Nothing adds up

What do you mean by exchange of information?

I have yet to see you present one problem with an animal developing the appearence of something else.

alex,

I have presented the problems but you do not see them as problems so for you there is no problem, for you it is all the luck of the draw so there is no need to look any closer at the problems.

The fish could have mutated a billion other ways all of which would be just as good and a lot quicker to develop.

As the first few fish get perfect copy they carry on mutating so you should not get a situation where a few get perfect copy and they wait till all the others catch up.

At each stage the tiny mutations for a few fish mean for a long time these few fish are at a far greater risk in number than the majority without mutation and that happens at each stage, there is always a critical number for any species that they must achieve to sustain the population.

In all this time a monkey cannot develop vocal chords and speach, humans have not developed wings.

Ants do well, in all this time they have not got any bigger, a panda eats bamboo which is rubbish and neither have evolved to get any better...it makes me think but obviously no one else does.

One wonders if you never think about anything what exactly is the sum total of what you do think? surely it cannot be simple theory full stop?

Books and study are suppoed to make you think not stop you thinking.

john

Ah i see the mistake you've made now.
The mutated fish do not have a 'critical number', they are still the same fish as the ones without the mutation and will freely breed with them.

In fact breeding with them is essential, that's how the mutated gene will spread to overtake the non mutated genes.

see?

alex,

If you only have 20 fish with the mutated gene and 10,000 without and thousands of fish get eaten before mating what do you think will happen?

Mating with a fish that has not got the gene just as easily produces offspring without the gene.

This was a minor point as an example of some of the ways this situation does not make sence.

If you cannot see any use in looking at considering anything other than the standard theory then that is fine.

Like I said I was more than happy with evolution but once I started to consider specific complicated methods, something did not sit well as the basic idea does not satisfy this at all.

It does however sit a lot better than curved empty space doing anything,lol!

john

The fish with the gene are far less likely to be eaten.
In this case both statistically because they are few in number
If there were 10,000 red smarties in a bowl along with 20 blue ones and i took one, would i more likely get a blue or red one?

AND

because of evolution because they are more protected from these predators than the fish without the mutation so are even more likely to avoid predation.

..your point?

Present me with something that isn't easily explained used the standard theory and I'd gladly reconsider.



It sits perfectly well with the theory of evolution.
These are not 'complicated' methods in terms of evolution, this is fairly basic.
I recommend reading up on evolution, maybe the 'selfish gene' by Dawkins or even 'your inner fish' by Neil Shubin.
Both great reads and accessible to the layman who doesn't have a great deal of knowledge about genes and gene transfer.

This is a very simple problem in all honestly (I should hope it is as I am currently doing a degree in it), I can see jck that what concerns you is the chance of extreme mutations occurring , and I understand it does seem extraordinarily bizarre. However, using your fish as an example, before the first stage of mutation, all the fish were capable of surviving however, due to their lack of camouflage maybe 10% were killed every year due to predation (purely hypothetical of course) lets say then, that a mating pair spawn (via mutations during gametogenesis) an individual with slightly differently coloured fins (this could easily occur, most likely as one or two amino-acids on a single DNA stand of a chromosome being altered), this would potentially increase the survival chance of the fish, by lets say 1%. out of a hypothetical population of 10,000 there is to be an expected death rate of 1,000. In all likelihood our individual fish with his SLIGHTLY improved genetic adaptation is very unlikely to die (if he did, then of course, the process would end until another fish with similar/same mutations occurred).
Our fish being better adapted to survive now, lives until mating age, at which point from the offspring, some would carry the same genetic trait (depending on whether it was a dominant or recessive trait then the offspring rate would be either 50% or 0%, however the 0% would all be "carriers" of the genetic sequence, which could then be passed down and possibly be later shown in the phenotypes of later offspring) will assume that this is a dominant autosomal gene, and therefore 50% of offspring now carry the trait, due to the large offspring figures we shall say that 100 offspring are spawned. obviously not all will survive to full birth (i.e. hatching) so we shall say only 50 survive to true birth.
we now have 26 (including parent) mutated individuals all with slightly elevated chances of survival. Over hundreds of years obviously these numbers will greatly expand, and eventually another mutation may occur, that lets say made the tips of the fins slightly more rounded, or to have a slightly differing pattern, there will be other mutations that are completely useless, however these born individuals, have similar or lower chances of survival compared to their ancestors, and are therefore less likely to survive.
Hopefully you can now see that it actually makes perfect mathematical sense, I would advise reading some literature on "Mendelian genetics", which shows the basic mathematical principles. which is amazing considering that Mendel was a monk who came up with his ideas before microscopy was even invented, and his ideas have shown true even today!

P.S. sorry if this is a bit of long winded response, but then genetics ain't a simple topic!

actually nvm, after reading back over the previous post it seems to me jck, not that we don't understand your maths, but that you don't understand evolution fully, your questions have been answered impeccably, however you don't seem to grasp them, considering you said earlier you like to look at all angles of things, you seem to be sticking to a very narrow minded view. Especially as Alex has actually pointed out to you repeatedly that environmental pressures lead to minor steps, but it appears you would rather clutch at your rather bewildering and random ideas.

You should go read his posts in the physics forum

Your sig is enough for that.

alex,

If there were 10,000 red smarties and 20 blue smarties in a bowl and you took one you would be more likely to pick a red one.

Unfortunately small fish are not like that example at all which is why I question your maths.

See, out of 10,000 small fish most will get picked and when most get picked the odd 20 become highly likely to be wiped out.

Back to the smarties, what is the chance that afer picking 9,980 you have left the 20 blue ones?

I have not got time to explain simplistic comparisons like this so it would help if you refrained from posting them.

john

alex,

The mutation applies to the fish that feeds by biting just bits of the fin so other predators kill these fish so the mutation does nothing to help the small number with a better copied leaf.

john

Not if the blue ones have a competitive advantage.

alex,

Despite my best efforts you and others still confuse the basics with what I am saying.

Out of a million fish all with some mutation how many would by chance alter the fin? Now out of that small number how many would move a minute fraction towards the leaf pattern?

The inital chance is extremely small but because the gene is blind any future mutations might be to a million other genes and nothing to do with the fin at all because....wait for it...the gene has no idea what it is doing or the result.

The chance of a minute gentic change in any fish resutls in the chance it will guess the next mutation as being on the fin is minute and even then guessing it right is almost impossible.

That is just the calculation for the first two minute changes.

This extremely complex long winded evolutionary nightmare carries on over millions of years with no benefit to the fish until complete and then only from having their tail fin bitten and one asks why bother and how... when the odds on pure chance of following a fin mutation did it guess the billions upon billions of chance mutations along the road.

Looking at basic evolution theory it is easy to see that people can simply say well it happens bit by bit over millions of years, I am not questioning that so why in the name of mary everyone keeps going on about it I have no idea.

Alex, what are the full combinations of any 20 from 10,000?

That is simple maths.

The simple maths for each minute mutation increases with each small change but the odds on any fish once it gets a small change concentrating on that and not picking another part of it`s body instead to mutate is enormous so work out any 20 from 10,000 just to get a taste of the odds here ok?

Let me tell you something for nothing...

The odds on any fish getting the first two minute changes correct are a lot longer than 20 in 10,000

Obviously some have worked out the maths so here is there first few questions as they must have the correct answers already:

With 10,000 fish what is the chances of all the genes that the tail fin will mutate, that is an easy one.

Now for the humdinger question:

Out of the few from 10,000 that mutate the tail fin how many different ways can that mutation affect the tail fin that is nothing like the leaf?????

Take millions of years and simplistic evolution and don`t do the maths no wonder you fail to grasp the numbers involved at each stage.

john

rporter,

Why, when you read through the thread you repeated everything the others had already said escapes me for the minute.

Anyway as you say you know the maths then I await your answers to my maths questions with eager anticipation.

By the way we mean real numbers here to back up your suggestion that you do know the maths, if you do not give an accurate number representing the correct odds then you will have simply evaded an answer because you don`t know one.

Happy days.

john