You cannot observe what happened millions of years ago.
Again, you are claiming what you cannot prove or witness.
Yes , it happened, but that does not mean it happened as you (ToE) says.
This is an impossible impasse.
It ends up as much a belief as any religion.
We could argue until kingdom come.
I suggest we do not
Richard
It has been verified in multiple experiments. For example,
The graphs track individual mutations. Several mutations are shown to reach fixation over time in populations of fungi. The paper also shows the differences in asexual and sexual populations with whole groups of mutations moving together to fixation in the asexual population, whereas mutations move towards fixation individually in the sexual populations due to sexual recombination.
T, as per usual you miss the point. No one as far as I can see has denied the evolutionary takes place. The question is how and why?
How does this paper demonstrate that fungi evolve through the survival of the fittest, particularly today when we know that evolution is often tied to change in climate?
It would seem that Why is an impossible question.
Climate may be a factor, but without any intelligent guidance the “why” is fluke.
Richard
Why wouldn’t survival of the fittest be involved when there is a change in climate? Those that are able to better cope with the change in climate will have more offspring and pass on the traits that allow them to cope better.
The paper I linked for you and the accompanying graphs show survival of the fittest as plain as day. Those with specific mutations become a larger and larger percentage of the population until all or nearly all individuals have that mutation.
So what intelligence are bacteria using when a new mutation confers antibiotic resistance and the offspring with those mutations take over the population in the presence of antibiotic?
An example: there are plant species along th U.S. Pacific coast whose ranges are being pushed northward due to climate change. One difference has been observed that has to do with fitness: those species whose seeds are spread by birds are moving north most rapidly, those spread by land animals not so fast, those spread by insects less so, those spread by wind less yet, and those whose seeds merely fall not well at all. If change continues as it has been, this means that those plants in the final category are seriously at risk, with risk decreasing as the categories move into seed dispersal methods that reach longer distances.
Or the ones that developed from barely tolerating very dilute concentrations of arsenic into descendants that metabolize arsenic.
None.
They are not adapting. That would be an active response. But, their life cycle is so short, and the mutations so frequent, one will be resistant. It proves nothing other than the laws of probability…
Richard
What does this have to do with the Selfish Gene which Richard Dawkins so successfully sold the scientific world without opposition for all these years and Trump is selling to his Republican Party under the guise if MAGA.
Yes, evolution takes place. If there is only ONE way that evolution can take place and that is by survival of the fittest then it must be by survival of the fittest, the selfish gene if you will. But the evidence does not PROVE this. Instead the evidence points to the fact that life forms that are best able to adapt to their environment will most evolve and survive.
It doesn’t even have to be climate changing over time. In my own region you can move from high desert with sagebrush to alpine forest in the span of 30 miles. Species are going to be butting up against these changes.
It shows how an allele pushes itself to fixation due to natural selection.
It is a two step process. First, there is variation produced by mutations which is blind to the needs of the organism. This is followed by natural selection of those variants, or chance fixation of neutral mutations. Organisms don’t actively change their genomes in order to meet the needs found in their environment.
That is what biologists call adaptation. If your argument is based on semantics then it doesn’t hold much weight.
Precisely.
The language used implies that Nature is changing consciously. That would need a corporate consciousness. There is no evidence to suggest that bacteria have a corporate consciousness.
Nature does not have a corporate consciousness so it cannot “adapt”.
Changes happen, and if they are advantageous, they will survive, but it is not adaption.
Richard
No it doesn’t.
: adjustment to environmental conditions: such as
…
: modification of an organism or its parts that makes it more fit for existence under the conditions of its environment : a heritable physical or behavioral trait that serves a specific function and improves an organism’s fitness or survival
Many words which are common and have more general meanings in routine speech, are utilized in the context of science with meanings that are more specific. “Theory” is a notorious example. As long as the context is clear and understanding between author and reader is clear, it is probably desultory to focus on such semantics.
So science has its own language?
That is all very well but the layman will hear and understand the common usage.
The point here is that any thing that is adapted has got there either
passively or consequential that is
It has the right features but not due to knowledge or understanding but because the feature a right for the situation
If climate or other pressures change it is the creature that already has the right features that will prosper or any creature that develops those features naturally.
IOW
it is not due to knowing or understanding what is required.
The problem is that Evolution is worded in such a way as to imply that the progressions are guaranteed, or inevitable. They are not. If no creature has the right features (Eg able to survive a large meteor) all will die out. Survival is not certain. Evolution is not certain.
As for flight. There is no good reason for any creature to develop it or know how to do it instinctively from the word go.
Neither is there a good reason why any creature should develop the ability to move on land just because it is there, or they have survived being exposed at high tide. it is not inevitable. It cannot be justified by any human conceptualisation.
The fact that it happened is either due to a higher intelligence (God) or fluke (The right features emerge and are utilised)
Richard
You are describing a problem with Lamarckian evolution. Although “Lamarckian evolution” is commonly used to refer to the idea of inheriting acquired traits, that was just a reasonable but incorrect guess on how genetics works. The main problem with Lamarck’s evolution as understood at the time is the idea that things are inherently trying to progress. Continuous abiogenesis produces simple organisms that are growing more complex and advanced, in Lamarck’s model. Most claims that particular social or political agendas are evolutionary are Lamarckian, not matching a modern understanding of biological evolution. In reality, at the physical level your description as a “fluke” is fairly accurate, though with the complication that evolution is generally starting with something functional and making variations on it, so the chance of the features that emerge being right for something are fairly good. For example, proteins generally have some sort of biological functionality. A mutant protein likely does something.
Above the physical level, as you state, we can recognize God as in control, directing those “flukes” as He sees fit, but not necessarily in any way that we can physically detect.
All biologists are very aware of the massive number of species and lineages that have gone extinct. As it turns out, 100% of the organisms alive today are the product of lineages that didn’t go extinct.
Your say so isn’t that compelling.
Well, tell me why, or even how a creature can suddenly fly?
Are you claiming that the complex figure of eight motion of a bird flight could be found by accident?
Why should any creature climb up and leap?
You do know about lemmings!
Richard
“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” -Colossians 4:6
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