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Darwin comes to town: how cities are creating new species
- rosser 8y agoThe case of the American cliff swallows, described in The Fine Article, offers an excellent response to the anti-evolutionist, "We've never observed it happening" position. That's it happening over decades.
- jibal 8y agoIf anti-evolutionists were to abandon their position due to evidence, they would have long ago.
- gonvaled 8y agoThe problem is more that the evidence they would accept is pretty much impossible to happen in the real world: something like a jiraffe giving birth to an eagle. Black-and-white worldviews are, by definition, not nuanced, but evolution, but its slow (by human standards) nature, is extremely nuanced, to the point of beeing unnoticeable.
- agumonkey 8y agoFuturama had an episode with endless dichotomic debates where anti-evolution would require proofs of smaller and smaller genetic gaps.
- jibal 8y agoUm, no, the problem is that they are dishonest to the core and refuse to accept valid evidence presented to them because they don't want to believe that evolution occurs. Demanding impossible evidence is just a corollary. "to the point of beeing unnoticeable" It's not unnoticeable; read the fricking article.
- gonvaled 8y agoIt is noticeable for a scientist or for anybody interested, but for a creationist a slightly different mote or bird will never be a proof of speciation: it is anyway very similar to the original species, and it will be explained away by saying that is was already there or something similar. As mentioned, a more radical event should happen to convince these people (so radical as to be impossible).
- olavk 8y agoNo, a "more radical event" will not convince creationists. There is already evidence enough to convince any reasonable person - more evidence of any kind will not change anything.
- grasshopperpurp 8y agoI agree, and it brings to mind Luke 16:31: >“He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ ”
- jibal 8y ago> for a creationist a slightly different mote or bird will never be a proof of speciation As I noted, for a Creationist nothing will ever be proof of speciation. But apparently telling such simple truths gets downvoted. > As mentioned, a more radical event should happen to convince these people (so radical as to be impossible). No, no event, not matter how radical, would convince them because they are ideologically committed to rejecting evolution, which they see as contrary to their entire belief system.
- explainplease 8y agoYou must not have spoken with very many creationists.
- jibal 8y ago
- throwawy3589 8y agoWhat I find even stranger is pro-science progressives essentially denying evolution to support their blank slate social policies. We can see that environment can have significant effects on animals in just a few decades, why would humans be immune? Progressives have ironically taken on a near religious ideology that humans are somehow different from other animals and immune to natural selection.
- maxxxxx 8y agoHumans generally have given up on pure natural selection. Otherwise we would have abolished all laws and law enforcement and let the stronger win. You may be surprised by who will thrive in such a world.
- empath75 8y agoRandom drive by racist comments by throwaway accounts are one of the least appealing aspects of hacker news.
- throwawy3589 8y agoPeople throwing up emotional drivel while doing nothing to refute a point is one the least appealing aspects of hacker news Please explain to me how humans are immune to natural selection and then go claim your nobel prize for revolutionizing human understanding of genetics.
- jibal 8y ago"Please explain to me how humans are immune to natural selection" Why should he do that? He never claimed that -- it's a strawman of your own making.
- jibal 8y ago"pro-science progressives essentially denying evolution to support their blank slate social policies" That has never happened. You seem to be committing a naturalist fallacy.
- aaron695 8y ago> offers an excellent response to the anti-evolutionist, "We've never observed it happening" position. I can't see this at all? Why are the swallows not just changing their wing spans to fit the environment? Or why aren't the swallows that do well just flying in from out of town and hanging around? The only evidence you have it's evolution is that you believe in evolution AFAICS. Anti-evolutionist's are an insignificant minority, I'd be more concerned that most people know little actually about evolution other than the catch phrase.
- selestify 8y agoDo we have any examples of beneficial mutations happening, as opposed to natural selection of existing genes? That's one of the biggest sticking points creationists have.
- tonmoy 8y agoEvolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It may or may not be due to mutation. Why would someone discredit evolution for creationism just because they can’t see a tiny aspect of evolution.
- selestify 8y agoRight, I'm just saying, back when I was a creationist myself, a large part of the argument was that it's well-nigh impossible for mutations to be beneficial. And it appears this is not direct evidence of that still.
- sohkamyung 8y agoI've read the book and it is full of fascinating examples of how urban environment are driving evolutionary changes in various animals. I live in Singapore (one of the places he talks about in the book) and I can see anecdotal examples of the kind of things he talks about in the book, like urban birds being less anxious around humans compared to forest birds.
- pjmlp 8y agoFor me the best example of that is Switzerland, although naturally this might happen in other places as well. Basically sparrows are so used to humans that they don't have any problem landing on a table while people are still there, while trying to see if they get something out of us. Some of them even adopt dog like behaviors, jumping left and right or making small noises, as if begging for some food.
- true_religion 8y agoI am really hoping this leads to domesticated swallows, which we can all keep as pets.
- dsfyu404ed 8y agoAfrican or European?
- mercer 8y agoPigeons in Amsterdam often don't even flinch at approaching bikes and just sidestep what would otherwise probably be death or serious injury.
- maxxxxx 8y agoThe crows in my neighborhood also have figured out how to deal with cars. They casually step aside when they see a car.
- siberianbear 8y ago
- everdev 8y agoI just saw a YouTube video yesterday about how Pablo Escobar took some hippos from Africa and shipped them to Colombia. It sounds like they started changing pretty quickly with the new climate and no predators. If the population keeps increasing, apparently at some point it'll be classified as a new type of hippo. https://youtu.be/C_fj9sEVMeE https://youtu.be/C_fj9sEVMeE
- guelo 8y agoJesus that was annoying, if you're going to have a slickly produced video about your trip to see Columbian hippos how are you not going to have video of hippos in Columbia?
- ndr 8y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UHFHT1WhPc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UHFHT1WhPc if you want to see some
- xefer 8y agoThere has to be evolutionary pressure on animals to avoid cars on the road. I wonder if there is any evidence that road kill numbers are reducing?
- agumonkey 8y agoAlso what about social pressure evolution rather than genetic evolution ?
- vectorEQ 8y agoyou mean micro vs macro evolution i think, and it might be interesting for you to look at those terms? this article , like darwins findings which there are proof for, are all about micro evolution - the environment and social circumstances triggering minor changes. i dont think (but ofcourse, i didnt do any experiements on it... ) that these 'new species' have new DNA. (and really.. that means they aren't actually new species... guess people are confused about what race and species actually mean. but that's another story :D... )
- agumonkey 8y agomacro evolution it is then
- vanderZwan 8y agoI guess you haven't actually read the article, since you would have found your answer in paragraphs fourteen to seventeen: > The shape of a bird’s wing is not something that evolution can mess with with impunity. It is very closely wedded to a bird’s way of life. Long pointed wings are better for fast flying in a straight line, while short rounded wings are good for making rapid turns or for quickly taking off. > The conclusion was inescapable: only cliff swallows with wings short enough to take off vertically from the tarmac to escape an oncoming car had managed to get away and spread their short-wing genes in the gene pool. The tardier long-winged ones ended up as ex-swallows on the hard shoulder, their long-wing genes excluded from the pool. And, as the surviving swallows became ever better adapted at evading approaching vehicles, the number of casualties plummeted. > When researchers consulted the bird collections of eight natural history museums in North America and took measurements on the shape of the wings of 312 starlings, they discovered something interesting. The starlings’ wings had gradually become more rounded over time, because the secondary flight feathers (at the bird’s “lower arm”, closest to the body) had become elongated by some 4%. > It is precisely this quick-response benefit of more rounded wings that may be one of the reasons that the settler starlings evolved. In those 120 years since Schieffelin had released the starlings’ founding fathers in Central Park, the human population in western North America (the part of the continent that the starling expanded into) grew almost fifty-fold. What had been tiny settlements when the starling arrived blossomed into metropolises in a matter of decades. And with urbanisation came new dangers for urban birds: cats and cars. It is quite likely that this is what caused the American starlings to evolve a wing shape that helped them get out of the way of a pouncing cat or a speeding motorcar hurtling towards them. The answers are out there if you actually look for them, you know.