tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post4569109728741796716..comments2024-03-27T14:50:47.345-04:00Comments on <center>Sandwalk</center>: IDiots Don't Understand Punctuated EquilibriaLarry Moranhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05756598746605455848noreply@blogger.comBlogger48125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-19634661587727707552013-07-26T17:47:10.386-04:002013-07-26T17:47:10.386-04:00Re Larry Moran
Some of the folks over at Panda...Re Larry Moran<br /><br />Some of the folks over at Panda's Thumb who are familiar with Booby's contributions over there have concluded that he really does believe what he writes.colnago80https://www.blogger.com/profile/02640567775340860582noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-10231029998747576252013-07-25T12:04:50.691-04:002013-07-25T12:04:50.691-04:00Mary? Yes, I think the distinction matters. Peripa...Mary? Yes, I think the distinction matters. Peripatric speciation is a special case, and PE assumes it's the dominant one. If allopatric speciation is not generally highly asymmetrical, many of the predictions of PE for the fossil record disappear. Transitional populations become less rare, because they aren't small, transient, and at the edge of a range. (I think the poor sampling of the fossil record still accounts for much, but Mayr's explanation goes away.) And the whole "genetic revolution" thing, and any explanation for stasis connected with it, also disappear.John Harshmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06705501480675917237noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-23220064846240770122013-07-25T11:48:04.247-04:002013-07-25T11:48:04.247-04:00John,
Is the distinction between allopatric speci...John,<br /><br />Is the distinction between allopatric speciation and peripatric speciation important? Several of the modern evolutionary biology textbooks don't even mention peripatric. In <i>Structure</i>, Gould talks almost exclusively about allopatry and allopatric speciation even though he has a description of Mary's original version of peripatric speciation suggesting that he knows what it meant.Larry Moranhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05756598746605455848noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-90340648907820019402013-07-25T10:36:00.753-04:002013-07-25T10:36:00.753-04:00Note that when Gould & Eldredge say "allo...Note that when Gould & Eldredge say "allopatric" they mean "peripatric". Standard allopatric speciation doesn't involve peripheral isolates.John Harshmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06705501480675917237noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-49096722766215215732013-07-25T10:13:54.333-04:002013-07-25T10:13:54.333-04:00RB:"This YEC always understood PE being a ret...RB:"This YEC always understood PE being a retreat that was forced as it became evident there was not the gradual changes in creatures by way of fossil sequences.<br />So they HAD to say there was statis and then a jump."<br /><br />This is a perfect example of why you can't put your conclusions in front of your investigation. Creationists have an ideology, they 'know' it is true, and therefore everything has to be in accord with that. So it's not /merely/ that Gould or other biologists are wrong, it's that they know they're wrong and they're making up lies to try to explain that away.Schenckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10802843636373254323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-61712647953628433692013-07-25T10:08:53.765-04:002013-07-25T10:08:53.765-04:00Dio:
"So a (for example) moeritherium will br...Dio:<br />"So a (for example) moeritherium will branch out into a dozen species with various lengths of trunk, shorter, longer etc. and a half-dozen species with shorter trunks go extinct, leaving only those with longer trunks, and thereafter skewing the average, and providing permanent morphological change."<br /><br />This was how Gould addressed the issue of getting large-scale morphological change and long term trends in morphology. There had been a criticism of PE that it couldn't explain long term trends, and this species selection is how Gould addressed that criticism (sometimes it seems like Gould felt PE could explain everything, which is a tricky territory for a theory to enter). Gould, of course, felt that there were multiple, valid, influential levels to selection, that evolution has a 'structure'.Schenckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10802843636373254323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-62349442568701209842013-07-25T10:04:23.024-04:002013-07-25T10:04:23.024-04:00G&E also explain that part of the reason they ...G&E also explain that part of the reason they even came up with PE was because they wondered what allopatric models of speciation would mean for the fossil record, so the ID claim that it has 'no basis in biology' is insane. This misunderstanding actually suggests that IDers think, 'if it's not a molecular explanation, it's not biology'. Given that, when and if they do have advanced degrees in biology, it's in molecular biology.<br /><br />At the same time gould also said that PE was in part developed because he had gone through the effort of learning good statistical methods to detect and analyze anagenesis in the fossil record, and he was frustrated because it didn't seem to occur, he was almost saying 'damnit, I learned this stat BS for nothing!'Schenckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10802843636373254323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-61255464090268225332013-07-25T01:38:19.721-04:002013-07-25T01:38:19.721-04:00Shapiro is a closet ID-proponent. Everyone knows i...Shapiro is a closet ID-proponent. Everyone knows it. Mikkel Rumraket Rasmussenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07670550711237457368noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-4257417806495376692013-07-24T18:35:03.316-04:002013-07-24T18:35:03.316-04:00Re lutesuite
When Dumbski found out that Jeffrey ...Re lutesuite<br /><br />When Dumbski found out that Jeffrey Shallit would be called to refute anything he said about information theory, Dumbski chickened out. That was smart on his part, given what happened to the hapless Behe.colnago80https://www.blogger.com/profile/02640567775340860582noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-83080378539704777042013-07-24T18:11:02.655-04:002013-07-24T18:11:02.655-04:00Diogenes,
What you describe there is species sele...Diogenes,<br /><br />What you describe there is species selection, not PE. Gould did indeed like species selection, and it may be that PE would make species selection more common and/or likely, but PE is not species selection. On the other hand, Gould thought that speciation happened by ordinary natural selection within populations.John Harshmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06705501480675917237noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-34413961842886786712013-07-24T16:48:22.313-04:002013-07-24T16:48:22.313-04:00Harshman writes: "PE is a claim that evolutio...Harshman writes: "PE is a claim that evolution occurs mostly during speciation, with stasis at other times. I don't think that a simulation would be likely to produce a result like that."<br /><br />As I understand it, there's more to it than that. There are bursts of speciation where a single species branches out into many with different morphological characteristics; then the bush is pruned down by extinction. Large-scale morphological changes are determined by what doesn't go extinct. <br /><br />So a (for example) moeritherium will branch out into a dozen species with various lengths of trunk, shorter, longer etc. and a half-dozen species with shorter trunks go extinct, leaving only those with longer trunks, and thereafter skewing the average, and providing permanent morphological change.<br /><br />That means the mathematics is dominated by species selection, which is different math than natural selection within a species, a mechanism that Gould deprecated; he appeared to define natural selection as not including species selection.Diogeneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15551943619872944637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-17496458312639226742013-07-24T16:43:25.383-04:002013-07-24T16:43:25.383-04:00Dembski has long fantasized about having scientist...Dembski has long fantasized about having scientists hand-cuffed to a radiator in his basement.<br /><br />"I’m waiting for the day when the hearings are not voluntary but involve subpoenas in which evolutionists are deposed at length on their views. On that happy day, I can assure you they won’t come off looking well." - William Dembski<br /><br />Bondage fantasy. Diogeneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15551943619872944637noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-42955654093172698442013-07-24T16:19:18.484-04:002013-07-24T16:19:18.484-04:00It has nothing to do with punctuated equilibria, b...It has nothing to do with punctuated equilibria, but it sure poses a problem for folks like James Shapiro, who think that microorganisms can decide upon favorable evolutionary paths. Lenski's E. coli must have finished last in their genetics classes!judmarchttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03111006189037693272noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-16761027290328427762013-07-24T15:21:17.150-04:002013-07-24T15:21:17.150-04:00Thanks. I added this footnote to the post ...
---...Thanks. I added this footnote to the post ...<br /><br />-------------------------<br /><br /><b>UPDATE</b> A reader, Paul C. Anagnostopoulos, supplied the reference. It's on page 710. Here's the complete quote from Gould in context. It's part of a discussion about the possibility of species selection. <br /><br /><i>Several Darwinian strict constructionists, Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett in particular, hold that almost everything of interest in evolutionary biology either inheres in, or flows form, natural selection's power to craft the intricate and excellent design of organisms—"organized adaptive complexity," in Dawkins's favorite phrase. ... I do not deny the wonder, or the powerful importance, or organized adaptive complexity. <b>I recognize that we know no mechanism for the origin of such organismal features other than conventional natural selection at the organismal level</b>—for the sheer intricacy and elaboration of good biomechanical design surely preclude either random production, or incidental origin as a side consequence of active processes at other levels. But I decry the parochialism of basking so strongly in the wonder of organismal complexity that nothing else in evolution seems to matter. Yet many Darwinian adaptationists adopt this narrow and celebratory stance in holding, for example, that neutrality may reign at the nucleotide level, but still be "insignificant" for evolution because such changes impose no immediate effects upon organismal phenotypes; or that species selection can regulate longstanding and extensive trends in single characters, but still maintains no "importance in evolution because such a process can't construct an intricate organismal phenotype or numerous, developmentally correlated traits.</i> Larry Moranhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05756598746605455848noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-41837406556273981172013-07-24T14:50:40.787-04:002013-07-24T14:50:40.787-04:00Each of the twelve independent populations in Lens...Each of the twelve independent populations in Lenski's experiment evolve in a gradualistic manner as new mutations arise and become fixed in the population. The steps are simply new mutations, although there is some epistasis that makes them more obvious.<br /><br />The experiment is very interesting but the populations are under extreme selection of a sort rarely seen in nature. It has nothing to do with punctuated equilibria.<br />Larry Moranhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05756598746605455848noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-24834870774331748002013-07-24T14:31:19.373-04:002013-07-24T14:31:19.373-04:00Don't forget that in Lenski's evolution-in...Don't forget that in Lenski's evolution-in-a-flask experiments, the E. coli population evolved in a stepwise manner. Oh wait, I forgot that it didn't make a new "kind" or is it baramin?franklyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15938727764470608358noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-51161865688576064232013-07-24T12:50:34.022-04:002013-07-24T12:50:34.022-04:00The Gould quote about "know no mechanisms&quo...The Gould quote about "know no mechanisms" is on page 710 of "The Structure of Evolutionary Theory."<br /><br />~~ Paul<br />Paul C. Anagnostopouloshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07146336984557843642noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-48976368787009904752013-07-24T11:07:52.039-04:002013-07-24T11:07:52.039-04:00Hmm, I seem to vaguely recall a hearing or trial o...Hmm, I seem to vaguely recall a hearing or trial or something, in someplace called "Dover", where the issue of evolution vs. intelligent design actually was up for discussion. And several "evolutionists" did show up and expound at length on that issue. I also seem to recall that Dembski declined to do the same, as did almost every other major proponent of ID. The one exception being Michael Behe. And, to put it mildly, he didn't "come off looking well."Faizal Alihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00937075798809265805noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-2086455634307196362013-07-24T11:06:14.258-04:002013-07-24T11:06:14.258-04:00And yet the idea of "coadapted gene complexes...And yet the idea of "coadapted gene complexes" has nothing to do with biochemistry and everything to do with beanbag genetics, as long as the interactions among beans are important. Mayr had no ideas about the physical nature of those interactions. Simple example: he expected that DNA sequencing would show that morphologically similar species were also genetically similar, to the extent that grades like "reptile" would be apparent in sequence analyses.John Harshmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06705501480675917237noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-70015711872419444092013-07-24T10:48:35.524-04:002013-07-24T10:48:35.524-04:00I had to be biochemistry 'cause we all know wh...I had to be biochemistry 'cause we all know what Mayr thought of genetics. Here's his statement equating population genetics with "beanbag genetics." You can read the history at <a href="http://www.genetics.org/content/167/3/1041.full" rel="nofollow">William Provine: Genetics and Speciation</a>.<br /><br /><i>The emphasis in early population genetics was on the frequency of genes and on the control of this frequency by mutation, selection, and random events. Each gene was essentially treated as an independent unit favored or discriminated against by various causal factors. In order to permit mathematical treatment, numerous simplifying assumptions had to be made, such as that of an absolute selective value to a given gene. The great contribution of this period was that it restored the prestige of natural selection, which had been rather low among the geneticists active in the early decades of the century, and that it prepared the ground for treatment of quantitative characters. Yet this period was one of gross simplification. Evolutionary change was essentially presented as an input or output of genes, as in the adding of certain beans to a beanbag and the withdrawing of others (Mayr 1959a, p. 2).</i>Larry Moranhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05756598746605455848noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-75603210233913996572013-07-24T10:41:12.921-04:002013-07-24T10:41:12.921-04:00Robert,
I want to thank you for providing comic r...Robert,<br /><br />I want to thank you for providing comic relief on <i>Sandwalk</i>. However, some of your ridiculous satires of creationist beliefs are getting very close to what they actually believe. Please be more careful in the future or else some readers might think you actually subscribe to those crazy ideas.Larry Moranhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05756598746605455848noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-40821523638275181822013-07-24T09:49:19.430-04:002013-07-24T09:49:19.430-04:00The way gene products interact and produce phenoty...The way gene products interact and produce phenotypes is largely down to biochemistry. <br />DKhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04761138604438222762noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-76728632326184963582013-07-24T09:21:51.084-04:002013-07-24T09:21:51.084-04:00Evolution: Change in the genetic characteristics o...Evolution: Change in the genetic characteristics of populations (and perhaps of biotas).<br />Speciation: Evolution of reproductive isolation between populations.<br /><br />Technically, only one and two are morphology. Are you going to say that speciation must be accompanied by morphological change of some kind, since isolating mechanisms are morphological features? Nobody ever said that speciation doesn't involve change. The claim of PE is however that most change is associated with speciation, which is quite different.John Harshmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06705501480675917237noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-31139856041500152002013-07-24T08:51:40.252-04:002013-07-24T08:51:40.252-04:00I agree. And even further, once they managed to in...I agree. And even further, once they managed to instill creationist, christian, conservative values everywhere, they'd take the next step and reinstate the inquisition. <br /><br />One need only read some of Bill Dembski's mastubatory fantasies about a future where evolutionary biologists are forced to stand trial and defend themselves before the public.<br /><br />"<b><i>I’m waiting for the day when the hearings are not voluntary but involve subpoenas in which evolutionists are deposed at length on their views. On that happy day, I can assure you they won’t come off looking well.</i></b>" - William DembskiMikkel Rumraket Rasmussenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07670550711237457368noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37148773.post-64545589366696630412013-07-24T07:47:55.081-04:002013-07-24T07:47:55.081-04:00In my opinion much of ID is creationism in a very ...In my opinion much of ID is creationism in a very shabby cloak, and exists as a Trojan horse. If ID was ever widely accepted they would begin to drop the pretence and move toward full-blown creationism.<br /><br />Dave BaileyThe Rathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02487724361976424018noreply@blogger.com