Wednesday, November 11, 2009 | Science : TGSOE | print version

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Darwinopterus v Dawkins

by Jonathan Sarfati - Creation Ministries International

CLICK HERE to see more about Richard Dawkins' new book The Greatest Show on Earth

Note that the review starts on one website and ends on another. Comments are on the link to the first half of the article. Also the main site http://talk.thinkingmatters.org.nz/ makes for some interesting browsing.
http://talk.thinkingmatters.org.nz/2009/darwinopterus-v-dawkins/

Prominent antitheist and self-styled “atheist” Richard Dawkins has written a new book, The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution. Ironically, he admits about all his previous pro-evolution books:

“Looking back on these books, I realized that the evidence for evolution is nowhere explicitly set out, and that it seemed like a good gap to close.”

Naturally, CMI is preparing a book to answer Dawkins’ latest. In a chapter about alleged bad design, Dawkins had a section about the loss of wings and evolution of features like halteres, the little drumstick-like stabilizers behind the one pair of wings on flies.

To set the stage, Dawkins related the theory of English evolutionist (and former debate partner1) John Maynard Smith (1920–2004) about the evolution of flying creatures. Maynard-Smith argued that flying creatures evolved first with high stability and low maneuverability (e.g. with the long pterosaur tail or an insect’s long abdomen). Then they shortened, which caused lower stability but greater maneuverability, and they evolved advanced sensory equipment to stabilize by fast reactions (e.g. larger semicircular canals in pterosaurs or halteres in flies).

Even when Dawkins wrote, there were already dragonflies in the ointment, so to speak, because they have both long bodies (stability) but are also highly maneuverable and have advanced navigation systems. Furthermore, even known pterosaur types didn’t fit this theory, as Dawkins admitted in passing. But after writing our response to this Dawkins “Just-so” story, this new pterosaur turned up, and it adds a final demolition point. This new pterosaur, which to be fair Dawkins could not have known about when he wrote, has the stability of the long tail as well as the advanced correction features before loss of stability supposedly drove the selection for the advanced flying skills.

As a sneak peek, to show that we are indeed rebutting Dawkins’ claims, here is a draft section from our forthcoming book answering The Greatest Show on Earth:
...
Continue reading
http://creation.com/richard-dawkins-v-darwinopterus

Posted: Wednesday, November 11, 2009 | Permalink

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1. Comment #431062 by Follow Peter Egan on November 11, 2009 at 1:48 pm

Oh no!!

Oh, Richard. What can I say£ You must feel a complete fool. You should have consulted CMI before going into print.

:-D

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2. Comment #431063 by zeerust2000 on November 11, 2009 at 1:54 pm

we agree with Darwin and Dawkins that flightless birds (at least most of them) descended from flying birds, losing their ability to fly. Once again, this is post-Fall devolution, not evolution

Right off the bat, Sarfati is commiting the error of assuming that evolution means progress in a given direction. For some reason he assumes that since some birds have evolved in the direction of flightlessness, then this somehow is not "evolution" at all. Even though he may well have read TGSOE, he clearly has not understood it. The question is, is this lack of insight or just wilfull misunderstanding. Personally, I can't be bothered deciding.

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3. Comment #431064 by Border Collie on November 11, 2009 at 1:54 pm

Oh, good grief ... Every time I think I've seen the bottom of the well ...

Other Comments by Border Collie

4. Comment #431066 by Peacebeuponme on November 11, 2009 at 1:59 pm

self-styled "atheist"

What a strange attempt at insult. Is there any other way to be an atheist?

It's not like Richard is bragging. I mean "self-styled 'Nutritionist'", or "self-styled corporate improvement guru" would make sense in trying to insult people with made-up expertise. It just cannot be applied to atheists.

A terribly thick person has written this piece.

Other Comments by Peacebeuponme

5. Comment #431067 by Stewart Cowan on November 11, 2009 at 1:59 pm

zeerust2000,

I think Dr Sarfati is saying that flightlessness is due to a loss of information in the genome. It is 'evolution', but not the uphill evolution required for the TofE to be feasible.

Has anyone read "Genetic Entropy & the Mystery of the Genome" by John C Sanford?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0981631606/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=471057153&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=1599190028&pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_r=0BKHVM94PMRT0W3WEN52

Other Comments by Stewart Cowan

6. Comment #431068 by scoobie on November 11, 2009 at 2:00 pm

All the evidence points to us having been made by the baby jebus sticking us together in modules. (no really, he actually claims this).

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7. Comment #431070 by zeerust2000 on November 11, 2009 at 2:05 pm

Stewart Cowan:

Why should flightlessness represent loss of genetic information? To we humans, who wish we could fly, it seems a pity, but flightless birds are doing just fine as they are. These concepts of "uphill" and "downhill" evolution are purely human concepts projected onto our view of the natural world.

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8. Comment #431072 by Pilot22A on November 11, 2009 at 2:07 pm

One almost feels the author's terror, at the devil sucking the faith and belief from his soul while reading Dawkins book.

The fact is, evolution accounts for these types of people. A million years ago some wild animal would have eaten them, thus deleting them from our gene pool, and the meat keeping the wild animal alive to pass on it's superior DNA.

Since the chances of being eaten by a wild animal has diminished today, freeways, cars, planes and trains have filled that evolutionary gap.

I refuse to feel sorry for these wacko's any more.

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9. Comment #431073 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 2:08 pm

safarti says

Dawkins’ book is full of straw-man arguments, with example after example of adaptation by mutations and natural selection that supposedly “prove evolution” (plus lots of “Just-so” story telling). But creationist biologists have long accepted the reality of mutations and natural selection (see Mutations Q&A and Natural selection Q&A), but understand that they are incapable of creating any of the vast amounts of novel genetic information required for goo-to-you evolution to be believable. Richard Dawkins’ “proof” of evolution in The Greatest Show on Earth is nothing of the kind.

what a prat, funny how safarti says that creationist biologists understand mutation and selection but that theres no capacity for novel genertic information for goo-to-you (wow, what a great bit of word play to help the creationists ages 9-90 understand that) well plainly there WAS a capacity for novel information as things did evolve as he suggests, the BIG problem of course is just how does safarti know that that novel information ISNT natural and actually designed, he simply cannot, he claims mutation and selection are there but i could equally claim that each and every mutation and selection was specifically designed/implemented by an intelligence and therefore not naturally possible either, as soon as any ID proponent insists there is a designer they are not in a position to know what is/could have been/isnt designed and as they cannot distinguish between a grain of sand being designed and a bird they have to admit its unknowable and therefore an article of faith.

using safartis reasoning i could claim that each and every facet of the universe from god itself to the precise shape and smell of a babies first poop is by definition created by that god and so actually considered supernatural, its just that the 'this cannot be tested as science' idea doesnt seem to be understood by the likes of safarti.

and as for all this 'proof' well safarti clearly knows his audience is thick as two short planks, as popping things into little marks like '' means that dawkins is wrong, right?

proofs, no, explanations that consider the evidence and still fit into the theory, yes.

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10. Comment #431074 by Stewart Cowan on November 11, 2009 at 2:09 pm

zeerust,

"flightless birds are doing just fine as they are"

Yes, the ones who lost the ability to fly were obviously at an advantage and so they were the ones who survived in their particular habitats.

Losing the ability to fly is not necessarily due to an uphill mutation, the kind that the TofE is dependent upon to merit being taken seriously.

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11. Comment #431075 by darwinschurch on November 11, 2009 at 2:10 pm

How can he write an article on something he obviously doesn't understand? Seriously! Clutching at straws.

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12. Comment #431077 by zeerust2000 on November 11, 2009 at 2:12 pm

Further to my last post, does the fact the we humans can no longer swing from tree to tree with the grace of a gibbon mean that we too have "devolved" downhill? Positing arbitrary goals as a requirement of "feasibility" for evolution betrays a very, very deep misunderstanding of the subject.

Edit: Stewart Cowan: Could you define "uphill mutation" please?

Other Comments by zeerust2000

13. Comment #431078 by fossil-fish on November 11, 2009 at 2:14 pm

Devolution??? Haven't they ever seen a penguin swim? Or a flightless cormorant catch fish underwater?

What are they trying to do exactly? Remove a mountain of scientific evidence with a tea spoon.

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14. Comment #431079 by Jos Gibbons on November 11, 2009 at 2:14 pm

These people are a joke. They think you refute evolution by natural selection as the explanation of the sequence of pterosaurs in the fossil record by showing one hypothesis about the sequence was wrong. (Not that they DID, since the two features have not been shown arising in reverse order; our fossils don't tell us their order or simultaneity yet. In fact, fossils cannot prove simultaneity, but creationists always act as if they have.) OK, maybe the early functions of flight weren't what we expected. So? There are thousands of fossil species; we're bound to make a few inaccurate guesses. The real question for creationists is why pterosaurs show gradualism at all. Umpteen creations?

And they think proposing a small minority of species were punished by God with flightlessness (though not winglessness, which God could have really used to scupper scientists!) for the fruit-eating transgressions of Adam and Eve, but not the rest of the bird species, is an adequate response to science's explanation, even though the creationists' alternative is untestable, hence ad hoc - and they then have the nerve to say it's everyone else who's blinded by religious commitments! Where's the EVIDENCE that ostriches were punished this way in the Fall? Genesis 3 doesn't count.

And they keep flogging that dead horse of some changes in the DNA's information being "losses", some being "gains", and evolution requiring "gains" but only losses have been observed. (We've observed point ADDITION in nylonase evolution, not to mention many other similar consequences of gene duplication. Is THAT enough of a gain for you?)

How do they know that kakapo flightlessness is "clearly recent"? Maybe it's only clear if you think creation was recent. They insist penguin swimming is similar to airborne flight, even though it's clear no wings can do both. Why, creationists, did God design some birds for swimming and most for flight, using wings in both cases, but wings in anything else (mammals, insects) only for flying and not for swimming? Why should the fact that halteres are functional be contrary to evolution? Their functions being DIFFERENT from those of modern wings is evidence FOR evolution. But don't expect that to be understood by people who complain that 160 million years ago was too young in the 165 to 150 million year period (even though it's actually older than most of the period!) or who clearly haven't tried to understand the module idea in terms of pleiotropy, polygeny and gene pools.

Yet somehow, what the most ingenious human designers can't achieve with bulky systems, was programmed into the tiny dragnfly brain without any intelligence involved at all!

Yes, 4 billion years of natural selection can outcompete a few years or decades of human aeronautics and AI, just as a few hours of genetic alogirthms and similar evolutionary computation technology can save years of R&D in modern industry. These people need to learn to understand how unimportant intelligence is when you have techniques like simulated annealing at your disposal.

Also, why do they make Dawrinopterus such an anti-Dawkins thing, if it was unknown when he wrote his book? These people just want to make their response to RD personal. Usually they make things anti-Darwin in a similar manner. Naturally, this time they were anti-RD to respond to his book. I guess "Darwinopterus v Darwin" would have looked silly ...

Other Comments by Jos Gibbons

15. Comment #431080 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 2:16 pm

Once again, this is post-Fall devolution, not evolution

Post-Fall? As in the 'Adam and Eve' myth?

But we're talking science here, so why bring fairy tales into it?

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16. Comment #431081 by Jos Gibbons on November 11, 2009 at 2:17 pm

Stewart Cowan,

please explain what an "uphill mutation" is, so we can understand why: (i) the TOE requires it; (ii) they don't exist. I won't ask anything too demanding, like you answering those 2 questions for us, or explaining what "the" TOE means (it gets updated, you know). But at least say what makes a mutation "uphill" so we can see how it relates to evolving either flight or flightlessness.

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17. Comment #431082 by zeerust2000 on November 11, 2009 at 2:20 pm

Comment #431074 by Stewart Cowan
Yes, the ones who lost the ability to fly were obviously at an advantage and so they were the ones who survived in their particular habitats.

In other words....they evolved.

Other Comments by zeerust2000

18. Comment #431084 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 2:20 pm

Stewart Cowan -

Are you out of your depth, again?

Did you not bother reading "The Blind Watchmaker" or "The Greatest Show on Earth"?

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19. Comment #431085 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 2:21 pm

I think Dr Sarfati is saying that flightlessness is due to a loss of information in the genome. It is 'evolution', but not the uphill evolution required for the TofE to be feasible.

again, clearly there is evidence of 'uphill' evolution through time, i dont understand creationists say it cant happen, because it patently DID and they know it did, they simply claim that a designer did it.

I simply cannot understand why this is an argument they use. they claim that info cannot increase but then say info did increase but because of god, as if they can somehow differentiate between what is natural and 'supernatural' wow, that is a mighty claim indeed. the insertion of god is just an addition they want to include because it fits their requirement for needing the assurance of life after death.

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20. Comment #431086 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 2:29 pm

Naturally, CMI is preparing a book to answer Dawkins’ latest. In a chapter about alleged bad design, Dawkins had a section about the loss of wings and evolution of features like halteres, the little drumstick-like stabilizers behind the one pair of wings on flies.

I wonder what the CMI will have to say about Richard's other examples in the chapter entitled "History Written All Over Us", which explains the nonsensical "design" of the recurrent laryngeal nerve, the vas deferens and the backbone.

Stewart, any comments on the recurrent laryngeal nerve and its elongated detour?

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21. Comment #431087 by godsbelow on November 11, 2009 at 2:29 pm

"The argument might impress Dawkins’ gullible choir in the Church of Saint Darwin,"

LOL that must be us

"but it should not convince anyone who does not already have a religious commitment to naturalism (materialism) and who cares to think about it."

They seem to be confused. It's the BIBLICAL account of the world's 'creation' that doesn't convince anyone who does not already have a religious commitment to Jewish or Christian mythology and superstition.

Religionists often seem to think they can discredit rational/fact-based positions by equating them with religious faith - while arguing at the same time that their own faith is virtuous. Doesn't seem like a particularly sound strategy of argument, does it?

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22. Comment #431088 by zeerust2000 on November 11, 2009 at 2:30 pm

The whole notion of "uphill" and "downhill" evolutionary change is a purely subjective judgement which assumes a prior purpose to evolution. Creationists love this notion of course because the purpose is provided by you-know-who. It is an illusion.

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23. Comment #431089 by markystar on November 11, 2009 at 2:33 pm

will we see any new species dubbed dawkinsopterus or, as i'd rather see, dawkinsosaurus!

the writer of this article is a clown without a grasp on how traits evolve separately in separate animal kingdoms and species. and what's up with his 'self-professed "atheist"' line? apparently, he doesn't understand what atheism is either.
assclown.

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24. Comment #431090 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 2:36 pm

stuart.

Losing the ability to fly is not necessarily due to an uphill mutation, the kind that the TofE is dependent upon to merit being taken seriously.

you do need to define what these uphill/downhill mutations are.

evidence shows that skull of our fish like ancestors were way more complex than our own, if im not mistaken the zygomatic arch for eg is the remains of another set of bones that used to cover our current brain holding cranium. stuart, is that an example of downhill mutation? our skulls are arguably less complex than those of some of our ancestors, now unless you want to suggest that the most complex versions of our ancestors were created initially and then let all that downhill stuff proceed.....

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25. Comment #431094 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 2:41 pm

"The argument might impress Dawkins’ gullible choir in the Church of Saint Darwin,"

again, safarti knows that some section of his audience are not too well educated.

saint darwin?? ive never even actually read origin. one day, i suppose i should.

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26. Comment #431095 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 2:50 pm

As a sneak peek, to show that we are indeed rebutting Dawkins’ claims, here is a draft section from our forthcoming book answering The Greatest Show on Earth

No, all you're doing is showing your wanton ignorance on a subject you know nothing about, and yet are too lazy to study.

Isn't that right Stewart?

Other Comments by Tyler Durden

27. Comment #431097 by Stewart Cowan on November 11, 2009 at 2:51 pm

zeerust,

That's because we're not descended from apes.

"Uphill mutations" add useful information to the genome so that more complex organs, etc., can be created.

"In other words....they evolved."

Yes, they did, but it's not the type of evolution that the TofE relies upon.

Hi Tyler,

"Are you out of your depth, again?"

Only insofar as the comments are coming faster than I can keep up with them!

I'm reading The God Delusion.

phasmagigas,

We're living in a fallen world. Things decay and that includes the genome. That's why there is death and disease now, but there wasn't before the Fall.

Evolution occurs precisely because there are post-Fall genetic mutations, BUT, and this is the crux, they are generally not the sort of mutations that mean dinosaurs eventually became birds. All that these mutations allow for is minor changes like removing the information to produce wings or long beaks or long fur, etc.

New species are produced, but it's not generally due to more information in the genome.

Other Comments by Stewart Cowan

28. Comment #431098 by Stewart Cowan on November 11, 2009 at 2:56 pm

Tyler,

"Stewart, any comments on the recurrent laryngeal nerve and its elongated detour?"

No, not yet.

phasmagigas #24,

You say we are ancestors of fish, I certainly don't. The idea is preposterous when you really think about it, especially in view of the impossibility of complex organs being formed in a world where mutations are rarely beneficial.

Other Comments by Stewart Cowan

29. Comment #431099 by idragosani on November 11, 2009 at 2:59 pm

What is 'self-styled "atheist"'? What do they mean? Someone can't claim to be an atheist unless someone else decides to bestow the title? Are they implying Richard isn't a real atheist?

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30. Comment #431100 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 3:00 pm

Stewart -

Please, pretty please, stop posting on the subject evolution until you've read something on (and understood) the subject itself.

Darwinian evolution has nothing whatsoever to do with "the Fall".

Evolution "relies upon" species evolving, there is no "direction"; there is no "purpose", only survival.

Modern birds are descendants of dinosaurs, fossils and molecular biology shows this - nothing to do with "Adam and Eve".

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31. Comment #431102 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 3:01 pm

stweart.

We're living in a fallen world. Things decay and that includes the genome. That's why there is death and disease now, but there wasn't before the Fall

thats an assertion for which you have no evidence (AFWYHNE)

Evolution occurs precisely because there are post-Fall genetic mutations, BUT, and this is the crux, they are generally not the sort of mutations that mean dinosaurs eventually became birds. All that these mutations allow for is minor changes like removing the information to produce wings or long beaks or long fur, etc.

AFWYHNE

New species are produced, but it's not generally due to more information

AFWYHNE.

You are simply making stuff up, its that simple.

its easy and its lazy.

Other Comments by phasmagigas

32. Comment #431104 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 3:04 pm

stewart

You say we are ancestors of fish, I certainly don't. The idea is preposterous when you really think about it, especially in view of the impossibility of complex organs being formed in a world where mutations are rarely beneficial

no, i said we are the descendents of fish like animals.

the 'impossibility' oh, you mean impossible by natural means, ie without supernatural intervention, so you must therefore be able to discern that what is natural and that what is supernatural, how can you tell the difference? thats quite a trick you have there.

Other Comments by phasmagigas

33. Comment #431105 by Stewart Cowan on November 11, 2009 at 3:04 pm

Tyler,

"Evolution "relies upon" species evolving, there is no "direction"; there is no "purpose", only survival."

Well exactly. BUT, as you know, massively complex organs exist. A huge amount of genetic information is required to make them. How likely is this in a world where decay is what happens in time - where mutations are nearly always neutral or unhelpful?

Other Comments by Stewart Cowan

34. Comment #431108 by Stewart Cowan on November 11, 2009 at 3:08 pm

Warning: work beckons and this is my last post...at least for a while...

phasmagigas,

"You are simply making stuff up, its that simple. its easy and its lazy."

You'll be hearing from my solicitor in the morning.

What I'm arguing is that it is just not possible for the immense complexity of life to be by chance. I think science demonstrates this.

Other Comments by Stewart Cowan

35. Comment #431109 by Gobby on November 11, 2009 at 3:08 pm

At the beginning I really had trouble understanding what Stewart is saying, but after his latest post (Comment #431097)it all makes sense now! It is so illuminating!

Suppose we're not descended from apes. And clearly we are not, because, well, human and modern apes live in the same time period, and clear a modern ape is not a homo sapien.That and it is so just because I say so.

And suppose there is the Fall. You know, because there is! Also having Winter surely means there is Fall, and Spring and Summer too! Anyway, there is a post-Fall because I say so.

So if we follow his assumptions then we can assume that evolution is not true and we can also assume there is a god!

I also assume Stewart's left arm grows on his right side. That's because I say so.

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36. Comment #431110 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 3:11 pm

stuart.

you simply dont understand.

How likely is this in a world where decay is what happens in time - where mutations are nearly always neutral or unhelpful?

decay is produced by a gazillion bacteria digesting and reorganising previously living organisms into copies of themselves, general input of energy from the sun is what keeps it ticking for now.

nearly always neutral or unhelpful, well lets assume thats the case, neutral is fine, the few helpful ones are what get passed along, most individuals in a season will die remember.

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37. Comment #431112 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 3:12 pm

You'll be hearing from my solicitor in the morning.

i hope he or she is hot.

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38. Comment #431113 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 3:14 pm

Stewart -

The word mutation is simply a copying error. Where did you read mutations are "always neutral or unhelpful"?

And what is your definition of "decay"?

What I'm arguing is that it is just not possible for the immense complexity of life to be by chance. I think the science demonstrates this.

Not "possible", and yet they exist. Just because you don't understand the process does not mean it does not happen.

And evolution is the anthesis of chance. Once again, you are opining on subjects you know nothing about and are embarrassing yourself. If you don't know, just ask - people here will help you, me for one but stop pretending like you know the science behind evolution when it's obvious you don't.

What science? Where does "science" say this? Source please, otherwise I'll think you're just making this stuff up.

Other Comments by Tyler Durden

39. Comment #431114 by Mbee on November 11, 2009 at 3:14 pm

Comment #431088 by zeerust2000

The whole notion of "uphill" and "downhill" evolutionary change is a purely subjective

Well obviously uphill evolution means that when a ground bird got to the top of the hill it had to learn to fly as it had no place else to go, whereas downhill evolution of birds means they did not need to fly so wings disappeared.

Heads for the door ...

Other Comments by Mbee

40. Comment #431115 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 3:15 pm

What I'm arguing is that it is just not possible for the immense complexity of life to be by chance. I think science demonstrates this.

you can argue all you want but thats an argument from personal incredulity, science (well not from the people who actually DO science)does not demonstrate that whatsoever, its chance mutation plus non chance selection, as i said earlier, you simply do not understand the ideas within the evolutionary framework.

Other Comments by phasmagigas

41. Comment #431116 by T. Kari on November 11, 2009 at 3:16 pm

WTF???!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!???

Are these the same people that shout about irreducible complexity and refuse to believe that *loss* of information can be beneficial in natural selection??
WTF???

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42. Comment #431118 by zeerust2000 on November 11, 2009 at 3:19 pm

Stewart:

"Uphill mutations" add useful information to the genome so that more complex organs, etc., can be created.

In what way is a flightless bird less complex, or contains less useful genetic information than a flight-capable one? Your judgement on this is extremely subjective. In what way is a penguin less complex than a blackbird? And even if, in some way, you could quantify biological complexity...so what? The theory of evolution doesn't require 'progress' in any such direction. It is a way of accounting for change in biological organisms, whatever form form that change may take.

"In other words....they evolved."

Yes, they did, but it's not the type of evolution that the TofE relies upon.

I'm sorry to be so blunt, but what makes you think you can arbitrate on the 'type' of change you would like to see? You can't just decide that "yes, evolution has occured, but it's not the right type so I'm not going to accept it". Evolution does not require evidence of change in an arbirtarily chosen direction. Animals evolve in whatever direction selective and genetic pressures impose on them. I'm sorry if you don't like it, but that's what the theory proposes. The theory of evolution does not "rely" on change being in any particular direction. I suggest you re-read (or read for the first time) TGSOE and/or The Blind Watchmaker.

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43. Comment #431121 by Tyler Durden on November 11, 2009 at 3:22 pm

You say we are ancestors of fish, I certainly don't. The idea is preposterous when you really think about it, especially in view of the impossibility of complex organs being formed in a world where mutations are rarely beneficial.

Read Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin.

And where are you getting this "mutations are rarely beneficial" line from? You're living on land because of these mutations.

Other Comments by Tyler Durden

44. Comment #431122 by InYourFaceNewYorker on November 11, 2009 at 3:25 pm

If there really were a God, I'd like to ask him what he was thinking when he made so many stupid people.

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45. Comment #431123 by Gobby on November 11, 2009 at 3:30 pm

InYourFaceNewYorker:

If there really were a God, I'd like to ask him what he was thinking when he made so many stupid people.

He will probably say "because I created mankind in my image. Smart people are the result of evolution."

Other Comments by Gobby

46. Comment #431124 by phasmagigas on November 11, 2009 at 3:34 pm

stuart

you use the word preposterous, so what should i accept instead as to the origin of humans or indeed something like a tapeworm hooked into an infants alimentary canal?

Other Comments by phasmagigas

47. Comment #431125 by Gobby on November 11, 2009 at 3:47 pm

Better yet, I should use Stewart's infallible logic to answer you, InYourFaceNewYorker.

God would probably say "In the beginning I created mankind in my image. Therefore, there was a complex stupidity trait in the genome full of information of stupidity. Then there was the Fall and decay and whatnot. Information of stupidity is being lost for millions of years. Some just have move information loss in the trait of stupidity than the others".

Other Comments by Gobby

48. Comment #431127 by God fearing Atheist on November 11, 2009 at 3:51 pm

34. Comment #431108 by Stewart Cowan

What I'm arguing is that it is just not possible for the immense complexity of life to be by chance. I think science demonstrates this.

No it doesn't. It demonstrates the opposite. You are arguing from personal incredulity. Please read "The greatest show on earth". Borrow it from the library if you resent Dawkins getting any royalties from a purchase.

33. Comment #431105 by Stewart Cowan - where mutations are nearly always neutral or unhelpful?

Even you said "nealry". You are forgetting "deep time" (as Dawkins puts it), and "deep population" as I put it. Let's say bacteria emerged 4 billion years ago. Flat out, bacteria can reproduce every 20 minutes. Lets give it a day. That is 365*4 billion generations. Off-hand, I don't know the bio-mass of the earth or the weight of an average bacteruim, but I guess there were thousands of billions of bacteria in every generation. If only one in a million mutations is beneficial that is a lot of benefitial mutations per year. Obviously as the organisms get larger, and generation time goes up and the population goes down. Lets say a homonid generation is 20 years, and the early homonid population was 10,000. There have still been 300,000 generations since the split with chimps, and a (US) billion individuals if a lifetime of 60 years is assumed.

TGSoE has an account of Lenski's long running (since 1988) experiment on the evolution of bacteria (e.coli). He calculated that every single point mutation has occurred several times. The whole point of the argument is that while mutation is random, the effect of mutation is not - it effects survival-to-reproduction probability. The tiny fraction of bacteria who happened to randomly acquire "good" mutations have more offspring than the many bacteria who happen to randomly acquire "bad" mutations. And to re-emphasise the point, this happens over "deep time" and "deep population".

TGSoE also emphasises the speed at which humans have bred plants and animals in a few thousands of years. A pekinese dog and a wolf have a common ancestor about 12,000 years ago (assuming 3 years a generation that is only 4,000 generations).

Please, please read TGSoE!

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49. Comment #431128 by chuckgoecke on November 11, 2009 at 3:53 pm

Gawd it annoys me when they take an annoying cliche and make it even more annoying, in an annoying attempt to be annoyingly cute: "Dragon Flies in the ointment"

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50. Comment #431129 by Jos Gibbons on November 11, 2009 at 3:58 pm

Phasmagigas - what's "AFWYHNE"? Google was no more enlightening than was urbandictionary.com.

Stewart Cowan - thanks for your definition in terms of increasing complexity. Observed examples during real time experiments and field studies include various new metabolic abilities of bacteria, stomach bifurcation in lizards introduced to a new habitat within <40 years, algae evolving multicellularity in response to predation, etc.

Admittedly this is only a fraction of the complexity whose explanation is required, but we can understand what we have spotted in terms of molecular genetics, use that knowledge to realise 4 billion years is more than enough time for the rest, and confirm the rest was indeed due to descent with modification by confirming common ancestry.

How, you may ask? Multiple concordant methods for reconstructing the family tree. Note in particular that, given any species A, B and C, their being related would imply either two - say A and B - have a common ancestor more recent than their shared common ancestor with the third, or else all three have a simultaneous most recent common ancestor. Tus, the three values for percentage DNA dissimilarity between them are either equal in the latter case, or in the former case two are equal and the odd one out is of lower dissimilarity (the A-B pair). By contrast, their not being related would permit other possibilities, such as all three being different, or the odd one out being MORE dissimilar. In fact, all three being different would be the most likely. Guess what we observe in the data, however? You guessed it - common ancestry.

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