Why male and female?

Originally posted by lemon lime
Repeatedly tossing letters onto the floor until a word shows up does not mean we can expect to see that same word show up on the next throw. There is no incremental increase of probability. The probabilities remain the same with each throw.

Evolution assumes incremental increases from one generation to the next based on selection. Selection is based on y once? According to evolutionists it happens so frequently there should be no doubt about it.

An organism needs to actually do something to increase its chance of survival.

certainly not necessarily. If a mutation gives a moth a better chance of surviving by colouring its wings to give it better camouflage from insect eating birds, the moth doesn't have to 'do' anything to make that mutation increase its chance of survival for it would be just the better camouflage that increase its chance of survival.

Tiny changes with potential for survival cannot be selected.

why not?

Natural selection is not an intelligently guiding force...

we are not saying nor assuming it is.

it cannot recognise potential.

and it doesn't have to 'recognise' or 'know' anything in order for natural selection to work.

Evolution assumes tiny changes are retained and added to other tiny changes UNTIL something develops to a point where it can then be "selected" (my emphasis)

No. I don't know where you got that from. You have got muddled here. The natural selection comes immediately after each incremental advantageous mutation and you don't need one advantageous mutation to be first added to another before natural selection can happen.

The changes themelves are too small to account for an entire mechanism for survival to show up in only one generation. Even it was possible for all the elements that go into making a simple mechanism to show up at the same time, self assembled and ready to go, what is the chance of this happening only once?

Who is claiming that many small evolutionary changes occur in just ONE generation? Not us evolutionist! This is just a straw man.

According to evolutionists it happens so frequently there should be no doubt about it.

wrong! As I just said, we are NOT claiming this and we never have! Evolution generally occurs with many small incremental changes over MANY generations and this is what we always have said. Although sometimes there are also the odd rare sudden drastic single advantageous mutations that constitute a major evolutionary change in one go, these events are more the exception to the rule because evolution still generally works incrementally most of the time. Even with the odd rare sudden drastic single advantageous mutations that constitute a major evolutionary change in one go, it would take MANY generations for natural selection to make such a mutation spread across the whole population and we have never claimed nor assumed otherwise.

Originally posted by humy

An organism needs to actually do something to increase its chance of survival.

certainly not necessarily. If a mutation gives a moth a better chance of surviving by colouring its wings to give it better camouflage from insect eating birds, the moth doesn't have to 'do' anything to make that mutation increase its chance of survival for it to the rule because evolution still generally works incrementally most of the time.

First of all, changes of color will happen because the genes already present in a population (of moths) are being selected.

Secondly, there are evolutionists who claim evolution is happening all time, because they do not recognise the difference between micro and macro evolultion. They believe the fact that natural selection occurs (no one argues with that) means mutations can add new genes into the system.

The fact that I can mix and match things that do exist does not mean I can expect new things to come into existence. If I have a collection of coins I can mix and match together, I can't expect to find new coins among them. That may be a poor analogy, and I have no doubt you can successfully pick it apart. That's what usually happens when I resort to using analogies. Then I need to explain it's only an analogy, and not meant as a precise representation of the idea the analogy is meant to convey...

I'm operating here on the theory that if it's possible for you to understand what I'm saying, then no matter how remote the possibility, given enough time you will understand what I'm saying. I'm not directing this last remark to you personally. I'm just saying I'm operating on that theory.

Originally posted by humy

Tiny changes with potential for survival cannot be selected.

why not?

Because natural selection does not recognise potential advantages. An advantage needs to be doing something before it can be "selected", not just have the potential for doing something.

Recognising potential is an act of intelligence.

Originally posted by lemon lime
First of all, changes of color will happen because the genes already present in a population (of moths) are being selected.

Secondly, there are evolutionists who claim evolution is happening all time, because they do not recognise the difference between micro and macro evolultion. They believe the fact that natural selection occurs (no one argues with ting this last remark to you personally. I'm just saying I'm operating on that theory.

First of all, changes of color will happen because the genes already present in a population (of moths) are being selected.

so what? And what barrier would stop a new mutation for color occurring?

Secondly, there are evolutionists who claim evolution is happening all time

that's because it is. We have EVIDENCE that it is occurring all the time.

because they do not recognize the difference between micro and macro evolultion.

Wrong again. We DO recognize the difference between micro and macro evolution and we say and know micro evolution is occurring all the time while macro evolution doesn't because, because macro evolution is a long series of micro evolution events, macro evolution events occur much less frequently.

They believe the fact that natural selection occurs (no one argues with that) means mutations can add new genes into the system.

What barrier will stop natural selection adding an advantageous mutation to a genome to a population?

The fact that I can mix and match things that do exist does not mean I can expect new things to come into existence.

straw man: that is not our logic. Do you deny the existence of mutations?

Originally posted by lemon lime
Because natural selection does not recognise potential advantages. An advantage needs to be doing something before it can be "selected", not just have the potential for doing something.

Recognising potential is an act of intelligence.

Because natural selection does not recognise potential advantages.

straw man: you imply here by 'recognise' that we are claiming that natural selection consciously recognise advantages when we do not say nor claim nor think such a thing.
Natural selection does not need to consciously recognize or know anything to select any advantageous mutations. Exactly what BARRIER is preventing the environment selecting an advantageous mutation? You have already admitted that natural selection happens (with “..they believe the fact that natural selection occurs (no one argues with that) ...” ) and if natural selection happens then natural selection can sand should select for any advantageous mutation so I don't understand your logic here. And what is this with the “ potential” advantages? -are you implying that a mutation cannot give an actual advantage?

An advantage needs to be doing something before it can be "selected", not just have the potential for doing something.

are you implying that there cannot be a mutation that cannot give an advantage? If so, we have many examples of advantageous mutations and you have completely failed to explain why such mutations cannot exist.
A mutation that gives a moth a colour that makes it better camouflaged is “doing” something for what it is “doing” is giving the moth better camouflager. How is that NOT true? In what way does such a mutation merely have the “potential” to make the colour but without actually make the colour? Are you denying that there exists a mutation that is “doing” something?

Originally posted by humy

First of all, changes of color will happen because the genes already present in a population (of moths) are being selected.

so what? And what barrier would stop a new mutation for color occurring?

Secondly, there are evolutionists who claim evolution is happening all time

that's because it is. We have EVIDENCE ...[text shortened]... tence. [/quote]
straw man: that is not our logic. Do you deny the existence of mutations?

The fact that moths go through many generations in a relatively short amount of time means they can quickly adapt through natural selection without mutations. Since genes for both lighter and darker genes already exist in the population, why would mutation be necessary? A barrier for mutations would be the amount of time needed for such a mutation to occur. If you believe adaptive mutations can happen as quickly as the natural selection of genes already present, then maybe you should talk this over with other evolutionists.

The universe according to one near by source says there is no such thing as edges, borders or boundaries. Apparently we can now add the word barrier to that list.

I do not deny the existence of mutations. I deny what you say mutations are able to do and how quickly they are able to do it.

Originally posted by humy

Because natural selection does not recognise potential advantages.

straw man: you imply here by 'recognise' that we are claiming that natural selection consciously recognise advantages when we do not say nor claim nor think such a thing.
Natural selection does not need to consciously recognize or know anything to select any ...[text shortened]... ly make the colour? Are you denying that there exists a mutation that is “doing” something?

Show me an example of how natural selection can anticipate something that hasn't yet happened, mutations or no mutations.

Show me how mutations can move faster than natural selection is able to respond to cause and effect.

In other words, explain to me the magical properties of mutation.

Originally posted by lemon lime
Repeatedly tossing letters onto the floor until a word shows up does not mean we can expect to see that same word show up on the next throw. There is no incremental increase of probability. The probabilities remain the same with each throw.

Correct. But you do concede that words will show up? Does this constitute information, or does it not, please actually answer the question as you seem to have been avoiding doing so up to now.

Evolution assumes incremental increases from one generation to the next based on selection. Selection is based on how well some fortuitous change increases the chance of survival. But survival is a quality that cannot be measured by one tiny change after another over several generations.
Why not? In fact I dispute that. Some single mutations are well known to increase the chance of survival in a measurable way.

An organism needs to actually do something to increase its chance of survival. Tiny changes with potential for survival cannot be selected. Natural selection is not an intelligently guiding force... it does not recognise potential because it cannot recognise potential.
Correct.

Evolution assumes tiny changes are retained and added to other tiny changes until something develops to a point where it can then be "selected". This is like expecting letters thrown on the floor to retain words until those words are eventually arranged into sentences and paragraphs.
Not quite, but close. So is it your claim that if you throw letters on the floor enough time, there will never be paragraphs? If so, you are wrong. This would be a good example of where 'given enough time' would work.

Originally posted by lemon lime
I said "For example"... it was an example of flawed reasoning to illustrate how the logic breaks down if we skip over the part where it says IF something is possible. Saying IF something is possible does not mean the same as saying something IS possible.

I still don't get your point. Are you claiming something specific is impossible that someone else claims is possible 'given enough time'? Or was that whole discussion simply an example of people having flawed reasoning? If so, whats the point? Are you saying someone has flawed reasoning in something else? If so what and where?

Originally posted by lemon lime
First of all, changes of color will happen because the genes already present in a population (of moths) are being selected.

So is it your claim that every gene in every life form has been in that life form since the beginning of life? How do you account for such great diversity of genes? Surely over time as genes die out there would be gradual reduction in gene diversity until each species is nearly uniform.
This also contradicts the well known fact that mutations occur and that some of those mutations affect colour.
So what is your view on domestic animals? Are you saying that every gene in every dog was already present in the ancestor wolves?

Originally posted by twhitehead
I still don't get your point. Are you claiming something specific is impossible that someone else claims is possible 'given enough time'? Or was that whole discussion simply an example of people having flawed reasoning? If so, whats the point? Are you saying someone has flawed reasoning in something else? If so what and where?

You are over thinking this. Look at these two statements and tell me for yourself how they are different.

1. Given enough time anything is possible.

2. If something is possible, then no matter how remote, given enough time it will happen.

Originally posted by lemon lime
You are over thinking this. Look at these two statements and tell me for yourself how they are different.

1. Given enough time anything is possible.

2. If something is possible, then no matter how remote, given enough time it will happen.

I already stated that 1. is false and 2. is true. But I still don't get your point. Are you claiming that something specific is impossible? Or are you just pointing out the obvious that nobody disputes anyway?

Originally posted by twhitehead
Correct. But you do concede that words will show up? Does this constitute information, or does it not, please actually answer the question as you seem to have been avoiding doing so up to now.

[b]Evolution assumes incremental increases from one generation to the next based on selection. Selection is based on how well some fortuitous change increases th ...[text shortened]... If so, you are wrong. This would be a good example of where 'given enough time' would work.

Answer the question? I wasn't the one who introduced the example of tossing letters on the floor. If a word happens to show up then no, it's not information. It's a pattern that just happens to match a pattern we recognise as being a word. Does that answer your question, or am I still "avoiding" your question?

Perhaps you can answer a question for me now. Does the probability of an outcome increase with each throw of the letters, or does it stay the same? You haven't addressed that point yet. I won't assume you have been avoiding it, but now that I've asked...

Originally posted by twhitehead
I already stated that 1. is false and 2. is true. But I still don't get your point. Are you claiming that something specific is impossible? Or are you just pointing out the obvious that nobody disputes anyway?

Forget it. I don't believe you were trying avoid my original point, so no harm no foul. I do think you are reading a lot more into my messages than is there, but apparently there is nothing I can do about that.