Most British scientists: Richard Dawkins' work misrepresents science

Oh yeah, and that ungainly anti-camouflage plumage must have so helped it to survive until mating time! And do further elaborate on the aspect you conveniently left out - the survival advantage of all those innumerable intermediate stages when choosy females would have been rather uninterested in the odd scruffy bits randomly appearing here and there.

 

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It was a hinderance, thus proving his fitness. There is the obvious limiting factor, which is that if the plumage gets too big, the males become more vulnerable to predation, limiting reproductive success.

I can rather easily imagine a gradual pathway to big feathers. It takes energy and good health to develop a thick brightly colored coat of feathers. Many birds select on this fact alone. So, slightly bigger feathers could, in the minds of some female birds, make those males more attractive as a mate.

 

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Your answer seems rational but just highlights the infinite 'flexibility' in neo-Darwinist thinking. It's always possible to concoct a reason why some bizarre feature could have survival value. Never mind that in most other cases the argument goes that camouflage/speed/parsimony in general are the 'obvious' survival traits nature selects to weed out the unfit. And I have no argument against natural selection working - but it's overall power has been greatly overstated by evolutionists.

 

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Birds can still fly away, so they can afford some unwieldy plumage. Evolution is very flexible. But it doesn't contradict itself. Female birds need more of a reason than "he exists" to make a determination of fitness. Their investment in pregnancy far exceeds that of the male, so it's important to them. Being able to make such determinations would obviously confer a significant survival advantage to her kids, which she also has to raise, often alone.

 

I am trying to concoct which bizarre feature some post could have which allows them to survive and mate.

The post seem to have no overall power to be naturally selected for weeding out or any power to evolve.

In my best guessing mode I would compare them to the flu virus.

Get inside a healthy cell, hijack the reproductive system, overwhelm the cell until it dies, leave nothing substantial in its place then hibernate waiting for the next rumble.

Humpty.

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Dear Humpty. First advice - try not to fall too often. It's a known risk often contributing to cerebral damage.

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Back to not-particularly-on-topic-sort-of-but-who-cares-by-now. Is the flu virus angling at 'if there's a God why would He/She/It/the One or Ones be so malevolent as to invent a flu virus?'
Don't know. I'm not privy to such plans. A guess though - viruses do help to keep populations fit and healthy in general. Limited natural selection at work.
Was there something about posts - maybe my posts - that particularly bugs you dear Michael? Or were you on about fence posts or something like that?

 

Nope. It presumes, instead, that those claiming to see evidence for ID have some identifiable criteria for such evidence such that it will support an actual argument, some aspects of reality that indicate ID - and therefore, by necessity, some other aspects that would contradict their argument, not support it.

Because if you don't have that, you don't have an argument from evidence at all - which in turn casts doubt on the existence of "evidence" as such in the first place: if everything possible is evidence, then nothing is. And the ID crowd claims to be arguing from evidence, sooner or later.

Although repeating your references to James Tours excellent but largely irrelevant description of the complexity of currently living beings suggests an actual argument is a long way away.

Nobody but fundie Abrahamic monotheists either talks or thinks like that. Yet another brick on the scale pan of assessment.

Inherently? Maybe if it evolved. Design is not inherently complex - the greater the skill of the designer, the less complicated the design, is a general presumption and common pattern.

That depends - the latter stages just prior to the emergence of modern living beings, maybe, but those would have been products of billions of generations of mutually interacting evolutionary developments. A great deal of complexity would be expected by any Darwinian theoretician.

Your point?

 

And then either verify that role via experiment and field investigation, and often measure that value - actually quantify the benefit;

or contrariwise, discover that the concocted reason was not in fact a contributing one, and regretfully discard it in this instance.

Starting with a clarification: it's not survival of the individual organism that is valued. The individual organism is not what survives, and is often cheerfully and ruthlessly sacrificed on the spot for the survival value of its demise.

 

Simply put, its no more then abiogensis and evolution, both being of course certain, simply by the fact that we are here.
Your magical pixie is an unscientific, comforting, but totally mythical story along with the whole ID debacle as has been shown in numerous videos/links in this thread.

Unscientific crap for starters?

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This is science you know.

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ps: I just gave a "like" to iceaura...is that OK with you qreeus?
Hmmm I see river and yourself have swapped a couple of likes!

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Wow! What one could make of that little company of ghosts, goblins, Bigfoot, probing Aliens, and ID ers!

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Again coming in to bat on rpenner's behalf? Brownie points accumulating no doubt. Do you never tire of repeatedly spewing out such fatuous bald assertions that merely superficially seem logical?

The expected mischaracterization. Complexity was not the main topic. Which was the total implausibility of naturalistic chemical synthesis of e.g. the minimal needed carbohydrates, nucleotides, lipids, etc. For all the painfully technical real-world synthetic chemist examples given. Peltzer encapsulated it more compactly - Maillard reactions in particular, but not exclusively, will screw up nature's chances of getting anywhere useful on the road to life, every time.

It's evident by now your partisan pals higher up will take no action to curb that continued snide insinuating.

Irrelevant at best. All KNOWN biology is hugely complex. Speculate about totally unknown hypothetical prebiotic 'self-replicating primitive thingys' all you want. No evidence such either did or could exist.

That you are a vexatious Troll with nothing better to offer than repetitive facile assertions and underhanded insinuations. Example - I waited in vain for a sensible, honest response to my #736. No surprise there.

 

Another example of mischaracterization. Where did I suggest only individuals were involved in natural selection? The very notion is an absurdity.

 

Seems this thread has now developed into the usual conspiracy nonsense so often claimed by cranks quacks and god bothering IDer's

http://scitechdaily.com/new-evidence-on-the-origins-of-life-on-earth/

New Evidence on the Origins of Life on Earth:
June 3, 2015
Papers linked to the above.......

http://www.pnas.org/content/112/24/7484.abstract

Temperature dependence of amino acid hydrophobicities

Significance
Systematic relationships have long been recognized between the hydrophobicities of amino acids and (i) their tendencies to be located at the exposed surfaces of globular and membrane proteins and (ii) the composition of their triplets in the genetic code. Here, we show that the same coding relationships are compatible with the high temperatures at which life is widely believed to have originated. An accompanying paper reports that these two properties appear to be encoded separately by bases in the acceptor stem and the anticodon of tRNA.

Abstract
The hydrophobicities of the 20 common amino acids are reflected in their tendencies to appear in interior positions in globular proteins and in deeply buried positions of membrane proteins. To determine whether these relationships might also have been valid in the warm surroundings where life may have originated, we examined the effect of temperature on the hydrophobicities of the amino acids as measured by the equilibrium constants for transfer of their side-chains from neutral solution to cyclohexane (Kw>c). The hydrophobicities of most amino acids were found to increase with increasing temperature. Because that effect is more pronounced for the more polar amino acids, the numerical range of Kw>c values decreases with increasing temperature. There are also modest changes in the ordering of the more polar amino acids. However, those changes are such that they would have tended to minimize the otherwise disruptive effects of a changing thermal environment on the evolution of protein structure. Earlier, the genetic code was found to be organized in such a way that—with a single exception (threonine)—the side-chain dichotomy polar/nonpolar matches the nucleic acid base dichotomy purine/pyrimidine at the second position of each coding triplet at 25 °C. That dichotomy is preserved at 100 °C. The accessible surface areas of amino acid side-chains in folded proteins are moderately correlated with hydrophobicity, but when free energies of vapor-to-cyclohexane transfer (corresponding to size) are taken into consideration, a closer relationship becomes apparent.

 

Hi Q-reeus.
The female is well camouflaged and is rather brab in comparison to the male.
And the male with his feathers down does not stand out too much but certainly more than the female.
This arrangement may mean the females had a better chance to survive than the males, however for a male to survive he probably had to be clever and attractive, much the same for human males, and would have had many females to mate with, similar to humans.
But I must say looking at the display of the male with his feathers up one could imagine an artistic designer.
Anyways I did look into the ID concept and think I gave it a fair go.
Its hot here must be over 100.
Alex

 

and this one.......
http://www.pnas.org/content/112/24/7489.abstract

tRNA acceptor stem and anticodon bases form independent codes related to protein folding:

Significance
The universal genetic code is the earliest point to which we can trace biological inheritance. Earlier work hinted at a relationship between the codon bases and the physical properties of the 20 amino acids that dictate the 3D conformations of proteins in solution. Here, we show that acceptor stems and anticodons, which are at opposite ends of the tRNA molecule, code, respectively, for size and polarity. These two distinct properties of the amino acid side-chains jointly determine their preferred locations in folded proteins. The early appearance of an acceptor stem code based on size, β-branching, and carboxylate groups might have favored the appearance of antiparallel peptides that have been suggested to have a special affinity for RNA.

Abstract
Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases recognize tRNA anticodon and 3′ acceptor stem bases. Synthetase Urzymes acylate cognate tRNAs even without anticodon-binding domains, in keeping with the possibility that acceptor stem recognition preceded anticodon recognition. Representing tRNA identity elements with two bits per base, we show that the anticodon encodes the hydrophobicity of each amino acid side-chain as represented by its water-to-cyclohexane distribution coefficient, and this relationship holds true over the entire temperature range of liquid water. The acceptor stem codes preferentially for the surface area or size of each side-chain, as represented by its vapor-to-cyclohexane distribution coefficient. These orthogonal experimental properties are both necessary to account satisfactorily for the exposed surface area of amino acids in folded proteins. Moreover, the acceptor stem codes correctly for β-branched and carboxylic acid side-chains, whereas the anticodon codes for a wider range of such properties, but not for size or β-branching. These and other results suggest that genetic coding of 3D protein structures evolved in distinct stages, based initially on the size of the amino acid and later on its compatibility with globular folding in water.

 

In actual fact just more evidence of the fact that abiogenisis took place at least once and Evolution carried on, or to put that in more down to Earth language, just more proof that Man invented God, not that God invented man.
Science is awesomely wonderful. You silly IDer's need to get over it.

 

Getting back on track again....

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Along with the above science popularisers, I would add that we may include a couple of Sci/Fi Authors? The two who immediatley come to mind are Authur C Clarke and Andrei Asimov: I believe both did as much for science as the great entertaiment their Sci/Fi books gave to all...Clarke in particular, made some astounding predictions that proved to be true, including and I,m going from memory so please correct me if I'm wrong, the Internet and communication Satellites.

 

The following is a Q+A interview of Richard Dawkins and Laurence Krauss, by
Steve Paikin:

The amazing thing in this Interview is how many times both Dawkins and Krauss referred to Carl Sagan.......
http://www.age-of-the-sage.org/richard_dawkins/science_vs_religion_quotes.html

 

I wear a helmet but yes the risk is still there. If I can find a good anchor point I will wear a fall protection harness and lanyard.

Thanks for caring for my health.

No.

No and no.

Humpty Dumpty - Poe

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No question in various cases fairly convincing evidence and/or good arguments exists for descent with modification leading to new features or even entirely new species. That's all in the domain of long existent DNA-based cellular biology. By far the major hurdle remains OOL. Unseasonably cool here.

 

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Artistic design.
Alex