You’re making this up. Who has ever studied those alleles? Do we even know how many alleles there are?
Again, you’re making up the “required” time. You simply have no idea what it takes to get from E. Coli to amoebae.
These unrelated topics don’t help your argument …aside from the fact that Big Bang is itself a questionable model which I will not discuss here.
I am not sure you even understand my position. If you care, you might want to start here: http://nonlin.org/evolution/
You can’t be serious.
Are you proposing that the reason the Japanese eat more French fries is because millions of Japanese, in the span of 20 years, have experienced genetic selection that compels them to eat a more Western diet?
Because there is not even any credible agent that could change the genetics for millions of Japanese in 20 years … we don’t have to ask about changes in the alleles. It’s a preposterous hypothesis.
But it can be tested, I’m quite sure - - it would be tested as False!
Are you saying your genetics match 100% those of one of your parents? Agent or not, genetics change continuously from generation to generation. You’re the one not serious.
Another nonscientific term. How on earth do you measure “morphological change”? You just don’t understand that vague descriptions ARE NOT part of the scientific method.
Indeed, because evolution is not science. But there’s an intense philosophical debate that just included you and me.
How on earth do you know there’s no genetic change? Aren’t your genetics different from those of everyone else?
No, they do not. You will never see a serious argument about “particle” in physics unless that particle is identified by other MEASURABLE properties.
In order to measure change (evolution), you need to know the initial condition and the final condition. But everyone has different DNA in the initial condition, hence NO Baseline. True, we can estimate one allele before and after, but do you define evolution based on one or a few alleles? Another question is How much change is “Evolution”?
You say:
If so, then every new birth is evolution.
And where EXACTLY do you draw the line? I have never seen this “line”, and this is exactly what I have been asking for all along.
Here is my original position which might help you understand: http://nonlin.org/evolution/
I went to your link. How can you write so much about something you don’t understand?
Here is a doozy of a paragraph right at the very beginning:
"Evolution is defined as “changes in gene frequencies in populations”.
For an aspiring scientific theory, this is vague and meaningless since every single newborn changes the gene frequency in a population."
There is nothing vague and meaningless about something you can Count.
Now that we have adequate genome technology, we can literally take a population of 1000 (let’s say…) Mice. And for the sake of simplicity, let’s say we are Only interested in Gene “A”, that comes in 5 forms.
And in 1000 mice, the allele proportions are:
1000 total pop.
So why is this vague? Or meaningless? This is incredible precision… now that we can tell precisely what makes one Allele different from another.
1000 = 100.000%
So let’s imagine that there is ONE new birth. And for the gene we are tracking, we determine
that the new baby mouse has Allele #2, increasing the count from 135 to 136, and the total is now 1001.0 , instead of 1000.0.
This changes the percentage for the 2nd allele by 0.000864, or roughly 9 hundreds of an additional percentage, which looks like this: 13.5% becomes 13.59%.
As you can see, if we are rounding, there is no change in Allele frequency at all with just 1 birth.
So… as you can see… these statistics are:
Thus, your sentence: “For an aspiring scientific theory, this is vague and meaningless since every single newborn changes the gene frequency in a population.”
is wrong in just about every way it is possible for a sentence to be wrong.
It isn’t vague.
It isn’t meaningless.
It is only meaningless if you expect that one birth is supposed to have monumental affects.
But experts can tell you that the larger the population, the more stable allele proportions become.
It’s only when a population is on the verge of extinction that allele proportions have the power to dramatically shift … because there it is easier to influence a population of 50 than it is to influence a population of 50,000.
No, you cannot round and then give a bunch of disclaimers. And this is only 5 alleles. But how many alleles does an organism have? That’s why Evolution is not science. And we haven’t even gotten to “Common Descent”. How do you go from “allele frequency” to “common descent”?
Do you agree that every single newborn changes the gene frequency in a population? It’s fine, but utterly unremarkable if you want to define every newborn as Evolution.
If you understood population genetics, you would know that I am not making this up. There have only been two or three generations in Japan since WW2. That’s too few generations to manifest a significant shift in allele frequency.
Your accusation about my character is quite remarkable.
I already gave you my idea and the mathematical basis behind it. You might try pointing out where my calculations supposedly went wrong, and to what extent.
I am astonished that you don’t see the connection. They are very much related because they show how the natural science community performs the job of modeling, data-gathering, verification, etc. I have shown that the way the biological science community uses its major theory to inform research and gain a better understanding of mechanisms is consistent with the way the geology and astrophysics communities do their work.
Your thread-bare assertion that they are not related does not make your assertion true. On the other hand, if you would like to offer substance rather than bare assertion, I am all ears.
You haven’t given me a reason to care, NonlinOrg. If I saw you constructively engaging in the conversation here, I would be motivated to read what you have written elsewhere.
I hope my feedback helps you, NonlinOrg. Have a blessed day.
Seriously? If I showed you a Great Dane and a chihuahua, handed you a ruler and a scale, you wouldn’t be able to figure out how to do a quantitative measurement of the difference in their morphologies? Morphology means the physical structure of the organism. Physical structures can be measured – it’s something scientists are quite good at.
You can hold whatever beliefs you want, but in the real world of people who actually do, fund, publish, teach and study science, evolution is part of science. That means that your belief in this case is simply wrong. (And no, this is not a philosophical debate.)
Because I know something about the subject.
I’ve never seen a serious debate in biology about whether something is evolution either. And there’s plenty of fuzziness in physics about what a particle is. Is a nucleus a particle? Is a broad resonance a particle? How broad does it have to be not to count as a bound state? What about an excited state of another particle? I note that you still haven’t provided me with a definition of a particle.
Since you’re making sweeping statements about a broad range of scientific subjects, I have to ask: what are your qualifications for declaring what’s scientific and what isn’t? Exactly which fields have you published in?
Your conclusion seems to have nothing to do with your premise. Everyone has different DNA, so we can count how many people have allele A at a site and how many have allele B there, and do the same for lots of other sites. Again, counting things is something scientists are good at. Then we can see whether the numbers change over time. Or we can compare two groups that have been separated for some time, and see how their allele frequencies differ.
“Define evolution”? I’m not defining evolution – I’m studying it. We can observe evolution of one allele, or of lots of alleles, or of an entire genome. You keep saying these things as if they were some kind of problem, but they’re not. [quote=“NonlinOrg, post:75, topic:34603”]
Another question is How much change is “Evolution”?
[/quote]
That’s a question I’ve answered repeatedly. Why do you keep ignoring my answer?[quote=“NonlinOrg, post:75, topic:34603”]
If so, then every new birth is evolution.
[/quote]
Yeah, I know. Every time you say that, I agree and ask why it’s a problem. In response, you just say it again. [quote=“NonlinOrg, post:75, topic:34603”]
And where EXACTLY do you draw the line?
[/quote]
At any change in allele frequency.
I have to wonder if English is your language of birth. You don’t seem to follow the sense of the written word very well, which is common if your native tongue is some other language.
My point about rounding is pretty basic!: some experimental studies don’t need to have data extended to the “One Hundredth” of One Percent. And so, for those, the birth of one person may not change the numbers. I also said that you can be as precise as you want to be.
You complain that I chose a hypothetical example of a gene with 5 alleles. Did you really want me to choose a gene with 20 alleles… and then type up percentages, to the one hundredth for 20 alleles - - pre-birth and post-birth? You seem incapable of understanding “an example” or a “demonstration of the math”. You ask how many alleles does an organism have? I would ask you … do you know any experiment any where, that tried to make meaningful observations on hundreds of genes at a time, incorporation thousands of alleles?
Have you ever done a science fair project? Virtually all science experiments seek to focus on just a few variables… But, as I said already, because we can now quickly identify all the molecules of DNA and RNA, if you want to study hundreds of genes and thousands of alleles… the technology exists for you to do it. It’s just going to take a long time and cost quite a bit of lab costs. So shall we dismiss all science because “it just takes so long”?
As for your sentence: “It’s fine, but utterly unremarkable if you want to define every newborn as Evolution.” We have already covered the issue of materiality. In a 500,000 member population, the birth of one is not going to materially change the metrics. In a near-extinct population of 10 precious “Tiger Pigs” (< totally fictional name), then the birth of ONE is going to have a 10% affect on lots of things, right? While in a 500,000 population, a birth of one is going to be 2 ten-thousandths of one percent (0.0002%) - - or a factor of 0.000002.
Generally speaking, evolution doesn’t get interesting until you have spanned multiple generations. So while a single birth might technically qualify as a “teeny tiny bit of evolution”, it isn’t really what a researcher is looking for. He is looking for material changes in a whole population; one birth does not represent a material change. When botanists measure the growth of a plant … they usually just measure from the ground to the top of the plant. They might count the number of branches. But would you fault them for not counting roots … and not counting individual leaves … and then dismiss their results because counting roots doesn’t produce dramatic conclusions?
You need to make up your mind … either you are interested in the tiniest shift in the metrics, or you aren’t. Usually when metrics dwindle into incredibly small measures … the researcher says: “there was virtually no change” or “there was essentially no change” … and the like.
Conclusion: I strongly suggest you start paying attention to what people tell you about methodology and experimental design. You seem woefully unprepared to grasp when something matters, and when something doesn’t matter. Your main ambition appears to be to dismiss everything as having no value because it isn’t precise enough … or because it measures precision down to a level that is uninteresting to you. My dear sir, you cannot play both sides of the game.
You just posted to me that you didn’t CARE about “any” change in frequency … because it was “unremarkable” … if not meaningless!
@glipsnort I don’t think you and I should spend any more time on this “science pirate”. He pretty much defines problems into and out of existence on a random basis.
I know I don’t have time to teach him things he intentionally ignores.
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously. And that’s a fact.
Or at least it’s an alternative fact.
OK, I see arguments for the sake of arguing. Thanks, but I am not interested. You too have a blessed day.
Size and weight, yes. But beyond that? Is a chihuahua just a sack of potatoes of a certain length?
My thoughts exactly.
Question is, do you have something to add, or just argue for the sake of arguing?
“Because I know” and “what are your qualifications?” just don’t cut it.
One or two allele, yes but “an entire genome”? Elaborate.
You just did define it as any allele change including those associated with every new birth. I am fine with that, but this definition makes Evolution totally unremarkable and gets you nowhere near “Common Descent”.
Sorry, your professorial tone is unwarranted and doesn’t work on silencing opponents. If that’s your approach to debates, good luck to you.
It’s great that we got to this agreement, but as mentioned, this doesn’t get you to “Common Descent” which was the whole point of Darwin and his followers.
Just to be clear, you dismissed the scientific measurement of morphology while knowing literally nothing about the subject. In fact, you don’t even seem to be aware that it is a subject. Doesn’t it worry you that drawing conclusions based on knowing nothing might be a bit prone to error?
As it happens, there are lots of things you can measure. Not just size, but sizes – sizes of the many parts that make up the structure of a body. Sizes, weights, angles, shapes. There entire textbooks on morphometrics.[quote=“NonlinOrg, post:85, topic:34603”]
One or two allele, yes but “an entire genome”? Elaborate.
[/quote]
To look at an entire genome, first you look at the first base in the genome. Then you look at the second base. Then the third base. You keep going until you’ve looked at all of the bases. Then you look at a second genome and do the same thing. Then you look at a third genome. And so on, through all the genomes you have available. Then you compare the genomes. You identify places where they differ; those are sites with alleles. You count how many copies of each allele there are in your sample. Then you compare your sample to another sample – from another time, another place, another species. (There are lots of other things you can do with genomes, too.)
No, the definition does not get you near common descent. It also won’t wash your car or pluck chickens for you. It does what it’s supposed to do: delineate the range of processes we consider evolution. We accept the reality of common descent because of the evidence for common descent, not because of a definition. (And I still have no idea why you think the definition is so important.)
Yes, absolutely. It may be a very small bit of evolution, but it sure still counts!
You don’t know what I do or don’t know. It was just a joke - I thought you might not get it.
That’s the theory - not my question. Has it been done? To what extent? Introns too?
…and that’s the problem with Evolution.
Then “Evolution” is a non-event. But that’s not what I hear and read all over.
I know you wrote this: “Another nonscientific term. How on earth do you measure “morphological change”?” Was that a joke too?
I didn’t state a theory; I said that’s what you do. Yes, we sequence complete genomes all the time. Everything from Ebola virus to thousands of human genomes.
I’m sure in your head this response somehow makes sense, but out here, not so much. This definition tells us only what counts as evolution. It doesn’t tell us whether there have been minute amounts of evolution or immense amounts, whether we’re only related by descent to other humans or also to kumquats and mushrooms. A definition can’t tell you those things; only evidence can. Yet for some reason you display interest only in the definition, not in the evidence.
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