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Interesting Stuff Thread

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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    Really? I thought it was widely accepted that Artificial selection and the prediction of phenotypes can work under quantitative genetics. Examples being the Belgian Blue cows, race horses or breeds of dog. If eugenics has been thrown out as having no basis in science I'd be interested in reading about it if you have any sources.

    Looking at our domestic animals, the results of intensive selection, we see all kinds of problems resulting from a rather cack-handed approach. Though we're getting better at selecting now, we still have to work with the stock that generations of selection has left us. Strong selection for favoured traits has let undesirable ones sneak in, as well as causing more general fitness problems. Many of our domesticates are prone to disease, have low fertility and show little genetic diversity. They survive in the controlled environments we create for them, but if we could release them back into the prehistoric environments from which we took them, I doubt they'd stand a chance.

    Would the same problems have arisen if humans had gone about their own breeding the same way? The results of closed breeding in European royal families offer a clue. Anyway, when human eugenics was instituted in the pre-Watson/Crick past, there wasn't much science behind it, and it was done with complete disregard for human rights. If it has a modern reincarnation, in the short term, it'll more likely be parents choosing between embryos and rejecting those destined to develop genetic disorders. In the longer term, you'd have to guess what future societies will see as acceptable or not.
    But do we not have enough information to run simulations? I mean given enough parameters can we not predict how humans will evolve under certain circumstances?

    Given that we think anatomically modern humans have been around for about 100,000 to 150,000 years, it's unlikely we're going to start shape-changing now, unless we do start subjecting ourselves to the same breeding regimes we now reserve for our pedigree beasts, or directly meddling with our dna. Leaving those options aside, evolution says we're in for the long haul, so we're looking at forecasting over hundreds of thousands or even millions of years.

    Now, going back to the chimp/human ancestor we estimate lived around 5 to 7 million years ago, could we have predicted that one branch of its descendents would go on to have all the attributes of modern chimps and another branch those of modern humans? For one thing, we'd have to have known the climatic variation to come, and the changes in ecology - tricky, given the role of chaos. And on top of that, we've the Rumsfeldian unknown unknowns. If we could, pace Gould, reset the evolutionary clock time and again, I wonder how many times would we end up with us?

    Looking forward, we've similar uncertainty, which is why I agree with AtomicHorror that any predictions we come up with are a bit of fun speculation, but no firmer than that.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,067 ✭✭✭L31mr0d


    darjeeling wrote: »
    If we could, pace Gould, reset the evolutionary clock time and again, I wonder how many times would we end up with us?

    this is mainly what I'm interested in though in regards to simulations. Like a simulation of how life on this planet would now look had the dinosaurs not been forced to extinction.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,353 ✭✭✭Goduznt Xzst


    darjeeling wrote: »
    Looking at our domestic animals, the results of intensive selection, we see all kinds of problems resulting from a rather cack-handed approach. Though we're getting better at selecting now, we still have to work with the stock that generations of selection has left us.

    Yeah I agree. I think the process of breeding traits is wrong, as, like you said, it can yield unknown problems. In regards to humans though I imagine all the artificial selections of which traits the human will have will be decided before birth. Like the recent baby that was born without the cancer gene. I suppose only time will tell how successful this will actually be.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    It seems After Hours wants to know what evolution has in store for us...
    http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055500860

    Should we tell them? :pac:


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,353 ✭✭✭Goduznt Xzst


    Just thought I'd add these links to the list, pretty good blog:

    http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/

    Good article from his blog: Does Evolution Imply Atheism?

    Want to support Atheism but don't want to join any specific groups? Support the Out campaign, by putting the scarlet A on your blog/facebook/bebo or buying some of the apparel.

    http://outcampaign.org/


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,353 ✭✭✭Goduznt Xzst


    Some more links:

    Pretty good atheist blog: http://www.truth-saves.com/

    Good way to arrange Atheist Meetups for your area: http://atheists.meetup.com/


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,359 ✭✭✭Overblood


    James Randi's youtube channel. Recently re-opened after a suspension.

    http://www.youtube.com/user/JamesRandiFoundation


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,359 ✭✭✭Overblood




  • Closed Accounts Posts: 247 ✭✭adamd164


    UCC Atheist Society site for any students on here:-

    http://uccatheists.com/


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  • Registered Users Posts: 351 ✭✭Tyler MacDurden


    Don't think this has been linked to before:

    http://rationalwiki.com/wiki/Main_Page

    As they say themselves,
    Our purpose here at RationalWiki includes:
    1. Analyzing and refuting the anti-science movement.
    2. Analyzing and refuting crank ideas.
    3. Explorations of authoritarianism and fundamentalism.

    Their FAQ for the Recently Deconverted might be of interest to our newly-godless brethren. :D


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,359 ✭✭✭Overblood




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    BBC Radio 4 In Our Time religion archive - here.

    Series of archived 45-min discussions on the history of religions, particularly Christianity.

    Over the years, the programme has looked at how people came to believe in gods, miracles, heavens, hells, angels and devils, and how doctrine has been developed and applied to society for good and ill.

    (The programme also looks at science, secular history, philosophy and more)


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,420 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    darjeeling wrote: »
    BBC Radio 4 In Our Time religion archive - here.
    Seconded -- In Our Time is excellent. MP3 podcast available from:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/iot/

    While I'm at it, I can also heartily recommend The News Quiz, arguably the funniest radio program in existence. Stuffed with atheists and other not-fully-humans too. MP3 podcast available from here:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/fricomedy


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,879 ✭✭✭Coriolanus


    The Skeptic's Annotated Bible
    http://skepticsannotatedbible.com

    Basically takes the King James Bible and sentence by sentence, book by book goes throughout the entire work attaching "tags" and comments to relevant sections.
    For example you can do a search of all violent references in the Book of Job, or all the references to "good" things in the book of Matthew. Particularly good is the cross-referencing of contradictions.
    The author also annotates individual words and sentences with a, perhaps not very unbiased, modern interpretation of sometimes archaic wordings.

    Includes the Koran and Book of Mormon too, similarly annotated and divided into subject/theme.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,454 ✭✭✭bogwalrus




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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 230 ✭✭silent sage


    http://wiki.ironchariots.org/index.php?title=Main_Page

    Iron Chariots is intended to provide information on apologetics and counter-apologetics. We'll be collecting common arguments and providing responses, information and resources to help counter the glut of misinformation and poor arguments which masquerade as "evidence" for religious claims.
    The complexity of issues surrounding religion ensures that any proper assessment requires us to delve into a number of philosophical, historical and sociological topics. Our ultimate goal is to provide a robust and definitive resource for:
    • atheists seeking responses to common apologetic arguments
    • theists who are questioning the efficacy of their beliefs
    • apologists who feel that their "pet" argument is above reproach
    • individuals of any philosophical ideal who have an interest in religious studies


    http://www.talkorigins.org/

    [URL="news:talk.origins"]Talk.origins[/URL] is a Usenet newsgroup devoted to the discussion and debate of biological and physical origins. Most discussions in the newsgroup center on the creation/evolution controversy, but other topics of discussion include the origin of life, geology, biology, catastrophism, cosmology and theology.
    The TalkOrigins Archive is a collection of articles and essays, most of which have appeared in talk.origins at one time or another. The primary reason for this archive's existence is to provide mainstream scientific responses to the many frequently asked questions (FAQs) that appear in the talk.origins newsgroup and the frequently rebutted assertions of those advocating intelligent design or other creationist pseudosciences.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    I know we're not meant to talk about goings on the other side of the fence ...but... I can't believe they've actually done it! They've locked the creationism thread! :eek:

    Is this the end of creationism on boards? Where will JC go now? Where will PDN sweep all the nasty science cluttering up his forum?

    Fanny Cradock: "Après moi, pas de déluge"

    Edit: Wed 24 - unlocked again!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,180 ✭✭✭Mena


    I think it's for the best really, however I do fear JC and Co. will meander their way over this side. Circle the wagons!


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,379 ✭✭✭toiletduck


    Locked, why?

    T'was one of the most entertaining and enlightening threads I think I've ever seen on boards.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,558 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    Thanks for the heads-up, although if people are only noticing now it's hardly a tragedy.

    Now, let's not venture down that road of double-guessing the Christianity mods decisions. That belongs in PM to them or feedback. We don't want this thread locked, now do we. :)


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    Dades wrote: »
    Now, let's not venture down that road of double-guessing the Christianity mods decisions. That belongs in PM to them or feedback. We don't want this thread locked, now do we. :)

    Absolutely. Just wanted to mark a bit of boards history: BC&P, 2005-2009, RIP.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,353 ✭✭✭Goduznt Xzst


    toiletduck wrote: »
    Locked, why?

    T'was one of the most entertaining and enlightening threads I think I've ever seen on boards.

    Agreed. It certainly made evolution a lot clearer in my eyes when I found it first. I'd lurked these forums for a while when I was still questioning a lot of the beliefs I was raised with and that thread was an invaluable help in providing a lot of answers.

    Still I guess the thread has begun to break the charter, specifically the recent additions by PDN, so I can understand that there is no reason to give it special preference.


  • Administrators, Computer Games Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 32,394 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭Mickeroo


    I always wondered why a thread with that many replies wasn't Sticky! :(


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    A study has now challenged the idea that chimps are our closest living relatives. Instead they reckon it may be the orangutan:
    http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/06/090623-humans-chimps-related.html


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,558 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    http://www.countmeout.ie/

    New site with info for those who wish to officially leave the Catholic Church.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,359 ✭✭✭Overblood


    The entire cosmos series can now be watched online here:

    http://www.cosmolearning.com/astronomy/documentaries/cosmos/


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    Good old Kevin Myers was having a good ramble today, about how the concept of natural selection being capable of bringing about the diversity of life on Earth is as far fetched as the Virgin Mary appearing in a tree stump.

    *sigh*

    Thank goodness they give Ian O' Doherty equal space to balance out this kind of tripe.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,611 ✭✭✭✭Sam Vimes


    Galvasean wrote: »
    Good old Kevin Myers was having a good ramble today, about how the concept of natural selection being capable of bringing about the diversity of life on Earth is as far fetched as the Virgin Mary appearing in a tree stump.

    *sigh*

    /facepalm. I don't agree with a lot of what that guy says but I've never seen him say something as ridiculous as that


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    Sam Vimes wrote: »
    /facepalm. I don't agree with a lot of what that guy says but I've never seen him say something as ridiculous as that

    He went out of his way to say he wasn't a creationist at the start of the article. He seemed to be leaning towards 'evolution must have been guided by God', but never flat out said it. Basically, he doesn't think 4bilion odd years was long enough for it to all happen by random chance.

    Here's the article in full:
    http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/kevin-myers/how-does-reducing-ones-ability-to-find-a-mate-confer-any-kind-of-genetic-advantage-1820300.html
    The image of the Virgin Mary is reported to have been seen on a tree stump in the village of Rathkeale, and thousands of people have flocked there. And yes, this is quite absurd. But is it more preposterous to believe that that piece of timber, and the willow tree from which it came, and the eye that beheld the wood, arrived in this world entirely by accident? For in this, the 150th anniversary of the publication of 'The Origin of Species', that is what we've been endlessly told this year.

    Before Darwinian dogmatists sneer the words "intelligent design" and "creationism", let me declare that I embrace neither concept. But nor do I reject them. I've been reading up on this subject recently, especially Ernst Mayr, Dawkins and Darwin, and what strikes me most is the sheer act of Darwinian faith which is required for us to accept that natural selection was the prime engine that conjured the vast complexity of modern life from its birthplace in the methanogenic oceans of the pre-Cambrian.

    It's far too easy to look back and postulate a route to where we are today, deducing it from whatever evidence archaeologists and palaeontologists have found. Instead, we should be taking the teleological approach, and viewing the problem the other way round. How can life naturally progress forward from those evil seas to our modern world, but without having the least idea where it is going?

    Now life as we know it depends on proteins. But even a relatively simple molecule such as insulin, consists of 51 conjoined amino-acids, with a molecular weight of 5808: nearly 6,000 times the weight of a hydrogen atom. And an average living cell contains 100 million protein molecules, involving perhaps 20,000 varieties of protein. Moreover, there are several hundred thousand types of protein, all of them impossibly complex. How were these made by accident? To say that such order is implicit in all of nature -- as some scientists do -- is begging the question, the equivalent of saying matter is intrinsic to materials.

    Time, you might add; time will enable these molecules to be assembled, bit by bit. Indeed, given enough time, you will be able to explain everything that has occurred from the first genetic trick at the dawn of existence. But has there been enough time? Would a mathematician looking at the random ingredients of those ancient, poisonous seas be able to propose that, actuarially, enough molecular encounters would sooner or later result in the first spark of life (whatever that might be) leading to us, just four billion (or so) years later? That's not an awful lot of time, considering all the random accidents that could not merely have started proto-life, but also wiped it out.

    This logically means that there must have been many competing proto-life forms. Just one -- apparently the one that depends upon DNA -- survived. But how did the dear old double helix come into existence? For DNA doesn't function at all unless complete. It's either the final, impossibly complex but useful article, or it's incomplete and utterly useless. So, no simple evolution here.

    But that's the way with so much of "natural selection". It often doesn't tolerate halfway houses. The swallow that doesn't make it from Africa to Europe simply doesn't survive to reproduce its genes. That's it: line extinct. Or put it another way. I drop you and your family in an unpopulated Africa, without telling you where you are, or giving you a map or a compass, and I then tell you to find your way back to your sitting room. You couldn't do it. You'd die on the way. Your children, neither knowing your fate, nor what NOT to do, (because evolution is about numbers, not about learning) would follow, to a similar fate. And their children, also.

    Granted -- with enough species types, and enough genetic mutation, sooner or later, someone will get back to the right room in Ireland, and then return to the right desert in Africa.

    But is there enough of the vital dimension, TIME, to enable the right gene to emerge and triumph, out of all these ghastly accidents?

    Or -- even more absurd -- did the complete navigation gene simply arrive out of nowhere?

    Even the title of Darwin's book hasn't been answered adequately. How do separate species emerge, in the process of "speciation"? How do outwardly identical, but reproductively-discrete species emerge alongside one another in the same ecological niche, as many kinds of fish have done? This is counter-intuitive. For how does reducing one's ability to find a mate confer any kind of genetic advantage? Conversely, not one single species of domesticated animal is unable to mate with its remote relatives.

    Human-triggered speciation has never occurred, despite separations of thousands of years. The dingo of the Australian desert is five millennia removed the Arctic wolf; yet they can still interbreed. Similarly, Northern Dancer could have bred with a Connemara.

    So, is speciation naturally pre-ordained? If so, is it unreasonable to ask how, by whom and why?

    And are such questions more or less absurd than ones about the stump in Rathkeale?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 576 ✭✭✭pts


    Galvasean wrote: »
    Good old Kevin Myers was having a good ramble today, about how the concept of natural selection being capable of bringing about the diversity of life on Earth is as far fetched as the Virgin Mary appearing in a tree stump.

    *sigh*

    Thank goodness they give Ian O' Doherty equal space to balance out this kind of tripe.

    That annoyed me on so many levels (link for anyone looking for it)

    He uses all the common arguments:
    • The "Odds" of us being here
      evolution isn't random!
    • Irreducible complexity
      this argument was shown to be wrong in the Dover trial
    • How does natural selection explain Abiogenesis
      it doesn't they are two separate things!!

    Then some crappy analogy about dropping families off in Africa, which again seems to argue that evolution is completely random.

    He says he has read about evolution (even read some Dawkins!) yet he fails to grasp even the simplest concepts.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    pts wrote: »
    He says he has read about evolution (even read some Dawkins!) yet he fails to grasp even the simplest concepts.

    Story of his career.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,781 ✭✭✭Mark Hamill


    pts wrote: »
    That annoyed be on so many levels (link for anyone looking for it)

    He uses all the common arguments:
    • The "Odds" of use being here
      evolution isn't random!
    • Irreducible complexity
      this argument was shown to be wrong in the Dover trial
    • How does natural selection explain Abiogenesis
      it doesn't they are two separate things!!

    Then some crappy analogy about dropping families off in Africa, which again seems to argue that evolution is completely random.

    He says he has read about evolution (even read some Dawkins!) yet he fails to grasp even the simplest concepts.

    I stopped reading at this point:
    It's far too easy to look back and postulate a route to where we are today, deducing it from whatever evidence archaeologists and palaeontologists have found. Instead, we should be taking the teleological approach, and viewing the problem the other way round. How can life naturally progress forward from those evil seas to our modern world, but without having the least idea where it is going?

    Essentially this says: its too easy for people to prove evolution by using archaeological and palaeontological evidence, instead they need to prove it using the nonsense presuposition that evolution had to end up with life as it is now. Ridiculous :rolleyes:.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,611 ✭✭✭✭Sam Vimes


    Galvasean wrote: »
    He went out of his way to say he wasn't a creationist at the start of the article. He seemed to be leaning towards 'evolution must have been guided by God', but never flat out said it. Basically, he doesn't think 4bilion odd years was long enough for it to all happen by random chance.

    He knows evolution isn't random chance right?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    Sam Vimes wrote: »
    He knows evolution isn't random chance right?

    According to what he said in the article, no he does not.
    Maybe we should tell him?


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,558 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    instead they need to prove it using the nonsense presuposition that evolution had to end up with life as it is now. Ridiculous :rolleyes:.
    That seems to be his understanding, alright. As if humans are some sort of perfect, end-result to the process, as opposed to relatively more intelligent meatsacks.

    Throw him in a tank with a shark and see how far we've yet to go.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    Dades wrote: »
    That seems to be his understanding, alright. As if humans are some sort of perfect, end-result to the process, as opposed to relatively more intelligent meatsacks.

    Yeah, it's as if he doesn't realise that life is still evolving.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 27,857 ✭✭✭✭Dave!


    Oh wow, I couldn't want to punch Kevin Myers any more right now.....


  • Registered Users Posts: 351 ✭✭Tyler MacDurden


    Kev's at it again, remember his eulogy of Harun Yaha's Atlas Of Creation about 18 months back? I hope someone emailed him the infamous fishing lure photo. :rolleyes:

    I must confess an admiration for Myers' work, even though I disagree fundamentally with him on some issues (mainly Europe and Evolution). On occasion however, his writing seems to be fuelled by emotion rather than research, today being a case in point. He can't have read too deeply on the subject, despite his claims to the contrary. There are some pretty poor lines of reasoning in there.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    It's far too easy to look back and postulate a route to where we are today, deducing it from whatever evidence archaeologists and palaeontologists have found. Instead, we should be taking the teleological approach, and viewing the problem the other way round. How can life naturally progress forward from those evil seas to our modern world, but without having the least idea where it is going?

    'Take the teleological approach'? No, no no! Why ever should we do that? What good reason could there possibly be?

    'Progress', 'forward', 'modern'? Kevin has got the whole thing arseways.

    Would a newspaper editor commission an uniformed commentator to parade his ignorance of quantum mechanics? I doubt it. Why, then, let Myers loose on evolution?

    .


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,845 ✭✭✭2Scoops


    darjeeling wrote: »
    Why, then, let Myers loose on evolution?

    He's writes essentially the same article on evolution once a year or more, whips up the atheist rationalist rabble into a frenzy, and generates some column inches on the letters page. It's his way of appearing controversial and relevant.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    2Scoops wrote: »
    He's writes essentially the same article on evolution once a year or more, whips up the atheist rationalist rabble into a frenzy, and generates some column inches on the letters page. It's his way of appearing controversial and relevant.

    Sounds about right. In fact, an awful lot of columnists seem to have missed their calling as internet trolls.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,845 ✭✭✭2Scoops


    LOL. The aforementioned Ian O'Doherty being one of them (sorry Galvasean!). :pac:


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 232 ✭✭DTrotter


    So he's saying believing in evolution is up there with the funny cut tree?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    2Scoops wrote: »
    LOL. The aforementioned Ian O'Doherty being one of them (sorry Galvasean!). :pac:

    Speaking of whom, there was a letter complaining about him for his joke about the Polish killing all their Jews, claiming to be 'deeply offended' and pointing out the historical and ststistical errors of his punchline.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    He says he is not a Creationist but obviously the creationust FUD is working on him

    "Now life as we know it depends on proteins. But even a relatively simple molecule such as insulin, consists of 51 conjoined amino-acids, with a molecular weight of 5808: nearly 6,000 times the weight of a hydrogen atom. And an average living cell contains 100 million protein molecules, involving perhaps 20,000 varieties of protein. Moreover, there are several hundred thousand types of protein, all of them impossibly complex. How were these made by accident? To say that such order is implicit in all of nature -- as some scientists do -- is begging the question, the equivalent of saying matter is intrinsic to materials."

    This is the same tired Creationist argument that modern proteins could not have randomly formed. Guess what, no one claimed they did. The current thinking, supported by evidence and experiment, is that they evolved from more primitive molecules.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,611 ✭✭✭✭Sam Vimes


    Wicknight wrote: »
    This is the same tired Creationist argument that modern proteins could not have randomly formed. Guess what, no one claimed they did. The current thinking, supported by evidence and experiment, is that they evolved from more primitive molecules.

    It took me a while to even grasp that this was what creationists were saying because it shows complete ignorance of what evolution is. I thought they had at least some idea of what they were rejecting.

    They're picking a point that happened millions of years along the evolutionary path, the formation of proteins, declaring that to be the first stage and saying it's impossible for it to be the first stage. Well no sh!t, no one said it was. If they're going to declare proteins as being the first stage they might as well declare the first stage as being fully formed humans. Oh wait that is what they say :D


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,031 ✭✭✭✭bnt


    Even the title of Darwin's book hasn't been answered adequately. How do separate species emerge, in the process of "speciation"? How do outwardly identical, but reproductively-discrete species emerge alongside one another in the same ecological niche, as many kinds of fish have done?

    Talk about getting it bass-ackwards. We (humans) defined the concept of "species", as the ability to interbreed, and use it because it's useful. It is not some universally-defined hard-and-fast line drawn by nature.
    Human-triggered speciation has never occurred, despite separations of thousands of years.

    Really? For example, you could argue that dogs have already been separated in to unique species by selective breeding (a.k.a. unnatural selection). A Chihuahua has great difficulty mating with a St. Bernard. Yes, we can produce a hybrid by IVF (human intervention, i.e. more unnatural selection!), but left to their own devices, they would be very unlikely to mate successfully. So, do a Chihuahua and a St. Bernard both still belong to the species Canis lupus familiaris? What about after a hundred or a thousand years of not interbreeding? When do we draw the line, and does it matter?

    My point is: the technical ability to interbreed - which is how we define a species - may still exist in theory when other factors make it impossible. This is one thing Darwin was getting at when he used the Galapagos islands as an example: species getting split in to discrete groups, with miles of ocean between them, so that they are no longer able to meet and mate. After many generations of evolutionary pressures, the species evolve in different directions, the ability to interbreed is lost through disuse (genetic drift), and we (humans) are now talking about many species rather than one.

    It's not a question of years, it's a question of generations. Humans are a very long-lived species, compared to most mammals, never mind birds or insects, so human evolution is obviously going to be slow. Bacteria and insects live even shorter lives and, sure enough, you can force them to speciate under lab conditions. Fruit flies do start to speciate if you feed them different foods over many generations - so there's your human-triggered speciation, right there, in an experiment to simulate geographic separation.

    Death has this much to be said for it:
    You don’t have to get out of bed for it.
    Wherever you happen to be
    They bring it to you—free.

    — Kingsley Amis



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    There was a letter in today's Indo where someone pointed out some of the many flaws in the Myers article. The author was from Mayo (IIRC). Anyone here?

    edit: someone else wrote in about Ian O' Doherty's racism.


  • Registered Users Posts: 351 ✭✭Tyler MacDurden


    Galvasean wrote: »
    There was a letter in today's Indo where someone pointed out some of the many flaws in the Myers article. The author was from Mayo Monaghan (IIRC). Anyone here?

    Worth a read, here ya go. Wondered if it was a boardsie too. :D

    Thursday July 16 2009

    HOWEVER thought-provoking Kevin Myers' column has been in the past, his blundering appraisal of evolution and natural selection (Irish Independent, July 14) only served to make him sound foolish and uninformed.

    He compares people's faith in a Limerick tree stump to Darwinists' "faith" in natural selection. He calls 150 years of scientific theory "preposterous" because he believes evolution relies on pure accident.

    How did "the complete navigation gene arrive out of nowhere?" he asks.

    The alternative, cumulative change, he dismisses because even a simple molecule such as insulin is "impossibly complex". He uses the words "accident" and "complex" quite a lot in his article.

    Essentially, therefore, Mr Myers is scornful of natural selection as the vehicle of evolution because it's difficult to grasp and he doesn't understand it.

    He says he has been "reading up on the subject" recently.

    He even mentions Richard Dawkins. I can only wonder which of Dawkins' books it was he read.

    I'd recommend 'The Blind Watchmaker' (Penguin Books, first published in 1986), which, if he read it carefully, would address all of the concerns he raises in his article.

    But don't just take my word for it. It was Douglas Adams' favourite book. "It's like throwing open the doors and windows in a dark and stuffy room" he said, when asked why.

    "You realise what a jumble of half-digested ideas we normally live with, particularly those of us with an arts education. We 'sort of' understand evolution . . . . Dawkins shows us that there is a dazzling clarity that is breathtaking when we suddenly see it."

    Mr Myers says he doesn't embrace either intelligent design or creationism, but nor does he reject them.

    This is uncharacteristically limp-wristed agnosticism from someone usually so forthright in his opinion.

    And yet Mr Myers sees fit to propagate popular misunderstanding of a theory that has withstood intensive scientific investigation for a century and a half on the strength of a bit of "reading up" he's done recently.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,558 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    Good letter. Bravo, Mr Mayne. :)


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