No evidence that there is enough time for evolution[*]

Lee M Spetner

Redoxia Israel, Ltd. 27 Hakablan St., Jerusalem, Israel

Abstract: A recent attempt was made to resolve the heretofore unaddressed issue of the estimated time for evolution, concluding that there was plenty of time. This would have been a very significant result had it been correct. It turns out, however, that the assumptions made in formulating the model of evolution were faulty and the conclusion of that attempt is therefore unsubstantiated.

[This post will remain at the top of the page until 00 hours Tuesday May 31. For reader convenience, other coverage continues below. – UD News]

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Wintery Knight asks why intelligent, educated Christians won’t speak up for their views.

Why is this not being addressed by churches?

Do you have an experience where a Christian group stifled apologetics? Tell me about that, and why do you think they would do that, in view of the situation I outlined above? My experience is that atheists (as much as I tease them) are FAR more interested in apologetics than church Christians – they are the ones who borrow books and debates, and try to get their atheist wives to go to church after they becomes interested in going to church. Why is that?

A couple of thoughts: Read More ›

“A Psychopath Walks Into A Room. Can You Tell? (NPR May21, 2011) Arresting title, that, for an interesting proposition: “Robert Hare, the eminent Canadian psychologist who invented the psychopath checklist, … recently announced that you’re four times more likely to find a psychopath at the top of the corporate ladder than you are walking around in the janitor’s office,” journalist Jon Ronson tells Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered. Of course, some allowance should be made for the fact that bosses are noticed/hated much more than other folk, and big bosses are larger than life. The effect one comes away with is that psychiatry has not done a better job than traditional wisdom in explaining things like: Why Read More ›

In “Evolution, sex and dinosaur necks, BBC’s Wondermonkey, Matt Walker asks (24 May 2011) whether long-necked sauropods like diplodocus evolved their necks via sexual selection:

A recent theory proposed is that sex, or more accurately sexual selection, was the main driver.The idea is that down the generations, male sauropods evolved ever longer necks to dominate rivals for the affections of females.

Dinosaurs are long dead, making it harder to test ideas about why certain traits evolved, and what they were adapted for. But evidence can still be brought to bear to analyse the different hypotheses.

Most hypotheses emphasized the practical uses of the neck, such as eating from trees, but in 2006, the idea surfaces that

… male sauropods that inherited a longer neck, caused by a chance mutation, would be more attractive to females.The length of their neck would signal their virility and suitability as a sire.

“Neck fighting” was hypothesized, with the longest neck producing the most offspring, thus fixing the trait. Great fantasy, but less imaginative researchers have pointed out Read More ›

I wish to publicly commend UD commenters ellazimm and Dr Elizabeth Liddle for their seriousness, civility, responsiveness in dialogue, and general positive tone. We need more objectors like these ladies. And, I hope that, increasingly, we will have them. Ladies, well done.   END

… it doesn’t evolve.

Remember when AVIDA proved Darwin right?

These results provide evidence that low-impact mutations can present a substantial barrier to progressive evolution by natural selection. Understanding mutation is of primary importance, as selection depends on the mutational production of new genotypes. Numerous changes that would be beneficial may nevertheless fail to occur because mutation cannot produce them in the time available.

Further, it is important for biologists to realistically appraise what selection can and cannot do under various circumstances. Selection may neither be necessary nor sufficient to explain numerous genomic or cellular features of complex organisms [2-4].

PDF and poster here:

Nelson CW, Sanford JC (2011) The effects of low-impact mutations in digital organisms. Theoretical Biology and Medical Modelling 8:9.

Nelson CW (2011) Selection threshold constrains adaptive evolution in computational evolution experiments. Great Lakes Bioinformatics Conference. F1000 Research 2:A13. Read More ›

At MSNBC (5/25/20), Charles Q. Choi tells us “Bizarre shrimp-like predators grew larger and survived longer than thought”:

The creatures, known as anomalocaridids, were giant predators (ranging from 2 to possibly 6 feet in length) with soft-jointed bodies and toothy maws with spiny limbs in front to snag worms and other prey.

[ … ]

Past research showed they dominated the seas during the early and middle Cambrian period 542 million to 501 million years ago, a span of time known for the “Cambrian Explosion” that saw the appearance of all the major animal groups and the establishment of complex ecosystems. Read More ›

Here. This link works. Thanks Mung. Notes on the article here.

In my previous two articles (here and here), I explored some of the background information concerning the integration of retroviral elements into primate genomes and the various arguments for common descent which are based on them. I explored, in some detail, the evidence for common descent based on the shared placement of retroviral sequences. In this final article, I will discuss the two remaining points which are raised in the popular-level article which I have been examining. Read More>>>

There is an interesting item about Peter Singer, ethics and the environment in the Guardian ‘Comment is Free’ by Mark Vernon – Without belief in moral truths, how can we care about climate change? – Peter Singer admits his brand of utilitarianism struggles with the challenge of climate change in a way Christian ethics does not. Singer has previously argued that some animals have more rights than some human beings because of a lack of belief in objective morality. But now he comments that he ‘regrets’ he doesn’t believe in God and that his position is in a ‘state of flux’ because of ethical problems related to environental degradation. A Darwinian approach involving ‘survival of the fittest’ thinking doesn’t give us strong reasons Read More ›

Johnson meant that real Darwinists say what Darwinism entails (materialist atheism) and then Christian Darwinists rush in to announce that we can somehow harmonize it with Christianity by not taking seriously what Darwinists actually say. Explained in detail here. The analogy is to American football.

In The Moral Landscape, for example, new atheist and PhD neuroscientist Sam Harris tackles free will: In The Moral Landscape, for example, new atheist Sam Harris tackles free will:

Many scientists and philosophers realized log ago that free will could not be squared with our growing understanding of the physical world. Nevertheless, mny still deny this fact. … The problem is tat no account of causality leaves room for free will … Our belief in free will arises from our moment-to-mement ignorance of specific prior causes. (Pp. 103-5)

Are we clear about this yet? If not, dozens of examples from other Darwinists are available. And then
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In The Language of Science and Faith, (IVP Books, 2011) explaining how microevolution can become macroevolution, they explain,

If a population of some species undergoes a substantial number of such changes [genetic mutations], it can eventually turn into a new species, a process called speciation. Usually speciation requires that the population be geographically isolated from other related populations so that the beneficial genes do not get diluted among the entire population. Mutations in the human species, for example, can easily spread among the entire population. But if everyone from, say, Canada, moved to the moon, then mutations in that population could eventually, over millions of yeas, lead to a new species that would be unable to breed with the parent species on earth. The new species would not necessarily be more advanced in any meaningful sense; it might even be less advanced according to some criteria. But it would be different.

Some sources don’t find this example a slam dunk. Thoughts? Note: It may already have happened. Read More ›

Reviewing Elena Mannes’ “The Power of Music: Pioneering Discoveries in the New Science of Song” (The Wall Street Journal, May 21, 2011), Tallis writes,

Ms. Mannes, an Emmy-winning granddaughter of the founders of New York’s Mannes School of Music, is inspired by the possibility that neuroscience may help us harness the potential of music to treat the sick and even to build more harmonious communities. Yet her investigation, based on a PBS documentary that Ms. Mannes produced, gives us little reason to expect that neuroscience will deliver on this promissory note. Read More ›

Forrest, a prof at Eastern Louisiana University, is considered a big expert on the intelligent design community and the dangers it poses. I put off explaining why she isn’t a  big expert, but can’t decently do so any longer. Read More ›