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Author
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Topic: Re-Framing the Intelligent Design Issue
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Frances
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Member # 169
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posted 29. August 2002 12:20
Instead of producing any form of mathematical proof or support, Warren seems to continue to claim, without much support, that RM&NS, genetic drift and Darwin's theory are mathematical logical impossibilities.
Warren insists, not surprisingly, that his 'mathematics' are sound and that it thus must be me who is having the problems.
In order to advance our discussions, I am willing to accept this unlikely possibility and thus would ask Warren to provide us/me with a truely mathematical analysis of his claims. Since he claims that all three are mathematical impossibilities, such should not be hard. After all I do not believe that Warren would have made such claims in the absence of such a thorough mathematical analysis.
In fact, such an analysis, if it can be shown to be supportable, would truely be revolutionary.
As I have shown genetic drift neutral mutations and small populations can lead to (random) fixation of alleles. Perhaps an introduction to genetic drift may be helpful to establish that we are talking about the same topic.
The relevant part
quote:
Genetic drift in these laboratory populations behaves according to theory.
Hmm, 1956 Buri already showed genetic drift to not only be a useful mathematical concept but also a useful biological concept.
See This table from Buri 1956
As far as natural selection in nature, Endler (1986, Natural Selection in the Wild: Princeton University Press) provides us with quite a few examples. The peppered moth comes to mind as a well studied and well supported example of natural selection.
Model simulations also suggest that RM&NS is capable of generating novelties
A great example of evolution of biological information can be found in the works of Tom Schneider
Finally some Examples fo beneficial mutations and natural selection
Such models have been supported by actual experiments. Nothing surprising here.
Seems that nature is not (yet) aware of these mathematical and logical impossibilities.
I am looking forward to Warren present his mathematical derivations to support his claims.
[ 29 August 2002, 12:24: Message edited by: Frances ]
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warren_bergerson
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Member # 262
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posted 29. August 2002 14:01
Frances,
No one is arguing that statistical fluctuations can occur. Genetic drift theory, however, asserts that statistical fluctuation plays a material role in changing the genetic composition of a population. It is easily shown that fluctuation by itself can produce change. However, if you combine random fluctuation with mutations, the result is divergence, not drift. Since mutation is known to exist and known to be relevant to evolutionary change, a realistic model must include the impact of mutation. If you include mutation in your model, drift gets replaced with divergence. The mathematics and concepts involved are elementary math and elementary modeling.
We know for a fact that divergence does not normally occur. The only way to prevent divergence is to ‘select out’ all the ‘inappropriate mutations’. If the selecting out is the result of natural selection then all ‘inappropriate mutations’ result must result in death or failure to reproduce. Given what we know about mutation rates, and the size of the genome, it is easy to calculate that if inappropriate mutations were fatal, then most cell divisions would result in death or a failure to reproduce. We can therefore conclude that if the only form of selection is Darwin’s natural selection, then all life would cease to exist. Again, the concepts and math are elementary.
As I stated earlier, the argument that 1)I can simulate drift and 2)I can observe some ‘apparent’ examples of drift, is not the same as the ‘theory of genetic drift is valid’. As my demonstration shows, if a drift demonstration uses realistic mutation assumptions, drift turns into divergence. The published demonstrations of drift are based on ‘unrealistic’ mutation assumptions (as well as unrealistic selection assumptions). [In many fields this would be called rigging the assumptions to produce the desired result.]
Again, the issue here is not the existence of natural selection, but whether it is the only, or even the primary source of selection in adaptive/evolutionary change. Demonstrating the ‘selection occurs’ and demonstrating ‘Darwinian natural selection occurs’ is not the same as showing that ‘all selection impacting evolutionary change is due to natural selection’.
My demonstration shows that there must logically exist ‘non-Darwinian, non-natural selection mechanisms’.
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Frances
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Member # 169
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posted 30. August 2002 02:30
Warren claims that when genetic drift is combined with mutation then divergence occurs. I wonder why Warren believes that divergence is a problem since it provides for a mechanism of evolution.
Of course the assumption that 'inappropriate mutations' are fatal seems to be overly pessimistic.
In fact the claims made by Warren seem to still be lacking in scientific foundation especially when compared with my references.
I have shown how genetic drift experiments have confirmed the mathematics.
But I am glad that Warren seems to be dropping his claims that RM&NS and Darwinian mechanisms are mathematical impossibilities.
I find it encouraging to see that Warren seems to be adjusting his arguments to deal with the facts.
Warren's claim that "inappropriate mutations’ result must result in death or failure to reproduce." seems to be overly pessimistic as well. But I am still hopeful to see some details.
As far as non-Darwinian non-natural mechanisms, we do know of several non-Darwinian mechanism. I wonder what Warren would consider to be non-natural mechanisms? Artificial selection? But there is no evidence of such in the evolution of life over the last 4 billion years.
[ 30 August 2002, 02:33: Message edited by: Frances ]
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