Religion and Ethics Forum
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Nearly Sane on May 09, 2017, 02:56:33 PM
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What odd things we are.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39842975
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It would appear to prove humans evolved into the species we are today. I wonder if we will carry on evolving?
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It would appear to prove humans evolved into the species we are today. I wonder if we will carry on evolving?
you are an example of evolution from your parents. Your children are also evolved from you.
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you are an example of evolution from your parents. Your children are also evolved from you.
I am an example of my parent's procreation, the evolutionary process takes many thousands of years, not a few generations.
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you are an example of evolution from your parents. Your children are also evolved from you.
It's just that natural selection is not applicable to us at the moment.
We have to a large extent got around it, and good thing too.
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It's just that natural selection is not applicable to us at the moment.
We have to a large extent got around it, and good thing too.
We may have reduced environmental pressures but the idea that natural selection isn't applicable currently is a basis misunderstanding of evolution.
As to whether the above is a 'good thing', would seem to only make sense if you think natural selection is a bad thing, which seems an odd idea.
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I am an example of my parent's procreation, the evolutionary process takes many thousands of years, not a few generations.
And yet to do that process, it is a fact that you are different from your parents. Evolution happens continually.
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And yet to do that process, it is a fact that you are different from your parents. Evolution happens continually.
I am not sure that is evolution though?
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I am not sure that is evolution though?
Change in gene alleles over time, one generation is time
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We may have reduced environmental pressures but the idea that natural selection isn't applicable currently is a basis misunderstanding of evolution.
As to whether the above is a 'good thing', would seem to only make sense if you think natural selection is a bad thing, which seems an odd idea.
Yes natural selection is in some areas a bad thing.
Do you want blind people to live, deaf people to live, disabled people etc.
Natural selection would kill them quickly
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Yes natural selection is in some areas a bad thing.
Do you want blind people to live, deaf people to live, disabled people etc.
Natural selection would kill them quickly
Apart from being obviously untrue in that blind, deaf and disabled people have existed through human history, this ignores the most obvious category of humans that would die if natural selection worked in the rather crude way you portray it, babies.
As to whether the what happens through natural selection as being 'bad', I suggest you need some criteria and justification for them. Got any?
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Apart from being obviously untrue in that blind, deaf and disabled people have existed through human history, this ignores the most obvious category of humans that would die if natural selection worked in the rather crude way you portray it, babies.
As to whether the what happens through natural selection as being 'bad', I suggest you need some criteria and justification for them. Got any?
Babies have parents.
You make my point, we work together to counter what natural selection would like to do.
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Babies have parents.
You make my point, we work together to counter what natural selection would like to do.
Yes, and babies are different from their parents. Woo, it's evolution!
And what do you think 'we' work together together on? In what way is what humans do not 'natural'?
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Yes, and babies are different from their parents. Woo, it's evolution!
And what do you think 'we' work together together on? In what way is what humans do not 'natural'?
I appreciate that, but the nature red in tooth and claw we try to eradicate.
If a child is born with a 'defect' our human brains deem this worthy of equal treatment. Our brains have allowed us to ignore and roll back natural selection to some extent.
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What odd things we are.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39842975
Looks a bit like Homo habilis, or Australopithecus africanus - yet the scientists have dated it much more recently than those. I note that some boffins have suggested that it evolved from Homo erectus, and then devolved to exhibiting more 'primitive' characteristics.
Whatever - it's all evolution, whether there be micro-intervals in the process, or whether there appears to be a degenerative change, or whether there is relative stasis (even living fossils like the coelocanth show features which are different from their incredibly ancient forbears).
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I appreciate that, but the nature red in tooth and claw we try to eradicate.
If a child is born with a 'defect' our human brains deem this worthy of equal treatment. Our brains have allowed us to ignore and roll back natural selection to some extent.
How is that not 'natural selection'? In what way can you break out of that?
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How is that not 'natural selection'? In what way can you break out of that?
I'm sure the answer is that we can't - but it helps to understand that 'natural selection' should never be applied simplistically to mean 'survival of the fittest' (wasn't that Spencer's phrase?) Even Darwin, I think. suggested that in the more recent evolutionary past, the law of 'natural selection' meant that the most intelligent creatures survived. Which in turn promoted the survival of those species which developed 'altruistic' habits. But everything remains 'natural' and everything is in evolution.
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I'm sure the answer is that we can't - but it helps to understand that 'natural selection' should never be applied simplistically to mean 'survival of the fittest' (wasn't that Spencer's phrase?) Even Darwin, I think. suggested that in the more recent evolutionary past, the law of 'natural selection' meant that the most intelligent creatures survived. Which in turn promoted the survival of those species which developed 'altruistic' habits. But everything remains 'natural' and everything is in evolution.
Yet, that seems to be BeRational's whole approach that we are 'stopping' evolution and changing it?
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It would appear to prove humans evolved into the species we are today. I wonder if we will carry on evolving?
Even if we are masked from environmental selection pressures (which we are not, completely) sexual selection is still alive and kicking; last I checked, pretty girls were still prettier than ugly girls. Or someat like that. A recent study I saw suggested that there are dozens of regions of the human genome under current selection pressure, and it is Asians and Europeans that are mostly subject to that, whereas Africans (we are an African species) are at an adaptive peak already and so under less pressure.
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It's just that natural selection is not applicable to us at the moment.
We have to a large extent got around it, and good thing too.
What evidence do you have for that?
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And yet to do that process, it is a fact that you are different from your parents. Evolution happens continually.
You have the cart before the horse. Descent with modification doesn't happen because of evolution. Evolution happens because of descent with modification (and selection of course).
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You have the cart before the horse. Descent with modification doesn't happen because of evolution. Evolution happens because of descent with modification (and selection of course).
You have the straw before the point. Didn't say it happens because of evolution. Just that it does and is evolution.
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You have the straw before the point. Didn't say it happens because of evolution. Just that it does and is evolution.
Evolution doesn't happen to individuals. Natural selection happens to individuals. Floo is correct when she says her being different to her parents is not evolution. Evolution is an emergent phenomenon.
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Evolution doesn't happen to individuals. Natural selection happens to individuals. Floo is correct when she says her being different to her parents is not evolution. Evolution is an emergent phenomenon.
This is the same nonsense where creationists think about crocoducks. Evolution as a change in alleles over time happens every generation. Note that doesn't say it happens to individuals.
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This is the same nonsense
No it is not nonsense at all. I recommend "Why Evolution is True (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Evolution-True-Oxford-Landmark-Science-ebook/dp/B007ZQFUFW/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1494364267&sr=1-1&keywords=why+evolution+is+true)" by Jerry Coyne to educate yourself.
where creationists think about crocoducks. Evolution as a change in alleles over time happens every generation. Note that doesn't say it happens to individuals.
It's the change of the distribution of alleles in populations over time. Individuals do not evolve. The difference between an offspring and its parents is not evolution.
A molecule of helium colliding with the rubber skin of a balloon is not pressure.
This pixel here ^ is not the web page.
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No it is not nonsense at all. I recommend "Why Evolution is True (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Evolution-True-Oxford-Landmark-Science-ebook/dp/B007ZQFUFW/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1494364267&sr=1-1&keywords=why+evolution+is+true)" by Jerry Coyne to educate yourself.
It's the change of the distribution of alleles in populations over time. Individuals do not evolve. The difference between an offspring and its parents is not evolution.
A molecule of helium colliding with the rubber skin of a balloon is not pressure.
This pixel here ^ is not the web page.
And I have read the book and still think you are wrong. Individuals do not evolve , so it might be useful if you didn't indulge in some straw here. They are different from their parents. They are not evolving, they are part of the process of evolution. If you want to argue , it would be useful if you didn't misrepresent the argument.
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NS so you are agreeing with me, " individuals don't evolve, the are not evolving, they are part of the process of evolution".
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is it not individuals mutate and populations evolve?
There are random "errors" in dna replication at conception. These mutations may be carried on into later generations. In most cases they offer no advantage to the organism but at the same time do no damage. If there are changes in the environment there is a remote chance that the mutation may provide a small advantage in coping with the changes. Individuals carrying the mutation have a marginally better chance of surviving than those which do not carry it.
There will be further random mutations in later generations providing some individuals with further advantage ... and so on.
Eventually, only those individuals carrying the advantageous mutations will continue breeding and those without will fail to thrive. Eventually only those with advantageous mutations will remain. The species will have evolved. Survival of the best equipped to survive - the fittest.
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is it not individuals mutate and populations evolve?
There are random "errors" in dna replication at conception. These mutations may be carried on into later generations. In most cases they offer no advantage to the organism but at the same time do no damage. If there are changes in the environment there is a remote chance that the mutation may provide a small advantage in coping with the changes. Individuals carrying the mutation have a marginally better chance of surviving than those which do not carry it.
There will be further random mutations in later generations providing some individuals with further advantage ... and so on.
Eventually, only those individuals carrying the advantageous mutations will continue breeding and those without will fail to thrive. Eventually only those with advantageous mutations will remain. The species will have evolved. Survival of the best equipped to survive - the fittest.
No doubt some boffins will fill us in on the significance of genotype and phenotype. What you've said is more or less my understanding of the matter. However, you've also implied that mutation is the instigator of significant evolutionary change - but that not all mutations are advantageous. I don't know how anyone could actually pinpoint somewhere in the sequence and say "this is evolution, and that is not" - we can only say that certain lines didn't thrive, and there may be billions of those unknown to us.
(As a footnote, The Burgess Shale fossils seem to indicate that there were more distinct phyla in the natural world in the very distant past than there are now - I've always found that odd. Maybe someone could comment, even if it is off-topic.)