News Roundup: Surprise, We're Still Learning New Things

Aha! This clearly proves that there is a divine Watchmaker with an inordinate fondness for issusseses. Just as the Scientific Theory of Intelligent Design predicted we'd find them! [/snarkasm]

I apologize for my ignorance, after reading the first brief article cited, I remain confused. Evolutionary rates were 5x as fast. Ok. Why were they faster? And specifically 5x faster than what? 5x faster than recent arthropod evolution? 5x faster than all recent rates for all life? How do you measure that?

My own ignorance-based assumption would be rates were much faster then because there were probably huge gaps in the environment which were available for exploitation whereas today (and for a long long time) the whole biosphere is saturated with life.

But yes, science is very cool because the amount of stuff to discover and learn is endless.

daoudmbo said: My own ignorance-based assumption would be rates were much faster then because there were probably huge gaps in the environment which were available for exploitation whereas today (and for a long long time) the whole biosphere is saturated with life.

Maybe there was less specialization back then, so changes were less likely to break something.

As daoudmbo mentioned, maybe there were way more empty niches than there are today or have been recently.

Or maybe it's what eric said; a new trait arose, with different lineages developing it in different ways, which lead to a major arms race. (Or leg race for species that didn't have arms.)

Or maybe generation spans were shorter, so more generations per year.

Or maybe there was more oxygen in the air, so things were more energetic back then.

Or some combination thereof. Actually, I'd guess it to be a combination of a huge number of different factors.

Well see those gears? They look just like designed gears. Except for all of the differences, they're completely the same.

Like life in general. It looks exactly like things that are designed, excepting all of the differences, most notably the dependencies upon inheritance that would be expected from unguided evolutionary processes. Ignore those, plus the fact that intellectual commonalities don't underlie adaptations, such as those for flight, after genetic exchanges cease to occur (or become extremely rare, at least), and it looks like design.

So see, excepting the evidence for evolution, there's no evidence for evolution.

Glen Davidson

daoudmbo said: I apologize for my ignorance, after reading the first brief article cited, I remain confused. Evolutionary rates were 5x as fast. Ok. Why were they faster? And specifically 5x faster than what? 5x faster than recent arthropod evolution? 5x faster than all recent rates for all life? How do you measure that?

Gears? I want gears! Why does god give all the cool stuff to insects?

John Harshman said:

daoudmbo said: I apologize for my ignorance, after reading the first brief article cited, I remain confused. Evolutionary rates were 5x as fast. Ok. Why were they faster? And specifically 5x faster than what? 5x faster than recent arthropod evolution? 5x faster than all recent rates for all life? How do you measure that?

They were 5x faster than recent arthropod evolution. What they did was get a phylogenetic tree for extant arthropods using both molecular and morphological data. Then they calibrated it to absolute time using fossils (and a very fancy calibration program). Finally, they looked at the rate of change per unit time along every branch, dividing the branches into two groups: those with a midpoint more than 500 million years ago (which they consider to be the Cambrian explosion, liberally speaking) and those with a midpoint less than 500 million years ago. The average, estimated rate of evolution along the first group of branches is 5x the rate on the second group. I do think there's a potential problem with that approach, in that if you look at the tree, the old branches are almost all much shorter in absolute time than the young branches, just because of the way they sampled species. This means that the younger rates are averaged over a much longer time than the older rates are, so that if there were a high rate of evolution for a little while during some Jurassic radiation or other, it probably wouldn't show up in their plots. So we can say that the evolutionary rate during the explosion was much higher than the average through time, but we can't say from this study that this was a unique event. As to why rates were so fast, there are various hypotheses. You need to explain why a speedup happened in both morphological and molecular evolution. Ecological explanations can deal only with the former. The authors suggest that Cambrian arthropods were smaller and shorter-lived than later arthropods (since there is evidence that molecular evolutionary rate varies with generation time), which seems unlikely to me. I don't have an explanation.

[nonscientist] Would a higher flux of radiation be a possibility? Would the natural background radiation from soil and minerals have been significantly higher that long ago, a half billion years closer to the formation of radioactive elements?

The item claiming a rapid Cambrian explosion seems to be getting the most attention here. I am having doubts about the paper itself, but I admit that most of its evidence is beyond my pay scale. The authors say in the first sentence of their abstract: "The near-simultaneous appearance of most modern animal body plans (phyla) ∼530 million years ago during the Cambrian explosion is strong evidence for a brief interval of rapid phenotypic and genetic innovation...". They are asserting the old idea that the CE was very rapid (without this claim, they cannot make their main arguments), but I thought the consensus these days is that the CE was not rapid. Were there not recent posts at the Pandas' Thumb that clearly argued the other way, based on piles and piles of evidence? At this time I am not buying the claim of this paper, but I would like to know what others think.

harold said: I detect an absence of the term "mutation rate". It seems as if they might be saying that mutation rates were comparable to those in the present, but accumulation of genomic change within lineages, over time, was faster during the period that they designate as the Cambrian explosion. Wouldn't that fit with a model of less restrictive selection?

Mark Sturtevant said: They are asserting the old idea that the CE was very rapid (without this claim, they cannot make their main arguments), but I thought the consensus these days is that the CE was not rapid. Were there not recent posts at the Pandas' Thumb that clearly argued the other way, based on piles and piles of evidence? At this time I am not buying the claim of this paper, but I would like to know what others think.

Boring??
We are the toast of contention in the science world today. We are in a story and a revolution!!
The times are very exciting for modern creationism.
We are flying high surely.
This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record.
Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim.
Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis.
Boring??

Robert,

Name one new scientific discovery made by a creationist that supports creationism.

That's what I thought. Nada, zip, zero, zilch. Boring!

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today. We are in a story and a revolution!! The times are very exciting for modern creationism. We are flying high surely. This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record. Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim. Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis. Boring??

There's now a video on the gearlike legs that is jaw-dropping amazing.

Click here right now!

Dave

Gears? Gears? Where's the automatic transmission?!?!?!?!?!?!!!!!!!!! :p

daoudmbo said: I apologize for my ignorance, after reading the first brief article cited, I remain confused. Evolutionary rates were 5x as fast. Ok. Why were they faster?

We are flying high surely.

Although I am still agnostic about whether the CE was extraordinarily rapid, there are ideas for why this period was able to produce so many new animal forms. The molecular clock data says that most of the phyla were present before the CE. The relative lack of fossils from these phyla could be b/c they were small and soft bodied (as the larval forms of these groups tend to be today). The earth was thawing out after a long cold period, and oxygen levels were increasing. This could mean greater availability of new ecological niches, and different animal lineages could adaptively radiate into those niches. Hard parts are easier to develop in warmer seas with high oxygen, and predation pressures would mean selection for hard parts. Finally, gene duplication would expand the genetic toolkit for evolution into the new forms.

Robert Byers said: Boring? We are the toast of contention in the science world today...

Mark Sturtevant said:

Robert Byers said: Boring? We are the toast of contention in the science world today...

Boring in that C/ID does not come up with new ideas. Boring in that C/ID is soundly defeated, but its pushers will not admit it. The attention paid is more due to annoyance. Attention does not mean respect.

Boring in that C/ID does not come up with new ideas.

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today.

"The lack of interest for pseudoscience in some philosophical quarters derives from the tacit assumption that some ideas and theories are so obviously wrong that they are not even worth arguing about. Pseudoscience is still too often considered a harmless pastime indulged in by a relatively small number of people with an unusual penchant for mystery worship. This is far from the truth. In the form of creationism and its challenges to the study of evolution, pseudoscience has done great damage to public education in the United States and elsewhere; …"

Taken from Massimo Pigliucci's blog, "Rationally Speaking" for August 29, 2013:

Philosophy of Pseudoscience: reconsidering the demarcation problem

which in turn is taken from the introduction to the recently published book

Massimo Pigliucci and Maaten Boudry, eds.
Philosophy of Pseudoscience; Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013
ISBN 978-0226051963

The Zimmer article on chimeras and mosaics is fascinating, and y'all should mosey over to read it. Zimmer has a great knack for finding illuminating stuff in science, and directing it to the public. The material on chimeras was especially new to me, such as the finding that women often have cells in their brain that appear to be from the children they bore!

Might it just be that at this early point in the evolution of life forms, it was basically a blank slate? As others have noted, likely the competition was not fierce, the environmental niches were wide open, the field of play was subject to genetic change at any time, and the complexity of life forms was only at an initial stage.

Mark Sturtevant said: The Zimmer article on chimeras and mosaics is fascinating, and y'all should mosey over to read it. Zimmer has a great knack for finding illuminating stuff in science, and directing it to the public. The material on chimeras was especially new to me, such as the finding that women often have cells in their brain that appear to be from the children they bore!

John Harshman said:

harold said: I detect an absence of the term "mutation rate". It seems as if they might be saying that mutation rates were comparable to those in the present, but accumulation of genomic change within lineages, over time, was faster during the period that they designate as the Cambrian explosion. Wouldn't that fit with a model of less restrictive selection?

It would fit, assuming that this less restrictive selection applied across the genome, which I find odd. That isn't what the authors are saying, though. Talking about small/shortlived organisms is all about neutral evolution, i.e. mutation rate. But certainly altered selection is one way to get faster evolution. Their molecular data, by the way, were second and conserved first codon positions of protein-coding exons.

The paper in Science tried to head off the same kind of dangerous ID-friendly thoughts, stating: "The gears in Issus, like the screw in the femora of beetles, demonstrate that mechanisms previously thought only to be used in manmade machines have evolved in nature." Wait a minute. How do we know these gears evolved, as opposed to having been designed? Because we know that everything in biology evolved. And how do we know that everything evolved? Because we know that nothing was designed. Right. But how do we know that nothing was designed? Because we know everything evolved. Ah, got it now. Everyone clear?

Ask Luskin why God, if he likes to design cool stuff, can't make humans some gears for jumping away. Just think of how easy crossing the street would be! All we get is imperfect knees.

Wait a minute. How do we know these gears evolved, as opposed to having been designed? Because we know that everything in biology evolved, that is what all of the evidence shows. And how do we know that everything evolved? Because we know that nothing was designed, that is what all of the evidence shows. Right. But how do we know that nothing was designed? Because we know everything evolved, just as all the evidence shows.

Ah, got it now. Everyone clear? We know this the same way we know everything, from the evidence.

DavidK said: Might it just be that at this early point in the evolution of life forms, it was basically a blank slate? As others have noted, likely the competition was not fierce, the environmental niches were wide open, the field of play was subject to genetic change at any time, and the complexity of life forms was only at an initial stage.

DavidK said: ...probably weaker DNA repair mechanisms.

DS said: Wait a minute. How do we know these gears evolved, as opposed to having been designed? Because we know that everything in biology evolved, that is what all of the evidence shows. And how do we know that everything evolved? Because we know that nothing was designed, that is what all of the evidence shows. Right. But how do we know that nothing was designed? Because we know everything evolved, just as all the evidence shows. Ah, got it now. Everyone clear? We know this the same way we know everything, from the evidence.

However, the upper limit of the mutation rate has to be within certain bounds, or the concept of reproduction loses its meaning.

https://me.yahoo.com/a/JxVN0eQFqtmgoY7wC1cZM44ET_iAanxHQmLgYgX_Zhn8#57cad said: We don't have evidence of design--notably, rational foreplanning, leaps of cognition, or commonality of thought between unrelated organisms (of the ones with little or no lateral gene transfer).

Tried to leave this comment yeaterday, but had computer problems:

No fair! Creationism is not boring. And Creationists do learn new things too. First they learned that the Earth was not flat, and conceded that, just like good scientists. Then they learned that the Earth was not the center of the universe and conceded that too. Then they learned life is much older than 1000s of years and conceded that too. At least a small majority did. Then, amid all their hopeless confusion as to how many “kinds” there where, how to group present and past organisms into them, and when each one originated (all at once? periodically over millions or more years?, etc.) along came a few brave souls admitting that there may indeed be just one “kind” that shares a “designed” ~4 billion year old common ancestor. Just not via "RM + NS."

Of course during all of that they learned something that we “Darwinists” have yet to learn – how to play “don’t ask, don’t tell what happened when, and just do whatever is possible to keep the ‘debate’ on long-refuted ‘weaknesses’ of ‘Darwinism’.” And when that fails just play the “Hitler” card and whine about how acceptance of “Darwinism” leads to every imaginable evil behavior.

In case anyone is really thinking it would be cool to have gears too, it should be pointed out that it probably would not be cool. Our imperfect design of hinge and ball and socket joints allows us to move our limbs in multiple planes, which is something that the particular insect legs described above cannot do. Also, gears have a lot of surface area of contact which would produce more friction. An insect is short lived and very small, and this is probably the only circumstance in which a gear system can have an advantage.

There was, incidentally, a CSI episode where the big twist was that the suspect was a chimera.

http://www.csifiles.com/reviews/miami/bloodlines.shtml

John Harshman said:

DavidK said: Might it just be that at this early point in the evolution of life forms, it was basically a blank slate? As others have noted, likely the competition was not fierce, the environmental niches were wide open, the field of play was subject to genetic change at any time, and the complexity of life forms was only at an initial stage.

This is known as the "empty barrel" theory. It doesn't really deal with the rate of molecular evolution, just morphological evolution.

DavidK said: ...probably weaker DNA repair mechanisms.

No, that would have been long before the Cambrian explosion, since pretty much all eukaryotes share those mechanisms. You are postulating some kind of massive convergent evolution of DNA repair.

harold said: So geographically or temporally local variations in DNA repair rates of populations are not completely out of the range of rational conjecture.

John Harshman said:

harold said: So geographically or temporally local variations in DNA repair rates of populations are not completely out of the range of rational conjecture.

Of course repair rates vary. But the notion that all the repair rates just happened to vary in the negative direction in lots of lineages at the same time, and then all switched back in the positive direction later, is farfetched.

Evolution of high mutation rates in experimental populations of E. coli. Paul D. Sniegowski, Philip J. Gerrish and Richard E. Lenski. Nature 387, 703-705 (12 June 1997). http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v387/n6634/abs/387703a0.html. Abstract: Most mutations are likely to be deleterious, and so the spontaneous mutation rate is generally held at a very low value1. Nonetheless, evolutionary theory predicts that high mutation rates can evolve under certain circumstances2, 3, 4. Empirical observations have previously been limited to short-term studies of the fates of mutator strains deliberately introduced into laboratory populations of Escherichia coli5, 6, 7, and to the effects of intense selective events on mutator frequencies in E. coli8. Here we report the rise of spontaneously originated mutators in populations of E. coli undergoing long-term adaptation to a new environment. Our results corroborate computer simulations of mutator evolution in adapting clonal populations4, and may help to explain observations that associate high mutation rates with emerging pathogens9 and with certain cancers10.

...So the authors set out to measure bacterial fitness in the presence of widely-varying rates of mutation. Their experiment employed two innovations that filled these gaps in previous work: 1. The panel of variants included not two, or ten, but 66 versions of the DNA copying enzyme (DNA polymerase I). These variants all grow normally when they live alone, but they exhibit mutation rates that span six orders of magnitude, from one thousandth of the normal rate to a thousand times the normal rate. (Because the DNA polymerase is the main copying machine, its fidelity is a major determinant of the error rate and therefore the mutation rate.) This means that unlike all or most previous work in this area, their library included antimutators - variants with a lower-than-normal mutation rate. 2. The authors staged evolutionary competitions in which all 66 variants were put together and grown for 350 generations. Specifically, they regularly diluted the cultures so that the environment cycled between low density (leading to rapid growth) and high density (leading to nutrient depletion and stasis). The experiment is, then, relatively simple in concept. Create a pool of variants and then see which ones (if any) will take over when they're in competition with all the others… (from Figure 2 of the paper)…their basic result: in the various competitions, only eight of the 66 variants emerged as winners or co-winners. Those eight variants represent a relatively small subset of what we might call mutation-rate space. Here's how the authors describe the outcome: Loeb: “The recovered mutants were all moderate mutators, with mutation rates ranging from 3- to 47-fold greater than that of the wild type. Of these, 88% had at least a 10-fold elevated mutation rate. No antimutators were detected in the output population despite constituting 77% of the input population.” [Panda's Thumb on Evolving Mutation Rates, 2010]

diogeneslamp0 said: Evolving a high mutation rate is fairly simple, and I'm not sure that unusually high amounts of convergent evolution would be necessary. Just a mutation or two can easily change the mutation rate by an order of magnitude.

John Harshman said: True, but I don't see the relevance. The claim would be that all of a dozen or so lineages of bilaterians independently and simultaneously changed from a high to a low repair efficiency and then independently and simultaneously changed back, and never changed again. The problem isn't that the individual changes are difficult. It's the conjunction of all those changes. Now, if there were some unique environment during that brief period that uniformly exerted selection for fast evolution, certainly a change in repair rates might be one way to achieve it (though we could then argue about the importance of mutation rate to evolution), but it seems to me that the interesting causal factor would be that unique environment rather than the proximate mechanism of rate increase.

diogeneslamp0 said: I don't see why the rate has to change twice. It could start out fast and then slow down and be consistent with the paper.

Mark Sturtevant said: In case anyone is really thinking it would be cool to have gears too, it should be pointed out that it probably would not be cool.

Paul Burnett said:

Mark Sturtevant said: In case anyone is really thinking it would be cool to have gears too, it should be pointed out that it probably would not be cool.

Gears would work well on exoskeletons, but not so well on us endoskeletal beings.

Casey Lufkin is in full cry over at the American Spectator, where a junior editor has had the temerity to question Tom Bethell's fawning review of Darwin's Doubt.

He deserves a hand in fielding Lufkin's bafflegab !

http://spectator.org/blog/2013/09/18/intelligent-design-is-not-scie

This just in: Carl Zimmer has a new article out in The Loom about Cambrian explosion. A study from the Oxford museum proposes a combination of factors for the CE. One that I did not know about was increased levels of calcium in the oceans due to a rise in sea level and coastal flooding. The expanded areas of warm, shallow seas could provide new niches for adaptive radiation. The elevated calcium could have been a problem and an opportunity. Calcium can be toxic, and so animals could have evolved ways of building skeletons as a way to sequester it. The obvious opportunity is that the skeletons of course provided new mean for protection and predation and mobility.

Mark Sturtevant said: This just in: Carl Zimmer has a new article out in The Loom about Cambrian explosion. A study from the Oxford museum proposes a combination of factors for the CE. One that I did not know about was increased levels of calcium in the oceans due to a rise in sea level and coastal flooding. The expanded areas of warm, shallow seas could provide new niches for adaptive radiation. The elevated calcium could have been a problem and an opportunity. Calcium can be toxic, and so animals could have evolved ways of building skeletons as a way to sequester it. The obvious opportunity is that the skeletons of course provided new mean for protection and predation and mobility.

Russell Seitz said: Casey Lufkin is in full cry over at the American Spectator, where a junior editor has had the temerity to question Tom Bethell's fawning review of Darwin's Doubt. Why the hell is Luthkin mewling over there, Peter Lorre-like, when he could confront us directly over here? He deserves a hand in fielding Lufkin's bafflegab ! http://spectator.org/blog/2013/09/18/intelligent-design-is-not-scie

Russell Seitz said: Casey Lufkin is in full cry over at the American Spectator, where a junior editor has had the temerity to question Tom Bethell's fawning review of Darwin's Doubt. He deserves a hand in fielding Lufkin's bafflegab ! http://spectator.org/blog/2013/09/18/intelligent-design-is-not-scie

New review of Darwin's Doubt by Charles Marshall, in Science. But you can read it here.

Surprise!: Marshall doesn't like it much.

Why the hell is Luthkin mewling over there, Peter Lorre-like, when he could confront us directly over here?

Critical thinking comes naturally to kids, the problem is to teach them reason, logic and constructive thinking.

Russell Seitz said: Casey Lufkin is in full cry over at the American Spectator, where a junior editor has had the temerity to question Tom Bethell's fawning review of Darwin's Doubt. He deserves a hand in fielding Lufkin's bafflegab ! http://spectator.org/blog/2013/09/18/intelligent-design-is-not-scie

Can you also, Lucullus, affirm that there is any power united with wisdom and prudence which has made, or, to use your own expression, manufactured man? What sort of a manufacture is that? Where is it exercised? when? why? how?

Of course repair rates vary. But the notion that all the repair rates just happened to vary in the negative direction in lots of lineages at the same time, and then all switched back in the positive direction later, is farfetched.

Mark Sturtevant said: The earth was thawing out after a long cold period, and oxygen levels were increasing. This could mean greater availability of new ecological niches, and different animal lineages could adaptively radiate into those niches. Hard parts are easier to develop in warmer seas with high oxygen,

eric said: ...some critter already has a mechanism for absorbing and using calcium from the surrounding water. But it has not developed any regulation, because the Ca concentration in the water is so low, none is needed (the environmental concentration does the regluating). Then, over the course of several tens or hundreds of thousands of years, the Ca concentration in the water goes up by a factor of 10, and voila! You get critters wih bony cysts and outgrowths.....

harold said:

Of course repair rates vary. But the notion that all the repair rates just happened to vary in the negative direction in lots of lineages at the same time, and then all switched back in the positive direction later, is farfetched.

Fortunately, no-one expressed that particular notion. To briefly reiterate what I noted - 1) Significantly higher underlying mutation rate seems unlikely. See above. 2) Lower selection pressure when new niches open seems plausible. 3) Local variation in DNA repair mechanisms, which can increase net but not absolute mutation rate in a lineage, can be selected for one way or another in current lineages. I brought this up for clarity; I'm not rigidly arguing that mutation rates are magically fixed, but that absolute mutation rates are constrained, for chemical and biological reasons. However, caveat, repair mechanisms can vary.

BTW, creationists seem to be unable to refer to the theory of evolution without lumping it with the question of how life got here - a subject outside the scope of evolutionary theory: How life from it’s humble beginnings diversified into today’s marvelous flora and fauna.

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today.

We are in a story and a revolution!!

The times are very exciting for modern creationism.

We are flying high surely.

This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record.

Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim. Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis.

Boring??

I think we have a semantic disagreement here. I would define “mutation rate” as “net mutation rate after repair is taken into account”. I think that this is the common definition for all except a few very specialized applications.

Anyway, I was objecting to using that as an explanation for increased rate of molecular evolution in the Cambrian explosion. If nobody was proposing that, I withdraw the objection, but I don’t in that case understand why anyone brought it up.

It would fit, assuming that this less restrictive selection applied across the genome, which I find odd. That isn’t what the authors are saying, though. Talking about small/shortlived organisms is all about neutral evolution, i.e. mutation rate. But certainly altered selection is one way to get faster evolution. Their molecular data, by the way, were second and conserved first codon positions of protein-coding exons.

Of course repair rates vary. But the notion that all the repair rates just happened to vary in the negative direction in lots of lineages at the same time, and then all switched back in the positive direction later, is farfetched.

I honestly could care little if "scientists" mock or engage in ad hominem attacks against creationism. I have yet to see evolution happen in person I do not want to hear about it takes millions and millions of years. Yes creationists get mocked by Academia but I have little respect for Academia as it is,to me talk of complicated biological gene's or toxins does not equate to proof or evidence. Also I think if someone has the evidence to back up their claim, ad hominem attacks should not be needed honestly. I do like the debate but I hate that it relegates to personal attacks and name calling,which helps no one in the end anyway.

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today. We are in a story and a revolution!! The times are very exciting for modern creationism. We are flying high surely. This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record. Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim. Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis. Boring??

Sorrowen said:

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today. We are in a story and a revolution!! The times are very exciting for modern creationism. We are flying high surely. This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record. Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim. Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis. Boring??

I think evolution could also be coined as Boring honestly but again in the world of Academia it is not thought of as Boring. Although honestly reading a scientific paper can be boring trying to read one about venom compounds is like watching Titanic for three days straight. But I do find being mocked and held in contempt by scientists to be rather amusing. Academia hates creationism it's not a big secret really, I remember being told once I was ignorant of evolution or something along those lines. Fact is I'm not I just think of evolution as a theory.

Sorrowen said:

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today. We are in a story and a revolution!! The times are very exciting for modern creationism. We are flying high surely. This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record. Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim. Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis. Boring??

I think evolution could also be coined as Boring honestly but again in the world of Academia it is not thought of as Boring. Although honestly reading a scientific paper can be boring trying to read one about venom compounds is like watching Titanic for three days straight. But I do find being mocked and held in contempt by scientists to be rather amusing. Academia hates creationism it's not a big secret really, I remember being told once I was ignorant of evolution or something along those lines. Fact is I'm not I just think of evolution as a theory.

Yeah that's kind of the point mocking someone is not exactly evidence. I know how Darwinism is used in the scientific community but is a theory, of course calling someone ignorant is a rather intellectually lazy cop out. Just like the millions of years cop out that kind of amuses me, if it where actually happening I would actually be able to see it happen. Not scientists tell me it's happening without ever giving real evidence, books and peer reviews really show nothing other then how the theory should work. Of course maybe that's why Academia likes to attack creationism and Christians, science is always open to new ideas or should be at least absolutism of evolution destroys debate. Also I wonder why indeed would I be skeptical of a absurd theory propagated by Academia.

Keelyn said:

Sorrowen said:

Robert Byers said: Boring?? We are the toast of contention in the science world today. We are in a story and a revolution!! The times are very exciting for modern creationism. We are flying high surely. This latest best seller has focused a good point about the sudden complexity arrival relative to the fossil record. Its not a YEC point as we disagree with the presumptions behind the fossil record claim. Its further not a biological scientific point anyways upon closer analysis. Boring??

I think evolution could also be coined as Boring honestly but again in the world of Academia it is not thought of as Boring. Although honestly reading a scientific paper can be boring trying to read one about venom compounds is like watching Titanic for three days straight. But I do find being mocked and held in contempt by scientists to be rather amusing. Academia hates creationism it's not a big secret really, I remember being told once I was ignorant of evolution or something along those lines. Fact is I'm not I just think of evolution as a theory.

Right. Should I wonder why? Keep writing.

Sorrowen said: Yeah that's kind of the point mocking someone is not exactly evidence. I know how Darwinism is used in the scientific community but is a theory, of course calling someone ignorant is a rather intellectually lazy cop out.

Just like the millions of years cop out that kind of amuses me, if it where actually happening I would actually be able to see it happen.

Not scientists tell me it's happening without ever giving real evidence, books and peer reviews really show nothing other then how the theory should work.

Of course maybe that's why Academia likes to attack creationism and Christians, science is always open to new ideas or should be at least absolutism of evolution destroys debate. Also I wonder why indeed would I be skeptical of a absurd theory propagated by Academia.

I honestly could care little if “scientists” mock or engage in ad hominem attacks against creationism.

I have yet to see evolution happen in person

I do not want to hear about it takes millions and millions of years.

Yes creationists get mocked by Academia but I have little respect for Academia as it is,

to me talk of complicated biological gene’s or toxins does not equate to proof or evidence.

Also I think if someone has the evidence to back up their claim, ad hominem attacks should not be needed honestly.

I do like the debate but I hate that it relegates to personal attacks and name calling,which helps no one in the end anyway.

PA Poland said: Evolution is a process that happens to populations over generations, and few creatures reproduce fast enough to exhibit extreme changes over any timescale we could observe them.

TomS said:

PA Poland said: Evolution is a process that happens to populations over generations, and few creatures reproduce fast enough to exhibit extreme changes over any timescale we could observe them.

I'd just note that this sort of thing is widely true in science. Much of the power of science comes from its ability to tell us about things that we cannot directly observe. Things that are too small or too large, too fast or too slow, or are inaccessible or invisible. Before the space age, we could only perform experiments on the laws of nature in a very small region near the surface of the Earth, but that did not prevent us from knowing about how things worked on the far side of the Moon. That's what makes the creationist slogan, "How do you know, were you there?" fundamentally anti-scientific. That's the power and beauty of science, that it tells us about things without us being there.

Once again, harold makes good points.

A problem with dealing with creationism in its various forms is that it is wrong in so many ways. If one points out that the creationists are wrong because of such-and-such, then there is the other issue so-and-so which also deserves mention. If one discusses the science, it may give the impression that the anti-evolutionists have some scientific issue worthy of discussion.

In short, Sorrowen, evolution doesn't care whether you "believe in" it or not.

TomS said: If one discusses the science, it may give the impression that the anti-evolutionists have some scientific issue worthy of discussion.

Sorrowen said: I know how Darwinism is used in the scientific community

...but is a theory,

Sorrowen:

Why are there no wild poodles? Or pugs? Or St. Bernards? Or cocker spaniels?

There are only domesticated ones? Why do you think that is? Where do you think they came from?

What would YOU call the process that can turn wolves into shih tzus and dobermans and bassets?

Sorrowen said: Just like the millions of years cop out that kind of amuses me, if it where actually happening I would actually be able to see it happen. Not scientists tell me it's happening without ever giving real evidence, books and peer reviews really show nothing other then how the theory should work.

Of course maybe that's why Academia likes to attack creationism and Christians,

science is always open to new ideas or should be at least absolutism of evolution destroys debate. Also I wonder why indeed would I be skeptical of a absurd theory propagated by Academia.

I think Sorrowen may have taken his leave.

What would YOU call the process that can turn wolves into shih tzus and dobermans and bassets?

Tenncrain said: So glad to have Carl Zimmer on the side of science. His tenacity in getting to the bottom of things beyond smoke screens (like here) is little doubt a big thorn in the side of the DI and other science pretenders.

To fix broken DNA, specialized proteins zoom in to stitch the loose ends back together. But these proteins can also grab onto the telomeres at the end of chromosomes. Thanks to this glitch in the repair system, cells will sometimes accidentally insert a bit of telomere DNA at a spot where they’re trying to repair a break.

There is no interpretation during transcription. Whatever is there gets transcribed. There is nothing you might call the "the equivalent of a 'comment'" in DNA, though there are bits -- introns -- that get spliced out of transcribed RNAs. You also should remember that most of the human genome isn't regularly transcribed and is useless junk (please, no ENCODE comments). If you stuck a bit of telomere in the middle of an exon, it would probably prevent the translated protein from working. But exons are only a couple percent of the genome.

Sorrowen said: I honestly could care little if "scientists" mock or engage in ad hominem attacks against creationism. I have yet to see evolution happen in person I do not want to hear about it takes millions and millions of years.

Yes creationists get mocked by Academia

but I have little respect for Academia as it is,to me talk of complicated biological gene's or toxins does not equate to proof or evidence.

Also I think if someone has the evidence to back up their claim, ad hominem attacks should not be needed honestly. I do like the debate but I hate that it relegates to personal attacks and name calling,which helps no one in the end anyway.

If a person says or does something very idiotic, people should not be allowed to point out that person’s idiocy?

Henry J said:

If a person says or does something very idiotic, people should not be allowed to point out that person’s idiocy?

EXACTLY!!!!!! After all, if people keep pointing it out, how are they going to fool those who would fall for it if it wasn't pointed out by somebody else?!? Or something like that.

harold said:

Henry J said:

If a person says or does something very idiotic, people should not be allowed to point out that person’s idiocy?

EXACTLY!!!!!! After all, if people keep pointing it out, how are they going to fool those who would fall for it if it wasn't pointed out by somebody else?!? Or something like that.

That isn't what ad hominem means. It means claiming that someone is wrong because of an irrelevant personal trait. Arguing "at the man" instead of "at the argument". It doesn't have to be insulting. "He must be wrong because such a great genius would never be able to reduce himself to considering so trivial a topic" is ad hominem. Don't just assume he's wrong because he's a great genius and the topic is trivial; address his actual argument. Calling someone an idiot is not ad hominem. Calling an idiotic argument idiotic is not, either. As long as you're saying it's idiotic because it's wrong, not the other way around. I personally find that calm, civil rebuttal of creationist nonsense most effectively convinces third party observers. The creationist can always match you in hurling insults. In fact, they're willing to hurl egregious false accusations and insults. What they can't match is reasoned arguments that make sense. But if you do happen to choose to insult them, that is not an example of ad hominem fallacy.

How do you make it clear this is not a scientific debate, but a political one?

harold said:

How do you make it clear this is not a scientific debate, but a political one?

Well, first of all, let me note that I'm not arguing against the mild, humorous insults that people indulge in at PT. That's just letting off steam, and it's orders of magnitude less unpleasant than what comes in the other direction. Also let me note that the ID/creationism enterprise is a failure, unless we consider creating minor local problems and creating a very generous welfare welfare system for about a hundred lazy, deceptive blowhards to be success. Now to answer your question - no-one ever went bankrupt by over-estimating the stupidity of the American people, or any other people in my opinion, but that stupidity has its limits. I try to just calmly and rationally point out the obvious evidence that it is a political "debate". And everyone believes me. I'm pretty sure that even Robert Byers believes me. Some of them believe me, but are already brainwashed converts to the ideology that panders to creationism. The rest of them believe me and see what's going on. I mean, it's not difficult. Thanks to the goofy "plausible deniability" strategy of ID, which was generated one second after the Edwards v. Aguillard decision, creationists themselves have to deny that ID/creationism is religious. Sure, it's amazing that they can destroy the intermediate term finances of a random rural school district once every five years of so. Sure, it's incredible that Casey Luskin and up to a hundred like him can make six figures a year for writing bad, repetitive nonsense once a month. But in the end, reality wins.

harold said: Thanks to the goofy "plausible deniability" strategy of ID, which was generated one second after the Edwards v. Aguillard decision, creationists themselves have to deny that ID/creationism is religious.

harold said: Shorter version - you don't have to tell people that their idiots, you can just show people that they're idiots.

diogeneslamp0 said: How do you make it clear this is not a scientific debate, but a political one?