The Evidence for Random Mutations

[Thermos aquaticus]

The evidence, part of it, is found in the Cambrian Explosion which reveals fully functional organisms appearing abruptly throughout the epoch in the well defined record, with no precursors evident.

How did you determine that there are no precursors in the fossil record, or that the precursors have individuals that fossilized?

It was a creative event...the supposed precursors aren't found, because they don't exist!

Please provide evidence that they don't exist.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I guess I'm just not as gullible.

The evidence, part of it, is found in the Cambrian Explosion which reveals fully functional organisms appearing abruptly throughout the epoch in the well defined record, with no precursors evident.

It was a creative event...the supposed precursors aren't found, because they don't exist!

Actually, I would be more accurate if I reduced the 600-mya timeframe to 550 mya.

The amazingly ignorant "fully formed" argument. And of course it is wrong. Precursors have been found in the Ediacaran. For some reason creationists seem to think that the discovery of new fossils ended with Darwin.

It is also amazing how "suddenly" is millions of years according to creationists. Life of course did not leave traditional fossils until they evolved a method of using CaCO3. The very earliest of "shellfish" were very small with simple shells:

Small shelly fauna - Wikipedia

It is amazing that creationists expect massive fossil evidence for life that very very rarely leaves fossils.

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

The amazingly ignorant "fully formed" argument. And of course it is wrong. Precursors have been found in the Ediacaran. For some reason creationists seem to think that the discovery of new fossils ended with Darwin.

"Fully formed" is also a throw away term. It doesn't matter what a species or fossil looks like, it will be called "fully formed".

It is also amazing how "suddenly" is millions of years according to creationists. Life of course did not leave traditional fossils until they evolved a method of using CaCO3. The very earliest of "shellfish" were very small with simple shells:

Small shelly fauna - Wikipedia

It is amazing that creationists expect massive fossil evidence for life that very very rarely leaves fossils.

Sometimes I wonder if creationists think fossils are supposed to slowly appear like a Polaroid or something. How else are fossils supposed to appear but suddenly? When you dig into the ground the fossils do suddenly appear as soon as you remove the dirt. It's the only way they can appear.

 

[Astrophile]

I have never seen random.in nature. Unpredictable by any math model absolutely unpredictable.by science absolutely everything in nature is that way, but random never seen it.

The decay of radioactive nuclei is random, in the sense that there is no way of predicting which will be the next nucleus to decay. However, one can predict what percentage of the nuclei in a sample of a radioactive element will decay in a given time.

 

[David T]

The decay of radioactive nuclei is random, in the sense that there is no way of predicting which will be the next nucleus to decay. However, one can predict what percentage of the nuclei in a sample of a radioactive element will decay in a given time.

That's what I have been saying unpredictable not random. Random is not sound science it sounds like science.

I have to ask between which two randoms must I choose. Religious Noahs ark when literally read, or just plain random without Noahs ark? Noahs ark is random as proposed by creationists.

 

[exchemist]

I've covered it so many times it's like the pea under the proverbial mattresses, but it never seems to sink in for a lot of people.

I guess I'm just not as gullible.

The evidence, part of it, is found in the Cambrian Explosion which reveals fully functional organisms appearing abruptly throughout the epoch in the well defined record, with no precursors evident.

It was a creative event...the supposed precursors aren't found, because they don't exist!

Actually, I would be more accurate if I reduced the 600-mya timeframe to 550 mya.

Do you consider organisms appearing over a period of 25 million years to be "abruptly"?

As I told you before, the so-called "Cambrian Explosion" should be - and often is - called the "Cambrian Radiation", as it was far from abrupt.

And don't forget that one of the principal reasons why we see so many fossil lifeforms from the Cambrian onward is simply because that was the epoch at which organisms had evolved the means to protect themselves from predators by secreting hard shells, which fossilise well. There is an appearance of "small shelly fossils" starting about 10m years before the start of the Cambrian proper.

This is likely to have been a response to the evolution of the mouth and means of locomotion rapid enough to catch and eat other organisms. Before this epoch, animals were soft-bodied and consequently only rarely left good fossil imprints. However studies of the Ediacaran epoch, in the late pre-Cambrian are leading to more knowledge about these soft organisms. It remains possible that many of the precursors to the phyla that appeared in the Cambrian actually evolved in the Ediacaran.

I know creationists love to seize on the term "Cambrian Explosion", as they can hype and misrepresent this to the uninformed as instantaneous appearance of species. But that is balls.

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

That's what I have been saying unpredictable not random.

Those are the same thing.

 

[David T]

Those are the same thing.

Therefore it only is related to the observer not to the observed. It's lack of predictability places it outside science religious human definition literally or we can start up with creationism another random or as the creationists love, God is unpredictable and performs magic. I mean isn't Noah ark a humanized random unpredictable?

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

Therefore it only is related to the observer not to the observed. It's lack of predictability places it outside science religious human definition literally or we can start up with creationism another random or as the creationists love, God is unpredictable and performs magic.

If you want to claim that God is random, then that is up to you. For the purposes of this thread we are talking about mutations.

 

[David T]

If you want to claim that God is random, then that is up to you. For the purposes of this thread we are talking about mutations.

Dude clearly you don't get out much and have projected onto me religious nut job.. I probably have camped out at least 500 days in the wilderness. Unpredictable is fundamental and is not causality. There is zero causal relationship between unpredictability over here and the object over there. Therefore unpredictable is not a something it's self evident. Nature determines narelative not science.or religion.

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

Dude clearly you don't get out much and have projected onto me religious nut job.. I probably have camped out at least 500 days in the wilderness. Unpredictable is fundamental and is not causality. There is zero causal relationship between unpredictability over here and the object over there. Therefore unpredictable is not a something it's self evident. Nature determines narelative not science.or religion.

Is there any chance you will address the evidence found in the opening post?

 

[David T]

Is there any chance you will address the evidence found in the opening post?

That nature is totally Unpredictable? I have never.disputed that point it's self evident. Not designed not created not predictable not a machine. But then again generally all environmental scientist types know this. Lab rats Ha not so much.

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

That nature is totally Unpredictable?

No, that is not what the thread is about.

Please read the opening post and respond if you wish.

 

[Astrophile]

That's what I have been saying unpredictable not random. Random is not sound science it sounds like science.

Perhaps you ought to re-read the opening post and try to understand what the phrase 'random mutations' actually means.

I have to ask between which two randoms must I choose. Religious Noahs ark when literally read, or just plain random without Noahs ark? Noahs ark is random as proposed by creationists.

I can't understand this. What has Noah's ark got to do with randomness?

 

[David T]

Perhaps you ought to re-read the opening post and try to understand what the phrase 'random mutations' actually means.



I can't understand this. What has Noah's ark got to do with randomness?

Random does not exist except in the observers head. Unpredictable that's all. Random has zero meaning.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

Do you consider organisms appearing over a period of 25 million years to be "abruptly"?

But they do “appear abruptly”...it wasn’t one species, it was thousands, each one appearing suddenly during that 25 m-y period:

“The Cambrian Explosion relates to an abrupt appearance of a wide range of organisms, mainly invertebrates, with hard (fossilizable) parts in Cambrian strata which mainstream scientists date from about 540 million years ago. “

Excerpt from The Cambrian Explosion

 

[exchemist]

But they do “appear abruptly”...it wasn’t one species, it was thousands, each one appearing suddenly during that 25 m-y period:

“The Cambrian Explosion relates to an abrupt appearance of a wide range of organisms, mainly invertebrates, with hard (fossilizable) parts in Cambrian strata which mainstream scientists date from about 540 million years ago. “

Excerpt from The Cambrian Explosion

Do you really think quoting from a creationist propaganda site is a credible response? I quote from the "About Us" section of the website:-

QUOTE
Many people refer to us as “Christians,” but we consider ourselves followers of Jesus. Like Jesus, we reject many of the issues found in “organized religion” (man-made attempts to reach God through rules and rituals). Actually, we believe religion has kept more people from the truth than anything in history. Although we reject man-made religion, we consider the personal pursuit of God as paramount in each of our personal life journeys.

This information is offered by AllAboutGOD.com, which is structured as a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. If you would like to support our efforts, you can make a tax-deductible contribution here. Thanks!


Contact us here.

AllAboutGOD.com
PO Box 507
Peyton, Colorado 80831

AllAboutGOD.com


WHAT DO YOU THINK?

- We have all sinned and deserve God's judgment. God, the Father, sent His only Son to satisfy that judgment for those who believe in Him. Jesus, the creator and eternal Son of God, who lived a sinless life, loves us so much that He died for our sins, taking the punishment that we deserve, was buried, and rose from the dead according to the Bible. If you truly believe and trust this in your heart, receiving Jesus alone as your Savior, declaring, "Jesus is Lord," you will be saved from judgment and spend eternity with God in heaven.

What is your response?

Yes, today I am deciding to follow Jesus

Yes, I am already a follower of Jesus"

UNQUOTE

etc etc.

This is NOT a reputable science source. In fact it is packed full of lies and misrepresentations of science.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

Do you really think quoting from a creationist propaganda site is a credible response? I quote from the "About Us" section of the website:-

QUOTE
Many people refer to us as “Christians,” but we consider ourselves followers of Jesus. Like Jesus, we reject many of the issues found in “organized religion” (man-made attempts to reach God through rules and rituals). Actually, we believe religion has kept more people from the truth than anything in history. Although we reject man-made religion, we consider the personal pursuit of God as paramount in each of our personal life journeys....


UNQUOTE

etc etc.

This is NOT a reputable science source. In fact it is packed full of lies and misrepresentations of science.

Well, I didn’t know that. I should have thought something when they said “mainstream scientists”.

Here’s some info from **real** scientists:

"The beginning of the Cambrian period, some 545 million years ago, saw the sudden appearance in the fossil record of almost all the main types of animals (phyla) that still dominate the biota today. To be sure, there are fossils in older strata, but they are either very small (such as bacteria and algae), or their relationships to the living fauna are highly contentious, as is the case with the famous soft-bodied fossils from the late Precambrian Pound Quartzite, Ediacara, South Australia."


-- Alan Cooper and Richard Fortey, “Evolutionary explosions and the phylogenetic fuse,” Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 13 April, 1998: 151-156




“Most of the hypotheses have at least a kernel of truth, but each is insufficient to have been the single cause of the Cambrian explosion....This is a period of time that has attracted a lot of attention because it is when animals appear very abruptly in the fossil record, and in great diversity. Out of this event came nearly all of the major groups of animals that we recognise today.....Because it is such a major biological event, it has attracted much opinion and speculation about its cause.”

— Oxford University’s Museum of Natural History paleontologist Paul Smith


You know, truth is truth, no matter who says it.
I’m just glad that these guys were honest about describing the evidence!

 

[ImmortalFlame]

Well, I didn’t know that. I should have thought something when they said “mainstream scientists”.

Here’s some info from **real** scientists:

"The beginning of the Cambrian period, some 545 million years ago, saw the sudden appearance in the fossil record of almost all the main types of animals (phyla) that still dominate the biota today. To be sure, there are fossils in older strata, but they are either very small (such as bacteria and algae), or their relationships to the living fauna are highly contentious, as is the case with the famous soft-bodied fossils from the late Precambrian Pound Quartzite, Ediacara, South Australia."


-- Alan Cooper and Richard Fortey, “Evolutionary explosions and the phylogenetic fuse,” Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 13 April, 1998: 151-156




“Most of the hypotheses have at least a kernel of truth, but each is insufficient to have been the single cause of the Cambrian explosion....This is a period of time that has attracted a lot of attention because it is when animals appear very abruptly in the fossil record, and in great diversity. Out of this event came nearly all of the major groups of animals that we recognise today.....Because it is such a major biological event, it has attracted much opinion and speculation about its cause.”

— Oxford University’s Museum of Natural History paleontologist Paul Smith


You know, truth is truth, no matter who says it.
I’m just glad that these guys were honest about describing the evidence!

You do realize that something being "sudden" or "abrupt" is purely relative to the time-frame being talked about, right? In this context, "sudden" refers to "dozens of millions of years" compared to "hundreds of millions of years".

Does 20+ million years sound "sudden" to you?

 

[exchemist]

Well, I didn’t know that. I should have thought something when they said “mainstream scientists”.

[snip - for later]

Before addressing the main part of your response it is worth spending a moment to consider the deceitfulness of the website you first quoted from. It calls itself AllAboutScience.org and on the main page there is nothing to suggest it is not a bona fide educational science site. A school student or general reader might think that is what it is, as you yourself did, or so you say.

However a scientifically literate reader will instantly realise what it is (which is what prompted me to go hunting in the "About us" section). I will quote in full the first paragraph on the Cambrian, from which you quoted only the first part:

" The Cambrian Explosion relates to an abrupt appearance of a wide range of organisms, mainly invertebrates, with hard (fossilizable) parts in Cambrian strata which mainstream scientists date from about 540 million years ago. They were complex, well-developed organisms with many types of differentiated cells, and it is widely conceded that evolution of these organisms from unicellular precursors within such a short period of time is highly doubtful. "[My bold]

The part in bold is a simple lie. Nothing of the sort is "widely conceded", as you will know if you have read Fortey or the other scientific authors you now mention.