black lab wide eyed dog

Selective breeding isn't evolution.

Please consider that:
a) the selection *always* must operate on genetic information that is already present, whereas evolutionary theory would require an explanation for how the genetic information got there, and

b) the selective breeding process is intelligently and purposefully directed by an outside agent (humans, in this case), which is a better parallel for God creating and sustaining things, rather than any support to evolution.

I don't believe in evolution, because it isn't true.

Breeding is evolution by artificial selection. Sit down and have a talk with a biologist about the subject instead of your pastor, mmkay?

People who are in the wrong shouldn't try to condescend. It doesn't fit.

Call it what you want. It is a fact that black labs descended from wolves. Artificially directed via human breeding choices or not, it's still evolution. The only difference is in the selection process: Artificial versus natural. The genes don't care.

Evidence for selection isn't evidence for evolution.

And identifying a process of selection (such as black labs coming from wolves) and then calling it "evolution" doesn't make it evolution.

Who's condescending? On the one side of this argument we have every biologist on the planet. On the other side are a bunch of creationists who don't understand genetics and routinely misapply information theory. I'm not wrong, you are. :D

Every biologist on the planet? That's an interesting assertion. I'm not sure what you're basing that on.

While most or all biologists on the planet would recognize the fact of natural selection, that's not the same as believing in evolution.

I feel like that's a key distinction to be made in this discussion.

I wouldn't be surprised if many biologists would disagree with the implication made in your meme that the existence of black labradors confirms evolution.

The irony of being accused of condescension by someone calling himself Socrates who is wrong about the point he's arguing is priceless. :D

Jests and jabs aside, dog breeding really is a classic, textbook case of evolution in action despite anyone's ramblings about and misuse of information theory. This may be of interest: https://biologos.org/blogs/dennis-venema-letters-to-the-duchess/evolution-basics-artificial-selection-and-the-origins-of-the-domestic-dog

I'm sorry if it bothers you that your distant ancestors were not human, and black labs are descended from wolves, but it really is a scientific fact that they were not. This is determined through much the same sort of DNA testing that is used in human paternity testing, criminal prosecution, and the exhoneration of falsely condemned prisoners. It's real stuff whether you like it or not. Why not learn about it instead of railing against it? It's actually quite beautiful to realize that all life is interconnected in such a deep manner. :)

You're right that my username can come across as pretentious, but I chose it as a joke and I don't know how to change it. I didn't bring it up here, and it doesn't need to be an issue in this discussion.

You were being condescending, when you wrote "Sit down and have a talk with a biologist about the subject instead of your pastor, mmkay?" Even if you are in the right, it's not necessary to write like that. I haven't written anything like that to you here.

If you're convinced I'm in the wrong, I'd encourage you to point out the areas where I'm wrong and give me reasons why I'm wrong. I will consider the things you say.

In your comment above, the sentence "I'm sorry if it bothers you that your distant ancestors were not human, and black labs are descended from wolves, but it really is a scientific fact that they were not" seems to contradict your other comments.

I'm assuming it's a typo, but I thought it would be good for me to give you the chance to correct it before I respond to it, so that I can respond to the right thing.

I was just poking a little fun at your name and irony of it all. I didn't really think you thought yourself as an actual Socrates. Don't take that too seriously. :P

"I'm sorry if it bothers you that your distant ancestors were not human, and black labs are descended from wolves, but it really is a scientific fact that they were not."

I added the black labs part and failed to change the last part of the sentence. ;)

Clarification: Our distant ancestors were not human. Black labs and all modern dog breeds descended from wolves. If you disagree, a scientific paper demonstrating an analysis of any dog genome that suggests otherwise should be produced. This really isn't a matter for us to decide or analyze or debate ourselves, we're not biologists and the technical parlance is beyond us.

It really is the case that evolution is real and that dog breeding is an example of evolution through artificial selection weather you think so or not. Are biologists wrong or is your understanding of evolution wrong? Evolution is the reason people need a new flu vaccine every year.

If you really wish to learn about evolution, I would suggest reading a biology textbook instead of attempting to debate this online with non-biologists such as myself. If you take the time to do that and have questions, I perhaps can refer you to a friend of mine who is in fact a Ph.D biologist. He may take up the time to clear up any confusion you might have on the subject. Rest assured though, there has been consensus on this subject for around a century. The arguments against it that you bring up have been thoroughly dealt with and demolished. It's not up to me to do that, though.

You can take this issue up with any biologist you'd like to, or peruse the scientific literature on the subject. I friend of mine is a biologist and will tell you you're wrong all day long on this one. The only ones that won't are so deeply religious they reject their own science because they believe it conflicts with their holy book. They are no longer doing science.

If you're one of those that also thinks the Heliocentric Theory is incorrect, I'd refer you to the literature written by cosmologists and others on the subject. Despite the wealth of evidence for the Earth not being the center of the universe, there is still a Flat Earth Society.

Whether the suggestion is condescenging or not, I would encourage you to speak with a biologist on all this instead of a pastor or other religious person that is completely untrained in the subject.

I'll leave you with this brief clip from a talk by Dr. Kenneth Miller in which he gives just one of countless examples of evidence for a common ancestor between humans and another modern primate available in the scientific literature. This was evidence presented in the Dover case in the United States concerning intelligent design and evolution, just one of many over the decades.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zi8FfMBYCkkHe

Dr. Miller is a cell biologist and molecular biologist, a professor, an author of several biology textbooks used in universities, an author of a book in at least its twenty third printing on evolution and religion (I might read that, it sounds interesting), and was the lead expert for the plantiffs in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case.

The full hour talk is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4r2J6Y5AqE

I'd also suggest Dawkin's book, "The Greatest Show On Earth." He is a well known evolutionary biologist and wrote that book as a rebuttal to all of the typical creationist claims including the ones you've presented here.

I will listen to car mechanics on the subject of fixing cars, cosmologists on the subject of stars and black holes, physicists on the subject of gravity, medical doctors on the subject of cancer, mathematicians on the subject of mathematics, and biologists on the subject of biology (especially evolutionary biologists on the subject of evolution).

Defer to the experts if you wish to learn a subject. Even if you were to win an argument with me here, it would change nothing about the fact of evolution. That argument was over in the scientific community well over a century ago. Religious people with no training are the only ones left who don't recognize that.

These links may be helpful which show a handful of the peer reviewed scientific papers published in journals on the subject. All of these are papers demonstrate evidence for evolution.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20J%20biol%20chem%5BJour%5D

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20phys%20rev%20lett%5BJour%5D

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20Biochim%20Biophys%20Acta%5BJour%5D

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20Nucleic%20Acids%20Res%5BJour%5D

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20virology%5BJour%5D

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20genetics%5BJour%5D

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?cmd=Search&term=%22evidences%22%5BTI%5D%20AND%20eng%5BLA%5D%20febs%20lett%5BJour%5D

Actually, nevermind those links. This might be better:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=biological+evolution

Note that there are 254,364 hits for "biological evolution" in the scientific papers referenced just from this one site.

Or if we want to try to narrow things down a little, we can be a bit more specific:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=biological+evolution++AND+eng%5BLA%5D+genetics%5BJour%5D

"Speciation" is a good term to use as well. This is where one species splits and becomes more than one, something anti-evolutionists routinely claim has never been observed and there is no evidence for. Of the 19,894 hits on the term, I would bet more than a few of them are relevant and valid.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=speciation

Note that you're probably not going to find any research papers with titles like "Evolution is Wrong and Here's Why" or similar hooey. No, the real fact of the matter is that this is all *extremely* well established science. The sigma certainty level on evolution as a whole is at least ten times greater than the certainty that cigarettes cause cancer. There are more bits of data supporting evolution than probably any other subject. You can see a tiny snippet of it in the links provided.

Most people don't have access to it or the training or qualifications to even recognize what is and is not evidence for evolution. If you take a gander through those papers you'll find they're filled with terms that neither of us probably has ever even heard of before. This is why I refer to experts to find out what the current state of human knowledge really is on various subjects, whether it's biology, physics, or what have you.

I'm a software developer that has worked professionally for well over a decade as a vehicle dynamics engineer. Long story short, I write computer models of physical systems. I have written simple genetic/evolutionary simulations as well. Once you've done that and seen how it works in principle, it becomes obvious that any population that self replicates less than perfectly (a mutation here or there) that alters the chances for survival will evolve. It's a mathematical fact, and the evidence for that having actually occurred in every species out there is written all over the DNA. Fossils are unnecessary and are not the best evidence.

While I'm not a physicist or a biologist, I write computer simulations of physics systems (Newtonian, not particle physics, I have spent most of my life working as a simulation engineer writing code and analyzing data). I could probably talk 99% of these authors under the table on vehicle dynamics specific matters, but do not have the expertise or training to challenge (or even understand usually) them on their respective subjects. If I wish to be educated on their subjects, I seek them out. I don't get my information from religious sites, some of which even deny that the Earth is round while they're lecturing the public that evolution isn't a fact.

By the way, thank you for the link to the biologos blog by Dennis Venema. I haven't read his writings before, but I took a quick look at it and it seems very useful. I will read it and think about what it says.

I'm pleased to hear it. I would suggest that if you disagree with anything he (or any other biologist) says on the subject, for instance about whether dog breeding is evolution or not (or food breeding for that matter, ever seen a wild banana compared to one in your supermarket?), you consider the possibility that your understanding of evolution is lacking rather than the biologist's, and defer to him with questions and arguments instead of random non-scientists online. You might as well be arguing with your car mechanic about whether blue eyes in humans are a result of a genetic mutation or not (they are, so is red hair).

Such matters are not resolved that way or extend the totality of human knowledge on the subjects of biology or evolution. Go straight to the source of expertise and learn about them there instead of asking random people on imgflip about it. Once educated on the subjects, if you still think everyone in the medical and biological fields are wrong, challenge the ideas by publishing research in a scientific journal so experts may debate you directly. Don't do it by debating software developers and other biology laymen on imgflip.

There really is not a debate about evolution going on between scientists. You're free to judge that claim by reviewing the scientific literature on the subject which I've provided a tiny number of links to as an introduction. These papers are deeply technical and require a level of expertise and training to understand, though (well beyond my own). However, you might be able to see for yourself at least that the ongoing discussions occuring there concern very specific aspects and details about the particulars of various biological processes in relation to evolution, not about the correctness of evolution as a basic process. This is really a fact today and has been for a long time. That debate between scientists was over more than a century ago.

The only debate that is alive today on the subject is between scientists and non-scientists. The ones that deny it generally do so because they are not comfortable with the idea that their distant ancestors were not human. They also generally confuse evolution for abiogenesis and various aspects of physics and cosmology, and are never very well versed in any of the subjects.

I'd really recommend you read that link and the other posts on that page by Dr Dennis Venema, professor of biology at Trinity Western University. The professor would seem to disagree with you, as does every other biologist on Earth. Some of them are even religious.

Like it or not, this is the reality of our existence. The evidence has been so overwhelming for so long now that even the Vatican accepts it (although not quite fully, they have their own little spin on it that largely misses the main point).

Accept and learn about reality or be a crybaby that rejects it. Your choice.

This may be of interest: http://www.nmsr.org/nylon.htm

You can have evolution through artificial selection or natural selection. Breeding is evolution through artificial selection where humans control who mates with who. There is no difference from the genetic standpoint, it's the same process at the DNA level.

I noticed you didn't answer the issue I brought up under point a).

Perhaps you intended to answer it (I'm not sure) by your assertion in another comment that "creationists routinely missaply information theory," but that's not relevant to my point.

As for point b), you're saying there's no difference at the genetic level between artificial selection (human controlled), and natural selection, because the genes can't tell the difference. But the problem is that evidence for natural selection is not evidence for evolution. Those are distinct things.

Your meme is citing an example of selection, and then implying that therefore anyone who believes in evolution should be treated with skepticism (the dog's expression).

But the problem with that is that both the evolutionary model and the creation model involve natural selection. The fact of natural selection is not in dispute by either side.

Since natural selection is accepted in the creation model, to pretend that evidence for selection serves as "evidence" against the creation model is intellectually dishonest.

Let me try this again going from your last comments. This will be long so I'll have to break this up into multiple posts:

"Your meme is citing an example of selection, and then implying that therefore anyone who believes in evolution should be treated with skepticism (the dog's expression)."

How in the world did you interpret the meme that way? No, the meme is implying that evolution is real and the existence of black labs is evidence for that which is something you deny, so the dog has a surprised look on his face. Ever seen a wild black lab? Of course you haven't. They didn't exist until humans bred them from wolves: That's evolution, the wolves evolved into black labs. In this case through artificial selection (meaning the parents were chosen by humans). That's evolution, and if it had happened naturally it'd still be evolution. The selection method for the mating is irrelevant.

You went on to deny evolution. The dog has a shocked look on his face at the evolution denier, who is staring a black lab in the face and denying it evolved from wolves through breeding.

"I noticed you didn't answer the issue I brought up under point a). "

"Please consider that:
a) the selection *always* must operate on genetic information that is already present, whereas evolutionary theory would require an explanation for how the genetic information got there, and"

I think we might be using the term "selection" differently. My use of the term is coming largely from evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkin's descriptions of the processes and the differences between them. I didn't answer your post in two seperate parts because the first part is an ill posed question the way I understand the terms: Selection is just about mating, it's who mates with who. Selection doesn't "operate on genetic information." It's how the animals pair off (or are paired off by humans artificially) with each other, not what happens after that.

When a bunch of wolves breed in a forest however they see fit, that's natural selection whether or not they even give birth afterwards, or whether or not they're clones that are forever free of mutations and therefore do not evolve at all, but instead stay perfect copies of each other throughout time. When a bunch of (non-clone and free to mutate now and then) wolves are put in two different pens and only the tamest few are allowed to mate with each other because humans isolate them accordingly in an effort to breed for tameness or long noses or whatever, they selection of mate pairs is done artificially. That's artificial selection. Selection is not evolution, it's selection. I understand the term as "selection in mating."

What happens after that selection (pairing off for mating), the changes that occur within the species, is evolution. My point was that the selection method is irrelevant to whether evolution occurs or not.

The selection method for mating (natural or artificial/bred) is irrelevant. You started out this conversation by pointing to the fact that the black labs were bred to suggest that dog breeding is not evolution because the breeding process is controlled by humans. That's incorrect. To refute that I've been saying that dog breeding is most certainly an example of evolution, in this case it's evolution through artificial selection. You seemed to be suggesting that only a process involving natural selection would be an example of evolution. That's incorrect, so I referred you to the link from the biologist explaining evolution in dogs. Again, whether the mating process is natural or artificially directed, it's still evolution. One is evolution through natural selection and the other is evolution through artificial selection.

I'm not sure where the confusion about all this lies. Have you read the doctor's discussion about dog breeding as an example of evolution (in this case through artificial selection) yet? Do you agree that there were wolves long before there black labs, and black labs descended from them?

"Your meme is citing an example of selection, and then implying that therefore anyone who believes in evolution should be treated with skepticism (the dog's expression)."

No, it's not an example of selection because there's only one dog in the picture. If there were two dogs, one male mounting a female, then it might be considered selection. ;)

"But the problem with that is that both the evolutionary model and the creation model involve natural selection. The fact of natural selection is not in dispute by either side."

Species evolve regardless of whether a person was there to select Fido and Buffy for mating or they were just left in the wild and Fido selected a different mate instead. Evolution follows in either case via the same genetic process. That's what I meant when I said the genes don't care. The selection method is just about how the mates are selected. It's either done naturally (the animals decide who they mate with ) or it's done artificially (humans decide who they get to mate with). And again, that can happen even if evolution does not occur. The selection method is irrelevant to all this.

Artificial or natural selection, the wolves mate, the genes transfer to the pups, there may or may not be mutations involved, and those new pups either are more fit to mate or not in the next generation. This evolution works the same way in either case, they just end up with different evolutionary changes over time. The pups genes don't care if its parents selected each other or a human selected its parents for them.

"Since natural selection is accepted in the creation model, to pretend that evidence for selection serves as "evidence" against the creation model is intellectually dishonest."

Not sure what you mean here. What's dishonest? I'm speaking of selection as the mating selection, the pairing off of mates. I'm saying that the evidence for evolution is also evidence that any model denying evolution is wrong.

Is natural selection accepted: There's more than one creation model, so it depends which group you ask. The Vatican accepts some level of evolution because the evidence for it is so strong at the molecular level that they really can't pretend it isn't real anymore, but my understanding is that they see it as directed by God which somewhat misses the point. In that case it'd seem to something like evolution through artificial selection.

A friend of mine is a more extreme Young Earth Creationist who is so vehemently against the idea of evolution and denies everything but the tiniest microevolution. She can accept some level of microevolution, but macroevolution is out of the question because she thinks the entire universe is only 10,000 years old, and she seems to lack the imagination neccessary to extrapolate a small change over a small period of time into a large change over a large period of time. They are the exact same process though, only on different time scales. She fails to see that, however.

Anyway, her creation model doesn't accept evolution regardless of the selection method. Others may. There isn't just one creation model out there.

I'm not entirely sure now where you actually stand on all this. Do you think that black labs ancestors were wolves or not? If they were, then some percentage of wolves evolved into black labs under the direction of humans (artificial selection in mating) and evolution occurred. Where are you on this one? Is your thinking like my creationist friend? Do you think wild black labs existed 10,000 years ago (or 100,000,000 years if you're not of the Young Earth brand)?

On the misinterpretation of the meme:

I'm wondering if you might have not registered the question mark in the meme at the end of "evolution isn't real?"

It should be read something like this:
"You say gravity isn't real?"
"Ever seen a rock fly?"

It seemed really obvious to me when I wrote it. I guess it wasn't?

There are two things here:

1) Evolution through artificial selection (breeding by humans)
2) Evolution through natural selection (not breeding by humans)

Both are evolution by definition. Not sure how I can make that any simpler. Again, please read a biology textbook on this and stay off the creationist sites.

Whether artificial or natural selection is in view, evolution and selection aren't the same thing.

Exactly my point. You started out making the point that the black lab descending from wolves wasn't evolution because it was done through breeding. My point is that the selection process doesn't matter and is irrelevant. It's still evolution.

No, we're saying opposite things. I'm saying, "selection" fits either the evolutionary or creationist model, so it's intellectually dishonest to pretend it counts as evidence for evolution and against creation. That's the main mistake in your meme. You seem to be acting as if selection and evolution are the same. They aren't.

Wolves changing into dogs isn't evolution? How do you figure?

From here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_the_domestic_dog

"Dog evolution (from the Latin evolutio: "unrolling")[4] is the biological descent with modification[5] that led to the domestic dog. This process encompasses small-scale evolution (changes in gene frequency in a population from one generation to the next) and large-scale evolution (the descent of different species from a common ancestor over many generations).[6]"

Don't look now, but the black lab has a shocked look on his face. This meme was aimed directly at you. :p