Evolutionist don't understand what macro-evolution/micro-evolution is.

[stormbind]

Of course those changes listed by betazed would only be 'macroevolution' if they produced groups of organisms unable to produce offspring with their predecesors according to current definitions of 'species'.

But betazed is rejecting the accepted definition of species.

 

[betazed]

@betazed: He's probably refering to observations of accretion discs around objects too small of heavy to be anything else in our theoretical models. Such have been hailed in the press as "first photos of a black hole".

I guessed as much.

What would you accept as "seeing" a black hole? Observing the Hawking radiation directly?

That would be definitely a direct observational evidence although I doubt we will ever be able to see that. Let us just say, lensing of images of stars around its edge would do. That would be truly "seeing" it.

 

[betazed]

But betazed is rejecting the accepted definition of species.

I have yet to see a precise universally accepted definition of 'species'. Mayr in his book "What evolution is" deals on this problem at length and he gives many definitions.

You have just given a new definition in this thread.

 

[The Last Conformist]

A theoretical model that possesses all the same physical characterists, is the same thing

A theoretical model that has physical characteristics isn't a theoretical model.

What I saw (on the television, via a load of technologies for gazing at galaxies) was actually giving out fast amounts of energy.

Any black hole vaguely similar to what our models say that they should be like, and big enough to be indirectly observed, would only send out tiny amounts of energy (in the form of hawking radiation and gravitational waves) - that's why they're called black holes.

The energy thrown out, I dare state, was from material in decaying orbits around the thing.

 

[stormbind]

The biological species or isolation species concept identifies a species as a set of actually or potentially interbreeding organisms. This is generally the most useful formulation for scientists working with living examples of the higher taxa like mammals, fish, and birds, but meaningless for organisms that do not reproduce sexually. It distinguishes between the theoretical possibility of interbreeding and the actual likelihood of gene flow between populations.

 

[stormbind]

The energy thrown out, I dare state, was from material in decaying orbits around the thing.

Very possible, they didn't look that closely at it and, although interesting, the show was on at an inconvenient time so I only watched something like 5 minutes

They also had two galaxies colliding. Not in real time, obviously, but they had a mass of stars which were claimed used to be two seperate galaxies. It made me wonder of all the havok that would have cause... all the solar systems destroyed... wonder if any species had evolved in those two galaxies?

 

[Gothmog]

No it isn't. It's the plain difference between microevolution and macroevolution.

I suggest you read something on these subjects before joining a discussion on them. If you have evidence of macroevolution then please share it instead of flaming!

Ah, so I am not on your ignore list.

I have read quite a bit on these subjects, enough to know that the difference between microevolution and macroevolution is purely semantics. There is continuous lineage between all forms of life, and much data to support that position. Please look at my posts above. What did you think of my explanation of the non-difference between microevolution and macroevolution?

Are you denying that agricultural scientists have produced many variants of crops no longer able to reproduce with each other? Isn't that species creation by your definition?

As far as the fruitflies, you are now saying that it is just a variation on existing fruitflies. Yes, a variation that can no longer breed with its predecesors. A new species by your definition, again showing the non-meaningful difference between microevolution and macroevolution. Just a way to slice up the pie for scientists, and completely arbitrary. Nature doesn't define species, humans do.

Here are a few references for you to peruse about fruit fly experiments.

Rice, W. R. 1985. Disruptive selection on habitat preference and the evolution of reproductive isolation: an exploratory experiment. Evolution. 39:645-646.

Rice, W. R. and E. E. Hostert. 1993. Laboratory experiments on speciation: What have we learned in forty years? Evolution. 47:1637-1653.

Rice, W. R. and G. W. Salt. 1988. Speciation via disruptive selection on habitat preference: experimental evidence. The American Naturalist. 131:911-917.

Rice, W. R. and G. W. Salt. 1990. The evolution of reproductive isolation as a correlated character under sympatric conditions: experimental evidence. Evolution. 44:1140-1152.

There are of course many other examples that one can find if one cares to peruse the literature.

 

[The Last Conformist]

That would be definitely a direct observational evidence although I doubt we will ever be able to see that.

While the Hawking radiation of a stellar-mass hole will probably remain unobservable more or less for ever, from a sufficiently small one it should be easy to see - evaporating miniholes have been suggested as an explanation for gamma bursts, altho I seem to recall that someone has calculated that that does not work.

But even if the big bang inconsiderately did not seed the universe with a primeval population of miniholes, it should be possible to manufacture them ...

Let us just say, lensing of images of stars around its edge would do. That would be truly "seeing" it.

I do not honestly see how this is much different from observing things in orbit - it really only measures the gravitational field, and we can only say it's got to be a black hole because the matter is too concentrated to be anything else.

(Gravitational lensing from non-collapsed objects, like galaxies, have been observed. There's some beautiful pictures of multiple images of the same quasar surrounding the lensing galaxy to be found by googling.)

 

[betazed]

I do not honestly see how this is much different from observing things in orbit - it really only measures the gravitational field, and we can only say it's got to be a black hole because the matter is too concentrated to be anything else.

You are correct. Except I was making the distinction (quitee arbitrary I might add) that seeing the accretion disk you only see the effects of the hole. However, going near a large inactive black hole you would actually "see" the edge of it (the only part of it that you can ever see), and see multiple images of stars behind the hole (and if the hole was rotating, see them in multicolor, some of them blue and some of them red, but of the same star). It would be an out of the world sight. That would truly bee "seeing". I was just letting my imagination run wild.

 

[CrazyScientist]

Think about it like this. Species are populations of organisms held together by some force of genetic cohesion. Put simply, something keeps the members of a species more similar to each other than they are to any outgroup.

For most animals, plants, and other macroorganisms, that force of cohesion is genetic exchange. For example, fruit flies are always swapping genes with other fruit flies. They have to do so to reproduce. Therefore no one group of flies becomes too divergent from the others. They are bound by a force of cohesion called genetic exchange.

Sexual isolation occurs when genetic exchange between two populations is blocked. There are many many known ways for this to occur, lumped into two broad groups. Pre-mating barriers, and Post-mating barriers. Pre-mating barriers are things like geographic isolation. The two populations could theoretically mate, but they don't. Post-mating barriers are when some physiological difference prevents successful reproduction between the two groups. Post-mating isolation can occur independantly, but it has also been shown that prolonged pre-mating isolation between two populations will eventually lead to post-mating isolation, due to lack of selection against it.

The important thing is, once two groups are sexually isolated, there is nothing preventing them from diverging phenotypically. If fruit fly population X is isolated from population Y sexually, then any microevolutionary change in either population will not be reflected in the other. The two groups can continue to get more and more different, because nothing is preventing them from doing so. This is called divergence without bound. Also, once sexually isolated, two populations are irreversably seperate, because there is no genetic exchange between them. Nothing keeps them similar to each other relative to outgroups. If they are still ecologically the same, then one could wipe out the other by competition if they were reunited, but they will never be the same species again. Gothmog's example clearly demonstrate that the development of sexual isolation has been observed in flies. There you have it. Speciation observed by science.

With asexual micro-organisms, speciation is much easier, because the force of cohesion for species is ecoligical in nature. I won't get into the details here, but suffice it to say that you can place a single cell into a diverse medium and get one or more coexisting irreversably seperate groups within a weeks time. I know because I personally perform these experiments every week for my Ph.D. thesis. I can't put the data up here because it is not yet published, but I can give you one grad student and his prof's assurances that they are quite convincing.

 

[stormbind]

Ah, so I am not on your ignore list.

What did you think of my explanation of the non-difference between microevolution and macroevolution?

Very much dependent on the outcome of the fruitfly issues. The trouble (ignoring the fruitfly) is that science has observed mutations within a species many times, and can apply that knowledge to graduation observed in some fossil evidence.

However, graduation just doesn't fit with sudden changes also represented in fossil evidence, which is where macroevolution comes in. Maybe the fruitfly helps to give an explanation, but in the limited reading I have done, there was no mention of the fruitfly! So I must read something on this before I respond.

Are you denying that agricultural scientists have produced many variants of crops no longer able to reproduce with each other? Isn't that species creation by your definition?

1. I don't know of these crops (emphasis)
2. Genetic engineering is cheating
3. Infertile results don't count (like a mule doesn't count)

As far as the fruitflies...

A convincing argument

I have not read much on these yet. I did a google at the first result was This is science vs. evolution

Here are a few references for you to peruse about fruit fly experiments.

Rice, W. R. 1985. Disruptive selection on habitat preference and the evolution of reproductive isolation: an exploratory experiment. Evolution. 39:645-646.

Rice, W. R. and E. E. Hostert. 1993. Laboratory experiments on speciation: What have we learned in forty years? Evolution. 47:1637-1653.

Rice, W. R. and G. W. Salt. 1988. Speciation via disruptive selection on habitat preference: experimental evidence. The American Naturalist. 131:911-917.

Rice, W. R. and G. W. Salt. 1990. The evolution of reproductive isolation as a correlated character under sympatric conditions: experimental evidence. Evolution. 44:1140-1152.

Thankyou. Any chance you have something online?

 

[stormbind]

After decades of study, without immediately killing or sterilizing them, 400 different mutational features have been identified in fruit flies. But none of these changes the fruit fly to a different species.

"Out of 400 mutations that have been provided by Drosophila melanogaster, there is not one that can be called a new species. It does not seem, therefore, that the central problem of evolution can be solved by mutations."—*Maurice Caullery, Genetics and Heredity (1964), p. 119.

*"Richard Goldschmidt fell into despair. The changes, he lamented, were so hopelessly micro [insignificant] that if a thousand mutations were combined in one specimen, there would still be no new species."—Norman Macbeth, Darwin Retried (1971), p. 33.

A thousand known fruit-fly mutations placed in one individual—would still not produce a new species!

"In the best-known organisms, like Drosophila, innumerable mutants are known. If we were able to combine a thousand or more of such mutants in a single individual, this still would have no resemblance whatsoever to any type known as a [new] species in nature."—*Richard B. Goldschmidt, "Evolution, As Viewed by One Geneticist," American Scientist, January 1952, p. 94.

The obstinate, stubborn little creatures!

"Fruit flies refuse to become anything but fruit flies under any circumstances yet devised."—*Francis Hitching, The Neck of the Giraffe: Where Darwin Went Wrong (1982), p. 61.

Most recent quote being two decades old, so it's not conclusive. No evidence of new species on that site though...

 

[stormbind]

If they are still ecologically the same, then one could wipe out the other by competition if they were reunited, but they will never be the same species again. Gothmog's example clearly demonstrate that the development of sexual isolation has been observed in flies. There you have it. Speciation observed by science.

That's assuming they cannot cross breed, and mix up the genes. This is the single issue in determining the credibility of entire fruitfly example.

 

[Pointlessness]

I just noticed there was a thread on this. It is time for me to reply to Ridgenet's rather absurd article.

Microevolution and Macroevolution
Microevolution is the process that is responsible for the many variations of some species of living things, such as dogs and finches. Macroevolution is the mythical process by which one kind of creature, such as a reptile, turns into another kind, such as a bird. It is argued by evolutionists that given enough time, the small changes caused by microevolution can add up to big enough changes to create entirely new species. Although this argument may seem reasonable on the surface, closer examination shows that it must be false.

When Darwin was on the Galapagos Islands, he correctly observed that some finches, which had been separated from other finches of the same species, had acquired distinctive characteristics (unusual beaks or feathers). He correctly concluded that these birds had evolved, in a particular sense of the word. They truly had undergone microevolution.

Most creationists agree that microevolution does occur. In fact, Biblical creationists 1 insist that it does. Microevolution is their explanation for how all the human races came from Noah's family. They say the races of men are the result of microevolution. Let's see how microevolution works.

Notice the great inconsistency in this Ridgenet editorial with other Ridgenet articles. This one states that it is illogical to deny microevolution, while another link denies the claim of peppered moths adapting to pollution, an example of microevolution. If Ridgenet was truly for microevolution, it would not deny this example. So is Ridgenet for or against microevolution? No one really knows. Sort of like John Kerry.

Selective Breeding
Imagine that a Boeing 747 full of people crashes safely on an uncharted tropical island. Most of these people have brown eyes, but a few have blue eyes. At the risk of over-simplifying the genetics, this is because brown-eye genes are dominant, and blue-eye genes are recessive. If a child inherits brown-eye genes from one parent, and blue-eye genes from the other parent, then the child will have brown eyes. If a child inherits brown-eye genes from both parents, the child will have brown eyes. The only way for a child to have blue eyes is to inherit blue-eye genes from both parents.

Suppose that the passengers in our illustration aren't rescued for several generations. Suppose further that a blue-eyed leader gains supremacy shortly after the crash and decrees that all children who aren't born with blue eyes will be killed immediately. After several generations, all the people on the island will have blue eyes. No more brown-eyed children will ever be born because the brown-eye gene has been eliminated from the population. This new race of people will probably have other distinguishing characteristics that result from this ruthless selection process because one gene often has several effects, and other genes might be lost in the selection process, too. A new race of people will have evolved through the process of microevolution.[/B]

I have no major qualms with this.

Scrabble Analogy
Now let's consider this analogy. Suppose you have a Scrabble game. You can draw seven letter tiles from it and make a wide variety of English words. But suppose you and your spouse divorce, and the judge rules that all community property must be evenly divided. You get half of the tiles and half of the board. If you happen to get the one Q tile, you will tend to form words like quick, queen, quiet, and acquire whenever you play the game. Your spouse will never be able to form these words. When you die, your property is evenly divided among your four children. Each child gets ¼ of your tiles and ¼ of your half of the board. Each child will be even more limited in the selection of words that can be formed when the child plays the game. Each child will have a different set of possible words that can be formed because each child has a different set of letter tiles. As the number of available tiles decreases, a distinctive set of possible words evolves for each child's game. There comes a point, however, when you just can't take away any more tiles and still be able to make words.

Huh? I would respond to his if this was even marginally coherent. Anyway, this analogy is void since there are many significant differences between Scrabble tiles and life.

In both examples, particular results become inevitable because of a loss of possible variations. Microevolution can (and does) result in a group of individuals with distinctive characteristics. Dog breeders, pigeon breeders, and horse breeders have all discovered that there is a limit to how many distinctive characteristics they can produce through selective breeding. Once they get rid of all the dominant genes that were preventing the desired recessive genes from surfacing, there is nothing more they can do.

One can breed a race of blue-eyed people by removing all the brown-eye genes from the gene pool. One can't breed a race of blue-haired people, though, because there isn't any blue-hair gene already existing in the population. Acquiring a totally new feature, like blue hair, requires new genes. Since microevolution is the process of losing genes, it cannot produce any new features.

Since when was microevolution the process of losing genes?

 

[Pointlessness]

Mutations
Mutations are caused by random changes in genes. Is it possible that a mutation could produce new genes that would create a new species? Let's consider that possibility.

It is possible that somewhere there could be a colony of flying ants. It might happen that the queen of this colony might suffer some genetic accident that damages the gene that causes wings to form. Her offspring would not have any wings, and naturally would not be able to fly.

The inability to fly is certainly not an advantage, so one would not expect that natural selection would cause them to beat the flying ants in the battle for survival. This mutation would be a disadvantage. But inability to fly might not be such a large disadvantage that the non-flying ants could not survive. These non-flying ants might not mate with the flying ants, and so they would be considered to be a new species. This is not evolution in the Darwinian sense because a "higher" (or superior) species has not been created. Quite the opposite. This hypothetical new species of ant is a step backwards, not forwards. It has lost the ability to fly because it has lost a required gene. It now also has some left-over "junk DNA" designed to control the wings it no longer has. This junk DNA no longer serves any purpose.

It could be said that the ant "devolved" because the new species is inferior. Devolution is consistent with the second law of thermodynamics. Given enough time, and left to themselves, things fall apart. Things don't naturally fall together. So it is possible that flying ants could devolve into ordinary ants because one of the genes needed for flying could be lost or damaged.

For flight-challenged ants to evolve into flying ants, at least one new gene would have to be added. There is no evidence that this happens now, or has ever happened in the past. "Gene-jockey" scientists have transplanted genes to create novel characteristics in laboratory animals, but new beneficial genes don't just appear by magic in a natural process. Genes naturally get worse, not better.

Flying ants would not have a great advantage of regular, ground ants. Flying would consume too much energy for ants, and ground ants would be better adapted to avoid predators, since they spend most of life underground. The system of tunnels they dig are also useful for storage, something hypothetical flying ant would not have.

I am so sick of creationists saying that evolution violated the second law of thermodynamics. So would an powerful, order maintaining god who creates species. Humanity itself violates this definition of the second law of thermodynamics. As soon as something falls apart, chance are we would build another one. The second law of thermodynamics is a law of physics. Stop misinterpreting it.

If you write a document, then let someone change some of the letters at random, the document will make less sense, not more sense. If you randomly change op codes in a computer program, the program will not improve. Random mutations do not make things better.

The document analogy is invalid. A more valid analogy of evolution is this.
You have typed out a document, full of typos, which represents your species. Someone randomly replaces letters in your documents with other letters, which represent mutations. Now, normally, that would make your document less readable. But the beauty is this: the computer has a super-advanced spell checker, natural selection. When a letter change makes the document less readable, the spell checker undos the change. When it makes it more readable, it keeps the change. Over time, your document would now be better than it used to be.

Loss is Not Gain
Scientific studies have shown us that species can lose genetic information either through loss of genes from selective breeding, or from mutation. As a result, the new species has only a subset of previously existing characteristics. The loss of characteristics may make the new species so much inferior to the previous species that it may not be able to survive, and may become extinct. There is abundant evidence that extinction has happened to most of the species that have ever lived.

It is possible, however, that a new species will survive despite its handicap. The new species devolves from a higher life-form to a challenged life-form. Some of the species we see today may not be as capable as their ancestors were, but they are not extinct because they have learned some way to compensate. There are blind fish that live deep in the ocean. Their blindness isn't much of a handicap because there isn't much light down there anyway, so they survive.

It is easy to see how one who doesn't understand the process might think that the cumulative effects of small changes from eons of microevolution could result in macroevolution. But microevolution removes genes from the gene pool. Macroevolution requires adding new genes with special capability. You can't get more of anything by removing some of it.

Pure stupidity. Mutations can be beneficial or detrimental. Nature does not care what mutations you get.

The blind fish are blind because at the bottom of the ocean, there is no light, and there is no need to see anything, in any case.

I still do not understand how Ridgenet concluded that microevolution is the loss of genes. Can someone explain this so I can understand it?

In the 20th century we have learned many things about genetics, thermodynamics, probability, and information theory that weren't known when Darwin developed his theory. These new discoveries give abundant evidence that lower forms of life can't evolve into higher forms. In the 19th century, Darwin could be excused for thinking that what he saw on the Galapagos Islands could explain how life appeared on Earth. Today there is no excuse.

Genetics, and our other advancements only increase our understanding and the amount of evidence there is of evolution. On the contrary, our belief of this theory should be greater today than in Darwin's time. Today, there is no excuse in not believing in evolution. Well, except for creationism.

I ran out of space, I had to use a second post.

 

[Phydeaux]

Let me clear some thing up. The point of this thread was not to go againist Macro-evolution (all though we can still talk about Macro-evolution). The point was, no offense, but alot of the evolutionist in Civilization Fanatics' Forums say things like "A bunch of micro-evolution = macro-evolution", or Macro-evolution and micro-evolution are the same", this is ether missleading or wrong... There is a big difference, micro-evolution does not need a mutation, and if there are mutations they do not need to be bad, but they can not cuase a wing to grow (for micro-evolution), macro-evolution needs a mutation that could over time cause a wing to grow. The words may make it sound close, but micro-evolution with out a mutation that could over time cause a wing to grow, can not = macro-evolution. Isn't that right?

 

[embitteredpoet]

Can't you see the logic of two groups of the same species diverging over time (due to random mutations) eventually becoming different species as the fact they can no longer exchange genes, means that they eventually become different species. Look at the unique florae and fanunae of ecosystems that have been isolated for a long time (Galapagos, Australia etc.) you can clearly see how species there have diverged from a common anscestor on other continents and adapted to their new environment. It makes perfect sense to me. (Unlike my tired rambling unfortunately)

 

[stormbind]

Can't you see the logic of two groups of the same species diverging over time (due to random mutations) eventually becoming different species ...

Yes, in that those populations can have completely different characteristics and different genes.

But, only if they can still cross breed. In order to evolve (by microevolution), the population has to keep breeding among itself... which means the framework of the chromazones remains 100% constant / compatible.

Example... humans evolving into many different races.

But in the above there's no example of a species change. The DNA layout has remained constant, even if though the genes themselves changed.

The question is: Where has evolution resulted in speciation? If dogs and cats have a common ancestor, why are their DNA layouts incompatible?

 

[CrazyScientist]

The point was, no offense, but alot of the evolutionist in Civilization Fanatics' Forums say things like "A bunch of micro-evolution = macro-evolution", or Macro-evolution and micro-evolution are the same", this is ether missleading or wrong...

Thers is nothing misleading or wrong about it. I think perhaps you just don't understand it. Lots of small changes amount to large changes. This can happen easily in the absence of genetic exchange.

There is a big difference, micro-evolution does not need a mutation,

I know this has been said before at least once in this thread, but I will repeat it. Both micro and macro evolution require mutation.

and if there are mutations they do not need to be bad, but they can not cuase a wing to grow (for micro-evolution), macro-evolution needs a mutation that could over time cause a wing to grow. The words may make it sound close, but micro-evolution with out a mutation that could over time cause a wing to grow, can not = macro-evolution. Isn't that right?

I'm afraid I don't understand what you're saying in this section of your post. If you're interested in limb development I can probably refer you to some papers. Are you trying to understand how limbs evolved into wings? Well I don't know too much about it, but I do know that all the genes between mammalian & reptialian forlimb bones and bird wing bones are homologous, and given what I do know about development, it seems to me that a bunch of small changes in certan regulatory genes would easily suffice to make one out of the other.

 

[Pointlessness]

Let me clear some thing up. The point of this thread was not to go againist Macro-evolution (all though we can still talk about Macro-evolution). The point was, no offense, but alot of the evolutionist in Civilization Fanatics' Forums say things like "A bunch of micro-evolution = macro-evolution", or Macro-evolution and micro-evolution are the same", this is ether missleading or wrong... There is a big difference, micro-evolution does not need a mutation, and if there are mutations they do not need to be bad, but they can not cuase a wing to grow (for micro-evolution), macro-evolution needs a mutation that could over time cause a wing to grow. The words may make it sound close, but micro-evolution with out a mutation that could over time cause a wing to grow, can not = macro-evolution. Isn't that right?

Microevolution may or may not need a mutation, but mutations happen anyway. I think you have no idea how common mutations are. You spend 2 minutes in the sun, BOOM, mutation!

The difference between microevolution and macroevolution is the macroevolution causes speciation. Once a new species forms that cannot produce fertile offspring with the original species, that is macroevolution. That is all there is to it.