Evolution is only a theory...or is it?

[lxskllr]

It cannot be tested.

Mutations occur, granted. But how these mutations help species adapt to environments cannot be measured. The physical environment of the Earth has been the same for 10,000 years, since the last Ice Age. It would take another major shift in global climate to trigger evolution. Evolution in humans has essentially ceased.

Two things. I just heard on the radio that cliff swallows out west aren't getting hit by cars as much as they used to. What they've found, is the ones that are getting hit have longer wings than the rest. Longer wings slow movement, so they can't get out of the way of cars.

Regarding humans; we've monkey wrenched evolution. There's likely some changes happening, but with us fixing/adapting problems, a lot of the more obvious changes aren't getting implemented.

 

[xalos]

If you weren't there to actually observe it, it's a theory. We just don't live long enough to observe it since it takes so much time to happen. Evolution? Yeah it could of happened that way, God sure it could of happened that way, or maybe an Alien just decided to take a crap on Earth one day and it could of happened that way.

A scientific theory is observed and repeatable. Most people confuse theory and hypothesis and use theory when they should use be using hypothesis. Evolution can be observed very easily by performing drosophila melanogaster micro evolution experiments.

 

[GrumpyMan]

A scientific theory is observed and repeatable. Most people confuse theory and hypothesis and use theory when they should use be using hypothesis. Evolution can be observed very easily by performing drosophila melanogaster micro evolution experiments.

Not buying it, sorry. You can't prove that's what happened billions of years ago, you weren't there to observe what actually happened.

 

[Paratus]

In a similar way that both general relativity and the capability of my anus to produce delicious chocolate spongecakes are.

Don't believe in my magical hole? Then you'll have to eat my poo.

Well I believe you seeing as you are a recertified assmaster

 

[xalos]

Not buying it, sorry.

There is nothing to buy. It's an experiment that is repeated by undergrads every semester in almost every college/university that has a genetics course with the same range of results.

Update for your edit:
"You can't prove that's what happened billions of years ago, you weren't there to observe what actually happened."

That same logic can be used against the creationist viewpoint. You have never seen God, you did not witness any of the books of the Bible while being written, and you were not present during the creation process. However, you also cannot produce any sort of experiment that proves any aspect of the creation belief on the micro or macro level. So, you should say you're not buying creation either.

 

[Paratus]

Not buying it, sorry. You can't prove that's what happened billions of years ago, you weren't there to observe what actually happened.

Why do we have to be there at the time to observe it?

 

[darkswordsman17]

The thing no one ever talks about is, why can't both be true? Granted, you can't usually have rational discussions with religious people. I consider the Bible to be propaganda, however I don't rule out that SOMETHING created us at some point, just nothing that mankind is or has been aware of.

The one thing no one can figure out is how did life actually start. Who's to say someone didn't start life on Earth, then the life evolved. Since we've never actually found any life (as of yet) elsewhere, anything is possible.

I don't think you quite understand just how much we actually do know. Life really isn't that spectacular, er actually in many ways its more spectacular than people know as they want to just be "its too much for me to comprehend therefore no one knows and its just magic!", when the reality is we have a pretty damn good idea of ways it could and likely did happen.

 

[ImpulsE69]

I don't think you quite understand just how much we actually do know. Life really isn't that spectacular, er actually in many ways its more spectacular than people know as they want to just be "its too much for me to comprehend therefore no one knows and its just magic!", when the reality is we have a pretty damn good idea of ways it could and likely did happen.

We don't know..those are hypo something or others and theories. I'm not saying I don't lean that way, but it's not fact by any means.

 

[GrumpyMan]

Why do we have to be there at the time to observe it?

Because you don't know what actually started it all, the very first moment. You can pretend to make all the little planets you want in a laboratory or university, doesn't mean it really happened that way, just like religion.

 

[disappoint]

Evolution is considered to be as factual as the Sun being (roughly) the center of the solar system. Anyone who says otherwise is either a troll, else someone who is utterly clueless as to the incredibly vast amount of evidence supporting evolution. Science is open to change, but the likelihood that evolution is wrong is about as close to zero as you can get.

5 sigma?

 

[darkswordsman17]

We don't know..those are hypo something or others and theories. I'm not saying I don't lean that way, but it's not fact by any means.

You act like we have no clue at all which is just straight up wrong. We have a very good idea of what very likely went on. Does it make any sense to go "well it could've been anything, it could've been aliens planting shit to grow in a specific manner" when there's nothing at all that indicates any such silliness, or does it make more sense to go, "hmm, the conditions were likely like this, we know what makes up the components that make up organisms and therefore life, hmm, imagine that we were able to create that stuff using the elements that were likely there in those conditions, and would you look at that, that is what happened!"?

 

[PowerYoga]

they said it in a movie aliens are real.

 

[DrPizza]

Because you don't know what actually started it all, the very first moment. You can pretend to make all the little planets you want in a laboratory or university, doesn't mean it really happened that way, just like religion.

That you believe that either thing you've mentioned has anything to do with evolution indicates a vast chasm of ignorance on your part. It's like attempting to discuss calculus without knowing that 1+1=2.

 

[DrPizza]

5 sigma?

I'd think way better than that, though that sort of abuses the meaning of that.

 

[PowerEngineer]

Because you don't know what actually started it all, the very first moment. You can pretend to make all the little planets you want in a laboratory or university, doesn't mean it really happened that way, just like religion.

I'll accept this argument and your others up to a point. I suppose we can't prove with absolute certainty that what seems to have happened on the basis of scientific thought is what actually happened. But let me extend this argument one step further to say that we can't prove with absolute certainty that each of us wasn't created just ten minutes ago with a full set of false memories (such as everything we "know" about our parents, spouse, and children). I submit that it'd be impossible to live (what appears to be) your life while juggling all the possibilities that can't be absolutely dismissed. I think it makes best sense to take the possibility that seems most likely (based on usefulness in predicting future results, i.e. scientific reasoning) and use it. That means I'll set the alarm clock tonight because I'm inferring that the sun will rise tomorrow.

On evolution as a theory, it seems to me we have so much evidence for the common ancestry of all life on this planet over millions of years (e.g. DNA) that it's hard to see where the "wiggle room" is for a replacement theory. There is much more "wiggle room" available for theories on what has driven the evolution of life. I agree that "survival of the fittest" using mutations seems like the best theory right now, but can imagine tweaks that bring in other factors (e.g. asteroids) as we gather more facts.

All of this can only explains what happened and how it happened. It can't explain why it happened; that's up to religion/philosophy IMHO.

My two cents...

 

[disappoint]

I'd think way better than that, though that sort of abuses the meaning of that.

True. I was just kidding, hence the .

 

[ImpulsE69]

You act like we have no clue at all which is just straight up wrong. We have a very good idea of what very likely went on. Does it make any sense to go "well it could've been anything, it could've been aliens planting shit to grow in a specific manner" when there's nothing at all that indicates any such silliness, or does it make more sense to go, "hmm, the conditions were likely like this, we know what makes up the components that make up organisms and therefore life, hmm, imagine that we were able to create that stuff using the elements that were likely there in those conditions, and would you look at that, that is what happened!"?

Just a few years ago people believed the earth was flat and the center of the universe. Just because they figured some of it out doesn't mean everything they think they know is right. It's still a lot of guessing based on perception from a humans perspective. The ideas change all the time. So what started life on earth? We know the components but just about any scientist will tell you they don't know what jump started life. They just have their theories. There's a difference between creating life from nothing with no intelligent interaction, versus doing it in a controlled lab.

They don't even really know why the big bang happened, if it happened at all.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

Not buying it, sorry. You can't prove that's what happened billions of years ago, you weren't there to observe what actually happened.

Evolution is what happens to imperfect replicators. By all accounts and evidence, even the earliest biological organisms fall into that category. It is rather at odds with all of the available evidence to suggest that there existed at any time in the history of life on our planet a class of organisms that did not reproduce with modifications to their genome.

Because you don't know what actually started it all, the very first moment. You can pretend to make all the little planets you want in a laboratory or university, doesn't mean it really happened that way, just like religion.

You're right, we don't know what started it all. We're not even sure that it "started" in the first place. This has absolutely nothing to do with the fact biological organisms evolve.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

So what started life on earth?

Probably panspermia. But of course, this has nothing to do with evolution.

They don't even really know why the big bang happened, if it happened at all.

We also don't know why certain subatomic particles decay when they do, but we know that they do. Not everything in the universe must have a "reason why," and the absence any knowledge of a "reason why" X happened does not invalidate our knowledge that X happened.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Probably panspermia. But of course, this has nothing to do with evolution.


We also don't know why certain subatomic particles decay when they do, but we know that they do. Not everything in the universe must have a "reason why," and the absence any knowledge of a "reason why" X happened does not invalidate our knowledge that X happened.

Actually..yes it does. Just as "dark matter" is a consideration for why certain things happen in the universe. It's one of those "this fits" type scenarios.

I think how life started is a big "reason why" we would need to know to be able to say there was or wasn't just spontaneous life. And no, none of this has to do with evolution, however he's commenting on my statement earlier about both evolution and intelligent design as a possibility rather than one or the other.

I prefer to keep an open mind, knowing that for as smart as scientists are, much of it is still grounded in human understanding..which isn't always right.

Now that guy talking about solar winds being the cause of everything....he's crazy.

 

[ecox1]

No one has heard of the E. coli Long Term Evolution of E. Coli project? It actually shows evolution and has repeatable results. Wikipedia link ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._coli_long-term_evolution_experiment ).

 

[drebo]

I don't think you quite understand just how much we actually do know. Life really isn't that spectacular, er actually in many ways its more spectacular than people know as they want to just be "its too much for me to comprehend therefore no one knows and its just magic!", when the reality is we have a pretty damn good idea of ways it could and likely did happen.

Bullshit. Science doesn't even know why proteins fold the way they do or why it's so important for them to fold. Without that information, it is patently absurd to insinuate that scientists "are close" to explaining how life and consciousness have started.

The building blocks of life are amino acids, and we have no clue as to why they form or where they came from, and we're about as close to explaining that as we are to traveling to the center of the Sun.

Granted, I suppose there's some possibility that it amino acids formed randomly over billions of years and then learned how to replicate themselves over billions more years. I'd say the probability of it happening again randomly in nature is about as high as there being some sort of "intelligent designer" who crafted our lives as we know it.

Hell, maybe there does exist a different metaphysical universe parallel to our own where beings far more advanced than we are live. And perhaps their understanding of matter and science is sufficiently advanced from our own that they have the capability to bring life into being. Personally, I like the idea of there being a progenetor race, like in Star Trek.

That's not to say that evolution (or, rather, mutation) doesn't occur. A person would have to be a moron to claim that it doesn't. But discounting that someone (let's call it alien) engineered the first life as a possibility for the beginnings of life on this planet pretty much makes you just as much of a close-minded fool.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

Double post

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

Actually..yes it does.

Look, I don't know how to put it more simply than I already have. In order for your disagreement to stand you would have to defend the idea that we don't really know that subatomic particles decay at random intervals. If this is not your claim, then you are not intelligent enough to understand the implications if your own statements, and thereby you have utterly disqualified the rest of your opinions.

I think how life started is a big "reason why" we would need to know to be able to say there was or wasn't just spontaneous life.

Do you have any evidence that life actually started?

And no, none of this has to do with evolution, however he's commenting on my statement earlier about both evolution and intelligent design as a possibility rather than one or the other.

This is a discussion about science. So-called "intelligent design" has no place in a discussion about science.

 

[Juddog]

Because you don't know what actually started it all, the very first moment. You can pretend to make all the little planets you want in a laboratory or university, doesn't mean it really happened that way, just like religion.

The first moment? Either you're talking about abiogenesis, or the big bang, neither of which is evolution, the latter having nothing to do with evolution whatsoever.