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Evolution, maybe someone can explain?

Dan From Smithville

The Flying Elvises, Utah Chapter
Staff member
Premium Member
There is relatively little change from the bottom of a sedimentary layer to the top. Major changes tend to occur between them.
No. There is no evidence that this is correct. It isn't correct.
Usually when population drops there is an extinction at hand.
Every year the populations of insects drop without it being an extinction event. Many songbirds in my area disappear in the winter. By fall, the armadillos and road runners in Missouri are no longer observed. All of these are examples of populations dropping that are quite common. None indicate an extinction.

Population numbers can decline for many reasons that have nothing to do with extinction. Life cycle changes, migration, hibernation all impact population numbers and are not extinctions.
I believe most cause of change in species not caused by mutation results from events that kill off most of a population especially where the survivors display some highly atypical behavior.
You can believe whatever you want. It isn't correct.
All behavior is caused by consciousness which derives from individual genetics and experience.
More baseless claims that are incorrect.
No. Not really.

Obviously he was aware that populations waxed and waned but he specifically said that populations were too stable for this to influence "Evolution". He simply assumed bottlenecks and consciousness were irrelevant to speciation so he missed the causes and means of change in species.
Once again, you are simply wrong.

Darwin read Malthus and was very aware that populations were unstable and that there was struggle to survive within and between populations.

A population bottleneck is a mid-20th Century concept that Darwin wouldn't have been aware of and he did not assume that consciousness was irrelevant to the theory of evolution. It just is irrelevant. There is no evidence or reason to consider it as an integral component of evolution.
Sure.

But such slight variations (excluding mutations) will not point in a single direction in a random walk.
I can only guess that you read "random walk" somewhere and fell in love with the term. What you are saying doesn't make sense. Mutations are random and generate variation, but selection is not random and favors the variation that increases fitness.
No matter what you call it change in species is not gradual and not the result of survival of the fittest.
Wrong again. All the evidence supports gradual change in populations driven by natural selection.

I've studied biology since I was a child. I have advanced degrees in biology and chemistry. I've worked for the government, industry and taught at a university, but until I encountered you, I've never met someone that delivers claims about biology as if they were omniscient while appearing to know almost nothing about the subject. I suppose with the exception of some creationists/literalists.

I can't imagine how you feel you have a voice here when you appear entirely ignorant of the even the most basic knowledge of the subject matter.
 

Dan From Smithville

The Flying Elvises, Utah Chapter
Staff member
Premium Member
"P. fumarii, an obligate chemolithoautotroph, is able to survive on
inorganic chemicals, hydrogen, and carbon dioxide.
Accordingly, the genome of
this organism is expected to contain many novel metabolic enzymes of
commercial interest.
The genome of P. fumarii was found to be 1.85Mbp in
length and contains approximately 2,000 genes.
Initial sequence annotation
has revealed an unusually high number of genes with no obvious similarity to
previously described genes from eubacteria and archaea.
The novelty of the
organism’s genes is expected to yield similarly unique gene products, some of
which have already been characterized by Diversa."


They have a genome with a higher proportion of novel genes. That doesn't mean they have an alien genome. Good grief!

I consider this misinterpretation consistent with the level of ignorance of biology I've seen demonstrated.
 

Dan From Smithville

The Flying Elvises, Utah Chapter
Staff member
Premium Member
If you are intentionally not understanding I am not going to pursue this.

All other life on earth had a common ancestor and share huge amounts of DNA.
The different taxa of living things share DNA in varying degrees. The more closely related, the more that is shared. The more distantly related, the less that is shared.
Life at black smokers are distinct and alien to other life on earth.
There is no evidence for this. You are misinterpreting the evidence of novelty and equating it to alien.
I believe this is indicative of life having arrived from outside the earth before life had a chance to form here probably naturally.
I expect you would.
Life at black smokers thus is the only terrestrial living thing.

We are the aliens and probably the result of some nova somewhere.
There is no evidence for any of this, so it would have to be a unsupported belief I would say.
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
Initial sequence annotation
has revealed an unusually high number of genes with no obvious similarity to
previously described genes from eubacteria and archaea.
Which is consistent with strong diversification from eukaryotes living nowhere near black smokers.
But they are not "completely different" like you claimed.
They fit the phylogenetic tree, meaning that there IS matching DNA which puts them on that tree.
They fit the nested hierarchical structure of life, like all other life.

They sit in a different branch then us complex eukaryotes, yes - just like I expected.
They are however not "completely different" with no DNA matches at all.
They wouldn't fit on the phylogenetic tree if that were the case.
 

YoursTrue

Faith-confidence in what we hope for (Hebrews 11)
They don't know exactly how it came about. There is the materialist camp that believes it must have happened as a result of unthinking processes. Then there is the more spiritualist view that life in the universe is fostered by intelligence (my camp).
I do not disagree that some mechanisms are done "unconsciously" as some have said here. Such as virus mutations. Among other things. Thank you for your response, however.
 

YoursTrue

Faith-confidence in what we hope for (Hebrews 11)
Mustta dis and mustta dat is about all there is in studying what else is there or what is.
The physicalist camp (not mine) would argue 'what else is there' that can account for DNA and complex life. So, it must have been a sequence of chance/unthinking processes, and we just need to figure out more about how it happened.

From what I read here, many people believe the science of evolution is virtually about everything "unconscious" regarding the universe and life. "Unconscious" development. How do you feel about it? Would you say that the science of evolution the study of anything and everything about life based on what I read here in some posts strictly and entirely the "unconscious" development or formation of life?
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
They fit the nested hierarchical structure of life, like all other life.

They sit in a different branch then us complex eukaryotes, yes - just like I expected.

Is this your opinion or the opinion of peers?

If it is the opinion of peers then professional opinion has, I believe, changed.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
From what I read here, many people believe the science of evolution is virtually about everything "unconscious" regarding the universe and life. "Unconscious" development. How do you feel about it? Would you say that the science of evolution the study of anything and everything about life based on what I read here in some posts strictly and entirely the "unconscious" development or formation of life?

It's hardly surprising that after Darwin et al dismissed a definition for or even the existence of consciousness that they then concluded that consciousness has no bearing on change in species, life, abiogenesis, and the creation of life.

Without realizing it they have created a reality based on the perspective of our species, language, reductionism, and inertness. This created reality might bear very little relationship to the reality we each strive to see.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
...he did not assume that consciousness was irrelevant to the theory of evolution. It just is irrelevant. There is no evidence or reason to consider it as an integral component of evolution.

He never discussed consciousness nor its role in the preservation of life. He did not discuss individuals or even believe that all individuals are conscious. He did not discuss individuals except highly tangentially as member of species. Despite the fact that all life and all ideas are individual he knew that individual consciousness played no role in preservation of nor change in life or species! Darwin's opinion that consciousness is irrelevant is not one I share.
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
From what I read here, many people believe the science of evolution is virtually about everything "unconscious" regarding the universe and life. "Unconscious" development. How do you feel about it? Would you say that the science of evolution the study of anything and everything about life based on what I read here in some posts strictly and entirely the "unconscious" development or formation of life?
You are trying to imply that there is a certain motive involved in scientific research. There isn't.
Biology just studies the facts and goes where the evidence leads.

The evidence leads to natural processes. That is all.
There is no evidence that anything else is involved, which is why it isn't part of the theory. That is all.

If you want to insist it should be included, you will be required to show / demonstrate why it should be included with independently verifiable evidence.
If all you have is "because I believe it religiously", then it will -off course- be ignored.
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
He never discussed consciousness nor its role in the preservation of life. He did not discuss individuals or even believe that all individuals are conscious. He did not discuss individuals except highly tangentially as member of species. Despite the fact that all life and all ideas are individual he knew that individual consciousness played no role in preservation of nor change in life or species! Darwin's opinion that consciousness is irrelevant is not one I share.
Nobody in science cares about your, or Darwin's, "opinions".
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
You are trying to imply that there is a certain motive involved in scientific research. There isn't.
Biology just studies the facts and goes where the evidence leads.

The evidence leads to natural processes. That is all.
There is no evidence that anything else is involved, which is why it isn't part of the theory. That is all.

If you want to insist it should be included, you will be required to show / demonstrate why it should be included with independently verifiable evidence.
If all you have is "because I believe it religiously", then it will -off course- be ignored.

Yet you ignore the fact that all observed change in life is sudden, based on behavior, and occurs at bottlenecks.

I'm not suggesting this is a "conscious" decision but rather that it springs directly from methodology and thinking. It's very hard to see what you aren't looking for and our species can't see consciousness even when we're looking for it. In our species consciousness is like a feedback loop and is nearly invisible from the inside. It is barely more visible in others.
 

cladking

Well-Known Member
Nobody in science cares about your, or Darwin's, "opinions".

Everyone is quite comfortable with opinions they share.

Most people share a rather long litany of premises that they acquire with language.

Many of these premises have been shown over and over in many ways to be entirely false but this science has had little or no effect on reevaluation, reinterpretation, and ongoing methodology or the pursuit of reductionistic science.
 

metis

aged ecumenical anthropologist
From what I read here, many people believe the science of evolution is virtually about everything "unconscious" regarding the universe and life. "Unconscious" development. How do you feel about it? Would you say that the science of evolution the study of anything and everything about life based on what I read here in some posts strictly and entirely the "unconscious" development or formation of life?

There are a great many people who believe in "theistic evolution", namely God-guided evolution. Thus, not all is chance with that viewpoint. Matter of fact, the surveys I've seen have that as being what the majority of Christian theologians believe.
 

George-ananda

Advaita Vedanta, Theosophy, Spiritualism
Premium Member
From what I read here, many people believe the science of evolution is virtually about everything "unconscious" regarding the universe and life. "Unconscious" development. How do you feel about it? Would you say that the science of evolution the study of anything and everything about life based on what I read here in some posts strictly and entirely the "unconscious" development or formation of life?
I am one that disagrees with the "unconscious" development of life theory. I think the mindboggling complexity of DNA and complex life processes are not likely to have happened by an unconscious process. Furthermore, I believe there are higher planes of nature than the physical plane and there exists things like nature spirits that foster things,
 
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