At Quanta: Mathematical Analysis of Fruit Fly Wings Hints at Evolution’s Limits

_{Denyse O'Leary

September 21, 2021

Evolution, Intelligent Design}

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On one hand, despite dramatic mutations in individuals’ genes and diverse environments in which they grow, members of a species develop into strikingly similar creatures. This robustness ensures that almost all individuals are functional. On the other hand, for evolution to occur, members of a species need diverse traits that natural selection can act upon. Those two forces — robustness and evolvability — tug in opposite directions. One wants less variation, and one wants more.
Around 20 years ago, biologists expected genetics and environmental factors to produce substantial heterogeneity, giving natural selection plenty of choice, said Alex Lancaster, an evolutionary biologist at the Ronin Institute in New Jersey who wasn’t involved in the new study. But, he said, more recent observations have attested to unexpected similarity across populations…
The photos of fly wings offered no clues as to the mechanisms that restrict the possible morphologies that can develop. Rather, the results substantiated the extensive power of these guardrails. Natural selection must mostly act on the significant diversity exhibited in the small number of linked, variable traits, while robustness tightly constrains the rest. Elena Renken, “Mathematical Analysis of Fruit Fly Wings Hints at Evolution’s Limits” at Quanta

Evolution has LIMITS? Isn’t it supposed to account for everything? Put another way, consider the Darwinian claim:

It may be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad, preserving and adding up all that is good; silently and insensibly working, wherever and whenever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and inorganic conditions of life.

The claim is doubtful, given the huge constraints on the system.

The paper is open access.

Comments

But the environment is a collection of random variables: temperature, access to food, presence of competitors, disease, geography, drought, flood, wind, accidental events, population increase/decrease.
So is the entire world since the beginning of time. The forces of nature respond to its environment which is other forces. You just made the point that selection is not random. Just because the environment has changed, does not mean what gets selected as a result is random. Once determined the environment leads to outcomes based on that environment. That is what selection is all about. Forget the idea of random. It gets one nowhere.jerry_{September 22, 2021
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Querius
I would imagine he understands each of the words and is not “struggling” with the concept of natural selection, but would like you to explain the application of “non-random” in context.
Thanks for that clarification. When I look back at my question - it could have been saying "explain what natural selection is" so I can understand the confusion. As you rightly said, I was just wondering how Bob explained that selection is non-random (deterministic or designed).Silver Asiatic_{September 22, 2021
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Bob
Nothing replaced his proposals because they weren’t accepted: they didn’t themselves replace anything.
True, he didn't replace anything - his was a new idea. That was my first question: why wait for Michael Behe? Nobody else wanted to propose the limits to evolution? Those should be known as variables in any evolutionary predictions - but nobody has done it. But regarding Behe's proposals being rejected - yes. He offered two proposals: 1. There is an Edge to Evolution. There is a boundary. 2. The boundary can be defined to the edge of what 2 coordinated mutations can produce. If something requires that, it's outside the edge of evolution. As you say, his proposals were rejected. And that's my point. Proposal 1 was rejected. Behe says there is a limit, a boundary. Response: "No, there isn't"? But you're saying here yourself that limits have been known for decades. Behe is only saying there is a boundary. Rejecting that is saying "evolution can act without limit". That's absurd. So, they might say "we only rejected the idea that 2 coordinated mutations is the limit". Ok, fine. If you know what is not the limit, you must have an idea what is the limit. But no further response was ever forthcoming. This is why it seemed to me that the evolutionary community was afraid of the topic. No effort was made to correct Behe's proposal, even though there has to be some boundary, and that limit is absolutely necessary to know when it comes to trying to predict evolutionary results. Instead, we see evolutionary claims quite often that never calculated any limits whatsoever.Silver Asiatic_{September 22, 2021
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Jerry
It is certainly not random and based on the environment the organism finds itself in
But the environment is a collection of random variables: temperature, access to food, presence of competitors, disease, geography, drought, flood, wind, accidental events, population increase/decrease.Silver Asiatic_{September 22, 2021
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Bob
what part of what I wrote are you struggling with? I can’t give a helpful answer without a better idea about what you’re not understanding.
I was wondering how you would explain the idea that selection is non-random. In my view, it is random. Selection is a function of what can be selected and whether a trait can be preserved in the population. It's a matter of what will survive and reproduce - fitness. "That which can be selected" is the function of multiple random factors (mutations and an enormous number of random environmental variables). To say that something is "non-random" means it either is "determined" - or directed by a natural cause towards a definite outcome. Or it's "designed" to do the same. A non-random event would have a non-random outcome. Gravity is non-random. We can predict the trajectory of an apple falling from a tree because gravity is a non-random force that we can define mathematically. But natural selection doesn't work like that, since it is dependent on random variables. Will a certain species survive and evolve? Natural selection doesn't tell us. A drought comes and the species dies off. What did selection do? Another drought for another species and a drought-resistant organism evolves. Its the same force, natural selection, with two radically different outcomes under the same conditions. Yes, to say that "selection is non-random because it is the force that preserved whatever survived and reproduced most successfully" is just an after-the-fact statement. I would also propose that natural selection is considerably different than artificial selection. For example, artificially inducing mutations in a population and than watching what happens would be non-random, but that's not nature working on its own. At any rate, those are my thoughts at the moment - understanding and accepting that the idea that "evolution is not random" is a very widespread teaching within evolution. I just disagree with it and wanted to see your thoughts on it.Silver Asiatic_{September 22, 2021
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Coronavirus has limits of adaptation apparently too... https://www.yahoo.com/news/nowhere-left-covid-mutate-deadly-175101965.htmlzweston_{September 22, 2021
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Zweston, You might be forgetting that nowadays, a person's unsupported assertion qualifies as irrefutable proof in their own solipsistic worldview. I'm afraid the people you want to engage cannot accommodate the heretical questioning you're suggesting. There's simply too much at stake. It would be a divide-by-zero operation and their worlds would implode. ; -) But yes, it would indeed be interesting whether they had ever entertained a stray shard of doubt about macroevolution and what it might have entailed. -QQuerius_{September 22, 2021
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Bob, sev, chucky.... have you ever questioned macroevolution? What is your best 2 or three evidences that it is true?zweston_{September 22, 2021
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selection is a non-random process
Most definitely! Some characteristics result in better adaptations than others. It is certainly not random and based on the environment the organism finds itself in. At another place and time, the same characteristics may be detrimental or neutral. The main issue is not that it’s non random or not but that it’s irrelevant for the Evolution debate. It’s a non-issue.jerry_{September 22, 2021
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Bob O'H,
selection is a non-random process.
I think Silver Asiatic was hoping that you would actually support your statement in 6. I would imagine he understands each of the words and is not "struggling" with the concept of natural selection, but would like you to explain the application of "non-random" in context. -QQuerius_{September 22, 2021
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Bob offering us help with understanding Darwinian evolution/Natural Selection??? :) Well by all means Bob, I am having a very difficult time understanding how anyone in their right mind can ever possibly believe that their 'beyond belief' brain was created by the unguided mindless processes of Darwinian evolution/Natural Selection,,,
The Human Brain Is 'Beyond Belief' by Jeffrey P. Tomkins, Ph.D. * - 2017 Excerpt: The human brain,, is an engineering marvel that evokes comments from researchers like “beyond anything they’d imagined, almost to the point of being beyond belief”1 and “a world we had never imagined.”2,,, Perfect Optimization The scientists found that at multiple hierarchical levels in the whole brain, nerve cell clusters (ganglion), and even at the individual cell level, the positioning of neural units achieved a goal that human engineers strive for but find difficult to achieve—the perfect minimizing of connection costs among all the system’s components.,,, Vast Computational Power Researchers discovered that a single synapse is like a computer’s microprocessor containing both memory-storage and information-processing features.,,, Just one synapse alone can contain about 1,000 molecular-scale microprocessor units acting in a quantum computing environment. An average healthy human brain contains some 200 billion nerve cells connected to one another through hundreds of trillions of synapses. To put this in perspective, one of the researchers revealed that the study’s results showed a single human brain has more information processing units than all the computers, routers, and Internet connections on Earth.1,,, Phenomenal Processing Speed the processing speed of the brain had been greatly underrated. In a new research study, scientists found the brain is 10 times more active than previously believed.6,7,,, The large number of dendritic spikes also means the brain has more than 100 times the computational capabilities than was previously believed.,,, Petabyte-Level Memory Capacity Our new measurements of the brain’s memory capacity increase conservative estimates by a factor of 10 to at least a petabyte, in the same ballpark as the World Wide Web.9,,, Optimal Energy Efficiency Stanford scientist who is helping develop computer brains for robots calculated that a computer processor functioning with the computational capacity of the human brain would require at least 10 megawatts to operate properly. This is comparable to the output of a small hydroelectric power plant. As amazing as it may seem, the human brain requires only about 10 watts to function.11 ,,, Multidimensional Processing It is as if the brain reacts to a stimulus by building then razing a tower of multi-dimensional blocks, starting with rods (1D), then planks (2D), then cubes (3D), and then more complex geometries with 4D, 5D, etc. The progression of activity through the brain resembles a multi-dimensional sandcastle that materializes out of the sand and then disintegrates.13 He also said: We found a world that we had never imagined. There are tens of millions of these objects even in a small speck of the brain, up through seven dimensions. In some networks, we even found structures with up to eleven dimensions.13,,, Biophoton Brain Communication Neurons contain many light-sensitive molecules such as porphyrin rings, flavinic, pyridinic rings, lipid chromophores, and aromatic amino acids. Even the mitochondria machines that produce energy inside cells contain several different light-responsive molecules called chromophores. This research suggests that light channeled by filamentous cellular structures called microtubules plays an important role in helping to coordinate activities in different regions of the brain.,,, https://www.icr.org/article/10186
So Bob, do please help me try to understand, how is it remotely possible for anyone in their right mind to believe that such 'beyond belief' complexity is the result of mindless Darwinian processes?
"It is not enough to say that design is a more likely scenario to explain a world full of well-designed things. It strikes me as urgent to insist that you not allow your mind to surrender the absolute clarity that all complex and magnificent things were made that way. Once you allow the intellect to consider that an elaborate organism with trillions of microscopic interactive components can be an accident… you have essentially “lost your mind.” Jay Homnick - American Spectator - 2005
Of related note as to the very limited 'creative power' that is found for Natural Selection:
Genome-wide analysis of a long-term evolution experiment with Drosophila – 2010 Excerpt of concluding paragraph: “Despite decades of sustained selection in relatively small, sexually reproducing laboratory populations, selection did not lead to the fixation of newly arising unconditionally advantageous alleles. This is notable because in wild populations we expect the strength of natural selection to be less intense and the environment unlikely to remain constant for ~600 generations. Consequently, the probability of fixation in wild populations should be even lower than its likelihood in these experiments.” http://www.homepages.ed.ac.uk/aspiliop//2010_2011/Burke%20et%20al%202010.pdf “The Third Way” – James Shapiro, Denis Noble, and etc.. etc..,,, excerpt: “some Neo-Darwinists have elevated Natural Selection into a unique creative force that solves all the difficult evolutionary problems without a real empirical basis.” http://www.thethirdwayofevolution.com/ The waiting time problem in a model hominin population – 2015 Sep 17 John Sanford, Wesley Brewer, Franzine Smith, and John Baumgardner Excerpt: The program Mendel’s Accountant realistically simulates the mutation/selection process,,, Given optimal settings, what is the longest nucleotide string that can arise within a reasonable waiting time within a hominin population of 10,000? Arguably, the waiting time for the fixation of a “string-of-one” is by itself problematic (Table 2). Waiting a minimum of 1.5 million years (realistically, much longer), for a single point mutation is not timely adaptation in the face of any type of pressing evolutionary challenge. This is especially problematic when we consider that it is estimated that it only took six million years for the chimp and human genomes to diverge by over 5 % [1]. This represents at least 75 million nucleotide changes in the human lineage, many of which must encode new information. While fixing one point mutation is problematic, our simulations show that the fixation of two co-dependent mutations is extremely problematic – requiring at least 84 million years (Table 2). This is ten-fold longer than the estimated time required for ape-to-man evolution. In this light, we suggest that a string of two specific mutations is a reasonable upper limit, in terms of the longest string length that is likely to evolve within a hominin population (at least in a way that is either timely or meaningful). Certainly the creation and fixation of a string of three (requiring at least 380 million years) would be extremely untimely (and trivial in effect), in terms of the evolution of modern man. It is widely thought that a larger population size can eliminate the waiting time problem. If that were true, then the waiting time problem would only be meaningful within small populations. While our simulations show that larger populations do help reduce waiting time, we see that the benefit of larger population size produces rapidly diminishing returns (Table 4 and Fig. 4). When we increase the hominin population from 10,000 to 1 million (our current upper limit for these types of experiments), the waiting time for creating a string of five is only reduced from two billion to 482 million years. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4573302/ “Darwinism provided an explanation for the appearance of design, and argued that there is no Designer — or, if you will, the designer is natural selection. If that’s out of the way — if that (natural selection) just does not explain the evidence — then the flip side of that is, well, things appear designed because they are designed.” Richard Sternberg – Living Waters documentary Whale Evolution vs. Population Genetics – Richard Sternberg and Paul Nelson – (excerpt from Living Waters video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0csd3M4bc0Q
bornagain77_{September 22, 2021
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SA @ 9 - what part of what I wrote are you struggling with? I can't give a helpful answer without a better idea about what you're not understanding.Bob O'H_{September 22, 2021
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SA @ 7 -
That’s good to hear. However, as I see it, that supposed knowledge of constraints and limits to what evolution can achieve are contradicted by at least two things from my experience: 1. Michael Behe’s attempt to delineate the actual boundaries of evolution (The Edge of Evolution) was harshly rejected by the evolutionary community. And along with the ridicule and rejection – nothing replaced his proposals. Nobody else wrote a book saying what the “real Edge of Evolution is”. It has been left to an IDist to provide that. Why the fear of defining constraints?
There is no fear. But sometimes the right conclusion can be reached in an incorrect way. Nothing replaced his proposals because they weren't accepted: they didn't themselves replace anything.
2. the researcher in this report says:
Around 20 years ago, biologists expected genetics and environmental factors to produce substantial heterogeneity, giving natural selection plenty of choice, said Alex Lancaster, an evolutionary biologist at the Ronin Institute in New Jersey who wasn’t involved in the new study. But, he said, more recent observations have attested to unexpected similarity across populations…

He doesn't actually say that there aren't evolutionary constraints, though. FWIW, I think most evolututionary biologists would side with Luisa Pallares, who is quoted in the piece.Bob O'H_{September 22, 2021
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Natural selection is nothing more than contingent serendipity. NS is non random in that not all variants have the same probability of being eliminated. But that is moot as natural selection, as it is currently formulated, doesn't have a chance of being the designer mimic Darwin envisioned. Genetics does not determine biological form.ET_{September 22, 2021
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The other day, Brian Miller highlighted a very interesting quote on the very misleading way in which Darwinists use the term 'selection pressure' in their literature.
Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection Has Left a Legacy of Confusion over Biological Adaptation Brian Miller - September 20, 2021 Excerpt: Evolutionary biologist Robert Reid stated: "Indeed the language of neo-Darwinism is so careless that the words ‘divine plan’ can be substituted for ‘selection pressure’ in any popular work in the biological literature without the slightest disruption in the logical flow of argument." Robert Reid, Biological Emergences: Evolution by Natural Experiment, PP. 37-38 To fully comprehend the critique, one simply needs to imagine attempting to craft an evolutionary barometer that measures the selection pressure driving one organism to transform into something different (e.g., fish into an amphibian). The fact that no such instrument could be constructed highlights the fictitious nature of such mystical forces. https://evolutionnews.org/2021/09/darwins-theory-of-natural-selection-has-left-a-legacy-of-confusion-over-biological-adaptation/
And as the late William Provine himself remarked, "Natural selection does nothing. Natural selection as a natural force belongs in the insubstantial category already populated by the Necker/Stahl phlogiston or Newton's 'ether'"
"Natural selection does not act on anything, nor does it select (for, or against), force, maximize, create, modify, shape, operate, drive, favor, maintain, push or adjust. Natural selection does nothing. Natural selection as a natural force belongs in the insubstantial category already populated by the Necker/Stahl phlogiston or Newton's 'ether'...Having natural selection select is nifty because it excuses the necessity of talking about the actual causation of natural selection. Such talk was excusable for Charles Darwin, but inexcusable for Darwinists now. Creationists have discovered our empty 'natural selection' language, and the 'actions' of natural selection make huge vulnerable targets." - William B. Provine, The Origins of Theoretical Population Genetics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001), 199-200
Ouch! Moreover, Natural Selection 'predicts' completely opposite results with equal ease. As the late Philip Skell noted,, "Natural selection makes humans self-centered and aggressive ? except when it makes them altruistic and peaceable. Or natural selection produces virile men who eagerly spread their seed ? except when it prefers men who are faithful protectors and providers. When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it experimentally, much less use it as a catalyst for scientific discovery. Darwinian evolution, whatever its other virtues, does not provide a fruitful heuristic in experimental biology. "
"Certainly, my own research with antibiotics during World War II received no guidance from insights provided by Darwinian evolution. Nor did Alexander Fleming's discovery of bacterial inhibition by penicillin. I recently asked more than 70 eminent researchers if they would have done their work differently if they had thought Darwin's theory was wrong. The responses were all the same: No. I also examined the outstanding biodiscoveries of the past century: the discovery of the double helix; the characterization of the ribosome; the mapping of genomes; research on medications and drug reactions; improvements in food production and sanitation; the development of new surgeries; and others. I even queried biologists working in areas where one would expect the Darwinian paradigm to have most benefited research, such as the emergence of resistance to antibiotics and pesticides. Here, as elsewhere, I found that Darwin's theory had provided no discernible guidance, but was brought in, after the breakthroughs, as an interesting narrative gloss. In the peer-reviewed literature, the word "evolution" often occurs as a sort of coda to academic papers in experimental biology. Is the term integral or superfluous to the substance of these papers? To find out, I substituted for "evolution" some other word – "Buddhism," "Aztec cosmology," or even "creationism." I found that the substitution never touched the paper's core. This did not surprise me. From my conversations with leading researchers it had became clear that modern experimental biology gains its strength from the availability of new instruments and methodologies, not from an immersion in historical biology.,,, Natural selection makes humans self-centered and aggressive ? except when it makes them altruistic and peaceable. Or natural selection produces virile men who eagerly spread their seed ? except when it prefers men who are faithful protectors and providers. When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it experimentally, much less use it as a catalyst for scientific discovery. Darwinian evolution – whatever its other virtues – does not provide a fruitful heuristic in experimental biology." ?Philip S. Skell - (the late) Emeritus Evan Pugh Professor at Pennsylvania State University, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. - Why Do We Invoke Darwin? - 2005?http://www.discovery.org/a/2816?
If a theory can predict opposite results with equal ease, then, as Philip Skill pointed out, it is useless as a guiding principle in science. And indeed, Natural Selection, and/or evolution in general, has been useless as a catalyst for scientific discovery.
"In fact, over the last 100 years, almost all of biology has proceeded independent of evolution, except evolutionary biology itself. Molecular biology, biochemistry, and physiology, have not taken evolution into account at all." Marc Kirschner, founding chair of the Department of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School, Boston Globe, Oct. 23, 2005 "While the great majority of biologists would probably agree with Theodosius Dobzhansky’s dictum that “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution”, most can conduct their work quite happily without particular reference to evolutionary ideas. Evolution would appear to be the indispensable unifying idea and, at the same time, a highly superfluous one.” Adam S. Wilkins, editor of the journal BioEssays, Introduction to "Evolutionary Processes" - (2000).
Even arch-Darwinist Jerry Coyne himself honestly admitted that, in direct contrast to every other hard science on the face of earth, "“Truth be told, evolution hasn’t yielded many practical or commercial benefits."
“Truth be told, evolution hasn’t yielded many practical or commercial benefits. Yes, bacteria evolve drug resistance, and yes, we must take countermeasures, but beyond that there is not much to say. Evolution cannot help us predict what new vaccines to manufacture because microbes evolve unpredictably. But hasn’t evolution helped guide animal and plant breeding? Not very much. Most improvement in crop plants and animals occurred long before we knew anything about evolution, and came about by people following the genetic principle of ‘like begets like’. Even now, as its practitioners admit, the field of quantitative genetics has been of little value in helping improve varieties. Future advances will almost certainly come from transgenics, which is not based on evolution at all.” (Jerry Coyne, “Selling Darwin: Does it matter whether evolution has any commercial applications?,” reviewing The Evolving World: Evolution in Everyday Life by David P. Mindell, in Nature, 442:983-984 (August 31, 2006).)
In fact, instead of ever fostering any practical and commercial benefits for man, evolution has instead led scientists down scientific blind alleys and dead ends with its false predictions of junk DNA and Vestigial organs, etc.. etc.. Moreover, besides being a complete bust as far a advancing science is concerned, evolutionary thinking has also had horrific social consequences on man.
Hitler, Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Mao – quotes - Foundational Darwinian influence in their political ideologies July 2020 https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/michael-egnor-on-the-relationship-between-darwinism-and-totalitarianism/#comment-707831
Francis Bacon, a devout Christian who is considered the father of experimental science, in his book “Novum Organum”, stated that the best way to tell if a philosophy is true or not is by the ‘fruits produced’. Specifically he stated that, “Of all signs there is none more certain or worthy than that of the fruits produced: for the fruits and effects are the sureties and vouchers, as it were, for the truth of philosophy.”
Is Biology Approaching the Threshold of Design Acceptance? – January 8, 2019 Excerpt: Simultaneously, biomimetics fulfills one of the goals of Francis Bacon (1561-1626), the champion of systematic, methodical investigation into the natural world. In Aphorism 73 of Novum Organum, Bacon told how best to judge good natural philosophy, what we call science: “Of all signs there is none more certain or worthy than that of the fruits produced: for the fruits and effects are the sureties and vouchers, as it were, for the truth of philosophy.” Good fruits are pouring forth from the cornucopia of biologically inspired design. What has Darwinism done for the world lately? https://evolutionnews.org/2019/01/is-biology-approaching-the-threshold-of-design-acceptance/
And 150 years after the pseudoscience of Darwinian evolution burst onto the scene, and in regards to the ‘fruits produced’ by Darwinism, we can now accurately surmise that, scientifically and politically speaking, Darwinism has been worse than useless as a scientific theory and has also been a complete disaster for man as fas as it has influenced politics.
Matthew 7:18-20 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. Atheism’s Body Count * It is obvious that Atheism cannot be true; for if it were, it would produce a more humane world, since it values only this life and is not swayed by the foolish beliefs of primitive superstitions and religions. However, the opposite proves to be true. Rather than providing the utopia of idealism, it has produced a body count second to none. With recent documents uncovered for the Maoist and Stalinist regimes, it now seems the high end of estimates of 250 million dead (between 1900-1987) are closer to the mark. The Stalinist Purges produced 61 million dead and Mao’s Cultural Revolution produced 70 million casualties. These murders are all upon their own people! This number does not include the countless dead in their wars of outward aggression waged in the name of the purity of atheism’s world view. China invades its peaceful, but religious neighbor, Tibet; supports N. Korea in its war against its southern neighbor and in its merciless oppression of its own people; and Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge kill up to 6 million with Chinese support. All of these actions done “in the name of the people” to create a better world. https://www.scholarscorner.com/atheisms-body-count-ideology-and-human-suffering/
bornagain77_{September 22, 2021
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Bob O'H
selection is a non-random process.
Just wondering how you would explain that.Silver Asiatic_{September 22, 2021
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he concept of trade-offs crops up all over the place.
The DNA model of evolution is obviously very limited. This limited model is accepted by ID as viable and working but because it’s very limited does nothing to inform the Evolution debate. The origin of species lies somewhere else. The biggest misdirections in the Evolution debate were first, Darwin’s ideas, then Mendel’s gene observations but mostly Watson and Crick’s DNA discovery and the theory of codons. All true but all irrelevant. The OP is about irrelevant mechanisms. When will researchers in evolutionary Biology abandon DNA? The idea of selection is relevant only to genetics and should remain within this area of discussion. It has no relevance for Evolution.jerry_{September 22, 2021
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Bob O'H
This has been false for much longer than I’ve been working in evolutionary biology – we’re aware that there are constraints on what may evolve, e.g. the concept of trade-offs crops up all over the place.
That's good to hear. However, as I see it, that supposed knowledge of constraints and limits to what evolution can achieve are contradicted by at least two things from my experience: 1. Michael Behe's attempt to delineate the actual boundaries of evolution (The Edge of Evolution) was harshly rejected by the evolutionary community. And along with the ridicule and rejection - nothing replaced his proposals. Nobody else wrote a book saying what the "real Edge of Evolution is". It has been left to an IDist to provide that. Why the fear of defining constraints? 2. the researcher in this report says:
Around 20 years ago, biologists expected genetics and environmental factors to produce substantial heterogeneity, giving natural selection plenty of choice, said Alex Lancaster, an evolutionary biologist at the Ronin Institute in New Jersey who wasn’t involved in the new study. But, he said, more recent observations have attested to unexpected similarity across populations…
I'm assuming you've been around for more than 20 years in this field. They're saying it's a recent understanding that "variation must be severely restricted" in order to maintain continunity and "robustness". That's why they did the experiment. How much variation did they see? Not much. All that said - where are these constrains built into evolutionary predictions? These should be quantified and act as limits to what mutations can produce. But I rarely (and I would say never) have seen that in projections from fossil evidence. What are the boundaries of what a bacteria can evolve into?Silver Asiatic_{September 22, 2021
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Hank - selection is a non-random process.Bob O'H_{September 22, 2021
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Bob O'H This has been false for much longer than I’ve been working in evolutionary biology – we’re aware that there are constraints on what may evolve, e.g. the concept of trade-offs crops up all over the place.
I think that evolutionary biology is not science because people who want to become ev. biol. are brainwashed first with central dogma of evol. (bacteria to bacteriologist ) even before they start to do anything . Probably the most brainwashed are accepted to work in evol. biol. Question: for how long did you know that undeniable truth that the life is about nonrandom processes and why you still are a evol. biol. ? They pay well?Hanks_{September 22, 2021
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It’s always the assumption that there is unlimited malleability and variation can be selected across the entire organism.
This has been false for much longer than I've been working in evolutionary biology - we're aware that there are constraints on what may evolve, e.g. the concept of trade-offs crops up all over the place.Bob O'H_{September 22, 2021
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Querius - great resource, thank you.Silver Asiatic_{September 21, 2021
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Also reminds me of Haldane's dilemma: http://creationwiki.org/Haldane%27s_Dilemma I chose the Creation Wiki reference specifically to avoid all the hand-waving, Lamarkian personification, "musta" rationalizations, and "not fully understood" and similar euphemisms for clueless that permeate other sources. -QQuerius_{September 21, 2021
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Exactly. Behe was ridiculed for 'The Edge of Evolution' . Now they discover:
for members of a species to look as similar as they do, their variation must be severely restricted
All evolutionary predictions have to work within those constraints and to my knowledge, nobody has ever done that before. It's always the assumption that there is unlimited malleability and variation can be selected across the entire organism.
As flies grow into adults, they have “this magical ability to correct for differences and create a very robust final form.”
Magically they aim at a final form - as if purposefully designed to accomplish that end.Silver Asiatic_{September 21, 2021
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