Oops, I forgot to read the second page before replying. After I did, I have something to add.

I'm going to play Devil's Advocate here and appeal to the theory of Creationism instead. I think that most of us, religious and otherwise, have at least acknowledged the existence of natural selection. Faster gazelles survive and pass along their traits to their offspring etc. What we haven't really discussed is the distinction of species. This may go mch further back in time than natural selection, but I want to discuss the creation such a variety of species as exists today.

Let's for a moment assume that evolution in its most complete form, starting from microbial life in the beginning of the universe is true. You start with microbes that all feed on the same thing, whether it be water or minerals in the water. Let us then assume that some microbes evolve to be larger than others. These larger microbes can collect more minerals (larger surface area for absorption etc), and can thus survive as effectively as the smaller microbes. Since the Earth is still young and there are plenty of minerals, the smaller microbes have no trouble surviving either.

Let us then assume that some of the larger microbes evolve a sort of mouth. Maybe an opening that they can actually ingest minerals through, rather than simple absorption. The rate of ingestion is faster than the rate absorption, thus they are able to process more minerals and survive even more efficiently. Let us then assume that these openings become large enough to swallow some of the smaller microbes. Problem is, the larger microbes have no way of digesting the cells of the smaller microbes. The small microbes clog the food intake and the large microbes starve. Let us then assume that by mutation, some large microbes evolve the ability to digest the small microbes and extract nutrients. Fine, you get the birth of predator and prey. Because minerals were plentiful until this time, both groups could survive equally effectively. There were no predators and no prey until this point, so any mutations would really have no effect upon the rate of survival of the different microbes. However, at this point, the large microbes have a distinct advantage. In addition to ingesting minerals, they can now ingest smaller microbes to obtain nutrients, thus ensuring a hightened rate of survival. The smaller microbes must now evolve methods of evasion, or face extinction.

A lot of assumptions leading up to this point, correct? Well, just stick with it a little longer. I'm almost to my point.

Let us assume that this evolution goes on for millions of years, and both types of microbes survive. Let us further assume that both evolve multicellular forms of themselves. Let us further assume that there are still enough nutrients in the environment to sustain all the mutations, with the exception of the small microbes that are eaten by the large ones of course.

I should hope that everyone can clearly see that this pattern could continue for millions more years. Maybe even by some random chance, the microbes begin developing limbs and instincts, basic intelligences. What this view does not explain is how multitudes of species arose with the variance that we see today.

Even assuming that all the more basic forms of life evolved into higher forms of life, that there was enough food supply to support all mutations but the ones that were eaten, none of this explains how the microbes evolved in several secular families, and how these families only prey upon certain things. There is no reason that distinct families of species, reptiles, mammals, birds, fish etc. should have evolved and all survived in one form or another.

Skipping forward a little bit. Let's talk about humans and primates. Let us assume that primates are spread across the globe. Let us further assume that one group, the group eventually to evolve into humans, begins developing intelligence and survives more effectively than all the other primates in their area. Essentially, these early humans, which scientists assume began somewhere in what we now consider Africa, out-survived all the other species of primate in their area. Other primates still existed, in South America etc. The question is, why did this only happen in one area. Why would it be illogical to assume that all groups of primates would develop like this? Shouldn't more evolved primates have outlived the lesser evolved? Shouldn't humans, by virtue of their hunting and gathering skills, all but eliminated apes, baboons, chimpanzees, and gorillas?

Thinking about this again, I realized that maybe the arguments I listed support evolutionism a little more than I intended them to. However, consider this:

We can all agree that natural selection definately favors certain traits within a species over other traits. However, to account for the myriad of species, minor mutations such as coloring differences, faster gazelles etc. can't be applied. I believe that in order for as many diverse species to evolve as there exist, there must have been some major mutations along the line. Mutations that would distinguish mammals from reptiles or insects. The problem with this is that these mutations would have had to been wide-spread and radical enough to prevent inbreeding, which could have very well eliminated the new species.

Now, I'm not claiming to be any expert. Last time I was actually interested in biology and evolution happened to coincide with the last time I took a class in Biology, which happened to be 5-6 years ago. So please don't take this argument too seriously. I am merely trying to see things from another point of view. I completely agree with natural selection and evolution, but wouldn't you agree that it is difficult to explain the sheer number of species of creatures? That the more evolved creatures didn't all kill off the lesser evolved as a result of natural selection. That we can have animals as advanced as humans and dolphins coexisting, evolving along with ants, plankton, and fish.

I'm not really trying to put down one view or another, just trying to see things from both sides. I realize I may have posted grossly inaccurate information or assumptions, but once again, I haven't researched the topic in depth. These are just some thoughts that I think may be worth discussing.

God apparently created animals before he created humans according to Genesis. All I know is that if I was tasked with creating a human, I wouldn't want to start from scratch. I would want a framework to work from. It's a lot like class inheritence. You just kind of use evolution as your mechanism to build a human. That's one idea, anyway. I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I by no means actually believe any of this crap.

No you really can't. The genetic defects would be so high, the species wouldn't survive more than a few generations. You'd need at least several hundred or thousand individuals.

Excellent post.

I'd just like to point that out before I start, a sensible, logical, step-by-step approach.

And what's more, it's entirely correct. Given the effect of random mutation and natural selection, then what described above will occur, more or less.

The reasons we have distinct species is because of an effect called, appropriately enough, speciation. Darwin's book, the Origin of Species, was supposed to talk about speciation, but it didn't really. It didn't really explain much about the origin of species at all. Darwin wrote about speciation in some other book, I think.

But anyway, speciation is the effect when a population is split. You have your population of simple creatures happily evolving away, but all of a sudden something happens. Some of the creatures migrate to some other area, or the population is split by an earthquake, or a river, or something that fragments the habitat. One group of your little creatures is still in the old place, evolving away, but the second group are now in a different environment and different adaptations will be necessary to survive. That second group will evolve away, but differently to the first.
Eventually, the two will have evolved to such a point where they are so different that they can't reproduce with eachother - they are two different species.

What happens now depends very much on the environment and the population. This is where some interesting discourse takes place, like "Foster's rule" which defines whether species become larger or smaller versions of themselves. Anyway, different things can happen;
- one population may overtake the other one
- one population may die out by itself
- the two populations may continue to evolve separately

The last one probably addresses your question about humans and chimpanzees.
It isn't strictly correct to say that "humans evolved from monkeys". The evolutionary line doesn't go "SOMETHING -> MONKEY -> HUMAN".
Monkeys and humans share a common ancestor. So it goes SOMETHING -> COMMON ANCESTOR -> HUMAN
and it also goes SOMETHING -> COMMON ANCESTOR -> MONKEY

The 'common ancestor' is not a monkey as we know it. Because that line has evolved too. They didn't stop evolving while humans did, they just followed a different line. The population of 'common ancestors' was split by habitat fragmentation, the two groups evolved separately, one became what we know today as a monkey, the other became what we know today as a human.

(Do note that this is certainly a gross simplification, I haven't even tried to look up the correct scientific language for 'monkey', and the evolutionary line is much longer - but this above should be adequate to explain this)

Anyway, excellent, I hope that answers your question.

Ah yes, indeed it does. Thanks. Looks like I need to read about speciation. I guess I'll start with Darwin and go from there.

No, not in my opinion.



5. The patient may notice that the particular convictions that he holds, while having nothing to do with evidence, do seem to owe a great deal to epidemiology. Why, he may wonder, do I hold this set of convictions rather than that set? Is it because I surveyed all the world's faiths and chose the one whose claims seemed most convincing? Almost certainly not. If you have a faith, it is statistically overwhelmingly likely that it is the same faith as your parents and grandparents had. No doubt soaring cathedrals, stirring music, moving stories and parables, help a bit. But by far the most important variable determining your religion is the accident of birth. The convictions that you so passionately believe would have been a completely different, and largely contradictory, set of convictions, if only you had happened to be born in a different place. Epidemiology, not evidence. (Dawkins, own emphasis added)

Hilarious. Your subjective approximation of truth is completely based on chance. Yes - in other circumstances you would've believed other bs. The fact that your faith condemns billions of people to hell because of chance is insanely disgusting.



Parenthetically, religion is unusual among divisive labels in being spectacularly unnecessary. If religious beliefs had any evidence going for them, we might have to respect them in spite of their concomitant unpleasantness. But there is no such evidence. To label people as death-deserving enemies because of disagreements about real world politics is bad enough. To do the same for disagreements about a delusional world inhabited by archangels, demons and imaginary friends is ludicrously tragic. (Dawkins)

Yes, for me too there was a time when I thought beliefs labeled 'religious' where unattackable. Most of the world thinks that. As for me: from now on I will no longer try to disguise my utter disgust and contempt for your Bronze Age god of Battle.

As for this topic of evolution: I refuse to debate a movie with someone who hasn't seen it.

"It's practically exponential!"
What? x^n where n is incredibly large?

Absolutely incredibly utterly totally stupid movie. Loved it.

I just realized something: you are revisionists. In itself this isn't bad at all, as history needs to be revised often to some extent in light of new evidences.

The difference between you and historical criticism though, and this puts you in the same category as nazi holocaust revisionists/negationists, is that you're attack of known history has nothing to to with rational argument or evidence, and everything with an ideology that isn't even your own.

It's like, if creationists and holocaust deniers got together at a ideological revisionism convention, these neo-nazi revisionists would probably be denied access to your dinner table. A guard would come up to the nazi and ask halt, how many years of history do YOU deny?. The nazi would reply 'three', and the guard would laugh and say sorry, but those guys are way out of your league. They deny hundreds of millions of years of evidence. And the neo-nazi would look at you with an immense respect, thinking damn, I hope I can deny reality as much as them one day.

And before you even think(rofl) about replying to this, give a good answer to my previous post, by me asking you why you belief bs A and not bs B. I'll post it again:

5. The patient may notice that the particular convictions that he holds, while having nothing to do with evidence, do seem to owe a great deal to epidemiology. Why, he may wonder, do I hold this set of convictions rather than that set? Is it because I surveyed all the world's faiths and chose the one whose claims seemed most convincing? Almost certainly not. If you have a faith, it is statistically overwhelmingly likely that it is the same faith as your parents and grandparents had. No doubt soaring cathedrals, stirring music, moving stories and parables, help a bit. But by far the most important variable determining your religion is the accident of birth. The convictions that you so passionately believe would have been a completely different, and largely contradictory, set of convictions, if only you had happened to be born in a different place. Epidemiology, not evidence. (Dawkins, own emphasis added)

Hilarious. Your subjective approximation of truth is completely based on chance. Yes - in other circumstances you would've believed other bs. The fact that your faith condemns billions of people to hell because of chance is insanely disgusting.


It's time to start asking questions like normal people do.

No insults or personal attacks please... -DSettahr

Normal people don't ask questions. They follow without doubt. You said it yourself, just look at the statistics.

Less evading the matter, more questioning.

He doesn't claim to have all the answers, but he does ask the questions..

Science is never complete and it is never certain. Even such things as the Laws of Motion are not certain because we don't know if we have been exposed to all possible circumstances and we will never know when we have. But, for simplicity, it is labeled a Law because we can reproduce what we know(and laws aren't concrete, they can be changed). We can not reproduce evolution in a reasonable amount of time, that is why it is a theory. We can not reproduce creationism, that is why it is a theory.

When it comes to evolution and creationism, each person has to look at the issue and determine what makes more sense to them. Some see a series of natural selections making sense(like myself), while others don't see things turning out like this without some outside help(like creationists do).

This is as fun as watching grass grow.

That was very diplomatic and nice and pleasant, and putting 'creationism' and 'evolution' on the same level is either going to please everyone, or no-one. I'd bet on the latter.

The statement 'evolution is just a theory' is incorrect, as 'evolution' is the fact, and 'natural selection' is the theory. But even so, it's superior to creationism as creationism isn't even a theory.
Creationism provides no falsifiable predictions and any that it does attempt to produce has already been falsified. Creationism is a view, an opinion, but not a 'theory'. Creationism relies entirely on trying to 'disprove' evolution, and it's been failing miserably at that for the last 100 years. It's beginning to become a little depressing how people can delude themselves so far from reality. Scientists have known evolution has been going on, even before Darwin. The real scientific debate is not about whether evolution occurs, we know it does. The debate is about how it occurs.

I do not and have never cared about pleasing either side of an issue. That is how I feel. If somebody doesn't like it, oh well.

What are these other theories on how evolution occurs? And even then, that means they are theories along side natural selection. You can not draw a fact from a theory. That is doing things backwards and making assumptions. You have to make the cause a fact before you can make the effect a fact. That is the equivilent, in persuasive writing, of drawing a True conclusion out of a False or Unknown premise. You have to follow an order for there to be any validity. And speculation is not enough to make a theory fact. That's what a theory is in the first place. And until we can observe evolution and reproduce it, it is just a speculation. Is it possible it's true? Yes. But is it possible it's false? Yes. To say there is absolutely no way evolution could be false is not only a logical fallacy, but it also violates on of those other laws in science known as the law of falsifiabilty.

The most accurate statement would be that creationism is a hypothesis. Without any logical reasoning to back it up, it can never be a respected theory.

Guys, please remember to respect each others opinions... a few of you (Tenshu, Nightwind) have made atagonizing comments bordering on the brink of insults/flames. Consider yourselves warned.

You know, I heard something on NPR a few days ago that's basically on this topic which I thought was quite insightful: (this is just a paraphrase):

Although humans tend to prefer to look for one single answer or cause that explains 'why' something is, that often is an oversimplification of the situation; events can be caused by different things on varying levels. In response to the question, "Why's the water boiling?" you could respond by talking about the increased kinetic energy of the water molecules, which overcomes their IMFs and causes them to escape freely into the air, and be totally correct.

On another level, you could say, "It's boiling because my wife turned the stove on," and be equally correct.

Or you could say, "It's boiling because I wanted some tea."

On any of the three levels, what you've said is absolutely true, but the explanations themselves are rather diverse.

The traditional 'textbook evolution' that you'd learn in High School is what is known as phyletic gradualism. It postulates that evolution is slow and gradual with species transforming from one into another more or less continually. There is also punctuated equilibrium that postulates that species change very little over time (the 'equilibrium'), but rapidly dissapear and are replaced by a new species very quickly (the 'punctuated'). These are the 'big two' at the moment, but they don't really 'confict' fundementally; puncuated equilibrium is really a form of gradualism, but puts greater significance on other effects. There is also speciation, which I've gone into some detail about before, and within speciation there's adaptive radiation, allopatric speciation, peripatric speciation, parapatry, sympatry, and ring species. For the most part, these don't really 'conflict' much at all, they're just explaining different phenomena, and it's the significance of each that's being discussed. More generally in evolutionary biology, there's anagenesis, catagenesis and cladogenesis. These tend to conflict moreso than the others. More generally still, concerning the origin of life, there's abiogenesis. This is a juicy topic, one that I hoped we might get on to, there's plenty of discussion to be had on this one. And if you really want to see whether evolutionary biologists are on the ball, throw at them the Gaia theory (or rather theories). It was classically seen to fundementally contradict evolutionary biology, but has recently been shown to work with it quite elegantly. That's fairly recent news, and you'll probably be able to catch out lazy biologists with it.

All of the theories, every single one of them (apart from Gaia and abiogenesis) relies on the assumption that 'evolution' is fact.

These sorts of assumptions tend to fall into one of two catagories.

Firstly, there are theories in which the assumptions they make are very significant. M-Theory essentially assumes that string theory is true, and manipulates it with other theories on gravitation to form what is called M-theory. If string theory is found to be true, then M-theory is likely to be true as well. But that is a big if, and the assumption that M-theory makes is very significant, and the mathematical assumptions that it makes tend to be included next to whatever conclusions it makes. String theory is still being fiddled with, and worked with, and we simply don't know whether it's correct or not.

Secondly, you might assume that the Earth revolves around the Sun. Planetary astrology does exactly that. You might assume that the Earth is not the centre of the Universe. Red shift theory relies on that. You might assume that the Earth is approximately spherical. Geographers assume this. All of these theories assume one thing to be true, and then claim other things given that that thing is true. But all of these assumptions are essentially negligible. If you want to be mathematical about this, we're talking about the probability of comitting a Type I error. Here, it is extremely low. No, it isn't 0. But it's close enough to 0 for us to consider it 0. Whenever we talk about the effects of gravity on Earth, do we really need to add in the 'assuming the Earth is spherical' clause? Pretty much all principles used today rely on the assumption that some other element is true. And those assumptions are entirely justified, because we just can't work from the ground up every single time. Those fundemental assumptions have been observed and observed and observed again enough times for them to be considered true, and labelled as 'facts'.

'Evolution' is most certainly in that second catagory. There is no 'ambiguity' or 'controversy' or 'conflict'. Darwin revolutionised biology, and ever since 'evolution' has gone from strength to strength and continually proven to be true. True enough for evolutionary biologists to rely on it being true. True enough for it to be fact.