionists, in their more candid moments, will tell you they don't know for sure a lot of the 'hows' of evolution. But they are just sure it happened.

It's a strange position when you think about it.

The "how" of evolution??? Isn't this simple??? Surely educated persons would know this? Please describe the "what" of the "how" we are discussing.

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http://www.microbe.org/news/perchlorate_microbe.asp

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timberlandko wrote:

Rex, your appeals to emotion and your flights of fancy neither refute the challenges posed against your proposition nor lend any credence to that proposition. Preaching, proselytizing, and parroting Scripture is not objective argument, it is rhetorical tapdancing.

Timber
You seem to lay some sort of standard down with blind conviction of how things are to be perceived. You parrot about them too much more than I do actually look at your number of posts... hehe. I simply come from a different school and I see another yet sometime similar reality than yours and your ilk.

I do say that I realize that my reality is not very well trodden by many... But none the less I have perceived this great effort in my own right.

You may not know this but I was once like you... I know your frame of reference and the boundaries that you impose upon others... You describe with mantras like proofs, facts statistical rates and rules of practice and "laws" of physics and other sciences... I grew beyond you Timber.

Science paints a perception of a dead physical world with life evolving from this dead physical non observant universe. They assume it is devoid on an atomic quantum inter-dimensional all conscious level, just dead rocks, dead sea, dead sky and we are the only living beings aside from a variety of lesser creatures. The plants that cannot "think" at all either let alone the bacteria that inhabits much of matter and space as a host.

Most scientists "believe" the universe is abundant and filled with nearly infinite possible forms of life. Yet they see the the universe as fading and decaying into a slow but inevitable end.

When I consider this idea it seems possible if not even probable. Hey, I can "sometimes" be gullable too...

But, it is more of the same mumbo jumbo... the universe is some dumb thing that we can manipulate at will and control without regard to it's own "soul" and the perfection and intricate balance that "lives and breathes within it". What does the universe contribute back?

Technology increasingly strips the earth of it's natural resources and it's soul, degrading, de-humanizing and devaluing. It is like pillaging a village of it's wealth.

Science dreams of one day manipulating stars terri-forming planets and their energy and acting as gods themselves over "creation"... which they call spontaneous combustion from physical matter which has no feelings, sense of being or suffer from unethical practices...

Why must technology move so fast when we are lacking so much in the secret hidden wisdom that, "all things are living". We spill oil in the earth's most pristine ecosystems... regularly occurring wild fires (most started by careless humans) are destroying living trees that have been here for centuries. Science only knows the words go and they cannot stop at the red light because free enterprise has no brakes...

Scientists cannot or refuses to premise that God could have a greater sense of being than they do themselves... So on one hand we have God created the heavens and the earth and on the other we popped out of a balloon filled with hydrogen. One, the universe is living with God everywhere and the other, everything is dead and we are alone, no living stones and spirits in the wind. Everything physical is lifeless and completely unrelated to any grand design..

In the dark ages the "scientists" of the day argued that dirt and dust did not contain life... So everyone believed them...

Most physical science even goes on to state that God is an impossibility... I am sure at least one physicist has written that based upon millions of scientific equations. And the psyche of the world follows along like the twelve monkey replication phenomenon. Like rabbits too. (the pink Easter variety)

God cannot be in the plants and in every living thing and spread out into the universe, sidewalks, roads and be everywhere else too. God can't also be alone listening to the falling trees in the forest, in the wind, and the rocks up in the satellites watching down on earth and God can't be in the center of the sun and also our in the farthest reaches of space and time... can he?

God can...

I believe in the "spirit" of life and God. We need to commune with these spirits and worship God and reverence this earth as stewards, thankful for our eternal heritage..

ALSO Farmerman

Many religions have worshiped the furry fuzzy little floppy eared bunnies as deities, what have you got against bunnies? They are godly creatures too! Smile

The Chinese have the year of the rabbit and there is the lucky rabbits foot. Rabbits are known for fertility which leads up a long chain of thought to a respect and understanding of the the great power of the sun which is a universal perpetuator of life. Like living light from a heavenly vision of the greatest life giver of all, God...

I believe scientific discoveries can only happen through an act of spiritual faith. The devil can't invent... or read our minds, (thank God for that one) only God can read our minds...

Peace with God

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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/04/060406102644.htm

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RexRed wrote:

Why must technology move so fast when we are lacking so much in the secret hidden wisdom that, "all things are living".

Thanks for clearing up the secret hidden wisdom that all things are living........

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rl

Quote:

Is evolution driven by changes in the creatures environment or not?

An answer of 'It is and it ain't ' allows for having one's cake and eating it too. You can be as arbitrary as you wish in assigning causality and still be right. It is not falsifiable.

PUH LEEZE. Popper himself stated that evolution is composed of a synthesis of contributing scientific evidence , all falsifiable. SOrry if the facts and discoveries dont meet with your likening.(anyway, "falsifiablity" is "Pop" science reasoning invoked by Creationists who saw their positions being disassembled as heavy evidence began being collected from well funded research in he 1970's)
Im sorry if I seem abrupt, but this week I saw the publication of a friends 10 year (at least) work on the evo-devo of ancestral tetrapodal structures in mid Devonian fish. The answers you demand will probably , individually, take time to produce . We know quite well the "how" of a number of species , but not all.
Read EO Wilsons, "The diversity of Life" Its a good discusssion of consequent evolution from various pressures on a living species. I still like adaptation to changing environments as a major component, buit have to admit that there are other instances when no environmental changes can be readily discerned. For that we have to dig deeper and our evidence is more difficult to expose. Its amazing though, that the big macro developments seem to parallel the big extinction events, (along with consequent extinction of entire species who, by becoming "late", provide empty niches to be opportunistically filled by adaptive radiation of species whose structure or dentition needed minimal tweaking to be survivable). Remember,at the close of the Cretaceous , for example, along with the extinction of dinosaurs, there was a concomitant extinction of most classes of mammals(like multituburculates as an example). Only 4 of 7 classes survived and one disappeared in the Eocene, so we have only 3 classes of mammals only 2 of which survived and expanded till present. (monotremes only have about 3 species)

Today we have major factors such as habitat loss resulting in extinction. Dont you think that habitat loss occured in the past? Or how about predation? When South and North America rejoined during the Tertiary, we saw the rapid loss of South American species that were unable to compete with larger carnivores. So the fossil record is loaded withgiant flightless birds that became lunch to a speices with a better feeding plan(like teamwork in hunting,)

Rex, Im glad that timber gives you some places to connect. I cant really connect with your logic so I usually just pass your threads by. However, if the humor in my Easter Bunny comment was a missed opportunity, lemme redo its genesis. See , someone said that God was similar to The Easetr Bunny (in that neither had proof or any evidence ) I, an "Orthodox Evolutionist" had jumped to the other side by embracing a silly premise that the Easter Bunny does, in fact , exist. See the humor? I know its about as subtle as a Chinese Mens Room, but blame it on my tiredness. Ill try to do better by inserting an alert emoticon (if I can find one) that annouinces that "the following is an honest albeit lame attempt at humor"

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Chumly wrote:

RexRed wrote:
Why must technology move so fast when we are lacking so much in the secret hidden wisdom that, "all things are living".
Thanks for clearing up the secret hidden wisdom that all things are living........

Well it's not a secret anymore... Smile

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Since you say all things are living and you believe in evolution have you found any fossil records for pencil sharpeners?

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Hi RL,

Nice to hear from you again as well... Smile

real life wrote:

farmerman wrote:
ALSO, noone has said that evolution is only driven by environmental change.......

Ros made a post that almost seemed to imply as much

rosborne979 wrote:
Yes. They evolved to survive in the habitat available to them. They exist because the environment exists.

that's why I asked him for clarification.

I never said "only" driven by environmental change. Please reviews FM's posts for more detail on other mechanisms. He covered it better than I could have.

Maybe if you quit picking and choosing sentences out of context and actually tried to follow the flow of conversation you might not misinterpret what is being said so often. Good luck.

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Chumly wrote:

rosborne979 wrote:
The transition was already plain to see even without Midskippers or Coelecanth or recent discoveries. Evolution is obvious. The transitions are obvious. All the discoveries do is just bring more and more detail.
I did not intend to infer that transitions were not in evidence prior to the beasts I referred to, only what the latest find meant, thanks very much for the clarifications.

Oh, ok. I thought your question was somewhat sarcastic, so I figured I would just take the opportunity to state the obvious.

Best Regards,

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Chumly wrote:

Since you say all things are living and you believe in evolution have you found any fossil records for pencil sharpeners?

Good one.

Rex thinks rocks are alive. We covered that little bit of insanity about 400 pages ago on one of these threads.

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rosborne979 wrote:

Oh, ok. I thought your question was somewhat sarcastic, so I figured I would just take the opportunity to state the obvious.

Best Regards,

Oh I see how you could have construed that, funny stuff! I was simply asking for a response I could respect as to this most recent discovery. As an aside, this thread has given me the opportunity to learn a lot more about the amazing subtly and variation of evolution, sharpen my discussion skills and come face to face with the stunning depth of the self-imposed ignorance of the religious dogmatists; three for the price of one! I do appreciate your insight.

rosborne979 wrote:

Rex thinks rocks are alive. We covered that little bit of insanity about 400 pages ago on one of these threads.

Long Live Rock Rolling Eyes

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I just found out that Dr. Hovind's new museum is having a tough time...

http://www.pandasthumb.org/.../dino_adventure.html

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What a bunch of dolts!

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Yes, the image of a rock suddenly sprouting legs and walking around may be the stuff of Disney and it does fit with all their other fantasies.

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