Cindy Claveau

I *can* say unequivocally that the universe is big!

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"As long as there’s one person on earth who remembers you, it isn’t over." - Oscar Hammerstein

Ishina

That's what she said.

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Twisted Pharaoh

It's not enough. You need or-ga-ni-za-tion.

Go make a cake with randomness and natural selection then tell me again about it.

Jopsy Pendragon

'Learn' ?

'Respond' ?

Again with the anthropomorphic metaphorical terms.

Evolution repeats failures over and over until it can repeat them no longer, not because it has learned not to, but because the failed species have, at long last, gone extinct.

Evolution repeats failures over and over until they are no longer failures because that liability suddenly becomes an advantage when a species' environment changes (for any of hundreds of possible random reasons).

It does not learn... it does not 'try', nature just mindlessly repeats that which it can repeat, and fails to repeat that which it can not.

Jopsy Pendragon

Um. Cakes recipes ARE a process of UNnatural selection. Recipes that work out get used, modified, refined and re-used.

Cake recipes that result in undesirable cakes, tend not to get repeated.

Give some chefs a million years and a cake recipe and there's no way in hell you're going to recognize what it turns into at the other end.

Darnk Yun

Oh, I see how it is!

when you make a recipe it's all good, BUT WHEN A CAKE MAKES A RECIPE YOU GOTTA HATE!


I AM OUTRAGED!

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Ahaha, such a simpleton. It'z so much fun playing jokez on you. I waz only here to see how she waz doing, but I had fun while I waz at it. So long, Sere, au revoir, mon ami! Pleaze dream of moi every night! Oui! ~ Harle

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Cindy Claveau

That's a very poor analogy.

Natural Selection is one of several components that make up the process of Evolution, along with Random Genetic Drift -> mutations. You can't evolve without both, and the system may not have the kind of organization YOU want, but it's worked pretty well for almost 4 billion years.

You can't argue with success. Well, maybe YOU can, but it would be dumb.

Ishina

I am confiscating your poetic license until you can show me you are able to use it appropriately.

Jopsy Pendragon

Still waiting for an answer from you (not the oracle) on this.

Lucifer Baphomet

There are actually several species of lungfish in desert environments which hibernate under dry mud, and then come out and breed when heavy rains give rise to short lived bodies of standing water.

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Jopsy Pendragon

Boy, howdy yes. And frogs too. I remember a couple of monsoons in AZ when puddles festooned with tadpoles, desperately trying to mate and spawn before they were boiled alive in their own muck.

God what a smell that left behind. UGh.

Bard Jameson

How about you ask my oracle a question? I use a system called the I Ping

I put your question into Google and role a pair of dice. The number of the dice indicates the web site location on the first page of Google results.

I then ping that site. I have a book with answers 1 through 512. The answer I give is the one that corresponds to the ping from that site in ms. Anything above 512 or a no response from host has no meaning.

Here is the result from your question "How about you ask my oracle a question?"

Dice Roll: 7
7th result on Google: www.ask-oracle.com/
Ping of that site: 201

Oracle 201:

Ducks are in flight
Peanut butter sticks to the roof of your mouth
Can you use a sieve for a drinking cup?

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Richie Waves

There was a creationist on another forum I was on and he never STFU about something he called CFSI in reference to Complex functional specified information, meant nothing much of anything except he didn't like evolution.

My point is, I'm sick of people using sciencey sounding stuff to push their shit little theories.

Jopsy Pendragon

Me too. I'm fine with some artistic metaphorical license... you know, the usual 'stars are like atoms' stuff. But if people proceed to imply logical scientific conclusions based on those comparisons, I just wanna thwap them with balloon animals.

Jahar Aabye

No. Ironically, it is actually a very efficient (in some ways) method for life forms to function in an environment. Oh, it's inefficient in the sense that a lot of organisms die, but it's efficient in that it does a wonderful job of ensuring that subsequent generations are well-adapted to their environment.

There is an abundance of evidence demonstrating how evolution incorporates existing structures for new purposes. The structure of our limbs is very similar to that of lobe-finned fish...the evidence suggests that all land-dwelling vertebrates evolved from a common ancestor, most likely a species of lobe-finned fish living in perhaps a swamp-like environment. There are fossils of animals such as acanthostega and ichthyostega that resemble almost an overgrown tadpole. Their limbs would not and did not support them on land, but would have been very useful for moving around in a shallow pond, lake, bayou, or river that was cluttered with rocks and various plant matter.

That those limbs would also allow locomotion on land was certainly beneficial later, but walking on dry land was not the reason why legs originally evolved from fins. And it was only those lobe-finned fish that evolved them, the ray-finned fish did not evolve legs. A trait that is beneficial in one setting may prove useful in another. Other times, new features evolve from existing ones:

The first vertebrates did not have jaws. They used their gill arches to filter water or mud and consume the small animals and plankton in a manner similar to how modern whales use their baleen to filter water for krill. Fossils of these early vertebrates show that they have more gill arches than modern fish. If you observe modern fish embryos, they begin with these extra gill arches, but two of them develop differently, enlarging and bending to become jaws during embryonic development. It turns out that jaws are advantageous, and eventually the fish whose embryos developed jaws would outnumber and outcompete those who did not. Some jawless fish species survive today, but only in very specialized roles.

Human embryos also have gill arches. Like fish, some of these go on to develop into jaws. But wait, we don't have gills. Why would our embryos have gill arches if we don't? Well, those arches develop i to other things, such as our eustachian tubes. The structures exist, initially they are very similar to the ones in fish, but they develop differently.

Now, most alterations innembryonic development fail. The result is stillborn for one reason or another. Or the organism develops and is hatched/born, but the new changes are simply not advantageous. And of course, those changes don't have to be ones that affect embryonic development. It turns out that a minor mutation in the gene that codes for the protein melanin, the pigment that makes tissues darker, creates a different chemical, pheomelanin. Where melanin gives skin, hair, and irises a brown color, pheomelanin has a more red/orange tone. People with this mutation have red hair. They are also incapable of developing a true skin tan, since the skin tans due to melanin production. Instead of tanning normally, these people develop freckles (and sunburn, lots and lots of sunburn). In areas where melanin is essential to protect the skin from sun damage, this mutation is not helpful to the individual. In areas where there is less danger of sunburn, red hair and the associated skin tone is less of a disadvantage. Unfortunately, humans carrykng this recessive mutation then move to places where the sun is much stronger innthe summer, and their offspring curse them every time they go to the beach

See how this works? Random mutation can affect how gill arches develop or which the makeup of a pigment protein. Whether the organisms with these changes go on to reproduce and pass the genetic changes further depends on how well the results of those changes help or hinder the individual. Even otherwise damaging genetic mutations may persist in a population, for example with some mental illnesses where impulsive behavior results in a much higher risk of unplanned pregnancy. The individual clearly is not well adapted to the environment, but natural selection is determined by reproduction.

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He pulled a Captain Ahab and Jaharpwn'ed her. - Trout

Lucifer Baphomet

We still have some around today.

Lampreys and Hagfish

Wrong Weatherwax

Roll to save vs. prognostication, -5 modifier.

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An education was a bit like a communicable sexual disease. It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and then you had the urge to pass it on. -Terry Pratchett

Cindy Claveau

Me too, but in this case there really is a term "Complex Adaptive System". Richard Dawkins used it, as did Murray Gell-Mann and others in describing ecosystems.

I just don't think it means what Pharoah thinks it does.

What are Complex Adaptive Systems?

Complex + adaptive != intelligence or sentience

Twisted Pharaoh

We are going to a deadend because you don't see organization where I see it. Without organization, Life cannot last.

For example, the splitting of Pangaea forced species to diversify. Being diversified they could have a greater variety of response to the different problems that affected them.

But for you it's randomness, for me it's organization.

Cindy Claveau

Where did I say there was no order? I didn't. However, I think "order" is a cognitive misinterpretation when it comes to nature and I distrust that term.

Nature relies on randomness to produce complexity and, in a few cases, Life. Without randomness there would be no bio-diversity and Life would die out very quickly when faced with adversity.

Textured Surface

I believe this might be relevant.

Twisted Pharaoh

Can we drop the talk about randomness? It's of no use to us. Randomness is just a method of distribution it's irrelevant here. Whether or not you have randomness does not grant you a free pass from organization.

Adaptation is what makes the biosphere a CAS. Now a CAS adapts better with memory or are you against this opinion?

Bard Jameson

Is that what your "oracle" told you?

Point of order: I don't give a fuck what your oracle told you.

Speak for yourself or fuck off.

Twisted Pharaoh

OK then lets drop our conversation here: -> ignore list

And I already mentioned that if you need to become aggressive I'd rather have you being aggressive against me.

Bard Jameson

I'm pretty sure that's what I did.