Is Darwinian Evolution a "Shell Game"?

[Platos stepchild]

There's something about Darwinian Evolution, which has puzzled me. First off: let me be clear about not being an "Intelligent Design" advocate, i.e. ("nut"). That's not why I'm being critical. So, ok...here's the thing: there are two, countervailing forces, acting upon the genome. The first is the tendency toward genetic integrity. If DNA is too unstable, then a species just won't survive. The second force acts upon a genome as the tendency toward genetic diversity. Regardless of whether "diversity" results from "mutations", or from "genetic drift", too little of it inevitably leads to extinction. Clearly, a "two person", zero-sum game is not being being played out, here, as you'd expect.

So, in this "game", we have countervailing forces, which are, by their very nature unstable. And yet, life clearly demonstrates that isn't true. Somehow, or another, a "negative-feedback-loop" managed to get incorporated into what was a straightforward, albeit unstable model of a genome. Even without the crunching numbers, the optimal range for any such "negative-feedback-loop" would be vanishingly small; hence the conundrum. But, once you introduce a damping mechanism, the conundrum only deepens. Science has long eschewed Plato's fourth mode of causation: final causes. That's not possible, however once such a "damping mechanism" gets considered. Einstein's "spooky action, at a distance" has nothing on the "spookiness" of wondering who's really pulling the strings, and charting our genetic destiny. What do you think; do I have a point?

[Mechsmith]

I puzzled this for quite a while also but then I ran across a concept that speeded things up a bit.

Basically I wanted to line up a card deck AC-2C-3C >>>>To JC-QC-KC . If I tried to do it by throwing the whole deck in the air every time I'd be at it a very long time.

But if AC would stick only to 2C and AC&2C would only stick to 3C and so on it would happen a bit faster.

I envision a primordal soup full of the amino acids but they will only stick in some sort of order. Some of the ways that they will stick will prove to be potentially alive eventually. At least it isn't just three card monte.


Yes, I think that you have a point. I don't know how to do anything with it though.

[Eckhart Aurelius Hughes]

I think that what we see is that there is a sufficent amount of diversity in a narrow enough spectrum of consistency. For instance, a human baby might pop out with blue eyes or brown eyes or even with some weird hazel mutation-colored eyes that nobody has seen before, but the baby still pops out human (which is saying a lot since it only takes much less than 1% genetic difference to turn a human into a different species like a chimp.

Part of that behavior may have evolved as well. An animal might instinctively avoid incest while doing behaviors or having traits that keep its genes in its species or subspecies.

For the relatively few times the balance has been found, many times it has not. Most species have gone extinct, many creatures die before reproducing, and most planets/moons might not have life.

[Platos stepchild]

Basically I wanted to line up a card deck AC-2C-3C >>>>To JC-QC-KC . If I tried to do it by throwing the whole deck in the air every time I'd be at it a very long time.

You are, of course right. And, that's exactly where Creationists play their own, particular shell game, with science. They're just waiting for some unwary Materialist to argue that, given an eternity, whatever's possible must become actual, an infinite number of times. The counterargument is yes, this assertion is true, because, well... it's a tautology. And, by the nature of tautologies, nothing non-trivial can be deduced, from them. Therefore, those "typewriting monkeys who'll eventually churn out the complete Works of Shakespeare" can never exist.

Your proposal is, of course the correct one: there must be an affinity, between possibilities, thereby generating order from randomness. The question now becomes: "Whence this "affinity"? The Creationist/"Intelligent Design" advocate calls it God; whereas, the Materialist calls in nature. It's therefore incumbent upon both to proffer sufficient evidence to discredit the other. But, that's a whole other post. Back to this "affinity" thing, my point is that we've got to take seriously the need for such a, well..., gimmick, as "affinities" frankly are.

Without the "gimmick", though we're left with the most unstable scenario, possible: simple, diametrically opposed forces. And, as I've previously argued, the relative stability, of life belies being described by such a simplistic model. Ok; let's be honest about what Materialism is up to. It's essentially promoting a self-generating, universal order. This is something which we know to be possible, even pedestrian (at least on a limited scale). So, is it too much to speculate that our ostensibly problematical "affinities" might actually come from such "universal order"? To me, this just seems more credible, maybe even more reverential, than Jehovah intoning Fiat lux! (Let there be light!)

-- Updated September 19th, 2014, 11:39 am to add the following --

I think that what we see is that there is a sufficient amount of diversity in a narrow enough spectrum of consistency. For instance, a human baby might pop out with blue eyes or brown eyes or even with some weird hazel mutation-colored eyes that nobody has seen before, but the baby still pops out human (which is saying a lot since it only takes much less than 1% genetic difference to turn a human into a different species like a chimp.

Part of that behavior may have evolved as well. An animal might instinctively avoid incest while doing behaviors or having traits that keep its genes in its species or subspecies.

For the relatively few times the balance has been found, many times it has not. Most species have gone extinct, many creatures die before reproducing, and most planets/moons might not have life.

As you say, the problem comes down to "[a] sufficient amount of diversity, [within] a narrow spectrum...". But, my point was that this is an inherently unstable scenario. "Unstable", and yet the meticulous balance between genetic "diversity", and genetic "fidelity" somehow maintains itself. 'Diversity", and "spectrums" just don't explain how that can be so.

I appreciate your insight into the important distinction, between "primary", and "secondary" characteristics. You're right: a change in something's "primary" characteristics will fundamentally change it; whereas, no change in it's "secondary" characteristics need have "fundamental" consequences. But, how does this (interesting) observation explain the dilemma of life being stable, when it ought not to be?

[Treatid]

The original post mentions negative feedback...

For whatever reason we find ourselves in a universe that permits positive and negative feedback. Rather than viewing evolution as a mechanism that applies to atoms, molecules, cells and organisms; we can view it as a process that applies to combinations of negative and positive feedback.

Evolution then selects for optimum sets of feedback systems. These sets must include some counter to stability. We know that the ability to adapt to new conditions is an essential part of the process of evolution. Being overly stable leaves an organism vulnerable to a change in environment. Yet, obviously, falling apart into chaos isn't very effective (from the point of view of an organism).

The exact balance of feedback mechanisms varies, of course. Parasites generally need to adapt faster than their hosts defence mechanism, for example.

However, overall, it should be no surprise that evolution involves both positive and negative feedback systems. Without a negative feedback system you would never stop eating, or sleeping, or running from the predator...

[Hereandnow]

I appreciate your insight into the important distinction, between "primary", and "secondary" characteristics. You're right: a change in something's "primary" characteristics will fundamentally change it; whereas, no change in it's "secondary" characteristics need have "fundamental" consequences. But, how does this (interesting) observation explain the dilemma of life being stable, when it ought not to be?

But then, you really don't believe this the root issue, do you? That is, while I'm sure the problem is interesting to you, there is underlying this the assumption that science will find things out. And so what if there is some yet undiscovered priniciple of integration working within the nature of things, it does not in the least suggest a creator God--it merely suggests another principle (notwithstanding the vacuous conversational plus that will arise for creationists politically).

the point at which things get really interesting is when forces (and physicists have no idea what a force is; it's just another pragmatic term used because, well, language must have its symbols), after 13 billion years or so, manifest value. That is when the equation becomes simply ineffable since value does not show up in our observational data. We treat value as if it does because science is absolutely silent on this-- it has nothing to say because there is nothing to observe. Thus falling in love, say, is treated as just another phenomenon. We watch the mating habits, social phenomena; the heartbeat rises,palms sweat; we talk about how love is conducive to survival and reproduction and so forth. But the question of the nature of value, love. joy, suffering, etc. is as mysterious as Being itself.

How does a force, any force, possess the predisposition for profound suffering? How is it that 13 and a half years ago Being was thrust into existence (in a manner of speaking), the same stuff of your genetic inquiries and produces the rapture of love and art and music; and the horror of torturous pain? THIS is where the real religious issues, that is, existentially significant issues (not the ones manufactured out of some medieval mentality, like the existence of God the creator. Pure fabrication.), arise.

[Atreyu]

All I'd like to say concerning this thread is that seems to me as if the typical 'Darwinist' acts as if their theory is sufficient to explain life, when in fact it is not. Obviously there must be more to it than just genetic drift and natural selection, but since science has no clue as to what else might be at play here they take the easy way out and just assume there aren't any other unknown variables involved.

But IMO only a fool would think that genetic drift and natural selection alone are a sufficient explanation for all we see in life.

[Platos stepchild]

"I'm a fool [to] think that genetic drift and natural selection, alone are a sufficient explanation for all we see in life."

That's essentially my point; and, hence the dilemma of genomic stability.

--

[Grotto19]

I don’t think such a drift is absurd at all when you consider the trillion times a trillion (whatever that figure is) interactions occurring every moment. Large scale evolution (such as from aquatic to amphibian) takes something in the order of 10 million to 1 billion years. That is an absurd amount of generations of creatures that breed every few months. DNA shift is subtle to be sure but over 1,000,000,000,000,000 generations or so it seems almost strange that we don’t have far more diversity.

Truth be told we cannot even attempt to comprehend what that amount of time could reasonably allow for. The very brief time we have been scientifically measuring such things is so insignificant all speculation is simply that. The best evidence we have are the bones we have found, and those show a pattern which for at least the time being seems relatively consistent. We really have little else to go on because evolutionarily our recordings are but a second reflecting on a millennia.

[Platos stepchild]

You said: "Truth be told, we cannot even attempt to comprehend [the] amount of time [needed] for [Darwinian Evolution to occur]". It's actually a mistake to calculate the entropy-of-life, in "linear" time. What I mean is, it's wrong to imagine a series of "near misses", until voila', we finally achieve abiogenesis. In order to properly calculate the entropy-of-life, we need to consider all of the possible states, in which life might try and manifest. Many of these "states" will occur more-or-less concurrently. (Here's where a lot of those "near misses" happen). The greater the number of such "concurrent states", the less time, overall is needed for life to appear. Since life is a highly ordered process (as per the information encoded in DNA), there must be a concomitant number of such "near misses". But, time's not a problem if we view the inception of life as a fluke (or a miracle). That possibility, however is not supported by the evidence. The point is, depending upon the exact ensemble of "possible states" in which life "tries" to exist, the overall time required for that to happen may be surprisingly short. And, if the Theory of Panspermia has any credibility, the time may be "short", indeed (That's because, according to Panspermia, some of those "possible states" would'ave already occurred within our galaxy, before finally manifesting here, on Earth. Note: the formation of amino acids,in space lends credibility to those "states").

-- Updated September 25th, 2014, 8:45 am to add the following --

Why are we not allowed to delete our own posts? Why so fascist?

[Nysorquaemtas]

Darwin's evolution etc is a hoax of the highest order.

That is why there is no evidence for it. That is why Dawkins talks about chances but doesn't really calculate any change. Because if he did, he would find out evolution is untrue, and, even worse, impossible.

It was ment to keep us away from anything spiritual. No, I am not a creationist, but I must say that creationists have some very good arguments against Darwinian evolution.

It is a piece of a very big puzzle.

But yes, it is a hoax.

[Platos stepchild]

"[Darwinian Evolution] is [indeed] a hoax", but only in that certain "teleological mechanisms", necessary for it's proper function, have been piously ignored. Science has long eschewed "final causes", as criteria for "change", out-of-fear of opening the door to, as Einstein might well call it: "spookiness-at-a-distance". And yet, without a credible "teleological mechanism", "Darwinism" must remain, at best an ad hoc explanation for biological evolution. So, "spooky", or not, we will eventually be obliged to concede that "life" at least behaves as though it has a "purpose". And, that "purpose" cannot be indefinitely "ignored", whatever it is.

[Hereandnow]

NysorquaemtasIt was ment to keep us away from anything spiritual. No, I am not a creationist, but I must say that creationists have some very good arguments against Darwinian evolution.

It is a piece of a very big puzzle.

But yes, it is a hoax.

So easily you breeze through it. You need to say a bit more.

[Present awareness]

By selective breeding, man has created a wide variety of dogs, from poodles to Great Danes. The same process works with plant life, this is why today's pot is much more potent then in the 60's. Darwin simply observed what was happening in nature, as opposed to taking the easy way out and saying "God must have done it all". Adaptation is a fact, and is the main reason that bacteria has become resistant to penicillin.

[Hereandnow]

"Adaptation is a fact, and is the main reason that bacteria has become resistant to penicillin."Not fact; there are no facts, only theories.