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Lv 4

Is Neo Darwinism a random process?

Neo Darwinism is the idea that random mutations and natural selection is the cause for evolution.

Since every piece of genetic code would have started off as a random mutation, can't we say that Neo Darwinism depends on a random cause?

Update:

PaulCyp - They are one of several processes but that doesn't change the fact that every piece of genetic code would have started off as a random mutation.

Update 2:

Paul - That is totally irrelevant. I'm not going to argue all your stupidity its like going in to weather a coin flip is truly random because it is caused by the movement in the air etc. Its called random mutations, science says its random so stop lying.

Update 3:

Laslo - "Evolution is a slam-dunk proven truth. This game's over. hang up your jersey and go home." Yeah they have been saying that for 150 years. And anyway this question is not about evolution in general its about Neo Darwinian evolution. It's right there in the question.

Update 4:

NDMA - according to Neo Darwinian theory mutations are random. And thats what I'm talking about.

Update 5:

NDMA - well thanks. I have been looking for that. i know changes in genetic code were not random (unless of course they are harmful). But I was looking for the evidence. If you think about it. Every time an organism is born there is genetic editing. Really we need to distinguish between random mutations and genetic editing by the organism.

9 Answers

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  • NDMA
    Lv 7
    7 years ago
    Favorite Answer

    That would be nice only mutations are generally not random! All four base assumptions of the Neo-Darwinism have been disproved empirically.. There is no Neo-Darwinism.

    Your second statement begs the question, the origin of genetic code is unknown - you are assuming random mutations...

    Science says nothing it is a process: Neo-Darwinists said mutations are random. The process of science revealed their claim was not true:

    “It is difficult (if not impossible) to find a genome change operator that is truly random in its action

    within the DNA of the cell where it works. All careful studies of mutagenesis find statistically

    significant non-random patterns of change, and genome sequence studies confirm distinct biases in

    location of different mobile genetic elements” (Shapiro 2011, p 82).

    http://ep.physoc.org/content/early/2013/04/12/expp...

  • 7 years ago

    No. A process it not random just because some part of it is unpredictable.

    Imagine a computer keyboard with just two buttons. On button produces a random letter and the other is a backspace. To type a message you just keep pressing the letter button followed by the backspace until you get the letter you want. The words you type are still the words that you have chosen to type because they are made up of letters that you have selected. That is how natural selection works. Random changes are PREVENTED from having an effect. Natural selection keeps what it needed by discarding the rest.

    Why then, does the issue of randomness keep coming up in these debates over a Century after Darwin removed it and half a Century after the molecular mechanism for gene coding was worked out? The reason is dishonesty. Anti-evolutionists have no interest in truth. They cannot use facts because it was following facts that led to the understanding of evolution. They can however easily prove that evolution cannot work by blind chance. So the lie. The pretend again and again evolution is driven by chance. They also construct proofs against chance as arguments between two opposing viewpoints. So people reading these proofs are given the impression that there must therefor be some other people arguing for chance.

  • Anonymous
    7 years ago

    Neo-Darwinism is the 'modern synthesis' of Darwinian evolution through natural selection with Mendelian genetics, the latter being a set of primary tenets specifying that evolution involves the transmission of characteristics from parent to child through the mechanism of genetic transfer, rather than the 'blending process' of pre-Mendelian evolutionary science. Neo-Darwinism can also designate Darwin's ideas of natural selection separated from his hypothesis of Pangenesis as a Lamarckian source of variation involving blending inheritance.

    As part of the disagreement about whether natural selection alone was sufficient to explain speciation, George Romanes coined the term neo-Darwinism to refer to the version of evolution advocated by Alfred Russel Wallace and August Weismann with its heavy dependence on natural selection.Weismann and Wallace rejected the Lamarckian idea of inheritance of acquired characteristics, something that Darwin had not ruled out. The term was first used in 1895 to explain that evolution occurs solely through natural selection, in other words, without any mechanism involving the inheritance of acquired characteristics resulting from use or disuse. These two scientists' complete rejection of Lamarckism came from Weismann's germ plasm theory. Weismann realised that the cells that produce the germ plasm, or gametes (such as sperm and egg in animals), separate from the somatic cells that go on to make other body tissues at an early stage in development. Since he could see no obvious means of communication between the two he asserted that the inheritance of acquired characteristics was therefore impossible; a conclusion now known as Weismann's barrier.

    From the 1880s to the 1930s the term continued to be applied to the panselectionist school of thought, which argued that natural selection was the main and perhaps sole cause of all evolution.[6] From then until around 1947 the term was used for the panselectionist followers of R. A. Fisher.

  • laslo
    Lv 7
    7 years ago

    There is nothing "random" about it. It operates within fixed natural laws of genetics and organic chemistry. And natural selection is about as far from random as you can get.

    Evolution is both highly intelligent and lawful.

    Besides, Evolution is a slam-dunk proven truth. This game's over. hang up your jersey and go home.

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  • Paul
    Lv 7
    7 years ago

    No.

    Mutations aren't truly "random." They're random within constraints. And natural selection is the opposite of "random."

    Finally, genetic code likely started off as proteins/amino acids that form according to the properties of carbon molecules. We've replicated this in laboratories. Put certain compounds in a flask, put them in certain conditions, and they *always* form the same complex molecules. Every single time. That's not random.

    Now, please go get some education.

  • Zapata
    Lv 6
    7 years ago

    The use of word "random" in this context is very misleading.

    The genes of a Spaniel and the genes of a German Shepherd will still produce a dog and not a duck. So it is not at all "random"

  • 7 years ago

    Actually random mutations and natural selection are only one of several processes which collectively drive biological evolution.

    Source(s): Christian biologist
  • 7 years ago

    It is only a "mutation" according to the limited understanding of science.

    It is actually a genetic change with a directionality put into matter by God.

  • 7 years ago

    Yes, we can.

    But the title of your question is very stunted, oowww...

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