I note many public evolutionists, Prothero and Shermer and many others always stress the cases of vestigial parts in marine mammals as evidence for evolutionary biology.
Yet in reality this is a sampling error that in fact makes the opposite case against evolution.
I agree marine mamnmals once were land lovers and only later gained features to surbvve in the water. Not the impossible steps said by evolutionists, as Berlinski demonstrates, but some other mechanism.
Anyways evolutionists persusde themselves, and try to persuade others, that the real changes found in marine mammals proves creatures changed greatly and by Darwins method.
Yet the great truth is that for all the living and fossil biology that is observed at least 99%% has no vestigial features whatsoever. If all biology evolved then all biology should be crawling with remaining bits but in fact its a great missing anatomy. There are no vestigial bits save in very few special cases like marine mammals.
Therefore if evolutionists use these few cases to make the evolution case then in strict sampling disipline they actually make the opposite case. If finding a few vestigial bits is to prove evolution then the glorious ascence makes the true case that evolution didn’t happen because it should be that vestigial bits are the norm and not the exception.
So i propose its a sampling error to say vestigial bits of marine mammals prove evolution and in fact it must be proving the opposite.
I think this is a good point unless someone can show otherwise.
John Harshman,
I didn’t say anything about a creator but yes, I would say that life required engineering. Organisms all have DNA, use the same or very similar genetic code. Ribosomes are all very similar. And the closely related organisms, design wise, do share many of the same components.
AGAIN evolution doesn’t expect a nested hierarchy. It expects transitional forms, intermediates, which would blur the distinct sets NH requires.
And just because you are unable to understand my argument for software doesn’t make it vacuous
LoL! You claims of Common Descent are untestable, John. Do you understand the repeatability concept of science?
It’s an obvious pattern. A nested hierarchy is exactly what we expect from inheritance, occasional alterations in the inherited stuff, and occasional splitting of species. If you drew a picture of what I describe there, it would look exactly like a phylogenetic tree with character changes mapped onto particular branches. Of course common descent can produce that pattern; it couldn’t avoid producing that pattern. I truly don’t know how that can be unclear. Further, we have known examples of common descent within species, notably in humans and viruses, and if you look at the differences among individuals you can actually reproduce the known tree of descent.
John Harshman,
WRONG\. A lineage will never lead to a nested hierarchy. A family tree does not form a nested hierarchy. Just because a nested hierarchy can be depicted as a branching tree doesn’t mean all branching trees are a nested hierarchy.
No, they don’t. They share quite similar components, but those components always differ slightly in ways that form a nested hierarchy. Organisms do all use similar genetic codes; oddly enough, the variant codes are organized in a nested hierarchy for no apparent functional reason. Ribosomes are indeed similar but oddly enough have a great number of random differences that, again, are organized in a nested hierarchy for no apparent functional reasons. An engineer would of course make all the ribosomes absolutely identical, since they all do the same thing. And if there were functional differences, why would those functions be organized as a nested hierarchy?
So who do you think did the engineering if it wasn’t a creator? You seem quite reticent about ever saying what your hypothesis really is.
You are confused. When I refer to a nested hierarchy, I’m talking about extant species. The intermediates are in the past and we don’t have any data on most of them. Now of course we do have fossils for some, and there are certainly a great number of fossil intermediates, and they do blur the lines.
True. It’s its vacuity that makes it vacuous. What argument for software? Your only argument so far, if it can be dignified with the name, has been that nobody has created life from scratch.
I don’t know what you mean by that. First: the nested hierarchy lies in the data at the tips of the tree. Nested hierarchy in that data is a natural expectation from a branching tree with inheritance of characteristics and occasional changes on particular branches. Do you disagree?
I do. You don’t. To repeat a phylogenetic analysis, you gather different data. You don’t go back and re-evolve the species.
Thankyou 🙂
Phylogenetic analysis assumes common descent, it doesn’t demonstrate it.
I agree with the part of the tips- ALL species are at the tips, which pretty much destroy the tree. The tree was all organism(s)- the truck, the branches, the tips.
A nested hierarchy is groups within groups- sets within sets. Different levels each defined with sets that are also defined. Linnaean taxonomy is such a system. Each level above species are sets of defining/ diagnostic characteristics, not populations. Whereas with cladistics the nodes are hypothetical populations
BTW John, no one predicted what the extant species would be. So it is ridiculous to say that evolutionism predicted a nested hierarchy of extant species
I think John Harshman’s complaint is fair, Frankie. Talking in soundbites is not advancing communication, specifically what you are proposing as an alternative explanation for the evidence before us. Do you have an inkling of an alternative explanation for the extant and extinct life and its radiation from a common ancestor that we see? Or is it that you dispute what we see?
Again, with nothing but sound bites. Phylogenetic analysis tests common descent. If no common descent, no tree should be better than another. I’ve explained this several times, but you never make an argument to refute it.
All you have are soundbites, Alan. That is all John has
Frankie,
QED
You mistake what a nested hierarchy is and what the prediction is. It doesn’t predict what the characters at the tips of trees will be; it predicts that those characters will be organized in a nested hierarchy. Nor does it predict what that hierarchy will be, just that it will be the same regardless of which characters you examine. But that’s enough to distinguish common descent from separate creation, or whatever your as yet unexpressed alternative actually is.
BS. I say it tests a common design. If no common design no tree should be better than the other. I’ve explained how it works and you try yo blame me because you refuse to understand
A common design? How does that work?
LoL! I know what a nested hierarchy is. I also know that evolutionism would be OK if there wasn’t one. And AGAIN, Linnaean taxonomy is a nested hierarchy and was based on the concept of a common design, ie a common archetype
We only see the tips; we have to look a the tips to reconstruct the tree. We don’t have access to all organisms that ever lived. The fact that the tips do imply a tree is the evidence for common descent. (Well, there’s other evidence too, but that’s the evidence from phylogenetic analysis.) You have yet to present any reason to expect that groups within groups would be a viable arrangement in the absence of common descent.
Look at computers, houses, cars- well most things that are engineered. Do they reinvent the wheel every year with every new car? If I know that a house is built to code then I can find all studs just by locating one. A common design with cars allows for OEM parts.
So a common design of life would include many common features throughout life
Common descent doesn’t predict groups within groups. No one knows then rate of loss and replacement and no one predicts all transitional forms would be extinct by now. Tiktaalik hung around for millions of years after tetrapods arrived.
Mayr said a nested hierarchy is the antithesis of evolution(ism). Evolution being to complex to produce pristine sets that NH requires
Carl Linnaeus noticed how plants and animals seemed to group into a nested hierarchy.
No, Linnaean taxonomy was not based on any concept; it was an attempt at an empirical representation of an observed pattern, an attempt to produce a natural classification of life. Linaeaus tried the same thing with minerals and failed. Why do you think that was?
Why would “evolutionism” be OK if there wasn’t a nested hierarchy?
Wouldn’t work in France. We use the metric system.
EXACTLY! His scheme represented a common design, He was a creationist searching for the created kind and God’s Orderly system. He finally place the CK at the level of Genera, but it has since been moved further up to at least Family
LoL! As long as I knew the code and the house was built to code
As I said. You don’t know the code and you don’t know whether the code is enforced.
Then it doesn’t apply. Obviously houses that are not built to code will be different
Dang it, it’s hard to respond to all the sound bites. Most of our current evidence for common descent comes from genomic characters. There is no stasis in molecular evolution, so no ancestors stick around for millions of years; even if they look the same, they’re genetically different. We literally only see the tips of trees.
Nor does nested hierarchy require perfect sets. We know there’s such a thing as homoplasy. It’s expected. (I don’t think it would be expected under your scenario, though; all sequences of identical function ought to be identical, and there should be no sequences without function. Of course that depends on my imagination of your unexpressed scenario, which I begin to think just doesn’t exist.)
What did Mayr actually say, and where did he say it? Cite your sources.
Except for the fossils!
ETA oops missed the bit about molecular phylogenetics.
How can you tell what the level of created kind ought to be? What are the criteria and what’s your argument that the criteria ought to be valid?
Most of the data (i.e. molecular data) are not available for fossils, and few if any of the fossils are likely to be ancestral species rather than their cousins. Nor do we have any way to tell. So yes, most fossils are at their own tips and ought to be.
I am not Linne nor am I a Creationist biologist. You would have to ask them. I am repeating what I read from them
I’m getting tired of the sound bites. You make no argument here. You just make an assertion. I have explained exactly why evolution over a tree should produce nested hierarchical data, all without common design, so your sound bite is nonsensical. Nor have you explained how common design works. None of your claims about re-use of parts stand up to the least bit of scrutiny, nor do they explain a nested hierarchy.
Now what common design predicts would be a nested hierarchy from evolution within “kinds” and a star tree (a big polytomy meeting at the root, with some horizontal borrowing of identical parts) between kinds. This we don’t see. Similar parts are not identical, horizontal borrowing is rare and can be traced to specific spots on a tree, and there is no star tree. Your claims refute themselves; all you have to do is examine them.
Exactly. You have no idea what you’re saying, and you believe the conclusions of the creationist biologists because they fit what you want to believe, not because you know anything about their arguments. You can’t back up anything you say.
John Harshman,
Nested hierarchies require pristine sets.
I don’t have Mayr’s book handy but I do have “Arrival of the Fittest::
Mayr 1982 “The Growth of Biological Thought”
And thank you- I will be responding to your posts with the “sound bite” bit
Sure. I did correct myself in edit. Though I would say that molecular data and fossil evidence are in close agreement when constructing phylogenies.
Oh my- I am just repeating what is said. You can’t back up anything you say about Common Descent.
Evolution does not predict a nested hierarchy.
Support this silly assertion.
He makes this assertion frequently, just to make waves.
Where is the software located?
I’ve had this conversation with Frankie before. Eventually he admits he does not know where it is or why he thinks it’s there, only that it must be there. Therefore ID.
In the cells
It was unlikely to be outside them, let’s face it.
Evolution predicts many transitional forms and they blur the lines of distinction. Even Darwin knew this. Wagner, of “Arrival of the Fittest”, concurs
It isn’t an assertion. Even Wagner, in “Arrival of the Fittest”, concurs. I thought you read the book…
Yes, it is as you say. Tiktaalik was just one example of an evolutionary transition from fish to amphibians. There were, of course others. Many transitional forms, other ancient sarcopterygian fish developing adaptations in response to the same conditions.
I’m glad to see you have come so far so quickly Frankie!