I love firefox for its developer related addons but lately it's been getting more and more grating with the performance hit and instability you take with addons.
So I've resorted to running in safe mode and disabling addons. What am I using firefox for anymore? Good question...
I personally find it a somewhat anemic worldview, which has no naturalistic explanation power...
Does an unnatural / supernatural being need a natural explanation?
...and defines god as something so remote that it has no significant ethical dimension.
Clearly, however, the God of Judaism and Christianity has significant ethical, moral and personal interest in us as attested by His Word the bible.
The Christian God is the really the only god who has a complete and coherent history, personal interest in you and I, and has been saying so and speaking an unchanging message since the beginning.
In this case, the total diversity in any population (including "the total of all animals on earth") can only go down. Right?
Well, it's important to note the vast diversity within populations. How many kinds of dogs are there? Or horses
We don't see a tremendous number of things in the fossil record. Not yet anyway. What we do see are species that have died out and we see animals of the genus and family of species we have today.
The dog family (Canidae) is very diverse and, even in evolution, evolved from root branches on the evolution tree.
Creation would say the dog family had all the traits necessary to breed all dog species over a number of generations. The information was already there and natural selection just had to go to work.
I agree with everything you've observed in the linked article but I think the big picture was missed.
Of all the various ways and mechanisms that bacteria survive, mutation is never the reason; mutation of the type that adds a trait previously impossible to express in the genetic code of the population.
Rather, what is the case is that, of the various survival mechanisms, we see genetic code being changed to alter trait expression to best suit environmental pressures.
Further, we have never observed and classified, with complete confidence, a mutation of genetic information, leading to the addition of a trait previously impossible to express in the genetic code of the population, that resulted in a population that was more fit for its environment. What we do see is genetic changes enabling expression of traits previously possible in the genetic code of the population.
Let me give a concrete example showing just who simple and obvious it is. Dogs for example have black-and-white vision...
I understand the example and its implications but this is, to put it drastically simply, easier said than done. I understand the example but we don't see that result (I assume) even if the mechanisms are proven. On the other hand, say we did see that result in dogs: Some dogs have colour vision. Just like hair colour, this could be reproductive sampling. We do not see this type of thing happening.
And at this point it should be clear not only that evolution is possible, but that evolution is obviously inevitable. Mutations happen, at least some mutations create novel traits or abilities, at least some of those novel traits or abilities include at least some benefit, and the fact genes can and do duplicate demonstrate that novel increases in abilities and information can and will accumulate with NO LOSS of previously existing information and abilities.
The fact than something can happen does not preclude the chance of it never happening. Gene duplication and mutation can happen but there are N other mechanisms that work against those two things summing up to something.
At the population level, mutations are a pure increase in information because all previous information still exists within other members of the population.
I might grant you an increase in information (although I question the idea's finer details) but that's not really the crux of the matter. You can have mutations, for sure, and they might cause all kinds of things, but a new trait added not previously expressible in genetic code of the population? We don't see that happening.
I really wish the evolution denialists would quit telling God how He is and is-not allowed to run his universe. The fact is that evolution works, and as I've explained above evolution is harnessed as an applied science within most major corporations.
Well, this is an important point to understand. Creationists are actually allowing God to tell us how he did it and we understand he leaves it up to us to figure out how that's possible.
A well balanced study of science and one's faith is appropriate here. God tells us many, many, many times we don't understand God's thoughts, nor his purposes, nor His designs, nor His plans. Creationists work with what God has told us knowing that God always turns out to have been telling us the straightforward truth. Then they go out and try to understand it as God has written it. Note that He also says many, many, many times, however, that His Word, His bible, is to be understood, "read to the people," "spoken out loud," "taught to the people", etc. God may be unknowable but what He wants us to know will be plain and forthright.
It is, in my opinion, is far more beautiful and impressive for God to creating a perfect and complete universe with perfect and complete laws of physic producing rainbows and snowflakes and the diversity of life, rath
You most certainly need a "meddling god" in your philosophy, to account for mutations and new species, since you assert these things cannot happen naturally.
I'm just saying God's nature doesn't need meddling. It goes along on its own. That's the beauty of God's creation.
That's simply wrong. We've observed mutations creating new features in the lab. "Seems" is an insufficient weasel word for a lack of looking.
Honestly, show me. I've read many and many that have been posted here. They all turn out to be selection rather than the change required for evolutionary speciation.
That's just a ludicrous amount to read into the word "kinds".
Literary experts know their subjects. They look at more than just words. They look at phrases, context, repetition, references, allusions, language, culture, intent, specificity of the words, phrases and language chosen, etc. These people aren't stupid. They know if you're going to believe in something you had better make sure it stands on its own. And that's what they've done. The scripture, all scripture, supports the idea that God created organisms after their own "kinds."
The Bible and evolutionary science don't contradict each other at all.
But yes I'm aware you aren't going to believe any science that you think does contradict, that's very clear. Mutations don't exist, or are necessarily bad, whatever it takes, got it.
Wrong. But I know you won't believe anything else.;)
It's your description, and a really big static list is still a big static list, inherently simpler than the same incredibly expressive source of information but with the capability to change over time. Which it demonstrably does.
Your "change over time" might be totally palatable to me. I might be seeing change over time as natural selection where you might be seeing it with other mechanisms like genetic drift via mutation. The line that I talk about is adding a previously impossible to express trait (impossible due to genetic encoding). We've never seen this and natural selection, itself, accounts for everything we've seen.
I am fulfilled scientifically and delighted by what God has done. Every time I learn about the increasing complexity and sophistication yet elegance of this universe I'm more amazed by Him. I'm more amazed by an ancient earth, where whole classes of animals with unique traits arose, then vanished never to be seen again, and things the earth has never seen before arose after them. I'm not going to disbelieve the evidence of the world He created because it doesn't match what I think a 500-word summary of the creation of the universe was trying to say. I believe God wanted me to read those words and see His hands in forming of the universe, not read it like a biology textbook.
You ignore inconvenient science and call yourself fulfilled because the box made of words you've put God in hasn't been disturbed.
Don't pretend those are the same.
I think it might be helpful to put the effort you put into studying science into studying God's Word in all of its facets. The bible isn't meant to trick anyone. By and large it's meant to be taken at face value. Most of it is just history, just facts. After all, if the faith is complicated, so much more will people avoid it. What devotees begin to understand about the bible is that God is a "truth teller". That is, things we find unbelievable at first turn out to be true. With enough experience, you begin to understand that if you just give God some credit, go out and try to find out how it might have occurred the way he said it did, it turns out most of the time he was telling the truth without any trickery.
You ignore inconvenient science and call yourself fulfilled because the box made of words you've put God in hasn't been disturbed.
Don't pretend those are the same.
Previous research has shown that wild-type E. coli can utilize citrate when oxygen levels are low. [6]
My core point with all of this discussion is to show that genetic changes, adding traits previously impossible to express, is never what is happening in these cases. It always turns out the organism contained this ability already if not the expression and it took environmental pressure to express the ability.
Actually, natural selection is a "key component" of evolution, not its only mechanism for accomplishing what it does. Another key part of it is "genetic drift," the type that enables speciation.
The wikipedia articles on evolution and natural selection are valuable here.
Studies seem to always show that a population always had those traits. To put it another way: We've never had an experiment that produced a new trait previously impossible to express with the existing genetic encoding.
I think it gives Him more credit to accept the existence of both natural selection to choose among traits, and with a mechanism for new traits to arise. It takes both to achieve the tremendous and changing diversity of the world's life, where life that exists now has features completely new and never seen in previous life.
I'll give you that. But the counter-point is that the bible, God's Word, makes claims and implications about speciation. So creationists are not about to say "oh, it looks like we observe something contrary to what God says" and just take that at face value. Everybody should be wiser than that. No, they try it out and see if such and such is really true.
It's an interesting new line for Creationists to draw in the sand, where trait selection is okay and species changing over time is okay, but God must have had a fixed set of possible features all laid out in advance and that list can never change. Such a pre-enumerated list carried down through the ages seems to lack the elegance that you so admire in natural selection...
Well, here's the thing, what creationists find amazing about the way God did it is that you get incredible diversification and variance of species from genetic variation within a species and natural selection. To a creationist, all of the variations that we see are due to the massive amount of information in every organism and natural selection. There's no lack of surprise and amazement looking at it from that angle. It's amazing just as it is.
Such a pre-enumerated list carried down through the ages seems to lack the elegance that you so admire in natural selection, but whatever. Point is it's just another way for the narrow-minded to place a completely artificial limitation on the capabilities of God and His plan, and thereby claim reality could not work that way.
Well, talking about it like it was a "pre-enumerated list" is really a disservice to God and an underestimation of what the genetic code is capable of. This isn't just a few dozen variations. DNA encodes a fantastic amount of information able to be expressed through reproduction and natural selection.
Either way, pre-emuerated or Spore-style procedural, it would be credit to God. Creationists, however, will look at what God has told them, give God some credit, and try to understand how it might have come about that way. And they come away with a solid foundation, both fulfilled scientifically and amazed and delighted in what their God has done.
It is frequently the case, observable in the human record, in the lab, and elsewhere. New traits arise that did not exist before. Some of them are bad traits, some are good traits, and which survive is based on natural selection.
The claim here is that a previously impossible to express trait, due to lack of genetic encoding, has been added and expressed. Every case I've ever come across has boiled down to natural selection or negative genetic change making an organism more "fit" for its environment - where positive genetic change would be adding a trait that was previously impossible to express due to lack of genetic encoding for that trait.
So, I would need some support for that claim. It just doesn't appear to be the case.
Yeah... no one ever thinks "natural selection" when they think of evolution. You're right. Sure. Why not.
I think I worded that badly. What I meant was that when people hear from the media that something was caused by evolution they think of the umbrella term that implies both natural selection and genetic drift adding previously impossible to express traits. Most people don't know and are not told that most of these cases are basic natural selection.
I say "most of these cases" because I know of one study where dna corruption (what I would grant is "genetic drift") expressed different behaviour for a certain bacteria population. Note that these mutations corruptions are loss of information, loss of function, loss of ability - which actually make them more "fit" for their environment - but it is not the type of genetic drift that evolution needs to generate new species.
Where did the minority get that trait from? The answer seems to be "mutation."
Where did they get them from? In the same way that human populations have minority populations of red heads (I don't know if red hair is really that rare but just for an example), all populations have groups able to able to express a certain trait while the majority can not.
Take the Black Plague. The people who survived likely tended to be better able to defend it. Take HIV/AIDS. Some people/groups are thought to be more resistant or immune to it than most. Actually, this is a really fascinating article.
Taking a step back for a moment. The Christian account of creation seems to indicate that God created the world and everything in it perfect, then sin entered the world, and things started to go bad. In other words, perfect dna, perfect balance, then dna gets corrupted, then natural selection does it thing on populations, and then you get unbalanced populations.
So, following, it appears that all species genetic information contains what is needed to survive earth's ecosystem. That may mean the population diminishes for a while and then rebounds. Nonetheless, some groups in a population not only have the information needed to survive but are currently expressing it unlike the majority. So the majority diminishes and the minority increases until the minority becomes the majority.
Lest some think that that's just not the case, as I've written elsewhere, we just don't have any evidence that mutation is adding previously impossible to express traits.
How are they not the same thing? Isn't evolution just random mutation + sexual/viral crossover + natural selection?
Definitely not the same thing. From wikipedia:
Evolution is the change in the inherited traits of a population of organisms through successive generations.
Natural selection is the process by which certain heritable traits—those that make it more likely for an organism to survive and successfully reproduce —become more common in a population over successive generations. It is a key mechanism of evolution.
Note "key machanism of evolution". Evolution is an umbrella term for a lot of things. The two most pertinent are biological change via (1) natural selection, and (2) genetic change adding previously impossible to express traits.
Natural selection does not imply genetic change the way that evolution needs it to in order to produce different species. In order for evolution to work, you have two things: natural selection and "genetic drift" (from the wikipedia article).
This is why I'm fine with natural selection as a mechanism but, due to lack of evidence, I can not agree that genetic drift, in the way evolution requires for new species.
Can you imagine any physical evidence that would ever change your mind about true evolution (Speciation, new traits, etc)?
I know the line of argument you're going down. Let me put it this way: Every time I read a news item, story or article that cites "evolution", they always boil down to natural selection. No relevant mutation adding a trait that was not possible to express before. It's usually pretty obvious with larger animals but can become subtle with micro-scale organisms. Nevertheless, the end is always the same: Natural selection doing its work without the one thing that evolution requires: that mutations add previously impossible to express traits.
Every single case boils down to something that can not really be called evolution in the terms everyone thinks it in. Natural slection, certainly, but not the umbrella term "evolution." It's actually a disservice to everyone's learning to call any of these things evolution - it's just simplifying to a point that actually detracts from understanding.
It's the way biology works, although some people like to have a "meddling god" to explain this all...
No need for a meddling god when said god set up an ecosystem that doesn't require micromanagement.
What's going on here is natural selection, a perfectly fine method of ecosystem management.
Genetic changes, causing adaptations and mutations which cause traits that didn't previously exist in the population, is never the case. It's always the case that a minority population, with a trait that makes them more suitable to their environment, survives better than the majority population lacking the traits to survive in their environment.
I'm actually impressed to the point of awe that natural selection, an inspired, elegant solution at its scale, is what we find out to operating in nature. It actually gives more credit to God's than any other ideas we might have had about it.
So you have overwhelming evidence of evolution at the molecular level, they're forced to admit that it's happening, reluctantly, but their new goal is that they want overwhelming evidence of new organs.
I would like to see studies supporting this overwhelming evidence.
What always ends up being the case is that natural selection, a perfectly fine method for ecosystem management, is the cause, never what most people think of evolution as such as genetic changes enabling traits that did not previously exist in the population.
Natural selection is brilliant. A minority population has a trait that enables it to better survive than the majority population: majority diminishes, minority increases. Beautiful.
It's the idea of evolution - one species turning into an entirely different species - that gets their panties in a bunch.
That's not true. Creationists are fine with natural selection (I think it's an inspired, elegant and brilliant method at its scale). But the common idea of evolution, when used in contexts like this, is that progressive genetic changes are occurring causing a gain of a trait that did not previously exist in the genetic code. This is never the case.
Instead, what always turns out to be the case is that a minority of a population has a trait that better enables them to survive whatever pressure is being exerted on them. The majority population diminishes and the minority flourishes.
Just using natural selection to make herbicide-resistant weeds isn't really any different than selecting certain traits to create new dog breeds.
I don't believe in evolution but natural selection absolutely.
Every single case where evolution is cited ends up being natural selection. This is an important difference. Natural selection is simply allowing those best fit to survive.
Evolution is too broad a term to apply to what's happening here. Most, having been taught evolution, will think there is some progressive genetic changes going on here enabling a survival trait that did not previously exist. That is never the case. This is a case of the common weed being killed out and the only one left being the one that could survive all along and, having no competition, it can thrive.
And, really, natural selection is inspired. It seems elegant at its scale and therefore brilliant.
That link, HARRY_READ_ME.txt, certainly is a trainwreck of bad organization, bad policy, bad procedure, bad communication, etc., but it's not an example of bad code. We'd have to see the code to say that. What I see from this document is not bad data or incorrect results - just horrific effort getting tools to work.
I see this with developers all the time who don't care enough about their code, its organization and its data - or are ignorant of why that's even important. I can totally see scientists being ignorant of IT and development best practice. Not excusing, just saying it's not as uncommon as many would think.
I agree with the CRU exoneration, however, that likely the results were correct but procedures were horrific. It looks like those guys were hacking around legitimate problems in their tools to produce their data - not manipulating their data.
Been dealing with some issues exactly like this myself. Is there ever a situation where you would work with floats rather than integers, related to what you were talking about? Only for presentation?
My sister's family of three very young children do without tv and, as long as they've been growing, I've always been impressed with their ability to play and lack of complaining when we turn off the tv at grandpa's house.
Once they're used to not having tv, they'll go and make up stuff to do. Like all kids they're bound to cross the line with you sometime and annoy you until you get angry but the benefits of no tv for kids is quite fascinating to watch.
They do have an entertainment center where they watch select movies and cartoons occasionally. But that is vastly better than on-demand cable tv where 99% of it isn't worth watching.
The need for continuous collaboration suggests that interfaces are not well documented or perhaps even well defined and/or the system/feature architecture is not well thought out.
Bingo. Absolutely bingo.
That is exactly the problem and, to me, it's obvious.
There's this idea of cost associated with designing up front and since it's an immediate cost it overrides the cost of all the trouble that ensues on the backend of a project timeline when that lack of documentation completely screws you over.
There is no free lunch. There is no silver bullet. There are only better and worse company practices and better and worse managers and developers. Which is really only to say: Duh!
Slashdot Mirror
I love firefox for its developer related addons but lately it's been getting more and more grating with the performance hit and instability you take with addons.
So I've resorted to running in safe mode and disabling addons. What am I using firefox for anymore? Good question...
Science thrives on dissenting views. What good is "science" if it becomes a belief because you refuse to consider information to the contrary?
Besides, the quality of writing may surprise you.
I'm one of the few people I know who has been known to pull a 180 on a new piece of information.
I personally find it a somewhat anemic worldview, which has no naturalistic explanation power...
Does an unnatural / supernatural being need a natural explanation?
...and defines god as something so remote that it has no significant ethical dimension.
Clearly, however, the God of Judaism and Christianity has significant ethical, moral and personal interest in us as attested by His Word the bible.
The Christian God is the really the only god who has a complete and coherent history, personal interest in you and I, and has been saying so and speaking an unchanging message since the beginning.
In this case, the total diversity in any population (including "the total of all animals on earth") can only go down. Right?
Well, it's important to note the vast diversity within populations. How many kinds of dogs are there? Or horses
We don't see a tremendous number of things in the fossil record. Not yet anyway. What we do see are species that have died out and we see animals of the genus and family of species we have today.
The dog family (Canidae) is very diverse and, even in evolution, evolved from root branches on the evolution tree.
Creation would say the dog family had all the traits necessary to breed all dog species over a number of generations. The information was already there and natural selection just had to go to work.
I agree with everything you've observed in the linked article but I think the big picture was missed.
Of all the various ways and mechanisms that bacteria survive, mutation is never the reason; mutation of the type that adds a trait previously impossible to express in the genetic code of the population.
Rather, what is the case is that, of the various survival mechanisms, we see genetic code being changed to alter trait expression to best suit environmental pressures.
Further, we have never observed and classified, with complete confidence, a mutation of genetic information, leading to the addition of a trait previously impossible to express in the genetic code of the population, that resulted in a population that was more fit for its environment. What we do see is genetic changes enabling expression of traits previously possible in the genetic code of the population.
Let me give a concrete example showing just who simple and obvious it is. Dogs for example have black-and-white vision...
I understand the example and its implications but this is, to put it drastically simply, easier said than done. I understand the example but we don't see that result (I assume) even if the mechanisms are proven. On the other hand, say we did see that result in dogs: Some dogs have colour vision. Just like hair colour, this could be reproductive sampling. We do not see this type of thing happening.
And at this point it should be clear not only that evolution is possible, but that evolution is obviously inevitable. Mutations happen, at least some mutations create novel traits or abilities, at least some of those novel traits or abilities include at least some benefit, and the fact genes can and do duplicate demonstrate that novel increases in abilities and information can and will accumulate with NO LOSS of previously existing information and abilities.
The fact than something can happen does not preclude the chance of it never happening. Gene duplication and mutation can happen but there are N other mechanisms that work against those two things summing up to something.
At the population level, mutations are a pure increase in information because all previous information still exists within other members of the population.
I might grant you an increase in information (although I question the idea's finer details) but that's not really the crux of the matter. You can have mutations, for sure, and they might cause all kinds of things, but a new trait added not previously expressible in genetic code of the population? We don't see that happening.
I really wish the evolution denialists would quit telling God how He is and is-not allowed to run his universe. The fact is that evolution works, and as I've explained above evolution is harnessed as an applied science within most major corporations.
Well, this is an important point to understand. Creationists are actually allowing God to tell us how he did it and we understand he leaves it up to us to figure out how that's possible.
A well balanced study of science and one's faith is appropriate here. God tells us many, many, many times we don't understand God's thoughts, nor his purposes, nor His designs, nor His plans. Creationists work with what God has told us knowing that God always turns out to have been telling us the straightforward truth. Then they go out and try to understand it as God has written it. Note that He also says many, many, many times, however, that His Word, His bible, is to be understood, "read to the people," "spoken out loud," "taught to the people", etc. God may be unknowable but what He wants us to know will be plain and forthright.
It is, in my opinion, is far more beautiful and impressive for God to creating a perfect and complete universe with perfect and complete laws of physic producing rainbows and snowflakes and the diversity of life, rath
You most certainly need a "meddling god" in your philosophy, to account for mutations and new species, since you assert these things cannot happen naturally.
I'm just saying God's nature doesn't need meddling. It goes along on its own. That's the beauty of God's creation.
That's simply wrong. We've observed mutations creating new features in the lab. "Seems" is an insufficient weasel word for a lack of looking.
Honestly, show me. I've read many and many that have been posted here. They all turn out to be selection rather than the change required for evolutionary speciation.
That's just a ludicrous amount to read into the word "kinds".
Literary experts know their subjects. They look at more than just words. They look at phrases, context, repetition, references, allusions, language, culture, intent, specificity of the words, phrases and language chosen, etc. These people aren't stupid. They know if you're going to believe in something you had better make sure it stands on its own. And that's what they've done. The scripture, all scripture, supports the idea that God created organisms after their own "kinds."
The Bible and evolutionary science don't contradict each other at all.
Couldn’t God Have Used Evolution?, Are the Bible and Evolution Compatible?
But yes I'm aware you aren't going to believe any science that you think does contradict, that's very clear. Mutations don't exist, or are necessarily bad, whatever it takes, got it.
Wrong. But I know you won't believe anything else. ;)
It's your description, and a really big static list is still a big static list, inherently simpler than the same incredibly expressive source of information but with the capability to change over time. Which it demonstrably does.
Your "change over time" might be totally palatable to me. I might be seeing change over time as natural selection where you might be seeing it with other mechanisms like genetic drift via mutation. The line that I talk about is adding a previously impossible to express trait (impossible due to genetic encoding). We've never seen this and natural selection, itself, accounts for everything we've seen.
I am fulfilled scientifically and delighted by what God has done. Every time I learn about the increasing complexity and sophistication yet elegance of this universe I'm more amazed by Him. I'm more amazed by an ancient earth, where whole classes of animals with unique traits arose, then vanished never to be seen again, and things the earth has never seen before arose after them. I'm not going to disbelieve the evidence of the world He created because it doesn't match what I think a 500-word summary of the creation of the universe was trying to say. I believe God wanted me to read those words and see His hands in forming of the universe, not read it like a biology textbook. You ignore inconvenient science and call yourself fulfilled because the box made of words you've put God in hasn't been disturbed. Don't pretend those are the same.
I think it might be helpful to put the effort you put into studying science into studying God's Word in all of its facets. The bible isn't meant to trick anyone. By and large it's meant to be taken at face value. Most of it is just history, just facts. After all, if the faith is complicated, so much more will people avoid it. What devotees begin to understand about the bible is that God is a "truth teller". That is, things we find unbelievable at first turn out to be true. With enough experience, you begin to understand that if you just give God some credit, go out and try to find out how it might have occurred the way he said it did, it turns out most of the time he was telling the truth without any trickery.
You ignore inconvenient science and call yourself fulfilled because the box made of words you've put God in hasn't been disturbed. Don't pretend those are the same.
That's the one I know about. See A Poke in the Eye?.
Previous research has shown that wild-type E. coli can utilize citrate when oxygen levels are low. [6]
My core point with all of this discussion is to show that genetic changes, adding traits previously impossible to express, is never what is happening in these cases. It always turns out the organism contained this ability already if not the expression and it took environmental pressure to express the ability.
Evolution == natural selection + time
Actually, natural selection is a "key component" of evolution, not its only mechanism for accomplishing what it does. Another key part of it is "genetic drift," the type that enables speciation.
The wikipedia articles on evolution and natural selection are valuable here.
How did that trait appear?
Studies seem to always show that a population always had those traits. To put it another way: We've never had an experiment that produced a new trait previously impossible to express with the existing genetic encoding.
I think it gives Him more credit to accept the existence of both natural selection to choose among traits, and with a mechanism for new traits to arise. It takes both to achieve the tremendous and changing diversity of the world's life, where life that exists now has features completely new and never seen in previous life.
I'll give you that. But the counter-point is that the bible, God's Word, makes claims and implications about speciation. So creationists are not about to say "oh, it looks like we observe something contrary to what God says" and just take that at face value. Everybody should be wiser than that. No, they try it out and see if such and such is really true.
It's an interesting new line for Creationists to draw in the sand, where trait selection is okay and species changing over time is okay, but God must have had a fixed set of possible features all laid out in advance and that list can never change. Such a pre-enumerated list carried down through the ages seems to lack the elegance that you so admire in natural selection...
Well, here's the thing, what creationists find amazing about the way God did it is that you get incredible diversification and variance of species from genetic variation within a species and natural selection. To a creationist, all of the variations that we see are due to the massive amount of information in every organism and natural selection. There's no lack of surprise and amazement looking at it from that angle. It's amazing just as it is.
Such a pre-enumerated list carried down through the ages seems to lack the elegance that you so admire in natural selection, but whatever. Point is it's just another way for the narrow-minded to place a completely artificial limitation on the capabilities of God and His plan, and thereby claim reality could not work that way.
Well, talking about it like it was a "pre-enumerated list" is really a disservice to God and an underestimation of what the genetic code is capable of. This isn't just a few dozen variations. DNA encodes a fantastic amount of information able to be expressed through reproduction and natural selection.
Either way, pre-emuerated or Spore-style procedural, it would be credit to God. Creationists, however, will look at what God has told them, give God some credit, and try to understand how it might have come about that way. And they come away with a solid foundation, both fulfilled scientifically and amazed and delighted in what their God has done.
It is frequently the case, observable in the human record, in the lab, and elsewhere. New traits arise that did not exist before. Some of them are bad traits, some are good traits, and which survive is based on natural selection.
The claim here is that a previously impossible to express trait, due to lack of genetic encoding, has been added and expressed. Every case I've ever come across has boiled down to natural selection or negative genetic change making an organism more "fit" for its environment - where positive genetic change would be adding a trait that was previously impossible to express due to lack of genetic encoding for that trait.
So, I would need some support for that claim. It just doesn't appear to be the case.
Yeah... no one ever thinks "natural selection" when they think of evolution. You're right. Sure. Why not.
I think I worded that badly. What I meant was that when people hear from the media that something was caused by evolution they think of the umbrella term that implies both natural selection and genetic drift adding previously impossible to express traits. Most people don't know and are not told that most of these cases are basic natural selection.
I say "most of these cases" because I know of one study where dna corruption (what I would grant is "genetic drift") expressed different behaviour for a certain bacteria population. Note that these mutations corruptions are loss of information, loss of function, loss of ability - which actually make them more "fit" for their environment - but it is not the type of genetic drift that evolution needs to generate new species.
Where did the minority get that trait from? The answer seems to be "mutation."
Where did they get them from? In the same way that human populations have minority populations of red heads (I don't know if red hair is really that rare but just for an example), all populations have groups able to able to express a certain trait while the majority can not.
Take the Black Plague. The people who survived likely tended to be better able to defend it. Take HIV/AIDS. Some people/groups are thought to be more resistant or immune to it than most. Actually, this is a really fascinating article.
Taking a step back for a moment. The Christian account of creation seems to indicate that God created the world and everything in it perfect, then sin entered the world, and things started to go bad. In other words, perfect dna, perfect balance, then dna gets corrupted, then natural selection does it thing on populations, and then you get unbalanced populations.
So, following, it appears that all species genetic information contains what is needed to survive earth's ecosystem. That may mean the population diminishes for a while and then rebounds. Nonetheless, some groups in a population not only have the information needed to survive but are currently expressing it unlike the majority. So the majority diminishes and the minority increases until the minority becomes the majority.
Lest some think that that's just not the case, as I've written elsewhere, we just don't have any evidence that mutation is adding previously impossible to express traits.
How are they not the same thing? Isn't evolution just random mutation + sexual/viral crossover + natural selection?
Definitely not the same thing. From wikipedia:
Evolution is the change in the inherited traits of a population of organisms through successive generations.
Natural selection is the process by which certain heritable traits—those that make it more likely for an organism to survive and successfully reproduce —become more common in a population over successive generations. It is a key mechanism of evolution.
Note "key machanism of evolution". Evolution is an umbrella term for a lot of things. The two most pertinent are biological change via (1) natural selection, and (2) genetic change adding previously impossible to express traits.
Natural selection does not imply genetic change the way that evolution needs it to in order to produce different species. In order for evolution to work, you have two things: natural selection and "genetic drift" (from the wikipedia article).
This is why I'm fine with natural selection as a mechanism but, due to lack of evidence, I can not agree that genetic drift, in the way evolution requires for new species.
Can you imagine any physical evidence that would ever change your mind about true evolution (Speciation, new traits, etc)?
I know the line of argument you're going down. Let me put it this way: Every time I read a news item, story or article that cites "evolution", they always boil down to natural selection. No relevant mutation adding a trait that was not possible to express before. It's usually pretty obvious with larger animals but can become subtle with micro-scale organisms. Nevertheless, the end is always the same: Natural selection doing its work without the one thing that evolution requires: that mutations add previously impossible to express traits.
How about this one: Observing Evolution Over 40,000 Generations. Clearly evolution via mutations adding traits not possible to express before, right? It's not that simple: A Creationist Perspective of Beneficial Mutations in Bacteria.
Every single case boils down to something that can not really be called evolution in the terms everyone thinks it in. Natural slection, certainly, but not the umbrella term "evolution." It's actually a disservice to everyone's learning to call any of these things evolution - it's just simplifying to a point that actually detracts from understanding.
It's the way biology works, although some people like to have a "meddling god" to explain this all...
No need for a meddling god when said god set up an ecosystem that doesn't require micromanagement.
What's going on here is natural selection, a perfectly fine method of ecosystem management.
Genetic changes, causing adaptations and mutations which cause traits that didn't previously exist in the population, is never the case. It's always the case that a minority population, with a trait that makes them more suitable to their environment, survives better than the majority population lacking the traits to survive in their environment.
I'm actually impressed to the point of awe that natural selection, an inspired, elegant solution at its scale, is what we find out to operating in nature. It actually gives more credit to God's than any other ideas we might have had about it.
So you have overwhelming evidence of evolution at the molecular level, they're forced to admit that it's happening, reluctantly, but their new goal is that they want overwhelming evidence of new organs.
I would like to see studies supporting this overwhelming evidence.
What always ends up being the case is that natural selection, a perfectly fine method for ecosystem management, is the cause, never what most people think of evolution as such as genetic changes enabling traits that did not previously exist in the population.
Natural selection is brilliant. A minority population has a trait that enables it to better survive than the majority population: majority diminishes, minority increases. Beautiful.
It's the idea of evolution - one species turning into an entirely different species - that gets their panties in a bunch.
That's not true. Creationists are fine with natural selection (I think it's an inspired, elegant and brilliant method at its scale). But the common idea of evolution, when used in contexts like this, is that progressive genetic changes are occurring causing a gain of a trait that did not previously exist in the genetic code. This is never the case.
Instead, what always turns out to be the case is that a minority of a population has a trait that better enables them to survive whatever pressure is being exerted on them. The majority population diminishes and the minority flourishes.
Just using natural selection to make herbicide-resistant weeds isn't really any different than selecting certain traits to create new dog breeds.
Bingo.
I don't believe in evolution but natural selection absolutely.
Every single case where evolution is cited ends up being natural selection. This is an important difference. Natural selection is simply allowing those best fit to survive.
Evolution is too broad a term to apply to what's happening here. Most, having been taught evolution, will think there is some progressive genetic changes going on here enabling a survival trait that did not previously exist. That is never the case. This is a case of the common weed being killed out and the only one left being the one that could survive all along and, having no competition, it can thrive.
And, really, natural selection is inspired. It seems elegant at its scale and therefore brilliant.
That link, HARRY_READ_ME.txt, certainly is a trainwreck of bad organization, bad policy, bad procedure, bad communication, etc., but it's not an example of bad code. We'd have to see the code to say that. What I see from this document is not bad data or incorrect results - just horrific effort getting tools to work.
I see this with developers all the time who don't care enough about their code, its organization and its data - or are ignorant of why that's even important. I can totally see scientists being ignorant of IT and development best practice. Not excusing, just saying it's not as uncommon as many would think.
I agree with the CRU exoneration, however, that likely the results were correct but procedures were horrific. It looks like those guys were hacking around legitimate problems in their tools to produce their data - not manipulating their data.
Does freedom feed you at the end of the day? Does it pay for your rent?
Yes, it does. Yes, it does. Next question.
That is some severe lack of thought put into that question and a severe lack of foresight.
Been dealing with some issues exactly like this myself. Is there ever a situation where you would work with floats rather than integers, related to what you were talking about? Only for presentation?
My sister's family of three very young children do without tv and, as long as they've been growing, I've always been impressed with their ability to play and lack of complaining when we turn off the tv at grandpa's house.
Once they're used to not having tv, they'll go and make up stuff to do. Like all kids they're bound to cross the line with you sometime and annoy you until you get angry but the benefits of no tv for kids is quite fascinating to watch.
They do have an entertainment center where they watch select movies and cartoons occasionally. But that is vastly better than on-demand cable tv where 99% of it isn't worth watching.
The need for continuous collaboration suggests that interfaces are not well documented or perhaps even well defined and/or the system/feature architecture is not well thought out.
Bingo. Absolutely bingo.
That is exactly the problem and, to me, it's obvious.
There's this idea of cost associated with designing up front and since it's an immediate cost it overrides the cost of all the trouble that ensues on the backend of a project timeline when that lack of documentation completely screws you over.
There is no free lunch. There is no silver bullet. There are only better and worse company practices and better and worse managers and developers. Which is really only to say: Duh!