Don't see anywhere in that statement where it says the entire theory of Evolution is established as a fact, portions of it maybe, that's not what I am arguing.
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Evolution is not observable admits Jerry Coyne
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Don't see anywhere in that statement where it says the entire theory of Evolution is established as a fact, portions of it maybe, that's not what I am arguing.
outhouse
Atheistically
You don't read at all do you?
http://www.interacademies.net/10878/13901.aspx
We agree that the following evidence-based facts about the origins and evolution of the Earth and of life on this planet have been established by numerous observations and independently derived experimental results from a multitude of scientific disciplines. Even if there are still many open questions about the precise details of evolutionary change, scientific evidence has never contradicted these results:
- In a universe that has evolved towards its present configuration for some 11 to 15 billion years, our Earth formed approximately 4.5 billion years ago.
- Since its formation, the Earth – its geology and its environments – has changed under the effect of numerous physical and chemical forces and continues to do so.
- Life appeared on Earth at least 2.5 billion years ago. The evolution, soon after, of photosynthetic organisms enabled, from at least 2 billion years ago, the slow transformation of the atmosphere to one containing substantial quantities of oxygen. In addition to the release of the oxygen that we breathe, the process of photosynthesis is the ultimate source of fixed energy and food upon which human life on the planet depends.
- Since its first appearance on Earth, life has taken many forms, all of which continue to evolve, in ways which palaeontology and the modern biological and biochemical sciences are describing and independently confirming with increasing precision. Commonalities in the structure of the genetic code of all organisms living today, including humans, clearly indicate their common primordial origin.
outhouse
Atheistically
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Sapiens
Polymathematician
If all you require are examples of directly observed speciation, and I have no clue why you'd find that of any more interest than that we can direly infer these days from genetics, here you go:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/science-sushi/evolution-watching-speciation-occur-observations/
But as I stated earlier, this is a game of moving goalposts, since we have clearly demonstrated observed speciation, you now ask for not the species level, not the genus level, not the family level, but the order level, and when you get that you will move the goal posts to every higher taxonomic levels (while refusing to define either "type" or "kind."). What utter rubbish!
I assume you have never read Coyne, but that you have merely read a criticism of Coyne by someone whom you trusted to tell you the truth about the book, Why Evolution is True. Would you mind telling us who you trusted? I'm genuinely curious who is putting out the "information" you seem to be parroting.
Perhaps you are the one, Loo, or as you call in america, outhouse, that has trouble reading what I say, I mentioned the entire theory of evolution as not being established fact, not smaller parts of it, as mentioned in your quote. Obviously some kinds of evolution occurs, otherwise the word would exist to describe nothing. But when we talk about the theory of evolution, we are talking about the whole process, not just if life evolved, but how and why life evolved, much of this is theory and not fact, and I stand by my statements which you obviously haven't taken the time to carefully read.
Aye, but the extent of speciation which creationists want is larger than what we observe.
They want a dog to give birth to a cat, more or less.
The "theory" & "fact" of evolution refer to different things.
The former is the biological mechanism (mutation, selection, reproduction, gene shift).
The latter is observable change in the fossil record.
It can also refer to the fact that evolution is also a useful tool for engineers, eg, evolutionary algorithms.
This is biomimicry, which inspires many factual things, eg, better wings, adhesives, robots.
That's basically the point I was making, there are facts, and there are theories trying to explain those facts, The whole process, facts and theories, is called Evolution.
So far as I understand it, cases of speciation have been observed over time in populations of bacteria and perhaps other life forms. Those cases are facts of evolution.
The Theory of Evolution, on the other hand, is a group of hypotheses that seek to explain the diversity of life on earth.
The Theory of Evolution, on the other hand, is a group of hypotheses that seek to explain the diversity of life on earth.
Shad
Veteran Member
Koonin supports evolution, read his work rather than quoting mining it. He actually makes a point that people like yourself, IDers, will take his work out of context just as you have done. You confuse Neo-Darwinism with evolution.
"Here I do not really understand the concern. I changed "ready-made" to "abruptly", to avoid any ID allusions and added clarifications but, beyond that, there is little I can do because this is an important sentence that accurately and clearly portrays a crucial and, to the very best of my understanding, real feature of evolutionary transitions. Will this be used by the ID camp? Perhaps – if they read that far into the paper. However, I am afraid that, if our goal as evolutionary biologists is to avoid providing any grist for the ID mill, we should simply claim that Darwin, "in principle", solved all the problems of the origin of biological complexity in his eye story, and only minor details remain to be filled in. Actually, I think the position of some ultra-darwinists is pretty close to that. However, I believe that this is totally counter-productive and such a notion is outright false. And, the ID folks are clever in their own perverse way, they see through such false simplicity and seize on it. I think we (students of evolution) should openly admit that emergence of new levels of complexity is a complex problem and should try to work out solutions some of which could be distinctly non-orthodox; ID, however, does not happen to be a viable solution to any problem. I think this is my approach here and elsewhere."
http://www.biologydirect.com//content/2/1/21
leibowde84
Veteran Member
That's a very well-explained, valid and reasonable understanding of why expecting evolution to be "observed" in this way is a ridiculous expectation. It can be supported in a plethora of other ways, but since the timeline for change is so huge, it isn't going to be "observed" in this way specifically.
leibowde84
Veteran Member
Even without being "observable" in this way, there is not one alternative supported by verifiable evidence (like the ToE) that exists. So, it is certainly the best explanation for the development of life that we currently have.
leibowde84
Veteran Member
This is a claim about "the Modern Synthesis", not Darwinism in general. You are confused, my friend.
Ouroboros
Coincidentia oppositorum
Also, considering that the modern synthesis was basically (if I remember right) what replaced Darwinism 40 years ago (or maybe even longer ago).
leibowde84
Veteran Member
Was it a science professor? If not, its no wonder why they didn't understand it.
Wu Wei
ursus senum severiorum and ex-Bisy Backson
No, as I said in the post, he was a philosophy professor. And I am not making an argument for or against, just interjecting a little levity into a rather bifurcated discussion
.