10 Responses to “Steve Matheson – Convergence and chance in the construction of the tree of life”

1. Salvador T. Cordova Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 3:26 pm

   The video appeared to be cut short.

   Can anyone summarize was his conclusion was?

   I will summarize conway morris's assertion: nature channels things into the same convergent form, i.e. convergnece of wings in distant lines: bats, birds, flying insects. Channeling is something like how water going down a mountaing might some how converge from separte lines into a major river. But this principle of physical behavior is not universal!!! We have many examples of physical divergence (like an explosion). On what basis does morris argue mindless forces converge on functional design? ZERO!

   I will point out, Morris has not one shred of experimental or observational evidence that "nature" did anything to effect convergence. Do airplanes have convergent architectures because somehow "nature" spontaneoulsy organized airplanes into existence without an engineer??

   What we do observe experimentally and observationally is DIVERGENCE from functional form like: wingless beetles, blind cave fish, extinct species, etc. Reductive evolution is more in evidence from direct observation than constructive evolution.

Comment by Salvador T. Cordova — June 27, 2010 @ 3:26 pm

2. nullasalus Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 3:37 pm

   Sal,

   I will point out, Morris has not one shred of experimental or observational evidence that "nature" did anything to effect convergence. Do airplanes have convergent architectures because somehow "nature" spontaneoulsy organized airplanes into existence without an engineer??

   Isn't Morris' view rather ID friendly, in that he stresses that certain 'results' of nature are practically foregone conclusions? I recall Ben Wiker praising Conway Morris' books and views, with good reason in my view. (I recall Morris editing a book of varying views on nature, with Denton making a showing.)

   I'm not sure if 'organized airplanes into existence without an engineer' really reflects Morris' claim at heart. It seems closer to something like 'programmed nature to introduce airplanes without requiring additional intervention.'

Comment by nullasalus — June 27, 2010 @ 3:37 pm

3. Guts Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 3:38 pm

   It's a 7-part series, this is part 1, might want to allow youtube to play it in playlist form. I am summarizing this from memory and also , the audio of the video is not that great, at least not on my laptop. So definitely go ahead and watch it yourself. Anyway, some examples of convergence he gives are the different anteaters seperated by oceans. Dolphins (mammal) and fish evolving the same torpedo-like form, tasmanian wolves and other wolves, the praying mantis form, wings, eyes, etc. There are also many examples of molecular convergence.

   If you look at the tree of life , the bottom one not the cone shaped one, you might ask why all that white space hasn't been filled in. Morris appears to think it's because evolution is constrained. Gould thinks it's all contingent. Matheson is skeptical of Morris's conclusion because he thinks there is evidence that morphospace is huge and largely/inexplicably unexplored. However, as Mike Gene has pointed out many times, this type of thinking is what lead proponents of the modern synthesis to be quite surprised by "deep homology".

Comment by Guts — June 27, 2010 @ 3:38 pm

4. Salvador T. Cordova Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 4:23 pm

   Isn't Morris' view rather ID friendly, in that he stresses that certain 'results' of nature are practically foregone conclusions? I recall Ben Wiker praising Conway Morris' books and views, with good reason in my view. (I recall Morris editing a book of varying views on nature, with Denton making a showing.)

   His views are ID friendly, but of late he doesn't like the Wedgies.

   I quoted him here in my essay A Case of Front Loaded Pre-Programmed Evolution:

   I believe the topic of convergence is important for two main reasons. One is widely acknowledged, if as often subject to procrustean procedures of accommodation. It concerns phylogeny[supposed evolutionary lineage], with the obvious circularity of two questions : do we trust our phylogeny and thereby define convergence (which everyone does), or do we trust our characters to be convergent (for whatever reason) and define our phylogeny? As phylogeny depends on characters, the two questions are inseparable

   Even so, no phylogeny is free of its convergences, and it is often the case that a biologist believes a phylogeny because in his or her view certain convergences would be too incredible to be true.

   During my time in the libraries I have been particularly struck by the adjectives that accompany descriptions of evolutionary convergence. Words like, “remarkable”, “striking”, “extraordinary”, or even “astonishing” and “uncanny” are common place…the frequency of adjectival surprise associated with descriptions of convergence suggests there is almost a feeling of unease in these similarities. Indeed, I strongly suspect that some of these biologists sense the ghost of teleology looking over their shoulders.

   Simon Morris

   Note: Morris was honest enough to admit "the circularity" of his own reasoning. Which means he has no experimental or observational evidence for his claims, just circular reasoning. I salute his honesty, I don't salute the fact he sticks to the claim as if it were science. He has the right to believe it, but it's quite another thing to demonstrate it.

   Gould was also wrong because he believes chance has an inordinate role in the assembly of organisms.

   They are both wrong!!

   Self-healing mechanisms, front-loaded evolution would tend to resist chance forces. Designed mechanisms (like airplane auto-pilots) are designed to resist the forces of chance to a limited extent.

   That is why, thankfully, a baby's development is not radically affected by the Mom being one step to the right or to the left when she walks on the beach (Gould's assertion was that so much hinges on such events).

   Likewise, a navigation system for a cruise missle will successfully adapt to weather conditions to reach its target.

   If evolution was pre-programmed, it will anticipate chance events and have machinery to circumvent chance obstacles to navigate the entitiy toward the pre-programmed goal.

   We have reasonable instances of front loaded evolution enabling adaptation in various environments, which biologists can't explain via Darwinism, but make sense in light of front loading. We call this by names such as developmental plasticity.

   An astonishing example of "Convergence" that flies in the face of Morris and Gould is:
   Batesian Mimicry ( I corrected Wikipedia's assertion of "evolved" to "designed" )

   Batesian mimicry is a form of mimicry typified by a situation where a harmless species is designed to imitate the warning signals of a harmful species directed at a common predator. It is named after the English naturalist Henry Walter Bates, after his work in the rainforests of Brazil.

   Such convergence is not explainable by chance (so we can dismiss Gould), it is not well explained by selection (Reginald Punnet offered a piercing analysis), so Morris is also wrong.

   The adapatation are "Gouldian" in the sense they are sudden like hopeful monsters, but they don't at all look random. In fact it is well accepted the machinery is already in the genes whether the adaptation appear in the individual or not. It seems lots of latent ability is stored for generations before appearing when needed. This is a micro-example of front loading.

   This is the sort of front loading even card-carrying creationists would readily accept.

   By the way, if Matheson pits Gould vs. Morris, Matheson is also wrong because he ignores the possibility both are wrong.

Comment by Salvador T. Cordova — June 27, 2010 @ 4:23 pm

5. Salvador T. Cordova Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 4:37 pm

   If you look at the tree of life , the bottom one not the cone shaped one, you might ask why all that white space hasn't been filled in. Morris appears to think it's because evolution is constrained. Gould thinks it's all contingent. Matheson is skeptical of Morris's conclusion because he thinks there is evidence that morphospace is huge and largely/inexplicably unexplored. However, as Mike Gene has pointed out many times, this type of thinking is what lead proponents of the modern synthesis to be quite surprised by "deep homology".

   Gould's colleague at Harvard, Lewontin, said the problem of Morphospace is serious. Lewontin wrote of this in the 2003 Santa Fe bulletin, and Salthe after reading Lewontin's writings concluded that neo-Darwinism was unsalvageable!

   Salthe on Lewontin:

   Postscript [of February 2003]:

   As added support for the viewpoint projected herein, I cite two of Richard Lewontin's works. First, his The Genetic Basis of Evolutionary Change, (1974, Columbia University Press) …Recently he has produced a paper for the Santa Fe Bulletin [Volume 18 (1), Winter, 2003] which raises four "complications" to the theory of natural selection that seem to me to cripple it altogether.

   Here was Lewontin's keen observation:

   Santa Fe Bulletin 2003

   Individual organisms are clustered in the space and
   those clusters are themselves clustered. And there are
   clusters of clusters of clusters, rather like the stars in
   the cosmos. The most important thing for the evolutionist
   is that nearly the entire space is empty, not
   only when extant organisms are considered, but when
   all organisms known to have ever existed are considered.
   The measure of the emptiness of that space is
   nearly one, and the measure of the occupancy is nearly
   zero.
   The real problem for the evolutionist is not to
   explain the kinds of organisms that have actually ever
   existed. The real problem for the evolutionist is how
   it is that most kinds of potential and seemingly reasonable
   organisms have never existed. The problem is
   to explain the location of the empty spaces in the
   clustered assemblage of occupied points. It is easy to
   describe organisms that have never existed. There are
   snakes that live in the grass, but there are no grasseating
   snakes. Birds perch in trees, yet , aside from a
   few exceptions, they do not eat all that greenery
   around them, but rather spend a great deal of energy
   searching for food. So why are there virtually no leafeating
   birds? The fact that the measure of the unoccupied
   space is so big compared to the measure of the
   occupied space, means that explanations of that lack
   of occupancy are not so easy to come by.

   My personal (not scientific view) is that God made the space to frustrate people who would argue life could some how create itself or spontaneously arise, or that Darwinian mechanisms would some how evolve the morpho space (like Morris seems to claim). That is my theological opinion, not a scientific one.

   The scientific problem remains, and Lewontin states it well. Neither Gould nor Morris give good explanations. Why should nature some how act as a channel to make birds that don't earth greenery? How do chance and contingency mechanisms converge on the same solution?

   Rather (my theological opinion) God left enough evidence for people to see if they are willing to diligently search, yet He also made the evidence obscure enough that those who are willfully blind will not see. That's my philosophical opinion.

Comment by Salvador T. Cordova — June 27, 2010 @ 4:37 pm

6. ID guy Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 6:55 pm

   Morphological convergence explained:

   Unified physics theory explains running, flying, swimming

Comment by ID guy — June 27, 2010 @ 6:55 pm

7. Bilbo Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 7:55 pm

   I wonder if the randomness reading group at Calvin is still going on and if visitors are welcome.

Comment by Bilbo — June 27, 2010 @ 7:55 pm

8. Salvador T. Cordova Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 8:31 pm

   Morphological convergence explained:

   Unified physics theory explains running, flying, swimming

   The physics may explain the necessary requirements for running, flying, swimming. It does not imply mindless mechanisms can construct such machines.

   Morris claims it does. I claim he has no evidence it does. He has not identified a sufficient mechanism to effect construction of these machines.

   Cars converge on the 4 wheels for physical reasons. The fact that they converge on the same design does not imply mindless natural forces will converge on that design, in fact mindless natural forces tend to force DIVERGENCE from that design (in that cars slowly decay and tires go flat).

Comment by Salvador T. Cordova — June 27, 2010 @ 8:31 pm

9. ID guy Says:
   June 27th, 2010 at 8:52 pm

   Salvadore:
   The physics may explain the necessary requirements for running, flying, swimming. It does not imply mindless mechanisms can construct such machines.

   No, but IF blind, undirected processes COULD construct such machines…

   The article was just about convergence or was it design constraints?……

Comment by ID guy — June 27, 2010 @ 8:52 pm

10. chunkdz Says:
    June 28th, 2010 at 5:48 pm

    I really wanted to watch this but the audio is so poor.

Comment by chunkdz — June 28, 2010 @ 5:48 pm

Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.