Automaton

It doesn't, however, by the logical nature of unfalsifiable concepts, they cannot ever be embraced as a scientific hypothesis. Science works. Beliefs contrary to science do not.

OrderedChaos

Because if creationism were true, we would see all 3 kinds of insect appear at once in the fossil record, all together. If evolution were true, we would expect to see the more 'primative' types appear first, followed by the more derived. It turns out that the fossil record is in favor of evolution. And the whole point of my post was to show how such a thing at metamorphosis evolved.

Daggah

If it isn't falsifiable then we can't know whether it's true or not.

Corey Hammer

On unfalsifiability:

I think a point needs to be cleared up about falsifiabiliy.

While nice, falsifiability is not necessary. The reason being certain fields, like archeology, may make hypotheses about specific events that are not falsifiable (e.g., was Cleopatra present during the battle of Actium or was she somewhere else?). However, these hypotheses are testable. Therefore, it is testability that is the hallmark of science. If (ID) Creationists can develop testable hypotheses, then they can do science. As of yet, they have not, nor is the likelihood of them doing so high.

unworthyone

Evolution does not rule the world. The mind was around well before the scientist. So beliefs contrary to science bring us to our original state of the metaphysical. Do you not agree the metaphysical exists?

Vorkosigan

What does this have to do with anything? We're discussing natural selection and the evolution of the butterfly.

tronvillain

There is not necessarily anything wrong with a hypothesis not being falsifiable. This becomes obvious if we consider the classic example of flipping a coin: if your hypothesis is that the coin is biased (say, to come up heads seventy percent of the time), no number of flips will completely falsify it. As has been pointed out, what is important is that the hypothesis is testable - as the coin is flipped, the probability of the hypothesis can be modified accordingly.

tronvillain

theunworthyone:
Of course, evolution was around well before the mind. I certainly don't agree the metaphysical exists, given that I have no idea what you mean by it. Now, back to OrderedChaos' post...

Grumpy

What's so special about butterflies?

<a href="http://beta.tolweb.org/tree?group=Cnidaria&contgroup=Animals" target="_blank">Coelenterates</a>, most <a href="http://beta.tolweb.org/tree?group=Mollusca&contgroup=Animals&dynnodeid=24 09" target="_blank">mollusks</a>, and many other <a href="http://beta.tolweb.org/tree?group=Arthropoda&contgroup=Animals&dynnodeid= 2409" target="_blank">arthropods</a> undergo metamorphosis to greater or lesser degrees. In fact, based on <a href="http://beta.tolweb.org/tree?group=Animals&contgroup=Eukaryotes&dynnodeid= " target="_blank">this diagram</a>, I'd say most phyla are dominated by organisms with a larval stage. Vertebrates are an exception. (Of course, between vertebrates and arthropods, the latter always have a stronger claim to being the "rule.")

lpetrich

Her'es a <a href="http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/phyla/metazoasy.html" target="_blank">more up-to-date</a> view. Check out the subgroups Deuterostomia (includes echinoderms and chordates), Ecdysozoa (includes arthropods and nematodes), and Lophotrochozoa (includes annelids and mollusks).

Indirect development through planktonic larvae (sort of like tadpoles) is present in all three of those subgroups, as well in Cnidaria/Coelenterata, though the larvae look very different from group to group. This suggests either multiple evolution of a larval phase or adaptation in different directions.

Here's an <a href="http://cas.bellarmine.edu/tietjen/Ecology/early_animal_evolution.htm" target="_blank">interesting page on early animal evolution</a>. One very interesting proposal is that the larval phase was the first step towards multicellularity, but that it did not scale very well, since it depends on interactions between nearby-neighbor cells. An invention that made possible greater size was to set aside certain cells, which would then form the next phase in the growth of the animal. Imagine a worm growing from the larva with more advanced and better-scaling patterning, perhaps originally as some sort of appendage.