The costa rican moth caterpillar

Discussion in 'Biology & Genetics' started by Dr Lou Natic, Apr 9, 2003.

  1. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

    Messages:
    24,066
    my explanation then

    another possible scenario:

    we know that there are many moths with 'eyes' (fake eye decorations) on their wings. Not that many people have problems with seeing that this could have evolved.

    let us just take it from there. We have the 'eyes'. The eyes are more efficient the further away from the body they are. There is a period of selection for this feature: the eyes are now quite far from the body.

    The eyes work better with high contrast: The area around the eyes gets darker.
    At the same time the survival rate is higher if the main body remains camouflaged. Hence an darker area with bright eyes evolves with a more camouflaged body.
    They eyes also work better if the shape is similar to the shape of the head of a snake. We have a selective pressure towards shape.

    in the end we have some finetuning, because the moth lives in a area with a specific dangerous snake. The more it resembles the snake the fitter the moth.

    all these processes could have occurred separately and still be functional or they could have happened at the same time. There are so many possiblities that it is often impossible to tell for sure how an adaptation occurs. But it is usually always possible to think of several distinct intermediate steps that could explain the end-adaptation. It can be difficult though, and if a structure serves several purposes at the same time or changes function several times it might be almost impossible.
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. Dr Lou Natic Unnecessary Surgeon Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,574
    I think it can be agreed then that for this mimmicry to be so accurate that this moth must have an incredibly long line of ancestry, it must be a direct descendent of the first moth to ever have spots. That first spotted moth must have appeared at least hundreds of millions of years ago.
    Moths don't breed particularly fast.
    The amount of trial and error that would be required for this caterpillar to stumble onto a perfect mimmicry by chance is mind blowing. An almost infinite number of possibilities would need to be tried before you got it perfect because we know it wasn't aiming for viper.
    It got the colour, shape and texture perfect and it even behaves like a viper.
    All this developing due to random mutations occuring in new generations, taking what works and then randomly building on that again, taking what works again etc etc, is alot for a simple mind like mine to comprehend.
    I believe it but thats got to take a HELL of alot of time.
    Makes me realise how insanely short my time on this planet has been and will be....
     
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

    Messages:
    24,066
    it is not as bad as you think it is.

    what's fast? if the generation time is one year than a lot can be done in a 1000 years.

    you do not need an infinite number of possibilities. You need eyes. You need a specific colour. you need an extension of the body. You need a change in shape of the body.

    You do not need any new genes for this. Just some minor changes in the development of the animal. Some adjustments in the developmental regulatory networks and voila! Changes in shape really need minimal changes in genetic information.

    Some existing behaviour can then be adapted to mimic some elements of snake behaviour.
     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    Leaf Insects

    I have a section on Camouflage (or mimicry) in Chapter 15 of God Gametes. This section makes reference to and “arms race’ that Richard Dawkins argues in The Blind Watchmaker drives species to adopt more complexity than would be expected by environmental pressure.

    From Chap 15 of God Gametes that can be downloaded free from www-e-publishingaustralia.com

    With camouflage we can again see the result of a one-to-one battle between predator and prey yet it is difficult to believe that a leaf insect on which even the veins of a leaf have been accurately duplicated, could be accomplished by an arms race. The Darwinian belief is that survival of the leaf insect relates directly to how well its camouflage can deceive predator birds. They argue that the copy of the leaf became so good because any imperfection could have been spotted and their true identity revealed.
    It is true that many leaf insects will be eaten and thereby fail to pass on genes because a bird has recognised them for what they really are. What is difficult to explain is why the copy of a leaf on the body of the insect needs to be so good when its legs and eyes are clearly visible. Surely there could not be any advantage in perfecting every detail of the leaf when a close examination by their predator will certainly reveal their true identity.
    But the arms race theory argues that the one-to-one battle between improvement in insect camouflage and the improved sight of a bird drove the leaf insect to near perfect representation of a leaf. For this argument to be true we need to accept the following:

    · Birds that prey on leaf insects can spot even a tiny flaw in the copy of a leaf.
    · A less than perfect copy of a leaf on the body of a leaf insect confers a survival disadvantage to one individual when all members of the species have poor quality camouflage for legs and eyes.

    Even if we accept the above we also need to believe that leaf insects were able to create such perfect copy by way of mutation and random selection.
    The Darwinian argument could only be true if birds were consistently eliminating from the population of leaf insects, individuals with less than perfect design. But natural selection has also driven the eyespots common on the wings of moths and butterflies. According to this argument a spot on the wing of an early ancestor to moths or butterflies must have accidentally looked a bit like an eye. When a bird approached it saw the markings and mistook the insect for a predator and flew away. So moths and butterflies with these markings had a selective advantage and over many generations an arms race drove the spots to look more and more like the eyes of creatures that prey on birds (such as cats). If therefore the eyesight of birds was so good that it drove the leaf insect to such a perfect camouflage, it is surprising that they mistake moths and butterflies for predators.
    There needs to be some reason why leaf insects have evolved a camouflage far better than could be justified by selection pressure. We also need to know how they did it. Is it seriously suggested that selection is solely responsible for such an exact duplication? Did random selection hone into place the very last detail of vein of leaf so perfectly copied by these creatures? Or is Dawkins arguing that for some strange reason birds could not see eyes and legs but developed a healthy appetite only for individuals with body-markings not exactly proportional to a real leaf?
    Even if eyes and legs were as well camouflaged as the body we would still have to accept that insects having a slight imperfection must have had true identity revealed to extremely observant birds, to be eaten, thereby failing to pass on genes of the flawed copies to offspring. Should we believe this did not really matter because in the broad picture leaf insects came up with a random mutant gene that mastered the design? Did natural selection then design a perfect leaf insect so over-zealous birds that memorise every last detail on the veins of real leaves could no longer spot the difference?
     
  8. river-wind Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,671
    don't discount the 0.000000001% chance that a moth happened to have one really screwed up gammete, and the child just happened to have a weird growth off it's but which looked exactly like a viper. from 0-60 in 1 generation. Not likely, but always possible.


    and for those tryignt o figure out how long these things have had to evolve this trait, keep in mind that modern vipers have only been around for so long, so this species of moth propbably evolved post-that.

    There is also a 0.000000001% chance that the moths looked like this for other reasons before they found themselves living near vipers, and the similarities just allowed for another reason to keep the look around.

    There needs to be some reason why leaf insects have evolved a camouflage far better than could be justified by selection pressure.
    maybe the birds in question have eyes which are better suited for distinquishing green color differences than brown/black.

    How good are you at telling the sexes of trees from a distance? does that mean anything more than you have no inherent need to do so, so you have not evolved the ability? I doubt it. If suddenly the human race had to know if a pine was a male or a female (say male began to seep sap which was deadly to humans), we would either die off as a species, or quickly learn how to identify the tree's sex from a distance. those individuals who were better at it would live to reproduce, creating offspring which are on average, better then the last generation. over a hundred million years, assuming no other evolution was prompted, we would have a species who doesn't even think twice about being able to identify pine tree sex at a glance.

    If the leaf insects suddenly died out, I bet that bird would suddenly get better at identifying moths vs/ preditors, as they would need a new main food source.


    And don't forget that often times eye spots aren't mimicing preditors, but are mimicing the creature's own eyes. a preditor bird will approch, and peck out the "eye", assuming that this will render the thing harmless. but instead of dying, the ting keeps flapping around, and maybe even flying, as if it was perfectly fine. What sort of wacked out monter can take a beak to the eye, and be fine?? It looks like a moth, but it must not be! Moth die when you peak out their eyes! I've done it before! I'm getting the hell out of here!
    It's fear of the unknown, which is also pushed by evolution. Those aniumals who run away from something dangerous because they didn't know what it was is more likley to survive to reproduce.



    I honestly wouldn't mind discovering that God exsists, and evolution is wrong. but I don't see any serious holes in evolution yet. You look at things deeply enough, often times the most simple answer to a "how did it evolve" question is just a conglomeration of randomness, sex, environment. Once you get to that answer, only a few more questions crop up. Once you add God into the mix, more questions than answers arise. And that seems to make it less likely for me.
     
    Last edited: Apr 24, 2003
  9. river-wind Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,671
    as for the octopi - wow that's awsome!!

    Keep in mind that octopi are exceedingly smart- my Ichthyology professor in College was doing his graduate work on grunter fish (they have two bone plates which they vibrate to make a grunting sound- can be found along the eastern US coastlin between NJ and Georgia or so (estimate)).

    He came into work and one of his fish was gone. 'Stupid pranks' he though. oh, well, not a terrible problem, he had alot of fish to work with.

    the next day, another fish was missing. Same thing the following day.


    so he set up a video camera.

    You'll never believe what he caught on the tape- the octopus that a collegue was studying, in an aquarium across the room, reached out of the fencing covering it's cange, unlatched it, opened it, dropped to the floor, across the room, up the table, opened the aquarium w/ the grunters, grabbed one, *re-closed the grunter's cage*, back across the room, into it's own aquarium again, and then *closed and re-latched it's own cage*.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    If this octupi had not re-latched it's own cage, they would have figured out what was going on. if the octopus had stayed in the grunter's aquarium, which I would have expected (lots of food), it would have been caught imeediatly. But for whatever reason (patterned behavior, actuall logical deduction, or something else entirely (mayby his cage was the only one w/ the right salinity levels, and he re-lacthed the cage top because he had to un-latch it to escape, it was just a backwards pattern. no logic involved)), he actually covered the tracks of his crime.

    astounding.
     
  10. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    river-wind

    >>> I honestly wouldn't mind discovering that God exists, and evolution is wrong. <<<

    These two are not mutually exclusive. No sensible person would deny that evolution happened. The questions are “why” and “how” did it happen. It may have been because of a God or there may have been a reason (or no reason) that it is impossible for us to contemplate.

    >>> Once you add God into the mix, more questions than answers arise. And that seems to make it less likely for me. <<<

    You can try to simplify the big questions but by doing so you will inevitably come up with bullshit answers. You only have to look at our history to see that? I would take the opposite view. I do not think we will ever be able to answer the really big questions like “who created it” or “why is there anything at all”. God Gametes tries to answer “what are we doing here” and that is a very big question. I will be very happy if I have made a tiny scratch on the surface of that one.
     
  11. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    Displays

    From Chapter 15 of God Gametes which can be downloaded free from www.e-publishingaustralia.com

    Displays

    Deer antlers provide a good example to explain displays. The male deer has large antlers that in earlier stages of development were probably used for defence but have evolved into a camouflage to look like branches of a tree. Antlers appear to have been driven by an arms race and would now impact in a negative way on the survival prospects of their species. They are certainly a disadvantage when running, something extremely important for deer defence. Large antlers are only on the male and are far too cumbersome to be useful for fending off prey or help in a physical contest against rival deer. It is possible they still assist in camouflage but it is more likely they have evolved into a display.
    Deer antlers confer a number of disadvantages outweighed by any benefit derived by camouflage or defence. But his objective is not simply to survive but to evolve greater complexity. His display is saying two things. Firstly he must project the image that his genes are so good that he has survived easily. His message says, “Look at all those other weaklings that do not have to carry all this weight on their heads. Carrying the heaviest antlers makes me the best. If life continues good, you get to produce the offspring of the best looking buck in the herd but if the environment should change for the worse, it is a fair bet that some of my progeny will inherit my strength but not cumbersome antlers.”
    He is also saying, “Not only am I strong but you see I am in touch with our EGP (external gene pool). I collaborate with genes of many other species so can pass on good things to progeny, longer legs, sharper teeth, anything they’ll need to face tomorrow’s environment.”
    A strict interpretation of the Darwinian theory of evolution would suggest that the long horns of deer or tail of the peacock is advertising a survival liability, not an advantage. To interpret displays as presenting physical features that confer a survival advantage is to assume that nature is guilty of false advertising. It is saying that these species have mistaken a trait for a benefit that is in fact a liability. We need to recognise that species that display are successful. They have been displaying for millions of years and continue to evolve even more elaborate displays.
    Darwinists misinterpret the meaning of displays because they misinterpret the meaning of life. If they assume that the reason for life is simply to survive, they have to argue that displays confer a survival advantage. But if the reason for life is to evolve greater complexity, an individual with an elaborate display is honestly representing the quality of genes that will pass to offspring. If the doe or peahen want progeny to evolve greater complexity, be able to adapt to environmental change and have access to genes not currently available in their species gene pool, they are very wise to be attracted to a male’s elaborate display.
    Displays are not primarily designed to advertise health or well adapted physical traits, but access to the external gene pool. In a changing world where species are programmed for greater complexity, availability of genetic resources will confer a greater survival advantage than a well-adapted gene pool.
     
  12. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

    Messages:
    24,066
    Re: Displays

    you misinterpretet darwinian evolution by stating it is about survival. It is about reproductive success, and if an impressive tail garantees more offspring than there can be selection for this feature, even if this means that the mail peacock is more obvious to predators.
     
  13. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    spuriousmonkey

    >>> you misinterpretet darwinian evolution by stating it is about survival. It is about reproductive success … <<<

    Give me a break? If a creature survives it is going to reproduce and that is obviously what was intended to be the main thrust of my argument.

    >>> … if an impressive tail garantees more offspring there can be selection for this feature, even if this means that the mail peacock is more obvious to predators. <<<

    I don’t think natural selection would drive the evolution of displays that confer such obvious liabilities? Your argument is saying that there has been a big miscalculation here. That species select a trait believing it is an advantage; but in fact it is a liability. I am of the belief that nature is more clever than that and any confusion relating to this issue can best be attributed to our own ignorance and not of nature.
     
  14. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

    Messages:
    24,066
    You are merely stating your opinion that an impressive tail is a liability. Reality shows that female peacocks pick the mail with the most impressive tails and display.

    edit: if you do a search you might find out that sexual selection is a topic that is quite well researched and supported by data.
     
    Last edited: Apr 25, 2003
  15. ElectricFetus Sanity going, going, gone Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,523
    spuriousmonkey,

    Good job, keep it up!

    Robert Jameson,

    God gametes this, God gametes that, look everyone I'm my own PR machine!

    river-wind,

    Funny, but what you getting at?
     
    Last edited: Apr 25, 2003
  16. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    Sexual Selection

    >>> Reality shows that female peacocks pick the mail with the most impressive tails and display. <<<

    For heavens sake!! I know the peahen is picking the male with the most impressive display. But why the hell is she doing it when it can only confer a survival (reproductive) liability on her progeny?

    >>> if you do a search you might find out that sexual selection is a topic that is quite well researched and supported by data. <<<

    I address the subject of sexual selection in several sections of God Gametes. The following quote is from Chapter 13

    Is Intelligence Sexy?

    In The Blind Watchmaker Dawkins discusses the evolution of human intelligence in terms of ‘sexual selection’ and ‘explosive evolution’. This concept is discussed in more detail in the ‘Arms Race’ in Chapter 15 but the basic concept is that there may arise in any population a sexual preference for a long tail on a bird, long antlers on deer, or in the case of humans, more intelligence. His argument is that there may not be a significant advantage in a particular trait but if it is selected, genes for selecting trait (and having trait) will compound and be expressed in increasingly exaggerated ways as each generation refines these features. Once a peacock’s long tail is selected, male offspring will have long tails and female progeny a sexual preference for long tails. For example, it is thought that the combined selective pressure of peacocks needing longer tails and peahens preferring them pushes the length of tails a long way beyond the optimum length for the species: (page 215 of “The Blind Watchmaker”)

    “Setting wrens on one side, peacock fans, and widow bird and bird of paradise tails, in their gaudy extravagance, are very plausibly seen as end?products of explosive, spiralling evolution by positive feedback. Fisher and his modern successors have shown us how this might have come about. Is this idea essentially tied to sexual selection, or can we find convincing analogies in other kinds of evolution? It is worth asking this question, if only because there are aspects of our own evolution that have more than a suggestion of the explosive about them, notably the extremely rapid swelling of our brains during the last few million years. It has been suggested that this is due to sexual selection itself, braininess being a sexually desirable character (or some manifestation of braininess, such as ability to remember the steps of a long and complicated ritual dance).” 8

    Even if it were possible to evolve these traits by way of cumulative selection we are as well asked to believe that species are programmed to select for characteristics that impact in such a negative way, on their chance of survival. There is little doubt that the tail of a peacock is beautiful so it is possible that the peahen may decide to mate with the male with the most impressive display purely on aesthetic grounds. But if survival of the fittest is driving the evolution of species, there is no escaping the conclusion that genes for growing a long tail and also for preferring a long tail would soon be lost because of the unjustifiably high costs they impose.
    It is also difficult to believe that human intelligence evolved because our ancestors needed to remember the steps of a dance. This overlooks the fact that greater brain volume could never outweigh the numerous other physical and social costs this evolutionary course has imposed on our species.
    More importantly though, it makes the completely false assumption that dance is related to intelligence. Dance is an expression of emotion and an artistic display of body movements that has little to do with remembering steps. It is possible that academics who spend the bulk of their lives closeted on university campuses may come to think that braininess is sexy but it is doubtful if this view is shared by the outside world. The music industry makes billions of dollars promoting sex and dance and there is little evidence to suggest they are interested in presenting popular ‘body movers’ as intelligent. If the promoter of some future rock star were to later discover that his ‘body shaker’ was not just sexy but also intelligent, it would likely be regarded as an unfortunate oversight to destroy his career if made public.
    There seems little evidence to suggest that society has ever regarded intelligence as sexy. If being able to dance were driving our evolution, emotional expression and a good sense of rhythm might well have been caught up in a spiral of explosive evolution, not intelligence. Mastering the theory of relativity or designing microchips is not sexy. Darwinists need to come up with a far better explanation than ‘remembering steps of a dance’ to explain the rapid evolution of our human brain.
     
  17. spuriousmonkey Banned Banned

    Messages:
    24,066
    Re: Sexual Selection

    An explanation is that she is picking a male who is apparently fit. It doesn't matter to her progeny that the males are more obvious to predators. The female progeny is not and her male progeny has a better change to reproduce if they have a more impressive display. The female peacocks favour impressive displays after all. There is a balance better being obvious to predators and higher succes rate of mating for the males. A male can be perfectly camouflaged and teriibly fit in that sense, but if all females favour more colourful males than the evolutionary fitness is absolutely zero.
    Also a male that can survive while being conspicuous is obviously in prime condition or extremely lucky. A prime candidate for any peahen


    edit: and for intelligence as an example of sexual selection in humans. That is Dawkins problem. There are obviously simpler ways to explain the development of intelligence during human evolution.
     
    Last edited: Apr 25, 2003
  18. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    ???

    >>> An explanation is that she is picking a male who is apparently fit. It doesn't matter to her progeny that the males are more obvious to predators. The female progeny is not and her male progeny has a better change to reproduce if they have a more impressive display. The female peacocks favour impressive displays after all. There is a balance better being obvious to predators and higher succes rate of mating for the males. A male can be perfectly camouflaged and teriibly fit in that sense, but if all females favour more colourful males than the evolutionary fitness is absolutely zero. <<<

    I do not have a clue what you are talking about.
     
  19. Idle Mind What the hell, man? Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,709
    Robert, spurious is saying that a peacock can be camouflaged well, without the impressive display to attract mate, and improve his chances against predation. However, when it comes to mating, and passing on his traits, he will be overlooked by the peahens, who are looking for the impressive tail feathers. This leaves him in a bad position as far as evolution is concerned.
     
  20. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    Height of Trees

    Again; that assumes the peahens are recognising the peacock’s display as an advantage when it is obviously a liability. Either the peahen is mistaken or we are incorrect in thinking that a successful species would consistently be making such a fundamental mistake. My money says that mother nature knows what she is doing and the Darwinian theory of natural selection has got it wrong.

    The arms race also applies to species that do not reproduce sexually. The following is a quote from Chapter 15 of God Gametes that can be downloaded free from www.e-publishingaustralia.com


    Height of Trees:

    There is another problem with the arms race theory. It can be correctly argued that natural selection will put a sudden break on an animal species less well adapted than a rival. If there is limited food supply it is easy to see how ‘survival of the fittest’ ensures that only the best adapted genes are passed down to future generations. A hungry animal will scavenge for the last morsel of available food in its territory and thereby deny a living to a less well-adapted rival. A cheetah that cannot kill a gazelle will starve. And a gazelle only needs to lose one battle to be eliminated. The survival of the fittest model however, does not fit so well when applied to trees.
    Dawkins argues that the height of trees has been pushed up because of competition for sunlight. Yet sunlight is not a finite resource. It is true that a heavy forest canopy effectively shades light from shorter trees yet we need to ask if this is the sole reason trees continue to ‘push up’. Most forests do not have canopies that block all light and it is unlikely that trees shade out light in a territory from competitors in the same way animals can deprive rivals of food. The struggle for light can seldom be compared to the life or death struggle between animals when one seldom has a second chance.
    Most tall trees have only a slight advantage over the smaller and there is still enough light for many species to survive on the forest floor. We must also remember that the tall trees need to reproduce from ground level and if they shaded out all light they would prevent regeneration of their own species.
    Trees would have evolved in an environment where there was only a slight difference in height and amount of sunlight. Taller trees would have gained a little light, something not in short supply and never has been. When both taller and shorter trees were at or below optimum height, the taller would be healthier and produce more seeds but shorter trees would certainly live long enough to produce the seeds needed to ensure their genes were passed on and would be less inclined to suffer storm damage, their newest growth being less exposed. As taller trees get taller however, they pay a higher price so the cost would soon outweigh the slight advantage received by capturing slightly more light.
    The point here is that smaller trees would have lost the first round when all trees were shorter but when taller, the smaller is favoured.
    With animals, the arms race theory correctly predicts that it would not matter if a species could win the second race for only the first is important. But this seldom applies to trees. The giant sequoias in the west of the United States live more than 3,000 years. Even if shorter trees do not live as long, they still live for many centuries, certainly long enough to carry forward genes for less tall and even more efficient trees. Genes for a more economical height have always been present. There has not been a selective process eliminating trees that lost the race for the last available light photon.
    God Gametes does not claim to know why some forests grow taller than optimum height. Presumably the 90 meters to which the sequoias grow is not economical and this poses a problem for Darwinism. It is suggested they have been forced to grow taller than efficient by an arms race yet are in fact a very successful species. The theory of natural selection cannot explain why they live longer than most trees not caught up in an arms race, trees free to grow to their optimum height.
     
  21. Dr Lou Natic Unnecessary Surgeon Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,574
    Re: Height of Trees

    Really? Is that what you have been saying?
    You could have been clearer, with all the god gametes this and that I struggled to see what you were trying to say.

    You know, I used to be 99% sure this was the case, that mother nature was in control and the planet earth was a living being that activated species for a purpose and so on. I also believed when we die we become one with the earth and so in a way our second life is actually being earth along with the rest of physical history.

    Now I'm not so sure. I'm 50-50 at this stage.
    I do favour that theory because it makes this coldly logical universe seem prettier but I try not to let that sway my judgements.

    The people here have taught me alot and I am starting to see how it is possible that this is all random.
    When I made this thread the point I was trying to make was that it seemed mother nature was in control and that it was aiming for viper when it "activated" deformities in the caterpillar's genes.
    I've seen some pretty good retorts to that possibility though.
    None have made it seem absolutely impossible, just not necasarily the case.

    I find it strange how nature is a web of efficiency, so genius are all the little coincidences that make it all tie together that it is easy to feel like earth knows what its doing.

    Every single species in an area is keeping all the other species in that area alive in some direct or indirect way. Its truely amazing.
    The oceans plankton moderators(whales, anemone's, etc) are keeping all life on land alive and if it weren't for histories plankton moderators that fish could have never crawled out of the ocean in the first place. 70% of earths oxygen is produced by plankton, once it would have been a hundred percent because I think plankton came before tree's even, if it didn't get preyed upon, it couldn't have stayed around this long( Just like we won't stay around for long because we don't get preyed on but that comes later).

    More plankton moderators have arised since then and how very lucky, if the whales ancestors didn't go back to the ocean and get to work on the plankton there is no way earth could have provided enough oxygen for six billion humans. What guided the whales ancestors to go into the ocean? Well there is a lot of very logical explanations but there is also the zany idea that earth was preparing herself for the homo-sapien invasion. Guiding her history by playing around with the instincts of individuals. Mind-control if you will. But only controlling the subconcious. Things are born with their instincts and they must change over generations for anything to change. I think earth might be somehow doing that.

    This is really hard for me to explain for some reason and it appears difficult for you too jameson.
    I will cut to the chase.
    My theory on why humans are here which alot of people here are probably sick of

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    I think humans were a "procedure" activated by mother nature on purpose. For whatever reason it was time for a change and we are altering this globe like nothing else in history. Alterations have occurred before but humans are a new shinier ice age of sorts.

    Now mother nature used her mind control techniques and ingrained instructions into our instincts; "Destroy and alter me, while in the process killing yourself off as quickly as possible", and we like the servants we are, got to work. We will allow for new species when we are gone, very different ones that will be perfectly adapted to our ruins.

    The whale just likes to eat plankton and play and dream, it just so happens that it is also helping the planet breathe, we like to progress and build and make ourselves comfortable and so on and so forth, it just so happens that that drastically alters the earths environment and will inevitably render us extinct relatively prematurely. It seems to me that earth can judge what consequences will be reached by making animals want to do things.

    Fairly accurately, notice the sudden influx of environmentalists? They didn't used to exist, at all. I believe earth might have got a little worried and "implanted" environmental awareness into the brains of some individuals to slow down the process of our alterations. Make us aware of what the consequences of our actions could be. Now environmentalists aren't necasarrily more intelligent than other people but why do they notice these dangers and none of the genius' of history did? Its almost like we only notice what earth allows us too.

    I also think maybe the bible was "inspired by god" like all the fanatics think. Inspired in the sense, environmentalists were suddenly "inspired". But earth never said it wasn't allowed to lie. The bible was a trick to boost us into the "alteration direction", the morals and values it teaches are flagrantly setting us up for a short lifespan as a species and telling us we are more important than earth. The things it says are "wrong" are righter than right in reality. Killing eachother is "right" for an efficient planet to stay basically the same. Treating every member of your species as a brother or "member of your clan" is very wrong if a balance is to be kept. Why does the bible contradict nature so damn much? It tells us to do the opposite of what everything else is doing, the opposite of what the animals that are keeping this globe spinning are doing.

    Earth set the instincts of humans back then to think like that to start these alterations. Looking after every member of your species is a good way to become overpopulated and overpopulation is a good way to alter the earth. Especially when accompanied by the ability to alter which grew from sharing knowledge with members outside of our family clan.

    So yes I think humans are a procedure similar to pruning the leaves on a tree or a forest fire. We will allow for new life and the nature of evolution is to make creatures more and more efficient. By killing lots of animals like we have we will be helping their species evolve.

    We didn't quite render whales extinct did we? For a long time no one cared, whales were thought of as mindless hunks of floating resources, but the environmentalists were activated just in time, now the whales have the ability to become even better at survival than they are now because of the inbreeding that will undoubtedly occur due to their lack of numbers, thus making deformities, some of which that will be beneficial and built upon until new more efficient whale species emerge. By that time our task will be over and the memory of humans will be circulating around the new food chain. A food chain that was bettered by our actions.

    No matter what the truth is, earths history is a strange tale, filled with mind boggling coincidences, and genius links and events.
    Science fiction seems so bush league compared to the story of this planet we live on.
     
  22. Robert Jameson Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    75
    Dr Lou Natic,

    I read your post and thought it very good. I will make a couple of brief comments now but it is late here (down under) so I will look at it again tomorrow.

    >>> I think humans were a "procedure" activated by mother nature on purpose <<<

    On purpose but for what purpose. You need a “how” and “why”. That was the beauty of Darwin’s theory. I do not agree with it but he appeared to have a model that explained the how and why and that is no doubt why he was so successful. (Apart from the fact that he was from a wealthy family and had influential friends that helped promote his concept.)

    >>> Now mother nature used her mind control techniques and ingrained instructions into our instincts; <<<

    I will go along with that. But who is mother nature and why is she doing it?

    >>> "Destroy and alter me, while in the process killing yourself off as quickly as possible", and we like the servants we are, got to work. We will allow for new species when we are gone, very different ones that will be perfectly adapted to our ruins. <<<

    Why would mother nature give us the instincts to create a complex society just to kill it off?

    >>> I also think maybe the bible was "inspired by god" like all the fanatics think. <<<

    If you are interested in theology then Chapter 18 of God Gametes is on Eastern Mythology and Chapter 19 on Christianity.
     
  23. Idle Mind What the hell, man? Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,709
    Robert:

    You haven't explained why it is an obvious liability. I don't see it as such. It could also be that this is a selective breeding done by humans. Peacocks have been kept in gardens of the wealthy for quite some time, where they are not subject to predation. Also, the people who tend them are likely to have chosen the birds that looked the best in order to impress their guests. A bit of behavioural evolution, and we have females that favour the more lavishly plumaged individuals.
    I don't know if those were intended as separate statements or not, but trees reproduce sexually.

    In response to the tree paragraphs:
    Yes and no. There is light that gets through, but you must realize, which I'm certain you do, that the energy requirements are very little at the early stages in comparison. Also, there is a different ratio between the amount of foliage and the woody tissue in younger trees than there is in mature ones. The increased foliage allows for a higher intake in energy.

    Trees can also become dormant for extended periods, with growth slowing down until another source of light becomes available.
     

Share This Page