Did Radiation Affect Evolution?

[Peez]

There is evolution. Change that takes place without any mind or planning involved. There are no goals.

There is also human caused change. Change that takes place due to planning and foresight and greed and pride and desire.

The changes that occur under both systems are not equivalent.

Change due to foresight and planning is not evolution.

Evolution is change to organisms and the environment without the interference of an external intelligence.

The human mind is more powerful than the random slow process of evolution.

In biology, evolution is an inheritable change from one generation to the next in characteristics of individuals in a population (regardless of the cause of that change). The main mechanisms responsible for evolution are genetic mutation and recombination, genetic drift, and selection. Of course selection has been entirely "natural selection" (including sexual selection) up until recently, but now there is also artificial (human-directed) selection as well.

Genetic mutation and recombination is "random" with respect to fitness, as is genetic drift, but selection is (by definition) not random. Thus evolution is the result of random and non-random forces. However, it certainly has not been (up until the recent intervention of humans ) the result of intelligence or planning.

Peez

 

[untermensche]

Human selection in mating is a direct result of the changes humans have made with their minds.

Humans, some, can be far more selective than they were in the past.

The human mind does not end evolutionary change.

But it is a unique force in the history of life that distorts evolutionary change.

The Bull Terrier exists only because of the human mind. Without the human mind they would not exist.

Evolution is change without a mind directing it. Change for the sake of change with no goals.

It is not the changes humans make with their minds using foresight and planning.

 

[DrZoidberg]

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1403.7303.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma_ray
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1203310/

Gamma radiation is mutagenic. Did it spark the Cambrian explosion in diversity?

But more importantly... hard to prove. But, sure. Why not?

 

[phands]

But more importantly... hard to prove. But, sure. Why not?

As I pointed out in #4 the prevailing opinion is not radiation, but free oxygen and rising seawater calcium levels.

 

[Peez]

Human selection in mating is a direct result of the changes humans have made with their minds.

Humans, some, can be far more selective than they were in the past.

The human mind does not end evolutionary change.

But it is a unique force in the history of life that distorts evolutionary change.

The Bull Terrier exists only because of the human mind. Without the human mind they would not exist.

Evolution is change without a mind directing it. Change for the sake of change with no goals.

It is not the changes humans make with their minds using foresight and planning.

That is a curious definition of evolution, in any event it is not one that biologists use. There is certainly an argument to be made that the human mind is a unique force in the history of this planet, but it has no special significance to biological evolution as we define it. The Bull Terrier is the result of evolution, human-directed evolution.

Peez

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But more importantly... hard to prove. But, sure. Why not?

As I pointed out in #4 the prevailing opinion is not radiation, but free oxygen and rising seawater calcium levels.

...which opened up new niches for multicellular chemoheterotrophs.

Peez

 

[untermensche]

That is a curious definition of evolution...

No it isn't.

Evolution does not have a mind. It does not have foresight. It cannot plan. It cannot adjust plans. It has no goals.

It is nothing like the changes humans make with their minds.

 

[DrZoidberg]

That is a curious definition of evolution...

No it isn't.

Evolution does not have a mind. It does not have foresight. It cannot plan. It cannot adjust plans. It has no goals.

It is nothing like the changes humans make with their minds.

Special pleading. You are a part of nature. So is your mind.

 

[Peez]

That is a curious definition of evolution...

No it isn't.

I don't suppose that you could provide any references for your definition?

Evolution does not have a mind.

Of course it doesn't, I have not suggested otherwise.

It does not have foresight.

Of course it doesn't, I have not suggested otherwise.

t cannot plan.

Of course it cannot, I have not suggested otherwise.

It cannot adjust plans.

Of course it cannot, I have not suggested otherwise.

It has no goals.

Of course it doersn't, I have not suggested otherwise.

None of that distinguishes between the definition of evolution that you have proposed and the one biologists use.

It is nothing like the changes humans make with their minds.

Of course, evolution does not have a mind. Evolution (as biologists understand it) is a process that can result from a number of different things, including a human mind. You can define evolution in some idiosyncratic way if you wish, but that is just semantic games.

Peez

 

[untermensche]

That is a curious definition of evolution...

No it isn't.

Evolution does not have a mind. It does not have foresight. It cannot plan. It cannot adjust plans. It has no goals.

It is nothing like the changes humans make with their minds.

Special pleading. You are a part of nature. So is your mind.

That does not make the changes made with a mind the same changes made without a mind.

There is no pleading.

Evolution is change with no mind. With no plan. With no goal.

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It is nothing like the changes humans make with their minds.

Of course, evolution does not have a mind. Evolution (as biologists understand it) is a process that can result from a number of different things, including a human mind. You can define evolution in some idiosyncratic way if you wish, but that is just semantic games.

Peez

It is not my definition.

It is a fact.

Evolution is change that occurs but not change because of a mind.

This is not disputed even by you.

 

[phands]

Scientists have recently sped up evolution by tinkering with enzymes and changing them to be more effective, or to resist environmental factors that limit or destroy them normally. This is Directed Evolution - it still has some randomness in the mutations, but the survivors which exhibit the desired behaviours are chosen by scientists, and cultured. It's really just what we've been doing to animals and plants for millennia, but done at very much more focused level - individual molecules.

I wrote about it in this thread.

 

[Worldtraveller]

This thread is a glorious demonstration of Dunning-Kruger.

 

[Peez]

untermensche:
It is not my definition.

And yet you have not provided a reference for this definition. Here are a few definitions that you might consider:

evolution Descent with modification; the idea that living species are descendants of ancestral species that were different from the present-day ones; also defined more narrowly as the change in the genetic composition of a population from generation to generation.

- glossary of Campbell Biology, Second Canadian Edition (Reece et al)

evolution (1) The theory that all organisms on Earth are related by common ancestry and that they have changed over time, predominantly via natural selection. (2) Any change in the genetic characteristics of a population over time, especially a change in allele frequencies.

- glossary of Biological Science, Second Canadian Edition (Freeman et al)

evolution In a broad sense, the origin of entities possessing different states of one or more characteristics, and changes in their proportions over time. Organic evolution, or biological evolution, is a change over time of the proportions of individual organisms differing genetically in one or more traits. Such changes transpire by the origin and subsequent alteration of the frequencies of genotypes from generation to generation within populations, by the alteration of proportions of genetically differentiated populations of a species, or by changes in the numbers of species with different characteristics, thereby altering the frequency of one or more traits within a higher taxon.

- glossary of Evolutionary Biology, Third Edition (Futuyma)

evolution Darwin defined it as "descent with modification." It is the change in a lineage of populations between generations.

- glossary of Evolution (Ridley)

evolution Originally defined as descent with modification, or change in the characteristics of populations over time. Currently defined as changes in allele frequency over time.

- glossary of Evolutionary Analysis, Second Edition (Freeman and Herron)

Peez

 

[untermensche]

That is deflection and changing the subject.

Is the change we see in evolution directed by a mind or not?

If it is not directed by a mind then by default it is change that occurs without a mind.

This is not difficult.

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This thread is a glorious demonstration of Dunning-Kruger.

Not likely. True Dunning-Kruger is extraordinarily rare.

It is not likely you have ever seen it.

 

[skepticalbip]

This thread is a glorious demonstration of Dunning-Kruger.

Indeed... either that or an example of dedicated trolling.

 

[bilby]

 

[Peez]

That is deflection and changing the subject.

No, it's not.

Is the change we see in evolution directed by a mind or not?

Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't.

If it is not directed by a mind then by default it is change that occurs without a mind.

OK

This is not difficult.

Agreed.

Peez

 

[untermensche]

This thread is a glorious demonstration of Dunning-Kruger.

Indeed... either that or an example of dedicated trolling.

This is what people that have no ideas yet an unearned sense of superiority talk about while others discuss ideas.

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Is the change we see in evolution directed by a mind or not?

Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't.

That is not a scientific opinion.

Show me the source that talks about some mind needed for any evolutionary change.

Calling the change caused by a mind evolutionary change is not a scientific opinion.

Evolution has no mind anywhere in the theory.

 

[Peez]

This is what people that have no ideas yet an unearned sense of superiority talk about while others discuss ideas.

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Is the change we see in evolution directed by a mind or not?

Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't.

That is not a scientific opinion.

Show me the source that talks about some mind needed for any evolutionary change.

Calling the change caused by a mind evolutionary change is not a scientific opinion.

Evolution has no mind anywhere in the theory.

I am starting to think 'dedicated trolling'.

Peez

 

[bilby]

This is what people that have no ideas yet an unearned sense of superiority talk about while others discuss ideas.

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That is not a scientific opinion.

Show me the source that talks about some mind needed for any evolutionary change.

Calling the change caused by a mind evolutionary change is not a scientific opinion.

Evolution has no mind anywhere in the theory.

I am starting to think 'dedicated trolling'.

Peez

With a side order of hobbyhorse.

 

[untermensche]

This is what people that have no ideas yet an unearned sense of superiority talk about while others discuss ideas.

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That is not a scientific opinion.

Show me the source that talks about some mind needed for any evolutionary change.

Calling the change caused by a mind evolutionary change is not a scientific opinion.

Evolution has no mind anywhere in the theory.

I am starting to think 'dedicated trolling'.

Peez

I am thinking you are full of shit!

Evolution has nothing to do with change using a mind.

Evolution does not plan. It does not plot. It does not have goals.

If you think there is a mind in evolutionary change you are deluded.

This was the genius of Darwin's work. He discovered a way in which productive change occurs with no foresight planning or goals.

Without a god driving the whole thing towards humanity.