Evolution: The ramfications of multiple mutations And the necessity for Informatio.

First of all, I would like to take a few moments to give a quick English vocabulary reminder. I hope you appreciate the irony, as I am the one having a primary foreign language: Quote: --Verb (used with object) 1. to repeat (a passage, phrase, etc.) from a book, speech, or the like, as by way of authority, illustration, etc. 2. to repeat words from (a book, author, etc.). 3. to cite, offer, or bring forward as evidence or support. I believe I have clearly stated whereas I put a quote. And once again, they were to SUPPORT my argumentation, they were not to BE the argumentation. This assertion : "He copied every single reference from the article without so much as bothering to change the order or include numbered citations within his essay. Needless to say, I don't find this amusing and I don't think the voters will either." Is not only false, but can be considered as a personal attack. The required citations for my point are not only in three distinct location, their only link being that they refer to the same subject. The article itself containing more the 16000 characters. As for numbered citations, I was not aware that those were needed, but this is my first debate, and as such I believe that having a little indulgence towards those criteria would be appropriated. As for the amusing part, well whether the voters find amusing or not that you personally attack a newcomer to this site is of course their prerogative. ================== Answers to specific points mentioned in the reply above: ================== --------> The utility of mutations and their occurrence into generations: You claim that many mutations are neutral, however, 70% of all mutations have a DIRECT negative effect on the individual, such as birth termination (death) or defects. The remainder is indeed either neutral or weakly beneficial. In many cases the structure is of no direct harm, yet all structures DO require extra energy in terms of development, maintenance, and weight, and are also at risk in terms of disease (e.g., infection, cancer), providing some selective pressure for the removal of parts that do not contribute to an organism's fitness. A structure that is not harmful will take longer to be 'phased out' than one that is. In view to this, every single physical change, even with non-interfering result for the individual survival, is most likely to be wiped after a few thousand's generation. And the required time for a beneficial change is acknowledged to be much more: If I may allow myself to quote one of your own sources: "QUOTE" Twenty years ago, evolutionary biologist Richard Lenski of Michigan State University in East Lansing, US, took a single Escherichia coli bacterium and used its descendants to found 12 laboratory populations. The 12 have been growing ever since, gradually accumulating mutations and evolving for more than 44,000 generations, while Lenski watches what happens. But sometime around the 31,500th generation, something dramatic happened in just ONE of the populations - the bacteria suddenly acquired the ability to metabolize citrate, a second nutrient in their culture medium that E. coli normally cannot use. "End of quote" This means that an organism as simple as a single bacteria do need, more or less, 31,500 thousand generations to evolve an actually useful trait. And that has been observed in only 1 of the 12 population. A simple mathematical calculus should resolve the number of generations required to took in average: 31,500 x 12= 378000. That means we have observed 378,000 generations in a single bacteria before we have something useful. The odds to have beneficial mutations, followed by multiple evolutionary mutations, especially with organism that are incredibly more complex than a bacteria, such as a mammalian, which requires a considerable amount of time with a lot more generations due to their said complexity, are then lowered to an impossibility point. (Not to mention reptilian forms, insects, and etc.) -------->Observed Instances of Speciation: You do use to wrong ends the word Speciation: Definition: Speciation is the evolutionary process by which new biological species arise. In the case of the copper resistant plants, there is no new species involved. Only a genetic change that allow the plant to better resist certain circumstances. --------> Vestigial structures: I did not dropped the subject, and my answer on it remains the same: Even if we might consider that an organ has lost his "primary" function from one specie to another, the fact remains that the organ, even considered as "vestigial" do still have an use on the other specie, even if less severe in terms or requirement for survival. A perfectly good example of it would be the humans vermiform appendix. Even if the require role is not the same as the precedents one observed, it does still have one. --------> My mistake: I do have to acknowledge a severe mistake that made my source look as unreliable and fantasist. When I copied over several parts of the mathematical explanations that served my theory, I did not look over the exponential part: "Quote" The mathematical problem for evolution comes when you want a series of related mutations. The odds of getting two mutations that are related to one another is the product of the separate probabilities: one in 10^7 x 10^7, or 10^14. That's a one followed by 14 zeros, a hundred trillion! Any two mutations might produce no more than a fly with a wavy edge on a bent wing. That's a long way from producing a truly new structure, and certainly a long way from changing a fly into some new kind of organism. You need more mutations for that. So, what are the odds of getting three mutations in a row? That's one in a billion trillion (10^21). Suddenly, the ocean isn't big enough to hold enough bacteria to make it likely for you to find a bacterium with three simultaneous or sequential related mutations. What about trying for four related mutations? One in 10^28. Suddenly, the earth isn't big enough to hold enough organisms to make that very likely. And we're talking about only four mutations. It would take many more than that to change a fish into a philosopher, or even a fish into a frog. Contrary to popular opinion, drug resistance in bacteria demonstrate natural selection (or a sort of artificial selection, in this case), but only selection among already existing variations within a kind. It also demonstrates that when the odds that a particular process will produce a given effect get too low, good scientists normally look for a better explanation, such as the plasmid explanation for resistance to multiple antibiotics. "End of Quote" As you will probably notice, it is 10^7 x 10^7 that gives 10^14. You could review the original source before assuming that a slight copy-over mistake makes it unreliable. Due to the (revised) mathematical answers stated above, the insights giving by the probabilities impossibility is quite clear. Also, several exterior sources to the one I cited do acknowledge 1966's mathematical result: http://www.sciencemag.org... http://www.icr.org... http://openlibrary.org.... You can now rest assured (Unless you discredit three different sources) that a symposium (Academic Conference) has been held in 1966 with this very precise question: Could mutations serve as the basis—with natural selection—as a mechanism for evolutionary change? The answer of the mathematicians: No. Just plain No! ================== Sources: ================== They are the same as the one cited earlier on, with one exception : -http://www.newscientist.com......