Posted on 04/27/2008 2:42:03 AM PDT by canuck_conservative
"Oh what a piece of work is man," wrote Shakespeare, long before Darwin suggested just how little work went into us. Somehow, that same process that gave us reason, language and art also left us with hernias, flatulence and hiccups.
One argument scientists often make against so-called intelligent design the idea that evolution cannot by itself explain life is that on closer inspection, we look like we've been put together by someone who didn't read the manual, or at least did a somewhat sloppy job of things.
Viewed as products of evolution, however, our anatomical quirks start to make sense, says University of Chicago fossil hunter and anatomy professor Neil Shubin, author of the recent book Your Inner Fish. And by focusing on our less lofty traits, evolutionary biology can help dispel one of the most egregious and even tragic fallacies surrounding Darwinian evolution that it moves toward perfection, with man at the apex of some towering ladder.
Evolution of Hiccups
That misreading of evolution has been connected to the eugenics movement of the early 20th century, with the Nazis extending the man-as-ideal notion to blue-eyed blond German-man-as-ideal notion.
"Darwin didn't believe it, but some, who saw it through a more religious light, tended to want to interpret evolution as a steady march toward the pinnacle of humanity," says University of Pennsylvania ethicist Art Caplan, who has written extensively on the eugenics movement.
By today's understanding, evolution by natural selection doesn't march toward anything it just modifies existing creatures to better compete in ever-shifting environments.
Understanding something as seemingly trivial as the evolution of hiccups can help clear up some profound misperceptions on the nature of life and humanity.
The sound of a hiccup echoes back to our very distant past as fish and amphibians some 375 million years ago, says Shubin. It's really just a spasm that causes a sharp intake of breath followed by a quick partial closing of our upper airway with that flap of skin known as the glottis. It's best if you can nip it in the first couple of hics, he says.
It's much harder to stop once you've let yourself get up to 10. By that point you've reverted to an ancient breathing pattern orchestrated by the brain stem that once helped amphibians breath, letting water pass the gills without leaking into the lungs.
"Tadpoles normally breathe with something like a hiccup," Shubin says.
The theme of his book is that we owe much of our anatomy to our animal ancestors. "Parts that evolved in one setting are now jury-rigged to work in another," he says. "When you look at the human body, you see layer after layer of history inside of us."
The first layer is what we share with chimpanzees and gorillas. The next goes back to mice and cows, while further down, you get to the relatively underappreciated layers we share with fish which include the backbone and basic layout of the body.
Fishy news about hernias
Our descent from fish explains why men are so much more prone to hernias than women. In fish, Shubin explains, the testicles lie up near the heart.
(Had they remained there, he said, it would give a whole new meaning to the Pledge of Allegiance.)
The budding gonads still form up high in a human embryo, but male mammals reproduce better with their sperm kept a bit cooler than body temperature. And so during gestation, human testicles take an incredible journey down through the body to their destination in the scrotum.
The trip downward puts a loop in the cord that connects the testes to the penis, leaving a weakness in the body wall where the cord attaches that never quite repairs itself.
Hence the trouble with hernias down the road.
The matter of milk
No good story about human design flaws can pass up a discussion of flatulence and science has addressed the kind that would occur if everyone in the world drank a tall glass of milk at the same time.
Geneticist Pragna Patel of the University of Southern California said one of her favorite examples of evolution in progress involves the gene that determines who can digest the sugars in milk and who cannot.
From genetic studies it appears that so-called lactose intolerance was our ancestral state.
A few people, however, were genetically gifted with an enzyme called lactase, which breaks down lactose, and in groups that started drinking lots of milk around 10,000 years ago, that version of the gene started to take over.
Scientists recently sequenced the lactase gene and found 43 different variations that allow adults to drink the milk of other animals.
"It's the first clear evidence of convergent evolution," Patel said, though it's not known whether those lacking this innovation failed to pass on their genes because they suffered from lack of nutrition or just didn't get invited to any parties.
I woud suggest reading a more modern Translation of the Bible - the New King James version is good but also the New International version.
This suggestion has to do with a search for truth.
Is not science interested in just that? Truth?
Don’t you know, for instance, that the science of archeology has proven over and over and over again that the facts in the Bible given about historical incidents / places / names have been PROVEN to be accurate???
If the Bible presents TRUTH about history, for instance, which it does —— that history includes the history of creation of life.
For instance, it includes the cataclysmic FLOOD to which the millions of fossils of ocean animals in the middle of desserts and on the tops of mountains and thousands of miles “inland” testify as accurate. Does that not even draw you to find out more of what is given in the TRUTHS revealed in the Bible - and matching up with the evidence?
Just asking...
It is like saying that if gambling is random then gambling houses should lose money as often as they make money. The games have an element of chance, but the house always has an advantage.
In evolution there is an element of chance as far as what genetic variations arise, but the ‘house advantage’ is SELECTIVE PRESSURE, which is decidedly non random.
No. Where did you ever get a silly idea like that?
Here is a definition of "truth" from a CalTech website:
Truth: This is a word best avoided entirely in physics [and science] except when placed in quotes, or with careful qualification. Its colloquial use has so many shades of meaning from it seems to be correct to the absolute truths claimed by religion, that its use causes nothing but misunderstanding. Someone once said "Science seeks proximate (approximate) truths." Others speak of provisional or tentative truths. Certainly science claims no final or absolute truths. Source.Science is concerned with explanations. That is where theories come in:
Theory: a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world; an organized system of accepted knowledge that applies in a variety of circumstances to explain a specific set of phenomena; "theories can incorporate facts and laws and tested hypotheses." Addendum: "Theories do not grow up to be laws. Theories explain laws."Dont you know, for instance, that the science of archeology has proven over and over and over again that the facts in the Bible given about historical incidents / places / names have been PROVEN to be accurate???Theory: A scientifically testable general principle or body of principles offered to explain observed phenomena. In scientific usage, a theory is distinct from a hypothesis (or conjecture) that is proposed to explain previously observed phenomena. For a hypothesis to rise to the level of theory, it must predict the existence of new phenomena that are subsequently observed. A theory can be overturned if new phenomena are observed that directly contradict the theory. [Source]
So do most works of historical fiction. Means nothing.
If the Bible presents TRUTH about history, for instance, which it does that history includes the history of creation of life.
See above.
For instance, it includes the cataclysmic FLOOD to which the millions of fossils of ocean animals in the middle of desserts and on the tops of mountains and thousands of miles inland testify as accurate. Does that not even draw you to find out more of what is given in the TRUTHS revealed in the Bible - and matching up with the evidence?
The early geologists were creationists seeking to prove the global flood. The last major holdout gave up in 1831. Science since that time has conclusively shown that there was no global flood at the appointed time, ca. 4,350 years ago.
I have evidence from my own work as an archaeologist that there was no major flood 4,350 years ago in the area in which I work.
Perhaps you should stick to belief and leave science to scientists (and archaeology to archaeologists, eh?).
And a PLACENTA? Placental mammals were a rather recent development, as witness the marsupials of Australia who seem to do without one.
Please go back, read my questions, and apply them to mankind.
well said. nature provides the fine tuning
There is absolutely no scientific possibility of the Great Flood as detailed in the Bible and stolen from Babylonian mythology. None.
Coyoteman,
You’re an archaeologist? Thoroughly cool!~
Osteologist too.
Most of my days are spent at the computer, though, just like a lot of other folk.
college professor?
Privately employed, though I have taught classes at a couple of local colleges.
This way I have more time for my own research.
Insects and microbes multiply rapidly, and often. IIRC doesn't the lowly cockroach lay egg capsules every other day, with each capsule containing hundreds of eggs?
This kind of pace hastens evolution, and allows biochemical changes to occur with greater probability.
LOL, I really have better things to do with my life, but thanks just the same.
I started off by saying I usually stayed out of these creation evolution threads and this is exactly why. This accomplishes nothing.
The rate measured by generations is not that much different from other organisms. My point is that the changes I describe are demonstrated vividly, insects change proteins relatively quickly to deal with change but they do not change phenotype.
In fact while insects can adapt biochemically rather quickly, their basic layout and structure are very stable over millions of years thus making my point.
How can you say that? When have you heard last of a lioness that had 100 cubs, several times, each year?
In fact while insects can adapt biochemically rather quickly, their basic layout and structure are very stable over millions of years thus making my point.
Their basic structure and layout are stable over the years (except in size) because the features pass the tests of natural selection. The insects' basic shape is not challenged as much as its biochemical weapons and features.
Look at what I wrote, the rate measured by generations, not time, that adjusts for differences in lifespan.
I think we are beating a dead horse now. It was enjoyable have this discussion but I will be moving on.
There is much to be said about this topic: does science search for truth. No need to flippantly dismiss the topic.
Science Magazine - many articles that touch on this subject - just start reading ...http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/search?src=hw&site_area=sci&fulltext=truth&search_submit.x=0&search_submit.y=0&search_submit=go
(Of course, you are correct, in that pseudo science can claim anything to be “truth” when it is only speculation....as we see in “An Inconvenient Truth” by Algore, for instance.....is, indeed, not about TRUTH but about a quest for power using scientific theory to justify the removal of freedom from many)....
Yet, the “truth” that germs can cause disease keeps being thrown out as not having been written about in the Bible...so how can the Bible be true??? It is not TRUE that germs can cause disease?
Regarding the Noahic flood - of course there are tales of a flood in the ancient civilizations - reflecting the FACT that there was, indeed, a worldwide cataclysmic flood.
Where you are doing your work may not YET show evidence of a flood....no salt water creature fossils there..... yet?
Perhaps one could just say....keep digging.
Most ancient people lived on waterways of one kind or another. And floods happen. That is certainly not evidence of a single, global flood. And if there was a flood of the nature described in the Bible, there would be nobody to tell tales!
Where you are doing your work may not YET show evidence of a flood....no salt water creature fossils there..... yet?
Perhaps one could just say....keep digging.
I have tested many sites where there is continuity from before to after the time ascribed to the global flood, ca. 4,350 years ago. There is continuity of soil deposits, there is continuity of culture, and there is continuity of fauna and flora. More recently, we have had demonstrated continuity of mtDNA types across that 4,350 year line.
Likewise, there is no discontinuity in the soils which would be the result of a substantial flood. That discontinuity could be in the form of removed or altered soils, but we see no signs of that.
Now, there are signs in various places of a large flood: the channeled scablands of eastern Washington come to mind. Those are attributed to ice dams in the Idaho panhandle area at the end of the last glacial period. But those features are well dated, limited in area, and two to three times older than the purported global flood.
I plan on "keeping digging" but neither I nor any of my colleagues across the US has found evidence of a global flood. Perhaps it is time to admit that that story is not entirely accurate?
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