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The Meaning Of Evolution


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I contend you guys switch the meanings on me. So let's have a clear understanding of the entire subjective understanding of the word evolution and what it is and what it's not.I understand that evolution is the belief that life is in a continuing process of change, based on random mutations and adaptations due to a hostile climate change.In the terms of mankind, evolution believes that what was once a single cell organism, slowly through millions of years mutated into a more complex being, while leaving behind the traits that were not healthy, (except in the case of the ape, alligator, shark and coelacanth, which continued many millions of years largely unchanged even though other species were dealing with a changing environment that necessitated change.)In terms of the Origin of Life, evolution teaches that the beginning of all life was a random occurance that millions of years of attempts allows to happen.In terms of humankind, evolution teaches Eugenics / master race through breeding and sterilization as being preferred on a purely scienitific scale. On a moral scale this doesn't fly.In terms of morality, I hold that evolution allows for no right and wrong other than survival of the species which trumps all other traits.Please feel free to express your understanding of evolution, without any wikipedia cut and paste jobs. If you can't explain it in your own terms, than I consider you not to have thought enough about it to argue either way.And as this is my thread, I am king, I set the rules. Which is nice.

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The idea of evolution has many components. As I understand it, these components are the following:Inheritance- Individual organisms pass down their traits to their offspring through their DNA. Certain organisms combine the DNA from two parents and others give direct copies of their own DNA. Either way, this ensures a flow of characteristics from parent to child, so to speak.Mutation- The passing of traits from parents to child is not perfect for several reasons, and the changes that occur in the transition are known as mutations. A mutation can come about due to the mixing of DNA from two parents as a result of procreation. It can also come from accidental glitches in DNA, which can come about for a variety of chemical and physical reasons.Natural Selection- This one is somewhat circular in its definition. Certain organisms or species have characteristics that allow them to survive in an environment. By "survive," I mean they are able to live long enough to create offspring that can sustain their species or even cause it to grow. We may describe these characteristics as "favorable," but this is a completely relative term since it depends 100% on their particular environment, the other species living in that environment, and any unexpected changes or events that could occur throughout the course of the life of the species or organism or whatever.These three things lead to a phenomenon known as evolution. Evolution is the tendency for species to develop "favorable" characteristics over the course of generations.Evolution is NOT a philosophy. It does not say what "favorable" means any more than the definition given above. It does not mean that it is "good" to kill something that is inferior, nor does it say this is bad, nor does it say anything about the concept of good and bad. It is an emergent phenomenon, not a way of life. Evolution has no end goal. It is not driving toward any particular result. Evolution as stated above doesn't say anything about the origin of life. It needs to be combined with further evidence to describe the origins of humans. Evolution as a concept can exist in a vacuum. If I were to go to a planet and out of thin air create many species that can reproduce by passing on their DNA, they will evolve. There's no escaping that. Now, we have outside evidence that at one point (I guess about a billion years ago or so) all species on this planet were single celled organisms. We also have evidence that as time went on, these organisms become more and more complex and now are extremely complex. This evidence is CONSISTENT with the idea of evolution since evolution tells us that species can change gradually over time and it's conceivable that becoming a more complicated being would be "favorable."We can extend the idea of evolution past life. If anything can copy itself and can change slightly, then it will tend to evolve. Thus, we could imagine that if there are certain types of chemicals, proteins, or whatever that can copy themselves and can change slightly, then they would tend to evolve. It's conceivable that these could continuously evolve into what we call life. This is the idea of abiogenesis It is, however, a potential consequence of evolution, not a defining characteristic of it. Again, if we are god and create species on a planet, they will evolve regardless of whether we created them out of thin air or gradually created them from component chemicals.

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Evolution is the tendency for species to develop "favorable" characteristics over the course of generations. Evolution has no end goal. It is not driving toward any particular result. This evidence is CONSISTENT with the idea of evolution since evolution tells us that species can change gradually over time and it's conceivable that becoming a more complicated being would be "favorable." It is, however, a potential consequence of evolution, not a defining characteristic of it. Again, if we are god and create species on a planet, they will evolve regardless of whether we created them out of thin air or gradually created them from component chemicals.
Evolution has no end goal, but the tendency is for things to improve?It does this naturally by survival of the fittest, correct?So survival of the fittest would be a purely evolutionary trait?
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Evolution has no end goal, but the tendency is for things to improve?
improve is an extremely subjective thing. Improve, in this sense, means more likely to reproduce effectively. This ability to reproduce would be completely dependent on the current environment. So lets say you have a Xabadoo ( a nondescript creature) The Xabadoo mates with a female, and the female has two baby Xabadi, A and B. Xabadoo A was born with the mutation of having gills, B was born with out them . If the Xabadi's environment was an arid climate, the gills would be a hindrance, and A would soon die, and B would survive. How ever, if the Xabadoo were born in a swamp, gills would be extremely valuable to Xabadoo A, and he would be more likely to survive and thrive in the swamp than B, and thus more likely to live longer and mate more often than B. Lets say A lives to be 10 years old, and has 10 kids, where as B lives to be 3 years old with two kids. A's children all have kids, they all live to be 10 years old, they all have ten kids, A's descendants start mating with B's and passing on the gills, and and on on, until the species is changed from the Xabadoo into the Great Gilled Gooplegooks. So, what might be a helpful "improving" mutation in one environment would be a useless or harmful one in another environment. A better word than improve is adapt.
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In terms of morality, I hold that evolution allows for no right and wrong other than survival of the species which trumps all other traits.
yes, but we as intelligent beings have evolved past the point of existing simply to survive and reproduce. thats why we do other things now like art, sports, whatever. our intelligence that has evolved over time has given us morality and the ideas of right and wrong. so evolution does allow for it. the idea of natural selection and survival of the fittest doesnt even really apply to us any more. sick/weak people can be treated by advanced medicine. people who would have no chance at survival hundreds of years ago can live just fine these days. but we can still see it very clearly in animals.
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Come on BG, just buy a college level biology textbook and read about it. If you're really interested, I can make a suggestion or two. You like to (jokingly, I think) throw around the fact that you're uneducated, but I respect your intelligence enough to think that you might be intellectually curious about the whole thing other than the fact that it makes for fun arguments with us crazy science-types.Ok, here are a few things to build on what others said. There are four main components to evolution...all of which are instrumental in changing allele frequencies in a population (the real definition of "evolution").Mutation - It happens totally randomly. Most are negative or neutral changes. The easist way to think of why is to think of a protein that has to be made in our cells for us to survive. Any change to the synthesis of this protein would affect us in a bad way. There are many more proteins like that which can be mutated in bad ways than there are proteins that would be beneficial. There are also many mutations that don't affect us at all...changes in a nucleotide that end up making the same amino acid that the original one would have coded for anyways. Genetic Drift - Sampling error. This can be when you have a "founder group" that leaves the population. Think of a flock of 50 seagulls out of a population of 100,000 that somehow make their way across the oceans to another continent. Since there are only 50, they most likely have different allele frequencies than the population as a whole had. This creates the "founder effect" which basically means that this group might now diverge because they have different genes (on average). That was a poor explanation, but I'm doing this off the top of my head. Or there can be a bottleneck, for example if a hurricane killed 99,900 of the seagulls. The remaining 100 would have a different average set of allele frequencies than the whole population, so minor changes would occur and it could build from there.Natural Selection - We all know about this, and it has many parts that I could explain if I have to. One important thing to remember is that "survival of the fittest" is very subjective, and can be taken in some unfortunate ways. It's best, like LLY said, to remember that it's really all about the ability to survive and create offspring. There is no consciousness in natural selection...traits are not "chosen". They are either passed on or not. Gene Flow - This is when genes are shared from population to population. For example, when Australians mate with Americans. This keeps the two populations of homo sapiens from becoming too distinct (in terms of both genotype and phenotype) so they don't eventually lose the ability to mate and therefore eventually (most likely) split into different species.BG, one of your big things is the fact that you don't believe that species can diverge and become two separate species (what you would call macroevolution). I explained this before, but I don't remember you responding so I'll do it again, as best as I can at the moment.1. There's a population, say of wolves. They live on one side of a mountain range.2. Population gets big, wolves spread out. Now they are on both sides of the mountain range.3. There's a long, tough winter, and the top of the range is impassable.4. The populations both move away from the cold, and therefore are now totally separated by the mountains. No wolves from either group ever goes to the other...there's no reason to any more.5. On one side of the mountain there are no predators. On the other side there is now a growing group of mountain lions.6a. As you believe, now "microevolution" takes place. The wolves where there are predators now only start surviving if they are small enough to hide among the rocks (or whatever). The small wolves survive and pass on their genes, the bigger and medium sized ones can be seen and eaten at a higher frequency. Eventually, all of the surviving wolves are much smaller and make some other changes, too. The ones with bigger ears survive to reproduce at a higher rate because they can hear the lions coming from far away. Their coloring changes. You get the idea. 6b. On the no-predator side a totally different process takes place because of the lay of the land.7. Now the wolves on one side look completely different from the ones on the other side. Their mating habits are now so different that they will never cross-breed again. Maybe their sexual organs are no longer compatable because of other things that have evolved over thousands or millions of years on opposite sides of the mountain. They are no longer the same species. And that's one totally oversimplified example of how species break off from one another on the evolutionary tree. Two different species coming from the same common ancestor. Evolution. Again, that's oversimplified and very specific...but it shows that the process is, at the very least, a possibility...and that's pretty much the only acceptance I think I could even hope to get from you. Sorry if that's unclear...it's late and I'm no professor.

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yes, but we as intelligent beings have evolved past the point of existing simply to survive and reproduce. thats why we do other things now like art, sports, whatever. our intelligence that has evolved over time has given us morality and the ideas of right and wrong. so evolution does allow for it. the idea of natural selection and survival of the fittest doesnt even really apply to us any more. sick/weak people can be treated by advanced medicine. people who would have no chance at survival hundreds of years ago can live just fine these days. but we can still see it very clearly in animals.
It does apply to us, just in less obvious ways. I'd write more about this, but I'm exhausted. If nobody gets to it before tomorrow afternoon I'll give it a shot.
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Evolution has no end goal, but the tendency is for things to improve?
improve is an extremely subjective thing. Improve, in this sense, means more likely to reproduce effectively. This ability to reproduce would be completely dependent on the current environment. So lets say you have a Xabadoo ( a nondescript creature) The Xabadoo mates with a female, and the female has two baby Xabadi, A and B. Xabadoo A was born with the mutation of having gills, B was born with out them . If the Xabadi's environment was an arid climate, the gills would be a hindrance, and A would soon die, and B would survive. How ever, if the Xabadoo were born in a swamp, gills would be extremely valuable to Xabadoo A, and he would be more likely to survive and thrive in the swamp than B, and thus more likely to live longer and mate more often than B. Lets say A lives to be 10 years old, and has 10 kids, where as B lives to be 3 years old with two kids. A's children all have kids, they all live to be 10 years old, they all have ten kids, A's descendants start mating with B's and passing on the gills, and and on on, until the species is changed from the Xabadoo into the Great Gilled Gooplegooks. So, what might be a helpful "improving" mutation in one environment would be a useless or harmful one in another environment. A better word than improve is adapt.
FYPThe tendency is for things to adapt.
So survival of the fittest would be a purely evolutionary trait?
I'm not sure what you're asking here - I think it would be more accurate to say that 'survival of the fittest' is a facet of the evolutionary process. Why do animals carry genetic codes? Who knows? When you do get a whole bunch of animals, all slightly different, anything they all try to do there will be winners and losers, that's just life. If you pick 20 people and see who is the best at football, you will have some people who are great, some who are ok, and some who suck. If you pick 20 random mice, they have more important things to worry about than football (like not getting eaten/stepped on), so the suckers there will end up dead instead of just on the sidelines. That's all that 'survival of the fittest' means. Natural selection isn't an outcome of evolution - the reverse would be closer. It's not something unique to Darwinism, it's just a part of how things happen.
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Come on BG, just buy a college level biology textbook and read about it. If you're really interested, I can make a suggestion or two. You like to (jokingly, I think) throw around the fact that you're uneducated, but I respect your intelligence enough to think that you might be intellectually curious about the whole thing other than the fact that it makes for fun arguments with us crazy science-types.Ok, here are a few things to build on what others said. There are four main components to evolution...all of which are instrumental in changing allele frequencies in a population (the real definition of "evolution").Mutation - It happens totally randomly. Most are negative or neutral changes. The easist way to think of why is to think of a protein that has to be made in our cells for us to survive. Any change to the synthesis of this protein would affect us in a bad way. There are many more proteins like that which can be mutated in bad ways than there are proteins that would be beneficial. There are also many mutations that don't affect us at all...changes in a nucleotide that end up making the same amino acid that the original one would have coded for anyways. Genetic Drift - Sampling error. This can be when you have a "founder group" that leaves the population. Think of a flock of 50 seagulls out of a population of 100,000 that somehow make their way across the oceans to another continent. Since there are only 50, they most likely have different allele frequencies than the population as a whole had. This creates the "founder effect" which basically means that this group might now diverge because they have different genes (on average). That was a poor explanation, but I'm doing this off the top of my head. Or there can be a bottleneck, for example if a hurricane killed 99,900 of the seagulls. The remaining 100 would have a different average set of allele frequencies than the whole population, so minor changes would occur and it could build from there.Natural Selection - We all know about this, and it has many parts that I could explain if I have to. One important thing to remember is that "survival of the fittest" is very subjective, and can be taken in some unfortunate ways. It's best, like LLY said, to remember that it's really all about the ability to survive and create offspring. There is no consciousness in natural selection...traits are not "chosen". They are either passed on or not. Gene Flow - This is when genes are shared from population to population. For example, when Australians mate with Americans. This keeps the two populations of homo sapiens from becoming too distinct (in terms of both genotype and phenotype) so they don't eventually lose the ability to mate and therefore eventually (most likely) split into different species.BG, one of your big things is the fact that you don't believe that species can diverge and become two separate species (what you would call macroevolution). I explained this before, but I don't remember you responding so I'll do it again, as best as I can at the moment.1. There's a population, say of wolves. They live on one side of a mountain range.2. Population gets big, wolves spread out. Now they are on both sides of the mountain range.3. There's a long, tough winter, and the top of the range is impassable.4. The populations both move away from the cold, and therefore are now totally separated by the mountains. No wolves from either group ever goes to the other...there's no reason to any more.5. On one side of the mountain there are no predators. On the other side there is now a growing group of mountain lions.6a. As you believe, now "microevolution" takes place. The wolves where there are predators now only start surviving if they are small enough to hide among the rocks (or whatever). The small wolves survive and pass on their genes, the bigger and medium sized ones can be seen and eaten at a higher frequency. Eventually, all of the surviving wolves are much smaller and make some other changes, too. The ones with bigger ears survive to reproduce at a higher rate because they can hear the lions coming from far away. Their coloring changes. You get the idea. 6b. On the no-predator side a totally different process takes place because of the lay of the land.7. Now the wolves on one side look completely different from the ones on the other side. Their mating habits are now so different that they will never cross-breed again. Maybe their sexual organs are no longer compatable because of other things that have evolved over thousands or millions of years on opposite sides of the mountain. They are no longer the same species. And that's one totally oversimplified example of how species break off from one another on the evolutionary tree. Two different species coming from the same common ancestor. Evolution. Again, that's oversimplified and very specific...but it shows that the process is, at the very least, a possibility...and that's pretty much the only acceptance I think I could even hope to get from you. Sorry if that's unclear...it's late and I'm no professor.
I won't mock you by pointing out that the wolves in your example are still wolves, not birds or reptiles.I get that it is never going to be acceptable by your side to stick with one or two simple explanations, maybe this is an impossible request.The point is really to try to make it easier to use the word evolution and go from there, instead of you guys using nuances to end run around my excellent point, and even the not so excellent points, which shows how slippery you guys are if you ask me.Also I am comfortable grouping the athiest label with evolution, since the two are often times pretty much related. Like Christian and fundementalist, which most of us are.Yea, I might have bit off more than I can chew though.I have for the record read and understand that the rock pigeon could be bred into all forms of pigeons we find today, but I read that in a Christian book so it is probably propaganda designed to sell books.
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I won't mock you by pointing out that the wolves in your example are still wolves, not birds or reptiles. I get that it is never going to be acceptable by your side to stick with one or two simple explanations, maybe this is an impossible request.
No, they aren't wolves anymore. They're a diffent species...they look different, act different, and most importantly cannot mate with wolves. Now give the process a few hundred million years, many more splits like the one I described, and the newest groups could be just as indistinguishable from wolves as wolves are from reptiles. BG, meet the process of evolution. Evolution, BG.And I don't know how I could make it much more simple than that example.
The point is really to try to make it easier to use the word evolution and go from there, instead of you guys using nuances to end run around my excellent point
What excellent point? I honestly have no idea what you're referring to. I'll try to respond to it.And what nuances? Yeah, the whole process involves a ton of nuances, but everyone here is doing a pretty good job keeping things in general terms...I think.
Also I am comfortable grouping the athiest label with evolution, since the two are often times pretty much related. Like Christian and fundementalist, which most of us are.
Yes, atheists probably all believe in evolution...but a very low percentage of people who believe in evolution are atheists (including this guy). This means that you should not make a strong correlation between the two, just like you can't say that rectangles are all squares just because the opposite is true. Then again, I'm not sure why you said that, so I'm not sure how to respond.
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I walked to the grocery store the other day. Only, I didn't macro walk, I only micro walked. I took small steps and moved a few feet at a time. I mean, everybody's seen micro walking. We do it all the time. I micro walk all the time. But have you ever seen somebody macro walk from a house to a grocery store? It's way too far to step. Steps are small, like a foot at a time. The grocery store is over a mile away! I've never seen anyone macro walk to a grocery store all at once, so obviously I don't believe in it.
This quote is from the stickied thread above, and I think sums things up nicely (Yet again Yorke is the voice of reason). The point is, a billion years is a very, very, very, very, very, VERY long time; what started out as different looking members of the same species can turn, through a series of incredibly minor changes over an incredibly longg time to completely different species. And something that started out having only one cell, again through only minor changes, over an ever longer time could start to like like the multi-celled incredibly complex forms of life we have today.And on the topic of "survival of the fittest" there is nothing in it that says anything about what we SHOULD do. All it says is that those better equipped to survive (whatever that happens to mean in a given environment) are more likely to survive to pass their genes on. There is no purpose or drive towards improvement. The theory of evolution doesn't "care" (whatever that means) what we do or who we help or don't help; it just tells us that those who have genes which make them more likely to survive are in fact more likely to survive and thus more likely to reproduce and pass those genes on. Whether we change the rules about "more likely to survive" to mean "more likely to live in a society where people are willing to care for them or help them and where drugs are available so they can live through weakness that would get them killed in the animal kingdom" or whether it means "more likely to be physically strong when living in a purely selfish society" is irrelevant; "more likely to survive" can take many different meanings.
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Gene Flow - This is when genes are shared from population to population. For example, when Australians mate with Americans.
ewwww
5. On one side of the mountain there are no predators. On the other side there is now a growing group of mountain lions.6a. As you believe, now "microevolution" takes place. The wolves where there are predators now only start surviving if they are small enough to hide among the rocks (or whatever). The small wolves survive and pass on their genes, the bigger and medium sized ones can be seen and eaten at a higher frequency. Eventually, all of the surviving wolves are much smaller and make some other changes, too. The ones with bigger ears survive to reproduce at a higher rate because they can hear the lions coming from far away. Their coloring changes. You get the idea.
dude, a wolf would totally beat a mountain lion's ass.
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No, they aren't wolves anymore. They're a diffent species...they look different, act different, and most importantly cannot mate with wolves. Now give the process a few hundred million years, many more splits like the one I described, and the newest groups could be just as indistinguishable from wolves as wolves are from reptiles. BG, meet the process of evolution. Evolution, BG.And I don't know how I could make it much more simple than that example.
you could have used Opossums, or is it possums. I get that one confused. Okay forget that, use Platypusses, because they are cool.
What excellent point? I honestly have no idea what you're referring to. I'll try to respond to it.
Don't pretend most of my points are excellent. It is beneath you to pretend.
And what nuances? Yeah, the whole process involves a ton of nuances, but everyone here is doing a pretty good job keeping things in general terms...I think.Yes, atheists probably all believe in evolution...but a very low percentage of people who believe in evolution are atheists (including this guy). This means that you should not make a strong correlation between the two, just like you can't say that rectangles are all squares just because the opposite is true. Then again, I'm not sure why you said that, so I'm not sure how to respond.
I don't want to get into a definition of species by going down this road:The nature of species is controversial in biology and philosophy. Biologists disagree on the definition of the term ‘species.’ Philosophers disagree over the ontological status of species. Stanford college link ( founded by Christians )
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The nature of species is controversial in biology and philosophy. Biologists disagree on the definition of the term ‘species.’ Philosophers disagree over the ontological status of species. Stanford college link ( founded by Christians )
Yeah, we talked about that in class. The Biological Species Concept is the widely accepted way to define species...the problem is that it's obviously hard to define the word because of how many different ways you could look at it...it's pretty subjective. But I can't think of any way of defining a species that would proclude it from evolving into one or more different species based on that definition. So it's kind of a moot point in the "can speciation occur" discussion.But look at you, going all Stanford on me.edit: you're right, I should have used platypusses...or is it platypi?
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Yeah, we talked about that in class. The Biological Species Concept is the widely accepted way to define species...the problem is that it's obviously hard to define the word because of how many different ways you could look at it...it's pretty subjective. But I can't think of any way of defining a species that would proclude it from evolving into one or more different species based on that definition. So it's kind of a moot point in the "can speciation occur" discussion.But look at you, going all Stanford on me.
Actually this was elluded to in the Ben Stein movie so I was just acting all smart and stuff.Besides if we define a species as something that can't mate with something else, then most of us would be a different species than beautiful women. And by 'us' I mean 'you guys'. Cause my wife is a hottie
edit: you're right, I should have used platypusses...or is it platypi?
I don't know for sure, but I hope it's Platypi!
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This quote is from the stickied thread above, and I think sums things up nicely (Yet again Yorke is the voice of reason). The point is, a billion years is a very, very, very, very, very, VERY long time; what started out as different looking members of the same species can turn, through a series of incredibly minor changes over an incredibly longg time to completely different species. And something that started out having only one cell, again through only minor changes, over an ever longer time could start to like like the multi-celled incredibly complex forms of life we have today.
Hawaii kind of throws a burr in your saddle when you require a long long long long long long time to get species evolving. They popped up out of the ocean a couple million years ago, took a while to cool off, needed time for coconuts to drift to their shores, or birds that pooped seeds, then after all the plants matured they became acceptable to birds and animals that got there via floating logs and such, until the y became new species. I guess evolution sometimes gets a pass on being consistant.
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Hawaii kind of throws a burr in your saddle when you require a long long long long long long time to get species evolving. They popped up out of the ocean a couple million years ago, took a while to cool off, needed time for coconuts to drift to their shores, or birds that pooped seeds, then after all the plants matured they became acceptable to birds and animals that got there via floating logs and such, until the y became new species. I guess evolution sometimes gets a pass on being consistant.
Ok you totally missed my point, but that is fine. My point was just in general how a series of small changes can have a large effect over a long time, without any specifics about how long a time was needed to get from one particular species to another. I'm sure someone more knowledgeable on the specifics can deal with the specific case of Hawaii or any other area for that matter; the fact that life didn't have to start from scratch but could migrate, swim, etc. probably had something to do with it. Also, even a million years is a pretty long time, as it is still more than we can fathom and is plenty of time for new species to emerge.So let me once again explain that my point was a completely general one: just because we can only observe small changes over a hundred or even a thousand years doesn't mean that big changes can't happen out of a series of small changes over a much longer time scale, be it a million or even a billion years. As I don't have a degree in biology, I can't explain any specific case. I just wanted to explain the error in accepting "micro"-evolution but not accepting "macro"-evolution, as "macro"-evolution is just "micro"-evolution over a much longer time period.
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Every day like clockwork the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. I can watch it traverse the sky in a perfect arc. It's just ridiculous to say that the earth revolves around the sun when any fool can look up at the sky and see otherwise! You atheists and your partisan heliocentric rhetoric can't convince me, I know what the Bible says and I know what I see.

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Every day like clockwork the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. I can watch it traverse the sky in a perfect arc. It's just ridiculous to say that the earth revolves around the sun when any fool can look up at the sky and see otherwise! You atheists and your partisan heliocentric rhetoric can't convince me, I know what the Bible says and I know what I see.
yea i hate it when all these "scientists" talk about the earth revolving at all. the earth is flat. if it were round people would be falling off the bottom. plus when you look out anywhere you can see the flat horizon. LOL when will people learn?
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What if evolution into separate species could be seen to recently?http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.htmlhttp://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.htmlHow much evidence is enough? For a theory to be "true" (in the sense that any science can be true), it must make falsifiable predictions and it must explain all known observations.Between the fossil record, the observed instances in the links above, and ongoing studies of changes in species, what is missing?Did you know that fruit flies can be forced to evolve so that the can no longer interbreed within very few generations?What if you started with the first multi-celled organism? What kind of mutations could be induced in those? Light sensitivity? Temperature sensitivity? A sucrose sensor? (HINT: The answer is yes to all of these.) And those are just the changes that can be induced during the creation of a PhD thesis. Add a couple million years.....

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The idea of evolution has many components. As I understand it, these components are the following:Inheritance- Individual organisms pass down their traits to their offspring through their DNA. Certain organisms combine the DNA from two parents and others give direct copies of their own DNA. Either way, this ensures a flow of characteristics from parent to child, so to speak.Mutation- The passing of traits from parents to child is not perfect for several reasons, and the changes that occur in the transition are known as mutations. A mutation can come about due to the mixing of DNA from two parents as a result of procreation. It can also come from accidental glitches in DNA, which can come about for a variety of chemical and physical reasons.Natural Selection- This one is somewhat circular in its definition. Certain organisms or species have characteristics that allow them to survive in an environment. By "survive," I mean they are able to live long enough to create offspring that can sustain their species or even cause it to grow. We may describe these characteristics as "favorable," but this is a completely relative term since it depends 100% on their particular environment, the other species living in that environment, and any unexpected changes or events that could occur throughout the course of the life of the species or organism or whatever.These three things lead to a phenomenon known as evolution. Evolution is the tendency for species to develop "favorable" characteristics over the course of generations.Evolution is NOT a philosophy. It does not say what "favorable" means any more than the definition given above. It does not mean that it is "good" to kill something that is inferior, nor does it say this is bad, nor does it say anything about the concept of good and bad. It is an emergent phenomenon, not a way of life. Evolution has no end goal. It is not driving toward any particular result.
Bookmark this.Refer to it whenever you have a question regarding evolution. Practical application of this answers 99.9% of questions from a lay-person.This is the one simple explanation you are looking for. Everything else is an expansion/practical example of thisForget stuff like this:
(except in the case of the ape, alligator, shark and coelacanth, which continued many millions of years largely unchanged even though other species were dealing with a changing environment that necessitated change.)In terms of the Origin of Life, evolution teaches that the beginning of all life was a random occurance that millions of years of attempts allows to happen.In terms of humankind, evolution teaches Eugenics / master race through breeding and sterilization as being preferred on a purely scienitific scale. On a moral scale this doesn't fly.So survival of the fittest would be a purely evolutionary trait?
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What if evolution into separate species could be seen to recently?http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.htmlhttp://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.htmlHow much evidence is enough? For a theory to be "true" (in the sense that any science can be true), it must make falsifiable predictions and it must explain all known observations.Between the fossil record, the observed instances in the links above, and ongoing studies of changes in species, what is missing?Did you know that fruit flies can be forced to evolve so that the can no longer interbreed within very few generations?What if you started with the first multi-celled organism? What kind of mutations could be induced in those? Light sensitivity? Temperature sensitivity? A sucrose sensor? (HINT: The answer is yes to all of these.) And those are just the changes that can be induced during the creation of a PhD thesis. Add a couple million years.....
Also bookmark this. I was going to bring up the fruit flies, and also those British moths that evolved from white to black back to white over a couple of centuries as the Industrial Revolution dirtied the air and then it was cleaned up, but hblask beat me to it.
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Cockroaches evolve really quick, coem up with a poison, they gro immune, cycle repeats itself.So do viruses, like AidsAnd music, luckily, I don't think I could take another Flock of Seagulls hit.When did you guys get the impression that I don't think anything ever changes ever?

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When did you guys get the impression that I don't think anything ever changes ever?
???? We're just pointing out that there are observed instances of speciation, along with a ginormous fossil record which supports the prevailing theories of speciation leading to evolution. If you are going to deny evolution, you have to explain why this explanation:"Mystical all-powerful being created a world that looks *exactly* like it would if evolution were true, in order to confuse us"is a better and/or more scientific explanation than this:"The observable small changes and observable speciation, which can occur in our lifetime, would, over a period of millenia, lead to the changes observed in the fossil record."It's getting hard to tell what your objection to evolution is. Do you deny the observed instance of speciation? Do you deny the fossil record? Do you deny DNA studies? Do you deny the ecological studies showing conditions which lead to speciation making accurate predictions about the changes? I mean, somewhere you have to say "science is lying to us about that" or you just have to admit that no amount of evidence will convince you and that you are not interested in letting facts get in the way of your beliefs.
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Cockroaches evolve really quick, coem up with a poison, they gro immune, cycle repeats itself.So do viruses, like Aids
Where's the problem? That's exactly what evolution suggests should happen. Lots of life forms evolve quickly.The answer is in LLYorke's post.You asked for an explanation, you get one, you ignore it? Sheesh.
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