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Author Topic:   Evolution and complexity
Loudmouth
Inactive Member


Message 106 of 119 (88381)
02-24-2004 12:37 PM
Reply to: Message 105 by Saviourmachine
02-24-2004 9:32 AM


Re: Loosing as likely as gaining - example
quote:
If you agree with me that there are to types of adaptions, normal adaptions (driven by selection) and complexity adding adaptions (due to this passive drive towards complexity) then it's maybe possible to calculate the speed of both.
Why couldn't both be driven by natural selection? Although, complexity could possibly be increased by neutral mutations. However, at some point this increase will most likely be selected for or against.
quote:
Until now I saw that the observed speed of mutations is much higher than should be expected looking to the fossil record.
Could you give an example? One example that from the top of my head, the proposed divergence between chimps and humans was measured independently of DNA differences. However, the two measures (fossil record and DNA differences) match up with human mutation rates. Is there another example that shows incapatible mutation rates?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 105 by Saviourmachine, posted 02-24-2004 9:32 AM Saviourmachine has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 112 by Saviourmachine, posted 02-26-2004 10:21 AM Loudmouth has not replied

  
FliesOnly
Member (Idle past 4145 days)
Posts: 797
From: Michigan
Joined: 12-01-2003


Message 107 of 119 (88387)
02-24-2004 1:20 PM
Reply to: Message 105 by Saviourmachine
02-24-2004 9:32 AM


Re: Loosing as likely as gaining - example
Hello Again, nice to here from you:
Saviourmachine writes:
I think this is a false analogy. I do not want to express all lost information throughout the years within my definition of complexity. But certainly the new blue print you made is important too, not only the opening of the door itself, or the mechanism you're using. If the mechanism is self-constructive (using the blue print), wouldn't you consider the blue print a part of it?
What I meant to demonstrate by the analogy was that even when information is added, it does not, IMHO, necessarily equate to an increase in complexity. In my analogy, I did not draw a new set of blueprints for the new (less complex) route the bowling ball took. Instead, I simply altered my existing blueprints by ADDING a new set of tracks (route). That is, I added more detail to the instructions, which resulted in a less complex system for opening my front door.
Information is usually not lost without a causative agent. By that I mean that an organism will not lose its tail for no reason, or if it does (pleitropy, linked genes, polygenic inheritance, etc) then Natural Selection will decide if that loss was adaptive or maladaptive (via fitness). So it is the outcome that needs to be measured, not the route. Or to put it another way, the complexity of the directions should not be used as the ultimate measure of complexity (perhaps they could be considered the penultimate measure ). Instead, the outcome of the directions is what’s important. If we use information code as the measure of complexity, then we would need to know the entire code in order to make comparisons. Isn’t it much easier to measure the result?
Saviourmachine writes:
To answer my own question, I would suggest that in the case where code is destroyed the amount of information and complexity of the organism is lowered, while in the adding code case the amount of information is preserved and the overall complexity is even increased.
But the result is the same. Although I understand your point of view, I think you are headed down a path that is impossible to measure (at least not with the current technologies available). We do not, for example, know the genotype of every extant organism and even if we do eventually unlock this information, we certainly will never ( I know, I know, never say never) know with complete certainty what the genotype of every extinct organism may have been. So how can we use it as a measure of complexity? In your example you conclude that if a tail is lost by removing genetic information, then the resulting organism is less complex than it closest ancestor, but if the tail is lost because new information was added that resulted in a blockage of the genetic code that forms the tail, the resulting organism would be more complex than its closest ancestor. So we would have two morphologically identical organisms, of which one is less complex than the other. Let me push this example to the extremes. Let’s suppose that in a population of monkeys, some individuals give birth to offspring with no tails due to a loss of genetic information, while other offspring lack tails because of the addition of new genetic information. (I'll continue with this rather unlikely example..but only to make a point). Suppose that these tail-less monkeys have an advantage in a slightly different environment, so they exploit this "new" habitat and eventually speciate. Knowing that Natural Selection only operates on characteristics which are expressed and if we further assume that the loss of the tail (no matter "how" it was lost) has no other genetic consequences, then by your measure we would then have two levels of complexity for the same species. Not a very useful tool, I would say.
Saviourmachine writes:
So, I don't talk about original plans, but about current plans!
But current plans are based on original plansand if the ancestor we are using as a bases of comparison is extinct, how would we know if the current plans are less complex or more complex? For example, NosyNed stated that the type question we may want to answer is whether a triceratops is more complex than a dog? Using your method of measure, we can’t answer this because we have no way of knowing the coded information of the triceratops. We do, however, have a basic morphological framework from which to work and can look at structural components of each and make an assessment based on that.
Saviourmachine writes:
If you agree with me that there are to types of adaptions, normal adaptions (driven by selection) and complexity adding adaptions (due to this passive drive towards complexity) then it's maybe possible to calculate the speed of both.
I don’t necessarily agree that there are two types of adaptations. An adaptation is simply any change in an organism that results in a higher level of fitness, and which was brought about by Natural Selection for its current function. It doesn’t choose the route (be it the addition or subtraction of information), it only looks at the outcome. For example, when we look at evolution as a whole, the complexity we see in mammals is an anomaly (in a sense) and is a result of left hand walls. What do I mean by this, you’re wondering? Well, Gould states that the ultimate left hand wall is that which represents the simplest living organisms (most likely bacteria). Go further left of this wall and you would no longer be considered living. What I am saying is that if we have multiple left hand walls, each representing a lower limit to some arbitrary classification (for instancea mammalian left hand wall which sets the lower limit for what we would classify as a mammal), then if we start at this lower limit and look at the evolutionary history of the organisms within the classification, we would see that some things became less complex, while others increased in complexity. I contend that we would have no idea (in a vast majority of the cases) how the organism got to its current design (no, I am not saying that there is a designer ) and that as a level of measurement, the route is unimportant. Natural Selection does not care how it got there, it only looks at the organisms’ ability to survive and reproduce in its current design, and makes adjustments based on that information.
I guess this all means that I think morphological characteristics are currently the best method we have for making complexity comparisons.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 105 by Saviourmachine, posted 02-24-2004 9:32 AM Saviourmachine has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 108 by Brad McFall, posted 02-24-2004 3:12 PM FliesOnly has replied
 Message 113 by Saviourmachine, posted 02-26-2004 11:20 AM FliesOnly has not replied

  
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 108 of 119 (88406)
02-24-2004 3:12 PM
Reply to: Message 107 by FliesOnly
02-24-2004 1:20 PM


Re: Loosing as likely as gaining - example
How can we use the "geneotype" (every past and any future in all present) for a measure of complexity? Did I glean the question correctly??
Here is a way-Complexty would be a sum of forms per any taxogeny enumerated across algebras of logical electron flow routes between thermal and mere contacts that connectivities of DNA,RNAandPROTEIN retain despite death. The "genotype" will be the sequence of DNA but the measure will involve the alegbra to simple program of the two 1-D categories in the life of any given clade dependent ONLY on the sequence of DNA serially associated with RNAs AND PROTEINS. The problem of "data" then is NOT about what passed DNA's sequences' were nor about what groups do not go extinct in the future but only on the set of electron transitivies in an abstract space for pairs of sums of periodic table of elements in physical continguity no matter the causal "agent". I only add a twist to currently recorded illustrations in science to effect this notion. The concept of information would NOT be defined in terms of "noise" but within, in this case the loss or gain of tail. I have some ideas about tails of tadpoles but the particular may not be this exemplar steped through
1)Perversions through the Pascal Arithemetical Triangle times the physiological activity of interactive DNARNAP undergoing an inversion to a thermal contact
2)This contact is connected by a coordinated 1-Dsymmetry among DNARNAPROTEINS (in community between -++-- and -->>--) formerly identical in a cardinally extensible 3Dspace of proteins(error in the current acceptance of the operon concept) as well as 1D--to-2D abstract space of RNA (also likely misuderstood kinematics of secondary structures) and DNA by electron flow and chemical bonds (here is where some physical ideas may also come true) and
3)Genetic regulation does not exist (as per only genotype in the measure of this complex) but pipulations can affect the topological r4elation of any perversion to couplable translations/transcriptions via nodes that can vary denumerably beyond the simplest dyad.
I clearly conceive the object of my type but it is not easy to figure out the best way to communicate it.The rate of readthrough may phase modultate -++- vs ->>- 1-D symmetry by thermal contact electron flow in the H2O bounding interactions to closed electrotonics' affordances( but wolfram could ( i doubt it) be more correct than me) and have NOTHING to do with Monod TIME (delta z over delta b) as the literature does "grammer" "If instead of pausing the ribosome were released and if there were no protector region, the preemptor would form and read-through would be the result of unfetterd translation."
I do not know however if flame spectra indeed work in this algothrim for complexity or not. If it does then there is little room for me to be grammetically mistaken at all lexoses. But Boole wrote "Whence passing from Logic to Algebra, we have at once Prob.w=a, a result which might have been anticipated. Substituting then for the numerator and denominator of the above fraction their values, we have for the a posteriori probability of a permanent cause, the expression..."
One must realize in this lingo more perhaps than just a Mendel 3:1. RATIO in fact less we learn to be less vocal about value here on EVC. It seemed very ODD to me that Mayr had to write the book "What evolution is" because should this cause exist then there may indeed be a why question in biology that can and in fact is answered without evolutionary theory being involved at all. But now my level of explanation spans all of chemistry physics and biology and is clearly not something a student would ever figure out on their own (mayr's own as standard of BIOLOGY)without trying to figure up a few pages of c/e on the net.
Growth may be addition and Development multiplication but it would have been wrong IN SCIENCE to seperate materially parts of the operon BEFORE working a tradeoff of cell death and differentiation. That is what science and not some doctor did. I think it(current non creationist science) is as worthwhile as the 50cent dues a month at the Hepetology club I formed in the 70s. Sure my club may not exist as long as this science but I am one guy and this lasted into my mid-life crisis.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 107 by FliesOnly, posted 02-24-2004 1:20 PM FliesOnly has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 109 by FliesOnly, posted 02-24-2004 3:23 PM Brad McFall has not replied
 Message 110 by FliesOnly, posted 02-24-2004 3:23 PM Brad McFall has replied

  
FliesOnly
Member (Idle past 4145 days)
Posts: 797
From: Michigan
Joined: 12-01-2003


Message 109 of 119 (88410)
02-24-2004 3:23 PM
Reply to: Message 108 by Brad McFall
02-24-2004 3:12 PM


Re: Loosing as likely as gaining - example
Hi Brad McFall:
Brad MacFall writes:
How can we...blah something, something blah something. Something else blah, and then something again, a bunch of other stuff blah and then back to blah something once more....into my mid-life crisis.
Uh...yeah, and then "Bobs your Uncle"...there ya go.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 108 by Brad McFall, posted 02-24-2004 3:12 PM Brad McFall has not replied

  
FliesOnly
Member (Idle past 4145 days)
Posts: 797
From: Michigan
Joined: 12-01-2003


Message 110 of 119 (88411)
02-24-2004 3:23 PM
Reply to: Message 108 by Brad McFall
02-24-2004 3:12 PM


Re: Loosing as likely as gaining - example
Hi Brad McFall:
Brad MacFall writes:
How can we...blah something, something blah something. Something else blah, and then something again, a bunch of other stuff blah and then back to blah something once more....into my mid-life crisis.
Uh...yeah, and then "Bobs your Uncle"...there ya go.
Oops...so sorry...I got so excited about finally getting a "Brad MacFall response" that I accidently hit the send botton twice.
[This message has been edited by FliesOnly, 02-24-2004]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 108 by Brad McFall, posted 02-24-2004 3:12 PM Brad McFall has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 111 by Brad McFall, posted 02-24-2004 3:34 PM FliesOnly has not replied

  
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 111 of 119 (88414)
02-24-2004 3:34 PM
Reply to: Message 110 by FliesOnly
02-24-2004 3:23 PM


Re: Loosing as likely as gaining - example
Flies, dont worry about the DUp but it really is not bla. I just dont have bla $ to explain to everyone at once how it can possible substitue for current literature's "The model for the association of repressor and operator consists of three dimensional diffusion along the DNA chain. Richter and Eigen(1974) have performed a theoretical treatment for the diffusion of a sphere(repressor) ttwoard a rod(DNA) under the influence of an electric field." MY work is simpler becuase I only USE ONLY 1-D. The work may not be bringing in dividends yet is clear as crystal in my mind.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 110 by FliesOnly, posted 02-24-2004 3:23 PM FliesOnly has not replied

  
Saviourmachine
Member (Idle past 3554 days)
Posts: 113
From: Holland
Joined: 01-16-2004


Message 112 of 119 (88801)
02-26-2004 10:21 AM
Reply to: Message 106 by Loudmouth
02-24-2004 12:37 PM


Molecular versus fossil dating methods
Loudmouth writes:
Why couldn't both be driven by natural selection?
Now everybody here agrees that nature can not select for complexity itself, you're coming up with this? I wouldn't have problems with nature directly selecting for complexity (for me it's pretty clear that a very big size, a very high speed and other extremes would make special complex adaptions necessary; I formulated that in my first 'rambling' post ). You've to convince NosyNed and FliesOnly about this.
Loudmouth writes:
Saviourmachine writes:
Until now I saw that the observed speed of mutations is much higher than should be expected looking to the fossil record.
Could you give an example?
I saw for example this on the web:
... The least diverged ancestral repeats (ie those that were inserted into the genome just before divergence) show 0.17 substitutions per site in human and 0.34 substitutions per site in mouse. Using 75 million years for the date of divergence gives a neutral rate for humans 2.2x10-9 per year or 4 x 10-8 per generation (or about 120 substitutions per individual across the 3 billion nucleotides in the human genome. That means that each of us has on average about two mutations in an active protein coding gene compared with our parents and that there are therefore several billion mutations in active genes in the world population.
Contrary to creationist claims there are more than enough mutations occurring - and fixing - in the genomes to explain the observed rate of evolution and the differences between the species....
1. Normally that's the answer I get, when questioning mutation rates: it's more than enough. But the more than enough isn't based on scientific evidence, I guess. It seems the other way around (see 3).
2. I found already an explanation for a slightly higher molecular evolution rate. Usually the dates the molecular clock provides will precede the corresponding dates in the fossil record, because a specie have to be around for a time to become 'significantly fossilized'.
3. This overview on PubMed states clearly that calculated divergence times significantly precede the first appearances of the relevant groups in the fossil record. Then the much slower 'complexion adding' mutation rate I suggest won't be welcome, I think.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 106 by Loudmouth, posted 02-24-2004 12:37 PM Loudmouth has not replied

  
Saviourmachine
Member (Idle past 3554 days)
Posts: 113
From: Holland
Joined: 01-16-2004


Message 113 of 119 (88815)
02-26-2004 11:20 AM
Reply to: Message 107 by FliesOnly
02-24-2004 1:20 PM


Morphological characteristics not exact enough
Nice to hear from you too.
I see your point: "maybe morphological characteristics aren't a good complexion measure, but we've nothing better. The complexity of the genotype isn't measurable."
FliesOnly writes:
In my analogy, I did not draw a new set of blueprints for the new (less complex) route the bowling ball took. Instead, I simply altered my existing blueprints by ADDING a new set of tracks (route). That is, I added more detail to the instructions, which resulted in a less complex system for opening my front door.
But in nature, the old systems that aren't used will disappear isn't it? If this was not the case, having two systems can be considered as more complex. Your confusing two mechanisms, the mechanism for opening the front door, and the mechanism for translating the blueprint to the opening door system. Both mechanisms are more complex than the old one alone...
So it is the outcome that needs to be measured, not the route.
The outcome is the phenotype, the route is the genotype and the system that decodes this? Indeed, nature is 'blind' about complexity 'inside', but also to complexity on the outside. Complexity is something we observe. So, we have to decide what to measure, not nature.
We do not, for example, know the genotype of every extant organism and even if we do eventually unlock this information, we certainly will never ( I know, I know, never say never) know with complete certainty what the genotype of every extinct organism may have been.
But we're able to relate organisms by DNA? That's by suggesting that the common ancestor had parts of their DNA, isn't it? So, if there are descendents living nowadays, we've their history in their DNA and can ultimately reconstruct the DNA of the common ancestor. Maybe in the future we can use the computer to analyse if it can live...
But, indeed, I'm heading down a path that is impossible to measure. That's because I think the complexity differences between dino's and current living mammals are too small to be detected by using only taxonomies.
Suppose that these tail-less monkeys have an advantage in a slightly different environment, so they exploit this "new" habitat and eventually speciate. Knowing that Natural Selection only operates on characteristics which are expressed and if we further assume that the loss of the tail (no matter "how" it was lost) has no other genetic consequences, then by your measure we would then have two levels of complexity for the same species.
1. The monkeys that differ only in this aspect, I would differ in terms of complexity, indeed.
2. To regain the tail, this would be more likely (for me) for the monkey who gained a regulatory gene, than for the one where the genes that coded for the tail were destroyed. So, it can have consequences.
3. If this mutations are equally likely, this example wouldn't be that rather unlikely.
I don’t necessarily agree that there are two types of adaptations. An adaptation is simply any change in an organism that results in a higher level of fitness, and which was brought about by Natural Selection for its current function.
Are there adaptations that are complexity adding and adaptations that aren't? Yes? So, I can differ two types.
Go further left of this wall and you would no longer be considered living. What I am saying is that if we have multiple left hand walls, each representing a lower limit to some arbitrary classification (for instancea mammalian left hand wall which sets the lower limit for what we would classify as a mammal), then if we start at this lower limit and look at the evolutionary history of the organisms within the classification, we would see that some things became less complex, while others increased in complexity.
I know, the "left hand wall" perspective does work in regard to live versus no live. But I do not see why mammals wouldn't degenerate. What's that essential about being mammal?
I guess this all means that I think morphological characteristics are currently the best method we have for making complexity comparisons.
I agree with you, but I do not expect differences between dino's and current mammals with that method.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 107 by FliesOnly, posted 02-24-2004 1:20 PM FliesOnly has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 114 by Brad McFall, posted 02-26-2004 7:05 PM Saviourmachine has replied

  
Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5033 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 114 of 119 (88916)
02-26-2004 7:05 PM
Reply to: Message 113 by Saviourmachine
02-26-2004 11:20 AM


Re: Morphological characteristics not exact enough
quote:
If this was not the case, having two systems can be considered as more complex. Your confusing two mechanisms,
I am trying to work up a topologically conditioned version of the PATH that a Boscovich curve makes AS Cantor's MOTION in a discontinuous space such that on each "Side" of this curve inter alia null regions would permit the existence of actual infinites if not chemsitry at least in biology. The may exist in physcis sensu stricto as well. The argument against this existence is as you noted as MORE complex hence Russel only admitted aggregates and not unities. In "Boltzmann's Atom" Lindley deprecated "This is what Daniel Bernoulli first tried, in 1738, with his argument deriving pressure from a consideration of atomic motion. But even after that, in 1763, Roger Boscovich wrote an exposition called "Theoria Philosophia Naturalis in which he offered an atomic theory that relied on essentially stationary atoms. Boscovich, a peripatetic philosopher-priest of Serbo-Croatian origins, argued that at a very short range,atoms attracted each other: that is why a piece of cloth soaked up water. At a somewhat longer range, however, atoms pushed each other away: that is why a gas exerted pressure. Boscovich's account, though it has some modern elements, also illustrates why atomic theory was not taken seriously by many scientists for such a long time. Rather than imagining atoms as having certain properties,and seeking to draw conclusions about their behavior, he instead gave the atoms whatever properties he needed in order to explain the phenomena he addressed. This put into practical terms Newton's suggestion..."This is however quite in harmony with intelligent design.One can not miss in the same book, "While still an undergraduate, Einstein wrote..."Boltzmann is quite magnificent...I am completely persuaded by the correctness of the principles of the theory, that the question really is about the movement of [atoms] according to certain conditions." Thus I think indeed Sylas is off the mark in another thread.
quote:
But in nature, the old systems that aren't used will disappear isn't it?
This I think is the question that my work has put back in question. I have not yet had the chance of working in the physical implication that is becoming less dual and more or less duplicit.
quote:
the mechanism for opening the front door, and the mechanism for translating the blueprint to the opening door system
I am nary near to describing how to make a "landscape" chart with the periodic table of elements to rescribe where these physical connections would go should it APPEAR that there is more than one( thus they would only "appear" to disappear. I am still working on the philosophy that Bertrand Russell put in this way of an aggregate of hydrogen, helium,...when he denied for the benefit of the HISTORY of LOGIC that inifinte unites can not exist. There may be MORE than two "mechanisms" chemically but I am first only interested in the application of Wrights "SHIFITING" balance theory trial and error process as a function of the 'element city'. It may not comport with Creationist issues on rates of decay. I just dont know at this point. Once I get it worded out this far it will be available to resolve SOME issues that seperate GOULD and Dawkins factually should the empirical post theory be committed but first the other quotes. I need to do al of these things so that the same criticsm Lindley layed legally on Boscovich IS what was illegally laid on me.
So once I avoid the legit criticism I hope to explain how indeed there could be strict ordertype connections among the tabled elements that ARE what Faraday meant with the word "contiguous" and were within what Maxwell denoted as "mild" and IS a property of biology that Bohr asked in NIELS BOHR A CENTENARY VOLUME"One of the most debated applications of complementarity was Bohr's attempt to formulate the problem of life in these terms. In a celebrated talk given in 1932, he ventured the idea that the phenomena of life and teh validity of physics and chemsitry are contradictions that could be seen in the light of complementarity, in the sense that any attempt to verify in all the validity of physics in a living cell would necessarily kill the cell and detroy the object of investigation
Thus, a new and different stat of matter might exist, which never would lead to a situtation at variance with the laws of physics but still outside..."
If the flame spectra fundamental series work out the subject will not be destroyed but programmed cell death will intervene in that place of aquousity but Bohr's comment will be a subset within Russel's senses and rotting death while ID is outside this yet again. WOlfram's claims about irreducibility and Monod's concerns about universality of the operon supply the object around Bohr's notion so the last sentence does not apply that I did not quote if I am correct that actual infinite baraminolgical unities exist.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 113 by Saviourmachine, posted 02-26-2004 11:20 AM Saviourmachine has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 115 by Saviourmachine, posted 03-01-2004 11:55 AM Brad McFall has replied

  
Saviourmachine
Member (Idle past 3554 days)
Posts: 113
From: Holland
Joined: 01-16-2004


Message 115 of 119 (89568)
03-01-2004 11:55 AM
Reply to: Message 114 by Brad McFall
02-26-2004 7:05 PM


Re: Morphological characteristics not exact enough
I've reasons to assume you're an expert, but only a computerized one:
  • quoting, but not anticipating on content
  • knowing too much names and dates
  • incoherent use of language
  • your database exist for the biggest part out of chemistry facts
  • writing out every word
  • taking quotes out of context (although that's almost human)
Would you mind to explain the following things?
  • what's a Boscovich curve?
  • what's Cantor's motion?
  • what's the meaning of that path in this discontinuous space?
  • what has the existence with infinities of this function to do with complexity?
  • what has Russel's admittance to do with complexity?
  • what are you illustrating with the experiment of Bernoulli & Boscovich?
  • what has assigning of desired properties to atoms to do with intelligent design?
  • who's Sylas?
  • what do you mean by dual physical implementations?
  • ...
Prediction:
You're not able to answer this questions in a clear, easy to read manner.
Thanks anyway for your posts, it was fun. But please cling to topic next time.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 114 by Brad McFall, posted 02-26-2004 7:05 PM Brad McFall has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 119 by Brad McFall, posted 01-22-2005 1:12 PM Saviourmachine has not replied

  
Saviourmachine
Member (Idle past 3554 days)
Posts: 113
From: Holland
Joined: 01-16-2004


Message 116 of 119 (91223)
03-08-2004 5:25 PM
Reply to: Message 101 by NosyNed
02-20-2004 8:53 PM


passive evolution drive speed
A short compilation:
NosyNed writes:
Saviourmachine writes:
What's the speed of this passive drive of evolution towards complexity, this 'drift'?
...
No, it [this passive drive] is a side-effect. In the case of tossing coins, the maximum amount of succesive heads will increase over time. You can assign a speed to that.
...
I guess no one can answer that question, because you've to guess the amount of generations in the past and the generation sizes, besides assuming a steady mutation rate and lots of other things like changing conditions as you mentioned. So, for me this part of evolution theory is highly speculative.
I'm not sure how well founded any rates are. I think there is some reason to treat them as more than speculative.
What are the reasons you mention about?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 101 by NosyNed, posted 02-20-2004 8:53 PM NosyNed has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 117 by NosyNed, posted 03-08-2004 7:24 PM Saviourmachine has replied

  
NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 117 of 119 (91241)
03-08-2004 7:24 PM
Reply to: Message 116 by Saviourmachine
03-08-2004 5:25 PM


Re: passive evolution drive speed
The correlation between the genetic differences and the fossil record wouldn't work so well if there wasn't some constancy of rate would it?
In addition, what is understood about the mechanisms suggests that there is no reason to think that the rate wouldn't be reasonably consistent.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 116 by Saviourmachine, posted 03-08-2004 5:25 PM Saviourmachine has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 118 by Saviourmachine, posted 03-20-2004 7:20 AM NosyNed has not replied

  
Saviourmachine
Member (Idle past 3554 days)
Posts: 113
From: Holland
Joined: 01-16-2004


Message 118 of 119 (93485)
03-20-2004 7:20 AM
Reply to: Message 117 by NosyNed
03-08-2004 7:24 PM


Genetic and fossil correlation
NosyNed writes:
The correlation between the genetic differences and the fossil record wouldn't work so well if there wasn't some constancy of rate would it?
Variation in molecular change between phyla
Marine Biological Laboratory "It is well known that unequal rates of sequence evolution have the potential to lead to incorrect molecular phylogenetic trees. This usually leads to so-called "long-branch-attractions", in which unrelated lineages with high rates of change artefactually cluster together. We will show that natural variation in rates of molecular change is much more extreme than is generally realized, and will explore the consequences of this rate variation for attempts to reconstruct phylogenetic history."
Mitochondrial Eve
PubMed "Molecular evolution data favor the African origin of modern humans, but the weight of the evidence is against a population bottleneck before their emergence. The mitochondrial Eve hypothesis emanates from a confusion between gene genealogies and individual genealogies."
  • They all try to justify different molecular and fossil rates. The correlation isn't not that clear, I think.
    Others that observed some discrepancies:
    [1] "A good fossil record." Clocks have to redesigned accordingly. University of Geneva
    [2] "Without a suitable fossil record (or other benchmark), it may be impossible to estimate the time over which an observed number of substitutions have occurred." Co-speciation: A framework for the study of molecular evolutionary rates.
    [3] "The molecular times agree with most early (Palaeozoic) and late (Cenozoic) fossil-based times, but indicate major gaps in the Mesozoic fossil record." ... "Molecular clocks are first calibrated with a known time of divergence and then used to estimate divergence times of other species." A molecular timescale for vertrebrate evolution
  • The clocks are first calibrated with the fossil record interpreted by slow evolutionary change and even than the correlation is sometimes working not that well.
    In addition, what is understood about the mechanisms suggests that there is no reason to think that the rate wouldn't be reasonably consistent.
    Assuming constancy
    A constant rate is an assumption. Necessarily there has to be evidence for it. What kind of mechanisms are you talking about? Why do you assume that there aren't other mechanisms? Does it not imply that you have to have a constant atmosphere (point mutations), the same copy system (duplication existing from eternity), and so on?

  • This message is a reply to:
     Message 117 by NosyNed, posted 03-08-2004 7:24 PM NosyNed has not replied

      
    Brad McFall
    Member (Idle past 5033 days)
    Posts: 3428
    From: Ithaca,NY, USA
    Joined: 12-20-2001


    Message 119 of 119 (179660)
    01-22-2005 1:12 PM
    Reply to: Message 115 by Saviourmachine
    03-01-2004 11:55 AM


    Re: Morphological characteristics not exact enough
    Bantam Matrix Edition books came out with space, time, and mathematics edited by Robert W, Marks which contained under title of The Future of Mathematics a heading called CANTORISM. It said,
    quote:
    I have spoken above of the need we have of returning continually to the first principles of our science, and of the advantage of this process to the study of the human mind. It is this need which has inspired two attempts which have held a very great place in the most recent history of mathematics. The first is Cantorism, and the services it has rendered to the science are well known. Cantor introduced into the science a new method of considering mathematical infinity One of the characteristic features of Cantorism is that, instead of rising to the general by erecting more and more complicated constructions, and defining by construction, it starts with the genus supremum and only defines, as the scholastics would have said, per genus proximum et differntiam specificam . Hence the horror he has sometimes inspired in certain minds, such as Hermite’s , whose favourite idea was to compare the mathematical with the natural sciences. For the greater number of us these prejudices had been dissipated, but it has come about that we have run against certain paradoxes and apparent contradictions, which would have rejoiced the heart of Zeno of Elea and the school of Megara. Then began the business of searching for a remedy, each man his own way. For my part I think, and I am not alone in so thinking, that the important thing is never to introduce any entities but such as can be completely defined in a finite number of words. Whatever be the remedy adopted, we can promise ourselves the joy of the doctor called in to follow a fine pathological case.
    The genetic code writes WITHOUT this finite understanding in the sense Weinberg denies to reality wrongly religously, insofar as the language and information metaphor is naturally analogous. It was no joy to have been the patient of this doctor. I was.
    I hvae begun to synthesize Maxwell's electrotonic *tube* and Gladyshev's *chromatographic coluummn* given that Maxwell provisioned the actual relation between heat and electricity homologically not analogically only related to Einstein's notion of particulate temperature functionality. "The laws of the conduction of heat in uniform media appear ... We have only to substitute...and a problem in attractions is transformed into that of a problem in heat."
    I have not yet been able to retrodict given proximate biology but I have the formal outline if such is. This is biophysics. Whether Cantorism is sufficiently necessary will depend on if I am correct about Croizat's perception of minimization or not. The use of infnity will exist should the physics require but Maxwell.
    "As we cannot perform the required integrations when a, b, c, are discontinuous functions of x,y,z, the following method,which is pefectly general though more complicated , may idicate more clearly the truth of the proposition.
    Let ABC be determined...aer never infinite and vanish when x, y, of z us infinite...the only solution of the equation is."
    This message has been edited by Brad McFall, 01-22-2005 13:15 AM

    This message is a reply to:
     Message 115 by Saviourmachine, posted 03-01-2004 11:55 AM Saviourmachine has not replied

      
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