Evolution Questions

[Zwinmar]

There is somthing that I have been wondering about, provided you would be willing to provide me some insight that I have yet to find, Dispite being in college (well on summer break atm).

This is the validity of the Theory of Evololution (sorry cant spell):
My main concern with it is that it is a theory, not a law, for the scientific community to say that it is fact without testing it on a continual basis, as any theory should be, I find that, distatesfull. Escpecially when it comes to politics. While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

Of course, I must admit that while I dispise it, I grew up in the Christian Church, so of course my core mindset is unfortunantly tainted by that.

Anyways, I would like to know how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory. (as i understand it anyways).

[Starglider]

Escpecially when it comes to politics. While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

Does Not Compute. What is the point of debating with you if you state up front that you will never change your beliefs no matter what the evidence? 'Never believe', 'open', 'actual evidence' <- your definition of one of these is fucked up. Or maybe you're just trolling.

[Kamakazie Sith]

Escpecially when it comes to politics. While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

Does Not Compute. What is the point of debating with you if you state up front that you will never change your beliefs no matter what the evidence? 'Never believe', 'open', 'actual evidence' <- your definition of one of these is fucked up. Or maybe you're just trolling.

Nevermind that he obviously has no idea what evolution is. We share a common ancestor with apes, and are not actually evolved from them. This is a common misconception.

Furthermore, he shows a lack of understanding in regards to scientific theory, and what it takes for something to be considered a scientific theory.

[Zwinmar]

I do admit a lacking in scientific theory, its been more than ten years since I last studied or even really heard of the whole process. Hence why I posted this.

From what I remember, theory is not law and never should be stated that it is.

The reason I say that I do not believe that my ancestors are apes is because, as I understand it, evolution takes eons. In order for apes to be the ancestors of humanity, by rights they should be extinct now, or at the very least produceing human like offspring now.

[Temjin]

Furthermore, he shows a lack of understanding in regards to scientific theory, and what it takes for something to be considered a scientific theory.

It comes from those damn childhood science classes. Because of them, I had no idea there was a big difference between a hypothesis and a theory until high school. And even then, I had to find out myself, outside the classroom.

[SirNitram]

Oh boy.

There's no such thing as scientific 'Law', outside of Thermodynamics, no. But there is observed fact(We have observed evolution in various species, including in the lab), and there is Theory(Which has undergone strict review and is constantly challenged.).

Anyone who tells you Evolution is not being tested, observed, and tallied constantly, and has been for the past two centuries? Flat-out liar. You can tell, because we no longer have the same theory that Darwin put out.

Or to put it another way:

It's the Theory of Gravity. HOW DARE YOU SAY THAT'S DOWN! PROVE IT!

[SirNitram]

I do admit a lacking in scientific theory, its been more than ten years since I last studied or even really heard of the whole process. Hence why I posted this.

From what I remember, theory is not law and never should be stated that it is.

The reason I say that I do not believe that my ancestors are apes is because, as I understand it, evolution takes eons. In order for apes to be the ancestors of humanity, by rights they should be extinct now, or at the very least produceing human like offspring now.

You're right, modern apes aren't your ancestors. They're your cousins by a distant(Aeons, in fact) common ancestor.

[Zwinmar]

hmm, so I have some bad misconception brought on most likely from the the "christian" education I went through.

anyways, off to work I go *sigh*, will look at this in the morning when I get off.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

The reason I say that I do not believe that my ancestors are apes is because, as I understand it, evolution takes eons. In order for apes to be the ancestors of humanity, by rights they should be extinct now, or at the very least produceing human like offspring now.

The ape species that are currently around are not our ancestors. They merely share relatively recent ancestry with us.

Let's say Ape X is the most recent common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees. Ape X is not around anymore, and likely hasn't been around for five or six million years. Instead, some of the Ape Xes had offspring which had offspring which had offspring and so on which eventually had offspring which could be classified as humans, and some other Ape Xes had offspring and so on which eventually came to chimpanzees. The same is the case with Ape Y, the most recent common ancestor between Ape X and Gorillas, and so on and so on with all animals, and almost all life (from what I know, things aren't quite as cut-and-dry when you get to bacteria). Ape X, Ape Y, and so on are all long extinct. We only have their descendant species around anymore.

[SirNitram]

hmm, so I have some bad misconception brought on most likely from the the "christian" education I went through.

anyways, off to work I go *sigh*, will look at this in the morning when I get off.

Few people actual teach the real theory of evolution; if you're American, that's double. It's THE EVIL SECULARISTS!!!!!!

Incidentally, you're working off the wrong idea with 'If we evolve from this, it should be dead'. Obviously the members living then would be, but if the genes of the species are stable, and their niche isn't threatened, there's not going to be much evolution worth talking about. Evolution doesn't strive for anything except making sure you make more copies of yourself, and that those copies make more copies. The exciting stuff happens when there's a new niche opened up.

[Singular Intellect]

There is somthing that I have been wondering about, provided you would be willing to provide me some insight that I have yet to find, Dispite being in college (well on summer break atm).

This is the validity of the Theory of Evololution (sorry cant spell):
My main concern with it is that it is a theory, not a law, for the scientific community to say that it is fact without testing it on a continual basis, as any theory should be, I find that, distatesfull. Escpecially when it comes to politics. While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

Of course, I must admit that while I dispise it, I grew up in the Christian Church, so of course my core mindset is unfortunantly tainted by that.

Anyways, I would like to know how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory. (as i understand it anyways).

Imagine someone disputing the "theory of gravity" because it's called a 'theory'. Gravity is a fact despite the more accurate terminology being the "theory of gravity".

Just like gravity, evolution is a theory, but essentially a fact as well.

Your claim you wish to recieve evidence is clearly a lie...you bluntly stated you'll never believe the 'theory' anyway.

[Patrick Degan]

My main concern with it is that it is a theory, not a law, for the scientific community to say that it is fact without testing it on a continual basis, as any theory should be, I find that, distatesfull.... Anyways, I would like to know how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory. (as i understand it anyways).

For a start, you proceed from a fundamental misunderstanding of what the word "theory" means in a scientific context, which is: "the description of an observed phenomenon". "Theory" is the more accurate term; "law" merely is a qualifier.

[Superman]

hmm, so I have some bad misconception brought on most likely from the the "christian" education I went through.

anyways, off to work I go *sigh*, will look at this in the morning when I get off.

Welcome to real life, bud. Lots of us have had similar backgrounds to yours.

[Coop D'etat]

If you want to get technical, humans didn't just evolve from a common ancestor with apes, humans are apes. The fact that we have less hair and type into computers doesn't change the fact that homo sapiens is, biologically speaking, just a stones throw away from a chimp.

[Kamakazie Sith]

hmm, so I have some bad misconception brought on most likely from the the "christian" education I went through.

anyways, off to work I go *sigh*, will look at this in the morning when I get off.

That's a good attitude to have. Ultimately, it probably isn't your fault that you've been misled. Now that you know you've been misled you can take steps to change that.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

Since you mentioned it, the ancestor we evolved from, the first one to branch off between modern apes and Man, is dead. Australopithecus Africanus, I believe.

[SpacedTeddyBear]

It appears that there is a lot of misunderstanding on your part when it comes to scientific terminology. The website here has the proper definition on those terms as well. You can also try this place as well. It should also address your initial comment on "how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory."

[Darth Wong]

I also like his comment about how the theory of evolution is not constantly being tested, when in fact it is. He actually PM'd me with this exact argument and I told him to make a thread because I figured the rest of you might be nicer to him than me.

After getting hundreds of almost identical versions of his argument in the past, my patience for that kind of zero-effort, "can't even bother to read the main website" argument has pretty much disappeared. If I didn't tell him to make a thread, I would have responded by just flaming him to a crisp for his ignorance and intellectual sloth.

[Fire Fly]

There is somthing that I have been wondering about, provided you would be willing to provide me some insight that I have yet to find, Dispite being in college (well on summer break atm).

This is the validity of the Theory of Evololution (sorry cant spell):
My main concern with it is that it is a theory, not a law, for the scientific community to say that it is fact without testing it on a continual basis, as any theory should be, I find that, distatesfull.

This is a good place to start to understand the basic differences between a scientific law, a hypothesis, and a scientific theory. There is a difference between each and the average lay person does not know that.

While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

You are right to say that it doesn't make sense that your ancestors were apes because your ancestors were never apes in the first place. Apes and your common ancestors are a modern day variation of an ancestral species which they both share heritage to. This is a major point that you need to understand. Analogously, there is a growing body of evidence which strongly supports the notion that a branch of dinosaurs evolved into modern day birds; inversely, however, it is not true that modern day birds are dinosaurs. Birds simply shared an ancestor with a certain branch of dinosaurs. An additional analogy would be wolves and dogs. Both modern day wolves and dogs share a common ancestral species but it would be incorrect to say that dogs came from wolves and vice versa.

The point is that apes and humans are more akin to cousin species; if humans were apes, it would be more akin to father and son, which is not the case. If you want evidence for kinship between apes and humans, all you need to do is look at the anatomy of both species and look at the genetic accordance of both species. The similar anatomy of both species tells us that both humans and apes must have had some sort of a similar lineage. The high genetic accordance tells us that both humans and apes have a very high degree of cellular similarity, metabolic similarity, physical similarity, anatomical similarity, physiological similarity, and pretty much anything biological. Moreover, this high genetic accordance tells us that both apes and humans must have had a common ancestor not too long ago since the lower the accordance, the farther apart the two cousin species would be.

Of course, I must admit that while I dispise it, I grew up in the Christian Church, so of course my core mindset is unfortunantly tainted by that.

Admitting that is really the first step to understanding scientific truth.

Anyways, I would like to know how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory. (as i understand it anyways).

The theory of evolution simply explains how the diversity of life came to be. The biggest hindrance to evolution is that it takes so long for it to actually be noticed, on the order of thousands of years. Evolution happens simply due to mutations in DNA (some mutations are deleterious, some are beneficial, but most are actually neutral); all animals have self correcting mechanisms which try to fix these mutations but it can't always catch every mistake. Usually, with lots and lots of time, mutations accumulate slowly and it begins to change the shape of certain proteins and their function. Eventually, with even more time, the change becomes even greater. Now, this is simply one aspect of evolution, usually referred to as microevolution. However, evolution really has no boundary and the term microevolution is really just a terminology to help distinguish the scale and to help us understand the differences on the molecular scale and on the large scale.

What I discussed above is simply an extremely condensed and oversimplified version of evolution. One could spend hundreds of pages discussing the subtle nuances of evolution. This website is typically considered one of the best websites on the internet which goes into great depths about evolution and answers common questions that you perhaps would have.

[Surlethe]

This is the validity of the Theory of Evololution (sorry cant spell):
My main concern with it is that it is a theory, not a law,

So? A theory is a cohesive explanation of a wide set of facts that makes use of a mechanism. A law is simply a generalization about a set of facts.

for the scientific community to say that it is fact without testing it on a continual basis, as any theory should be, I find that, distatesfull.

Every single new biological observation, fossil find, experiment in the lab, to name a few, tests the theory of evolution.

Escpecially when it comes to politics. While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

Good. Nobody who knows what evolution says believes his ancestors were apes. In reality, evolution predicts that we share a common ancestor geologically recently with the other great apes.

Of course, I must admit that while I dispise it, I grew up in the Christian Church, so of course my core mindset is unfortunantly tainted by that.

Deal with it. At least you recognize that you have serious misconceptions.

Anyways, I would like to know how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory. (as i understand it anyways).

Well, there's two answers. First: evolution is a fact, as well as a theory. We observe evolution in action all the time -- why do you think we have to manufacture new flu medicines each winter? Second: the theory of evolution has passed so many tests that there's no reason to think it's false at all. It's, quite literally, the best description of how biodiversity arose. Why shouldn't it be taught as though it were true, since it certainly is?

[dworkin]

The reason I say that I do not believe that my ancestors are apes is because, as I understand it, evolution takes eons. In order for apes to be the ancestors of humanity, by rights they should be extinct now, or at the very least produceing human like offspring now.

Your recent anscestors, up to your parents were / are apes. In fact you yourself are an ape.

All the great apes share a number of characteristics that classify them as apes. Humans have all of these and so are clasified as apes. Humans (as an example) also have a number of characteristics peculiar to them, which is how you can tell them apart.

[Ariphaos]

Change in allele frequency over time is fact. We've seen it, and continue to see it.
Mutations, including the creation of new alleles, gene duplication and divergence, etc. is fact. We've seen it, and continue to see it.
Selection, sexual, natural, and artificial, is fact. We've seen it, and continue to see it.

Those are facts of evolution. They are processes that any competing theory must explain in order to replace the theory.

Common descent is a theory. That is, we only have evidence to support it - we naturally did not witness the entire evolutionary chain. However, there are pieces to the puzzle that are facts. For example, fossil evidence - a limited selection of transitional fossils, and genetic evidence, most tellingly retrovirii embedded in DNA, both must be explained by a competing theory.

Abiogenesis is a hypothesis, and not a part of evolution - Darwin wrote the origin of species, not the origin of life, after all. But even with that, it makes many testable claims.

[Superman]

A professor of mine, who is also a physician, once told me that there's more biological variation between a man and a woman than between a human and a chimp.

[Fire Fly]

The reason I say that I do not believe that my ancestors are apes is because, as I understand it, evolution takes eons. In order for apes to be the ancestors of humanity, by rights they should be extinct now, or at the very least produceing human like offspring now.

Your recent anscestors, up to your parents were / are apes. In fact you yourself are an ape.

All the great apes share a number of characteristics that classify them as apes. Humans have all of these and so are clasified as apes. Humans (as an example) also have a number of characteristics peculiar to them, which is how you can tell them apart.

Taxonomically, I would agree that humans and apes are the same since we're both hominids. My only criticism of this point is that it easily confuses people who don't understand taxonomy. Lay people who oppose evolution think that modern humans came from modern apes and that just isn't the case.

[Zixinus]

My main concern with it is that it is a theory, not a law, for the scientific community to say that it is fact without testing it on a continual basis, as any theory should be, I find that, distatesfull.

It is "tested" because it best explains the already existing fossil record, and does not conflict any new fossils found or similar evidence (bones, genetics, comparing different species biology to another, etc). Adoption to environment has also been observed, thus again tested. On a small scale, adoption to environment gives a perfect explanation to changes to environment.
It cannot be tested on a large scale, because that would take thousands, if not millions of years to do. However, we don't need to, as we found the remains of long-dead animals that we can study. We can date these animals by carbon dating (or similar methods), which is a tricky thing as it involves nuclear physics.

Furthermore, a scientific law tells how an effect (phenomenon) will happen, not why will it happen. A theory will attempt to explain the connection of effects and why the effect happens. Evolution is the most obvious explanation for anybody studying zoology. In fact, biology makes no sense without it.

While I personally will never believe that my ancestors were apes (that just doesnt make sense to me), I am open for actual evidence.

I have a simple suggestion: visit a natural history museum.
You can view the evidence for yourself, and if you are lucky, you might even find someone who will explain a bunch of things for you.

Anyways, I would like to know how the theory of evolution can be taught as fact, when in reality it is still a theory. (as i understand it anyways).

Because the word "evolution" can both refer to the theory AND "effect". The "effect" of evolution can be demonstrated by fact, and is well ,if not perfectly, explained by the theory of evolution.

The reason I say that I do not believe that my ancestors are apes is because, as I understand it, evolution takes eons. In order for apes to be the ancestors of humanity, by rights they should be extinct now, or at the very least produceing human like offspring now.

And they are! The "apes" humanity evolved from are dead a long time ago, however they are not the same apes as you see today in the zoo. However, the living apes are very,very,very,very,very distant branch of humanoids. They are a distant branch, who we share a common ancestors with (from a very,very,very long time ago).