Darwin Unhinged: The Bugs in Evolution

I believe you've misunderstand Darwin's idea of mental development.

You gotta be kidding me!  If you want to discuss Darwin - great.  I have actually read and studied The Descent of Man & the work titled Mental Evolution in Animals by Romanes for which Darwin wrote a chapter.  Darwin, of course, did not believe in random mutations being a factor in evolution. 
 https://archive.org/details/mentalevolutioni1884roma 


From your linked article, which you might have not read.

Darwin's work had far-reaching influences on the theory and practice of psychology. Its emphasis on the individual's adaptation to the environment helped establish the "functional" view of the mind and of human behavior, influencing such thinkers as John Dewey and James Angell (1869-1949) in the United States, who together founded the functionalist movement at the University of Chicago. Darwin's conception of the continuity between humans and other species gave the study of animal behavior a new importance. Sigmund Freud's younger colleague, George J. Romanes (1848-1894), to whom Darwin turned over his notes on animal behavior shortly before his death, established the field of comparative psychology. Paralleling the science of comparative anatomy, this field seeks to provide insights about human beings by studying the similarities and differences between human and animal psychological functioning. In addition, Darwin's principle of natural selection led to a greater interest in variation and individual differences among members of the same species.

I have cited Darwin's support of mental evolution and cited the Romanes connection before in this thread.  The work on understanding instinct started by Darwin was widely drown out by neoDarwinism's materialistic framework.  The ID folks, as a group, have not grasped Darwin's careful work in observing nature.

You gotta be kidding me!  If you want to discuss Darwin - great.  I have actually read and studied The Descent of Man & the work titled Mental Evolution in Animals by Romanes for which Darwin wrote a chapter.  Darwin, of course, did not believe in random mutations being a factor in evolution. 
 https://archive.org/details/mentalevolutioni1884roma 


From your linked article, which you might have not read.

I have cited Darwin's support of mental evolution and cited the Romanes connection before in this thread.  The work on understanding instinct started by Darwin was widely drown out by neoDarwinism's materialistic framework.  The ID folks, as a group, have not grasped Darwin's careful work in observing nature.

I'm not disagreeing with your modern evolutionary concepts. Though expressing as you did modern evolutionary concepts with highfalutin words and ideas were not part of this mid 19th century man's vocabulary that's what you misunderstand. Darwin succinctly expressed mental evolution this way: "Nevertheless the difference in mind between man and the higher animals, great as it is, certainly is one of degree and not of kind." In modern parlance there is a clearly observable continuum of simple to complex intelligence and emotion behaviour in animals and humans. The work advanced by Romanes came after Darwin.

Further reading: http://www.pigeon.psy.tufts.edu/psych26/darwin1.htm

I find it interesting that there seems to be relatively little interest in actually examining and evaluating Ewert's research study. The latest (and outstanding) explanation of it by Brian Miller that I offered a link to seems to have been somewhat ignored. It went over like a lead balloon, as they say. As has been my comment that perhaps the most "scientific" approach is to humbly follow wherever the data leads regardless of preconceptions. Of course this could be completely a lack of interest, but I think it may also show a certain hostility to any research that seems to or could be interpreted as leading to notions of God as an active force meddling in the world and evolution. Is it the problem of thinking this is letting God "get his Divine Foot in the door" (as famously remarked by Richard Lewontin)? 

In reality this very good research study comes to no such conclusion, and its implications are only that some high intelligence or intelligences of some undefined nature have apparently been molding the great patterns of evolution (along with a lesser contribution from Darwinistic RM + NS in microevolution). This guiding of large-scale evolution has apparently followed a process or pattern over time of innovating with the reuse of previously existing designs, then waiting, then innovating again with reuse, and so on. The nature of this intelligence or more likely these intelligences is unknown, but they have apparently left indelible footprints in genetics and biology, as shown by Ewert's analysis of a great amount of genetic data. 

At this point their nature can only be an object of speculation, and it seems to me as a non-Christian this speculation if it is indulged in should be allowed to range over the full array of possibilities offered by science including parapsychology and psychical research, and also even spiritualism and the non-Christian mystical traditions. I know - this is scientific heresy.  

I think it is time to (reluctantly) and provisionally accept these unpalatable, indigestible research results as nevertheless perhaps being a glimpse of reality. These results unfortunately even if verified in time may not ever lead to a scientific identification and understanding of the true nature of such intelligence(s). They may be fundamentally inscrutable. But nevertheless these agents or this agent of nearly incomprehensible intelligence still appear to have been and still are guiding the large patterns of what we call evolution. In order to remain unbiased and objective, these apparent truths of the operation of nature should still be seriously considered despite the perhaps insuperable difficulty of elucidating the agents' nature. 

If this research is wrongheaded and invalid that needs to be convincingly shown, not just dismissed out of hand. 

There has already been some interest and some criticisms coming in from mainstream Darwinist circles. Time will tell.

One of these objections is here. 

This criticism has been addressed here. To paraphrase, ".....this objection is that ...the scientific community already knows that life is not well explained by a tree, and ....the leading evolutionary explanation is really a reticulated tree or an undirected graph and therefore it is no wonder the dependency graph model beats a “strawman” model. Human genetic data fits an undirected graph better than a tree, and so would a dependency graph (or so can be predicted). The objection is that essentially, an undirected graph is what you get when you allow for species hybridizing as well as species splitting: genetic material merges from more than one branch of the tree. This is kind of like lateral gene transfer, but more extreme."

But the problem with this objection is that it isn't really relevant to Ewert's results. This mainstream criticism mainly applies just to the outermost twigs and leaves of the tree (genera and species) rather than the families, orders and classes - the large branches and the trunks of the descent trees. These are the levels of organization where the real innovative, creative work of evolution has taken part.

"Ewert specifically chose Metazoan species because “horizontal gene transfer is held to be rare amongst this clade.” Likewise, in Metazoa, hybridization is generally restricted to the lower taxonomic groupings such as species and genera. In a realistic evolutionary model for Metazoa, we can expect to get lots of “reticulation” at lower twigs and branches, but the main trunk and branches ought to have a pretty clear tree-like form. In other words, a realistic undirected graph of Metazoa should look mostly like a regular tree.

For example, a realistic undirected-graph evolutionary model could easily accept hybridization between modern humans and Neanderthals, but it would have to heavily penalize anything that looks like a hybridization between, say, finches and fish." 

I find it interesting that there seems to be relatively little interest in actually examining and evaluating Ewert's research study. The latest (and outstanding) explanation of it by Brian Miller that I offered a link to seems to have been somewhat ignored. It went over like a lead balloon, as they say. As has been my comment that perhaps the most "scientific" approach is to humbly follow wherever the data leads regardless of preconceptions. 

 its implications are only that some high intelligence or intelligences of some undefined nature have apparently been molding the great patterns of evolution (along with a lesser contribution from Darwinistic RM + NS in microevolution).

The work done by Ewert is done as a simulation of evolution.  Usually many independent simulations need to be run by multiple research groups to get to a claim for an ontological finding.  I strongly agree that RM + NS is a poorly supported claim.  I offer that the observations of living things over the last billions of years is a data source into the "memory" of life and that the "survival problem solving" of living things is a source of vast intelligence to process the data through mental work.

Today the evidence is coming faster and faster and that the old paradigm is failing to match the empirical and bioinformatic evidence being documented.  The following paper carries a lot more weight in disrupting the entrenched ideas of neoDarwinism.
https://www.cell.com/trends/ecology-evol...18)30117-4

We challenge the view that our species, Homo sapiens, evolved within a single population and/or region of Africa. The chronology and physical diversity of Pleistocene human fossils suggest that morphologically varied populations pertaining to the H. sapiens clade lived throughout Africa. Similarly, the African archaeological record demonstrates the polycentric origin and persistence of regionally distinct Pleistocene material culture in a variety of paleoecological settings. Genetic studies also indicate that present-day population structure within Africa extends to deep times, paralleling a paleoenvironmental record of shifting and fractured habitable zones. We argue that these fields support an emerging view of a highly structured African prehistory that should be considered in human evolutionary inferences, prompting new interpretations, questions, and interdisciplinary research directions.

They have hard evidence that the tree model is not the correct model for human evolution, which seems to have started far earlier and at many more locations then the current models of evolution.

 The starting point for most genetic studies of human origins has been to investigate the depth of present-day diversity between and within African populations. Most studies have used simple ‘tree-like’ demographic models to infer population split times, neglecting or simplifying population structure, even if sometimes considering a degree of gene flow between branches

https://m.phys.org/news/2018-07-reveal-h...earth.html

All living things use the genetic code to 'translate' DNA-based genetic information into proteins, which are the main working molecules in cells. Precisely how the complex process of translation arose in the earliest stages of life on Earth more than four billion years ago has long been mysterious, but two theoretical biologists have now made a significant advance in resolving this mystery.

https://m.phys.org/news/2018-07-reveal-h...earth.html

Implications are not science evidence.  Especially implications about something happening billions of years ago.  However, very interesting work.

 The study serendipitously found evidence for another proposal about tRNAs. Each modern tRNA has at its lower end an "anticodon" that it uses to recognize and stick to a complementary codon on an mRNA. The anticodon is relatively distant from the synthetase binding site, but scientists since the early 1990s have speculated that tRNAs were once much smaller, combining the anticodon and synthetase binding regions in one. Wills and Carter's analysis shows that the rules associated with one of the three class-determining bases—base number 2 in the overall tRNA molecule—effectively imply a trace of the anticodon in an ancient, truncated version of tRNA.

Implications are not science evidence.  Especially implication that something happening billions of years ago.  However, very interesting work.

It is far more productive than supposing consciousness, God, or some supernatural cause.

Evolution at work. What is the cause? Enviromental change. Audio is available. Follow the link. 

Shakespeare’s Starlings And The City

Introduced to North America by a Shakespeare enthusiast, starlings become a test case of urban evolution in this excerpt of “Darwin Comes To Town.”

[i]The following is an excerpt from Darwin Comes To Town: Darwin Comes to Town: How the Urban Jungle Drives Evolution by Menno Schilthuizen.

In Henry IV Part 1, Hotspur is planning to drive King Henry crazy by letting a starling endlessly repeat the name of Hotspur’s brother-in-law Mortimer: “Nay, I’ll have a starling shall be taught to speak nothing but ‘Mortimer,’ and give it him, to keep his anger still in motion,” muses Hotspur. In 1877, this obscure Shakespearean reference to Sturnus vulgaris, the European starling, landed the bird a place on the list of animals and plants that were to join the human colonizers in the U.S. For in that year, drug manufacturer Eugene. Schieffelin’s greatest successes were achieved with Hotspur’s starlings. In 1890 and 1891, he had some eighty breeding pairs shipped from England and released them in New York’s Central Park. Instead of sitting around repeating royal names, the birds wasted no time and immediately proliferated into the vacant niche of winged inhabitant of American cities and villages.[/i]
https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/s...ings-city/

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[url=https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/]07/27/2018
Adapt Or Die In The Urban Jungle
30:18 minutes
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LISTEN ON SOUNDCLOUD

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[img=313x0]https://www.sciencefriday.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/shutterstock_334071773-min.jpg[/img][/size]



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If you thought city life was stressful, imagine being a wild animal trying to outlive speeding cars, toxic chemicals and heavy metals, or even the unnaturally bright nights and din of traffic. Why stick around at all? Yet our urban areas still teem with wildlife. Pigeons, mice, lizards, moths, and plants all eke out their livelihoods in sidewalk cracks, subway tunnels, and building ledges (like theraccoon that napped on a skyscraper in Minnesota, as a dramatic example). But how is city living affecting how these organisms evolve?
[The eerie glow of blue ghost fireflies.]
Biologists asking this question are coming back with answers from urban areas all over the world—observing sexual selection gone awry, catfish learning to eat pigeons, an emerging new species of blackbird, birds singing louder and in a higher pitch, lizards with stickier feet, and toxin-tolerant flowers. Even Darwin’s famous finches seem to be evolving in response to human activity in the Galapagos.
Evolutionary biologist Menno Schilthuizen, author of Darwin Comes to Town, tells tales from the front lines of urban evolution research. Read an excerpt of the book here.[/size]

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Segment Guests
Menno Schilthuizen
Menno Schilthuizen is an evolutionary biologist at the Naturalis Biodiversity Center, and author of Darwin Comes To Town: How The Urban Jungle Drives Evolution (Picador, 2018). He’s based in Leiden, Netherlands.
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Christie Taylor
Christie Taylor is an associate producer for Science Friday. Her day involves diligent research, too many phone calls for an introvert, and asking scientists if they happen to have an audio recording of their research findings.
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Elizabeth Carlen
Elizabeth Carlen is a PhD candidate in biology at Fordham University in New York, New York.
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About Christie Taylor
@ctaylsaurus
Christie Taylor is an associate producer for Science Friday. Her day involves diligent research, too many phone calls for an introvert, and asking scientists if they happen to have an audio recording of their research[/size]

The work done by Ewert is done as a simulation of evolution.  Usually many independent simulations need to be run by multiple research groups to get to a claim for an ontological finding.  I strongly agree that RM + NS is a poorly supported claim.  I offer that the observations of living things over the last billions of years is a data source into the "memory" of life and that the "survival problem solving" of living things is a source of vast intelligence to process the data through mental work.

Today the evidence is coming faster and faster and that the old paradigm is failing to match the empirical and bioinformatic evidence being documented.  The following paper carries a lot more weight in disrupting the entrenched ideas of neoDarwinism.
https://www.cell.com/trends/ecology-evol...18)30117-4

They have hard evidence that the tree model is not the correct model for human evolution, which seems to have started far earlier and at many more locations then the current models of evolution.

The problem is, this apparently is to be expected under current neo-Darwinism theory for this area of relatively recent human evolution, where it  actually should look like an undirected graph or "tree". This was indicated by the objection to Ewert's study results that I posted earlier (it is at https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/...ife/728/14 ). The relatively recent human evolutionary history can be expected to have heavily involved hybridization, lateral gene transfer and species splitting, which is not expected to result in a RM + NS common descent tree. 

".....this objection (to Ewert's study) is that ...the scientific community already knows that life is not well explained by a tree, and ....the leading evolutionary explanation is really a reticulated tree or an undirected graph and therefore it is no wonder the dependency graph model beats a “strawman” model. Human genetic data fits an undirected graph better than a tree, and so would a dependency graph (or so can be predicted). The objection is that essentially, an undirected graph is what you get when you allow for species hybridizing as well as species splitting: genetic material merges from more than one branch of the tree. This is kind of like lateral gene transfer, but more extreme."

As I mentioned, this criticism is mostly irrelevant to Ewert's study which was designed to analyze the probability of various different types of large scale descent graphical structures corresponding to the origins of the higher taxonomic classifications, the families, orders and classes.

The problem is, this apparently is to be expected under current neo-Darwinism theory for this area of relatively recent human evolution, where it  actually should look like an undirected graph or "tree". This was indicated by the objection to Ewert's study results that I posted earlier (it is at https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/...ife/728/14 ). The relatively recent human evolutionary history can be expected to have heavily involved hybridization, lateral gene transfer and species splitting, which is not expected to result in a RM + NS common descent tree. 

".....this objection (to Ewert's study) is that ...the scientific community already knows that life is not well explained by a tree, and ....the leading evolutionary explanation is really a reticulated tree or an undirected graph and therefore it is no wonder the dependency graph model beats a “strawman” model. Human genetic data fits an undirected graph better than a tree, and so would a dependency graph (or so can be predicted). The objection is that essentially, an undirected graph is what you get when you allow for species hybridizing as well as species splitting: genetic material merges from more than one branch of the tree. This is kind of like lateral gene transfer, but more extreme."

As I mentioned, this criticism is mostly irrelevant to Ewert's study which was designed to analyze the probability of various different types of large scale descent structures corresponding to the origins of the higher taxonomic classifications, the families, orders and classes.

I wonder if you will acknowledge Ewert's intention is to discredit evolutionary theory?