(September 9, 2013 at 10:17 am)Drich Wrote:(September 9, 2013 at 9:29 am)Esquilax Wrote: Of course there's a succession of mutations, because all changes and variations that occur within an organism are mutations. If life didn't mutate, we'd just be cloning ourselves.tonus seems to think differently. maybe you two figure out who is right, and present one. Otherwise people might start to think I have divided the oppsitions argument.
.
As I understand it, Esq is saying that the evolution of organisms occurs as a result of numerous successive mutations. That's not at odds with what I am saying, which is that those mutations do not all have to be "positive" or beneficial and that changes that are not beneficial will not automatically lead to the extinction of a species. Or the immediate extinction, anyway.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
-Stephen Jay Gould
