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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
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Author | Topic: Natural Limitation to Evolutionary Processes (2/14/05) | |||||||||||||||||||||||
NosyNed Member Posts: 9004 From: Canada Joined: |
I've learned something. If you guys already took all this for granted, you might recommend that the basics that are presented to students and the public be restated to represent what you take for granted, as at present they give another picture. Wow! and I thought our texts were a bit medicure and out of date. My daughter 6 years ago in elementary school had a text which, while simple and short, got it right. Then last year in grade 11 they went into a bit of detail discussing how this works. All of it still pretty simple compared to what she will get into at the university level but that is what you have to do when there is very limited time and a group of students not all of whom are as interested as some are. Of course, if evolution isn't discussed well I might refer you to the article in the NY Times of a couple of weeks ago that points out that, while the court cases are stopping the fundamentalists from officially tampering with a descent education, they are coming in the back door by causing so much hassle for educators that a discussion of evolution is curtailed in practice. If there is a problem with the popular understanding it may not all be blamed on poorly written texts and poorly trained teachers. Perhaps it is just the sort that maintain AIG and ICR that can be blamed.
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
quote: I've had enough experience in this kind of debate from time to time to understand the problems with the terminology and what constitutes proof. I think there are excellent creationist scientists who know a lot more than I can digest but I haven't checked up on their thinking for a while so maybe I will do that, and see if I can find discussions on creationist sites at the same time. I think the creationist argument is hampered to a great extent by the fact that the whole territory is a minefield of evolutionist assumptions.
quote:quote: Yes, I was starting to get the impression that it is looked at because it raises the problems for evolution I sincerely hope it does. Thanks for the acknowledgment. Sometimes killing a giant only takes a slingshot.
quote: This is one area where I would expect minimal interference by bias.
quote: Well, I do believe the Flood explains the facts, certainly far better than the Geologic Time Table does, but my main argument is that the Geologic Time Table is such a silly idea on the face of it, just looking at the strata it supposedly explains, it should embarrass scientists to take it seriously. No need for all the minute investigations of particular bits of data as the basic picture is already ridiculous. Don't know if I care to slog through all that again, but we'll see. Thanks for being nice. I agree, discussions are fun. I do a lot of it. But I've been in the arguments that get worked to death too so not sure how much more of that I want to take on. This message has been edited by Faith, 02-17-2005 03:36 AM
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PaulK Member Posts: 17828 Joined: Member Rating: 2.5 |
quote: The real situation is exactly the reverse. The Flood as an explanation for geology is very, very silly which is why geology abandoned it quite early. Mainstream geological views - while incomplete - are far more sensible.
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
quote:quote: Geology abandoned a wrong view of the Flood as I understand it. There were some silly ideas of what the effects of such a Flood would be a century or so ago. But the idea that the strata could have built up over billions of years is ridiculous on the face of it. A few feet of perfectly horizontal evenly deposited sediments is supposed to have occurred over a few million years? What, at a rate of a millimeter a century? No rain, no wind, no flooding, no erosion, no earthquakes, no disturbances? Over huge swaths of planet earth? In all the mountains that were pushed up after it formed, in all the deserts, everywhere one looks? Then precisely sharply demarcated from another similar formation of a different kind of material equally homogeneous and neatly laid down bit by tiny bit for another umpteen million years with another neat horizontal demarcation and so on and so forth and that's taken as real? And kabillions of fossils, marine fossils in the mountains etc etc etc etc etc Fossils take special conditions to be made etc etc etc etc etc But since I'm sure you are a veteran of this argument, as am I, maybe we should just agree to avoid it as it is always the same old. Anyway it belongs in another thread and I'm going to bed, so goodnight. This message has been edited by Faith, 02-17-2005 04:11 AM
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PaulK Member Posts: 17828 Joined: Member Rating: 2.5 |
Yes, Geology abandoned a "wrong view" of the flood - the idea that it accounted for an appreciable part of the Geological record.
And quite frankly before condemning modern geological views you should actually learn what they are, instead of beating up on straw men.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1497 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
The lists of processes of evolution present them all separately-and-equally as separate processes. Because they are. Mutation is not selection; selection is not mutation. They're two different processes. But together they are evolution. (It sounds like I'm describing the Wonder Twins.)
I'm the one who said it sounds like the definition should be changed from Evolution = change in the frequency of alleles to Evolution = Mutation PLUS the selection processes that reduce diversity. I don't see the difference. If you have a process that expands diversity randomly, combined with a process that contracts diversity non-randomly, the result is going to be a directed change in allele frequencies. Obviously.
If this is now the going definition of evolution, acknowledging all these elements in the process, fine. Again I don't see how the elements you've mentioned aren't directly implied by the definition of evolution as a change in allele frequencies. Nonetheless, though, I think you've actually added something to the discussion - the idea of the processes of evolution being counterposing forces that expand or contract diversity - and for that your clear thinking should be commended. This message has been edited by crashfrog, 02-17-2005 10:14 AM
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1497 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
No rain, no wind, no flooding, no erosion, no earthquakes, no disturbances? What makes you think that there are no disturbances, or that these processes didn't leave marks in the strata that we can detect? I mean its news to me that the geologic strata contains no evidence of all of these processes occuring. Wherever did you get such an idea?
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
quote:quote: By looking at it. If such disturbances occurred throughout those billions of years at the same rate they do now, or even a much reduced rate, there is no way a horizontal deposition of sediments would have survived anywhere. It isn't a matter of "marks" one can "detect," it's a matter of the whole supposed process being impossible. This message has been edited by Faith, 02-17-2005 10:53 AM
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AdminNosy Administrator Posts: 4754 From: Vancouver, BC, Canada Joined: |
evolution is the forum, limitations is the topic.
Please head over to Geology and the Great Flood for this current discussion.
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
quote: OK, entertain me with the latest ideas about how the strata got there -- I've run into some in other arguments years ago -- but as long as they are taken to represent great aeons of time there is no explanation that can overcome that ridiculous idea. Actually, I expected eventually to read through the threads on that subject so no need to bother. This message has been edited by Faith, 02-17-2005 11:02 AM
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AdminJar Inactive Member |
The Flood is getting way too far off topic. Let's start yet another flood thread if we're going there again.
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
quote: My point was that mutation is apparently considered to be going on in all populations, even in the most extremely fixated. The others are events that happen now and then. The way the discussion has gone here suggests that mutation should be included in the presentation of all the events as well as described independently. Also, I was the one who had to point out to somebody earlier on that they are two different processes.
quote: That's why it would be clearer if they were presented in the combinations you expect them to occur, instead of separately.
quote:quote: If you don't make it clear that you assume mutation to be ongoing in ALL populations then it appears that selection could occur without it, which is where I started out thinking about this, not realizing just how mutation-preoccupied the whole field is.
[quote]quote: quote: Thank you.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1497 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
My point was that mutation is apparently considered to be going on in all populations, even in the most extremely fixated. Not "considered", known. It's known to be going on in all populations, in every individual.
Also, I was the one who had to point out to somebody earlier on that they are two different processes. I don't think there's anyone here but creationists who don't understand that selection and mutation are two different processes, with unique effects on a population's genetics. That's why we always formulate evolution as natural selection and random mutation; and why creationists point out that mutations aren't selective and that selection isn't creative and think that they've refuted evolution.
If you don't make it clear that you assume mutation to be ongoing in ALL populations then it appears that selection could occur without it Of course selection could occur without it. But it never does, because it's impossible according to the laws of physics to avoid mutation. It has to happen, and we observe that it always does.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1497 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Faith, I hope you'll join us in a discussion of your objections here.
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1474 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
quote: That's not how it is presented on umpteen biology websites and evolution glossaries.
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