Vanderzyden

Geo,

To whom, and what in particular, is your post directed?

John

GeoTheo

"Also, breeding (whether dogs or bananas) is not co-opted evolution. It is inter-species breeding, nothing more. Surely you are speaking of evolution as entailing trans-species or new-species development."
This is a false statement. It is co-opted evolution and works on the same principle of genetic mutation. The only difference is that artificial selection is used instead of natural selection.

Doubting Didymus

Again, you are trying to attach non-theistic evolution. We can get into this later. For now, God may choose to be the select-or, BUT, natural selection COULD work without his finger on every button. In a population of tigers, those with a small mutation that makes for a better stripe pattern will naturally have a better chance of surviving an reproducing than his brothers. God did not neccesarily cause the stripes to move in that particular direction. That is why the process does not need his direct intervention at all times.

In the case of biological common descent the 'cumulative' problem dissapears. With natural selection filtering out any negative mutations, only the good or neutral ones can be passed on. Thus, probability is working in a very different way.

You are still thinking of evolution as totally random accidents just happening to form complexity. It doesn't go that way. Natural selection is inherently non-random.

Is it possible that god might have more on his mind than simple efficiency? As a matter of fact, I think it should be quite plain that god wants more from us than the precise, efficient fulfillment of a pre specified purpose. It is obvious to me that if god exists, he cares as much for the means as he does for the end, cares as much about our everyday lives as he cares about our eventual destiny. Given that the means should be as interesting and important to god as the eventual destiny, evolution is perfect as a method.

Natural selection is capable of filtering all bad mutations and leaving all good mutations. This process is inherently non random, is capable of accumulating every little piece of luck and does not need to be pushed uphill by any agent. I agree that this can not guide the evolution of life in any specific direction, but if you take the example of human co-opting of this process, you can also see that agents can easily play the part of both specifyer and guide.

It will not be long before the breeds of dogs can no longer interbreed, and thus they will have been new species. Speciation is not a huge step. It is simply that one little extra step that stops a 'race' of individuals from breeding with the species it once was. What you should be payin more attention to is the amount of difference that we have placed between the grey wolf and the pekingese. That is quite a big difference, and it has been both specified and guided.

I am confident that such a being would not need to do so. A compassionate god would be as interested in the way his creations come into being as he would be in their eventual destinies. He would have no interest in controlling every move his creations make, and I don't see why he should have any desire to use a process that can not acheive anything without his personal say-so.

Using my current favourite analogy: if God wants to hear music in air, would he create a gramophone that not only has to be operated with a handle, but also needs every note pre programmed by himself? What interest would that hold for a god? Certainly, If I were an all powerful, sophisticated and compassionate being, I would create a gramophone that operates on its own, and the music I would listen to is not my own compositions, but the work of mozart, bach, and my other creations. This is music that, while I may have forseen its coming, was not directly composed by myself. How much better it must feel for such a being as god to hear and veiw things not planned entirely by himself? So, what more perfect a mode of creation than one that is technically autonomous, but can be guided as it suits him?

I simply disagree that a god who would use evolution woud have to be cold and distant. I love my dog, yet I know that it evolved from wolves. You have not satisfactorily demonstrated that god would have to create me from nothing in order to love me. In fact, I think could could love me all the better if he knew the struggles, the trials, the epic story of low failures and soaring triumphs that my long line of ancestors played their parts in, to produce me.

Jesus Tap-Dancin' Christ

So a God who creates pestilence is doing it for our own good, and makes for a better relationship?

Albion

I guess I don't really see what you're saying, John. Are you saying that evolution doesn't work at all, the molecular and fossil evidence for common descent is all an illusion, and God is doing every last little thing directly? And leaving clues so that we're in no doubt that he's the creator and designer? Because if that's the case, as I said before, that seems to preclude both free will and the need for faith, and it runs contrary to everything I've ever heard about Christianity.

Selection of the sort that Darwin described goes on all the time. You only have to spend ten minutes looking at nature programmes on the Discovery Channel to see that. Carnivorous animals survive by killing other animals, often after chasing them and often not very humanely. The prey animals are terrified and they're in pain and they suffer. This happens, whether you believe in a loving God sustaining his creation or whether you don't; it isn't just some sort of theoretical possibility for people who want to believe in evolution. The young-earthers dismiss that suffering as an outcome of the Fall and say that God intended all creatures to be vegetarians, but that after Eve sinned, suffering began. I assume you aren't arguing the literal Genesis position; therefore, survival of one creature through the suffering of another must be what God had in mind.

Actually, breeding really is co-opted evolution. That's why Darwin started his book on the origin of species with some long descriptions of selective breeding. In this case, the selection is done by a human agent, not by environmental conditions. Since speciation takes a long time and since selective breeding depends on the breeding cycle of the animal concerned, it's hardly surprising that new species haven't been formed by selective breeding. You're also assuming that that's the goal of selective breeding, and I don't see why it would be.

Vanderzyden

"Natural selection" is an oxymoron. That is because its common meaning is equivalent to "accidental selection". Whether the interaction is "hands-on" or "hands-off", a Selector--and Selections--must necessarily exist if we observe a selection process. The Darwinist position calls the "cumulative succession of the results of accidental events" a process, but it is no such thing. A processor requires (a) a designer and (b) a processor. Even if it is "automatic", the process must be designed, specified, established, started, and confined to the parameters if it is to function properly. The Darwinist denies the existence (and/or necessity) of either a designer or processor. As such, the "theistic evolutionist" cannot reconcile purposelessness with purpose; she cannot combine intelligent design with an full and complete reliance upon accidental events.

For the Darwinist, whatever happens in nature occurs by accident. Take your tiger example: you are forgetting that the stripe pattern must first be established for it to be varied. As I indicated last time, it is highly improbable for the striping to appear by accident. Yes, it is acceptable that the pattern would vary--in different generations--within certain allelic bounds. This is mere adaptation, and is observable in all species. However, the gene must be instantiated in the first generation so that there is a context for the variation. There is no evidence of new gene development--which would be necessary for development of advanced, complex life forms from simpler ones. As you can see, the "cumulative" probability problemcontinues to persist.


Again, I would remind you that God knows all truths (all-knowing = ominscient), all-powerful (he has creative/destructive power; all power comes from him), and supremely good (everything he does is good and fulfills a specific purpose). Indeed, he cares for his creation. But an all-knowing, good God who has power over matter and energy would "do things right" and would have no trouble in doing so. You have not shown how cumulative accidental events comport with this view of God.

By your use of the term "luck", I see that you are having difficulty imagining how natural selection can actually be a process. There is no such thing as "luck". Random = chance = accident = essentially nothing. It is clear that natural selection, as it is common known, is intrinsically random.

Even if you could argue that natural selection was inherently non-accidental (i.e. purposeful), you must show a mechanism which accounts for genetic addition and enhancement. Mutations do not a new species make. Mutations are slight modifications of genetic forms.

Tell me, how does the DNA from simpler genetic material, say from unicellular organisms, come to extend itself to possess many more highly sophisticated genes. There is no mechanism that can account for what we observe in the fossil and living records.

In speculating about the origins of domestic dogs, we must consider not only gray wolves, but coyotes, jackals, etc. Spontaneous speciation is a gigantic step that is unproven. What you are describing is extinction of variants within a species. Would you please demonstrate how breeding is a co-opt of macroevolution (i.e. trans-species modified common descent)?

That's all I can write about at the moment. We can cover the last third of your reply later....

John

[ November 01, 2002: Message edited by: Vanderzyden ]</p>

scigirl

I see you haven't actually read the Lodish text yet. Well, when you do, I'll be ready to discuss these mechanisms with you , including gene duplications, transposons and retrotransposons, and genome duplications to name a few.

scigirl

scigirl

Oh and I just want to reiterate that I applaud everyone who is contributing to this thread...it's been very interesting and informative.

Vanderzyden

Scigirl,

My point is that there is no evidence of new gene generation. What can you point to that accounts for new, higher complex genes?


John

Albion

It has nothing to do with "the Darwinist." All science is the study of natural processes, and the term "natural" excludes the contribution of supernatural guidance as part of what's being studied. Now, if you're going to argue that there's no such thing as an unplanned and unguided natural process, you're going after the whole of science, not just evolutionary biology.

Both new genes and new effects have been seen in experiments. What do you think mutations do if they don't result in new genes?

So you're saying that the natural world in which some animal species exist for the purpose of being killed so that other species should survive is an example of how this good God works? Couldn't God have arranged for the prey animal to not suffer during the process of being converted into food for the predator? I've known people who have lost their faith in the Christian God over this single issue. It isn't that trivial.


Mutation may be; natural selection isn't. That's why it's called selection.

Why don't you go along to PubMed and look up some articles on gene and chromosome duplications? Duplications provide a lot of raw material for major changes to the genome. If variation occurred simply by gene exchange during sexual reproduction, what you're saying would be true; however, it's the presence of mutations that provides the driver for genuine changes.

You might want to check out the different fox species (and genera) sometime. They're also members of the Canidae, but they aren't the same species or even genus as wolves and coyotes.


If I may add another question to the ones you're already addressing: You seem to be saying that the nature of this Creator is very important and that it has to be the Christian God. Are you aware that the Intelligent Design community are saying that the nature of the designer is not relevant to the discussion and that the only important thing is that certain aspects of nature require a designer of some sort? They used to be a lot more open about the nature of the Designer, but of course that isn't going to help them shoehorn this stuff in to the school curriculum. So they've gone very very quiet about it. I gather from your posts that the whole business makes no sense if you aren't approaching it from the viewpoint of an omnipotent and benign Designer whose nature is somehow already known (I assume by reading the Bible). This places you in conflict with the ID establishment. How much sense do you think your position would make if the nature of the designer was a closed book apart from whatever you could deduce from the way the universe works?