Correction to this piece: I was apparently mistaken about the use of the terms “micro-evolution” and “macro-evolution” by reputable biologists. My apologies. I still stand by the gist of this piece and the video it links to; but I regret the error and any confusion it may have caused.
And now, yet another video from my new science video hero, cdk007.
First, just so everyone’s clear: “Macro-evolution” and “micro-evolution” are made-up words concocted by creationists to make themselves sound scientific. Biologists don’t use them. They’re scientifically meaningless. They’re just different stages in the evolutionary process; “macro” is just “micro” over a longer period of time.
Also, “macro-evolution” (if people insist on calling it that) has been observed, both in the field and in the lab. Just so we’re clear.
So this video makes clear the absurdity of this argument, with a beautiful and elegant analogy. Video after the jump.
Oh, once again: The music in the background is fun, but it’s not necessary — all the actual information is visual.
Testing comments
I’m not sure who started using the term first, but I have heard scientists use the m. They just understand that the terms are merely handles with which to conceptualize long term versus short term trends in evolution. Variation and selection acting upon genes will lead to both “forms” inevitably. cdk007 also has a very good video simulating gamete protein binding can cause speciation in reproductively isolated populations.
wow, I should have proof-read my last post. Sorry if it made no sense the first time through.
You said,
“First, just so everyone’s clear: “Macro-evolution” and “micro-evolution” are made-up words concocted by creationists to make themselves sound scientific.”
I’m afraid you have been mislead. Microevolution and macroevolution are perfectly good scientific terms and they are used by evolutionary biologists all the time.
There is legitimate scientific debate about whether macroevolution is more than just lots of microevolution or whether macroevolution encompasses mechanisms not seen in microevolution. It’s the sufficiency of microevolution argument.
I happen to be one of those scientists who agree with Stephen Jay Gould that there are many levels of evolution (hierarchical theory). Thus, macroevolution cannot be sufficiently explained by lots of microevolution. There are other things going on at the higher levels. [http://bioinfo.med.utoronto.ca/Evolution_by_Accident/Macroevolution.html]
The video is very misleading because it assumes a simplistic version of macroevolution. There aren’t any evolutionary biologists who believe in that kind of macroevolution. Thus, I have to conclude that the makers of the video are as ignorant of evolution as the creationists they mock.
The video is excellent. Thank you for sharing it.
I’m not quite sure what it is that is getting Larry Moran (above) so worked up. Perhaps he’s not familiar with creationist canards? Has he never heard a creationist say, “Has anyone ever seen a wolf turn into a dolphin? No!”
I think it’s hardly fair (and quite incorrect) to say that the makers of the video are as ignorant of evolution as the creationists. In fact, I’d say that it is the Gouldians and the creationists who have something in common: the quest for an insurmountable wall between “microevolution” and “macroevolution”.
Any luck so far?
Yes, sometimes meteorite impacts, floods, earthquakes, etc., cause rapid changes in the environment in which genes are selected. So what? To continue with the given analogy, in the case of a meteorite impact, some saplings will get wiped out while some will survive. Perhaps the ones that survive happened to have slightly thicker bark. So now we have a forest that “rapidly evolved” thick-barked trees. You could call that a Punctuation if you wish, but I think that muddies things. There is no leprechaun pressing evolution’s pedal to the metal.
Like Dawkins, I believe Gould’s talents as a writer harm science in that he can make incorrect statements seem compellingly true.
Gould’s primary contribution is not PE, but rather the caricature of gradualism. Creationists will be indebted to him for at least another century.
Lest I seem to anti-Gould, I love his descriptions of “spandrels” in evolution. He’s done a good job of popularizing one of evolution’s possibilities: exaptations.
For a great view of gradualism and of the startling power of plain-jane natural selection, I’d recommend almost anything by Richard Dawkins. Perhaps “The Blind Watchmaker” or “The Selfish Gene” in particular.
Evo Lutionist says,
“Yes, sometimes meteorite impacts, floods, earthquakes, etc., cause rapid changes in the environment in which genes are selected. So what? To continue with the given analogy, in the case of a meteorite impact, some saplings will get wiped out while some will survive. Perhaps the ones that survive happened to have slightly thicker bark. So now we have a forest that “rapidly evolved” thick-barked trees. You could call that a Punctuation if you wish, but I think that muddies things.”
I agree. It muddies things because it has nothing to do with punctuated equlibria and nothing to do with the debate about the sufficiency of microevolution.
And it certainly has nothing to do with whether microevolution and macroevolution are terms used by scienitists.
Finally, it has nothing to do with whether the understanding of evolution demonstrated in the video is accurate or not.
It does have something to do with the adaptationist fallacy but that’s another topic altogether. It explains your love of Dawkins and disdain for Gould.
Thanks for playing. Come back when you’ve learned enough about evolution to understand the controversies.
Wow, I wonder what Larry Moran’s credentials are that he can criticize a senior biologists like Dawkins? Reading a book by Behe, does not an expert make you.
Sabrina: If I’m correct, Larry Moran is a pretty well-known professor of molecular evolution at the University of Toronto.
Methinks he might have an idea what’s he’s talking about. Just sayin’.
Wow, thanks, Greta Christina! You’ve just given me another link for the blog entry I’m writing on the misuse of science by science fans.
It certainly does *not* seem to be true that “First, just so everyone’s clear: ‘Macro-evolution’ and ‘micro-evolution’ are made-up words concocted by creationists to make themselves sound scientific. Biologists don’t use them.” I was pretty sure that I’d encountered the terms in scientific writing, and when I did a google search just now, the first several results were from scientific sites. Try this one:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/macroevolution.html
As for Gould, the claim that he gave aid and comfort to creationists is a smear, pure and simple, and discredits those like Dawkins who use it. It sure as hell isn’t evidence of rational thought. I’m getting more and more annoyed by Dawkins, though I know he has written some moderately intelligent stuff here and there, and by those who are running around sniffing his butt.
On his own comment thread, Larry adds this:
“The key to macroevolution is the mapping of standard evolutionary mechanisms to the real world over very long periods of time.”
Then go on to contradict yourself in the very next sentence:
“Just knowing the standard microevolutionary mechanisms isn’t sufficient to explain the large-scale changes.”
Which is it?
Larry and others suggest “species sorting” as a separate evolutionary mechanism, but skim past the fact that that too looks just like the differential success of branches on the tree* (i.e. macrogrowth).
*=nitpick=technically, maybe a shrub is a better analogy.
Duncan,
“As for Gould, the claim that he gave aid and comfort to creationists is a smear, pure and simple, and discredits those like Dawkins who use it. It sure as hell isn’t evidence of rational thought.”
I assume that you buy into Gould’s NOMA nonsense too? I’d call that quite clear “aid and comfort.”
Its not enough to be a biologist, no matter how distinguished, you have to be right too. And this one seems to be conflating his misunderstanding or lack of precise and exacting explanations of something he has seen with imaginary “mechanisms we don’t know”. Its an invalid premise for two reasons, 1) it presumes he has some vastly greater understanding of every step of the process by which “any” species changed over time to correctly assign some secondary mechanism, instead of just arbitrarily presuming one has to exist and 2) he fails to provide any sort of alternate mechanism that “could” have done it. Not knowing how X happened via Y doesn’t mean it *didn’t* or *couldn’t* happen, just that you lack the imagination, or the data, needed to explain it. If you want to argue some alternative mechanisms, you first have to come up with some valid theory about what those are, and propose how they **actually** caused the result. Simply waving your hands around and saying, or letting someone else say, “I am an expert, so there!”, isn’t sufficient. Even experts can be short sighted, ignorant or too stubborn to get past their own confusion over something to accept that they have no better alternatives.
And just to be clear, when you stop accepting “I don’t know” as an explanation, and start hand waving about mechanisms for which there is no evidence, other than your own, far more likely, limited understanding of the data, it might be argued that you are not doing science any more.
Kagehi says,
“And just to be clear, when you stop accepting “I don’t know” as an explanation, and start hand waving about mechanisms for which there is no evidence, other than your own, far more likely, limited understanding of the data, it might be argued that you are not doing science any more.”
I agree.
Since there are known mechanisms that don’t count as microevolution then this doesn’t apply to me. All knowledgeable evolutionary biologists agree that species sorting is such a mechanism. There is no debate about this. There is debate about whether there are any clear examples of species sorting.
Given that fact, which of the following statements is scientific?
1. Macroevolution is nothing more than lots of microevolution.
2. Macroevolution is likely to be more than just lots of microevolution.
3. I don’t know whether macroevolution is just lots of microevolution.
Kagehi, I think we can all agree that anyone who says #1 isn’t doing science any more, right?
In defense of Larry and in response to Evo Lutionist and Kagehi:
That video is far from great. It’s not science at all, either. It’s mildly deterring to real science and would best be described as propagandic metaphor. Comparing it to evolution and/or using it to support neo-Darwinism is about as scrupulous as using Haeckel’s embryos or those damned horse diagrams..
Dawkins has at least once supported this nonsense (his reference to the Nilsson / Pelger simulation). I call it nonsense because the simulation (similar to the one presented here) deals with morphological changes in fully formed adults.
These computer simulations that supposedly demonstrate evolution via natural selection and mutation omit the geno/pheno type distinction, and show no means by which successive forms can result from successive lines of embryological development.
Go Larry! You are the only sound spewer of science on this page.
And now to Kagehi: you say “Not knowing how X happened via Y doesn’t mean it *didn’t* or *couldn’t* happen, just that you lack the imagination, or the data, needed to explain it. If you want to argue some alternative mechanisms, you first have to come up with some valid theory about what those are, and propose how they **actually** caused the result.”
In science you don’t argue alternative mechanisms you objectively process facts. “Imagination” is not science.
You are correct in your assertion that “If you want to argue some alternative mechanisms, you first have to come up with some valid theory about what those are, and propose how they **actually** caused the result.”
To this day evolutionary biology has failed this simple test. Darwinism itself is an alternative mechanism to special creation, which until roughly 1859 was the default position held by the vast majority of the Earth’s peoples.
We can’t even sufficiently explain the simple variation in the Galapagos finches Charles first laid eyes on 149 years ago.
I will consider talking or responding to anyone who can start to explain how an unintelligent, unguided process produced a DNA helix demonstrating perfectly true “left handed” chirality. Even one “right handed” molecule and our DNA would unravel.
Or anyone who wants to discuss the work of Stanley Miller and Harold Urey at the university of Chicago, work that was published under headlines of “Life in a Laboratory” that proved to be completely false.
Reject pop culture and the opinions of propagandists financed by rich publishers with religio-political agendas and burdens!
We are still waiting for evolution’s Einstein, and the burden is on the supporters.
While rereading my above comment, I got to thinking the latter half could be interpreted as denigrating to the theory of evolution, evolutionary research, or the Miller experiment.
Aside from commenting on the poorness of the video, my intent was to demonstrate that Kagehi’s own words ironically summarize the micro/macro dilemma he conveniently sidesteps. Kagehi said, “Not knowing how X happened via Y doesn’t mean it didn’t or couldn’t happen, just that you lack the imagination, or the data, needed to explain it. If you want to argue some alternative mechanisms, you first have to come up with some valid theory about what those are, and propose how they actually caused the result.”
We don’t know how macroevolution occurred in actuality, and we have no valid theory about any process that actually caused the result (macroevolution). Further distressing is that Kagehi ironically counters Larry with this in the context of the macro/micro dilemma after relaying an example of what he touts as macroevolution but actually is not!
As Larry said, “There is legitimate scientific debate about whether macroevolution is more than just lots of microevolution or whether macroevolution encompasses mechanisms not seen in microevolution.”
Therefore, in spite of mountainous evidence suggesting evolution occurs, we still have no “…valid theory about…how they (evolutionary processes) actually caused the result (macroevolution),” in the words of Kagehi. (paren. mine)
Especially if we claim to be fans of science or religion, let’s all apply our own standards to our own beliefs, and let’s all follow the advice of Carl Sagan: “At the heart of science is an essential tension…an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counter-intuitive they may be, and the most ruthless, skeptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new.”
APOLOGIES –
Okay, third consecutive comment, sorry Greta but on the above post, I mistakenly attributed some words of Evo Lutionist to Kagehi.
It was Evo Lutionist who relayed the poor example of macroevolution (the tree bark) to counter Larry, NOT Kagehi, My apologies to Kagehi!
Lesson learned for me – comment on one commenter at a time for maximum clarity.
Hopefully I can have Greta fix things up for me later today… 🙂
Yes, I’m an idiot.
i was looking up some info for my biology project and ur site showed for a link. i was just wondering if you knew who created the video. they really didnt help any cause.