• In total there are 2 users online :: 0 registered, 0 hidden and 2 guests (based on users active over the past 60 minutes)
    Most users ever online was 742 on Tue Mar 19, 2024 2:59 am

Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Engage in conversations about worldwide religions, cults, philosophy, atheism, freethought, critical thinking, and skepticism in this forum.
Forum rules
Do not promote books in this forum. Instead, promote your books in either Authors: Tell us about your FICTION book! or Authors: Tell us about your NON-FICTION book!.

All other Community Rules apply in this and all other forums.
User avatar
lehelvandor
Freshman
Posts: 213
Joined: Sat Nov 01, 2014 2:09 pm
9
Location: Cambridge, UK
Has thanked: 24 times
Been thanked: 104 times
Contact:

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

One overall picture is given in https://www.sanger.ac.uk/research/initi ... enome.html, however of course it focuses on diseases etc. But its backdrop is of course the extensive sequencing (i.e. mountains of data :O ) they need to undertake, which was much easier in Europe for instance.
And found this https://www.genome.gov/Multimedia/Slide ... shkoff.pdf
User avatar
Movie Nerd
Intelligent
Posts: 560
Joined: Thu Nov 06, 2014 9:36 am
9
Location: Virginia
Has thanked: 30 times
Been thanked: 178 times

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

lehelvandor wrote:One overall picture is given in https://www.sanger.ac.uk/research/initi ... enome.html, however of course it focuses on diseases etc. But its backdrop is of course the extensive sequencing (i.e. mountains of data :O ) they need to undertake, which was much easier in Europe for instance.
And found this https://www.genome.gov/Multimedia/Slide ... shkoff.pdf
It certainly does look promising.
I am just your typical movie nerd, postcard collector and aspiring writer.
User avatar
ant

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 5935
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:04 pm
12
Has thanked: 1371 times
Been thanked: 969 times

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

lehelvandor wrote:One overall picture is given in https://www.sanger.ac.uk/research/initi ... enome.html, however of course it focuses on diseases etc. But its backdrop is of course the extensive sequencing (i.e. mountains of data :O ) they need to undertake, which was much easier in Europe for instance.
And found this https://www.genome.gov/Multimedia/Slide ... shkoff.pdf
Unrelated but very important to a portion of evolutionary theory is the Indonesian findings ("Hobbit")

I was watching a great Nova special on the various hypotheses related to homo H.
One explanation for why the hobbit was so small is "Island Dwarfism"
But there are a lot of questions that need to be answered if that is to be considered an explanation.

Thr primary thing that caught my attention was the incredibly small size of the hobbit's brain.
At first it was thought that because of its size, there would have been distinctive limits to its intelligence in comparison to homo sapien.
When tools were found, that changed everything.

And of course, it also causes us to rethink where life was thought to have undoubtedly originated from, and or how the hobbit would have gained access to the islands.

Interesting stuff.
User avatar
ant

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 5935
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:04 pm
12
Has thanked: 1371 times
Been thanked: 969 times

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

Lets all be clear and Im certain you agree, L, that working with ancient dna is very challenging.




 

"Sequencing Neanderthal DNA

Challenges in Extracting Ancient DNA

Working with ancient DNA is very challenging, both in terms of finding sufficient material to work with after decomposition has occurred, and in terms of eliminating modern human contamination. Distinguishing between modern human and ancient genetic material is particularly difficult when the ancient DNA comes from close relatives of modern humans.

Organisms decompose after death. Water, oxygen and microbes break down DNA. Within 100,000 years, all DNA is destroyed. Ancient DNA tends to be found in small quantities. The DNA that is extracted is generally fragmentary and damaged. Some damage results in changes to the DNA sequence. Cytosine can change to uracil, which is read by copying enzymes as thymine, resulting in a C to T transition. Changes from G to A also occur. DNA errors are very common at the ends of molecules.

Contamination by modern DNA is a particularly difficult problem to solve. Labs and chemicals may be contaminated by the DNA of the people working in them, while many fossils have been handled by researchers for years. Contamination is difficult to detect because Neanderthals and humans share much of their genetic material, making some DNA sequences indistinguishable. Researchers have developed ways to analyze the results of ancient DNA sequencing efforts to determine whether contamination is likely and how much has occurred. Analysis of the results and efforts to keep labs and specimens free of modern DNA is very important as some researchers believe that the early studies of Neanderthal DNA included modern contaminants."

More here:


 http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/gen ... erthal-dna
User avatar
Interbane

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 7203
Joined: Sat Oct 09, 2004 12:59 am
19
Location: Da U.P.
Has thanked: 1105 times
Been thanked: 2166 times
United States of America

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

I was watching a great Nova special on the various hypotheses related to homo H.
I saw that one too, the Desolation of Smaug. It had dragons though.
In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.” - Douglas Adams
User avatar
ant

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 5935
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:04 pm
12
Has thanked: 1371 times
Been thanked: 969 times

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

The Rubin's study drew different conclusions regarding neanderthal/H. Sapien interbreeding:



"The average split time between the Neanderthal and modern human populations was around 370,000 years ago.  They used the sequence to look at the possibility of interbreeding between Neanderthals and moderns. Admixture would be seen as derived alleles that are found in Neanderthals and in low frequencies among modern humans. They did not detect this in their sample. A simulation to test the Neanderthal contribution to the human genome found a 0% chance of Neanderthal input with a 0% to 20% confidence range. With this data, the authors cannot definitively rule out admixture (Noonan et al. 2006)."

That is interesting I think and from what I understand, is contrary to other findings.
why is this? Simulation errors? Contamination?
User avatar
ant

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 5935
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:04 pm
12
Has thanked: 1371 times
Been thanked: 969 times

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

Interbane wrote:
I was watching a great Nova special on the various hypotheses related to homo H.
I saw that one too, the Desolation of Smaug. It had dragons though.
the Nova specials are all on youtube.
Like a true idiot, I purchased a couple off of itunes before checking youtube
User avatar
lehelvandor
Freshman
Posts: 213
Joined: Sat Nov 01, 2014 2:09 pm
9
Location: Cambridge, UK
Has thanked: 24 times
Been thanked: 104 times
Contact:

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

Ah the cute little ones (that seem not to be so cute, I mean they co-existed with "late"/modern humans for tens of thousands of years but so far no real evidence of interaction, so maybe not that nice people :) ). But incidentally, they are close to the very very much older Lucy, who incidentally has her 40th anniversary of being brought to surface. Lucy in the Earth, with or without diamonds :)... most likely without, but she is a gem. It is also interesting to see the ratio of brain and body mass, I have not followed the various musings but there were some theories based on current animals (mentioned crows for instance) that this ratio can be an indicator of possible intelligence level - personally I would think there are more exceptions than confirmations of whatever numerology these speculations may have ended up with;

On very old DNA, gawd yes - that's why in 2007 and up to 2010 they still had quite a bit of contamination, and methods were a bit iffy, too. Because of that (and that oddly, genetics in the lab have been subject to a similar accelerated progress in terms of instrumentation and methodology to that of microelectronics... even in terms of the cost, which means better availability of the needed technology, too), would normally look through the timeline of the materials.

So indeed 2006 is an almost "preliminary" finding, and they used an intrusive method, admittedly the sample could not yield conclusive results, re-affirmed by the re-analysis I think a good year later because of the glaring differences, also they were knocking the earlier study a bit because of the high sequencing error rate. A more "proper" (in terms of extent and full sequencing) genome was only done in 2010 - albeit vastly more and more detailed data, they got to very few percent (I think the max was around 4%) of N elements making it "across". Looking around back then, everyone around 2006/7 was begging for more data so that they can get above the noise floor :)
User avatar
ant

1G - SILVER CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 5935
Joined: Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:04 pm
12
Has thanked: 1371 times
Been thanked: 969 times

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

There is ongoing debate as to whether or not hobbit and H.S. had any contact, if they arr in fact an entirely different species, or a malformed H.S. at least thats what I am understanding so far.

But their tool making and location is what's perplexing.

If they were intelligent enough for toolmaking then this rules out any hypothesis that posits mental deficiencies or abnormalities. There's definitely evidence in favor of deliberate design of tools.

If homo s. Somehow made it to the islands by boat (zero evidence for that) then island dwarfism is the only hypothesis that would offer an explanation for dwarfism to have occurred.


Two things are problematic here:

Island dwarfism doesnt explain why some species became gigantic when it offered no adaptation advantages to speak of on an island.

If there is any truth to Dollo's law of irreversibility, a complex organ like the brain would, to my understanding, not reverse in size - big to very small.

anyway, these thoughts are very much based on a very cursory look at some of the literature.
User avatar
lehelvandor
Freshman
Posts: 213
Joined: Sat Nov 01, 2014 2:09 pm
9
Location: Cambridge, UK
Has thanked: 24 times
Been thanked: 104 times
Contact:

Re: Why Do So Many Have Trouble Believing In Evolution?

Unread post

Yep and they seem to have been quite competent hunters, and were there some cooking tools found, too? So definitely not thick people;
And then a bunch of theories, found a cute illustration :) of the different paths it may have taken, but they will argue for some time unless more data comes up http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/6 ... bit624.jpg
Post Reply

Return to “Religion & Philosophy”