Is there an edge to evolution?

[stringmusic]

Think of it this way, E. coli has cancer. It discards it's "leg"(genetic machinery) to save energy to fight the cancer and the cancer cannot take over that leg and spread to the rest of it's body, yet it still has cancer. There is zero evidence that the bateria can reproduce that "leg" again, and with it still having cancer, a logical conclusion is that it's going to have to eventually discard it's other "leg" because it will eventually need more energy to fight the cancer. And so on and so forth.

I thought this was a good analogy.

 

[WaltL1]

I thought this was a good analogy.

You have a unique ability to not realize when your argument is shown to be false, not based on facts and you are getting them from a Intelligent Design website to try and discredit a genetic scientist writing for the American Society of Human Genetics.
As Ive said before, give me a break.

 

[WaltL1]

The part in red, that's not what happened as it relates to E. coli, it threw away "gentic patrimony, including the ablilty to make some of the building blocks or RNA"

Definition of patrimony
pat·ri·mo·ny [ páttrÉ™ mï ’nee ] 1.heritage: the objects, traditions, or values that one generation has inherited from its ancestors

I would call that pretty important.

String this was your statement -
Originally Posted by stringmusic View Post
If you're loosing any genetic material, you're moving towards not only no longer being human, but no longer existing at all.

Please note the subject you chose was about humans.
I posted research about humans showing your statement to be false.

E.coli was not the subject. Not real sure you comparing humans to E.coli is real accurate if you think about it. We are slightly different.

 

[WaltL1]

I've never said that it was no longer E. coli, but that it's heading in the wrong direction, contrary to Darwinian evolutionary theory.

String instead of going to Uncommon Descent Serving, the Intelligent Design Community website that you are using, I went to the actual website of the scientist Lenski. If you read what the ACTUAL SCIENTIST said instead of the writer for your website you will or at least should see the slanted information you are basing your argument on.
Please note when the scientist tells you what they are finding, NOWHERE does he mention its broke, its killing itself, its going backwards or contrary to Darwin or anybody else.
Stop going to those websites and make your points with credible information.
If you don't see the difference between what the actual scientist says and what your intelligent design writer says he says, then I really don't know what to say.
http://www.livescience.com/14557-coli-offers-insight-evolution-bts.html

 

[bullethead]

I've never said that it was no longer E. coli, but that it's heading in the wrong direction, contrary to Darwinian evolutionary theory.

Science has not let the Darwinian Theory rest as the do-all, end-all in evolution theory. They are constantly finding out new and different things and present those findings.
It is not a shock that this "de-evolution" has occurred and was noticed. To read about it for the first time in an article is almost a eureka moment, but then when researched there are and have been examples of this happening. Evolution does not mean that everything is eventually going to be the exact same thing as everything else and advance in the same ways. It means change over time in order to adapt. If losing some things are necessary then so be it. Humans have been able to shed un-NEEDED dna (we are missing body parts and have organs that we no longer use) and we are still going. Science has not yet cracked the surface of what species needed and what they did not need, what species may or may not have been more advanced and then cut back on what they did not need to get where they are today. There has been too many species and too much time to make such a dent.....yet.
At the time Darwin"s theory was one of the best available. Time and study has shown that there are other things happening that may be added to that theory.

 

[660griz]

Pretty good reading. http://www.nature.com/nature/newspdf/evolutiongems.pdf

 

[TripleXBullies]

Pretty good reading. http://www.nature.com/nature/newspdf/evolutiongems.pdf

So we see pigs, cows and hippos with hip bones, manatees might be in the middle at this point and then whales with what's left of hip bones with similar ear structures to the others too. But still, whales are now (and yes, still) whales, string. You're right about that.

 

[660griz]

But still, whales are now (and yes, still) whales, string. You're right about that.

Yep. Whales will be whales.
I think string may be falling into the old argument, "if we evolved from monkeys(apes), why are there still monkeys(apes)?".

There are two usual answers for that question.

1) We didn't evolve from apes.(Which is the point some are trying to make.)

2) Species evolve as offshoots of parent species: they branch out. This tends to happen when they become isolated from the parental species in some way (as when the New and Old World monkeys became separated by the Atlantic Ocean). Entire species do not evolve into new species; their offshoots do—and they can have many branching offshoots.

In some cases, newly evolved species end up out-competing their parental (or sibling) species, driving them to extinction, but by no means in all cases. Otherwise, there would always be exactly the same number of species on the planet (which, taken to its logical extreme, bearing in mind that we all go back to the same common ancestor, would imply that there could only ever be a single species on the planet!).

To put it simply, there are monkeys still around because, like us, not all species of monkeys have yet gone extinct.