Adaptation

[Spud]

'Increase in complexity' is irrelevant.  The beaks vary, differ, through adaptation.  They don't need to be more complex, just different, in order to better exploit different resources.

I've just been reading how beaks (and body size and other traits) vary through adaptation; also that this appears to involve epigenetics rather than genetic mutation. I mentioned complexity because Sriram did.

[Spud]

Not necessarily if the genome required for one beak type is due to a genetic mutation. In that case the original ancestor may only have had the information for one beak type but some of the offspring in some generation down the line, through mutation, developed the genome for the other beak type. Which dominates would be down to the prevailing environmental conditions and whether one beak type or the other conveys survival advantage.

In that example, the original ancestor was more complex as it had the genetic information from which the mutation would arise. The new species would not be able to change back, so it's less complex.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

We keep coming  back to the analogy of the  stubborn blind man who will not  be convinced about the existence of light. Nothing can be done....

Given that I’ve corrected you on this several times before now, why have you returned to exactly the same mistake? Are you really so incapable of learning something?

Once again: your analogy is a false one. It’s false not only in its specifics, but also in its construction. It’s wrong in its specifics because you sneak in an agreed phenomenon (light) as if it’s equivalent to the premise you want to argue for but that isn’t agreed at all (“patterns” etc).   

It’s wrong in its construction because what you’re attempting here (albeit unwittingly) is a fallacy called “begging the question” (or petitio principii):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

You assume your premise to be correct, and then blame the failure of others to agree with you on their inability to see it too. It’s the same “argument” as: “We keep coming  back to the analogy of the  stubborn man who can’t see the colour green who will not  be convinced about the existence of leprechauns. Nothing can be done....”. 

Can you see anything wrong with that argument?

It would help here if you’d acknowledge that you grasp the problem and try at least to address it rather than just pretend it hadn’t been explained to you, only to return to exactly the same mistake over and over again.

Can you do that? 

[Stranger]

In that example, the original ancestor was more complex as it had the genetic information from which the mutation would arise. The new species would not be able to change back, so it's less complex.

Wow, so much wrongness in just two sentences.

Let's take a step back and think about what information is. First and foremost it is characterised by unpredictability. If you can infer the next bit of data from what has come before, then it is not telling you anything new, i.e. its information content is zero. If you have a good idea from previous data but it are not 100% sure, then it will contain some information (but less than the amount of data). If you have no idea at all what the next bit of data is, then it is all entirely new information. There is formal mathematics behind this but I hope you get the idea.

So, if I have a counter, that just produces the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4,... then it is not generating any information. If I ask the question: what will be the 2467th number be? The answer is obvious.

Now, what if I have a true random number generator? In this case every number it generates is new information because it is totally unpredictable. Before it generates 2467th number, I will have no idea of the answer to my question about its value. When it generates it, I'll know the answer, so I will have new information. Now, it's not very useful information and, unless its generating lottery numbers or something, nobody is likely to care. That doesn't change the fact that it's information.

Mutations, while not strictly random (some types are more statistically likely than others), are random with respect to survival and (apart from the general statistics) are unpredictable. We have something like a random number generator. Mutations generate new information. Almost all of it is about as useful as the output of our random number generator but the point is that it is new information that cannot be predicted from the previous generation's genomes. So no, the ancestor did not contain the information for the mutation.

So mutations are constantly generating new (largely useless) information. Each human has about 60 to 100 mutations (last time I looked it up - there may be a better estimation now but the exact number is irrelevant), but most of them do nothing of any significance at all.

The point with evolution is that all this new information is fed into the filter of natural selection. Just like you can generate any sound you want from (random) white noise, using the right filter, natural selection amplifies the information that aids survival and reproduction in the context of the environment of the population and filters out any that is harmful. There is nothing really mysterious or difficult to understand about it. If some mutation (new information) is actually useful for survival and reproduction, then those individuals that have it will survive and reproduce more than those without it, and hence it will spread through the population. Conversely, any mutations that are detrimental will quickly die out. Hence new information enters the genome based (essentially) on the environment, because it is that that provides the filter on the constant 'white noise' of mutations.

As for not being able to go back, well it depends. On one level, if a mutation changes a single base from (say) A to G, then it can obviously be changed back by another mutation from G to A. Other mutations are unlikely to be exactly reversed (say a duplication). Anyway, it's unlikely for a mutation to be reversed if it's advantageous in the environment and hence selected. That doesn't mean that, for example, if the environment changes, then the population is any less able to adapt, because it's constantly being fed by the new information from mutations.

Hence, you are simply wrong in assuming that the ancestor is necessarily more complex. However you may define complexity, it can go up or down in evolution. For example, trichromatic vision was an increase in complexity that resulted from the duplication and subsequent mutation of a part of the genome: The Evolution of Trichromatic Color Vision by Opsin Gene Duplication in New World and Old World Primates.

[Sriram]

This analogy is easily dismissed. 

The blind man can still get a light meter, £20 at Amazon, and that will provide evidence for him.

A sea turtle can detect magnetic fields, whereas I cannot, as unlike turtles I don't have any inbuilt magnetoreceptors. I do not deny the existence of magnetic fields, however.

By building instruments to detect phenomena beyond our inbuilt sensory apparatus is one way to determine if extraordinary claims are real, or just imagined, a by-product of the way that complex minds have evolved to work.

You're going to need a better analogy.

We have discussed this many times. How does a light meter help a blind man to accept the existence of light? For one thing how does he read the meter and more importantly, how does he know that it is some strange thing called light that is being registered in the meter?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

We have discussed this many times. How does a light meter help a blind man to accept the existence of light? For one thing how does he read the meter and more importantly, how does he know that it is some strange thing called light that is being registered in the meter?

See Reply 102 for why your attempted analogy is still fundamentally false.

[Sriram]

Sriram,

Given that I’ve corrected you on this several times before now, why have you returned to exactly the same mistake? Are you really so incapable of learning something?

Once again: your analogy is a false one. It’s false not only in its specifics, but also in its construction. It’s wrong in its specifics because you sneak in an agreed phenomenon (light) as if it’s equivalent to the premise you want to argue for but that isn’t agreed at all (“patterns” etc).   

It’s wrong in its construction because what you’re attempting here (albeit unwittingly) is a fallacy called “begging the question” (or petitio principii):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

You assume your premise to be correct, and then blame the failure of others to agree with you on their inability to see it too. It’s the same “argument” as: “We keep coming  back to the analogy of the  stubborn man who can’t see the colour green who will not  be convinced about the existence of leprechauns. Nothing can be done....”. 

Can you see anything wrong with that argument?

It would help here if you’d acknowledge that you grasp the problem and try at least to address it rather than just pretend it hadn’t been explained to you, only to return to exactly the same mistake over and over again.

Can you do that?

You can keep using your many 'fallacies' as a security blanket to defend your early 20th century memes. It doesn't concern me really.

It is very simple....some of you lack the natural ability to discern subtle patterns and experiences and therefore it is not possible for anyone to provide you with the evidence for such things. Arguments are of no use.

I was only trying to see if the opinions and perspectives of some senior and eminent scientists would help you along in understanding such matters a little bit. But it is obviously not happening. Your memes are only fighting back as ferociously as ever.

So...lets stop this discussion.  Thanks.

[Stranger]

We have discussed this many times. How does a light meter help a blind man to accept the existence of light? For one thing how does he read the meter and more importantly, how does he know that it is some strange thing called light that is being registered in the meter?

How do you know that radio waves or neutrinos exist? Your 'analogy' always was beyond daft. A blind person who refused to believe that light exists, despite evidence, would be as stupid as you or me refusing to accept that electrons or x-rays exist.

Mindless repetition of a silly analogy does you no favours, seriously.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

You can keep using your many 'fallacies'…

Putting the word “fallacies” in inverted commas is, ironically, itself a fallacy called poisoning the well. You don’t rely on “fallacies”; you rely on fallacies, which makes your arguments wrong.

…as a security blanket to defend your early 20th century memes.

Identifying the fallacies in an argument isn’t a “security blanket”; it’s how you determine that the argument is wrong.   

It doesn't concern me really.

Then it should. If you want to turn up here to argue for something then you must also accept that the argument collapses when it’s fallacious.

It is very simple....some of you lack the natural ability to discern subtle patterns and experiences and therefore it is not possible for anyone to provide you with the evidence for such things. Arguments are of no use.

And that’s just your repetition of the same fallacy of begging the question. I could equally argue: “It is very simple....some of you lack the natural ability to discern leprechauns and therefore it is not possible for anyone to provide you with the evidence for such things. Arguments are of no use”. As it’s precisely the argument you attempt except with a different object (leprechauns instead of patterns), what wrong with it? 

If you want to demonstrate that there are “subtle patterns and experiences” rather than that you just imagine them then at some point you need to argue the point without doing so fallaciously. So far at least though you’re a 0/10 on that score. 

I was only trying to see if the opinions and perspectives of some senior and eminent scientists would help you along in understanding such matters a little bit.

You’ve provided no evidence at all that “some senior and eminent scientists” do share your claims of “patterns” and such like, and even if you had, their justifying reasoning for that would stand or fall on its merits and not because they are “senior and eminent”.   

But it is obviously not happening.

That’s right – and for good reason (see above).

Your memes are only fighting back as ferociously as ever.

No, reason is. You should try it some time.

So...lets stop this discussion.  Thanks.

Probably wise for you do so, but it says a lot about you that you always run away rather than engage with the arguments that falsify you. How do you think your intellectual cowardice will enable you ever to learn anything?   

[Stranger]

Your memes are only fighting back as ferociously as ever.

Yet again: your meme that memes are always irrational, is just false. That isn't how they are defined. They are just ideas that either survive, mutate, or die out. Sometimes they survive because they are good, rational, and useful ideas, sometimes because they are just stories that people find comforting or whatever, sometimes because they contain sort of mental traps, like "if you doubt, you'll go to hell", or any number of other reasons. If you had actually bothered to read the relevant chapter of The Selfish Gene, you would know this.

Both rational ideas, like the principles of sound reasoning and trying to avoids fallacies, and the fallacies that people cling to because they find them attractive, simple, comforting, etc. are memes.

[Maeght]

You can keep using your many 'fallacies' as a security blanket to defend your early 20th century memes. It doesn't concern me really.

It is very simple....some of you lack the natural ability to discern subtle patterns and experiences and therefore it is not possible for anyone to provide you with the evidence for such things. Arguments are of no use.

I was only trying to see if the opinions and perspectives of some senior and eminent scientists would help you along in understanding such matters a little bit. But it is obviously not happening. Your memes are only fighting back as ferociously as ever.

So...lets stop this discussion.  Thanks.

Or you discern subtle paterns and experiences which aren't real and don't have the natural ability to differentiate reality from imagination.

[Sriram]

Or you discern subtle paterns and experiences which aren't real and don't have the natural ability to differentiate reality from imagination.

This thread is not about my experiences or patterns. It is about adaptation, Natural Selection, Random variations, gene centric evolution etc.....and the perspectives of scientists like Denis Noble, Stephen Talbott and others.  Their views obviously seem to have no impact on the pretty stubborn memes held by people here.  That is the point.

[Maeght]

This thread is not about my experiences or patterns. It is about adaptation, Natural Selection, Random variations, gene centric evolution etc.....and the perspectives of scientists like Denis Noble, Stephen Talbott and others.  Their views obviously seem to have no impact on the pretty stubborn memes held by people here.  That is the point.

Yet you posted about subtle patterns and experiences and say some of us lack the ability to see those patterns. Why did you do that if the thread is about natural Selection, Random variations, gene centric evolution etc.? And again you bring in stubborn memes in this post.

[Stranger]

Their views obviously seem to have no impact on the pretty stubborn memes held by people here.  That is the point.

The sad thing is that it really is a battle of memes but you don't seem to understand the concept any better than you understand natural selection, random variation, and so on.

The battle here is between the memes of science, evidence, logic, and distinguishing between conjecture, hypothesis, and tested theories, and your own memes that seem to start with the assumption that you already know the answers and science should just catch up, and reading every article through the tunnel vision that that assumption creates.

For example, look at the article you so selectively quoted in #54. Not only is it a rather oversold pop-science piece but you missed out the very important point that the mutation rate was non-random because "The plant has evolved a way to protect its most important places from mutation...". There's even a whole section called "Plant evolved to protect itself" [my emphasis in both quotes].

Think about it.

You might also want to reflect on the fact that the whole reason why Richard Dawkins introduced the concept of memes was to show that the principle of variation and selection is more fundamental than any specific process. According to the evidence we have, even DNA itself must have been the product of evolution by variation and selection. I don't know of any hypothesis of abiogenesis that doesn't involve simpler replicators first.

[Outrider]

What magic?

Panpsychism.

Consciousness is not magic.

Consciousness directly changing the world is. Consciousness existing outside of individual brains is.

I think you know of the power of the unconscious mind for which there is plenty of evidence.

And that evidence doesn't even come close to existence outside of individual organisms, or to direct interlinking, or to affecting physical phenomena through means other than the body it resides in.

O.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sriram,

This thread is not about my experiences or patterns. It is about adaptation, Natural Selection, Random variations, gene centric evolution etc.....and the perspectives of scientists like Denis Noble, Stephen Talbott and others.  Their views obviously seem to have no impact on the pretty stubborn memes held by people here.  That is the point.

No – the point here is that you seem to unable to frame an argument that isn’t false, and unable to engage with the falsifications when they’re given to you. If you ever want to learn something I suggest you start with that – address the problems when you go wrong, and frame instead arguments that are cogent. 

Why wouldn’t you do that if you could? 

[Spud]

Wow, so much wrongness in just two sentences.

Let's take a step back and think about what information is. First and foremost it is characterised by unpredictability. If you can infer the next bit of data from what has come before, then it is not telling you anything new, i.e. its information content is zero. If you have a good idea from previous data but it are not 100% sure, then it will contain some information (but less than the amount of data). If you have no idea at all what the next bit of data is, then it is all entirely new information. There is formal mathematics behind this but I hope you get the idea.

So, if I have a counter, that just produces the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4,... then it is not generating any information. If I ask the question: what will be the 2467th number be? The answer is obvious.

Now, what if I have a true random number generator? In this case every number it generates is new information because it is totally unpredictable. Before it generates 2467th number, I will have no idea of the answer to my question about its value. When it generates it, I'll know the answer, so I will have new information. Now, it's not very useful information and, unless its generating lottery numbers or something, nobody is likely to care. That doesn't change the fact that it's information.

Mutations, while not strictly random (some types are more statistically likely than others), are random with respect to survival and (apart from the general statistics) are unpredictable. We have something like a random number generator. Mutations generate new information. Almost all of it is about as useful as the output of our random number generator but the point is that it is new information that cannot be predicted from the previous generation's genomes. So no, the ancestor did not contain the information for the mutation.

So mutations are constantly generating new (largely useless) information. Each human has about 60 to 100 mutations (last time I looked it up - there may be a better estimation now but the exact number is irrelevant), but most of them do nothing of any significance at all.

The point with evolution is that all this new information is fed into the filter of natural selection. Just like you can generate any sound you want from (random) white noise, using the right filter, natural selection amplifies the information that aids survival and reproduction in the context of the environment of the population and filters out any that is harmful. There is nothing really mysterious or difficult to understand about it. If some mutation (new information) is actually useful for survival and reproduction, then those individuals that have it will survive and reproduce more than those without it, and hence it will spread through the population. Conversely, any mutations that are detrimental will quickly die out. Hence new information enters the genome based (essentially) on the environment, because it is that that provides the filter on the constant 'white noise' of mutations.

As for not being able to go back, well it depends. On one level, if a mutation changes a single base from (say) A to G, then it can obviously be changed back by another mutation from G to A. Other mutations are unlikely to be exactly reversed (say a duplication). Anyway, it's unlikely for a mutation to be reversed if it's advantageous in the environment and hence selected. That doesn't mean that, for example, if the environment changes, then the population is any less able to adapt, because it's constantly being fed by the new information from mutations.

Hence, you are simply wrong in assuming that the ancestor is necessarily more complex. However you may define complexity, it can go up or down in evolution. For example, trichromatic vision was an increase in complexity that resulted from the duplication and subsequent mutation of a part of the genome: The Evolution of Trichromatic Color Vision by Opsin Gene Duplication in New World and Old World Primates.

Thanks for the message. In my other post I mentioned that the beak changes seem to be caused by epigenetics rather than mutation, which is quite new to me but I found it interesting to read about. It even seems as though mutations are not really involved in speciation?
I got your point about information. But surely if you have a set of numbers arranged in order of smallest to largest and a set in which one of the numbers is not in sequence with the others, the second set doesn't contain more information but less? This will be obvious if we illustrate the numbers with something, eg peas, 
What I meant generally is that if as is supposed, all dogs come from a wild ancestor, a poodle is less complex than the original wild type because it's offspring can never return to the original wild type.

[Stranger]

It even seems as though mutations are not really involved in speciation?

Epigenetic changes may be involved but they cannot replace genetic mutations. There are many changes for which we know the exact mutations that gave rise to the changes - the classic example of the peppered moth being one such change.

I got your point about information. But surely if you have a set of numbers arranged in order of smallest to largest and a set in which one of the numbers is not in sequence with the others, the second set doesn't contain more information but less?

No. As I said, information is to do with how 'surprising' or uncertain the data is. The way it's measured is information entropy. So in the your example, the second set contains more information than the first because the out of sequence number is unexpected.

This will be obvious if we illustrate the numbers with something, eg peas, 

No idea what you even mean by this.

What I meant generally is that if as is supposed, all dogs come from a wild ancestor, a poodle is less complex than the original wild type because it's offspring can never return to the original wild type.

Non-sequitur. Again, as I said,, although it's unlikely that a series of mutations will be exactly reversed, that doesn't mean that it isn't possible for a species to regain characteristic of its ancestors. You are still making the completely invalid assumption that the ancestor somehow contains the information required for its descendants. Mutations add new information, basically from the environment - information is transferred from the environment to the genome via the random noise of mutations being filtered through the ability to survive and reproduce in the current environment of the population.

While complexity in this context can be quite tricky to define, I did give the example of trichromatic vision (for which we know the associated mutations), which I can't see how you could possibly regard as anything other than an increase in complexity.

[Outrider]

I got your point about information. But surely if you have a set of numbers arranged in order of smallest to largest and a set in which one of the numbers is not in sequence with the others, the second set doesn't contain more information but less?

Hi Spud,

I think here you're confusing 'data' and 'information'. The data just is, and the set of numbers is exactly the same data regardless of the order. If the position within the dataset is important to the interpretation then that is a layer of data, so either of them might have more or less information depending on the context of the information.

O.

[Udayana]

...
What I meant generally is that if as is supposed, all dogs come from a wild ancestor, a poodle is less complex than the original wild type because it's offspring can never return to the original wild type.

As you've posited this more than once ... complexity is wrong word/concept to use here.

The population of ancestor wild dogs were/are more diverse than the poodle population. Note I do not mean any individual ancestor or poodle - we need to consider the population even though any individual will carry a certain level of diversity hidden in recessive or otherwise unexpressed genes. Poodles result from selective breeding - restricting mating to other dogs likely carrying the desired genes - mostly other poodles (hence pedigree records and so on...).

If left free to breed "in the wild" the descendant population would soon regain a much higher level of diversity.

[Spud]

As you've posited this more than once ... complexity is wrong word/concept to use here.

The population of ancestor wild dogs were/are more diverse than the poodle population. Note I do not mean any individual ancestor or poodle - we need to consider the population even though any individual will carry a certain level of diversity hidden in recessive or otherwise unexpressed genes. Poodles result from selective breeding - restricting mating to other dogs likely carrying the desired genes - mostly other poodles (hence pedigree records and so on...).

If left free to breed "in the wild" the descendant population would soon regain a much higher level of diversity.

What I meant by 'complex' is that a poodle population can't produce anything other than poodles if isolated from other dogs, whereas an isolated wild dog population has the potential to produce a range of different breeds.
Similarly I remember reading that there was a danger that wild corn would become extinct; if that happened we would have no 'backup' from which to selectively breed the types of corn we use for food, should the latter also become extinct.
I'm just saying that adaptation leads to decreased complexity - in the sense just described.
I'll try and comment on your point about trichromatic vision - I still need to read about that.

[Stranger]

What I meant by 'complex' is that a poodle population can't produce anything other than poodles if isolated from other dogs, whereas an isolated wild dog population has the potential to produce a range of different breeds.

Drivel. In fact selective breading is required to make sure that breeds maintain their 'desired' characteristics.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

What I meant by 'complex' is that a poodle population can't produce anything other than poodles if isolated from other dogs, whereas an isolated wild dog population has the potential to produce a range of different breeds.

That's nonsense. Given enough generations for mutations to occur and enough environmental factors acting on them there's no reason to think that poodles wouldn't eventually be the ancestor of any number of different strains of canine down the line. Indeed given enough generations there's no reason to think that eventually different species entirely wouldn't occur, just as people and octopuses are different species with a common ancestor.       

[Spud]

Spud,

That's nonsense. Given enough generations for mutations to occur and enough environmental factors acting on them there's no reason to think that poodles wouldn't eventually be the ancestor of any number of different strains of canine down the line. Indeed given enough generations there's no reason to think that eventually different species entirely wouldn't occur, just as people and octopuses are different species with a common ancestor.       

But you would need to breed the poodles with a 'wild type' dog in order to maintain their health. If you keep breeding poodles with poodles only, they will develop more and more genetic disorders and eventually become extinct.
Here is an example, not in dogs but wheat:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-42204575.amp

[Udayana]

But you would need to breed the poodles with a 'wild type' dog in order to maintain their health. If you keep breeding poodles with poodles only, they will develop more and more genetic disorders and eventually become extinct.
Here is an example, not in dogs but wheat:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-42204575.amp

That is entirely possible and most likely, but it depends on the probabilities. The larger the number of poodles you start with the greater the diversity within that population, and the greater the chances of beneficial mutations being promulgated, both of which , over time, could result in new strains.