Evolution Pros and Cons

[Pyrotex]

Okay. Cases have been made for 'intelligent design'. And HB and BigDog have taken pains to distinguish 'id' from 'ID'.

 

But if you are that intent to distinguish 'id' from 'ID', why did you choose the same name? [except for capitalization]

 

What if I came up with a slightly different POV concerning, say, baptism, but I called this new POV, 'Satanism'? What if I came up with a different take on Christianity, but still main-stream Christianity mind you, and called it "Godless Hedonism"?

 

If you were that keen to distinguish 'id' from 'ID', you would have given it a name that clearly distinguishes it. Like 'Natural Design', for example.

[Moontanman]

As far as alternate solvents. There are counter arguments using logical laws of chemistry. For example, silicone polymers are very stable, which is why they make good synthetics substitutes for organic versions of the same thing like oils and plastics. This means they are not as easily reversed under similar conditions. This creates a potential problem even before we get started in terms of the energy requirements of such life.

 

The stability of silicones is why they are a viable alternative under the conditions of heat and pressure of Venus, if they weren't more stable they wouldn't be any better than hydrocarbons. Silicones can be quite complex and can be combined with hydrocarbons as well. Heat and pressure makes silicones a contender, their stability is not an impediment.

 

Aqueous life builds upon CO2 and H2O using photosynthesis to supply an energy conversion that is renewable. The logical question is would be the parallel source of energy in a silicone world? Would that be SiO2 or sand/glass and H2SO4 to make (SiOHS)n? Concentrated lab H2SO4 can be stored in SiO2 or glass containers. It would be hard to even get past the initial raw material problem to make monomers for polymers.

 

Aqueous life is not dependent on photosynthesis, complex life is usually dependent on photosynthesis but much of the life on earth is chemo-synthetic. Chemo-synthesis was the first energy source of life and could be the source of energy for other planets as well.

 

Under the heat and pressure conditions of say for instance Venus, Concentrated Sulfuric Acid becomes a completely different animal and can dissolve a wide range of chemicals including silicones.

 

 

In evolutionary theory, we start with replicators, but are not sure how to start from scratch. Silicone will have a hard time with step one and may never reach active replicators, even if human can skips all these steps and make such polymers in the lab, directly. This is not intelligent design since the laws of chemistry make it hard to do by itself. Again by intelligent design, I mean it should flow easily from logical laws without relying too much on a unique random event that defies the odds.

 

We know absolutely nothing about the behavior of silicones under the heat and pressure conditions it would take to make them a viable alternative to hydrocarbons. You really cannot say silicone cannot reach any stage of chemical evolution, we just don't know. All we can say is that silicone is more likely than carbon to support life under these conditions.

[Pyrotex]

Here is an article that might benefit all our POVs:

 

Two and a half years ago, in what is so far the "trial of this century," federal district judge John Jones III ruled that it was unconstitutional for a school board in Dover, PA to teach intelligent design (ID) theory in a public high school science class. The decision was stunning; the ID movement lost on every front....

The Dover trial seemed, for a brief moment, to be a wooden stake driven into the heart of creationism. But ID is once again back up and on the march....

 

...But in the debate over evolution, I also think creationists' doggedness has to do with the fact that they make a few worthy points. And as long as evolutionists like me reflexively react with ridicule and self-righteous rage, we may paradoxically be adding years to creationism's lifespan.

 

First, I have to agree with the ID crowd that there are some very big (and frankly exciting) questions that should keep evolutionists humble. While there is important work going on in the area of biogenesis, for instance, I think it's fair to say that science is still in the dark about this fundamental question.... [biogenesis] is no less relevant than the Big Bang is to physics or cosmology. Evolution should be able to explain, in theory at least, all the way back to the very first organism that could replicate itself through biological or chemical processes. And to understand that organism fully, we would simply have to know what came before it. And right now we are nowhere close....

 

Read the full article at What Neo-Creationists Get Right -- lessons learned from the Intelligent Design camp

 

from TheScientist.com, magazine of the Life Sciences

[Thunderbird]

Moontanman "Chemo-synthesis was the first energy source of life"

Do we know that for certain?

[Moontanman]

Do we know that for certain?

 

It's pretty certian that photosynthesis devloped after chemo-synthesis. No way to know for sure but it's much easier for organisms to obtain energy from chemo-synthesis than photosynthesis. It is certain that life first subisisted on excess chemical energy from within the earth. Hydrocarbons welling up from within the Earth were reletively easy to combine with sulfates of various metals and other chemicals to obtain energy. Photosynthesis is a more sophisticated process and would have taken more time to come about, it probably wouldn't have been first.

[HydrogenBond]

The word evolve means to make more complex. Evolution can go both ways. That was an ambiguous choice of words. Take a poll among layman and you will see. In this case, the choice of words gives an advantage, since it doesn't reveal the whole story which could seem illogical to many.

 

The use of id instead when ID is not an advantage. It starts you with two strikes against you. It makes things harder. Just saying or suggesting "id" bogs the discussion at the political angle. It is easy to discredit with nothing more name calling. Maybe making life harder is not very intelligent. But I think in terms of literally meaning an intelligent set of principles beyond selective advantage. For example, an energy balance makes sense. Dice are symmetrical so energy is not suppose to make any difference. But we don't have atomic symmetry in life molecules, reactions and configurations, in terms of all things having equal energy so we can just throw the dice.

[Pyrotex]

using the word "intelligence" will ALWAYS beg the question:

 

"What or Who is the possessor of this "intelligence" you speak of?"

 

Inanimate objects cannot be intelligent--like the dice. Even if the operation of throwing dice "makes sense" to you (you being the possessor of intelligence) it's just messy and confusing to try even in a metaphorical way to describe the operation of the dice as the thing possessing the intelligence.

[Buffy]

The word evolve means to make more complex. Evolution can go both ways. That was an ambiguous choice of words.

Actually, no:

Latin ēvolvere, to unroll : ē-, ex-, ex- + volvere, to roll; see wel-2 in Indo-European roots.

1635–45; < L ēvolvere to unroll, open, unfold, equiv. to ē- e- + volvere to roll, turn

 

Unless qualified by "as it refers to the theory of Evolution" I don't think you'll find any definitions that imply "complexity" and even when referring to Evolution, there's little that invokes "increasing complexity" as opposed to simple "change."

 

I think the important thing to realize is that ID is a bundle of somewhat random elements that have historically (well, history of ID being about 5 years at this point) been brought to bear with the goal of "refuting Evolution." Whether that's fair to any of the individual elements is somewhat moot at this point, and I think it behooves any of those elements to try to stand on their own.

 

The concept of id on the other hand is quite vague and as long as its printed with qualifiers and prefacing remarks about it, can be subject to further clarification without the baggage, but that depends on the skill of the presenter....

 

Anyone who tries to make a distinction between education and entertainment doesn't know the first thing about either, :confused:

Buffy

[Galapagos]

Here is an article that might benefit all our POVs:

 

 

 

Read the full article at What Neo-Creationists Get Right -- lessons learned from the Intelligent Design camp

 

from TheScientist.com, magazine of the Life Sciences

 

Anyone who reads this should also read all of the critical response from pandasthumb:

What critics of critics of neo-creationists get wrong: a reply to Gordy Slack - The Panda's Thumb

Is it really true that “science is still in the dark” on the OOL, as Slack said? Not a chance. If we lived in a world where it actually looked like the first living things were as complex or more complex than life today, or where the last common ancestor contained absolutely no evidence of an evolutionary history, or where big obvious puzzles like the interdependency of DNA/RNA/protein had no hint of solution, or where the building blocks of life were completely unrelated to those produced in prebiotic experiments – all of these things would be true, say, on a robotic planet without microscopic life, where robots were replicated by macroscopic assembly performed by other robots, and powered by hooking up to a grid of fusion-fueled power plants – then we could say “science is still in the dark” on the origin of this robotic biosphere. But instead, we have numerous lines of evidence all pointing towards the notion that current life descends from a relatively simple ancestor, and that ancestor descends from a series of even simpler ancestors. Why should any of this evidence exist, if life was poofed into existence all in one step, which is what the creationists/IDers think happened even when they won’t admit it, because they are not brave enough to defend what they actually think? Additionally, why should the remaining puzzles, particularly about the origin of the first replicator, cause any unusual amount of discomfort for scientists? Whether or not that puzzle is solved, the gap between prebiotic experiments and the first replicators (or better yet, pseudoreplicators with statistical inheritance) is a drastically reduced vestige of a gap compared to what the gap looked like in, say, 1950. When you think about it, the creationists’ attempt to insert miraculous divine intervention into this tight little gap which is left is actually pitiful, and a pretty sad commentary on the state that creationism/ID has been reduced to. The verse “And God said, let the NA precursors link together into a short noncoding kinetically favored chain and pseudoreplicate approximately statistically after their kind” just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

 

If anyone has any doubts about the state of OOL science, read the above pandas thumb article.

 

PZ Myers also responded to the article:

Pharyngula: What is wrong with journalists?

 

 

I also personally think Directed Panspermia(referred to as "intelligent design" in previous posts itt) is a very unlikely scenario for two reasons. One, the technology that would be needed for such a process would require a lot of time and resources, and two, I agree with Stephen Hawking when he says primitive life is probably common in the universe, while intelligent life is probably fairly rare. Given the lack of evidence for Directed Panspermia, and what we know about the last universal common ancestor and the prebiotic conditions of Earth(see pandasthumb article above), life forming here independently (or with help via undirected exogenesis/panspermia) is much more likely.

 

Also, Intelligent Design has a very specific definition, and was coined by Christians with a very specific agenda:

Intelligent design - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Intelligent design is the assertion that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."[1][2] It is a modern form of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God that avoids specifying the nature or identity of the designer.[3] The idea was developed by a group of American creationists who reformulated their argument in the creation-evolution controversy to circumvent court rulings that prohibit the teaching of creationism as science.[4][5][6]

 

The only group other than Abrahamic Theists(mainly Christians from The Discovery Institute) that subscribe to ID would be Raelians:

Raëlism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Raëlism, or The Raëlian movement, is a UFO religion founded by a former French sports-car journalist and test driver named Claude Vorilhon. Raëlians believe that Vorilhon, who is known by the movement as Raël, received special knowledge and instruction for mankind from the creators of life on Earth, human-like extraterrestrials called Elohim whose technology enabled them to appear as "angels" or "gods" in the eyes of ancient people. Raëlians believe that previous visitation from Elohim sparked the founding of many major religions humanity knows today.[1]

[...]

Raëlians believe that all life on Earth, humans included, was created scientifically by human-like extra terrestrials that are more scientifically advanced than us, called the Elohim, using DNA synthesis and genetic engineering and thus believe in intelligent design. Throughout the ages, Elohim sent different prophets: Moses, Jesus, Buddha, and many others to guide humanity and to prepare us for the future. Largely left to progress on our own, until the time of the Apocalypse/Revelation when Elohim would send their final messenger and reveal the truth for all to know. Raëlians desire to spread that message and work towards building an Embassy where we can officially welcome the Elohim back, and for the first time in human history, actually understand them for who they are, instead of worshiping them as gods as our primitive ancestors did.[5]

 

:confused:

[Moontanman]

Do we know that for certain?

 

I remembered something I read a short while back that you might find interesting, mechanical energy might have been the first energy source according to this article.

 

Life On Earth May Have Originated As The Organic Filling In A Multilayer Sandwich Of Mica Sheets

ScienceDaily (Dec. 5, 2007) — Life may have begun in the protected spaces inside of layers of the mineral mica, in ancient oceans, according to a new hypothesis.

 

Life On Earth May Have Originated As The Organic Filling In A Multilayer Sandwich Of Mica Sheets

[Pyrotex]

Anyone who reads this should also read all of the critical response from pandasthumb: ...What critics of critics of neo-creationists get wrong: a reply to Gordy Slack - The Panda's Thumb.

If anyone has any doubts about the state of OOL science, read the above pandas thumb article. ...:doh:

Wowee kazowee, Batman!

Thank you for pointing out this critical review. Excellent.

Okay, so the Creationists didn't get anything right.

That seems to be par for their course. :)

[HydrogenBond]

If you look at fossil data, logic says the fossils that are most likely to be found will stem from species or animals with the most units. If one animal has 10,000 units and another only 10 units, the odds will higher us to find fossils of the first scenario. This is common sense but it can be supported with statistics and experiment that uses 10,000 red blocks and 10 blue block in a box. We will pick 50 units.

 

We don't find as many missing links, simple because there may not have been many units. It doesn't mean they didn't exist, only the fossil data will not reflect them since the data is biased toward higher population animals with more units. There is nothing wrong with this, with selective advantage being a good theory to reflect the advantage of those species with more units.

 

With science, theory needs to reflect the data. If the fossil data is biased by population of units, the theory needs to reflect this to take into consideration the preponderance of solid data. This can create a practical problem. The way I look at it, the data we have is not just a random sample of all the species that were present. The sample reflects randomness but within a bias slanted toward species with more units.

 

As an example, say the earth had a major catastrophe. This is hypothetical. One million years later an alien comes back to collect human fossils. One is more likely to find fossil types of humans with more units, if we assume a random fossilization and degradation of all the humans on earth. One will get more fossils of poor people than rich people. Based on this data, one may have to conclude somewhat malnourished humans had selective advantage with genetic drift going in this direction. This would be totally consistent with the hard data and evolutionary theory even if it does not reflect historical reality. But to assume this conclusion is wrong, would contradict the data.

 

Based on this empirical paradox, we need to add logic, if we wish to come to the reality. To get the correct answer, based on historical records the aliens find, they would have adjust the interpretation of the data. They would have to create a new theory so when we use the population biased data we get the old theory.

 

The analogy is special relativity works with unbiased data or any random velocity we chose. While Newtonian works within any random velocity but within the bias of slow velocity. The new theory when reduced to the biased fossil set needs to default down to evolutionary theory. The goal needs to be more logical to predict the results before they appear so the theory can use any data and does not only work with the population biased data. That is my thinking which made we wish to try other things.

[Pyrotex]

The word evolve means to make more complex. Evolution can go both ways. ....

HB,

I'm just guessing here, but your posts make me think that you have been raised in a family, or at least in a local social culture (possibly a church) that has gone to some lengths to raise you to believe that evolution is more or less bogus. Reminds me of my upbringing.

 

Anyway, I say this because of the little things in your posts that keep showing up, like the way you use simple scientific terms, like "evolve" or "complexity" -- much like the ways that creationists insist on using these terms.

 

Creationists are purposeful in crafting their own definitions for these scientific terms and in persuading folks that these are the "real" definitions. So, you might find it interesting to take an hour off, get a college dictionary, put your feet up, and check out the meanings of a dozen or so terms used frequently in evolution.

 

There's an old saying I just discovered:

If a Creationist tells you the sky is blue, go outside and check for yourself.

 

By all means, correct me if I'm wrong.

cheers :)

[questor]

It seems that this thread degenerated into an argument about creationism/deities/god/religion, etc. rather than what I mentioned in my opening

statement. ( quote)''It is obvious that environment influences variation in species, all one has to do is observe the different skin colors in Homo Sapiens.to see these results. These of course are macro variations and we do not know the biochemical reactions in genes that ocurred to cause these differences.''

My request was that anyone who understood the biochemical basis of life, which of necessity yields the mechanisms for evolution as well as any other life process, would explain these processes. This brought a deluge of links which, although interesting and informative did not answer the question. The truth is that currently this information is not known. If it was, then man could create life. We know the building blocks of life, we know the genetic molecule, we know the composition of enabling enzymes,but we can't yet make reproductive life which sustains itself. Without life, there would be no evolution or creationism or any thing else to argue about. Here is an interesting link on the subject: The biochemical basis of life

INMHO creationism has many meanings, the most common of which is tied in to

religion. It seems that most people cannot envision a universe which had some type

of intelligent design without interjecting the god argument. I myself have no way of knowing how the universe came to be, so I will wait for the truth. If it happens that man can make life, I think the god argument will go away, but the creation debate may continue.

When we fully understand the biochemical basis of life we will be able to diagnose, prevent, and treat most genetic disease and malformations.We will also be able to explain the biochemical basis of evolution and life itself.

[Zythryn]

When we fully understand the biochemical basis of life we will be able to diagnose, prevent, and treat most genetic disease and malformations.

 

Does this mean that since I fully understand gravity, I can prevent falling?

Understanding does not equate to the ability to create.

[HydrogenBond]

I started this thinking in the other evolutionary discussion about Darwin. Modern evolutionary theory has a connection to Darwin and the Origin of Species. His observations were based on the final affects of evolution, with selective advantage a good way to correlate the observable data. This was evolution 1.0. Later genetics was added as the cause behind the selective advantage affect. Currently these two have blended to give a good model for evolution. This is evolution 2.0.

 

The next logical step, is evolution 3.0. where we fill in the middle area between genetic cause and the selective advantage affect. In other words, once a new gene appears, through mutations, for example, it first has to be integrated at the cellular level, before the final affect of selective advantage can occur. Just making a new gene does not address how the cell will deal with something that it never saw before, and how it turns this into something stable so it can allow a selective advantage.

 

As an analogy, to get a better feel for this middle step, consider someone who thinks up the idea of a better mousetrap. This is analogous to a new gene. Selective advantage is analogous to when this new invention reaches the market place and is able to compete and gain market share.

 

Between the conception of the idea and the selective advantage in the market place, there is the prototype stage where you build a working device that can demonstrate the concept. Then there is the need to interface this prototype to a production facility, so it can be mass produced in a cost effective way. There is also the need to build up distribution and marketing. When all these steps are satisfied, then we get selective advantage. In version 2.0 we go from conception of a new gene, to mousetrap tycoon, in one step. In version 3.0, we look at the middle steps in more detail.

 

For example, birds evolve feathers. We also know this helps with flight, which is a big selective advantage. We also know the feathers can be traced to genetic changes. The question is, how did the cell go from that new never been seen before gene, which it is not set up yet for production, and put it into production and distribution, so the bird can use it to gain selective advantage?

 

What would happen if there was a good gene, full of potential, but the middle steps have a problem. It will never reach selective advantage. Or say, there is a good gene full of potential, but it needs some basic changes to occur first, it could lay dormant and show up much later. Version 3.0 will create a better bridge between genetic cause the selective advantage affect.

 

Let me give another analogy. The hydrogen auto engine is like a new gene. This is going through its own middle stage but has not yet gained selective advantage in the free market. The reason is, before it can burst onto the scene, we first need to set up a hydrogen fuel infrastructure. The engine may be ready to go, but has to lie dormant until other changes occur. All of a sudden it looks like a just appears, even though it was developed decades earlier.

[Pyrotex]

...For example, birds evolve feathers. We also know this helps with flight, which is a big selective advantage. We also know the feathers can be traced to genetic changes. The question is, how did the cell go from that new never been seen before gene, which it is not set up yet for production, and put it into production and distribution, so the bird can use it to gain selective advantage?....

You posted all that just to raise up the old "where did feathers come from?" diatribe?

 

The origin of the feather was solved some time ago. Feathers were an advantageous modification of scales. The advantage was in heat retention, insulation. Natural selection selected for the ability to tolerate periods of intense cold without adding significant weight (like fat deposits would). The ancestors of birds had feathers long before they started taking to the air.

 

Now can we talk about something else?