Evolution: the Facts.

[Lowpro]

Now I often enjoy linking this article because it pleases me so:

http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/10/20/how-to-examine-the-evolution-of-proteins/

Now, there's another article that seems to be more of an evolutionary biochemistry perspective that I don't have the article on (It'll be out Jan 18th so I'll get it then, but here's story:

Evolution of increased complexity in a molecular machine

Abstract:

http://www.hhmi.org/research/ecs/thornton.html

Nature article

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature10724.html
Too cool for school

Interestingly this semi-confirms my own hypothesis of LUCA, where I said if LUCA did exist, it probably has duplications of its own genome of simple translatable areas. Mutations within these duplications allow for new functions to arise from material and because of the redundancies net gains of new translatable proteins arise, meaning novel functions occur WITHOUT any violation of chemistry. Evolution baby, it's valid.

 

[KwamiFabu]

This is interesting. I don't subscribe to Nature and can't afford it. We must always bear in mind the possibility, remote as it is, that natural selection isn't the exact mechanism, and that evolution proceeds by some other route. But it does proceed. These are the mintutae by which otherwise sound theorems are confounded.

 

[Dinwar]

No kidding natural selection isn't the only mechanism at work. There's also kin selection, sexual selection, artificial selection, genetic drift, and a few others that I can't think of off the top of my head. Then there are the factors involved in the mutations themselves--remember, natural selection is the culling process, while mutations create the diversity we're dealing with.

 

[Lowpro]

This is interesting. I don't subscribe to Nature and can't afford it. We must always bear in mind the possibility, remote as it is, that natural selection isn't the exact mechanism, and that evolution proceeds by some other route. But it does proceed. These are the mintutae by which otherwise sound theorems are confounded.

Yea I tried to link from multiple sources just so you can get as much material, and REALLY most of what you need you can get straight from that link, as methods are probably irrelevant to most readers (to me they're everything though)

Natural selection isn't the only mechanism at work with evolution (Dinwar gave many a google-able example of other types of selection, all of which fall under evolution as evolution is the passage of traits and how they are passed is varied with natural selection being one of them), but what makes it important is that it explains WHY organisms have what they have (phenotypically and genotypically) without invoking special creation.

Personally I don't prefer to call natural selection a culling process simply because that only applies to a snapshot of a population (generally it's argued that way) when the truth is...genes tend to stick around even if they're not phenotypically expressed. You don't have to have gene deletion when gene inhibition/silencing is much more prolific so I think culling implies removal and that may be true on the phenotypic level, but the genotypic level to me is more important. Hell you don't even need gene silencing when you can just silence protein transcription FROM that gene...miRNA's are neato.

 

[RVM45]

I have never seen this point presented:

Assume, for the sake of argument, that the Creationists are absolutely correct.

Why does it necessarily follow that Evolution is "Bad Science"?

Or to go even farther, and insist that Evolution is a "Stupid Theory" full of "Asinine Assertions"?

Couldn't one logically hold that the theory was Ingenious, and described processes that were quite Conceivable.....

Sounded perfectly Plausible, as it were......

And even if it should turn out to be False, wouldn't it still provided a very handy Hypothetical Categorization Scheme to Classify various Species of Plants and Animals?

Yet every Creationist's Argument that I've ever heard contains large amounts of Scorn and Scoffing at the Evolutionist's perceived lack of Intelligence, "Common Sense", and even Good Will and Honesty.

Actually, regardless of the ultimate Truth or Falsehood of Evolution or Creationism.....

One could very well find Idiots and Liars in both Camps, as well as Honest Intelligent searchers after truth in both Camps.

Some Scientists are pretty quick to disparage the Intelligence and Sanity of Creationists too.

I guess its more Phun to Hurl Insults and Scorn at people that one disagrees with.....

Thus obviously refuting their Ideas.

.....RVM45

 

[Dinwar]

Assume, for the sake of argument, that the Creationists are absolutely correct.

Why does it necessarily follow that Evolution is "Bad Science"?

Creationism itself went through this process. It was, at one point, a perfectly plausible theory--as plausible as anything else we had, anyway. More data was obtained, and it became much, much less plausible, to the point where today it can only be supported by falsehoods and willfull ignorance. Creationism was good science up until the point, not that it was shown to be wrong, but rather that its supporters abandoned the data in favor of the theory. THAT is the cardinal sin of science--not being wrong, scientists are wrong all the time, but rather refusing to acknowledge that you're wrong.

And even if it should turn out to be False, wouldn't it still provided a very handy Hypothetical Categorization Scheme to Classify various Species of Plants and Animals?

Evolution would, certainly. The theory is used outside of biology all the time. The problem is, Creationism doesn't. Evolution provides an inherent classification scheme, one which is fundamental to the entire concept and without which the concept cannot function. Creationism has two fundamental classifications: the Designer, and everything else. Not exactly useful.

One could very well find Idiots and Liars in both Camps, as well as Honest Intelligent searchers after truth in both Camps.

I highly doubt it. An honest person searching for the truth cannot conclude that Creationism or Intelligent Design are correct once they examin the evidence. At best, they can do the God of the Gaps thing, pushing their Creation event further and further back until it becomes meaningless (and I mean that literally--asking "What came before the Big Bang?" is a nonsensical question). I won't deny that there are idiots and liars among scientists studying evolution--I'm sure there are those that would put me in the idiots catagory--but falsehood is foundational to modern Creationism/Intelligent Design.

Please note that here I'm talking about the actual Creationists/ID advocates who are coming up with the ideas--Behe, Ham, Hovind, and that ilk. The average Creationist has no idea what the data are (most of them don't even know the word "data" is plural, in my experience). They're deluded suckers taken in by conmen.

 

[dgilman]

"How did life arise? What were conditions really like at the dawn of life?"

I have read tons of stuff on this. Every experiment done on or involving attempts at abiogenesis over the last 150 and more years has produced results indicating that it never happened.

Robert Shapiro's thesis <em>Prebiotic cytosine synthesis: A critical analysis and implications for the origin of life</em> (available at: pnas.org/content/96/8/4396.full) has convinced me that it is unreasonable to conclude that it has ever happened.

The difficulties Venter and his group had to synthesize that DNA and insert it into the chosen cell, along with their carefully recorded observations, has convinced me that life is only possible in an irreducible complex (excessively complex) unit. They had use enzymes, they couldn't get the long polymers without using the system of an already functioning cell and they had to have an error detection method.

 

[dgilman]

"An honest person searching for the truth cannot conclude that Creationism or Intelligent Design are correct once they examin the evidence."

I did. The evidence for the Evolution Theory in its current form is very weak. There is currently no evidence whatsoever to conclude that multi-cellular life evolved from unicellular life. The investigations into that belief has been so disappointing that it has been all but abandoned.

BTW, the earth is at least 4.5 billion years old and complex unicellular life forms first appeared on it before it was 1 billion years old. The papers I have read have convinced me of that.

 

[Dinwar]

I have read tons of stuff on this. Every experiment done on or involving attempts at abiogenesis over the last 150 and more years has produced results indicating that it never happened.

The fact that you've read a lot, and that we don't currently know how it happened, neither argue that it didn't. And you still fail to demonstrate the critical issue with ID: the nature of the designer in question. Until you do so, we can't even test if the Designer existed, let alone conclude that it exists.

As for the experiments, you obviously have ignored a large volume of research. Science Daily News today had an article about different ways to form organic compounds in space, for example.

There is currently no evidence whatsoever to conclude that multi-cellular life evolved from unicellular life.

Except for those pesky intermediate forms.

The investigations into that belief has been so disappointing that it has been all but abandoned.

No, it's been abandoned because it's impossible in theory. Multicellular life prior to the Ediacaran simply didn't have any parts that would fossilize. We know it happened--we even have a number of perfectly good vectors for it--but finding precisely which route it took is impossible, because the data is lost to us (at least, as far as I'm aware--a biogeochemist may know otherwise). No MODERN unicellular organism is going to magically become a multicellular one before your eyes, that's true; but that's not what evolution has ever stated.

I did. The evidence for the Evolution Theory in its current form is very weak.

I note that you're ignoring most of the evidence--all of biochemistry, cellular biology, developmental biology, ecology, etc.; all of paleontology; all of anatomy; all of physiology; all of modern medicine; etc. You're picking the low-hanging fruit here. And here's the thing: even if you're right, and some deity--I'm sorry, some "Designer" --made life 3.9 billion years ago, evolution would STILL be correct. We know that designed entities can evolve, because WE'VE DONE IT. Computer programs, the epitomy of designed entities, can evolve. And this fits evolutionary theory perfectly well.

Evolution requires four things: heritable traits, variation in said traits, differential survival, and time. Once you have those for things, evolution necessarily must happen. It doesn't, fundamentally, matter how those came to be. And science explicitely accepts this. Abiogenesis is held as a different field than those which study evolution.

But okay, let's examine the ID/Creationism hypothesis. What is the Creator/Designer? What evidence do you have, not that evolution is wrong, but that your particular hypothesis about what the Designer/Creator is is right? What tangible data support your conclusions? And remember, "support your conclusion" is different from "show evolution to be flawed".

 

[Sideroxylon]

Evolution is a fact held by expert consensus and argued against largely by US evangelicals who also argue patently absurd ideas like a 10,000-year-old earth and a global flood.

 

[Dinwar]

I've never liked the emphasise on expert consensus. I mean, it makes it sound like this is something handed down from On High, which the lowly masses cannot question (not saying that that's your intent, Sideroxylon--just saying that I've seen it used that way, and it often comes off that way whether you want it to or not). In reality, anyone is free to question evolution--with the caveat that they need to UNDERSTAND evolution before they try to disprove it. While consensus is a good rule-of-thumb for people with no real knowledge of the field (for example, I tend to go with the consensus of physicists dealing with quantum mechanics, because I frankly don't want to learn the math), it's not really a useful tool once you get to the point of discussing the subject in any depth.

The rest of your post I absolutely agree with. And I stand by my statement that no one can look at the evidence honestly and conclude that Creationism and ID are correct, or even valid. Creationism is only supportable by ignorance, and ID is a flat-out fraud. The proof of that latter statement is in publically-available documents.

 

[Sideroxylon]

I think agreement with expert consensus must be the default position on any subject where you are not fully aware of what is known in a given field and how we know it. We agree on this. The other point here is that there is no controversy at all among the experts on evolution as to whether it happened or not. This is not a shaky hypothesis. Evolution is the great foundation of the life sciences. Unless your knowledge of the subject is sufficient to provide evidence and arguments of the power and originality to publish an paradigm-threatening paper then you are pissing in the wind.

 

[dgilman]

"The fact . . . that we don't currently know how it happened, neither argue that it didn't."

I was merely pointing out that it is a belief without any scientific basis. I did not cite that as proof of anything; just good evidence that it didn't happen. Every single experiment produced evidence that it didn't happen.

"Except for those pesky intermediate forms."

What "pesky intermediate forms"? There are none, absolutely none, zilch, nada.

". . . you still fail to demonstrate the critical issue with ID: the nature of the designer in question. Until you do so, we can't even test if the Designer existed, let alone conclude that it exists."

If it is not possible for me to describe the designer, his/her nature, that proves nothing other than I don't know who he/she is/was. Your reasoning is inconsistent. (Look again at my first quote of you.)

"Multicellular life prior to the Ediacaran simply didn't have any parts that would fossilize. We know it happened--we even have a number of perfectly good vectors for it--but finding precisely which route it took is impossible"

So we are to accept it without scientific evidence then? Accept it on faith? (the "good vectors" is weak evidence) Anyway, I saw a documentary last month about a dig done my a Chinese archeologist who claims otherwise. I need to look it up. His claim was that the "Tree of Life" is upside down. He discovered fossils of soft-bodied mulct-cellular animals in Precambrian sediment.

"I note that you're ignoring most of the evidence--all of biochemistry, cellular biology, developmental biology, ecology, etc.; all of paleontology; all of anatomy; all of physiology; all of modern medicine; etc."

No I'm merely pointing out that the current evidence does not support the theory of evolution in its current form. It requires a mind committed to "no god did it" to continue with it. You have not noticed that I have not said that evolution did not or does not happen. I feel I need to say it again. The current theory does not fit the observations.

I like debating with you. Are you a biologist? I am connected to a biologist with a PhD on another site. He believes in the evolution theory in its current form but is convinced that abiogenesis is impossible.

 

[Dinwar]

I was merely pointing out that it is a belief without any scientific basis.

This is false. We don't know the precise mechanism--however, there IS a scientific basis for the conclusions. The huge volumes of organic compounds found in space, for example. Or the biogeochemical pathways by which organic molecules can be sorted. Geochemical trace fossils. And so on.

Every single experiment produced evidence that it didn't happen.

You're drawing conclusions which cannot be reasonably drawn from the experiments.

What "pesky intermediate forms"? There are none, absolutely none, zilch, nada.

There are organisms that act as unicellular organisms, but can form collonies and act as multicellular organisms. That's one. Phylum Porifera is a second. So this is false.

If it is not possible for me to describe the designer, his/her nature, that proves nothing other than I don't know who he/she is/was. Your reasoning is inconsistent. (Look again at my first quote of you.)

This is untrue. I can make (well, *I* can't, but people studying abiogenesis can) extremely precise and testable hypotheses about how life formed via abiotic, biotic, and what can only be called semi-biotic processes. Those hypotheses have been, and continue to be, tested. In contrast, ID/Creationism propose a formless, amorphous Designer/Creator and hold as an axiom that it cannot be defined or described. There's an enormous difference between the two.

So we are to accept it without scientific evidence then? Accept it on faith? (the "good vectors" is weak evidence)

Weak evidence is still evidence. Congratulations--you've contradicted yourself in three posts.

Besides, it's not an article of faith that multicellular organisms evolved from single-celled organisms. As I said, we have intermediate forms. We also have analogous transformations going on today: bryozoan collonies have been found that act as single organisms, each polyp acting as a single cell of that organism. Really creepy, actually--the whole coloney can get up and move. There's also genetic evidence, the most obvious being that mytochondria and chloroplasts have a separate genome from the rest of the cell. So there's support for the idea. What I said is that we're almost certainly not going to find FOSSILS of the transitional forms--for sound taphonomic reasons (namely, they have no hard parts and soft parts rarely get preserved). Fossils aren't the only evidence for evolution.

I suggest Valentine's "On the Origin of Phyla" for a full discussion. It's a few thousand pages, and is an introduction to the topic; there's no way to reproduce it here.

Anyway, I saw a documentary last month about a dig done my a Chinese archeologist who claims otherwise. I need to look it up. His claim was that the "Tree of Life" is upside down. He discovered fossils of soft-bodied mulct-cellular animals in Precambrian sediment.

There's any number of things wrong with this. First and foremost, an archaeologist doesn't have paleontological expertise, any more than I as a paleontologist have archaeological expertise. While I like archaeologists, I certainly don't trust them to analyzefossils--and they rightly don't me to analyze archaeological artifacts.

Second, the "Precambrian" consists of 4 billion years. We know that soft-bodied organisms that can be called animals were around since at least the Ediacaran (630 ma). Every paleontologist that's looked at the issue has concluded that soft-bodied animals almost certainly existed far further back. We know that photosynthetic organisms existed 2.5 ga--the Oxygen Revolution is proof of that. Most put that as the upper limit to the age of multicellular animals, but I'm not convinced. Certainly LARGE multicellular animals only existed after that, but small ones? Maybe.

Third, the oldest evidence of life is 3.9 ga. So even if they found these critters in the Neoarchean it wouldn't invert the "Tree of Life".

No I'm merely pointing out that the current evidence does not support the theory of evolution in its current form.

And I'm pointing out that your knowledge of the evidence is extremely shallow. How can you say that the current data don't support the evidence when you're surprised that they've found soft-bodied critters in Precambrian sediment? It's' not exactly a secret that they exist--in fact, the word "Ediacaran" has been used as a type of organism, a stratigraphic period, and an ecological niche.

I like debating with you. Are you a biologist?

I'm a paleontologist.

He believes in the evolution theory in its current form but is convinced that abiogenesis is impossible.

This isn't as impressive as you probably believe. What's his knowledge of Eoarchean/Hadean marine chemistry? That's rather central to the abiogenesis question, and if he doesn't know that subject extremely well (well, as well as it CAN be known, anyway) I seriously doubt he'll have anything to offer abiogenesis research. No offense to him--I'm sure he's a good biologist. It's just that biologists tend to forget that what we see now isn't what the world was like in the past. NASA and SETI have the same problem--life had been around for a little over two BILLION years before our atmosphere became oxygen-rich, yet NASA looks for oxygen in the atmosphere when looking for signs of life. I get why, but my point is such errors indicate that the person involved thinks that life as we know it is life as such. It's not. The very concept of life breaks down during abiogenesis--the difference between a living thing and a nonliving pile of chemicals gets extremely blurry, and drawing the line between them is necessarily somewhat arbitrary. If you don't even know the environment the thing is in, you're not going to figure out how it works.

If I may offer a tip on formatting: Using

and /quote (inside the brackets) at the beginning and end of the quotes would make it easier to tell what you're saying vs. what you're quoting.

 

[Lowpro]

There's a whole lot of stupid to get through here.

"The fact . . . that we don't currently know how it happened, neither argue that it didn't."

I was merely pointing out that it is a belief without any scientific basis. I did not cite that as proof of anything; just good evidence that it didn't happen. Every single experiment produced evidence that it didn't happen.

You're just wrong. It's not a belief, we use the evidence from genetics and biochemistry and observe genes and the traits they develop and by using population genetics we can see how natural selection works, DOWN TO THE GENE level. Evolution is indisputable here. To deny it is to deny the Earth is a sphere. Hell if you could show that it doesn't happen, you'll probably win a Nobel Prize and be gifted a small country too.

There's a lot of evidence is biochemistry to show that amino acids can form without a DNA/RNA blueprint, and energetically it's feasible for RNA to form on its own and be stable, and now it's just a matter of getting the best conditions and time for it to happen is all, which is why the RNA world of Abiogenesis gets a lot of credit. This isn't evolution though, so don't be a parrot to people who tell you otherwise. This is biochemistry, and this is my thing.

"Except for those pesky intermediate forms."

What "pesky intermediate forms"? There are none, absolutely none, zilch, nada.

Completely wrong http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional.html

Read that and learn.

". . . you still fail to demonstrate the critical issue with ID: the nature of the designer in question. Until you do so, we can't even test if the Designer existed, let alone conclude that it exists."

If it is not possible for me to describe the designer, his/her nature, that proves nothing other than I don't know who he/she is/was. Your reasoning is inconsistent. (Look again at my first quote of you.)

His point is that you don't know what Intelligent Design is or the problems it has. It's written off BECAUSE of the nature of its requirement for a designer, and deus ex machina event. To require that doesn't give you a tenable theory, which is why it's bunk until the designer is observed. It's not whether you know what the designer is, but that you can prove this designer is the designer in the ID argument. No one can do that, it's impossible physically, and philosophically it's a dead end; it's Russell's Tea Pot.

"Multicellular life prior to the Ediacaran simply didn't have any parts that would fossilize. We know it happened--we even have a number of perfectly good vectors for it--but finding precisely which route it took is impossible"

So we are to accept it without scientific evidence then? Accept it on faith? (the "good vectors" is weak evidence) Anyway, I saw a documentary last month about a dig done my a Chinese archeologist who claims otherwise. I need to look it up. His claim was that the "Tree of Life" is upside down. He discovered fossils of soft-bodied mulct-cellular animals in Precambrian sediment.

We accept it because the theory makes it possible, and we do have evidence, just not fossilized evidence. I wouldn't be surprised if there was differentiated tissues within a single celled organism (algae do it). You also need to understand that the Tree of Life is a genetic's based, not phenotype based, though they're related. If that multicellular organism were found (gotta be careful in China, they're dubious...) it came from the genetics of an ancestor who had those genes, that's the point of the Tree of Life. It shows the passing of genetics.

"I note that you're ignoring most of the evidence--all of biochemistry, cellular biology, developmental biology, ecology, etc.; all of paleontology; all of anatomy; all of physiology; all of modern medicine; etc."

No I'm merely pointing out that the current evidence does not support the theory of evolution in its current form. It requires a mind committed to "no god did it" to continue with it. You have not noticed that I have not said that evolution did not or does not happen. I feel I need to say it again. The current theory does not fit the observations.

You haven't given any evidence or argument (or a sign that you understand evolution in the first place) so your claim that you're pointing out that the current evidence doesn't support the ToE is a lie until you give me something more that baseless assertions. If you can prove that genes don't pass and change due to chemistry which is due to physical laws, then the ToE stands strong.

Abiogenesis is not evolution though, that's biochemistry. And let me tell you, it's not impossible as far as we know, it's a matter of narrowing down processes and determining the best stringent environment. You should read up on abiogenesis

If you say abiogenesis is impossible and you haven't given me any reason to it and rely on the "well biologists take it on faith?!" you've lost. Go learn more, speak to use with more than flat assertions (evidence would be best) and then you'll fare better talking with us.

I like debating with you. Are you a biologist? I am connected to a biologist with a PhD on another site. He believes in the evolution theory in its current form but is convinced that abiogenesis is impossible.

This isn't a debate. Don't think that it is. This is a forum, you'll provide evidence for your assertions or you'll be vilified. You're talking to Dinwar, a paleontologist, you're talking to be, I have a degree in Biology and Chemistry and work in a lab studying microRNA. You're now connected to two more biologists. Congrats.

Also on the Cytosine paper, the author only says that Cytosine is difficult to keep from degrading (as are pretty much all biochemicals) but the question is how much cytosine can be incorporated into an RNA/DNA strand, because once it is, it's safer and can maintain itself longer within the strand. If you have other biochemicals like enzymes which can form on their own (though maybe the class of enzyme we need here may not, it's difficult when you're left with only speculation) you can increase the rate of cytosine production and incorporation. That's the entire point of biochemistry, which is just applied thermodynamics in this case. The paper shouldn't convince you that abiogenesis is impossible, it should convince you that it isn't easy. We've had greater than or equal to 3.1 billion years with changing climates (which mean changing environmental stringencies, including no real atmosphere, UV radiation, reducing atmosphere, all that stuff) which does interesting things to your chemical rates. We also have asteroid bombardments bringing us the correct L-type protein to form chiral sugars, and Uracil on its own forms easily enough in deep space.

You've got a lot of stuff there, it's not impossible anymore now, it's a matter of determining the stringent environments for it. And! No need for a designer too.

You'd do well to read this too, so maybe you can see why it's hard to take you seriously
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/abioprob.html

 

[Lukraak_Sisser]

In addition to the two already excellent posts I would like to add some more experiments that dgilman appearantly missed.

There is extensive biochemical evidence that it is a trivial matter to generate self replicating molecules that take their own building blocks as substrate and then make more copies of themselves. These self replicating molecules are however far from perfect in making copies, introducing the elements needed to evolve.
RNA, or RNA-like molecules are among these, but are far from the only ones.
The building blocks for these molecules are produced during simple organic reactions that would/could have occurred in pre-biotic environment of earth as we understand it.
And as pointed out, many of these molecules have been found in space, showing how simple the reactions truly are and how durable those molecules in the absence of oxygen.

Lipids, the oft overlooked but equally critical component of life are equally simply formed and there are numerous experiments showing how they tend to self assemble into mycelles that encapsulate the environment and have the tendency to split and merge spontaneously.

The problem is that biochemical 'archeology' by definition has to stop at the last common ancestor of all currently know lifeforms. And that ancestor already had DNA, proteins and a number of chemical processes that original life did not need to have. But all we know is that this is the life form whose descendants ended up dominating the earth, not that it was the ONLY lifeform to have appeared. Since however other lifeforms would have ended up as food, there is indeed no fossilized evidence. Chemical reactions rarely fossilize well and did not leave enough traces to be clarified.

ID/creationist sites to me always seem to ignore vast tracts of evidence in the hope that if they don't look at it, it'll go away.
The fact is not that we don't have a theory on how abiogenesis might have occurred and how such life would then evolve, but rather that we don't know which of the many theories is the right one.

But I would also suggest that it might be fruitful to go the other way. Do an experiment that clearly and undeniably shows creation. A proposal could be a few diamonds sealed in a container with water containing all trace elements needed for life that has been thoroughly sterilized, which is then sealed away from external energy input. According to all know chemistry this mixture will remain inert for all time. If a miniature ecosystem complete with plant and fish is suddenly there, that would be a convincing experiment. (assuming correct controls of course)

 

[Kotatsu]

Every single experiment produced evidence that it didn't happen.

That is necessarily incorrect. A correct statement would be: "Every single experiment produced evidence that it didn't happen according to the precise protocol and under the precise conditions used in the experiment, which are a subset of all possible protocols and conditions." This does in no way imply that abiogenesis didn't happen, period.

What "pesky intermediate forms"? There are none, absolutely none, zilch, nada.

It is important that you learn, early in this discussion, that there are only a few, very specific, ways in which this statement can be true:

1. The first organism to exist -- whether it was created through abiogenesis or through divine fiat -- is immortal and incapable of reproduction, thus being the only organism that has ever existed, and is the only organism that exists now (provided it does, indeed, still exist, of course).

2. All organisms are created by special event at a zygotic event disconnected from previous and subsequent generations, requiring a continual process of creation events every time an organism is conceived.

These are your only options for supporting your statement; I suggest you choose one or the other, and then present your evidence for them.

The reason for this is simple: if there is a succession of generations, each given individual is an intermediate form between its immediate ancestor and its immediate progeny (provided there is any). This is true, whether or not any of the three generations differ in any character at all. The three generations may be genetically, morphologically, ecologically, anatomically, physiologically, and behaviorally identical, as well as identical in all other imaginable ways, but the middle generation will still be intermediate between its ancestor and its progeny (if there is any) simply by its spatial position on the tree of life.

This is true, for instance, for asexually reproducing organisms, which, some argue, can be said to actually be "immortal" (although they have traditionally been assumed to have very short organismal lifespans (1)). However, many organisms are not asexual, which, due to the way sexual reproduction works, implies that variation in traits other than spatial position on the tree of life may occur. The evidence for variation in traits over time is so extensive, that I feel no need to back up this claim unless challenged to do so.

Now, if any trait other than spatial position in the tree of life varies throughout a lineage over time, any given individual organism necessarily links its immediate ancestors and its immediate progeny (if any), which means that the traits manifest in the selected individual is linked both backwards in time to those of its immediate ancestors, of which it can roughly (and somewhat incorrectly) be said to be a subset, and forward to those of its progeny (if any), in which only a subset (the term is again used as an approximation) of the given individuals traits are manifest or latent.

The only two loop holes from this argument -- which basically is an elaboration of the famous "every individual is an intermediate form" argument -- are outlined above, viz. single-organismal constancy over geological time, or continual, repeated creation. Please select which explanation you prefer.

If it is not possible for me to describe the designer, his/her nature, that proves nothing other than I don't know who he/she is/was. Your reasoning is inconsistent.

How interesting that you should use the word "inconsistent". You will naturally agree that consistency demands that if the following statement is true:

"If it is not possible for me to describe the designer, his/her nature, that proves nothing other than I don't know who he/she is/was."

then the following statement must also be true:

"If all hitherto performed experiments on abiogenesis have failed accurately reconstruct any such events, that proves nothing other than that the researchers performing these experiments do not know how it happened"

And not, as you previously stated:

Every single experiment produced evidence that it didn't happen.

Anyway, I saw a documentary last month about a dig done my a Chinese archeologist who claims otherwise. I need to look it up.

Yeah, I wouldn't put the name of a documentary very high on the list of things you actually need to look up.

It requires a mind committed to "no god did it" to continue with it.

It requires no such thing. It requires precisely this: a familiarity with the principle of parsimony, and the courage to apply it in your research. Nothing more, nothing less. That, in itself, is a lesson in parsimony.

The current theory does not fit the observations.

Curiously, the theory of evolution fits the observations I have made in my own research (I am a biologist, working with the evolutionary relationships of bird parasites). It also fits with the observations of my supervisor, who works with birds, as well as the observations of my ex-supervisor, who works with annelids, the researchers in my department who work with ctenophors, polychaets, nemerteans, and entoprocts. It fits with the research and observations of my fellow PhD students at my university, working with fungus gnats, various orders of mushrooms, several orders of plants, and some algae. A post-doc here is mainly working on whole-metazoan phylogenies, and the theory of evolution fits his observations on that level. I am also interested in similar research on a variety of animal groups, and try to read as much as I can. With the proviso that I don't have time to read everything, I will claim that to my knowledge, the theory of evolution fits the observations in such diverse groups as collembolans, butterflies, amphibians, ungulates, and rotifers.

In short, I feel confident in saying that in all probability, the theory of evolution in its current form fits all metazoans, all plants, and all fungi. That leaves a pretty narrow window for you to throw your "it doesn't fit observation" stones at. But please: tell me more about the group of organisms for which the current theory of evolution does not fit the observations. As you can claim that is the case with such vim and boldness, I expect you will have no problems finding more specific examples I have overlooked.

Otherwise, you could always contact the forum member Randman privately, and ask him for some examples, as he has made the same claim previously, without supporting it. Perhaps he can help you an, at the same time, present evidence for his own claims.

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(1) It's been five years since I worked with asexual organisms last, and the field may have moved on considerably. I know about the "ancient asexual scandals" that revealed that some organisms may have been asexual over very long time spans, but I can't remember off-hand what this was based on.

 

[steenkh]

So we are to accept it without scientific evidence then?

What is scientific evidence for you? A lot of scientific knowledge is based on inference, and I find it curious why you should exclude it here. All of cosmology, and most astronomy (except planetary astronomy) is based on inference. Perhaps you do not regard these as scientific disciplines?

 

[Dinwar]

Since however other lifeforms would have ended up as food, there is indeed no fossilized evidence. Chemical reactions rarely fossilize well and did not leave enough traces to be clarified.

One of the really cool things in paleontology is that this isn't necessarily true. One way we can detect life is by looking at chemical trace fossils--concentrations of elements that can only happen, according to thermodynamics, if there's some metabolic process pushing it. Delta-C13 is a great example, if you can disentangle the temeprature signal from the photosynthetic signal (I believe that as photosynthesis increases, DC13 increases [and as a science forum we really should have a way to add Greek letters to our posts ]). The real trick is to figure out what utterly alien life-forms, with a completely alien metabolism, would do. It's not impossible--that 3.9 ga fossil in Australia was a chemical trace fossil--but it's not easy, even by the standards of people who consider months of excavating in in Montana a great way to spend a summer.

Not saying that your point isn't well-taken. I just get distracted by cool fossils.

It requires a mind committed to "no god did it" to continue with it.

I forgot to really address this point: Simply put, this statement is historically inaccurate. The guy who gave us our nomenclature for biology was a devout Christian, describing his work as trying to see into the mind of God. The whole Catastraphism/Gradualism debate was conducted, on both sides, by devoute Christians, and arguments such as "God would not do that to His creation" were considered valid. Mendell was a monk (actually a fairly high-ranking monk in his monastery--most of the pollenation work with the peas was done by his subordinates). Dr. Robert Backer, one of the first advocates of the idea that birds are dinosaurs, is an evangelical preacher. There's a Roman Catholic priest (a Jesuit, if that means anything to you) that's highly involved with human evolution research. I'm not a fan of his research, but my complaints about it are entirely at the level of two people in the field disagreeing with each other--the fact that I put that first phrase in this sentence the way I did shows that I accept him as a legitimate researcher. Owen and Lyell were both devoutly religious.

That's just a small sampling of theists who accept evolution as true. I've met a large number of theists who study evolution in my life, and I expect to meet many more. So one can, in fact, believe both in evolution and that God created the world. As the theists would put it, evolution is the mechanism by which God performed His creation.

 

[dgilman]

You're great!

"We don't know the precise mechanism--however, there IS a scientific basis for the conclusions."

No there isn't. I've read the conjectures, but they do not stand up under experimentation. Even Dawkins has admitted that there are no good theories on abiogenesis. So far, it remain a belief unsupported by any scientific evidence.

"Curiously, the theory of evolution fits the observations I have made in my own research (I am a biologist, working with the evolutionary relationships of bird parasites)"

Great! A biologist. The observation do indicate that natural selection exists; that is indisputable. The evidence is even proof to me that new species can be generated, but how far away from the ancestral taxon level it is reasonable to conclude is possible has not yet been established. The extrapolations I read and hear are way too vast to be accepted as reasonable. Plus the organism would have to gain, lose or fuse whole or parts of chromosomes at some stage. This has to be done with immense precision.

It would also have to be done with very impressive efficiency to account for the rates I see in the timelines observed. I conclude therefore that although mutations, natural selection, most likely in association with genetic re-sequencing do produce new species, I still hold that the evolution theory, in its current form, is still unsupported by the observations.

Regarding my comment on the lack of good evidence to support the belief that multi-cellular life evolved from uni-cellular life, the examples given as "intermediate forms" are not good examples. Some of those colonies aren't even of individuals of the same species. Those that are are still unique individuals with differing DNA whereas the multi-cellular units are not and all have the same DNA. The difficulty not explained nor confirmed is how the gonads were modified to produce individuals whose cells would remain attached and modify themselves to become the various tissues. There is therefore no scientific basis, only immense extrapolations, unconfirmed and nu-corroborated. The best examples of those colonies are all called "pseudo-tissues" by my biologist friend.

"What is scientific evidence for you? A lot of scientific knowledge is based on inference, and I find it curious why you should exclude it here."

The inferences do not all fit well or are often contradicted by other observations. Gradualism is contradicted by the observations in the Tommotian layers, yet it hasn't been abandoned and "punctuated equilibrium" remains unsupported by actual evidence and requires the use of circular logic to maintain.