Tell me one beneficial mutation example - if there is

[Tormod]

Originally posted by: jasonparker

i always hear the same examples; antibiotics resistance of bacteria, ddt , anemia examples…. These are all invalid.

 

"These are all invalid"...because? Please don't post a link to an e-book as "proof". Our FAQ requires you to back up strange claims with evidence. I have told you before - we do not accept the harunyaha website as proof, and I want you to tell us *which* examples you have heard and *why* they are false.

 

I have warned you about this more than once now. You never follow up my warnings, so one more post like this and we will have to block your membership.

 

You ask for proof of beneficial mutations. I'd like to ask - beneficial for whom? The influenza virus is an example of a virus which is extremely adaptable by mutation. It is obviously beneficial to the flu virus that it can mutate and find new ways to invade and trick immune systems.

 

Some people will be resistent to some kinds of flu, and others to different kinds of flu. Nobody can be resistent to all kinds of flus because the flu *will* mutate. That is why a lot of people get the flu even though they take flu shots. Here in Norway a recent published figure was that about 75% of those who took the shot still caught the flu during the next 6 months or so.

 

That some people are resistant while others are not is also an example of beneficial mutations - for the individuals in question.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: jasonparker

By the way i uggest you to check this before you write " The Collapse of the Theory of Evolution in 20 Questions"

What, is someone paying people to promote this idiotic site? Or is the author afraid to admit it is them and keeps using different names.

 

If you can come up with a valid source, we can discuss it further.

 

and BTW, try "ability to survive out of water".

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: BEAKER

I always wondered (logically of course), that; "if evolution were true, why would anything be the same?" I mean after all, if it all began as a total fluke of unequaled good fortune and imeassurable luck

There is nothing LOGICAL about the ad homenum attack against the concept. In fact is shows a complete lack of reasoned logical approach to it.

 

Evolution had nothing to do with "luck" or "good fortune" any more than our sun bursting into fusion. They both follow the same well ordered and inviolate laws of physics.

that life began in the first place from dead matter,

OK all, repeat after me....

 

Evolution has nothing to do with or say about where the first living cell came from. That is Abiogenesis. People that are educated in what Evolution really is do not make this otherwise common mistake. We get this ignorace of Evolution here all the time. Ignorance is not stupidity. Ignorance just means that you don't KNOW about something. Ignorance is overcome by education.

 

Now you are educated in the differnce between Evolution and Abiogenesis. That is what we strive to do here is educate. If you wish to discuss Abiogenesis, we have threads for that also.

in spite of the overwhealming odds against it;

Life exists, therefore the chances of life existing is 100%. Seems like perfect odds to me.

and that if it has indeed continued to blossom into the incomprehensible varriety and beauty that we see today because of random mutations that have unfolded into things being the way they are; isn't it far more likely that the world that we know should be filled with millions of "missing links" - not just a few.

Filled? Yes in fact it IS. Billions in fact. Every existing, previously existing, creature is a transitional. Anyone with basic understanding of Evolution would know this.

 

Perhaps what you are asking for is a well organized, layer by layer, documented, with picts and text, archeological find with a complete series of perfectly preserved organisms. Seems rather silly to think such a thing would exist actually.

 

Again, with a slight education on the subject, you would not expect such silly things. When you realize that we have only been looking for fossiles to evaluate evolutionary processes for less than 150 years. That we have only used the level of scientific rigor now employed for less than 50 years. That there have been less than 200 fully funded field research efforts in all that time. And almost all of those in only two of the Continents. It is little surpise that we have found much of any. That we have found literally thousands of transitional shows how well established Evolution is.

 

To someone unwilling to understand how evolution works, not having a pict of my father would disprove that I am a decendant of my grandfather. No matter how many, how detailed of a fossile record we find. No matter how well we establish transitionals, a Creationist will always want one more. Unfortunately NATURE did not worry about being able to convince Creationists of how silly such a desire is.

But why don't you have three eyes?

Would you procreate with someone with 3 eyes? Your ancestors didn't either.

Or why dosen't your friend have only one nostril, (you can of course put any varriation you can imagine into this scenario)

Once more we see an attempt to twist how Evolution works into absurd levels. "One Offs" would not have anything to procreate with. Is this confusing to you?

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: Tim_Lou

freethinker is cccccccccccccomin....

Hi Tim. Nice to hear your thinking about me! :-)

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: Tim_Lou

imagine we have 3 eyes, one nostril, and your questions would become "But why don't you have 2 eyes? Or why dosen't your friend have 2 nostril?"

Nice job Tim. Very well put.

 

And a lot shorter than my ramblings!

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: BEAKER

I suppose I am; in a way. What I'm really speaking of is ramdom mutations in a system that has no rhyme nor reason; no created structure and no designer; no intellegence at all to it's amazingly intricate and finely tuned appearance.

 

Tell ya what. Take your favorite monitor. Hold it over the edge on the top of a ten story building and let go of it.

 

Then ask about the random, unstructured, no designer, no creator, no intellegence effect GRAVITY had on it.

 

Did it do what I would predict it to do regardless of the random, unstructured, no designer, no creator, no intellegence effect of GRAVITY?

 

Both Gravity and Evolution have the same set of physical laws to operate in. There is NOTHING random or unstructured about it. Niether needs a designer, creator nor intellegence.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: BEAKER

I do understand the concept. But what defines bad?

Unsuccessful at reproducing and thus not passing that gene on.

What "force" has determined that the end result that we see with all it's beauty and gradure shoud be the only version to survive out of the millions of possile varriants?

Fish eating their newborns as fast as the pop out. Rabbits having to eat their own **** to live. babies born with their brains outside of their skull. This is "beauty and gradure"? The most important organ in our body, our brain, located at too high of a center of gravity with little to no real protection. This is intellegence in design? I doubt that there is a single one of us that could not come up with a more beautiful and grandiose vision.

And that is simple logic.

Simple yes. Logic? Far from it.

[Tim_Lou]

ffffffffffffinally...

Beaker... dont feel discouraged by freethinker... hes always being critical, thats his style. : )

 

"Rabbits having to eat their own **** to live"

..........i saw the S word... :

 

i hope you can come up with an final answer, Beaker. ; )

 

hmm.... off-topic.

[Tormod]

A bit off topic but interesting in light of trying to refute evolution by talking about instant mutations.

 

There are many examples which are not instant but which have taken tens of thousands, often millions, of years to develop.

 

Our big brains come at a huge cost for humanity. It is twofold: first, in order for babies to be able to squeeze through the mother's pelvis they need collapsible skulls which means smaller heads which means undeveloped brains. Whereas baby chimps can cling to their mothers within very short periods after their birth, human babies lack even the most basic of survival instincts. And secondly, because it takes so long for the brains to develop and for the individual to acheive sexual maturity, adults have to spend up to 18-20 years of their life bringing up their kids. That is second to none in the animal kingdom.

 

That our society can survive even though most adults spend more than 1/3rd of their lives tending to the needs of the young is incredible. So there must be some evolutionary advantage to it. Why can a newborn horse stand up after mere minutes, while an infant human takes about 12-18 months to learn to walk? Why can some animals communicate almost immediately after birth, while babies can't utter anything but gurgling for a long time? Because our huge brain capacity takes an enormous toll on our existence. That is the price we pay to be smart. It is not inevitable that humanity will continue to survive with these traits.

 

Considering we live in a very polluted world where a lot of the margins are crossed (like the level of NOx in the athmosphere, and the level of carbon soaked up in trees, oceans, and rocks) a major volcanic eruption or asteroid impact could easily make life difficult for 20-30 years. If the catastrophe wiped out, say, half the human population, ruined our infrastructure, darkened the skies, and polluted the air - how long would humaity survive? It could be over in a decade. THAT'S what evolution is about. Because suddenly human beings - so excellent at adapting - would no longer be able to adapt because the environment would be too harsh for our kinds.

 

Some humans would inevitably survive, though, and in a few generations there would probably be no need for the incredible brains. Speech could degenerate. We could grow smaller. We would have no need for advanced technology (and nobody would be around to build it) so we'd have to relearn all the skills from the bottom up - farming, making stone tools, how to kill game for food.

 

And with that, the human species would no longer be the dominant species on this planet. It would have lasted perhaps a hundred thousand years, out of which perhaps 5,000 were marked by high civilzation. Compare that to the 100 million years of the rule of the dinosaurs. Or the longevity of the crocodile. Or the sea turtle.

 

In the long run, humans - and the other primates - are not the ones who have been around for too long, and there is really nothing for us to say we would be around for too many more millennia.

[BEAKER]

Take your favorite monitor. Hold it over the edge on the top of a ten story building and let go of it.

 

This would seem a more fitting display of the practical application of evolution in light of the law of entropy.

[GT(N)T]

"But why don't you have three eyes? Or why dosen't your friend have only one nostril, (you can of course put any varriation you can imagine into this scenario) and why arn't these types of atributes seen all over the world in greater numbers than those of us who have been fortunate enough to end up "normal"."

 

Perhaps because if you had three eyes you would have a harder time than a normal person in attracting a mate and would thus tend to have fewer offspring.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: GT(N)T

Perhaps because if you had three eyes you would have a harder time than a normal person in attracting a mate and would thus tend to have fewer offspring.

It didn't help poor Blinky at all!

 

[Stargazer]

Originally posted by: BEAKER

Take your favorite monitor. Hold it over the edge on the top of a ten story building and let go of it.

 

This would seem a more fitting display of the practical application of evolution in light of the law of entropy.

 

What do you mean?

[Tim_Lou]

maybe something to do with entropy?

 

well, the interaction of organisms do not violate the 2nd law of theormdynamics at all, since the sun giving heat to the earth is already a general increases in entropy.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: Tim_Lou

the sun giving heat to the earth is already a general increases in entropy.

DECREASES entropy. (or the tendancy to?, which I believe was an extensive discussion previously)

[TeleMad]

Beaker: But why don't you have three eyes? Or why dosen't your friend have only one nostril, (you can of course put any varriation you can imagine into this scenario) and why arn't these types of atributes seen all over the world in greater numbers than those of us who have been fortunate enough to end up "normal". These types of varriations shouldn't be enough to stop the propigation of such mutations, in spite of the deified theory of "survival of the fittest".

 

Instead we see nothing of the kind.

 

We don't see anything like that? You can read about many things like that in "Mutants: On Genetic Variety and the Human Body." Here's part of one of the reader's reviews...

 

”For example, Carl Herman Unthan was a violin virtuoso by age twenty, although he had no arms. Of course, not all such mutants are so successful. Harry Eastlack had a defect that told his body to make bone whenever it made any repair, so that bruises and tears would turn into bone, not healed flesh. The stillborn babies here are strange indeed. One has a second developed mouth in its forehead. Another child was born with over twenty half-developed fetuses in his brain. The book, however, is far from a chamber of horrors. Even the most bizarre of the mutants do show us things about the process of becoming and being a human creature. Conjoined twins, for instance, are closely examined here in many ways for many lessons, like how our developing bodies can know left from right. The deformities in limbs show the importance of embryonic limb-buds, a signaling protein called "sonic hedgehog," and "hox" genes that are the same ones that help keep our vertebral segments orderly. The same hox genes work to make the segments in worms. Leroi writes of the "breathtaking similarity" living creatures have in such arrangements, as evolution has built variations on the same basic plan. "We are, in many ways, merely worms writ large."

 

There are pygmies and dwarfs here, and giants, and men / women of intermediate sex, albinos, piebalds, cyclopes, and families covered all over in hair.” (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00030KOIK/qid=1101187117/sr=8-2/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i2_xgl14/103-1920936-6551818?v=glance&s=books&n=507846)

[Freethinker]

Ya but are all mutations genetic?

 

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :-)

 

Take the concept of all these mutations we have "seen" and think about the fact that some 65% of all fertilized eggs do not come to term, with the primary reason being the resultant genetic combination exceeds acceptable limits and the body rejects it. Imagine how extreme some of these genetic combinations might be if brought to term.