Evolution My ToE

[YoursTrue]

It has been explained to you in great detail with a great deal of information/evidence. You've also been provided with mutiple links.

The problem is, you haven't grasped the basics, and don't appear to want to do so. Honestly, it sounds like you need to take a course on the subject. Googling creationist sites isn't going to be very helpful to anybody.

One of the reasons I will not take a course in it is because I cannot interrupt the instructor and ask questions as I do here. It's possible if I do he will tell me to read another book or go to another website, and the basic questions of doubt will remain unanswered. You keep bringing up creationist sites. As if nothing they say has any merit. Listening sometimes to the impeachment arguments in the U.S., it most assuredly has people highly invested in either side, true or not. I certainly cannot follow it all about the possibilities of evolution -- and so now I have a question based on something I read about Neanderthals. Let me see if you agree with the following statement about them, and so I'll poswe my question after that. (I was wondering exactly when it is said that "Neanderthals" lived, so I looked it up.)
"They lived throughout Europe and parts of Asia from about 400,000 until about 40,000 years ago" From History.com website. I guess that's not a creationist website. So let me ask you, do you agree that Neanderthals lived from about 400,000 until about 40,000 years ago?

 

[Polymath257]

No. In order for both of us to understand the other, isn't the evolution you are talking about genetic and biological? We have to have a starting point to understand the other. So are we discussing social or genetic evolution in the strict genetic-biological sense?

Can we use analogies to help you understand biological evolution? Sometimes those analogies won't be exact, but will have the central idea needed to understand biological evolution.

In particular, one issue that seems to come up is fixity of species. And the simple fact is that species are NOT fixed when time is taken into account, even though they are distinguishable at almost any particular time.

Another issue is that of the 'first' member of a species. And the simple fact is that species are variable enough that it isn't necessarily clear where the boundary is, so no 'first' need have existed.

Yet another issue is the notion that small changes from one generation to the next, where each parent and child would be considered the same species, can still lead to large scale changes over the course of many generations.

There are other similar issues, but in each of the ones above, the analogy with language can show how such can happen. Furthermore, there is always enough genetic variation in most species to allow such shifts, so the analogy actually works.

 

[Polymath257]

"They lived throughout Europe and parts of Asia from about 400,000 until about 40,000 years ago" From History.com website. I guess that's not a creationist website. So let me ask you, do you agree that Neanderthals lived from about 400,000 until about 40,000 years ago?

The latter date seems to be the case. There is a fair amount of debate about the older date. The earliest potential Neanderthal bones are from about 430,000 years ago, but hose are controversial. Clearly they existed as a separate line from about 180,000 years ago and there is some evidence that they split off the main line to humans up to 800,000 years ago.

Let's say that the earliest dates are uncertain based on what we know right now.

It might be a good idea to read over the following article:

Neanderthal - Wikipedia

 

[YoursTrue]

Can we use analogies to help you understand biological evolution? Sometimes those analogies won't be exact, but will have the central idea needed to understand biological evolution.

In particular, one issue that seems to come up is fixity of species. And the simple fact is that species are NOT fixed when time is taken into account, even though they are distinguishable at almost any particular time.

Another issue is that of the 'first' member of a species. And the simple fact is that species are variable enough that it isn't necessarily clear where the boundary is, so no 'first' need have existed.

Yet another issue is the notion that small changes from one generation to the next, where each parent and child would be considered the same species, can still lead to large scale changes over the course of many generations.

There are other similar issues, but in each of the ones above, the analogy with language can show how such can happen. Furthermore, there is always enough genetic variation in most species to allow such shifts, so the analogy actually works.

I believe species can modify genetically without human intervention. I do not consider that the same as evolution from a unicell to eventually become a human being by sheer biological force over millions of years.

 

[Polymath257]

I believe species can modify genetically without human intervention. I do not consider that the same as evolution from a unicell to eventually become a human being by sheer biological force over millions of years.

OK, so that is a first step. We acknowledge that species can change over time.

Next question: by how much? Is there a natural barrier to how much they can change?

 

[YoursTrue]

The very post you are replying to, actually IS giving you more then "mere resemblances".
It's giving you a progression through time.

These aren't just random fossils that "look alike".
There's chronology and gradualism there - exactly as expected in evolutionary context.

What you see in that post is, off course, only the tip of the tip of the tip of the iceberg of evidence...
But your response to it is remarkable....

Either you really don't see how it is offering more then "mere resemblances" or it's a serious case of dishonest evaluation of what people tell you.

I need to have the dna explained to show it was moving into another form. Including an explanation of the distinctive differences of the dna. Furthermore, I've been investigating about Neanderthals, and see the following: on one website, I don't believe it's a "creationist" website. (God forbid, I suppose, it should be from someone who believes in creation by God...to use an expression.) Whatever happened to those Neanderthals? | Understanding Genetics
It starts out by saying, "Imagine you're in Europe 40,000 years ago. You are part of a group of Neanderthals happily living in a cave."
Now here's the question. It seems there were cave dwellers. When I took art history in college, the instructor explained about 10,000 year old cave paintings. OK, I thought, interesting, but not believing what I now do, I thought, ok -- ok. These primitive people drew on cave walls. But now my question is about cave-dwelling. So what's your hypothesis about when and why homes were built, rather than living in caves? Any idea if the Neanderthals built homes rather than for hundreds of thousands of years go from cave to cave? I mean I think now these are reasonable questions to ask. Also, as I was doing a little research, I came across a name our friend Haeckel gave to this breed, culture, or whatever (subspecies?).
"However, an alternative proposal put forward by Ernst Haeckel in 1866 – Homo stupidus – is more revealing about common attitudes to the Neanderthals which persisted well into the 20th century." Before I read that about our dear friend Herr Haeckel calling the Neanderthal man 'homo stupidus,' I wondered, during all those years they were cave-dwellers?? (Wow is all I have to say now.)

 

[YoursTrue]

OK, so that is a first step. We acknowledge that species can change over time.

Next question: by how much? Is there a natural barrier to how much they can change?

I can't answer that with certainty, can you? Let me rephrase. I wouldn't venture a guess right now.

 

[Polymath257]

I can't answer that with certainty, can you? Let me rephrase. I wouldn't venture a guess right now.

As far as we can tell, there is no such natural barrier. What happens is that mutations increase diversity and natural selection moves the average. Then more mutations increase the diversity around that new average.

If changes happen faster than new mutations can re-introduce diversity, then there are problems with further change. But as long as the rate of change is smaller than the replenishment of diversity, the evidence is that there is no other barrier to the amount of change possible.

In other words, in the long term, there is no species barrier.

 

[YoursTrue]

How many accidental resemblances to this degree do you expect to see? Are there ways to tell the differences between accidental resemblances and actual genetic resemblances?

Given the *timing*, what other possibilities are there? remember, there were NO humans at the time these creatures existed. Also, these creatures stood upright, made tools, had large brain cases, etc. To pass it off as mere resemblance seems, to me, to be ignoring the evidence.

What other explanation for these creatures do you propose? And how *did* humans originate?

Continuing my investigation of what reports say about scientists and their opinions, Sci-news.com says this about the changing opinions of researchers and Neanderthals: "The evidence for cognitive inferiority is simply not there. What we are saying is that the conventional view of Neanderthals is not true,” said Dr Paola Villa from the University of Colorado at Boulder Villa, who is the first author on the paper." And the article goes on to offer opinions as to how they think Neanderthals may have phased out. As I said, that their successors must have figured how to farm after hundreds of thousands of years of their Neanderthal predecessors, maybe they figured they'd like to build homes instead of living in caves. I'm not trying to be funny here -- so cognitive inferiority is not there, they say, it's just that they liked living in caves all those hundreds of thousands of years I guess.

 

[YoursTrue]

The latter date seems to be the case. There is a fair amount of debate about the older date. The earliest potential Neanderthal bones are from about 430,000 years ago, but hose are controversial. Clearly they existed as a separate line from about 180,000 years ago and there is some evidence that they split off the main line to humans up to 800,000 years ago.

Let's say that the earliest dates are uncertain based on what we know right now.

It might be a good idea to read over the following article:

Neanderthal - Wikipedia

OK, back to the Neanderthals. Reading a report about Neanderthals and human ancestry, it is now suggested that "our ancestors" (humans, I suppose they meant?) "had babies with Neanderthals." So now here's another question: Our Ancestors??? were not Neanderthals?
All modern humans have Neanderthal DNA, new research finds - CNN
(such a cute depiction of a thoughtful Neanderthal man...)

 

[YoursTrue]

As far as we can tell, there is no such natural barrier. What happens is that mutations increase diversity and natural selection moves the average. Then more mutations increase the diversity around that new average.

If changes happen faster than new mutations can re-introduce diversity, then there are problems with further change. But as long as the rate of change is smaller than the replenishment of diversity, the evidence is that there is no other barrier to the amount of change possible.

In other words, in the long term, there is no species barrier.

As far as you can tell. But is there any solid (other than conjecture) evidence that species of fish can evolve to whatever the next step outside the

As far as we can tell, there is no such natural barrier. What happens is that mutations increase diversity and natural selection moves the average. Then more mutations increase the diversity around that new average.

If changes happen faster than new mutations can re-introduce diversity, then there are problems with further change. But as long as the rate of change is smaller than the replenishment of diversity, the evidence is that there is no other barrier to the amount of change possible.

In other words, in the long term, there is no species barrier.

You don't know that for a fact. For instance, there are fish that can crawl on land. But there is simply nothing to prove that these landcrawlers became anything else. You can say they did, but really it's only a figured guess.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I need to have the dna explained to show it was moving into another form. Including an explanation of the distinctive differences of the dna. Furthermore, I've been investigating about Neanderthals, and see the following: on one website, I don't believe it's a "creationist" website. (God forbid, I suppose, it should be from someone who believes in creation by God...to use an expression.) Whatever happened to those Neanderthals? | Understanding Genetics
It starts out by saying, "Imagine you're in Europe 40,000 years ago. You are part of a group of Neanderthals happily living in a cave."
Now here's the question. It seems there were cave dwellers. When I took art history in college, the instructor explained about 10,000 year old cave paintings. OK, I thought, interesting, but not believing what I now do, I thought, ok -- ok. These primitive people drew on cave walls. But now my question is about cave-dwelling. So what's your hypothesis about when and why homes were built, rather than living in caves? Any idea if the Neanderthals built homes rather than for hundreds of thousands of years go from cave to cave? I mean I think now these are reasonable questions to ask. Also, as I was doing a little research, I came across a name our friend Haeckel gave to this breed, culture, or whatever (subspecies?).
"However, an alternative proposal put forward by Ernst Haeckel in 1866 – Homo stupidus – is more revealing about common attitudes to the Neanderthals which persisted well into the 20th century." Before I read that about our dear friend Herr Haeckel calling the Neanderthal man 'homo stupidus,' I wondered, during all those years they were cave-dwellers?? (Wow is all I have to say now.)

Remarkable how you are doing your very best to not acknowledge the point made in the post you are replying to.

I'm not seeing how any of this "reply" of yours is relevant to the point at hand, which was about a progression of "transitional" fossils of which you said that it was just "mere resemblances" while completely ignoring the clear progression through time and the transitional nature of every one of them.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

As far as you can tell. But is there any solid (other than conjecture) evidence that species of fish can evolve to whatever the next step outside the

Yes. The genetic evidence makes common ancestry of species nothing short of fact.
And this fact is only confirmed by other independent lines of evidence, like the fossil record, comparative anatomy, geographic distribution of species, distribution of fossils through time, etc.

When you have multiple independent lines of evidence all converging on the same answer, it becomes rather impossible to still deny the conclusion - if one cares about holding rational beliefs, that is.

You don't know that for a fact. For instance, there are fish that can crawl on land. But there is simply nothing to prove that these landcrawlers became anything else. You can say they did, but really it's only a figured guess.

If nobody was arount to witness your birth, would you say that it is impossible to prove that those who claim to be your biological parents, are actually your biological parents?

If some guy you never met comes up to saying he's your half brother, a result of your dad having an affair nobody knew about, would you say it's impossible to prove that he's actually your half-brother?

If some guy you never met comes up to saying he's your cousin, would you say it's impossible to prove that he's actually your cousin?


I'll go ahead and assume that you'll answer all of these with "no - dna testing would prove or disprove those claims"

Well, there's your answer.

DNA testing allows us to determine kindship and common ancestry. It allows us to determine levels of relatedness.

This is how we know about mitochondrial eve and y-chromosome adam. This is how we know that the common ancestors of chimps and humans split about 7 million years ago. This is how we know that life shares ancestors.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

One of the reasons I will not take a course in it is because I cannot interrupt the instructor and ask questions as I do here. It's possible if I do he will tell me to read another book or go to another website, and the basic questions of doubt will remain unanswered. You keep bringing up creationist sites. As if nothing they say has any merit. Listening sometimes to the impeachment arguments in the U.S., it most assuredly has people highly invested in either side, true or not. I certainly cannot follow it all about the possibilities of evolution -- and so now I have a question based on something I read about Neanderthals. Let me see if you agree with the following statement about them, and so I'll poswe my question after that. (I was wondering exactly when it is said that "Neanderthals" lived, so I looked it up.)
"They lived throughout Europe and parts of Asia from about 400,000 until about 40,000 years ago" From History.com website. I guess that's not a creationist website. So let me ask you, do you agree that Neanderthals lived from about 400,000 until about 40,000 years ago?

I have looked at the science reported on creationist sites. I have never seen any with merit.

The evidence supports that time range for Neanderthals. Rejecting that would require more than just some dudes religious beliefs.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

As far as you can tell. But is there any solid (other than conjecture) evidence that species of fish can evolve to whatever the next step outside the

You don't know that for a fact. For instance, there are fish that can crawl on land. But there is simply nothing to prove that these landcrawlers became anything else. You can say they did, but really it's only a figured guess.

The mudskippers, walking catfish, and other fish with similar ability exist today. Of course there would be no evidence that they are their own ancestors of millions of years ago.

Would any evidence convince you? It doesn't sound like it.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

OK, back to the Neanderthals. Reading a report about Neanderthals and human ancestry, it is now suggested that "our ancestors" (humans, I suppose they meant?) "had babies with Neanderthals." So now here's another question: Our Ancestors??? were not Neanderthals?
All modern humans have Neanderthal DNA, new research finds - CNN
(such a cute depiction of a thoughtful Neanderthal man...)

The barrier to gene flow was incomplete and some interbreeding occurred. It has been determined that breeding was successful only between make Neanderthals and female Homo sapiens. This interbreeding is some of the evidence used to support a position that Neandethals were not a separate species, but a subspecies of Homo sapiens.

Those of the population with the Neanderthal genes have Neanderthal ancestors. Unless you have a better explanation for those genes in some modern people.

 

[Polymath257]

Continuing my investigation of what reports say about scientists and their opinions, Sci-news.com says this about the changing opinions of researchers and Neanderthals: "The evidence for cognitive inferiority is simply not there. What we are saying is that the conventional view of Neanderthals is not true,” said Dr Paola Villa from the University of Colorado at Boulder Villa, who is the first author on the paper." And the article goes on to offer opinions as to how they think Neanderthals may have phased out. As I said, that their successors must have figured how to farm after hundreds of thousands of years of their Neanderthal predecessors, maybe they figured they'd like to build homes instead of living in caves. I'm not trying to be funny here -- so cognitive inferiority is not there, they say, it's just that they liked living in caves all those hundreds of thousands of years I guess.

And your point is?

 

[Polymath257]

OK, back to the Neanderthals. Reading a report about Neanderthals and human ancestry, it is now suggested that "our ancestors" (humans, I suppose they meant?) "had babies with Neanderthals." So now here's another question: Our Ancestors??? were not Neanderthals?
All modern humans have Neanderthal DNA, new research finds - CNN
(such a cute depiction of a thoughtful Neanderthal man...)

And your point is? We had already noted that Neanderthals are NOT our ancestors, but instead our cousins.

 

[Polymath257]

As far as you can tell. But is there any solid (other than conjecture) evidence that species of fish can evolve to whatever the next step outside the

Absolutely. We have fossil evidence of the transition from fish to amphibian.

You don't know that for a fact. For instance, there are fish that can crawl on land. But there is simply nothing to prove that these landcrawlers became anything else. You can say they did, but really it's only a figured guess.

Then how do you explain the fossil evidence? You claim mere resemblance, but ignore *when* the various species existed.

So what is YOUR explanation?

 

[Audie]

Absolutely. We have fossil evidence of the transition from fish to amphibian.



Then how do you explain the fossil evidence? You claim mere resemblance, but ignore *when* the various species existed.

So what is YOUR explanation?

I would like to see that explanation before any other discussion
goes forward.

At one point in time, you have no trace of any vertebrate life on land,
but there are fishes with some evident ability to live out of water,
for at least brief periods of time. They had limb like fins, like
the coelacanth of today. Lungs.

Later, you find there are a number of creatures that obviously
could move about reasonably well on land, their bony structure
so like the crossoptrerygian fishes that it would take looking the other
way to avoid seeing the relationship. No other land vertebratges.
No hyaena, no snake, no bird, Just big clumsy amphibians and
some invertebrates.

As time goes on there is a ;\succession through time of more
capable and diversified land animals.

How indeed did all this happen, if they did not evolve one from the other?

One thing your friend keeps going back to is the microbe-to
man thing. I wonder at what point it becomes impossible?
Unicellular to multi?
Fish leave the water?
I wish I knew what the problem is.