New evidence that natural selection is a general driving force behind the origin of species

Vanderbilt University ^ | 23 February 2006 | Staff

[muawiyah]

What we have here is yet another rhetorical device designed to demonstrate a scientific truth for which there is no reliable bench test.

Best I can figure it, these guys are into "just say it's so" mode. In fact, the talk about underlying mechanism suggests they are not too sold on the idea that DNA exists.

This is the sort of logic that is used to argue that there are thousands of species of salmon.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"The first is dogs. Man has removed dogs from the environment and breeding population of wolves for at least 50,000 years. The physical appearance and behavioral make up of dogs has become much different than that of wolves and yet they can breed quite well."

1) That's artificial selection
2) Not all dogs can/will breed with wolves.
3) This artificial selection is a great support for natural selection

"The second is man. Many instances of populations of human populations are isolated for thousands of years in diverse environments and yet when those populations are introduced to other populations breeding readily takes place."

1) Natural selection isn't defined by speciation. It's defined by adaptation to the environment. There is nothing about the fact that people can interbreed that goes against this.
2) A few thousand years is a very short time for speciation to happen. Isolation is not a guarantee that speciation will happen.

"Man has been doing what by Darwin’s theory says should produce new species that can not reproduce with the old species for tens of thousands of years yet man has failed to produce a new species."

Darwin was well aware of selective breeding, far more than you. People have not been trying to make new species. And we have been at it for only a very short time even if we were. That being said, scientists have witnessed speciation.

[Phil Connors]

Some 5000 years ago!>>

Heretic! He did it at 9:00 AM Greenwich time, April 24, 4004 BC! That's 6002 years ago! (Give or take a month.)

[From many - one.]

It sure does help protect you from bird flu.

[muawiyah]

But zebras are horses too ~ and there are different kinds of zerbras, even "negatives" and "positives". Still trying to figure out what sort of "magic force" natural selection is that it takes perfectly good animals who live out on a grassy plain, and gives some of 'em white stripes, and some of 'em brown stripes, and tells them to try to stay apart when breeding.

I'm more inclined to think genetic change is at work, and the gene flow isn't just from your mommy and daddy ~ some of it must come from infection by viruses that leave behind parts of themselves in your genome.

In fact, all I have to do is examine your genome very carefully to see if, voila, there are any viral genes in there. Think I'd have luck?

[goldstategop]

It confirms Darwin's standing as the greatest scientist who ever lived, period. He'd be pretty much pleased at the impressive amount of work done to substantiate the theory of natural selection since his day. Given its repeated empirical validation, it now seems appropriate to describe it as a natural law.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie. Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[trisham]

bookmark

[Gles]

http://www.answersingenesis.org/

[muawiyah]

Concerning your statement that "Natural selection isn't defined by speciation" one is driven to ask just exactly what it was Darwinian evolutionists think Darwin was up to when he sought to address the issue in "The Origin of Species"?

On those long sea voyages, maybe Darwin was simply thinking of girls or something, eh?!

[ThirstyMan]

What Darwin did in his revolutionary treatise, “On the Origin of Species,” was to explain how much of the extraordinary variety of biological traits possessed by plants and animals arises from a single process, natural selection.

I don't believe this statement is accurate.

A trait that gets favored by natural selection is a trait that was already there. Natural selection explains nothing about "extraordinary variety" but rather is an expression of an existing species' environmental adaptation.

[DesertSapper]

I love your synopsis. Probably the most meaningful post yet.

[goldstategop]

Indeed. Darwin himself was a pigeon fancier and goes at some length to discuss the differences between natural and artificial selection in the Origin. He draws on this background to show that if anything, man's puny attempts in reshaping animals for human uses pale in comparison to what Nature does to adapt animals and plants to their particular environments.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie. Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Concerning your statement that "Natural selection isn't defined by speciation" one is driven to ask just exactly what it was Darwinian evolutionists think Darwin was up to when he sought to address the issue in "The Origin of Species"?"

Speciation is ONE end product of natural selection. It is not the only one. Speciation is not required for natural selection to have occurred, or for it to be noticeable. I am sure, since you have read Darwin, you already knew this. :)

"On those long sea voyages, maybe Darwin was simply thinking of girls or something, eh?!"

He was too busy getting sea sick.

[Rightwing Conspiratr1]

So Darwinists have some limited understanding of probability. Would that they apply it more broadly.

Well they apply it as they see fit because they are "scientists" for Darwin's sake. Priests of the monkey god. Guardians of the soup myth cult. Don't question it heretic.

[grey_whiskers]

If there is any driving force involved it will be energy itself

Sorry, just...can't...resist!

"ENERGY makes it go!" PING!! (see post 14)

[DesertSapper]

"Speciation is ONE end product of natural selection. It is not the only one. Speciation is not required for natural selection to have occurred..."

Check out the caption for the first pic in the article: "...a type of leaf beetle that is in the process of transforming into a new species." This article's Darwinist author either doesn't agree with you or he has a working crystal ball.

Who is correct? Inquiring minds want to know!

[muawiyah]

Naw, he was thinking of girls and letting his mind wander. That comes through bright and clear in some of his later works where he concludes that it's sex that makes it all happen!

Anyway, it's changes in the genome that make all the difference, and "natural selection" doesn't really explain that ~ it just describes it.

For all anyone knows the bird flu may be the prime mover for transporting genes between species, although some lotharios who post here regularly are of a different opinion (at least concerning their place in the grand scheme).

I think the Darwinian answer is, of course, that irrespective of how the genes get passed aroun, only those which benefit the species (if not the individual) give a survival advantage to the species, and that, in turn, is the element of ultimate importance.

No doubt having teeth in a world without teeth probably allows you to eat more, and presumably breed more, but that's more an "individual" survival advantage and not necessarily of great utility to your species. After all, everybody else may be getting all they really need sucking in through a reverse nephritic process managed by tiny cells in their skin.

The survival of numerous species, apparantly unchanged, for tens of millions of years, suggests that some "designs" have ultimate advantage and enable a species to beat the point spread of the probabilities surrounding natural selection, or, that they have developed an immunity to changes in the genome and are able to ward off all gene changes from whatever source.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

" Check out the caption for the first pic in the article: "...a type of leaf beetle that is in the process of transforming into a new species." This article's Darwinist author either doesn't agree with you or he has a working crystal ball."

Or else you don't understand what either of us is saying. :)

[grey_whiskers]

Still trying to figure out what sort of "magic force" natural selection is that it takes perfectly good animals who live out on a grassy plain, and gives some of 'em white stripes, and some of 'em brown stripes, and tells them to try to stay apart when breeding.

Maxwell's Daemon meets The Breeder's Cup PING!

[phantomworker]

I didn't know that natural selection was ever in doubt.

Same here.

[This study, however] provides empirical support for the proposition that natural selection is a general force behind the formation of new species by analyzing the relationship between natural selection and the ability to interbreed...

The study provides more empirical support.