Macro-evolution Never Occured

EXTENSION a.) Observed Microevolution Firstly, the opposition has clearly disregarded "evolution on a scale of separate gene-pool" definition for his own (non-existent) definitions of macroevolution. Observed microevolution is clearly a fact-both sides actually acknowledge this. However, the opposition has clearly not acknowledged any of my arguments on the O. gigas and the complete Mendelian separation that it has experienced from the O. Lamarckiana. The opposition has not acknowledged that (a) the creation of a new species does not often postulate a huge jump, and (b) that the sense in which "theory" is used is more accurate to that of "theorem." Let us deal (b) first. Accordingly to Biologist Jaime Tanner, "in science the word 'theory' refers to the way that we interpret facts." [1] There are many currently accepted "scientific theories" that are often accepted without much debate around them. Apart from those who wish to be absurd, the heliocentric theory, or the Copernican view of the Universe, is a theory that is accepted with much less debate that what goes on right now. [2] Now let us deal with (a). The opposition states that "new species arise because of new genes." This is true, but the opposition then goes on to say that "science up-to-date fails to tell us the origin of new genes in a genome." Upon further anlaysis, the opposition has then completely ignored the possibility of gene duplication. Gene duplication is "[genes that are] once-identical genes can undergo changes and diverge to create two different genes." [3] This often happens by many methods: one of them is called "Ectopic Recombination," which basically happens when an unequal-cross over of genes causes a difference in the DNA size in the chromosome. [4] Studies on this method of new genetic additions by Jianjhi Zhang shows that for bacteria M. pneumoniae, 44% of the genes have been duplicated viaectopic recombination. [5] Evolution by gene duplication is quickly becoming an interesting theory in which many scientists are now investigating into. Comments on 2nd Excerpt The opposition cites Kalendar's "Genome Evolution of Wild Barley" when clearly the whole paragraph is directly copied and pasted from Creationism.org, which does not cite Kalendar's paper. In fact, Kalendar's paper "examined the role of the BARE-1 retrotransposon in genome diversification in individuals at the Evolution Canyon microsite, Lower Nahal Oren, Mount Carmel, Israel." Species were not artificially cultivated from a set time, but "collected at six stations located along a 300-m north-south transect across the NFS (North Facing Slope) and SFS (South Facing Slope) of Evolution Canyon." The results concluded that "the SFS [plants have] larger genomes than the NFS [plants]," which does not in anyway prove that "transposons copying and splicing rapidly" could cause rapid evolution. Even if this is true, and some papers seem to uphold this view (ex. Ellison 2015), this would still be a proof of macroevolution. [6] Comments on Other Excerpts They are not in anyways directly related to the BoP of the opposition, and henceforth, must be disregarded. b.) Epigenetics and Biochemistry The opposition's understanding of "epigenetics" is abit shaky. Epigenetics studies "a change in phenotype without a change in genotype." [7] Here is where the opposition's arguments fail; biochemical evidences, however, shows that the genotype of a species suggestscommon lineage. The opposition holds that epigenetics "explains natural selection by adaptation in the microevolution level." Epigenetics also explains how the environment effects the phenotype of the individual, whilst the genotype is often similiar. The human being and the chimpanzee is the best example-since they live in highly different societies, the human has developed the ability to be rational and the ability to discuss rationality. However, the chimp has no such ability, perhaps due to the fact that chimp language is still primitive. The phenotype of the two species are different, yet the genotype is very very similar-96% in fact. c.) AoA and Transitional Fossils The opposition here does not in anyway refute the Archeoraptyx and Georgiacetus examples. The opposition's case is based mainly on a series of quotes. I call this "argument from authority." Let me deal with the only non-fallacious statement in the whole argument, then deal with the Sophistical arguments later. The opposition says that "it is a scientific fact in Molecular Biology that irreducible complexity (abb. IC from now) is the main factor that makes us understand why the fossils showed up fully formed." Is it? Firstly, IC is scientific iff a creator is scientific. I will not get into the question of a creator. I will simply respond to this with the following: "the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence." Just because we don't know does not mean we need to appeal to other things to make the theory sensical. [8] Secondly, the arguments from authority do not prove much. It just proves that this is all the opposition can muster against the actual evidences presented. d.) Molecular Evidences Firstly, the opposition assumes the Lamarckian mistake-the environment does not change the genotype of the individual in anyway (although it might do so in a specie when bad variants are eliminated). To assert that "chimpanzees and men have such similar-looking transposons in similar chromosomes [is] because the sequences were programmed to serve similar biological functions" brings some programmer into the picture. Apart from that, this is simply not true; Gupta and Lewontin (1981) observed that different genotypes donot undergo genotypical changes due to environment; they simply react differently to the change. [9] Apart from this, the mere usage of the word "transposon" seems to make it clear that transposons are "genomes," so to say. However, a transposon is a DNA sequence that can change its position within the genome; these make up the "~35 million single nucleotide differences" between the Chimp and Human genome. [10] Again, these differences do not prove that macro-evolution never happened. The opposition has yet to respond to the retrovirus argument and the cytochrome C arguments, which make up the core of the "molecular evidences" in which I have presented. REBUTTALS a.) Evolution as a Mere Scientific Hypothesis Some comments have been made about this in EXTENSION a.). However, I would like to contribute more into the discussion of the true meaning of theory in science. The opposition says that "Macroevolution = theory." The opposition, however, commmits a straw-man. Scientific theories are not normal theories. For example, when I say "Schopenhauer's arguments are just a theory," I would often mean that he attempts to give an a priori explanation of the world. However, when I say that "heliocentrisim is a scientific theory," I (as would many scientists) often means that it has passed a substantial amount of revision. Firstly, evolution is not a hypothesis. A hypothesis is often a prediction that is falsifiable; for example, "the increase in the extension of a rubber band would directly increase the average velocity of an object" is an hypothesis. However, the fact that force is proportional to acceleration is a scientific theory derived from the Newton's 2nd Law. A scientific theory is often a theory that makes predicitions that (a.) empirically falsifiable, (b.) well-supported by many strands of evidences, and (c.) consistent with pre-existing empirical observations. An example of a widely accepted scientific theory is the theory of General Relativity and Special Relativity. Both of these theories initially made empirically falsifiable predictions (GR predicts that the perhilion of Mars will slightly miss the moon, in stark difference to the Newtonian prediction, and this happened) and were well-supported by many strands of pre-existing and currently existing evidences. No one would doubt the falsity of general relativity, although some hope for a unification between quantum mechanics and general relativity. The "just-a-theory" objection often means that the opposition is willing to say that gravity is not real (as it is based on Newton's Theories), the the Big Bang never happened etc. On a basis of consistency, this would fail. The resolution is negated! CITATIONS: [1] http://www.livescience.com... [2] http://www.vibrationdata.com... [3] http://www.medicinenet.com... [4] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov... [5] http://www.umich.edu... [6] http://www.pnas.org... [7] http://www.whatisepigenetics.com... [8] http://en.wikipedia.org... [9] http://www.jstor.org... [10] http://genome.cshlp.org...