Re: Co-optation Today

Treus wrote:
John Harshman wrote:


Let's explore further.


Let's not. There's no reason for me to broadcast personal details at
present.

This is hardly personal. I'm merely asking about your scientific
background. You know mine already.

What is your profession? What sort of degree do
you have. I believe you've called yourself a biophysicist at one point.
Are you a scientist?

The biophysicist appears to have left the Planet of the Apes in
disgust.

Why are you so reluctant to give straight answers to simple questions?

Your observed "phylogenic" state is merely
a complex association, a correlation of properties. The necessity (or
near necessity, or very strong possibility) of the imagined *process*
of "phylogenesis" to which you ascribe it is found nowhere in your
actual data. Yet you keep taking that unfounded leap. Where is your
process, or sufficient components thereof, in action such that we can
extrapolate *exclusively* from what we actually observe to what we
imagine to be happening in the long term? If your "phylogenic" states
require "phylogenesis" based on subjective judgements of obviousness,
then fine, but let's be clear that is what we're dealing with.


Similarly, the necessity of solar fusion is found nowhere in the data we
get from the sun.

Maybe not, but the explanation we use both a) accounts for the all the
details inherent in the transformation in question and b) does so
exclusively in terms of repeatable observations of defined phenomena.

Why, so does the tree explanation of sequence data.

Have you accounted for all the details inherent in phylogenesis in
terms of repeatable observations of defined phenomena? If so, why the
"what would stop it happening?" response to skepticism about point
mutations being arbitrarily cumulative?

Yes, I've accounted for all the relevant details. We see mutations, we
see them accumulate. We don't see them accumulate over millions of years
because we haven't been watching that long. Similarly, you've seen
fusion in the lab. But you haven't seen it on a solar scale. Maybe
there's some unknown process that prevents fusion from happening if it's
ramped up to a huge size. Or maybe the sun is what it looks like, and
DNA sequences are what they look like too.

It's an inference from that data, no more. All science
is like that. How do you know that there's nothing other than fusion
that could explain that data? No, I haven't thought of anything else,
but how can you rule out everything I haven't thought of?

You are incorrectly stating my position. See my last comment and
compare it with your imaginary tree.

I don't see the difference. What makes you think my tree is imaginary?

Insufficient evidence of the sort necessary for a causal
interpretation of your data.

What sort would that be, exactly. Please be specific. Tell me exactly
what I would need in terms of real data, not your usual vague
pronouncements.

Hey, here's a laboratory experiment I haven't mentioned before, which is
probably relevant. It's been shown that phylogenetic methods work well
in resolving known, laboratory-generated phylogenies (of viruses, the
only "organisms" that evolve fast enough for a tree to happen in the
lab). Would you care for a citation?


By all means let's have a look.

Hillis, D.M., J. J. Bull, M. E. White, M. R. Badgett, and I. J.
Molineux. 1992. Experimental phylogenetics: Generation of a known
phylogeny. Science 255:589-592.

You can get a pdf here:
http://www.zo.utexas.edu/faculty/antisense/DownloadHillisPubs.html

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Co-optation Today
    ... Could be pixie dust. ... Phylogenesis, like pixie dust, accounts for the data. ... The data itself does lead you to the tree. ... It's hard to imagine what you would consider "founded". ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Co-optation Today
    ... Could be pixie dust. ... Phylogenesis, like pixie dust, accounts for the data. ... The data itself does lead you to the tree. ... imagine to be happening in the long term? ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Co-optation Today
    ... Could be pixie dust. ... Phylogenesis, like pixie dust, accounts for the data. ... The data itself does lead you to the tree. ... It's hard to imagine what you would consider "founded". ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Co-optation Today
    ... Could be pixie dust. ... Phylogenesis, like pixie dust, accounts for the data. ... The data itself does lead you to the tree. ... imagine to be happening in the long term? ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Co-optation Today
    ... Could be pixie dust. ... Phylogenesis, like pixie dust, accounts for the data. ... The data itself does lead you to the tree. ... It's hard to imagine what you would consider "founded". ...
    (talk.origins)