Are Fossils evidence of evolution ....or are the evidence of fossils

[Sparks]

18 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

No, the DNA was not identical. As I told you previously, there were mutations within the regulatory regions. So you don't know, yet somehow think you do. Sad.

Ok, then nearly identical. 

Micro evolution happens at every birth.  It's the reason siblings have different features, though they are based on the same set of DNA code from the same parents.  It happens all day, every day at every birth of every living thing.  But no amount of micro changes will produce a giraffe from two human parents, which would be macoevolution, because the parents have no code to do it.  They have no way to introduce the code to do it.

If you think you have seen macro (a new kind coming from a different kind, cows making cats), I would love to see the evidence.

Now we can make GMOs, in which we splice genes with a virus containing a new payload, but it does not happen in nature, as there is no pathway to provide new information, naturally.

Twins:

 

[Sparks]

1 hour ago, one.opinion said:

No, the DNA was not identical. As I told you previously, there were mutations within the regulatory regions. So you don't know, yet somehow think you do. Sad.

This was from a white paper abtract:

Lenski, R. E. & Travisano, M. Dynamics of adaptation and diversification: A 10,000-generation experiment with bacterial populations. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 91, 6808-6814

In fact, we observed several hallmarks of macroevolutionary dynamics, including periods of rapid evolution and stasis, altered functional relationships between traits, and concordance of anagenetic and cladogenetic trends. Our results support a Wrightian interpretation, in which chance events (mutation and drift) play an important role in adaptive evolution, as do the complex genetic interactions that underlie the structure of organisms.

You would think that with 73,000+ generations, his experiment has proven there is NO macroevolution to be found.  It's still e. coli.  As for us humans, we supposedly became human in just 15,000 generations from primordial soup. 

Wouldn't you expect a moth to crawl out of the dish, at least, after 73,000?

[Sparks]

1 hour ago, The Barbarian said:

You've been badly misled.    Perhaps you don't know how "information" is calculated.  How do you think the math works for this?

Population geneticists do this regularly.   But show us your math, proving that new information can never appear in living things.  

I did.  It's Mendel's Law of Genetics.  In case you are not aware, Mendel discovered the fundamental laws of inheritance.  Basically, you cannot inherit anything that your parents don't have to offer you, like wings.

Now, if through a genetic defect you were born without feet, it is true you have the benefit of not getting athletes foot.  Much like the malaria example earlier.  

A disease that will kill you prevents you from getting malaria.  Hmm.  Benefit?

[one.opinion]

1 hour ago, Sparks said:

If you think you have seen macro (a new kind coming from a different kind, cows making cats), I would love to see the evidence.

This is a ridiculous argument. You are saying that we can't believe evidence for evolution because cows don't give birth to cats? No one ever claimed that they should! Large scale evolutionary changes are made through small but increasing increments over long periods of time. There is fossil evidence, for example, of transitional species between mammalian tetrapods and cetaceans. Nostrils slowly moved higher and higher from the front of the face to the top of the head over long periods of time. Limbs were altered (front) or lost (hind) from those suitable to land locomotion to those suitable to water locomotion over long periods of time. The fossil record supports other changes over long periods of time.

https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evograms_03

 

[Sparks]

6 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

This is a ridiculous argument. You are saying that we can't believe evidence for evolution because cows don't give birth to cats?

Because no kind ever gives birth to another kind.  Cats always produce cats, and dogs produce dogs, and that's all that is observed (kinds produce kinds, not other kinds).

6 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

There is fossil evidence, for example, of transitional species between mammalian tetrapods and cetaceans.

I told you why fossils are made irrelevant to the evolution discussion.

6 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

Nostrils slowly moved higher and higher from the front of the face to the top of the head over long periods of time.

  This is micro.

6 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

Limbs were altered (front) or lost (hind) from those suitable to land locomotion to those suitable to water locomotion over long periods of time. 

Scientists finally figured out that whales never had back feet (those were for reproduction, and they finally realized it).

6 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

The fossil record supports other changes over long periods of time.

There is no fossil record.  There are piles of fossils, though.  I think we should call it fossil disarray!

[one.opinion]

30 minutes ago, Sparks said:

we observed several hallmarks of macroevolutionary dynamics

I'll split this one with you. Lenski did not call the development of aerobic citrate utilization a macroevolution event, but he did mention macroevolutionary dynamics.

22 minutes ago, Sparks said:

Basically, you cannot inherit anything that your parents don't have to offer you, like wings.

This is untrue. You can inherit traits that your parents don't have. While it is true that complicated anatomical features like wings will not suddenly appear overnight, progeny often have new traits that are absent from their parents due to mutations in germ line cells.

18 minutes ago, Sparks said:

A disease that will kill you prevents you from getting malaria.

You keep misunderstanding what I write. I can't tell if this is accidental or not... The HbS mutation resulted in increased survivorship in heterozygotes for populations in the tropics where the mutation arose.

[Sparks]

13 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

I'll split this one with you. Lenski did not call the development of aerobic citrate utilization a macroevolution event, but he did mention macroevolutionary dynamics.

OK. 

13 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

This is untrue. You can inherit traits that your parents don't have. While it is true that complicated anatomical features like wings will not suddenly appear overnight, progeny often have new traits that are absent from their parents due to mutations in germ line cells.

I really don't think traits are what Mendel meant.  He was dealing with pea pods when he made his discovery. 

Wings will never appear on humans because no matter how much time you give it, the code cannot appear.  Mendel's Law of Genetics prevents it. 

13 minutes ago, one.opinion said:

You keep misunderstanding what I write. I can't tell if this is accidental or not... The HbS mutation resulted in increased survivorship in heterozygotes for populations in the tropics where the mutation arose.

This is still micro and was from defective cells, from sickle cell disease.  This is not macro, nor a benefit without consequences.

[one.opinion]

4 minutes ago, Sparks said:

Because no kind ever gives birth to another kind.  Cats always produce cats, and dogs produce dogs, and that's all that is observed (kinds produce kinds, not other kinds).

I repeat yet again that no scientist makes these claims. Refuting claims that no one makes is pointless.

6 minutes ago, Sparks said:

I told you why fossils are made irrelevant to the evolution discussion.

No, you made easily-refuted arguments that reflect virtually no understanding of the available data.

7 minutes ago, Sparks said:

This is micro.

Ok, so accumulate enough of these genetic changes to turn a land-dwelling tetrapod mammal into a water-dwelling mammal with pectoral fins. You can call it micro or macro, but it describes the evolution of the cetaceans, one tiny bit at a time.

 

10 minutes ago, Sparks said:

Scientists finally figured out that whales never had back feet (those were for reproduction, and they finally realized it).

You are misunderstanding the argument (shocking). The limbs in the cetacean lineage altered over time to something very different from the four tetrapod limbs.

16 minutes ago, Sparks said:

There is no fossil record.  There are piles of fossils, though.  I think we should call it fossil disarray!

The fossil record is evident to anyone objective enough to consider it. Just because you are committed to NOT believing it doesn't make it false.

[one.opinion]

5 minutes ago, Sparks said:

Wings will never appear on humans because no matter how much time you give it, the code cannot appear.  Mendel's Law of Genetics prevents it. 

You have again demolished a claim that no one ever made. Congratulations.

6 minutes ago, Sparks said:

This is still micro and was a defective cells, from sickle cell disease.  This is not macro, nor a benefit without consequences.

Agreed, but I brought this up in your attempt to claim that no mutations could generate new information. This example (and the other I provided) directly refuted your cocksure claim.

[The Barbarian]

30 minutes ago, Sparks said:

I did.  It's Mendel's Law of Genetics.  In case you are not aware, Mendel discovered the fundamental laws of inheritance.

Minored in genetics as an undergraduate.  

30 minutes ago, Sparks said:

Basically, you cannot inherit anything that your parents don't have to offer you, like wings.

That's where new mutations come from.   Thought you knew.  You and I have dozens of mutations that neither of our parents had.  They were in the sperm and egg cells that united to form us.

I gather, since you declined to say, that  you don't know how information is calculated.    I'll give you a very simple example.

Suppose a population of organisms has two alleles (versions of a particular gene) for one gene locus.   Suppose that each allele is in half of the population.  That means that each allele has a frequency of 0.5.    The information is found by multiplying the  log of the frequency of each allele by the frequency of each allele, summing all the differences, and multiplying it by -1.

So the information for that gene in the population is about 0.30.    

Now, suppose a new mutation appears and eventually there are three alleles in the population, each with a frequency of about 0.333.    Now the information for that gene is about 0.48, an increase.  In this way, Claude Shannon showed that any new mutation in a population will increase information.

44 minutes ago, Sparks said:

A disease that will kill you prevents you from getting malaria.  Hmm.  Benefit?

You were misled about that, too.    Here's why:

Suppose you and your spouse live in a malaria area.    And suppose you both have one copy of the HgS allele (sickle cell).    Now suppose you have kids.    The odds are:

1 in four will have both HgS genes and likely die before having children.

1 in four will have both Hg normal genes and likely die of malaria before having children.

2 in four will have one HgS and one normal gene and be resistant to malaria and not die from sickle cell anemia.    So you have an advantage in passing on your genes over someone with two normal genes.     It's an awful cost, but it has an advantage.

But it's still imperfect.  Which is  why a new mutation is spreading in malaria areas.  The new one, HgC, does not kill those with two HgC alleles, but provides good protection from malaria.   The new mutation provides a better advantage than the old one.