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What is adaptation?

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
In the past twenty or thirty years, creationists have started referring to adaptation and that they accept that species adapt. They appear to consider this to be the evolution that they can tolerate. But it is unclear what they mean by adaptation. There is meaning to this word in science, but I am not clear what meaning creationists apply to it.

I find the definition of adaptation by the late John Maynard Smith to be one I like and he also provided definitions of related or similar conditions that are confused with adaptation, but not adaptation.

I would love to read what creationists here think adaptation is. Those interested in science are welcome to respond as well.
 

PoetPhilosopher

Veteran Member
My mom tried to get me to read some Creationist books as a kid. I don't have access to them now, but it was trying to say that stuff like all the different breeds of dogs was adapting, trying to say that they all came from like two dogs on Noah's Ark, and also trying to say that Darwin flunked the test of "true science" and that the science community has been going astray ever since. I believe none of this, of course.
 

We Never Know

No Slack
In the past twenty or thirty years, creationists have started referring to adaptation and that they accept that species adapt. They appear to consider this to be the evolution that they can tolerate. But it is unclear what they mean by adaptation. There is meaning to this word in science, but I am not clear what meaning creationists apply to it.

I find the definition of adaptation by the late John Maynard Smith to be one I like and he also provided definitions of related or similar conditions that are confused with adaptation, but not adaptation.

I would love to read what creationists here think adaptation is. Those interested in science are welcome to respond as well.

That depends on the person looking at the situation.

Take global warming, overtime some species will get through it and some won't.

Some will call it adaptation, some will call it evolution. In my opinion its both. Adaptation can happen in shorter time than evolution and those adaptations may lay the ground work for evolution. Yet others will argue evolution provided those adaptations to those that can adapt.
 

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
My mom tried to get me to read some Creationist books as a kid. I don't have access to them now, but it was trying to say that stuff like all the different breeds of dogs was adapting, trying to say that they all came from like two dogs on Noah's Ark, and also trying to say that Darwin flunked the test of "true science" and that the science community has been going astray ever since. I believe none of this, of course.
Essentially, what I am seeing is that creationists are using adaptation instead of evolution to make it more palatable to them. But they are stretching the meaning to cover many things that are not adaptation.
 

We Never Know

No Slack
That depends on the person looking at the situation.

Take global warming, overtime some species will get through it and some won't.

Some will call it adaptation, some will call it evolution. In my opinion its both. Adaptation can happen in shorter time than evolution and those adaptations may lay the ground work for evolution. Yet others will argue evolution provided those adaptations to those that can adapt.

@Dan From Smithville you posted looking for opinions and I gave my opinion. You don't have to reply but if you are asking for opinions then accept the ones you get. After all this isn't about a god.
 

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
Adaptation has a genetic basis.

John Maynard Smith described adaptation in his book "The Theory of Evolution" as follows. "An organism is genetically adapted to particular conditions if it possesses traits suiting it for life in those conditions and if it develops those traits in all or most environments in which it is able to develop at all."

Acclimating to temperature, callused feet, color changing like a flounder or an octopus, or addition of muscle mass from work would not be adaptations under this definition. A recent claim made regarding lactose intolerance insisted that the Chinese population has begun to tolerate lactose as a result of the recent introduction of a large variety of milk products into their economy. This claim was not describing adaptation and was also factually inaccurate.
 

We Never Know

No Slack
Adaptation has a genetic basis.

John Maynard Smith described adaptation in his book "The Theory of Evolution" as follows. "An organism is genetically adapted to particular conditions if it possesses traits suiting it for life in those conditions and if it develops those traits in all or most environments in which it is able to develop at all."

Acclimating to temperature, callused feet, color changing like a flounder or an octopus, or addition of muscle mass from work would not be adaptations under this definition. A recent claim made regarding lactose intolerance insisted that the Chinese population has begun to tolerate lactose as a result of the recent introduction of a large variety of milk products into their economy. This claim was not describing adaptation and was also factually inaccurate.

If you burned out in the sun for the first three/four weeks of summer but then after that you quit burning and started getting a good tan,, did you adapt or evolve to get that tan?
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
Essentially, what I am seeing is that creationists are using adaptation instead of evolution to make it more palatable to them. But they are stretching the meaning to cover many things that are not adaptation.

Somewhat akin to 'micro-evolution' and how it's used, then?
 

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
Somewhat akin to 'micro-evolution' and how it's used, then?
General acceptance of small changes in genes that lead to optimized or novel phenotypes by creationists is a major breakthrough. It is micro-evolution that they are accepting and more often calling adaptation. However, it is never clear why they think this cannot be extended in time to generate larger differences between related lineages.
 

SigurdReginson

Grēne Mann
Premium Member
It's an odd thing. Micro evolution has to exist in the YEC world view, since domesticated animals and crops show that permanent changes to species can be achieved through selective breeding conditions. That much is obvious. Not only that, but we can see other variations among the same types of animals all over the globe depending on what environmental factors they find themselves in (such as polar vs. grizzly bears). On top of that, if micro evolution didn't happen, Noah's arc would be impossible since there are way more variations of species that existed than could ever fit on the ark without limiting the numbers allowed on. If the amount of animals allowed on the ark were limited, the ones allowed on could evolve into the other species we see today after leaving the ark.

This puts YEC folks in this weird place where evolution has to be real, but evolution can also undermine their position if they acknowledge that it can continue to change organisms if enough time goes by, so they have to limit it in some way. With this, they argue that the "kinds" mentioned in the bible refers to a system where animals are restricted from evolving past a certain point (somehow) just so evolution can exist in a limited capacity while not being so fully encompassing that it undermines YEC.

The problem with this is that their idea of "kinds" and how it works is not biblical. There is absolutely nothing in the bible that says that god allowed animals to evolve, but that he prevented them from evolving too much to prevent animals from evolving out of their classification of "kind." This is a purely modern concept, it seems.

Like I said, it's an odd thing.
 

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
It's an odd thing. Micro evolution has to exist in the YEC world view, since domesticated animals and crops show that permanent changes to species can be achieved through selective breeding conditions. That much is obvious. Not only that, but we can see other variations among the same types of animals all over the globe depending on what environmental factors they find themselves in (such as polar vs. grizzly bears). On top of that, if micro evolution didn't happen, Noah's arc would be impossible since there are way more variations of species that existed than could ever fit on the ark without limiting the numbers allowed on. If the amount of animals allowed on the ark were limited, the ones allowed on could evolve into the other species we see today after leaving the ark.

This puts YEC folks in this weird place where evolution has to be real, but evolution can also undermine their position if they acknowledge that it can continue to change organisms if enough time goes by, so they have to limit it in some way. With this, they argue that the "kinds" mentioned in the bible refers to a system where animals are restricted from evolving past a certain point (somehow) just so evolution can exist in a limited capacity while not being so fully encompassing that it undermines YEC.

The problem with this is that their idea of "kinds" and how it works is not biblical. There is absolutely nothing in the bible that says that god allowed animals to evolve, but that he prevented them from evolving too much to prevent animals from evolving out of their classification of "kind." This is a purely modern concept, it seems.

Like I said, it's an odd thing.
They are in the tough position of trying to reconcile facts and force them to fit a pre-existing narrative without shattering that narrative. It does not seem to be working out very well. Now, as you point out, they are up against a wall to explain how a continual series of smaller changes do not add up to the evolution of higher taxa (their new kinds). There is no evidence for such a barrier.

The limitations that some groups apply in interpreting the Bible has become a real barrier for those groups.

What I find odd is the use of computers and other communication technologies by those same people that are no where to mentioned in the Bible. However, I feel confident that some of them are hard at work to bend scripture in some bizarre, back-breaking interpretation to show that computers are foretold in the Bible. But that is outside the scope of this thread.
 

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
What I have noticed regarding adaptation is that many people include as adaptations conditions that do not have a genetic basis.

For instance, the idea that Chinese populations can digest milk simply by increased use of milk in their diets. That this somehow creates a tolerance to milk in those populations. That would be incorrect. At best, it would indicate that they are developing a tolerance to the discomfort associated with milk consumption by a population that does not have the genetic ability to digest the lactose in milk.

Becoming used to a new climate is not a genetic adaptation though it is referred to in common parlance as adaptation. It is a developmental flexibility well within the capabilities of existing phenotypes that does not arise as the result of new or altered genes.
 

Dan From Smithville

What's up Doc?
Staff member
Premium Member
Funny. From March, 2017.....

What's the difference between "evolution" and "adaptation"? | Religious Forums

Creationists really need new talking points.
Did you know that fossil evidence in pelicans reveals 30 million years of evolutionary stasis in beak morphology. Apparently, stasis in pelicans is pretty common.

Louchart, A., Tourment, N., & Carrier, J. (2011). The earliest known pelican reveals 30 million years of evolutionary stasis in beak morphology. Journal of Ornithology, 152(1), 15-20.
 

Jose Fly

Fisker of men
Did you know that fossil evidence in pelicans reveals 30 million years of evolutionary stasis in beak morphology. Apparently, stasis in pelicans is pretty common.

Louchart, A., Tourment, N., & Carrier, J. (2011). The earliest known pelican reveals 30 million years of evolutionary stasis in beak morphology. Journal of Ornithology, 152(1), 15-20.
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