Evolution

[Raptor]

r

I had a quick look at your profile nn, or should I call you 23? If your a girl, you look quite nice, if your a bloke, forget I said that.

evolution, it appears that the arguement is a progression of species, onwardly going into the future. But what is the purpose? Is it satisfying some unwritten necessity or law?

There is no purpose, there is nothing it's trying to fulfill, it's not a conscious decision, it just simply happens.

Say we have a wild dog, it gives birth to a litter of ten puppies. Eight of these puppies have thin fur, two have thick fur; and it's a very long and cold winter. Which puppies are likely to survive the winter? Right. The two with thick fur. So which puppies will grow and give birth to the next generation? The two that survived...and so the next generation will have the thicker fur because they inherited it from the parents. The genes for thinner fur will eventually be filtered out as the dogs with thin fur aren't able to survive.

What the bloody hell are we doing with species that have totally ignored evolution? (dragonflies, crocodiles, etc)

Just because they've stayed relatively similar doesn't mean they haven't evolved. But they've just stayed so similar because there aren't any factors pushing them to change.

[MaiTino]

r

I had a quick look at your profile nn, or should I call you 23? If your a girl, you look quite nice, if your a bloke, forget I said that. Listen, I kicked this off simply because , on a personal level, I just think macro-evo doesn't ring true. For a theory to work, it needs to account to everything it is supposed to affect. Eg, gravity pulls, not some objects,but 'all' objects. (Now why it does , and what is its power source? is another thread away) In evolution, it appears that the arguement is a progression of species, onwardly going into the future. But what is the purpose? Is it satisfying some unwritten necessity or law? What the bloody hell are we doing with species that have totally ignored evolution? (dragonflies, crocodiles, etc). Anyway I don't think we'll ever have an answer, so do you want to talk about the Beatles or some other group?

hmmm, wouldnt the argument then be that perhaps they didnt evolve because they did not need to? in someways, are all animals not evolutionary left overs?

Edited April 6, 2007 by nn23

[MaiTino]

hmmm, and i dont know how the others feel, but i find it a little difficult to decifer your point when you quote somebody elses post without specifying why? Are you in agreement with them? What part do you agree with? To whos enquirey are you applying the quote? Blueboy to me you are not making an awful lot of sence, and even if this is because of my own stupidity, i am willing to learn if only you give me the information.

[Raptor]

Even if this is because of my own stupidity, i am willing to learn if only you give me the information.

Nah I'm just as confused as you are.

[blueboy]

Carini, I get your drift. But I think it is also the case that plants evolve. If that is true, in order to survive, would not(in the case of the Galapogos islands) the food source of the plant evolve, so it would be out of the reach of the tortoises?

[blueboy]

Mutations occur to individuals, which are then able to be passed on to offspring. Whether it occurs in the mother or the father is irrelevant, and no, it doesn't need to occur in both. Mutated genes can be accepted, that doesn't mean that they're going to work.

Humans only split recently, and different nationalities have in fact evolved slight differences. Had they been completely isolated for a longer period of time, speciation could occur.

[ReignStarz]

"Lets face it, Macro- evolution is a load of hogwash. There's no mechanism that can be recognised for an organism to want to shift from it's comfortable 'self' into something it probably doesn't want to be. Now Micro-evolution, what a fantastic concept; allow your creations to flow with the tide, as long as the improvements are beneficial. As for the weakest, allow intelect to evolve(in the micro sense of course)so it can have an exiting existence looking at ways to improve and put right those who are weak.

We're all too frightened to ackowledge it, but I think it's about time we grew up and realised Darwin should have stayed on his Beagle and invented another theory. Give it a few years and unlike the geological strata, links will be made making Macro evolution the Norse god of yesteryear. Brilliant concept , but totally flawed. If you get in touch Richard, I'm not a creationist, in the derogatory sense you'll no doubt put it, but just some one who thinks evolution is todays opium for the masses, limiting their total existence to three score and ten. I don't personally know whats what, but if my mrs had a genetic mutation Im sure I wouldn't want to share it with her,(even if I could)"

That sounds extremely wack..

Please correct me if im wrong but. Macro-Evolution is an ACCIDENT. Things just dont go from comfortable to "okay I want to merge with this". It happens by luck and chance.

Second off.

Micro-Evolution is wack, you cant just sit back and let things "Evolve" in their enviroment and play no role...So lets take away medicine,Gene therapy,Doctors, All the things that help us stay alive... And lets watch our enviroment "Evolve" .....That sounds pretty darwinish to me. Survival of the fittest. It doesnt happen bro.

Do you know how long it would take to just let micro-evolution to work...At this point I dont think it would.

[Raptor]

Mutations occur to individuals, which are then able to be passed on to offspring. Whether it occurs in the mother or the father is irrelevant, and no, it doesn't need to occur in both. Mutated genes can be accepted, that doesn't mean that they're going to work.

Humans only split recently, and different nationalities have in fact evolved slight differences. Had they been completely isolated for a longer period of time, speciation could occur.

Yes, that is what I said.

[MaiTino]

Carini, I get your drift. But I think it is also the case that plants evolve. If that is true, in order to survive, would not(in the case of the Galapogos islands) the food source of the plant evolve, so it would be out of the reach of the tortoises?

But how does this contradict the point of macro evolution?

edit:oopsy, its moved on loads since i wrote this, i'll just read through

Edited April 6, 2007 by nn23

[MaiTino]

Yes, that is what I said.

I'm with ya dude

Blueboy, if you want to discuss something, you need to let us know what it is, were not psychic

What part of raptors statement did you agree/disagree with and why? its quite simple.

Edited April 6, 2007 by nn23

[Raptor]

Carini, I get your drift. But I think it is also the case that plants evolve. If that is true, in order to survive, would not(in the case of the Galapogos islands) the food source of the plant evolve, so it would be out of the reach of the tortoises?

The plants do also evolve, it's essentially an arms race, like what we have with technology: You make a sword, your enemy makes a shield; you make a gun, your enemy makes a bulletproof vest.

Plants have evolved loads of different ways to try and prevent herbivory, they've got spines (thorns), they have poisonous chemicals. A group of plants called Hollow-thorn Acacias even evolved a mutualistic relationship with ants, which protect the plant from herbivores. But the herbivores will keep evolving new features to get past these defences, it won't ever end.

Keep in mind that some plants will also try to attract herbivores, what do you think fruit is for? They're just vessels used to transport seeds, and animals are needed to help spread them.

Edited April 6, 2007 by Raptor X7

[MaiTino]

Lets face it, Macro- evolution is a load of hogwash. There's no mechanism that can be recognised for an organism to want to shift from it's comfortable 'self' into something it probably doesn't want to be.

Is that what Macro evolution claims to be? I thought that the mechanism was actually better known as natural selection=adaption which makes macro quite relavent. I was of the understanding that macro evolution was the process by which micro evolution takes place.

Now Micro-evolution, what a fantastic concept; allow your creations to flow with the tide, as long as the improvements are beneficial. As for the weakest, allow intelect to evolve(in the micro sense of course)so it can have an exiting existence looking at ways to improve and put right those who are weak.

I'm not sure that macro denies or contradicts this...indeed perhaps some schools of thought that incorporate the macro perspective do but in general, i think it supports this. I think the only difference from what i am able to deduce is that the micro gives more specification of the adaptions that took place from species to species.

We're all too frightened to ackowledge it, but I think it's about time we grew up and realised Darwin should have stayed on his Beagle and invented another theory. Give it a few years and unlike the geological strata, links will be made making Macro evolution the Norse god of yesteryear. Brilliant concept , but totally flawed.

Actually Darwin never disagreed with microevolution...

Darwin, on the other hand, saw no fundamental difference between microevolution and macroevolution. He asserted that "Certainly no clear line of demarcation has as yet been drawn between species and sub-species — that is, the forms which in the opinion of some naturalists come very near to, but do not quite arrive at, the rank of species: or, again, between subspecies and well-marked varieties, or between lesser varieties and individual differences. These differences blend into each other by an insensible series; and a series impresses the mind with the idea of an actual passage." (Darwin, 77)...

( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macroevolution )

If you get in touch Richard, I'm not a creationist, in the derogatory sense you'll no doubt put it, but just some one who thinks evolution is todays opium for the masses, limiting their total existence to three score and ten. I don't personally know whats what, but if my mrs had a genetic mutation Im sure I wouldn't want to share it with her,(even if I could)

Yes, there do appear to be many different perspectives on evolutionary change, but they are generally in acceptance that it took place, they only seem to clash on the prospect of how. And these clashes are only between perspectives that take things to extremes. Which extreme perspective are you disagreeing with Blueboy? To simply say macro is not definative for there are many schools of the macro perspective that encompass the micro perspective and vice verca. Edited April 6, 2007 by nn23

[carini]

Carini, I get your drift. But I think it is also the case that plants evolve. If that is true, in order to survive, would not(in the case of the Galapogos islands) the food source of the plant evolve, so it would be out of the reach of the tortoises?

Yes they are in an ever evolving state. Now these plants might not grow out of reach of the turtles though. Say you have a plant that produces berries. The problem is that only the berries that are actually eaten by an animal actually can grow. So only seeds that are pooped out in a heap of turtle crap have enough nutrition surrounding them to grow. This would keep those plants that have berries within range of the turtles mouths breeding. Its like a feedback loop. Plants with berries that are too high for the turtles to eat dont reproduce because they cant get their seeds into a pile of turtle poop. Turtles with necks that are too short dont survive or get as much nutrition as their counterparts with longer necks and therefore arent as able to pass their genes on to the next generation.

This is a very simplified case.

In response to your other replies, evolution is always occuring. It never stops. Just becasue the body form of a creature hasnt changed dramatically over millions of years doesnt mean its not evolving.

[blueboy]

Ok , Ok, I'm beaten. Where's your church? One final flurry though, it is stated now that it is thought that life was kicked off from space (metiorites, etc). I was wondering how the evolutionary process worked there, before arriving on planet earth? Any thoughts?

[blueboy]

"Lets face it, Macro- evolution is a load of hogwash. There's no mechanism that can be recognised for an organism to want to shift from it's comfortable 'self' into something it probably doesn't want to be. Now Micro-evolution, what a fantastic concept; allow your creations to flow with the tide, as long as the improvements are beneficial. As for the weakest, allow intelect to evolve(in the micro sense of course)so it can have an exiting existence looking at ways to improve and put right those who are weak.

We're all too frightened to ackowledge it, but I think it's about time we grew up and realised Darwin should have stayed on his Beagle and invented another theory. Give it a few years and unlike the geological strata, links will be made making Macro evolution the Norse god of yesteryear. Brilliant concept , but totally flawed. If you get in touch Richard, I'm not a creationist, in the derogatory sense you'll no doubt put it, but just some one who thinks evolution is todays opium for the masses, limiting their total existence to three score and ten. I don't personally know whats what, but if my mrs had a genetic mutation Im sure I wouldn't want to share it with her,(even if I could)"

That sounds extremely wack..

Please correct me if im wrong but. Macro-Evolution is an ACCIDENT. Things just dont go from comfortable to "okay I want to merge with this". It happens by luck and chance.

Second off.

Micro-Evolution is wack, you cant just sit back and let things "Evolve" in their enviroment and play no role...So lets take away medicine,Gene therapy,Doctors, All the things that help us stay alive... And lets watch our enviroment "Evolve" .....That sounds pretty darwinish to me. Survival of the fittest. It doesnt happen bro.

Do you know how long it would take to just let micro-evolution to work...At this point I dont think it would.

Crikey mate, get your calculator out and try and work out how many ACCIDENTS it would need to account for every living thing on the earth. And, Oh, I don't know about your part of the world, but ACCIDENTS usually end in disability or death in England.

[carini]

Ok , Ok, I'm beaten. Where's your church? One final flurry though, it is stated now that it is thought that life was kicked off from space (metiorites, etc). I was wondering how the evolutionary process worked there, before arriving on planet earth? Any thoughts?

The beginning of how life started is still a mystery to everyone. No one knows how or where it started. It's very possible that a few ancient cells remained encased within in asteroid or meteorite that broke off a primitive planet a long time ago and then crashed into earth. I personally dont think this is the case though.

I think that life will arise, as a consequence of natural laws at work in the universe, anywhere it can. There are 70 million billion stars visible to telescopes, thats 70000000000000000000000. Many more we cant see. Life producing conditions exist elsewhere in the universe. We arent alone.

Evolution keeps life going in the face of an ever changing environment. The process was exactly the same before it arrived on earth, if thats the case.

[aussiemermaid]

My Aunty, who works in the catholic church asked me to answer these:

Why, if we have evolved from monkeys and other animals from other things, then why havent we evolved any more? Why havent the monkeys evolved into other human forms? Why are we still seeing monkeys in the zoo??

Just something to think about

[Cradle of Fish]

My Aunty, who works in the catholic church asked me to answer these:

Why, if we have evolved from monkeys and other animals from other things, then why havent we evolved any more? Why havent the monkeys evolved into other human forms? Why are we still seeing monkeys in the zoo??

Just something to think about

We share a common ancestor with the apes, and going further back a common ancestor with monkeys, we arent evolved from the monkeys you see today. The common ancestor we're all descended from would be alot like a monkey though.

The reason we haven't evolved any more is because we haven't had the time, and frankly we may have hit an evolutionary dead end because our societies ultimately defeat survival of the fittest.

[Raptor]

We are still evolving, so are monkeys and every other animal in the world.

Why haven't monkeys evolved in to more human forms? Well, why would they? They evolve to suit their own needs, not to fulfill some sort of a goal to become a human.

We didn't evolve directly from the monkeys you see today, but we all came from a common ancestor. Humans are just one branch of a much greater tree; with other primates making up the rest. We're all evolving individually, to suit our own needs.

Our ancestors benefited from being able to stand up straight so they evolved bipedality (two legs), they benefited from intelligence and so evolved larger brains, and so on.

While the ancestors of marmosets for example, benefited from having stronger tails, sharper teeth etc.

[aussiemermaid]

I know that!!!

But why arent we seeing it? Shouldnt something have happened to us since the roman empire?

This was my aunties argument, im just bringing in other points of views to have a look at, to explore other questions!!!

Ive learnt what you said in Biology, and i am not disputing the evidence. My aunties argum,ent was, why aftyer this long have we "stopped"- and i know your propbably thinking that evolution occurs after long periods of time- but how long, and why so long??

[Raptor]

I know that!!!

But why arent we seeing it? Shouldnt something have happened to us since the roman empire?

This was my aunties argument, im just bringing in other points of views to have a look at, to explore other questions!!!

Ive learnt what you said in Biology, and i am not disputing the evidence. My aunties argum,ent was, why aftyer this long have we "stopped"- and i know your propbably thinking that evolution occurs after long periods of time- but how long, and why so long??

Humans have technology which pretty much allows us to work past natural selection, at least far better than any previous species.

In the wild animals which are weak are unable to survive and so their genes are slowly removed from the gene pool; but with humans that doesn't happen, we have medication and technology to ensure a great number of people survive, so the gene pool isn't being filtered out. Get what I mean? Although that's not entirely true as natural selection does still have an effect, which can be seen by looking at changing allele frequencies.

If you're talking about obvious physical changes, well, how many 2000 year old Romans have you seen to compare?

Edited April 7, 2007 by Raptor X7

[carini]

2000 years since the roman empire is nothing, its like a raindrop in an ocean. It takes thousands of years for small changes to affect a species makeup and hundred of thousands to millions of years for a species to evolve so much that it can be cant even be recognized as being related to its predecessors.

Take a a look at this. This is a description of the timeline of earths history as a 24 hour clock. It took 4 billion years for animals to evolve backbones. Or on this clock 21+ hours out of a 24 hour day. Now the first evidence of life we have is from about 3.5 billion years ago in the form of stromatolites. So it took about 3 billion years for life to evolve a spine.

http://www.amnh.org/education/resources/rf...pages/clock.htm

[Gowza]

we haven't stopped, if you look at the current generation of teenagers, most of them are taller than previous generations. but it's much slower now because these days with the technology we have we are able to change the environment to suit us which then means that our physiology doesn't need to adapt as much (e.g. if someone lives in a cold environment all we have to do is put on more clothes or put the heating on, as opposed to our bodies adapting and growing fur). why does it take so long? well it's been said already in this thread, each generation plays a part and makes a change but usually it's a very small change, it also takes awhile to phase out those who have the physiological disadvanatage, especially since the human population is so big in numbers. if we have a major natural or man made disaster which forces us to change then things might move along quicker but as it is atm we have no real need to have any major changes.

[aussiemermaid]

Humans have technology which pretty much allows us to work past natural selection, at least far better than any previous species.

In the wild animals which are weak are unable to survive and so their genes are slowly removed from the gene pool; but with humans that doesn't happen, we have medication and technology to ensure a great number of people survive, so the gene pool isn't being filtered out. Get what I mean? Although that's not entirely true as natural selection does still have an effect, which can be seen by looking at changing allele frequencies.

If you're talking about obvious physical changes, well, how many 2000 year old Romans have you seen to compare?

Lol, that what i was taught in biology! And i can see, and almost agree with that theory (as it still is a theory isnt it???? as it cant be proved without flaws....?) Anyway, there are always many relgious people who will come back for a fight, (like my aunty).

I was only making a different point, with different views!!!

I agree with what has been said, but still blieve there was a creator to put it all their to begin with, even though something may of had to make the creator!!! It just gets too confusing!!

[Raptor]

Anyway, there are always many relgious people who will come back for a fight, (like my aunty).

I was only making a different point, with different views!!!

I don't necessarily disagree, I'm just here to answer questions.

If anything I guess I'm agnostic. There might have been a creator served as a catalyst for the universe's creation, or even one who's watching everything right now, or maybe not at all. I just don't believe any one knows yet, religion was created by man.

What ever the truth is, it's not going to be in the form of religion or mythology. It'll be part of science.