Bacterial resistance to antibiotics has nothing to do with evolution according to Michael Egnor MD
Sorry, I couldn't resist. Here's what Michael Egnor says on Evolution News & Views (sic): No, Despite Often-Heard Claims, Antibiotic Resistance in Bacteria Is Not Evolution.
This notion, however, is mistaken. Bacterial resistance to antibiotics has nothing to do with evolution. Evolution, in the Darwinian sense of undirected (unintelligent) process of random heritable variation and natural selection, is the process by which populations of living things change over time without intelligent agency causing or guiding the process. When the process of change in populations is guided by intelligence, it is called artificial selection -- breeding.
Of course I'm not the first to point this out. Charles Darwin, in the Origin of Species, made exactly the same argument. In his first chapter, he discussed artificial selection -- animal husbandry and breeding of plants. In subsequent chapters he developed an argument that in nature, changes in population are accomplished by natural selection, without intelligent agency. Darwin distinguished artificial selection from natural selection -- he distinguished breeding from evolution, and of course his theory of evolution is a theory of natural selection, not a theory of animal husbandry or plant breeding, which had been practiced for thousands of years and to which Darwin contributed nothing.
Bacterial resistance to antibiotics is artificial selection. Antibiotics are intelligently designed by medical researchers, deliberately administered to patients by doctors, who understand that there are some bacteria that are not sensitive to the antibiotic and that have the potential to proliferate. Actually, the administration of antibiotics that kill some but not all of the bacteria in the patient is quite deliberate, because there are huge populations of beneficial bacteria (e.g. in the gut) that should not be killed since they are necessary for health.
Shhhh. Don't tell Michael Behe who wrote a whole book based on resistance to antimalarial drugs.
107 comments :
Some days, it's too depressing to list all the reasons why Egnor is a moron.
I will point out that Joe G was just telling us yesterday that ID did not reject any part of "unguided evolution." One of us, I forget who (Rumraket?), just told Joe that IDcreationists do, in fact, deny all observations of evolution.
So, um, all those hospitals were *intentionally* trying to create MRSA and VRE? And this guy is a freakin' *surgeon*? (ie. someone who should be concerned for his patients' post-op recovery)
Bloody hell, but that's a scary thought.
Nobody in their right mind would let this putz come with in 10 feet of himself/herself with a scalpel.
"Shhhh. Don't tell Michael Behe who wrote a whole book based on resistance to antimalarial drugs. "
So, by Egnor's definition, Behe was investigating the edge of intelligent design instead of the edge of evolution...
Some days, it's too depressing to list all the reasons why Egnor is a moron.
Oh, what the heck. Let's do it anyway. I'll start.
1. He's a moron because he doesn't understand evolution even though dozens of people have been explaining it to him for more than five years.
Exactly. What a moron.
I don't expect MD's to understand how research works as well as Ph.D's do. I know it's not a research degree. I know that it's not fair to say, oh, MD's are not as smart as PhD's etc. And MD's usually aren't taught the complexities of evolutionary theory.
But... how, how did this man get an MD? How? How? And make him a surgeon? Who signed off on this? Did no one notice that he is a complete moron? Did he conceal it?
Does he in fact have some great, or even mediocre intellect, and is concealing, and deliberate says moronic things just to TROLL us? Ray Comfort style? Is he just Ray Comfort with a SCALPEL? Operating on your daughter's BRAIN!!??
It's the banana argument next. You watch-- next it's the banana!!!
There are so many things wrong with what Egnor writes one hardly knows where to start. Should we point out that the resistance to antibiotics that bacteria evolve is not by intent? That it is still evolution, even if selection is artifical? That there are countless species that have evolved antibiotics to combat infections from microorgagnisms? That the vast majority of used antibiotics aren't "intelligently designed", they're found in organisms living in the wild and subsequently put to use by humans? That there are many other microorganisms that have evolved resistance to these long before humans started using them? That this biochemical armsrace has been going on basically since the origin of life? That humans try to find new antibiotics in rare/isolated species that the pathogenic microbiome humans are usually exposed to, have yet to evolve resistance towards?
Is there no end to the level of wrong that one man can shuffle into so few words?
Now let's have a creative challenge. A contest.
Let's see who can best complete the following sentence.
I wouldn't trust Michael Egnor to...blank.
I'll start.
I wouldn't trust Michal Egnor to put a refigerator magnet on a refrigerator.
Since Egnor is likely reading this thread, I have a question for him:
Do you believe that bacteria know that antibiotics are deliberately processed (by humans) into particular formulas and deliberately introduced (via pills, injections, creams, sprays, powders) onto and/or into animals, plants, and humans in attempts to eliminate particular bacteria?
Yes Steve. Dr. Michael Egnor, neurosurgeon, believes that MRSA and VRE were designed by hospitals, by doctors such as himself.
Yes, Dr. Michael Egnor, as much as any other doctor, designed MRSA and VRE.
Which makes him a mass murderer practicing biological terrorism.
Also, Dr. Michael Egnor believes that doctors who give kids chloroquine designed chloroquine-resistant malaria.
Let's follow that logic. Since Behe said he proved, via malaria, that no system could evolve if it needed two or more mutations, what Behe actually proved is that no Intelligent Designer can create a system if it needs two or more mutations. That is what Dr. Michael Egnor believes and is saying.
Thus, Egnor's thesis means that Behe disproved Intelligent Design as an explanation for Irreducible Complexity.
Aren't we missing the obvious point here? Egnor is living proof - or should that be 'evidence' - of his argument that you can be a competent neurosurgeon without understanding the theory of evolution. Apparently, he is and clearly he doesn't.
How strange he would write these things.
Antibiotics are naturally produced by (mainly) soil microorganisms like bacteria and fungi. Thus virtually all soil microorganisms have evolved innate resistance mechanisms to the compounds produced by their neighbours. His conflation between natural and artificial selection is ridiculous.
Also, antibiotics are selected for use based mostly on their activity against the most likely causative agent (eg Gram + or Gram - bacteria) of a given disease, not for their inability to kill beneficial bacteria. The indiscriminant killing of intestinal bacteria by prescribed antibiotics is why Clostridium difficile infections have become so common.
Prof Moran,
It depends on how you define evolution. If you define evolution as change over time everything is evolution.
Any well-informed microbiologist can tell you that resistance to modern antibiotics is already present in permafrost bacteria.
The info did not evolve, it only has to be become to dominate the population through selection (i.e. differential reproduction) in an environment where the resistance exerts a reproduction advatage. In modern hospitals, poultry industry, etc.
Usually, the resistance is associated with HGT (plasmids) or loss of functional genes. Fully in accord with the frontloading hypothesis.
Peer, will you please explain how the "frontloading hypothesis" accounts for extinctions?
Geological disasters and catastrophes, diminished control over TE transposition (piRNA depletion) due to increased radtiation, genomic meltdown, etc.
There are so many ways leading to extinctions...there is only one leading to life.
@ Moran:
Prof Moran, zou said ^He's a moron because he doesn't understand evolution even though dozens of people have been explaining it to him for more than five years.^
I am new here, can you please be so kind to define evolution for me.
Then, as scientists, we at least know what we are talking about. Thanks!
AHA, now I get it...this type of evolution. Plasmodium turning in plasmodium turning into plasmodium etc.That is indeed what we need to understand how microbes turned into microbiologists.
I guess you also believe that when someone in Europe throws a stone with 100 Mph to the west, it will end up in America a few days later, isnt it?
Dr Egnor is right. And you have a definition problem. Or rather: the problem is that you do not define. No definitions, no science.
Indeed, after skimming Diogenes blog, I observed that he is unable to distinguish Darwinisme from evolution. This is a common problem among Darwinians: Pretending the two are equal. It shows Diogenes is not a scientist. Scientists define properly and specifically.
Why don-t you start a real discussion, here, on Moran-s weblog?
Let-s define some terms, first.
Evolution...define it.
Peer you understand nothing which wouldn't be so bad except you are eager to demonstrate it. I could take a small population of bacterial cells in which none are resistant to a given antibiotic, and in 24 hrs show you that resistant bacterial cells have arisen. How did they arise? What is your explanation for this? Hint: it has nothing to do with pre-existing resistance and everything to do with the fact that DNA polymerase in the bacteria copies the chromosome before every cell division event.
There are so many ways leading to extinctions...there is only one leading to life.
Jesus?
There are so many ways leading to extinctions...there is only one leading to life.
So you'll be starting up a local chapter of Microbes for Jesus? Can I have a T-shirt?
SRM, great minds....
2. He's a moron because he didn't think anyone would remember that the last time he treated this subject he dismissed it on the basis that evolution of resistance was so trivially true it was a tautology and told us nothing useful. So, the great Michael Egnor v. Michael Egnor debate: Evolution of resistance: So True It's a Truism, or Completely and Utterly False - You Decide!
Peer, are you saying that "Geological disasters and catastrophes, diminished control over TE transposition (piRNA depletion) due to increased radtiation, genomic meltdown, etc." are all part of the front loading of Earthly (and Universal?) processes and events?
@Peer Terborg
Look in the left sidebar of this blog. Scroll down to "Essays and Articles." Read "What Is Evolution." Enjoy.
Peer Terborg says,
It depends on how you define evolution. If you define evolution as change over time everything is evolution.
You are correct. No decent scientist would ever think that this is an acceptable definition of evolution. A decent scientist would start a discussion about definitions by giving us his definition.
How organisms become extinct.is independent of how they originated.
I can imagine several scenarios for extinctions, there may be dozens. Mega floods, asteroid impacts, vulcanism, inbreeding, overpredation, etc..
@ Moran,
Exactly my point....that-s why I asked you now about three times.
Please define what you mean by evolution.
"The info did not evolve, it only has to be become to dominate the population through selection (i.e. differential reproduction) in an environment where the resistance exerts a reproduction advatage. In modern hospitals, poultry industry, etc."
That IS evolution. And yes, if the selection has to fix new mutations in the population, then it IS evolution of new information. Changes in copy numbers of entire genes, changes in the nucleotide sequence of regulatory regions, insertions and deletions, transitions and transversions in protein coding regions leading to changes in the amino acid sequence of proteins. All of these things happen and play a role in various antibiotic resistance evolution.
No, the information is not there to begin with, if it was all that would be required to evolve perfect antibiotic resistance is to isolate a clone in the beginning population and then subsequently ferment it. But this never happens, it always takes multiple (often hundreds, if not thousands) of bacterial generations for effective antibiotic resistance to evolve in the population, which means it's not that some specific, already existing allele ("information already there") just has to dominate the population, it's that actual mutations that alter the genome of the organism have to happen. So it's new information by any sensible definition of the word. It's textbook evolution, get over it.
You can probably also imagine a mind existing in the absense of a physical brain, with magical powers, that can zap living organisms and entire universes into existence with the power of thought alone.
Of course, your imagination is not relevant to this discussion at all. This thread is about Egnor not having a clue about what evolution is or how it works.
@SRM,
If you take one single colony from an agar plate and expose it 24 hours to antibiotics there will be no survivors. No adaptation. Show some science and specify the condtion, please.
"there is only one leading to life."
Then please show with an "observational science" experiment that life can be created by divine magic.
By the way, there's also only one process leading to star formation: Coalescence of normous amounts of matter under gravity. Yet the universe is full of stars. The fact that some things can only happen in one way doesn't mean it cannot happen at all, or that it happens only once, or even that it happens infrequently, or that divine magic is required for it to happen at all.
"If you take one single colony from an agar plate and expose it 24 hours to antibiotics there will be no survivors. No adaptation. Show some science and specify the condtion, please."
If you pour large amounts of an antibiotic(enough that every member gets exposed to well over it's lethal dosage) into a fermentation flask with 50 billion bacteria that have no defense against it, you'll kill all the bacteria in there too. So clearly the "information" for effective antibiotic resistance is not "already there".
It actually takes many generations of mutation for effective resistance to be found. You can actually make antibiotic resistant bacteria by keeping the concentration of the antibiotic low enough that it doesn't kill all the bacteria, and then keep fermenting them under these conditions and spreading them on agar plates containing small amounts of antibiotics too, and pick the clones that grow the fastest for further fermentation.
The fact that under such conditions (and such experiments have been done), effective antibiotic resistance doesn't immediately pop up, but takes hundreds of successive bacterial generations, proves that the information isn't "already there". It has to evolve through mutation and subsequent selection.
"Exactly my point....that-s why I asked you now about three times.
Please define what you mean by evolution. "
He answered you 20 minutes before you posted this. Perhaps you should actually bother to read and understand, instead of just posting mindlessly?
Ha ha. You are wrong. Even if the original cell leading to the colony was not resistant, the potential for a mutation that leads to resistance exists in every cell division event that leads to a colony consisting of millions or billions of cells. This is such a trivial point that it is clear you understand nothing about mutations. The frequency with which you detect antibiotic resistance will depend on the frequency with which a given resistance arises (which is dependent on the number of unique nucleotide changes that can lead to said resistance) and the number of cells in the colony you speak of. If the frequency of resistance is very low (say 1 x 10e-10, then you will need to check the cells from several colonies - but you will find, inevitably, that resistant cells have arisen.
On the other hand, if all cells in a given colony are in fact not resistant to an antibiotic, then you are correct, those cells themselves will not become resistant simply by being on an antibiotic plate. But this is because the circumstances that lead to resistance are not magic, but rather dependent on aspects of molecular genetics and biochemistry that are very simple for most people to understand. But not you apparently.
Hey Peer,
Don't be silly, every one knows that the stone will fall off the edge of the earth into the void long before it reaches America.
Peer, you have stupidly assumed that absence of evidence is evidence of absence. I do in fact distinguish between Darwinism and evolutionary theory. This distinction has not been relevant to my blog posts, the last of which was on relativity theory and the starlight problem.
You are new here, so I can't blame you for being unaware that the distinction between Darwinism and evolutionary theory is a major topic on this blog and frequently discussed.
However, I am not inclined to be tolerant towards you because you STUPIDLY assume, without asking me first, that I do not distinguish between Darwinism and evolutionary theory.
Furthermore, the distinction between Darwinism and evolution is not the same as the distinction as made by IDiots, who define Darwinism= materialism and evolution = irrefutable observed changes, claiming that ID subsumes evolution.
That ID claim is a lie, as we see here IDiot Michael Egnor denying that OBSERVED evolution is evolution.
Now this "it shows Diogenes is not a scientist" stuff shows that you are an asshole who uses ad hominem fallacy in place of evidence. I will act on this knowledge in the future.
I'm not an expert but isn't one way of developing an antibiotic resistance by breaking a functional gene (s) via a deleterious mutation?
Hey Peer,
What type of scientist are you ?
There was a nifty visual demonstration in a Horizon where gel bands with increasing concentrations of antibiotic were prepared, then the rightmost band inoculated, and a time lapse camera left on. Movement from one band to the next was sporadic. A tiny 'breakthrough' would appear, colonise the band and stop dead at the next boundary. After a pause, a new breakthrough would suddenly appear, and the colonisation process would repeat. It is clear that the original inoculum did not any members with resistance to the highest concentration, else their descendants would simply have breezed past every boundary as if it weren't there (maybe the others got in the way? ;) ). Of course, the 'front-loader' can always say they were loaded (3.5 billion years ago?????) with a capacity which takes a while to switch on after 'sensing' the environment.
@Allan
That sounds very interesting, do you have a link for that?
Peer says: "Plasmodium turning in plasmodium turning into plasmodium etc."
You seem unaware that "But they're still bacteria" is a creationist argument so stupid and low, such a cliche, such boilerplate copy-n-paste from the least educated segment of the creationist con-o-sphere, that most scientists consider it a cliche to even address it. The response is, if we have energy, to point and laugh.
IDiot attempt at Sarcasm :That is indeed what we need to understand how microbes turned into microbiologists.
Ha ha! We've never seen that joke before!
Jesus, moron copied that from Ray Comfort. We have us a Kent Hovind fan.
We know the difference, you gibbering bumpkin, between the OBSERVED PROCESS OF EVOLUTION and universal common descent. We know they are not the same.
However, the topic of this thread is that YOU CREATIONIST IDIOTS DENY BOTH OF THEM. You creationist IDiots deny BOTH the observed process of evolution AND universal common descent.
Do you see what that Egnoramus did above? He denied OBSERVED processes of evolution. Not merely universal common descent, you jibbering moron.
Creationist Arg 1: But they're still bacteria! It doesn't explain how microbes turn into microbiologists! Ha ha! Observed processes of evolution are NOT the same as universal common descent! Creationists deny common descent but WE DON'T DENY observed processes of evolution.
Creationist Arg 2: We DO DENY OBSERVED processes of evolution. They're really examples of intelligent design! Gotcha, Darwin!
Scientist: Excuse me, your Arg 2 contradicts your Arg 1.
IDiot Terborg: Oh, you think bacteria turning into bacteria proves universal common descent!
No IDiot, your authorities contradicted themselves and we caught them. You seek to misrepresent our position because we exposed your contradictions. Subject-changing IDiot.
Peer Terborg
AHA, now I get it...this type of evolution. Plasmodium turning in plasmodium turning into plasmodium etc.That is indeed what we need to understand how microbes turned into microbiologists.
Ironic that the creationists wants us to recreate events that happened over billions of years in the lab, yet claims that we are the unreasonable ones.
I guess you also believe that when someone in Europe throws a stone with 100 Mph to the west, it will end up in America a few days later, isnt it?
You're mistaking us for creationists.
Dr Egnor is right. And you have a definition problem. Or rather: the problem is that you do not define. No definitions, no science.
Again, you're mistaking us for creationists, who love making their cases, as Egnor does, by mere wordplay. You also seem rather incompetent at doing a bit of searching. Larry has plenty of posts where he defines evolution, explains why some definition is lacking, why some definition is better, explains how to make the concepts clearer to students and scientists, etc, etc, etc.
Try and learn to read. Try and learn to explore and understand. Maybe then we could have a decent conversation.
At last, following the lead of Prof Moran, I found a sort of definition of evolution he copied from a neodarwiinan textbook:
>Biological (or organic) evolution is change in the properties of populations of organisms or groups of such populations, over the course of generations. The development, or ontogeny, of an individual organism is not considered evolution: individual organisms do not evolve. The changes in populations that are considered evolutionary are those that are ‘heritable' via the genetic material from one generation to the next. Biological evolution may be slight or substantial; it embraces everything from slight changes in the proportions of different forms of a gene within a population, such as the alleles that determine the different human blood types, to the alterations that led from the earliest organisms to dinosaurs, bees, snapdragons, and humans<
Are there scientists, here, who regard definitions that encompass everything as scientific? Can it be falsified?
Fuytema did a good job formulating a pseudoscience definition, which includes so many obscuranto, that we cannot see the wood for the trees.
As I already mentioned above, this neodarwinian obscuranto can be condensed to: change over time.
No wonder the ID group of people is gaining momentum..
Peer the 'scientist' writes:
"If you take one single colony from an agar plate and expose it 24 hours to antibiotics there will be no survivors. No adaptation. Show some science and specify the condtion, please."
despite the fact that he earlier claimed that antibiotic resistance supports the 'frontloading hypotheses.'
Hilarious.
"Genomic meltdown"? You've not been reading ReMine, have you?
Yes, and it has been for decades. So odd then that despite all this momentum, that they no longer publish PSCID, that Bio-Complexity has been reduced to publishing political essays (no science), and that there is exactly zero published research ON their own claims. Not to mention the fact that despite all this momentum, we see the exact same, lame, ridiculous "arguments" being used today as were used 20 years ago, and that the same mouthpieces for the 'movement' are still engaging in the same nonsense.
No, I cannot imagine such a mind. I acknowledge the shorcomings of my brain. But I do not claim, as many, that such mind cannot or does not exist.
I personally think that Egnor surely knows what he is talking about. I think he knows what AB resistance causes, that is does not involve the making of something, but merely the corruption of enrichment (selection) of something that was already in the genepool. I know and understand both paradigms, because I am interested in the topic of origins. I am not interested in atheism or theism for which this blog and many others are abused.
Mikkel - kicks off about the 18:30 mark http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xz0yb2_bbc-horizon-defeating-the-superbugs-720p_news
Also interesting bit about tracing MRSA (using common descent evidence, already!) to healthy American pigs given antibiotics as a matter of routine.
"Are there scientists, here, who regard definitions that encompass everything as scientific? Can it be falsified?"
This is so dumb it borders on illiterate.
You don't falsify definitions, you falsify hypotheses. You can't falsify what evolution IS, you can however test for whether it actually happens as described.
If evolution is defined as heritable change in populations over generations(just to make it short), then if you show there is no such thing taking place(showing that nothing corresponds to the process as defined), then you still haven't falsified the definition (because it would still be true that evolution, if it happened, was heritable change, by definition).
But you would have shown that there is no process corresponding to the definition. As in there would then just be a definition of a process that doesn't actually happen. The definition would not be "falsified", the occurence of the process to which it refers would.
Get it? This is supremely basic. This means evolution, the actual process, is falsifiable, but the definition is not, because definitions aren't hypotheses, they're just descriptions of meaning or concepts for particular words.
Now we can USE the definition to make hypotheses, such as "All of life shares universal common descent through the evolutionary process(which needs to be detailed of course, in order to yield quantifiably testable predictions)". This would then be testable.
Get it?
ID is dead thanks to morons like you. The Discovery Institute is full of lawyers and a few philosophers. They've failed to recruit young PhD's in the physical or life sciences. The only IDiot with a life science Ph.D. whose career is not in the dumper is Behe, and every falsifiable statement he's ever made has been falsified, usually in comical ways, and sometimes they're known to be falsified before Behe publishes his prediction.
Examples: blood clotting cascade and intraflagellar transport, both called Irreducibly Complex by Behe, known to exist in reduced forms before Behe made the prediction; but not known to IDiot Behe.
And how'd Jonathan Wells' prediction that centrioles were little tiny spinning turbines work out for you? Oh, right.
Peer, would you do us a favor and copy and paste the "20 Year Goals" of Intelligent Design from the Wedge Document of 1998? They've got 3 years to go and I'm trying to count up how many have been achieved already. Counting is hard, help me out please.
Manning, it is a pity, indeed, that the minds of the people are not more open to each other. I would love to see papers of the ID camp being published and discussed by scientists of the field and in the open. It would be a much more beautiful world, where we could exchange our ideas and cooperate to find the truth behind the universe. .
"I personally think that Egnor surely knows what he is talking about. I think he knows what AB resistance causes, that is does not involve the making of something, but merely the corruption of enrichment (selection) of something that was already in the genepool."
Then you and Egnor are apparently equally ignorant.
Terborg: "I am not interested in atheism or theism for which this blog and many others are abused."
Wow, that's the first time we've seen a creationist say he's not motivated by religion in at least 4 hours.
We know that some IDiots believe tbeir "God of the Gaps" fallacy and all-consuming hatred of atheists are not religious beliefs.
@ Rasmussen,
Thanks for filling in the gaps. I sometimes think faster than I write. But, apparently you understood my train of thought. I fully agree with zour explanation.
Let-s say it differently. The definition provided by Fuytema is so broad, any change over time is evolution.
Does not mean that this change over time is mechanistically explained through hypothesis such as universal common descent, selection, mutations, etc.
Furthermore, the definition excludes evolution in the fossil record.
IDiot's been reading Sanford.
Next up: the chart showing that the exponential decay in ages of the Biblical patriarchs as proof of "Genetic Meltdown". Noah lived to be 900, right Peer? Darwin is finished.
That is both amazing and scary at the same time.
Peer: "I would love to see papers of the ID camp being published and discussed by scientists of the field and in the open."
They have been discussed by scientists; virtually every claim made by IDiot/creationists was dissected by scientists, who pointed out that all these claims were based on either factually false claims, redefinitions of the scientific method (e.g. God of the Gaps), and either have been falsified or use equivocation to seek to evade falsification (e.g. irreducible complexity, specified complexity).
See Talk.Origins, Panda's Thumb, Ken Miller's and Jerry Coyne's books, anti evolution.org, and this blog here. Party's over.
You have arrived at the party after it's already over. You could help clean up and wash dishes if you want to be useful. But I don't think you know how late the hour is.
Closing Time. You don't have to go home but you can't stay here.
Diogenes> ...Behe, and every falsifiable statement he's ever made has been falsified...
At least he makes falsifiable statements, something we cannot grant change-over-time= evolution philosophers.
How can I falsify a theory that claims that all biology can be explained as common descent plus modifications? All shared characteristics demonstrate common descent, while those that do not (and thus falsify common descent) proof modifications. How on earth can I falsify this concept? In my opinion this is nothing less than pseudoscience. Formulate definitions and hypothesis in such way, nobody is able to understand them properly or can falsify them.
Don-t you see that, mister Living-in-Barrel?
Can anybody here propose a potential falsification for the the Darwinian pseuodoscience concept common descent plus modification?
"All shared characteristics demonstrate common descent, while those that do not (and thus falsify common descent) proof modifications. How on earth can I falsify this concept?"
With statistics. Read the chapter "Prediction 1.2: A nested hierarchy of species" in Douglas Theobalds 29+ Evidences for macroevolution: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section1.html#nested_hierarchy
Make sure you read that, including the sections "potential falsification" and "Prediction 1.3: Consilience of independent phylogenies"(including the section on falsification there too).
That's how you do it.
"In my opinion this is nothing less than pseudoscience. Formulate definitions and hypothesis in such way, nobody is able to understand them properly or can falsify them. "
As the link I just gave demonstrates, your opinion is wrong and given that you write that "nobody understands them properly", I think part of the reason you are of that opinion, is that you don't properly understand how the hypothesis of common descent through the evolutionary process makes quantifiably testable predictions.
Just because you don't understand it, or are not aware of other who does, does not mean it cannot be understood or that it cannot be falsified.
Yes, see my previous post.
Can anybody here propose a potential falsification for the the Darwinian pseuodoscience concept common descent plus modification?
I could think of a couple just of the top of my head:
If every single extant species had a completely unique mechanism of heredity.
If every single possible mutation was immediately 100% lethal.
I think it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to argue for common descent with modification if either were the case. There are probably many others.
I am pretty sure, nobody can falsify the pseudoscience of Darwin because every possible phenomenon, imaginable phantasy fits.
Let-s try the hypothetical boneless chicken ...
Common descent with chickens (a sort of birds) and not having bones is the modification.
It perfectly fits the pseudoscience of Darwin.
Try at home. All phantasies fit, as far I can tell..Let me know if you found some that do not fit.
Oh, I think the Egnorance understands evolution. He's a mind-brain dualist, believer in souls and the originator of the notion that your brain is like a cell phone and God is ATT.
Egnor deliberately, for whatever reason (religious zealousness?), misrepresents science in general and evolution in particular. That he lies to play his game seems to be of no importance to him.
Thank Quest...I will drink a beer now...
Have a good one and.... Dawinians.....do not hesitate to mail me as soon as you found a non-fitting phantasy: peer.terborg@gmail.com
Pretty sure they will never mail...
Quest, assuredly you get a jet engine first, than a propellor and after more deletions a paddle.
Just as the prophet with the long grey beard predicted....would be my guess
And now I am going for your beer...lets enjoy life.
Re DiogenesI
I don't expect MD's to understand how research works as well as Ph.D's do
Actually, surgeons like Egnor don't really have to know much about biology to perform their tasks. In this regard, they are much like automobile engine mechanics who don't have to know anything about the physics of internal combustion engines to work on automobile engines.
Nobel prize winning biochemist J. B. S. Haldane answered this one 80 years ago. When asked what observation would falsify evolution, he responded, "a fossil rabbit in the pre-Cambrian strata". Needless to say, the pre-Cambrian rabbit has not yet been found.
Terborg: I can imagine a data point which does not falsify common descent. Therefore, no data point can falsify common descent.
Moronic non sequitur. You should know that evolutionary theory is about *comparative* biology. Theories of comparative biology cannot be falsified by ONE data point. They can be falsified by patterns of similarities or differences, derived by comparing MULTIPLE data points.
Kindergarten level obvious.
Moreover, your hypothetical boneless chicken would be explained by you as due to front-loading. You would say its ancestor had "cryptic information" programming it to turn boneless. A bone less chicken would not falsify your front loading hypothesis.
Terborg: "All shared characteristics demonstrate common descent"
No. Kindergarten level error. Do I have to hold baby's hand and teach it about analogy vs. homology? I won't.
Go to Pubmed. Search for Theobald. If you haven't heard of Theobald then I'm not arguing with babies.
You have already been advised to read Theobald.
Terborg: "How can I falsify a theory that claims that all biology can be explained as common descent plus modifications?"
Gee I dunno, maybe go to PubMed and search the scientific literature? Which you IDiots never do, which is why IDiot Behe got humiliated at Dover: making encyclopedic statements about the scientific literature ("No scientist knows!") before searching the literature.
Rumraket has already pointed you to Theobald's work at Talk.Origins. I would add that Theobald's peer-reviewed papers on tests of the hypothesis of common descent (2010 if I recall) are essential reading.
Terborg appears blissfully unaware of the scientific literature on the topic. Such ignorance is bliss.
So Peer is just another sock puppet for Quest. They both have a bizarre fondness for ellipses... which is a dead giveaway, are not native English speakers, and are obsessed with yours truly.
Pest, changing the subject when we kick your ass?
Did anyone point out to Egnor that penicillin, for instance, is a natural product, and it was used by fungi against bacteria long before it was used by humans against bacteria?
They both have a bizarre fondness for ellipses... which is a dead giveaway, are not native English speakers, and are obsessed with yours truly.
Lots of people are obsessed with you but I'm keeping an eye on him anyway. :-)
I'm not an expert but isn't one way of developing an antibiotic resistance by breaking a functional gene (s) via a deleterious mutation?
Something similar might be possible if a non-essential enzyme is required to convert a non-toxic chemical to a toxic one in the cell. Knocking out function of enzyme by mutation would prevent the lethal conversion. But the most common mutational pathway to resistance relies on fact that the antibiotic specifically binds to, and inactivates, an essential enzyme in the cell. A mutation can occur that impairs binding of the antibiotic to the enzyme, but does not otherwise impair the essential activity of the enzyme. For example, Rifampicin is an antibiotic used to treat tuberculosis. It binds to a subunit in the essential RNA polymerase complex in the bacterium and inactivates it. Virtually all instances of rifampicin resistance are caused by mutations in the beta subunit of the RNA polymerase. These mutations prevent rifampicin binding and inactivation, but do not impair the activity of the RNA polymerase itself.
There are many potential contrary observations, but we have to deal with actual ones. 'Unfalsified' is not 'unfalsifiable'.
Evolution does not have to deal with non-actual phenomena, any more than ID does. How does ID address the matter of boneless chickens?
I would have done that, but that would still give Egnor;s claim more importance than it really has. It's enough to understand that Egnor is arguing on definitions, rather than on whether antibiotic resistance demonstrates the principle that selection, whichever it is, can select from a population and produce populations with different characteristics than the original populations.
They have nothing against evolution, so they imagine that if they argue on definitions they at least give the appearance of winning.
Like cheetahs are (more or less) intelligently designing impala's and impala's are designing cheeta's.
No evolution involved. Jay!
Yes, well: I've long been of the opinion that the Salem Hypothesis should also include doctors.
Hey Peer,
What type of scientist are you ?
Peer doesn't seem to have answered this, so I thought Web of Science might help. Unfortunately it doesn't offer any papers by "Terborg P", so we're still in the dark. Maybe a Christian Scientist or a Creation scientist?
"Manning, it is a pity, indeed, that the minds of the people are not more open to each other."
The point it, ID scientists cannot even produce reviewable, valid science to be published in their OWN journals. That should tell you something.
Maybe try "Peter Borger".... Borger is a YEC asthma researcher that fancied himself an expert on all things. He was a fan of front loading, as I recall.
Just a Darwin sceptic, Mannin. ...a sceptic with a cause.
Btw, did not get any mails yet...
A friend of mine told me the following true story. Once, at night in Amsterdam, he was attacked by four or five knife-wielding gangsters trying to rob him off. One of them, Big-mouth, clearly manifested as the leader. My friend grabbed the knife of Big-mouth with his left hand (although it inflicted a deep cut), and knocked him down with a right uppercut. The other gang members fled as boneless chickens.
Get it? Most people are just cowards following Big-mouth. That's why Big-mouth rules the world. Poltics, science, everywhere.
I see one clear Big-mouth, here. Grab his knife and kick him down.
Big-mouth (the mr know-it-all) Diogenes says:
"Moreover, your hypothetical boneless chicken would be explained by you as due to front-loading. You would say its ancestor had "cryptic information" programming it to turn boneless. A bone less chicken would not falsify your front loading hypothesis."
No, it would simple be loss off information.
We see it everywhere and it is a motor for adaptation/speciation.
To adapt and speciate ("evolve" would Big-mouth say), you only need to reshuffle or get rid of frontloaded info.
One act of creation was sufficient.
Diogenes believes that you and quest are the same person. It seems you both are obsessed with Diogenes and both attack the same insufficiency of evolution. What do you say to that?
Are you Peter Borger? Or Jon Witton?
Big-mouth, do you mean Douglas Theobald of the --outdated 29 evidences for macro-evolution-- Talkorigins?
I had a lengthy chat with Douglas about 10 years ago about the outdatedness of his 29 evidences. Does the TalkO still exist? No, it could not stand up against science fact-discoveries of the past 10 years.
I have not seen any new evidence for years...probably because it was just argueing from Darwinian ignorance?
I noticed that all Quest's contributions have been removed.
I do not like that. I can assure you that I am not Quest. I am indeed PB, which was obvious from utterly coincidential scrammbled letter-pseudoname, a spokesmen of the new frontloading biology.
I am a staunch anti-Darwinian, merely for scientific reasons. I find Big-mouth-know-it-all Darwinian debaters boring to the bone, science stoppers of the first degree.
Yes Larry removes all Quest's comments. In his defense quest claims that someone (Diogenes)used sock puppets to get him in trouble
Hm... You just threw it around like it was a fact... Can you point out exactly what are those "science fact-discoveries" and why they disprove what Douglas Theobald wrote (exactly which parts if any)? If you don't do it is easy to presume that you're making it up.
And no one else seems bothered by that.
Peer Tarboro,
Hold on a moment! Are you suggesting that Diogenes is Douglas Theobald or a post just disappeared the had more info?
Don't misunderstand me. I'm open to almost all ideas. I'm sure an intelligent person like you has an explanation why he believes the Earth is 6000 years old
I have a feeling we met at conference somewhere but I can't recall where and when
Wouldn't it be hilarious if Diogenes turned out to be actually Douglas Theobald and Jon Witton Jonathan Witt from discovery institute?
Evolution does not have to deal with non-actual phenomena, any more than ID does. How does ID address the matter of boneless chickens?
They would be irreducibly complex. Obviously a chicken with only half its bones would not be functional.
My point is...why is big-mouth rude intolerenat extremism, such as exhibited by the man in the barrel, tolerated and encouraged??
Because Diogenes knows what he's talking about and gives cogent arguments to justify his opinions.
Peer Terborg asks,
My point is...why is big-mouth rude intolereant extremism ... tolerated and encouraged??
Because I want to give everyone a chance to debate this topic, even the IDiots. That's why I don't ban them in spite of the fact that they are almost always rude and intolerant.
I'm much more likely to ban someone who keeps repeating the same thing over and over again in spite of the fact that other people are tying to debate the issue.
That's why I'm keeping an eye on you, Peer Terborg. If you don't have anything to contribute then you won't be contributing.
Post a Comment