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Questions about Evolution?

Autodidact

Intentionally Blank
Yes, I understand it's complicated, but I bet there's at least an attempt out there. Science is all about complicated math.

Speaking as someone who passionately accepts and promotes ToE, this I think is a sticking point for people. I can't wrap my head around 3 billion years, but it's hard to get how tiny genetic mutations add up to Redwood trees and whale sharks.
 

Jose Fly

Fisker of men
Such an estimate could very well be out there. But I would question the utility of such an estimate given the huge number of assumptions that would have to go into it (the starting point, what exactly would be required genetically for different extinct species, etc.).

Also, mutations are extremely common. They happen pretty much with every replication event. At its most basic, evolution is a process of trial and error and each reproductive/replication event throughout the 3+ billion year history of life on earth has been, and continues to be, a new trial.

And when you think about just how long 3.5 billion years is.....as hard as that is to do....well....it's not very surprising to me to imagine how all this is possible. To me, under those circumstances, extreme diversity is inevitable.
 

Valjean

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Yes, I understand it's complicated, but I bet there's at least an attempt out there. Science is all about complicated math.

Speaking as someone who passionately accepts and promotes ToE, this I think is a sticking point for people. I can't wrap my head around 3 billion years, but it's hard to get how tiny genetic mutations add up to Redwood trees and whale sharks.

It didn't take us long to create a Chihuahua from a wolf, did it? Imagine what Nature can do with millions of times this.
 

themadhair

Well-Known Member
It's a math question.
This qualified mathematician disagrees.

There are far too many assumptions on mutation rates, available ecological niches, time needed for reproduction cycles, effects of competition, effects of environmental attrition, etc. to render any such attempted calculation meaningless at this time. You could try taking the biodiversity of today as a rough template and try to extrapolate backwards, but even that would be grossly inaccurate given that life today is very much different from life back then.

Let me give you an example. Say you wanted to estimate the total number of rice pieces in China. The way you would approach this would be to estimate the size of a piece of rice, estimate the concentration of piece of rice to paddyfield unit area, estimate the coverage of paddyfields in China, etc. etc. When you have these estimates the actual calculation is relatively simple. Now the calculation you are asking for is pretty much like this analogy if you didn’t know what a grain of rice was, didn’t know what a paddyfield was and didn’t know what China was. This isn’t a question of mathematics or of a difficult calculation – the problem is that, at this time, there simply is nowhere the amount of required information to even begin the estimation process upon which any such calculation could be based.
 

Tiapan

Grumpy Old Man
I posted this in another forum but feel it is more relevant placed here.

Those who believe in creationism instead of evolution, tend to naively pursue the standard line that the probability is so remote that life could not possibly originated by chance, so some divine entity must have brought it to the universe.

This argument works on a basis similar to the old story that a monkey randomly typing letters may eventually come up with Shakespeare's Sonnets given enough time (Low probability but massive amount of time). They then argue that the probability is so low, the result of random life could not occur within the time frame we have stipulated for the age of the universe? (eg 100 billion years).

Say, you have a one in a million chance of winning lotto so you get a ticket a day for the whole of your life and like 990,000 others never win. You conclude it is not possible to win, the odds are too long, and yet every week almost with out exception someone DOES win, in fact some weeks many have to share the prize because they all won. So alright the odds are very low, but the event still does occur because there were enough instances (Population) of it with in a reasonable time (frequency) frame to Guarantee it will occur, statistically.

Their argument appears to work on the basis that if we randomly chuck the Universes' billions of carbon atoms together with billions of other atoms of Uranium, Gold, Lithium, Helium, Neon, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Sulfur, Hydrogen and every other element, relying on random collisions to effect a combination reaction to eventually form the finished arrangement of a fairly large and complex protein molecule straight off. Yep I'd say that was pretty long odds but not impossible. Your lotto might have a million to one chance of winning but you don't necessarily have to wait a million weeks to win. It might happen tomorrow, or it may never happen.

For example would the odds improve if the subparts (ie amino acids ) where prepared first then assembled in a simple elimination reaction, rather than throw the appropriate atoms together at the same time, hoping to get the protein in one hit?

I would like to suggest there are a number of natural processes present which promote this spontaneous life probability making it less random and more quantifiable and predictable. You do not seem to have accounted for them in your thesis yet they alter the probabilities significantly.

Many argue, this is difficult because in order to get the first thing started, we need DNA. In order to synthesize this however, a group of protein molecules must work together with several other parts of the cell, to get things rolling for that first, simple life form to start "evolving". So the probability of having all these sophisticated chemicls in place simultaneously is next to impossible. Or is it?

In fact DNA is an evolved substance that does require some support. However there is evidence that earliest Archean life was based on simpler RNA which can self replicate without fancy proteins. RNA is still common to all life forms where as DNA is not.

Now lets also add some realistic factual influencing conditions that may alter your statistical analysis significantly.

First you mention the age of the Universe as 10^(19) secs

Lets look at the earth instead (We can then dispense with the highly variable estimates of probabilities for a planet being in the right spot and right size etc. in how many other gazillion solar systems. After all its right here, we know it exists and to top it off we know it can support life.

Age 4.7 Billion years = 1.4x 10^17 sec

Life on earth originated on earth after only about 1 billion years.
Most of the initial period (Hadean) was too hot for carbon based molecules to remain stable.
The earth then cooled slowly, atmospheric steam eventually condensed to rain and created first oceans
So lets say for arguments sake that it was 1/2 a billion years before it was cool enough for the possible reactions we require to occur and life was active after 1 billion years. That means from the time when earth was ripe it was only 1/2 billion years before life was in full swing.

So

1/2 Billion years = 1.5 x 10^16 seconds.
Your state a rate of interaction is 10^7 secs per reaction (10^19/10^12). I would query this figure. Most reactions I am familiar with, are complete in less than 10^3 seconds that's a factor of 10,000 difference already.

I'm also not sure we need all the atoms of the universe, just the ones that are likely to be present on an early earth-like planet. You can try bashing Neon and Krypton together as much as you like and they'll always bounce apart.

Lets look at just 9 elements (C, N, O, H, P, S, Fe, Ca, Mg) instead of the usual 92. (that's another factor of 10).

So where in the universe would you be most likely to find these precursor to life chemicals?
In the Vacuum of space? I don't think so.

Perhaps on the surface of a planet like boiling hot Mercury or frozen Pluto? I don't think so.
But bell blow me down, we might find it in the oceans and atmosphere of the typical earth-like Archean planet we are looking at. Current astronomy announced recently that nearby stars are now being identified with earth like planets in solar systems beyond ours. Given the size of the universe and the rate we are finding alien planets, it is likely they exist in their millions.

However, I agree it is all chance, most things have a probability of occurring under certain circumstances. A process that relies on a series of subprocesses implies a decreased rate of success. (see the O-Ring Failure on Challenger disaster), but chances of overall success increase as the number of instances of the experiment increase or as environmental parameters change allowing new possibilities. Many natural physical processes are not as random as they may seem. In complex systems many of these processes are self determining eg The earth starts off hot (Geological evidence), rain boils off the ground immediately returning to the atmosphere as steam, the earth cools, surface now < 100C, rain no longer boils off the ground, water then accumulates on the ground, more cooling, oceans are borne. This system does it all by itself simply following the laws of physics. Whats so difficult to understand about this. There are plenty of component probabilities but the outcome is almost certain given known environmental factors. No Creator required in this step.


Continued Part 2....
 

Tiapan

Grumpy Old Man
Creationists should take their Blinkers off - Part 2 Many religious people are becoming more accepting of a big bang because it matches their own genesis story closely with minor modifications.

The current scientific theory indicates from the repeatable evidence of Hubble's red shift phenomena, that all viewable galaxies appear to be expanding away from a central point in our universe. Extrapolating back in time, we get to the point, where all matter must have been in a single tiny place/volume, a singularity, which consequently exploded to give us our expanding universe ie the "Big Bang". Lets call this singularity the Alpha point. Yes there s a chance this is wrong and it was actually used as a football at Wembley Stadium, but most of the available evidence points to this rather large singularity back at our beginning.

It would be bit foolish to challenge this evidence, it is fairly strong. This leads us to 3 possible types of Universe. The first as initially proposed by Einstein and Hoyle was consistent with the historical concept that the universe was locked in a continually static state. In 1927, Georges Lemaître, a Belgian physicist and Roman Catholic priest, predicted that the recession of a nearby spiral nebulae was due to the expansion of the universe. Keep up the good work, Brother. Because of the red shift phenomena this static model has been demonstrated to be false. This leaves us with the remaining two possibilities.

It could be a continually expanding universe, in other words the gravitational attraction of the total universe is not enough to arrest the expansion, so the universe will expand add infinitum. The down side of this is that eventually the stars will run out of fuel, die and drift further and further apart until we end up with a dilute wide spread dead cold dark universe and that's that. It also implies the big bang was a one off event, very suspect (Who put it there? Where did it come from?)

The final choice is one where the universe expands rapidly initially but slows down under the influence of the universal gravity, eventually stopping and then collapses back on itself, to a tiny point again (lets call this the Omega Point). It is fully possible immediately following the collapse that this omega point becomes an alpha point which then immediately explodes again repeating the process in a new big bang and off we go again as a cyclic universe. (So our universal singularity is the alpha and the omega point. - PUN)

I concur with Einsteins later model, this final explanation seems most logical, as in nature, the simplest possibility is usually the correct mechanism. However many of my scientific colleagues have done some serious maths and physics concluding that from current observations there is not enough matter to produce the gravity needed to arrest the expansion and initialize a contraction. There is a short fall in the mass by about a half. Hence the current massive research into this hidden stuff called "Dark Matter". There is also the general assumption that time and the universe started uniquely at this "big bang" event and that nothing existed before this event, This is often based on the scientific comment that the physics gets a bit weird with these super particles so as we cannot observe them or anything prior we can therefore not demonstrate anything that would be acceptable scientifically as we have no evidence prior to the big bang. There may be nothing before the Big Bang or there may have been something that existed prior to the Big Bang, or possibly a God took it from Wembley Stadium and put it there.. again a probability but this time there is no evidence to support any of the hypothesis.

In terms of our current universe this is true, since it was born in this big bang, This does not mean that there was nothing before. It just says we don't have enough evidence yet to comment on anything before this period. I therefore would suggest one major possibility is the cyclic universe. It then relies on the relatively simple concept that it has always existed and will always continue to exist naturally, without having any super deity having to have whipped it up in his kitchen.

But I have just stated that my colleagues have proved this is not possible. The beauty of science. After testing of new ideas a hypothesis can be modified as many times as are necessary, gradually honing it, ultimately culminating with a match that is the truth.

OK what I am about to hypothesize is my own theory based on the knowledge I have gained in my 40 years as a scientist. The above calculations boil down to the simple GMm/R^2, ie the gravitational equation.

Now our old mate Einstien came up with another simple formula himself ie E=mc^2.

Lets do a quick substitution

E=mc^2
therefore
m=E/c^2

Now we have

GMm/R^2

Substitute m=E/c^2

(Gx(E/c^2)x(e/c^2))/R^2

=GEe/c^4R^2

Why have I substituted Mass for its energy equivalent?

Consider the Big Bang an explosive event packing a lot of energy. Whether immediately because of breach of the Schwartzchild radius equivalent or delayed due to the intense gravitational force, one of the first things to expand away at the speed of light from the "big bang" alpha point, is light itself, photons. If the Universe is 15 Billion years old then this would represent a sphere of 30 billion light years diameter at present. (Although its SN distance would calculated as a much greater distance.)Lets call this the photoshell. (have you ever watched footage of an old nuclear blast?). As the embryonic universe cools various Bosons and Fermions coalesce out of the chaotic maelstrom of very hot quark soup cools immediately after the big bang. This might have been 3 minutes or 300,000 years later (not important) matter and anti matter annihilate each other generating a large number of photons, and a small residual excess of matter.

As I wasn't actually there at the time, I will have to put my neck out a bit here. May I suggest that it started as basically a massive spherical explosion, with an initial central single very large detonation (read Impulse) radiating force outward. This seathing blob bang thing has huge inertia so a lot of the energy remains contained for a short time while it expands to accommodate being continuously blown outward and apart. The outer surface of the expanding cloud will be cooler than the inner zone allowing earlier condensation of quarks to hadrons and generating vast quantities of photons. Given conservation of momentum laws, the rate a particle will move away from an explosion (its Velocity) is inversely proportional to its mass. Thus given, all particles came under the influence of this explosive force almost simultaneously, assuming the same impulse (ie Force x time), then we could expect to see, a series of expanding shells where the outer ones consist of the lightest particles traveling a extremely high velocity (eg Leptons such as electrons) followed by succeeding shells of heavier slower particles, proton (Hydrogen) shell, neutron shell, alpha particle shell (Helium).... Uranium shell etc...etc. traveling away at slower speeds. It would be nice to see some these shells but they are probably so far away now we may never be able to observe them.
Would they emit any detectable radiation?

Larger coalesced objects were quasi-stable, exploding regularly until smaller lumps (Hadrons) that were more stable remained all moving outward from the force of the initial impulse. Now these particles all have measurable mass, are affected by gravity and the laws of conservation of momentum apply. Because of the difference in mass between our lightest particles eg electrons and the "mass less" photons (although one would think they must have some tiny mass because they are affected by gravity), there would be a huge distance between the outer Photo shell and the next inner Hadron shells the first of which will be the neutrino shells then the negative electron shell. Muons in close succession then a big gap to the positively charged inner Hadron layers of the Proton and neutron shells

Another interesting feature of this model, if I am correct so far, would be the presence of a larger outer negatively charged shell composed of lighter leptons such as electrons. Well within this shell will be the smaller heavier shell of protons this time with a positive charge. Given positive attracts negative one might ponder what interesting effects and interactions these two spatially separated charged spheres may initiate.

The whole point of this model is that it consists of a number of shells within shells, a bit like an onion. We as humans on earth reside within the inner most shells, the heaviest zone. So how can I prove all this? I am not sure I can at present, but as another hypothesis such as those by supernatural creator "anti-chance" theorists here. I believe it is as valid and probably has more thought process in it. Importantly it is not excluded by anything in physics.

But whats all this got to do with the universe contracting you say?


Continued Part 3....
 

Tiapan

Grumpy Old Man
So Far All calculations of potential mass have been calculated based on the hadron content of the universe. When added up this falls short of the expected amount. Dark matter has been suggested as the repository of the missing matter but it also falls a bit short.

I would now like to offer my theory.

That which has been excluded from this standard universal gravity calculation is the photo-shell, because it is considered massless. I contend that in a closed universe this photosphere must be part of the equation. Hence I suggest much of the missing matter is in fact that mass which was converted to energy E=mc^2 ie light photons (and mega heaps of them at that) which I now represents mass as M=E/c^2=hv/c^2.

If I am correct, then we may indeed have sufficient total Mass/Energy Equivalent to generate enough gravity to arrest the universes expansion allow a contraction back to our initial condition (alpha/omega point) and further to suggest it is quite possible we have a cyclic universe. Lets call it The Phoenix theory.

The problem then becomes, if it has been there the whole time, and will continue to be there forever more, cycling through the phases of explosion expansion, contraction, explosion....ad infinitum. If so, is there a need for a god, when it simply just "is" ie it exists full stop. No start, no finish. In other words the big bang may have occurred as a direct consequence of the previous universes collapse, passing through the alpha omega point and not by chance.

Now this isn't science, it is me hypothesizing a theory based on my knowledge as a scientist, but I would think a bit before dismissing it out of hand.

From my understanding the energy density of the universe was dominated by photons (with a minor contribution from neutrinos) only 10^-5 seconds (ie 0.00001 seconds) after the initial Big Bang. Some theories indicate, similar to a black hole, gravity retained light for a short period. I am not sure I agree totally with their interpretation. But that is another discussion. It is not particularly important as we all concur that a some point, shortly after the big bang there was a very large burst of light, predominantly in the gamma region from nuclear interactions rather than Xray-UV-Vis-IR typical of far weaker electronic transitions.

The evidence we have would seem to bring us very close in time to the actual Big Bang event. In fact we can go back to within 10^-37 of a second of it, with some degree of certainty and evidence. If these are correct I think it would be fair to say that processes which are causal resulted in a predictable out come ie light is emitted.

Surely Particle Physics after 50 years has demonstrated enough evidence overwhelmingly supporting the theory for even the most skeptical. Again Particle Physics is a wonder world of probabilities but its macro effects are very predictable.

The Hydrogen was clumped into heavier clouds until the gravitational fields spawned nuclear furnaces, the first stars not so much by Chance, by GRAVITY.

As we all know the heavier metals ie those beyond iron up to uranium and possibly short lived ones beyond, can only be created under the most extreme stellar explosive conditions. ie that of an exploding star and not just a little one it has to be a whopper. One that was fed on the ashes of stars that reached the iron threshold.

The type of explosion you need is called a super nova. Hence the 3 generations of stars referred to. Our little sun will only go to the carbon threshold cause its tiny. But being small has its advantages it burns a lot longer. All the better for us earthlings. Bigger stars go critical and explode a lot quicker. You also forgot to mention the Iron threshold, that aside, again overwhelming evidence regarding size of star, its emission spectrum, age and the nuclear fission transitions possible due to its fundamental mass limitations. Why did you leave out the discussion of why carbon and iron are significant in stellar life cycles. Would that defeat the religious "anti-chance" argument, because again we are showing very high probability cause and effect?

Most primary school children in my country could give you a number of causal events, in sequence, that would show this process hardly occurred by Chance. Gravitational aggregation of an exponential behavior. The bigger the lumps formed, the bigger the local gravity effect, the more they could attract and hold until we end up with spherical planet and sun sized objects (and a lot in between). All this aggregation of large chunks of rock flying together at thousands of kilometers per hour generates a bit of heat. Even after the planets have swept up most of the debris in their paths it will still take a while for things to cool down

Next look at the make up of the planets as we move from the inner to outer solar system. We have zones, the physical properties of matter govern its behavior, we see an order not chaos and randomness. Hard dense metaliod planets orbit close to the sun in the hot zone, while the huge gaseous planets orbit in the frigid outer reaches. Is this magic, no the volatile liquids and gases are boiled and blown off by the intense heat and solar winds of the Sun to the outer reaches of the solar system where they condense and are gradually assimilated into the gas giants. Not Chance, Not God, plain simple physics.

Of course earth just happens to sit nicely in a most fortuitous position. Now that is actually Chance. However it has quite a high expected probability of occurring. Just like Goldilocks its not too hot, not too cold, its just right. Don't take this as a sign of godly intervention, it simply means if earths orbit was outside this "nice" zone then we would not be having this discussion, because we would not be here. It seems to me completely logical that an early atmospheric water vapor could only start creating oceans once the temperature of the surface dropped below 100C (assuming STP). Again causal not chance.

Religious literalists try to write off the probability that the natural creation of complex "life" chemicals is some how impossible. eg In the reducing atmosphere of this newly formed planet a lightning bolt struck a pond that was rich in complex amino acids...by chance creating ribonucleic acid (RNA) and, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), were synthesized. ...by chance.

I believe as observed on Venus Jupiter Saturn Uranus, Neptune and now Mars, lightning is very prolific in these primordial gaseous atmospheres. Nitrogen , carbon dioxide and a tiny amount of oxygen are smashing these molecules ionizing and deionizing them into very reactive free radicals which tend to condense with other molecules usually the next one they bump into forming increasingly more complex organic and hetrocyclic compounds. The molecules formed from lightning in this Archean atmosphere, are not random either. These organic compounds fall into distinct groups ie cyanates, simple alkanes, alkenes, and alkynes, various aldehydes, ketones, amines, imines, cyanides, isocyanates nitriles even simple amino acids such as glycine and sugars etc etc.

These compounds are washed into the oceans. One might conclude they would be diluted into practical non-existence in the huge volume of the oceans, (1.4 x 10^9 cubic kilometers) with a low probability of ever getting together to form more complex compounds. The fact is actually the opposite, while some of these compounds dissolve forming very dilute concentrations, most organic compounds don't. In fact they ACCUMULATE (READ CONCENTRATE) forming a tarry oily scum layer that floats ON THE SURFACE of water. This hydrophobic interaction guarantees we get significant concentration of organics and hetro-cyclics.

Then from the surface of the oceans, like sea foam, it is whipped up and splashed with wind and rain against the ancient shores of this hostile new world. So instead of being diluted out of existence (as your argument would have us believe) they are in fact being concentrated and forced together billions of times along thousands of miles of ancient coastlines.

We also have a moon, whose regular tidal influence causes alternating changes of flood and dry in the coastal literal zones, continuously mixing and separating, combining and recombining these highly concentrated organic environments, over and over again. NOT EXACTLY RANDOM IS IT. BTW the moon was lot closer then and its tidal effect was far greater.

It is now easy to envisage with extremely high probability 99+%, that small bubbles of this oily scum form, capturing a small packet of water from the sea immediately around, isolating and protecting it, giving us a very simple but non-living cell (These are referred to scientifically as micelles). Every so often the chemical make up of the membrane is such that it has some integrity and is there fore stable for a time.

This could be a day, a month, a year or even a million years. Remember these seas have no life yet so they totally pristine and STERILE. If we left a partially finished organic bubble on the beach today it would be destroyed and assimilated by a host of organisms in short time. But this is pre-life, so this micelle's "life" undamaged could be indefinite.

Continued Part 4 ....
 

Tiapan

Grumpy Old Man
Life is complex, but the building blocks it is made of are actually fairly simple, some fatty acids, a few simple sugars, a handful of amino acids, several hetrocyclic compounds and some metals. All with Mol Wt <500 (ie tiny and simple). Now to top that off, isn't it amazing that these building blocks of life require precursors, which just happen to be exactly the ones produced by lightning mentioned above. NOT EXACTLY RANDOM IS IT. I think we have just knocked out some more large chunks from your "Chance" statistical analysis.

Given that even one tenth of a ml contains 10^20 molecules we could have billions or even trillions of combinations of these simple compounds bumping into each other at different locations within each tiny cell every second, in precisely the environment we would expect life to occur. Further we have literally billions of these little micelles all containing a little chunk of water with a cocktail of chemicals dissolved or suspended in a little protective membrane, at billions of places around the planet.

Perhaps some are taken deep into the earth though tectonic subduction exposed to extreme temperatures and pressure emerging millions of years later from submarine vents, containing new modified compounds. Loose in the ocean again, they are mixed back with our original bubbles to get even more combinations, perhaps stray UV causes a free radical triggering in just the right combination. Who knows, the point is that's a heap of combinations going on, in a lot of places simultaneously for a 500,000,000 years.

Some will just sit there, and maybe shrivel into a blob under a hot sun. Or perhaps a larger one is picked up by the wind and smashed into two or three separate new "Cells". Two different micelles could be thrust together to get one. Most will be reclaimed by the sea remixed and remade over and over again. Then just occasionally say once in a million years a combination of compounds come together forming the first building blocks. Now add some more millions of years.

No body has yet defined which mechanisms and which combination of biochemicals are the minimum to define life. A virus falls just short. It is still fairly low odds that any particular cell will have all of them correctly placed simultaneously. Yet given the astronomical number of combinations being tried every second it was inevitable eventually. The evidence shows it did take a while, around 500,000,000 years. That's quite a few NON RANDOM EXPERIMENTS during that time.

What ever the first organism was, and evidence suggests it was simple sulfur bacteria, like those still found in hot springs. It did not use O2 it used Sulfur instead. It probably incorporated an iron or copper organo-metal chelate catalysis as an simple energy harnessing mechanism. It may have grown without necessarily having the full traits of life. It could, as an example divide, relying on physical breakup mechanisms eg wind or surf, to spread and disseminate. The point here is you do not necessarily have to have every process in place to kick life off. The higher combination of traits have plenty of time to be
incorporated in fact they have 3.5 billion years to develop. (As there was no O2 yet it was probably a bit hard for Adam and Eve to breath during this period).

One thing seems sure, there would be no competition for our new organism initially. The world was its oyster. However, for this blob to be considered life it should at least consume something, generate internal energy and excrete waste, continually seeking organic matter to grow. In the process of gathering organics it absorbs many compounds, occasionally absorbing one that improves the system.

These signs of life may not all have been present in our blob. Perhaps it developed and incorporated a RNA replication system later, initially relying on wind and surf to physically break up and disseminate its ever growing mass. It may not be life as we are familiar with today, but still having many of the characteristics we associate with living things, might be considered proto-life. Add more millions of years.

Although rare events, there is evidence they occur. Gradually the primitive organisms gains new abilities and complexity over millions of years, if it didn't it would be dead and recycled back the ocean soup. The RNA process must have been incorporate early on, because it is present from then on. Other processes such as making better membranes or sorting useful compounds from inert substances or duplicating information and dividing, all processes which can be acquired over time, and not necessarily in a particular order. But eventually ending up as an early simple sulfur containing bacteria which produced hydrogen and oxygen as by products, by effectively splitting water. By one billion years several types of bacteria were competing

probably feeding on the millions of years growth of our primitive blob which having had no need for defense is now susceptible to to grazing attack by newer bacteria taking advantage of the rich carbon food source. It has also started to be poisoned by its own waste product Oxygen because there is so much of it in the atmosphere now.

These organisms did not change very much for a very long time (over three billion years), but we cant rush these things. This Precambrian supereon represents 7/8 of the time since the planets birth. During this time their waste product oxygen gradually accumulated in the atmosphere. These amazing little creatures actually terra-formed an entire planet. The skies gradually changed from gray to blue and helped blanket out high energy UV. Iron present in its reduced form was then oxidized by the atmospheric oxygen and precipitated in vast quantities as sedimentary deposits in lakes and seas, that we now mine today as iron ore deposits (e.G the Kimberley, in WA). The other waste product hydrogen escaped to space. With anaerobic bacteria forced to retreat from the atmospheric oxygen that was poisoning them, left a niche that was shortly filled by aerobic bacteria. The greater energy available through aerobic oxidation allowed an explosion of life diversity and is called the Cambrian explosion which occurred only 500 Million Years Ago.

Consider the origins and final destination of the humble Mitochondria. But that's an interesting story for another day.

Now we can argue all day about the actual probabilities. My point is that simplistic probabilty arguements are a least naive if not plain wrong as they ignore some major NON RANDOM influencing factors severely compromising his logic. Just the few factors I have mentioned above could make as much as factor 10^20 difference in the probability the life did evolve randomly from inanimate matter.

"Anti-entropy" is certainly a key identifier of life. The ability of life to organize and restructure itself, superficially appears to violate the laws of thermodynamics. However another minutes research reveals why it does not violate any laws of thermodynamics. If order is achieved, then elsewhere in the system order is lost, given the many inefficiencies of the various processes involved far more order though out the entire system is lost, than the small amount gained, so the net effect on the total system is a net increase in entropy. Completely obeying the laws of thermodynamics. So where is the problem?

There is probability associated for all things, but the actual maths point to a large degree of certainty.

Agrarian societies emerged from nomadic societies because of climatic changes. a direct and high probability event ie they adapted and succeeded. A number of different versions probably arose simultaneously but the most successful would have dominated their individual geographic regions. Again lots of individual probabilities and combinations, do they have wheat or Cattle or Both? This is determined by environmental constraints such as water, fertile ground, adequate sunlight etc etc. but over all in the macro sense highly predictable out come.

Say one tribe adopts cannibalism, another prohibits cannibalism. In a famine the nice guys all die of starvation while the cannibals survive because of their adoption of population control mechanism. Alternatively after a series of bumper crop years the Anticannibals multiply and prosper eventually go across and wipe out the disgusting sinful cannibal savages. Yet both systems are legitimate answers to the environmental constraints and survival. Here the out come of which tribe was successful was governed by climate. There are literally millions of factors (probabilities, some really long shots), this may seem as though most things could never be achieved, but in reality many are.

I believe Darwin was correct in his deductions about the development of life, are closest to the truth because they are solid, well founded and provide a lot of validated evidence.

The fact that we have a serial probability does not bode well for its success as the individual probabilities are multiplied, the more there are, the lower the probability of success. This does not mean a successful out come is not possible. Given many instances of the initial conditions, successful events may be come very regular so long as the population is large relative to the probability. As shown in numerous examples above, many perceived probabilities are improved by the natural laws of Physics. As we learn more and observe our Universe in greater detail, questions which in the past were "unanswerable" outside the camps of religious gurus, are now more and more being unraveled and revealed just using reason.

Its not that God does or doesn't exist, it's just that we simply don't need him any more. The pieces of the cosmic jigsaw puzzle are coming together just fine without him.

Cheers
 

themadhair

Well-Known Member
Ermm….you do realise that Newton’s equation is completely deficient for the orders of magnitudes of matter we are talking about here? You do also realise that, due to most of this matter not being in matter form, that Newton simply cannot be made to apply here? You do realise that, this close to the big bang, the very laws of physics you are referencing have completely broken down? You do realise that…..

I could go on. Interesting, but…well….
 

Tiapan

Grumpy Old Man
Are they? And also string and quantum physics? Newtonian Physics is only part of the equation not its totality. Do these laws all suddenly disappear or is it simply the fact that physics as an evidenced based science by definition will not proceed to an area beyond where time and matter do not exist ie no evidence available.

However the human mind is free to hypothesis universes beyond, but only evidence will make it valid in the scientific sense. At present that appears as impossible as impossible gets.

Yes, beyond the event horizon things are a little different, but just because we do not know everything, does not mean everything we do know is false. What is relatively certain is that normal physics holds until very close to the big bang(<1sec) and most probably beyond in the macro sense.
 

Kurgan

Member
I have read a number of articles about where did god come from. It seems our creditable records of the practices of human cultures goes back about eight thousand years BC. This is also about the very end of the last Ice Age
It appears that no culture evolved from around that period without some form of religion. It is generally accepted that the cradle of civilization was in Mesopotamia in about 6000 BC (best records)

My question is have you seen the theories about the biological god the cultural god and the impact of the development of imagination on the rapid advance of mankind in the last ten thousand years.

The answers provided or the postulations they propose seem to make sense to me.


I an definately untied
 

painted wolf

Grey Muzzle
There have been several attempts to "time evolution".... one of the biggest issues with such calculations is that rates are different for molecular evolution and organismal evolution.

DNA mutates at a reliably consistent rate... however, not all mutations are going to contribute in obvious ways to the evolution of a species.

Animals that breed quickly and have high turnover tend to evolve in visible ways quickly. Even a species that doesn't seem to be evolving is still changing with each generation, still silently evolving.

wa:do
 

painted wolf

Grey Muzzle
I have read a number of articles about where did god come from. It seems our creditable records of the practices of human cultures goes back about eight thousand years BC. This is also about the very end of the last Ice Age
It appears that no culture evolved from around that period without some form of religion. It is generally accepted that the cradle of civilization was in Mesopotamia in about 6000 BC (best records)

My question is have you seen the theories about the biological god the cultural god and the impact of the development of imagination on the rapid advance of mankind in the last ten thousand years.

The answers provided or the postulations they propose seem to make sense to me.

The only problems with this idea are that 'religion' is a very broad series of socio-cultural behaviors to try to pin down to a single starting point.
The biggest problem is that evidence of spiritual behavior predates biological humans. Neanderthals for example have many hallmarks of belief in an afterlife or at the very least a significance of death.

wa:do
 

Alceste

Vagabond
It's a math question.

If I were going to approach it from a mathematical perspective, first I'd abandon the concept of "years" and think in terms of "generations", since a generation would be the most meaningful unit by which the evolution of a species could be measured. What's a year to a fruitfly? What's a day to a bristlecone pine tree?

I'd also abandon the idea of a steady rate of evolution, whether at the cellular level or the level of organisms. Too little is known about pre-cellular life, and post-cellular life appears to go through cycles of rapid change and diversification and relative stability, particularly after mass extinctions.

Then I'd let go of the number of billions of years I'm supposed to have at my disposal, since it's never smart to commit to an answer before you've even started on the problem.

Then I'd give up. :D
 

Buttons*

Glass half Panda'd
I have a question: Please explain how the eye evolved. :) I was recently introduced to the idea about the eye in any species being so complex that it would be really hard to know how it came about. Does evolution in general have any theories about this? Are there specific branches of evolution that disagree about the origin of the eye?
 

themadhair

Well-Known Member
I have a question: Please explain how the eye evolved. :) I was recently introduced to the idea about the eye in any species being so complex that it would be really hard to know how it came about. Does evolution in general have any theories about this? Are there specific branches of evolution that disagree about the origin of the eye?
Evolution: Library: Evolution of the Eye
^ Pretty good explanation. Note that for each stage there is a clear advantage over the ancestral stage. It is this ‘trial and error’ approach that natural selection operates on to produce the eyes we have today. Note how, in the human eye for example, the presence of a blind spot shows this trial and error approach.

Darwin had already addressed this question in his book Origins of Species:
Organs of extreme perfection and complication.—To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible degree. Yet reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a perfect and complex eye to one very imperfect and simple, each grade being useful to its possessor, can be shown to exist; if further, the eye does vary ever so slightly, and the variations be inherited, which is certainly the case; and if any variation or modification in the organ be ever useful to an animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, though insuperable by our imagination, can hardly be considered real. How a nerve comes to be sensitive to light, hardly concerns us more than how life itself first originated; but I may remark that several facts make me suspect that any sensitive nerve may be rendered sensitive to light, and likewise to those coarser vibrations of the air which produce sound.
In looking for the gradations by which an organ in any species has been perfected, we ought to look exclusively to its lineal ancestors; but this is scarcely ever possible, and we are forced in each case to look to species of the same group, that is to the collateral descendants from the same original parent-form, in order to see what gradations are possible, and for the chance of some gradations having been transmitted from the earlier stages of descent, in an unaltered or little altered condition. Amongst existing Vertebrata, we find but a small amount of gradation in the structure of the eye, and from fossil species we can learn nothing on this head. In this great class we should probably have to descend far beneath the lowest known fossiliferous stratum to discover the earlier stages, by which the eye has been perfected.
In the Articulata we can commence a series with an optic nerve merely coated with pigment, and without any other mechanism; and from this low stage, numerous gradations of structure, branching off in two fundamentally different lines, can be shown to exist, until we reach a moderately high stage of perfection. In certain crustaceans, for instance, there is a double cornea, the inner one divided into facets, within each of which there is a lens-shaped swelling. In other crustaceans the transparent cones which are coated by pigment, and which properly act only by excluding lateral pencils of light, are convex at their upper ends and must act by convergence; and at their lower ends there seems to be an imperfect vitreous substance. With these facts, here far too briefly and imperfectly given, which show that there is much graduated diversity in the eyes of living crustaceans, and bearing in mind how small the number of living animals is in proportion to those which have become extinct, I can see no very great difficulty (not more than in the case of many other structures) in believing that natural selection has converted the simple apparatus of an optic nerve merely coated with pigment and invested by transparent membrane, into an optical instrument as perfect as is possessed by any member of the great Articulate class.
He who will go thus far, if he find on finishing this treatise that large bodies of facts, otherwise inexplicable, can be explained by the theory of descent, ought not to hesitate to go further, and to admit that a structure even as perfect as the eye of an eagle might be formed by natural selection, although in this case he does not know any of the transitional grades. His reason ought to conquer his imagination; though I have felt the difficulty far too keenly to be surprised at any degree of hesitation in extending the principle of natural selection to such startling lengths.
It is scarcely possible to avoid comparing the eye to a telescope. We know that this instrument has been perfected by the long-continued efforts of the highest human intellects; and we naturally infer that the eye has been formed by a somewhat analogous process. But may not this inference be presumptuous? Have we any right to assume that the Creator works by intellectual powers like those of man? If we must compare the eye to an optical instrument, we ought in imagination to take a thick layer of transparent tissue, with a nerve sensitive to light beneath, and then suppose every part of this layer to be continually changing slowly in density, so as to separate into layers of different densities and thicknesses, placed at different distances from each other, and with the surfaces of each layer slowly changing in form. Further we must suppose that there is a power always intently watching each slight accidental alteration in the transparent layers; and carefully selecting each alteration which, under varied circumstances, may in any way, or in any degree, tend to produce a distincter image. We must suppose each new state of the instrument to be multiplied by the million; and each to be preserved till a better be produced, and then the old ones to be destroyed. In living bodies, variation will cause the slight alterations, generation will multiply them almost infinitely, and natural selection will pick out with unerring skill each improvement. Let this process go on for millions on millions of years; and during each year on millions of individuals of many kinds; and may we not believe that a living optical instrument might thus be formed as superior to one of glass, as the works of the Creator are to those of man?
 

Autodidact

Intentionally Blank
If I were going to approach it from a mathematical perspective, first I'd abandon the concept of "years" and think in terms of "generations", since a generation would be the most meaningful unit by which the evolution of a species could be measured. What's a year to a fruitfly? What's a day to a bristlecone pine tree?

I'd also abandon the idea of a steady rate of evolution, whether at the cellular level or the level of organisms. Too little is known about pre-cellular life, and post-cellular life appears to go through cycles of rapid change and diversification and relative stability, particularly after mass extinctions.

Then I'd let go of the number of billions of years I'm supposed to have at my disposal, since it's never smart to commit to an answer before you've even started on the problem.

Then I'd give up. :D

Well I would too but I'm not one of those smart math guys.

I bet there's work out there on this.

I'm thinking not even mutation rates, but just average rate of speciation.
 

painted wolf

Grey Muzzle
I'm thinking not even mutation rates, but just average rate of speciation.
Again, you have to account for generation length, reproductive rate (K vs. R) .... gene flow, population size, ecological carry capacity (not all environments can support the same number of species) ..... and on and on.

No two groups follow the same rate of speciation.... bacteria evolve faster than mice who evolve faster than whales.

wa:do
 
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