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The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. There's too much evidence for me to believe that evolution doesn't happen, at an

by kiba 3y ago

The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. There's too much evidence for me to believe that evolution doesn't happen, at any scale. Evolution is clearly observable and foundational to biology. Whereas Christian creation stories always felt like mythology, sounds human centric and made up. I read stuff like the Epic of Gilgamesh and realized that some stories in the bibles are based on older iterations written by ancient people.

0xcde4c3db 3y ago
> The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. It is nonsense through the lens of biology, but it's nonsense that's very ideologically convenient to certain demographics, which (perhaps paradoxically) means that terms to talk about the distinction become useful in some sociopolitical or anthropological contexts. For what it's worth, the very particular term for the religiously-motivated typology that accepts microevolution while rejecting macroevolution is baraminology.
- xigency 3y ago
  Now I am reminded of the YouTube clickbait I loved, something like, “evolutionists will hate this video.” I thought I would, but in fact I saw a lot of great biology and science and was glad that they were teaching how life can change over time…
aleph_minus_one 3y ago
> The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. Even from a biological perspective this distinction is not nonsense: couldn't there exist an additional mechanism that is not arbitrary mutation and survival/selection of the fittest, which could be an additionally important for the formation of species and macroevolution? Candidates for such possible additional mechanisms have been proposed from biologists, such as Lamarckism or epigenetics (though the mainstream view in biology is these either could not be observed (Lamarckism) or are not considered to be important for macroevolution (epigenetics)).
- SamBam 3y ago
  This "couldn't there exist..." is doing a lot of work that I don't understand. "Couldn't there exist different laws of gravity for big things like planets and small things like rocks, which explains why I've never seen rocks attracted to each other?" Yes, there could in some alternative universe, but not in this one that we know of, and it's not necessary to explain why you don't notice rocks being attracted to each other. There could exist some difference between "microevolution" and "macroevolution," but not in this universe that we know of, and it's not necessary to explain species. The entire concept was made up by creationists to try to add a patina of science to their deeply-unscientific beliefs. And the problem with an unscientific world view is that science will never change your mind about things, you'll just decide what science to accept and which to not accept.
  - aleph_minus_one 3y ago
    > "Couldn't there exist different laws of gravity for big things like planets and small things like rocks, which explains why I've never seen rocks attracted to each other?" Something very related is a topic that is seriously discussed among physicists: > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics The problem with the existing theories of gravitation which seem to work quite well on the scale of solar systems is that there does seem to exist evidence that some observed data on the scale of galaxies might not be well-explainable by these theories. See > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics#Observational_evidence_for_MOND https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics#Ob... Very recently new evidence for MOND came up: > https://phys.org/news/2023-08-smoking-gun-evidence-gravity-gaia-wide.html https://phys.org/news/2023-08-smoking-gun-evidence-gravity-g... > https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37051241 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37051241 See also: > https://tritonstation.com/2023/08/02/is-ngc-1277-a-problem-for-mond/ https://tritonstation.com/2023/08/02/is-ngc-1277-a-problem-f... > https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37009037 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37009037
    - SamBam 3y ago
      That's why I deliberately said "planets" vs "small rocks," for which this does not apply.

by kiba 3y ago

0xcde4c3db 3y ago

> The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. It is nonsense through the lens of biology, but it's nonsense that's very ideologically convenient to certain demographics, which (perhaps paradoxically) means that terms to talk about the distinction become useful in some sociopolitical or anthropological contexts. For what it's worth, the very particular term for the religiously-motivated typology that accepts microevolution while rejecting macroevolution is baraminology.

xigency 3y ago
Now I am reminded of the YouTube clickbait I loved, something like, “evolutionists will hate this video.” I thought I would, but in fact I saw a lot of great biology and science and was glad that they were teaching how life can change over time…

aleph_minus_one 3y ago

> The distinction between macroevolution and microevolution sounds like nonsense. Even from a biological perspective this distinction is not nonsense: couldn't there exist an additional mechanism that is not arbitrary mutation and survival/selection of the fittest, which could be an additionally important for the formation of species and macroevolution? Candidates for such possible additional mechanisms have been proposed from biologists, such as Lamarckism or epigenetics (though the mainstream view in biology is these either could not be observed (Lamarckism) or are not considered to be important for macroevolution (epigenetics)).

SamBam 3y ago
This "couldn't there exist..." is doing a lot of work that I don't understand. "Couldn't there exist different laws of gravity for big things like planets and small things like rocks, which explains why I've never seen rocks attracted to each other?" Yes, there could in some alternative universe, but not in this one that we know of, and it's not necessary to explain why you don't notice rocks being attracted to each other. There could exist some difference between "microevolution" and "macroevolution," but not in this universe that we know of, and it's not necessary to explain species. The entire concept was made up by creationists to try to add a patina of science to their deeply-unscientific beliefs. And the problem with an unscientific world view is that science will never change your mind about things, you'll just decide what science to accept and which to not accept.
- aleph_minus_one 3y ago
  > "Couldn't there exist different laws of gravity for big things like planets and small things like rocks, which explains why I've never seen rocks attracted to each other?" Something very related is a topic that is seriously discussed among physicists: > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics The problem with the existing theories of gravitation which seem to work quite well on the scale of solar systems is that there does seem to exist evidence that some observed data on the scale of galaxies might not be well-explainable by these theories. See > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics#Observational_evidence_for_MOND https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics#Ob... Very recently new evidence for MOND came up: > https://phys.org/news/2023-08-smoking-gun-evidence-gravity-gaia-wide.html https://phys.org/news/2023-08-smoking-gun-evidence-gravity-g... > https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37051241 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37051241 See also: > https://tritonstation.com/2023/08/02/is-ngc-1277-a-problem-for-mond/ https://tritonstation.com/2023/08/02/is-ngc-1277-a-problem-f... > https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37009037 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37009037
  - SamBam 3y ago
    That's why I deliberately said "planets" vs "small rocks," for which this does not apply.