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Evolution and life in the future

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
Given our sun is set to red giant, that earth will become uninhabitable, and unable to support life, how is evolution a valid theory if it's thought that life will no longer continue?
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
Given our sun is set to red giant, that earth will become uninhabitable, and unable to support life, how is evolution a valid theory if it's thought that life will no longer continue?

Life ends, what has this to do with evolution.

BTW. The chances are that humanity will in all probability not exist by the time the sun goes pop. We will either have killed ourselves by our own stupidity or evolved into something completely different
 

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
Life ends, what has this to do with evolution.

BTW. The chances are that humanity will in all probability not exist by the time the sun goes pop. We will either have killed ourselves by our own stupidity or evolved into something completely different

I'm thinking primordial soup of gasses from which we are said to evolve, from the single cell organism that is the origin of life on earth, or so we've been taught. So, either life continues or it won't. Evolving life forms isn't in question by me, only the idea that "life ends". I don't think it will, based on the theory but then I'm also a Chris6ian so maybe faith has something to do with it.
 

Scolopendra

Member
Given our sun is set to red giant, that earth will become uninhabitable, and unable to support life, how is evolution a valid theory if it's thought that life will no longer continue?
How does this question make logical sense? How is the fact that Earth could be destroyed by the Sun in 5 billion years a relevant factor in the disproval of evolution and step by step natural selection?
 

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
How does this question make logical sense? How is the fact that Earth could be destroyed by the Sun in 5 billion years a relevant factor in the disproval of evolution and step by step natural selection?

It's not to disprove, but to strengthen the theory. I'm an evolutionist.
 

John53

I go leaps and bounds
Premium Member
Given our sun is set to red giant, that earth will become uninhabitable, and unable to support life, how is evolution a valid theory if it's thought that life will no longer continue?

You're assuming life only exists on earth. I don't know if it exists anywhere else in the universe but I feel there's a strong possibility it does.
 

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
Still doesn't answer my question. Why do you think that fact is in any way relevant?

To what? Evolution? Earth 5 to 7 billion years from now? Relevance of evolution and life on earth in 5 to 7 billion years doesn't seem relevant to you. OK. Are you referring to humans? It's still relevant unless you just choose not to think about it.
 

Scolopendra

Member
You're assuming life only exists on earth. I don't know if it exists anywhere else in the universe but I feel there's a strong possibility it does.
Also step by step natural selection per se can be applied to things that aren't "alive" as well. The two requisites are something that replicates itself and has slight random changes in its fitness with the increase of generations. These changes (i.e. mutation) can either benefit or undermine its ability to replicate and are inherited by the "prole" which will either get more fitness or less fitness and "selected" this way. Ideally this could be done with a robot, Dawkins even goes as far as applying it to abstract replicators like thoughts and ideas (he called them memes instead of genes in the 1970s, which ironically gave birth to the internet memes we know today)
 
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Scolopendra

Member
To what? Evolution? Earth 5 to 7 billion years from now? Relevance of evolution and life on earth in 5 to 7 billion years doesn't seem relevant to you. OK. Are you referring to humans? It's still relevant unless you just choose not to think about it.
You didn't understand my question. I said why would the fact that at some point in time Earth won't be able to support life be relevant in determining the validity of the theory of evolution?
 

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
It's difficult to imagine we evolved in this manner, but ...

shutterstock_259094870.jpg
 

Scolopendra

Member
It's difficult to imagine we evolved in this manner, but ...

shutterstock_259094870.jpg
I'm not sure what we're discussing about here. I'm an atheist and also in the field of biotechnology of course I support evolution, I don't understand why you're posting a zygote having a series of mitosis now.
 

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
You didn't understand my question. I said why would the fact that at some point in time Earth won't be able to support life be relevant in determining the validity of the theory of evolution?

Based on where we came from, where we are, and 5 to 7 billion years in the future, and the earth's environment at that point would lead some to question whether any life will be present at all. I will suggest the earth will be full of life, just different than the life it supports today.
 

Scolopendra

Member
Based on where we came from, where we are, and 5 to 7 billion years in the future, and the earth's environment at that point would lead some to question whether any life will be present at all. I will suggest the earth will be full of life, just different than the life it supports today.
If the current models are correct the Sun will turn Red Giant in about 5 billion years. Earth will be far outside the habitable zone if the scenario is correct. Either a tidally locked superhot molten world or literally absorbed by the sun nucleus depending on the severity of the expansion
 

Balthazzar

Christian Evolutionist
I'm not sure what we're discussing about here. I'm an atheist and also in the field of biotechnology of course I support evolution, I don't understand why you're posting a zygote having a series of mitosis now.

Not sure either at this point... seems odd we come from such a state and transform into what we are. I have no idea why I might find the process relevant even a little bit. Silly to post an image like this in an evolution thread.
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
I'm thinking primordial soup of gasses from which we are said to evolve, from the single cell organism that is the origin of life on earth, or so we've been taught. So, either life continues or it won't. Evolving life forms isn't in question by me, only the idea that "life ends". I don't think it will, based on the theory but then I'm also a Chris6ian so maybe faith has something to do with it.


Who said soup? Certainly not science who study this. More like clean water with the right mix of minerals, chemicals and sunlight that allowed single celled prokaryotes to form. From their the world is their oyster.

Are thinking abiogenesis? Evolution comes after abiogenesis. The single cell had to form before it could evolve.

There is a hypothesis that life is short lived in universal terms and can only exist during a specific stage of entropy. By this reconning all life on earth will be long gone by the time the sun goes red giant.

It is however just a hypothesis that cannot be fully tested... yet.

So lets assume it's wrong and life will still exists in another 5 billion years. Consider how life has evolved from a single cell to the diversity of life we see today in less than 4 billion years. What will evolution bring a few billion years into the future? And what will the ingenuity of such future life bring.
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
You're assuming life only exists on earth. I don't know if it exists anywhere else in the universe but I feel there's a strong possibility it does.

If life doesn't exist elsewhere then it's an awfully big waste of space.
 

Polymath257

Think & Care
Staff member
Premium Member
Given our sun is set to red giant, that earth will become uninhabitable, and unable to support life, how is evolution a valid theory if it's thought that life will no longer continue?

I don't see the relevance. Evolution is a description of how and why species change over time. One thing that happens to many species is extinction.

When the sun expands (in a few billion years), whatever life still exists on Earth will go extinct.

I'm thinking primordial soup of gasses from which we are said to evolve, from the single cell organism that is the origin of life on earth, or so we've been taught. So, either life continues or it won't. Evolving life forms isn't in question by me, only the idea that "life ends". I don't think it will, based on the theory but then I'm also a Chris6ian so maybe faith has something to do with it.

The theory of evolution deals with how species change over time. An outside influence can make it so that it is impossible for life to continue (witness the extinction of the dinosaurs).

Now, it is possible that we or some other species will learn how to travel to other planets or even stars and so life from Earth may spread out to other places. But life on Earth will end.

Perhaps (even probably) there is life other places in the universe already. In that case, that life will have species that change over time. And maybe darwinian evolution isn't the process by which they do this.

I still don't see the relevance of your statement.
 

Polymath257

Think & Care
Staff member
Premium Member
To what? Evolution? Earth 5 to 7 billion years from now? Relevance of evolution and life on earth in 5 to 7 billion years doesn't seem relevant to you. OK. Are you referring to humans? It's still relevant unless you just choose not to think about it.

It is probably closer to 3 billion years.

And no, it doesn't seem relevant to whether the theory of evolution is valid or not.

Multicellular life has existed for less than a billion years on Earth. It has only been 65 million years since the dinosaurs went extinct. You are talking about events 3 billion years in the future at least.

But yes, life on Earth will go extinct. Maybe life *from* Earth will continue. I don't know. But humans will either go extinct or evolve into something else LONG before these events occur.
 
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