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To: Ichneumon
So there is evidence supporting evolution. Now, can anyone explain it well enough to predict future evolutionary behavior, given stimuli to respond to?
42 posted on 08/23/2005 11:18:22 AM PDT by .cnI redruM (Dear Pat: A Reverend represents God, not The Godfather)
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To: .cnI redruM
So there is evidence supporting evolution. Now, can anyone explain it well enough to predict future evolutionary behavior, given stimuli to respond to?

Yes. Evolutionary systems are well-described in general systems theory in mathematics. The properties of evolutionary systems in the abstract are well understood and that model of system dynamics can be completely parameterized in biology with ease. Sometimes I think there is a perception that there is something fundamentally unsound about the concept of evolution, as though it is not a deeply rooted mathematical consequence of system dynamics. Even if evolution is not the primary driver of speciation, it is still a perfectly valid model.

Given that biological evolution is an instance of a general mathematical system dynamic, one can make predictions as detailed as the parameteric data for the given system one has. In practice, there is some uncertainty because our knowledge of the system we live in is incomplete or approximated, leading to only crude parameterization of the mathematical model.

58 posted on 08/23/2005 11:40:20 AM PDT by tortoise (All these moments lost in time, like tears in the rain.)
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To: .cnI redruM
So there is evidence supporting evolution. Now, can anyone explain it well enough to predict future evolutionary behavior, given stimuli to respond to?

Yes, in the same sense that we can predict the future behavior of a Quincunx or Galton Board, to a high degree of statistical accuracy because we understand the stochastic process by which it works, yet will still be unable to predict where any given ball will land.


64 posted on 08/23/2005 11:46:28 AM PDT by Ichneumon
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