Evolution of Mammals Re-evaluated

AaxelB writes "A study described in the New York Times rethinks mammalian evolution. Specifically, that the mass extinction of the dinosaurs had relatively little impact on mammals and that the steps in mammals' evolution happened well before and long after the dinosaurs' death."

Comments

Science rethinking.

[CannonballHead]

So... I'm not trying to argue for or against intelligent design/evolution. Science is often championed as being very sure... especially evolution, it seems, when one looks at the court cases and news articles when the controversy comes up in schools, where it taught as pretty much proven fact. Does it raise questions in no one else's mind when it is quite consistently being "rethought?" It seems it should not be dogmatically asserted as it is now, nor should a "rethinking" be taken in stride as if it's entirely normal behavior for science. And yes, I know it's not a scientific fact, it is a scientific theory, as most scientific thoughts are - but most school kids don't know much of the difference between "fact" and "scientific theory." It's simply taught. Here's the chapter on gravity, here's the chapter on evolution. Maybe informative materials should be re-evaluated when the theory itself is re-evaluated.

Re:Science rethinking.

[E 99]

While the Peacock's tail is an impediment to personal survival, the extravagance of it tells females that the male is healthy, strong, has good genes and would make a good choice as a father to their offspring.

That explanation doesn't hold water, because many, if not most, male birds have bright colors that are attractive to the females of their species, yet their bright colors are no hinderance to their survival. Furthermore, the gene that makes peahens attracted to extravagant impediments to survival would have been selected against from the moment it appeared.

The common explanation that the various species of male birds evolved bright colors because the females are attracted to those colors is a copout, as it presume the females were attracted to bright colors before the bright colors existed in the males, and doesn't explain how they came to be thus attracted before the objects of attraction even existed. More than that, it doesn't explain why this process has apparently happened over and over in many different species of birds, whose different colors require different molecular pathways, but hasn't happened in any species outside the bird class. Anything resembling a complete theory would need to do those things.

What is constantly being reevaluated is the actual mechanisms that drive this change... ...They are not reevaluating the means of evolution, just the details of the timetables of when things happened.

These statements seem contradictory. The second one is true. Evidence can, and constantly has, improved our understanding of the history of evolution. There is no forseeable evidence that can improve -- or disprove -- the accepted theory of the mechanism of evolution. Until we can make a full mathmatical model of how DNA encodes organisms, and simulate a complete organism in a future supercomputer, it is an untestable and unfalisifiable theory, and therefore no has greater basis in science than saying that God directly and arbitrarily split each species into subspecies at various points in time. While science isn't interested in theories that don't have factual basis, religions such as Christianity and Atheism often are.

Re:Science rethinking.

[arminw]

.....That evolution happens is a known fact.......

That depends on your definition of evolution. If you say an example of evolution is shown be how bacteria become resistant to antibiotics, then that is a fact. They may in fact adapt, if you will, "evolve", to the point where they cannot interbreed any longer.

If you are saying that evolution is how reptiles became birds or monkeys became human, then that is faith. The immunity of bacteria and the breeding of dogs is fact that has been called evolution. Then this gets extended beyond the breaking point, with no evidence whatsoever for any of the large changes (even in tiny jumps) needed to turn a fish to a reptile and other transformations of totally different kinds of living things. Science is based on observation and experiment, not conjecture of what might have happened in the past to explain what we see today. There are no intermediates between a dog and a cat, reptile or fish or bird. They are distinct kinds of creatures and there will NEVER be a semi-dog or a semi-cat, half one and half the other, at least not without the intelligent interference of man.

Evolution is based on some fundamental assumptions (beliefs, faith) about time and space and the measurements of parameters thereof. If these assumptions are false (and there is evidence they are) then the whole house of evolutionary cards collapses in a heap.

Evolutionists are also totally ignorant about the nature on origin of information. Where does the immense amount of information coded in the DNA come from? This information is software, detailed code in how to build the particular life form. In computers, software comes from a mind. Where do the software instructions come from to build even a single cell?

Re:This is Great

[arminw]

......draws into question the previous belief ........

All evolutionary thinking is nothing but a belief system masquerading as science. It is based on the assumption (belief) that time itself as well as our measurement thereof is correct and absolutely constant. If is a belief that fossils were somehow made over vast periods time by unknown processes that nobody has ever duplicated, even today. Nobody has EVER made a fossil. NO fossils are being made anywhere today, especially by any slow, gradual process, sometimes imagined by evolutionists. When an organism dies today, it becomes food for others. We call this decay. To prevent this, a dead body needs to be put in an environment that prevents all microorganisms from feeding on the remains and oxygen must be excluded. This has to happen very quickly. A sudden disastrous upheaval such as the Biblical flood could certainly account for fossils.

Rocks are dated by their radioactivity. The unwarranted assumption (faith) is that such radioactive decay rates have never varied over the vast periods of time evolutionists need in order to make their assertions seem plausible. Radioactive decay is a process that comes from the properties of the various kinds of atoms. This rate of decay is governed by certain "constants". There is NO known law of physics that mandates that these all remain invariant over the vast periods of time involved. It is assumed (believed, faith) that these constants, and therefore the radioactive decay rate has always been what it is today. There is evidence that some of these so called "constants" have changed greatly since the beginning of time.

Until the 1800s, the term "dinosaur" was invented. In all the preceding centuries these same creatures were known as "dragons". Every culture has tales of and depictions of these fearsome beasts that are quite consistent across time and civilizations. There are mountains of recorded history of humans having feared and fought these huge creatures.