on another blog called pandas Thumb Joe Felsenstein directed readers to the 2019 evolution videos. i canned them, watch numerous summeries, and a few whole programs.
Added by moderator: This appears to be the Panda’s Thumb post that is being referenced. The videos appear to be HERE.
The only one i gave thumbs up to was by a dude called Bowen. It was called adaptative radiations. What the flock is going on?
I really like this as a creationist. He talks about flocks of specification that turns up everywhere now in the sees. they find, like in the cichlid fishes of africa, clusters/flocking of dozens of species from a parent one.
This is not what evolutionists should expect and Bowen suggests there must be some NEW evolutionary rule guiding this. He finds it everywhere.
The reason a creationist loves this is because it does show a sudden speciation of something that fills every niche it possibly can. including changing bodyp[lan as needed.I would add this happemns on the dry land and in the fossil record. This is very predicted by creationist models to show speciation fast and furious and done and no time needed. that it hardly changes bodyplans after the initial explosion of flocking. And its very likely the morm for speciation and not the exception. Flocking is the normal common way how diversity in biology happened. iThis is unwelcome in evolutionist circles. They want very chance happening that coupled withy mutations and selection make trees/nests of relationships.They want PE concepts with start and stop events creating lineages.indeed randomness. Yet investigation shows speciation is a explosion every time. It doesn’t need to wait for mutations. i think from this flocking can be why theropod dinosaurs had so much variety because they were just a flocking of flightless ground birrs. lIkewise marsupials and placentals and others are just a flocking episode fast and furious. So the evolution talks of 2019 really do have something to offer progress.
Yup, you found the post and the videos. Of the 377 videos, you felt one agreed with you. Enjoy!
Creationists often assume that at meetings of evolutionary biologists, what we mainly do is sit around talking mostly about Charles Darwin, reading quotes from him, and oohing and aahing about how wonderful and correct that was.
These videos should give a clearer picture of what kind of work is going on.
I think you may have missed what a species flock is, but just out of morbid curiosity: Why did you think that adaptive radiation (“flocking”) is at odds with mutations, selection and evolutionary trees?
Corneel,
I think a better question is, how could ANYTHING be a problem for evolutionary theory?
I remember the first time I heard about the eye evolving multiple times in history. And the evolutionists response was, “So what?” That’s when I knew they really have gone off the deep end to preserve their faith.
Why? What’s the chance of an eye evolving in a descendant lineage of the metazoan common ancestor? Is it small?
You might as well ask why streamlined forms are so common in aquatic life.
Oh, wait now, I forgot who I was quoting there… Sorry, carry on.
Perhaps we can compare and contrast that to the chances of the designer designing the specific eyes that it designed?
OK, had to google that. The most recent paper I could find on the topic is an oldie, but it looks like eyes may in fact have evolved only once.
We should probably stop derailing poor Robert’s thread now, though.
Corneel,
What does evolutionary theory predict, that complex features would evolve once or multiple times?
Apparently the answer is, either one. Because nothing is a problem for evolution. What would falsify it?
An entertaining thought I often have is to picture what a scientific presentation at a conference would look like if scientists followed the ID model. I suspect that the scientist would present 15 slides demonstrating that ID supporters can’t produce any positive evidence for the supernatural origin of the gene they are studying, and then conclude at the end of presentation that since ID has no evidence it must have evolved.
29+ potential falsifications of macroevolution:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/
Ah, the smell of Theobold in the morning! 🙂
Yep, fantastic resource of potential falsifications.
But I believe phoodoo is indifferent to common descent. The impression I got is that he specifically dislikes the “chance” element (lack of teleology) in evolutionary theory.
The answer is, it depends on what we’re talking about. Evolutionary convergence is not precluded by evolutionary theory, but evolutionary theory is not about particular traits, but about how they emerge.
Evolutionary theory predicts that, after separation, populations will diverge into new species as time goes by.
Evolutionary theory predicts that divergence occurs at every level, and that examining different organisms, and their traits, we might be able to learn the histories of such divergence, and that the form of such divergence will depend on the trait’s history and selective pressures.
The particular histories of each trait and species on earth are not what evolutionary theory is about. Evolutionary theory explains the patterns of divergence (at least approximately). It can tell us if they’re under strong positive selection, strong negative selection, etc. But it doesn’t predict them specifically, any more than gravitational theory would predict the formation of our solar system in particular (clue: it doesn’t), but it does explain the motions of the solar system (at least approximately).
Evolutionary theory is not a predictive model of everything, just like gravitational theory is not a predictive model for everything.
Maybe because they cannot distinguish discussions about evolutionary histories from evolutionary theory.
Maybe because when they read/listen that evolutionary biologists “refuse” to accept some new results/hypotheses, creationists imagine that to mean that the new finding breaks the whole scientific discipline, rather than breaking some old habits in thinking, or some pattern that wasn’t witnessed before.
Scientists tend to be skeptical to new proposals. Often they’re painted to be even more skeptical than they might really be. Sometimes they’re really that skeptical. That doesn’t mean that they reject the new findings to “protect” the whole of evolutionary theory. It just means that new hypotheses and proposals need strong support before being acceptable.
The Pope disliked the idea of the Earth moving about the Sun, and yet it moved.
Oh, well, here is 50 proofs that evolution is wrong:
https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/pets/g19496948/funny-dog-names/
As long as we are going to just make shit up about what links say.
I won’t judge the lot. i scanned them, watchjed a selection of summeries, watched a small number through, and gave a thumbsup to one. The best one.
It was all very minor details and almost seemed like students needing to fill out the year.
It does, to use a music analogy, seem to be all covers or attempts to make hit songs but only one in the top forty.
There was aone about creationisrts but it was more interesting because the guy had green hair! Wait a minute in the picture of Mr Felsenstein here HE is wearing a straw hat! Hmmmm.
Corneel,
Actually like morphology would have like genetics unrelated to common descent. If a creator did everything. In other words a parts department genetic tag. It would be wrong to presume only a common descent would predict copmmon genes.
Maybe not! Its obvious what the talks are about. I naddressed a certain talk and not general evoltion theory.
this guy seemed to think he was introducing something new needing a new explanation. I think it actually demonstrates what really happens in populations changing. flocks are not abberrations but the true equation.
I think this is a very interesting point especially because it was about in the waters.
I saw it on the land but aha its that way in the waters too.
Can you explain what you think the problem with eyes evolving multiple times is, that somehow makes it worse than them evolving only once?
Oh let me guess, you think it’s a tornado in a junkyard multiple times?
But like morphology doesn’t give like genetics, necessarily. The genes involved in streamlining tuna aren’t the same as those involved in streamlining dolphins, for example. And there are many, many genes that are not involved in morphology, either because their effect is on some aspect of metabolism, or because they are not even expressed. They too indicate common descent.
As an Arkist, you need common descent to give present species numbers. So there’s no point denying it at the same time.
It would help if you specified what your beef is. As far as I can tell, your complaint is that because of the large role that chance plays in the evolution of complex innovations (e.g. eyes), evolutionary theory cannot predict the evolution of any specific innovation. Is that about right?
Did you read Entropy’s response?
Sure thing, but if you want to impress the Pope with your arguments, you better understand where he is coming from.
Ah, I see. I think you may have misunderstood him.
As Allan already remarked, in your scenario the species within a species flock are descended from a common ancestor. So where did the genetic variation between species come from and when was it introduced?
ETA: correction
I asked you a much simpler question than that. I said, if evolutionists can accept both the eye evolving only one time, or the eye evolving multiple times, and both suit the theory of evolution just fine (so it has zero predictions I guess), then exactly what would falsify this slippery theory?
So then, to answer this question, T_aquaticus posts a standard evolutionist talking point, by linking to a post about 29 supposed evidence for evolution and says, see, its 29 things that can falsify evolution! WTF?
And then you say, “oh, great link.” Its a great link because it says nothing about falsification whatsoever??
One thing I find over and over again with materialist/evolutionist arguments is that they don’t even possess a decent level of intellectual veracity. They are just Brain Dunning level stupidity. Just throw out your talking points, obfuscate, and then change the subject. Sites like TSZ are a real learning tool for shining light on the vacuousness of the skeptical position.
Why would anyone have a problem accepting what the evidence shows, whether that is one or multiple eye origins? We go with the evidence, as any rational person should. And the evidence shows that eyes have evolved multiple times. You have not explained why this is a problem.
But that doesn’t follow. It does not follow that because evolution does not make any claims about how many times eye should have evolved, that evolution does not make predictions about anything.
Every one of those 29 lines of evidence has a section devoted to it that speaks of potential falsification. Perhaps if you weren’t so afraid of reading it you would have discovered that?
Somehow I find it fitting to see you write that. Look, children, it’s trying to speak.
Rumraket,
Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit! Everyone of those so called falsifications is just after the fact horseshit.
Here is but one example:
Oh, is that right?? They are not efficiently designed? According to whom? So if we found out biological molecular systems are very efficient, all you materialist atheist would surrender your hand, and admit, well, yea, I guess it does seemed planned, we were wrong! Is that how it works? Is that what happens? What would constitute efficient? You wouldn’t just move your goalposts once again?
What fucking bullshit.
phoodoo,
This is right. Until there is a model they can build and test the reasoning is circular. The reasoning goes like this…Eyes are easy to evolve. Look at how many times eyes have evolved.
Then you ask how have they evolved and you get cited Theobald’s paper. Which does not have a mechanistic explanation other than common descent which does not support complex adaptions. It does not answer **how** eyes evolved.
At the end of the day the grand “theory” of UCD needs a mechanism to become a real theory and in reality mind is currently the only viable candidate for the innovations we are observing like the eukaryotic cell.
Hey, you know what else is bullshit? ID!
Who’d have thought that science would prove to be so easy? You have done good work here today, people.
How does mind do it?
You could adopt a bit more charitable view here. Consider that the evolution of eyes in animals is not independent; Certain building blocks (e.g. crystallins and opsins) were already present in the common ancestor of animals. Maybe it even already had some primitive visual system in place. In that view, multiple instances of eyes evolving isn’t that miraculous.
See?
I cited a review paper upthread .
I can’t get excited about that. Falsification is nonsense anyway.
If falsification were a valid account, then theism would have been falsified long ago. But there are still plenty of theists around.
walto,
A mind can create a sequence and arrange parts which is a mission critical mechanism for the origins of unrelated living organisms. A mind can create a complex plan to pull something like this off. Matter does a good job with the organization of the cosmos but life itself needs more.
When we get to the origin of matter we are probably going to run into the same issue if the current physics ideas on quantum gravity are right.
Corneel,
Can you spot the fallacy?
Oops, you forgot to capitalize it, like in “Designer” and “Intelligence”.
No, you have to help me out here.
Corneel,
The conclusion is assumed.
It’s no wonder you didn’t get past the first sentence if you are going to be like that. Just pretend that evolutionary theory is mainstream and widely accepted in the scientific community and read on please.
Corneel,
I did. It does show the challenge of explaining what we observe in the tree of life.
According to logical sense. For example, it costs energy to carry around and maintain extra unused DNA, which might also eventually mutate in a way that makes it disrupt some useful function. That’s patently inefficient. It is not at all difficult to see how a designer could simply get rid of this kind of excessive genetic material. Same goes for things like inefficient nerve routes and so on.
This kind of inefficiency makes perfect sense of a blind process that can’t take a bird’s eye view of things. There are population genetic reasons for why natural selection cannot weed out any and all molecular inefficiencies and waste that occurs. But a designer can.
No. There are actual mathematical models that deal with these issues. The amounts of functional DNA for example can only be explained by some relationship between population size and fecundity. And if the organism in question has functional DNA significantly beyond this, that really would constitute a problem for those population genetic models.
The wastefulness of the extraneous material (nonfunctional DNA, excessive and wasteful molecular complexity) is evidence for evolution because it wouldn’t make sense on design, and for various population genetic reasons it is known that the selection mechanism is not efficient enough to remove all of it. So yes it really would be a problem if we consistently found a total absence of this kind of wastefulness as it would be beyond the limits of what could be explained by the efficacy of natural selection.
Your ability to act out your indignation and repeat the word bullshit over and over again isn’t an argument. It does reveal how much you hate and despise science that conflicts with your bronze-age superstitions though.
No it isn’t. They’re not asking if the eyes evolved. They already know that. They have moved on and they’re asking instead if eyes evolved multiple times or just once.
So what circularity?
Rumraket,
The hatred and indignation are so deeply ingrained that phoodoo cannot read, even as a courtesy, the most calm explanations.
Bullshit bullshit bullshit! Gravitational theory is false because it doesn’t predict who will fall off a precipice with names and addresses! There you have it evil Newtonists!
How?
What on Earth is a mission-critical mechanism?
How? Are you just suggesting a human (or human-like) thinking process can imagine something?
Life needs what?
Physics has come up with models that purport to explain the state of the universe we observe. Biology has come up with models that purport to explain life’s diversity on Earth and some models that purport to explain life’s origin. I find the diversity-of-life explanation (evolution) quite convincing. The origins explanations are a bit light on supporting evidence. All these models are a bit more substantial than Bill Cole’s “mind” (or should it be Mind) explanation. But we takes our choices.
Entropy,
Mind you, why should we worry?
Says the one whose whole answer to explanations is “bullshit bullshit bullshit!” showing either abject inability to read, or refusal to even try.
Says the one who rejects answers without even trying to understand them.
Sorry phoodoo, but you didn’t even try and read our explanations for understanding. Thus, you have no basis to judge.
Maybe you could redirect all of that anger towards your poor intellectual involvement and try reading for comprehension for a change.
Whether 200 or 5 fall off a precipice in a day, no matter what their names and addresses might be, is completely compatible with gravitational theory. Therefore, gravitational theory is unfalsifiable and you don’t worry? Damn you Newtonists.