The Evolution of Birds (Or: What missing link?)

Discussion in 'Biology & Genetics' started by Trippy, Sep 28, 2014.

  1. exchemist Valued Senior Member

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    Ah, I see, so now you are claiming that the appearance of a second air connection to the lung is a "binary change" and thus impossible. I disagree. Without knowing the layout of the bronchi and lungs in these early creatures, it seems to me illogical to say it is impossible, any more than a hole in the heart is "impossible" - when in fact it is very common.

    As for the asymmetric tidal flow which I am suggesting as a half way house, it is clear you still either can't understand it or else are determined to make artificial difficulties for some reason. I do not have the patience to spend more time on this with you.

    As I say, I'm grateful to Trippy and others for an enlightening discussion.
     
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  3. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Yes; but I agree the existing lungs might develop a new hole - that would not be a "binary change." Also the nose (or what every the outside connected hole might be could be duplicated. - that would not be a "binary change."
    However nether of these would be a benefit. Even if the highly improbable both happened to the same baby that would not be a benefit - just extra useless development cost.
    I even grant that the existing tube leading from a single nose to a single lung could split with separate smaller lung at each of the new ends (as exists now in humans) - that would not be a "binary change."

    But for one baby to get a new nose (a differ external air port), a new tube connecting the new nose to the lung (Or lung pair if they already exist) and a new entrance hole for the lungs on opposite side of lungs from the original entrance - that would be a "binary change" or if you prefer the literature term, a "hopeful monster." I.e. a lot of different new and mutually cooperating for greater (not lesser) benefit than the system its parents had.

    Note also that for conversion (even a small percent of the flow) to "one way" flow thru the lung, which I represent by a capital O must have two tubes connecting to it, one on each side of lung(s) for one way flow thru it.
    I. e. "one-way" connections must be like"
    --------->O --------->

    Here is what you suggest is a step to one-way breathing:
    The bold arrow indicates the top path delivers 75% of the air to the lung(s). Ignore the dots - needed to make lungs near end of arrows.
    Separate paths to lung(s) :

    --------->
    ....... O
    --------->

    followed for the exhales by:

    <---------
    .............O
    <--------- Here the bold indicate bottom path exhales 75% of the lungs

    Even if one of two paths does most of the intake and the other does most of the exhaust, that is NOT a step to one way flow!

    So in summary:
    Your "hopeful monster" needs to be a baby with new nose, duplication of the air passage ways, new hole (entrance) into the lungs that the new path terminates in, and that new entrance must be across the lungs from the old one. All five requirements needed to happen in just one baby, by chance.

    Perhaps there are 6 as even all five would probably have flow thru both pipes equal - need an at least partially functional "check valve" in one of the tubes to "imbalance the flow volume" too.

    I admit your words sort of sound like they are an intermediate step to one way flow, but I have tried now two ways to show they are not. You make drawing rebuttal or show a not self contradictory Time / Action table exists. Just repeating your nice sounding words does not prove incremental step conversion of two way to one way flow thru lungs is possible. We all come from one-way flow in fish - in the mouth and out the gills. That can and has been converted to two way flow by evolution, but not the reverse.

    Note I am NOT saying that no creater that is one way breater can have descendants that are only two-way breathers, but I do say if that happens, they ADDED the two way system and did not convert the one-way system. Fish that went on land ADDED lungs and eventual found they did not need the one way system but in embryonic development we still first start down the one way path - have slits near where our necks will be.
     
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  5. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    Why are you talking about new orifices and second noses. That's not how one way breathing is achieved.
    Look at this again:

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!


    One tube that the air flows through to get into and out of the lungs - the one way flow occurs in part of the lungs as a result of bernoulis law and the configuration of the the yellow bit connexts to the green and teal bits.

    Again, birds:

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!


    One tube feeding the lungs, the one way airflow occurs within the lungs.

    We're not talking about a major change to get from a two way tidal breather to a one way tidal breather. The only requirement is a change in the configuration of the way the tubes feeding the lungs split, physics does the rest.

    And again, we come back to the point that the mutations for these changes exist in humans and are both viable and survivable.

    No we don't - the ancestor of tetrapods was a fish that possessed both lungs and gills.
     
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  7. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    Nothing external needs to be duplicated.

    I can't make sense of this. There's no requirement for a new lung. There isn't even a requirement for a new tube, it can be achieved with existing tubes by rearranging them in a fairly minor fashion, the laws of physics are what generate the one way flow.

    Completely irrelevant.

    Look at this diagram AGAIN.

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    The ONLY thing that is required is for the green portion to have started attached to the teal portion and subsequently migrate. The lung will funtion perfectly as a two directional tidal lung until the second split in the yellow portion (where it splits to service the teal and green portions) achieves the configuration that enables one-way flow. All of which has happened in the over-all mass of the already existing lung, shown in light grey.

    Your assertions are completely wrong and start from a false premise.

    No check valves are requuired. One way airflow is achieved in the alligators lung without them - the one way flow is driven by bernoulis law.

    You've been wrong for two days.
     
  8. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Yes and in my last paragraph (probably added after this post of yours but before I read yours) I made my point more clearly: I.e. certainly one-way breathers like fish can (and did) ADD (probably a quite small faction of their total breathing initially) a new two way system that as the generations passed be came relatively more important -so much so that the descendent of some of these "dual system breathers" ceased making the original one-way system, with at most only slight indications of it ever existing in their early embryonic stages. CONVERTNG one way system into a two way one I think is impossible, but that does not rule out finding new uses for parts of the old two way system in the new 2-way system. Often evolution finds new ways to use old structures, rather than let them atrophy away like the system in fruit eating mammals for making vitamin C did.
     
  9. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    Gills were one way.

    The evidence we have suggests that the first lungs were tidal two way - amphibian lungs, for example, are little more than gas bladders which allow gas exchange to occur across them - Billy, this isn't anything I haven't already tried to point out to you.
     
  10. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Yes, exactly as I would suspect the first two-way amphibian lungs would be simple additions to the one-way breathing (in mouth 0ut gills) of the fish they evolved from; and for many generations the one-way system still provided most of the O2 needed (but not obviously in the tiny fraction of their 24* hour day these first generation were on land).

    Their ancestor fish had spent "millions of years" optimizing their one-way breathing so any random change to it would almost certainly impare its function from the near optimized design they had achieved. I.e. I think, as stated several times, that the creature on the way to becoming a lung fish or amphibian initially ADDED new two-way structures (with very minor percent of total capacity ) to the nearly optimized one-way system. (As they say and mother natures certainly learned: "If it aint broke -don't fix it.") However, for breathing as you are getting trapped in a pond that is evaporating, etc. the two-way (in mouth/ out gills) is "broke" and 99+% of the fish so trapped did die.

    I don't know, but bet the first survivor (of the drying pond) between tidal refresh did so more by being able to absorbe air thru their "skin" like modern frogs can - I thing a relatively small frog (high surface to volume ratio) can survive on "skin breathing" only for days and not be dormant like when buried in mud - just quietly resting to keep O2 needs low.

    Many generations later, when the amphibian live more on the land than in the water the one-way system probably does much less than half of the 24 hour daily requirement for O2. Parts of the then less needed one-way system may be incorporated into the two-way system (very slowly in incremental changes, of course, as that is the only way evolution proceeds)** making it more complex but more efficient - a "net benefit" that can be selected for. I don't know but that seems reasonable.

    In closing, as more evidence of how hard, if not impossible, to CONVERT a two-way system into a one-way system look at the whale - they have been water creatures for very long time (millions of years?) yet have not been able to convert back to one way breathing thru their lungs. They have gotten some of the superficial characteristics back - I.e. intake via mouth and exhale via a different path (the "blow hole") but are still two-way flow thru their lungs.

    *Yes I know the day was closer to 20 hours long back then.

    ** Yes I also know that huge differences in body can be achieve by a tiny evolutionary change (in the DNA for example. Wonderous and sometimes viable modes to fruity flies are made by a little radiation.)
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 2, 2014
  11. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    Air is not dense enough to support gills in the way you describe here.

    Lungs don't exist in fish in replacement of gills, they exist in fish in addition to gills. As far as we know they are an additional structure to gills, not a modification of existing gills. Lung fish lungs do not function in the way you seem to think they do.

    Which is the same principle their lungs operate on, as I pointed out earlier, simple gas exchange across a permeable membrane.

    Here's one problem with this - one way plumbing works for two way breathing, but the inverse isn't neccessarily true, especially as lungs get more complex.

    This specific argument is absurd, for a number of reasons. On the one hand, you're assuming that there's any evolutionary pressure driving the evolution of one way breathing in cetaceans. On the other hand you're ignoring the fact that a cetaceans lungs are more complicated than an amphibians.

    What's more, lung breathing in fish doesn't work the way you seem to think it does. Fish don't fill their lungs up to push the air past the gills to absorb the air through the gills. It's inefficient, and what's more, air doesn't have the density to keep the gills open so they can function in the first place.

    The Quensland lungfish is a living fossil, it retains the use of both its lungs and its gills, but it does not use them both at the same time. The queensland lungfishstores the air in its lungs until the DO content of the water falls below some critical value. When the DO content of the water falls below that level (usually because of heat) the lungfish starts absorbing oxygen directly from its lungs, it even diverts blood flow away from its gills to prevent the loss of oxygen from them in low oxygen environments.

    The evidence simply does not support your hypothesis that two way breathing evolved from one way breathing, it points in the opposite direction. Not only that but every objection you have raised has been an argument from personal incredulity - you do not believe it can happen, therefore it can not. The simple fact of the matter is that the macroscopic modifications required to move from two way tidal breathing to one way tidal breathing are not as major as you seem to thin they are, they simply require a rearrangement of existing plumbing. One way plumbing works perfectly well with one way breathing and to add icing to the cake, the mutations required to achieve these rearrangements still exist and are still expressed from time to time in humans who lead perfectly reasonable lives. Equally, your argument regarding cetaceans is absurd because it ignores the fact that a cetaceans lungs are more complex than an amphibians and so the transition is more complex.
     
  12. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    I did not "describe" gills supported by air - I said just the opposite: Said in air gills were "broke" (non functional).

    I had no such hypothesis - Again I said exactly the opposite. That capacity to breath air was added - NOT a development mod from gills / one way breathing system.

    I don't think as you claim. I said, even with capitalization so you would not miss it, that gill fish's one way system was near optimum (in water) after millions of years of refinement. That any random mod to it would be selected against. Thus lung fish would need to ADD new surface to take O2 from the air (or as frogs did use their skin) I even clearly stated that becoming a lung fish would be a slow process, initially supplying only at tiny fraction of their O2 but letting a few have better chance of not being in the 99.99+ % that died when trapped in small pond by receding tide.

    You are making too many assumptions that are contrary to my clearly stated (below) views. Essentially putting words in my mouth that you then show are false. I will not defend your straw men. Glad to see you think them false.

     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 8, 2014
  13. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    You are the only person to have ever talked about air-gills in the first place. Nothing, I repeat, not one single thing I have said even remotely implies the existence of air gills.

    Then you need to think through what you say more carefully.

    Good, I'm glad, however, regardless of your intent, that is what your posts communicated.

    You also stated, repeatedly, that you did not think that one-way air breathing evolved from two-way air breathing.
    You have stated, repeatedly, that you think that birds must have different ancestors than the dinosaurs on this basis.

    The simplest possible lung, is a semi-permeable gas bladder. Perhaps you can explain to us how you propose to get one way air flow through the absorbing part of the lungs using a single tube and a single bladder (the simplest lung possible) - because this is precisely what you're proposing.

    Unless you're now rescinding your previous views?

    The accusation of straw-men implies intent. I had no intent to deliberately misrepresent what you said. I don't have to, the issue you've focused on is not central to my arguments, it's actually irrelevant to my arguments and I don't need it to strengthen mine or defeat yours.

    Take a moment to think about it Billy T. Why would I go out of my way to construct a straw-man that is completely irrelevant to my arguments? In case you've forgotten, my arguments so far are thus:

    1. The transition from two way breathing to one way breathing is not 'digital' it is something that can happen by accumulated small changes.
    2. Intermediate stages between two way tidal breathers like humans and the system birds use exist in species extant today. One example is the alligator which has both one way and two way airflow within the bulk of its lung, but absorbs oxygen into its blood stream through the one way portion.
    -> 2a: The alligator has two large lungs with branched Bronchi.
    -> 2b: The alligator achieves one way air flow through the part of its lungs responsible for gas exchange because of the configuration of the intersection of one of these branches as a consequence of Bernouli's law.
    -> 2c: At the macroscopic level, the change required is the migration of one bronchus and the subsequent rearrangement of its branching point.
    -> 2d: The change required for the transition from an alligators breathing apparatus into a birds is the atrophy of those parts of the lung not directly involved in gas exchange, and their specialization as air sacs.
    3. The transition from two way to one way is supported by the fossil evidence.
    4. The transition from two way to one way is supported by living fossils (the actual point I was making in relation to lung fish).
    5. The potential for the mutations for all of these things to happen still exist in the human genome and these mutations are still spontaneously expressed from time to time.
    6. Cetaceans are irrelevant to the conversation because cetaceans have lungs that are more highly specialized than those of amphibians, consequently, for cetaceans to evolve one way breathing would require a more complicated set of changes than it would an amphibian.

    These are all points you appear to have chosen to ignore in order to falsely accuse me of erecting a straw-man hypothesis.

    I'm doing nothing of the sort, I presented what I considered to be a perfectly reasonable interpretation of your words based on what you had written and the context of the conversation so far. This is perfectly normal communication and is part of the communication process.

    The transmitter ideates what they wish to communicate, formulates the communication, and transmits it. The receiver receives the communication, parses and interprets the communications and makes further decisions based on what they interpret the transmitters intent to be. Sometimes miscommunications happen...

    Tell me something Billy, you are (or have been) married. If every-time you and your spouse had a miscommunication, you had accused her of erecting a straw man argument, how well do you think such a relationship is going to last?

    If I misunderstood the intent behind your post, fine, I apologize, however, I, like most people, will react more favorably to you if you calmly point out that there seems to have been a miscommunication than when you start making shrill accusations.
     
    Last edited: Oct 9, 2014
  14. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Please quote me using the term "air-gills," giving the post number. I don't think anyone has, me included.
    (1) is correct. I have repeatedly said that one-way breathing did not evolve from two-way breathing, especially not in fish as their one-way system was near optimum after millions of years of refinement for getting O2 from water, but I also said it was a "broke system" for fish trapped in small pond by receding ocean tide.

    I have said that any random change to the perfected one-way breathing system would be selected against. That to get a one way system from creature with a two way breathing system you need to ADD at least a small NEW means of getting O2 (without degrading the perfected one-way system) from the environment that is a functional benefit - like for fish trapped by receding tide so it can be the one in < 0.000,1 that does not die before the tide returns. (Many tidal pool fish do survive if the pool is still getting O2 from the air but if the last inch of pool's water seeps into the sand before the higher tide return, then a cruel and fast selection process begins.)

    On (2) No. look at my first post here - It notes that evolving one way breathing from two-way breathing dinosaurs is a problem that must be explained. I have even stated that birds may have dinosaurs as their ancestors, but when I did so, I noted that even essentially identical structure is NOT proof that one creature evolved from the earlier one.

    I illustrated this with the octopus's eye - identical to the human eye, except the retina is better placed behind the supporting structure (blood vessels and network of nerves that block light and cut the image into very many separated pieces that make huge computational task for the V1 area of the human brain to connect together correctly.) I.e. with each new fixation (several each second) V1 must solve a jig-saw puzzle with more than a million pieces! (and at that stage no color or common motion or identity of the pieces is even known.) To really understand the magnitude of this problem, imagine you are blind - see no common motion (found in V5) see no colors (found in V4) and have less than o.5 seconds to correctly assemble a million piece jig-saw puzzle whose edges don't even fit together due to the blocked out gaps in the image - you fill them in.
    I wish you would quote me instead of telling IN YOUR WORDS, what I "propose," "assume," "discuss", etc. as you so frequently do. To my POV that is "putting words in my mouth." I always quote you - I never re-phrase what you. said.

    I will in this case note that I have said that I have seen guppies (I keep in 1 gallon mayonnaise jar, not well oxygenated passively the thru relatively small air/water surface) occasionally seem to be opening their mouth to the air. (Perhaps that is common and why they are called guppies.")
    To be honest, I have not tried to carefully follow your line of thought. My posts mainly either tell my POV or defend myself from things like your assertion that "I have been wrong" (disagreed with your understanding of what I have been consistently stating?) "for two days now" etc. Same reason I am forced to make this post.
    Legally twice, at least 22 years each, but several times in multi-year long relationships. (Several while still married to first wife, but not living with her. I was generous with her - gave house she sold for $300,000+ decades ago. We did not divorce as then her cheap medical coverage via my APL/JHU group plan would end. We divorced when she decided to occupy the home in Oslo she inherited from her mother and thus had free high quality medical coverage. Every one of these long term relationships wanted to marry me but I explained I could not as was married and not yet wealthy enough to afford two wives. That I had to treat mother of my children well, etc. One said: "OK, I understand, but want a baby by you." We separated soon there after - I told her she was smart and good looking - could find even better than me, and that as her "biological clock" was ticking, I stepped out of the picture.
    I did not make it caps or bold. See end of my post 89. I.e. not "shrill" I ended that post by just re-posting parts of early post where I stated exactly the opposite to what you were "misunderstanding." You don't need to apologize - just quote me in the future instead of re-word my communications according to your understanding of them.

    BTW, several days ago I apologized to you in another thread in which you removed my post. It was very closely related to the subject of nitrates in water. (Told the main source and that last year in the Gulf of Mexico those nitrates made 7000 acre O2-free dead zone.) but my post was not specifically related to the technology of measuring these water concentrations.

    You are with little doubt by far the most qualified poster to comment on that narrow subject. If my very closely related comments were too far off subject, you effectively closed the thread. No one can even "dot an i" to improve your post.

    Better, I think, would have been to reply by PM and delete the thread as leaving it open is sort of a trap - I spent a lot of time to getting documentation and quotes from even a Nobel Prize winner telling that nitrate source (alcohol from corn) was more polluting, made greater global warming than just using gasoline. (and many other reasons not repeated here why that costly program should not even exist.)

    I admit I was initially mad that all that effort you killed with a few clicks. I posted nitrate in water facts the voters need to know.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 9, 2014
  15. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    No. For one thing you've taken the comment out of context, for another you've misinterpreted what I said.
    We're explicitly and implicitly talking about air-breathing here. The fact that fish are one way water breathers is irrelevant to whether one way air breathing evolved from two way air breathing. This is one of the sources of our miscommunication.

    The only person who is saying that 'random changes' to a 'perfected one-way breathing system' are necessary is you, so here you're arguing against yourself.

    Remember, we're talking about air-breathers, gills are irrelevant to the discussion.

    No you don't. That's the whole point I've been making with regards to Alligator lungs. The only modification required to alligator lungs to move from a two way tidal breather to a one way tidal breather is a minor re-arrangement of internal structure.

    The same post that states that you didn't read the article, so you don't know if your concerns are discussed or addressed? That first post.

    And I explained to you, on the one hand why the argument you presented is a fallacy and irrelevant, and on the other hand why the argument you presented was simply wrong.

    I'm pointing out a logical implication of what you have explicitly stated. That's not the same thing as putting words in your mouth.

    Guppies have swim bladders, which evolved from early lungs.
    In some teleosts, the swim bladder is still connected to the gut which is why they come to the surface to gulp air.

    It's not just a matter of caps or bolding.

    Right - the OP was asking about experimental techniques for field work, but you were wanting discuss probable sources (which are catchment dependent anyway) and effects. I haven't looked at that thread since I last posted, so if you edited your post I missed it.

    Which reminds me, I never did get back to it with any literature on macrophyte surveying techniques.

    No, because there is plenty of scope for discussion in relation to experimental techniques - for example, rather than taking quadrats to measure macrophyte distribution, depending on the macrophyte an aerial photo analysis might suffice.

    Then start a thread in Earth Sciences discussing the sources and impacts of Nitrates in the environment, it's a fascinating topic. I can even Do it for you if you want using your post in that thread as the OP.
     
  16. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks. If you can recover the post you deleted, with the quotes from links to documentation of my statements, please do so and start new thread. I tried to do that but when I clicked on “show” nothing appeared I could copy.

    Your “No.” was answer to my request for a quote of me using the term “air-gills” and post number of it. I have no idea what “context” I omitted and I certainly did not misinterpret what you said – I never “interpret” for you, or paraphrase you, but always quote what you said; however, I did not quote your second sentence of the two that started your post 90. They were:
    “You are the only person to have ever talked about air-gills in the first place. Nothing, I repeat, not one single thing I have said even remotely implies the existence of air gills.”

    I did not quote 2nd sentence or respond to it even though it seems to imply I had accused you of speaking of “air-gills” which I had not, nor did you AFAIK. I chose to just let that insinuation pass without comment.
    --------
    I want to know what context I omitted. To make it easy for you to be clear on that, here is the full text of our starting exchanges we have had in a series of post:

    Post 88: Trippy said: “Air is not dense enough to support gills in the way you describe here. “
    After quoting Billy T's:
    “Yes, exactly as I would suspect the first two-way amphibian lungs would be simple additions to the one-way breathing (in mouth 0ut gills) of the fish they evolved from; and for many generations the one-way system still provided most of the O2 needed (but not obviously in the tiny fraction of their 24* hour day these first generation were on land).”

    Post 89: Billy T said: “I did not "describe" gills supported by air - I said just the opposite: Said in air gills were "broke" (non functional).

    I had no such hypothesis - Again I said exactly the opposite. That capacity to breath air was added - NOT a development mod from gills / one way breathing system.

    I don't think as you claim. I said, even with capitalization so you would not miss it, that gill fish's one way system was near optimum (in water) after millions of years of refinement. That any random mod to it would be selected against. Thus lung fish would need to ADD new surface to take O2 from the air (or as frogs did use their skin) I even clearly stated that becoming a lung fish would be a slow process, initially supplying only at tiny fraction of their O2 but letting a few have better chance of not being in the 99.99+ % that died when trapped in small pond by receding tide.

    You are making too many assumptions that are contrary to my clearly stated (below) views. Essentially putting words in my mouth that you then show are false. I will not defend your straw men. Glad to see you think them false.”
    After quoting more of Trippy's post88:
    “Air is not dense enough to support gills in the way you describe here.
    Lungs don't exist in fish in replacement of gills, they exist in fish in addition to gills. As far as we know they are an additional structure to gills, not a modification of existing gills. Lung fish lungs do not function in the way you seem to think they do. ...
    The evidence simply does not support your hypothesis that two way breathing evolved from one way breathing.”


    Then in post 90, Trippy said: “You are the only person to have ever talked about air-gills in the first place. Nothing, I repeat, not one single thing I have said even remotely implies the existence of air gills.”
    After quoting Billy T's: I did not "describe" gills supported by air - I said just the opposite: Said in air gills were "broke" (non functional).
    I had no such hypothesis - Again I said exactly the opposite. That capacity to breath air was added - NOT a development mod from gills / one way breathing system. ...
    Rest is already given above.
    --------------------
    If the “omitted” context you accuse me of is something not given above, please find it and tell the post it is in. I will try to find time to respond to rest of your post 92, later, but first I need to know what context you think I have omitted.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 10, 2014
  17. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    Already done.

    I really can't be bothered getting into this with you. It's irrelevant, it's a distraction.

    Point blank, I was never actually attributing the statement to you. Here's an idea, rather than throwing all these distractions up, why don't you address something relevant to the conversation.
     
  18. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks for recovery of my deleted post.
    On (2) Ok - I must have misunderstood the first sentence of your post 90 reply to me, which was:
    "You are the only person to have ever talked about air-gills in the first place." but I don't see how thinking you were not speaking of me, in a reply to me, is possible.

    On (3) I don't have anything more to add after my first few posts. My main two points made were:
    (A) that evolution normally proceeds by tiny random beneficial changes not "hopeful monsters." Thus some changes like which side of a bone a nerve goes by can not "evolve" to the other side. That is what I called a "binary change" (not analogue changes with nerve moving 0.0001% of the way to the other side each generation) and
    (B) Greatly the same structures in two different creatures suggest one may have evolved from the other but do not imply that must have happened. I Illustrated that with the essentially identical eye of man and octopus, except of one binary difference - which side of the retina the network of nerves collecting the photo sensitive cell out puts are on. (Blood vessels are on same side as that neural network in both man an octopus.)

    I then commented on how much better the octopus design is. (No "blind spot," no need to try to correctly join the thousand of parts of every image that are separated by the shadows of blood vessels, which is done in man's V1 and made especially hard as no color (learned in V4) or motion (learned in V5) information is yet available and due to the "blood vessel cuts" the edges of the pieces of this complex jig-saw puzzle don't even fit together exactly - you automatically guess to fill in the gaps those shadows made.

    The proof of this "guessed filling in" is easy to demonstrate: With one eye closed and other fixated so central part of vertical line crosses the blind spot but that part only of line is green - rest is red. You will perceive a continuous red line.

    On (1) I agree - ALL of my posts since the first few have been forced by you: - Forcing me to try to correct your not fully correct re-statements of what I posted:
    You, always in your words, instead of quoting my posts, told what I had "assumed," told what I "thought," told what I was "presuming," what my "hypothesis" was, what I was "describing," what I was "claiming" etc. - Pick any of these, and I will tell the post number in which you made those assertions about what I had posted.

    Again: I agree, our exchanges have mainly been a distraction / detour in the thread. As I made long ago my two points, I don't intend to even open this thread again.

    By later edit: Again thanks for recovering and posting the deleted post (and for the excellent, informative title you gave it.)
    Any one interested can read it here: http://www.sciforums.com/threads/so...-nitrite-contamination-of-fresh-water.142751/
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 10, 2014
  19. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

    Messages:
    10,890
    I don't know how I can be any clearer.

    And I specifically and axplicitly addressed this by pointing out that if we consider the alligator lung as a trasnsitional form then there is no binary change required in the rearrangement of the lung , on the poviso that the rearrangement of the lung at the macroscopic scale takes place before the microscopic scale has become too complicated.

    And I countered this by pointing out that Dinosaurs and birds have a far closer relationship than octopuses and humans. Dinosaurs and Birds are the same clade, where the only thing humans and Ocotpuses have in common is they're both members of the animal kingdom.

    You have not addressed ANY of my counter arguments, and what's more your arguments are arguments from personal ignorance on two levels.
    1. You can not imagine how it happens so you imagine it can't.
    2. You still haven't read the article in the OP or any of the material linked to within it.

    I'm well aware of how the human eye and the human brain work, as well as the various tricks and illusions that take advantage of how it fills in missing data, thankyou.

    Welcome to communication Billy. It's imperfect, and whether you realize it or not, you're doing the exact same thing you're bitching at me about. You're the one that is perpetuating this aspect of the discussion at the expense of addressing the counter arguments I have offered.

    Gosh Billy, I'm sorry I got, you know, busy, and it took me a few days to reply to your post.

    Here's an idea, how about instead of, once again, bitching at me about the imperfection of communication between two human beings in a written mdeium, you actually address the arguments I have presented relevant to the OP.

    That's the point that you've missed in amongst all of this - sure, I'm responding to your commentary about the flaws of human communication, however, I keep trying to redirect the conversation back to the topic. You, on the other hand seem intent on ignoring these redirections in favour of getting down and dirty.

    Thanks.
     

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