Re: How can the evolutionary progress from slime to humans be linear?


"Craig T" <craig.tevis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:dn5sgt$mm0$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> Uno Lapideus wrote:
>> Thanks, Jim! Just a few comments...
>>
>> > I'm not sure what gap you're talking about
>>
>> The "gap" of 90 million years between therapsids and mammals (almost
>> twice the average).
>>
>> > KT boundary? 65 mya?
>>
>> Not that it has any relevancy to my question, but the "gap" is much
>> closer to the Permian mass extinction (I have read that more than 90%
>> of all species were wiped out by this event), some 270 MYA, "shortly"
>> after the therapsids had entered the scene, and close to 100 MYR or so
>> before the first mammal arrived.
>>
>> > a concept called punctuated equilibrium
>>
>> I am rather well familiar with both PE and with "gradualism." The
>> problem I have with Stephen Gould's reasoning is that I can't find
>> references to where he proposes an explanation for what eventually
>> triggers a "burst of favorable mutations" after long periods of stasis
>> (if you have such a reference, please share!)
>
> I don't think PE depends on "burst of favorable mutations". What
> changes is the environment. If the environment is the same, the species
> stays the same. Some have pointed out that there is a rhythm to mass
> extinctions.

Very well stated. Yes, mass extinctions are the punctuation part of
punctuated equilibrium. And, as Craig indicates here, it is the changes in
environment (shifts in climate) that are the cause of mass entinction,
followed my a "radiation" of new species that are better adapted to the new
conditions. All of this might happen over thousands of years but thousands
of years are a blink of the eye in geologic time. And, as Craig states, "If
the environment is the same, the species stays the same." This being, of
course, the equillibrium part of the phenomenon.

Uno claims to be familiar with PE. But how he can make this claim and, it
seems, be so perfectly unfamiliar with the understanding that Craig and I
share on this is perplexing. When I first read Uno's words I was so
flabbergasted as to how anyone who claimed to understand PE could describe
it as a "burst of favorable mutations" that I didn't know how to respond.
It seemed not worth the trouble.



> That might be the pattern you are seeing. Dinosaurs
> emerged just after the Permian, if that helps your pattern.
>
> Some of your pattern is forced, though. The evolution of placental
> mammals was not as big as a change as the evolution of vertebrates. In
> fact, the evolution of humans from other primates was a tiny step.
> Alien scientists would just see us as another ape. Looking backwards,
> we see a line. But if we start at the bottom, we see a bush of life
> going in all directions.
>
>>
>> > Take a class in paleontology
>>
>> I have studied paleontology textbooks, and countless paleontology
>> oriented websites (isn't Google great?). Nowhere have I found anything
>> even resembling the graph that I had Excel make for me, based on the
>> "age numbers" that appear most correct. Please give me a reference, if
>> you know of one!
>>
>> > One [] misconception about evolution is that it describes a random
>> > process
>>
>> Now, this is news to me! What exactly is the non-random mechanism that
>> you mention? How can germ line DNA replication errors or germ line DNA
>> damaged by cosmic rays be described as anything but random? As far as
>> I know (which doesn't mean a whole lot), these are the only two
>> mechanisms that produce mutations. I'd love to learn more about
>> additional mechanisms accomplishing genome refinements!
>
> Mutations are random. Selection is not.

Mutations are random. Replication is orderful. Natural selection is the
admixture of randomness and orderfulness with the end result being
biological complexity.

Or, as complexologists might put it, complexity emerges at the boundary
between order and chaos.

Or, as I put it, order plus chaos equals purpose.

>>
>> > emergence of purposeful phenomena
>>
>> Is this not a tad problematic? If waves pound rocks into sand, does
>> this make the sand-making mechanism purposeful? To introduce "purpose"
>> in the process smacks of "divine intervention" (well, to me, anyway),
>> something that I cannot come to terms with...
>>
>> > read any of Richard Dawkins books
>>
>> Have read them all. And I thoroughly dislike his position, which to me
>> implies that he alone knows what's going on, and that nobody else does.
>> I also think that his recurring and vitriolic attacks on Stephen Gould
>> were completely uncalled for, which left me with a sour taste no matter
>> how good his rhetoric is. Way to often does he express statements that
>> imply that the gene pool is "making plans," that it has a mysterious
>> life of its own, "inventing" new (and useful) genes.
>>
>> > the more you realize how little you know
>>
>> Amen to that! Although some never seem to realize this: even big shot
>> scientists have been known to step into the proverbial pile by stating
>> that "we now know all physics there is to know, with only a few loose
>> ends left to tie up." Yeah, right!
>>
>> Uno
>
> If you like Gould, you should reread his writings. Gould wrote a ton of
> essays on the theme that evolution is bushy, not linear. No goal, no
> direction.

I think it's impossible for purposeful entities to be the result of a
nonpurposeful process. Evolution is a process that purposefully anticipates
the future along the lines of maximizing the probability that life will
survive into eternity.

> Fish don't have any less genes for proteins than mammals do.
> In fact, the gene count for nematodes is over 19,000 genes, while we
> have 20,000 to 25,000 genes. A lot of the ground work for the diversity
> of multicellular life was laid down before the Cambrian.
>

Life is an eternity machine. I'ts a computational entity that continually
calculates the design (morphology) and distribution (location) of it's
constituent parts (lifeforms) that will maximize the probability that it
life will survive into eternity. Catastrophic events are the computational
input to this calculatory entity. Predictably, the rate of evolutionary
change that immediately follows catastrophic events increases as the
calculatory entity has more raw data to process than it does over periods of
environmental stability.

Jim



.

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