Re: Alternative Mechanisms of Evolution?


andrevan808@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
> Hi Benton.
>
> "Not that I doubt natural selection - it
> is obviously a source of evolution."
>
> Firstly, natural selection is not confined to the evolution hypothesis
> only.

Confused. Evolution happens. It has been observed in action.
Creationists accept that evolution happens, though they make an
arbitrary distinction between micro- and macro-evolution to avoid the
implications of that acceptance.

Natural selection is a theory of a *mechanism* for evolution.

> Natural selection is not proof of evolution.

There is no proof of anything in science! Natural selection is a theory
of a *mechanism* for evolution.


> Natural selection
> does not add any new information to the genetic code of the organism.

Quite so. On the other hand, natural selection is the action of
selection on variation. In living organisms, this variation is genetic,
and is generated by mutations. Some mutations duplicate sections of the
geneome, and both the original and the duplicated sections can undergo
further mutation. You may chose for some esotetic reason not to call
this an increase in information, but it is a well-studied mechanism by
which the variation on which selection can act is generated.

>
> Secondly, evolution requires massive amounts of new information for the
> organism to 'evolve' to a more complex organism (ie: to evolve from a
> 'simple' molecule to a complex human being).

Your point being?
It's had a lot of time to do so - 3,500 million years.

>
> "An organism that produced genetics that were most likely to survive
> with changing conditions would be adaptable at a far greater rate than
> one that relied on the slow, random process of mutation and natural
> selection."

Quite so. But then no such mechanism has been observed in the natural
world.

>
> Natural selection is the re-arrangement and/or loss of existing
> information due to external influences of the environment.

No, its the process whereby selective pressures act on the variation
generated by mutations to change the genotype of populations of
organisms. Read a biology text book.

> Also in
> every instance, a mutation never adds any new information to an
> organism. It either alters the existing information or there is a loss
> of information.

So what happens when a section of the genome is duplicated, and
mutation to one or both of those sections leads to differences which
are expressed in the organisms by the action of the different genes?
Geneticists and biologists seem to think that it has been observed to
result in the creation of new structures.

Or do you have better information on this than the scientists who have
studied it?


> Some animals have adapted very quickly to changing environmental
> conditions, stunning some 'scientists' in the process, because
> evolution requires long ages.


It does? That will come as a surprise to the scientists who have
published papers on just such phenomena.

> I'm NOT referring to the so-called 'peppered moth proof', that was a
> huge fraud by evolutionists, (Nature 396). A possible example can be
> found on the Galapagos Islands.

The huge fraud was that to illustrate an article on the subject, moths
were mounted on tree-trunks and photographed. Wow! The whole of a major
chunk of scientific research carried out over three centuries lies in
tatters!

Read all about this 'huge fraud' whose exposure competely destroyed the
theory of evolution here:
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/taxome/jim/pap/malletgensoc03.pdf

I'm not sure what the relevance of the Galapagos Islands is here. The
fauna has been extensively studied for a century or so, and instances
of speciation in the bird fauna as a consequence of climatic variation
have been observed.

>
> "In Africa, I've seen... <snip>...to migration. But
> it also seems possible that tribalism could lead to a form of social
> and reproductive isolation that could result in speciation."
>
> Interbreeding within isolated people groups would have resulted in
> tribes gaining certain unique features, due to a recycling of existing
> genes in the 'gene pool'. The originally created genetic information
> is either reshuffled, sorted or has degenerated, and in no way has it
> been added to.

So feel free to go off and marry your sister. Your offspring will gain
'unique features'.

>
> This may be of some help to you.
> André.


Yes, it's a great example of the sort of illinformed creationist
bollocks you should treat with a very large pinch of salt.

RF


.

Relevant Pages

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