Comments on: BBC: DNA mutations followed by selection does not lead to new species!?!?

By: antivenom

antivenom — Sun, 13 Oct 2013 20:58:27 +0000

The theory of evolution is a rational theory that has considerable support from scientific experiments and observations. What disturbs me most is that many “self-proclaimed open minded people” seem to be very anxious to stop trying to find flaws with it. I propose that taking such a stance is equivalent to intellectual suicide.

By: Baldrz

Baldrz — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 19:42:51 +0000

SZ, you’re probably right. A misreading of “such” by the copyeditor, perhaps prompted by a misplaced comma by the author, could account for this mess. There’s no way to determine where the problem originated just by looking at this snippet, so Greg’s claim that it “can be blamed entirely on the editors” is untenable.

By: Nathan Myers

Nathan Myers — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 00:55:42 +0000

SZ: I’m not used to seeing quite so much name-calling welcomed around here. Evidently some people don’t feel obliged to live up to the standard of discourse the rest of us do. If I were Greg, I would take that as disrespect, but, again, that’s up to Greg to enforce.

It appears Greg’s objection to the article is a matter of an anonymous editor (or the author) mistakenly substituting exactly one instance of “which” in place of “that”. Any grammatical error may be a great crime, of course. I have even seen Greg misplace an apostrophe more than once, but I would not long pillory him for it.

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 19:17:57 +0000

This is about Victoria Gill??? I had no idea. See, you have to be less vague.

She’s brilliant, I love her writing. She does a great job.

The article in question implies by omission and a little more than omission, and quite by accident, that tiny mutations do not add up to macro evolution. I think that’s funny.

I’m also absolutely confident that Victoria Gill does not have such a simplistic view of evolution, and to the extent that this article is screwed up in this way I’m certain can be blamed entirely on the editors.

By: Stephanie Z

Stephanie Z — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 18:24:40 +0000

Nathan, what you’re allowed to do here has no bearing on whether you’re being an ass about it.

By: Nathan Myers

Nathan Myers — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 17:15:33 +0000

SZ: At least I’m not here name-calling.

Victoria Gill is a hard-working BBC reporter helping to explain real science to real people, and does not deserve scorn. She does deserve an apology. Nothing in her article is scientifically objectionable. Crazies will cite anything without concern for facts; looking over your shoulder for what crazies might do is a way to become one yourself. I don’t, and I don’t expect Ms. Gill to. Minnesotans may have a problem, but their problem is not Ms. Gill.

No one can predict whether any particular variation might be a step on the road to a speciation. But it’s perfectly reasonable to look at a set of changes and note that they spread throughout a breeding population and did not contribute to speciation, because, in fact, no speciation occurred. Such changes are valid subjects for study, and deserve a name. Reporters are welcome to use the name correctly, as Ms. Gill did in this case.

Study of evolution started with accounting for speciation, but there’s no reason to confine it there. H. sap. has experienced a great deal of micro-evolution over the last N millennia, and the likelihood of its speciating seems more remote now than it’s ever been, no matter what happens to the melanin.

(If you don’t think I’m allowed to disagree with Greg here, how do you account for his invitation to “come back here and fight it out”? Surely that’s up to him to decide.)

By: Stephanie Z

Stephanie Z — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 13:08:06 +0000

Nathan, what you can’t possibly be serious about is coming to the blog of a member of MnCSE and telling him he needs to be ashamed and apologize to people because he cares more about wording that creationists will use as a political tool than you do. You can’t really be that much of a skeevy troll. Can you?

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 02:37:16 +0000

I’m sure there is a way to get a new species by screwing around with melanin. There must be examples. There are plenty of species where signaling is closely related to group membership, boundaries, and mating, and where the signaling is visual. There are probably examples among insects. It is remotely possible that there are examples among the forest guenons.

By: Nathan Myers

Nathan Myers — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 02:25:36 +0000

Stephanie Z: Are you saying that you think you can get a new species out of fooling around with melanin? Or that Greg never, ever misses scorning whoever deserves it? Please be more specific.

What creationists might make out of a research program, or its name, is about the last thing I will ever worry about.

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 11:34:11 +0000

I’m pretty agnostic on the decoupling because I think the concepts are really shorthands and gloss the actual real life complexity of the question they (the concepts, as it were) are trying to answer.

Who knows, we may simply be in agreement here!