Stephen E. Jones wrote:
>CL>Is it no longer believed that Genesis 1 & 2 are a combination of Genesis
>>in the scripture of the priests of Moses and in that of the priests of Aaron?
>>I thought that was widely accepted.
>
>I have never heard of this. My Bibe search program reveals no "priests of
>Moses"? Maybe Cliff can post some references to this theory?
I should have said, "widely accepted among those who study the
text scientifically". I find no references after a brief search. I suspect
web pages about textual criticism of the bible are buried among the
many non-skeptical, non-analytic pages relating to the bible.
For a couple of centuries scholars have inferred that the Pentateuch
was a combination of texts written by 4 different authors. This based on
vocabulary and style. And that some unknown person did the combining.
Redundancies resulted but these were left standing, presumably because
the 'editor' did not want to alter scripture. The 4 authors somehow have
been identified as being either in the priestly lineage of Moses or of
Aaron. Anyway, I guess the answer to my question is that this is not
a popular belief.
>I am aware of Cliff's parabiosis theory (parabiosis...2: anatomical and
>physiological union of two organisms. http://m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary),
>The online Encyclopaedia Britannica does not even mention it. Is there any
>fossil or genetic evidence for it? Has any biologist ever maintained it? Is
>there any example of a Siamese twinning which is heritable in a sexually
>reproducing species? If there was, would it have any long-term survival
>value?
Nope, not in our era, that is, since the Cambrian explosion. This was a
mechanism that could only produce viable organisms in a strange benign
ecosystem without well-formed segmented competitors. A one-time event,
a one-time mechanism. There is, however, no particular reason why
a predisposition to Siamese-twinning should not be heritable, other than
that it would be strongly selected against, it would not be well-adapted.
Only a simple organism could benefit from being transformed into a
chain of identical 'siblings'.
>Maybe parabiosis has limited applicability to some highly segmented forms
>like arthropods and snakes? But I doubt that it is applicable to less highly
>segmented forms like vertebrates.
Right, it only plays a role in a brief formative period that kicks off the
Cambrian.
>Indeed parabiosis sounds a bit like the phenotypic side of polyploidy which
>only works consistently in asexual species and even then only causes
>changes at lower taxonomic levels (e.g. species and genus).
No, parabosis is analogous with the genotypic side of polyploidy; there
is physical duplication or multiplication.
The reason for positing a mechanism for generating trains of segments
is that observation only reveals reduction in number of segments. In those
few cases where the fossils show change among indisputably related
animals over time, the pattern is one of loss of segments. There has to
be a starting point, when multi-segmented animals were formed. The
evidence suggests that this was a relatively sudden event.
>But even if parabiosis were the cause of the Cambrian Explosion, it would,
>like all naturalistic theories on the Cambrian Explosion, still have to
>explain
>why eukaryotes originated ~ 1.2 bya and then nothing much happened for
>nearly 600 mya, and then in ~ 5 million years between ~ 575 and ~570
>mya, *everything* happened!
You criticize Darwinian gradualism, but when you get a theory
involving unique pivotal events, you demand an explanation for this
unacceptable irregularity in the flow of history! You're a hard one to
please.
>"Essentially, the same amino acid chain being found also in other animals
>and even in plants, we have a case in histone-4 where more than 200 base
>pairs are conserved across the whole of biology. The problem for the neo
>Darwinian theory is to explain how the one particular arrangement of base
>pairs came to be discovered in the first place. Evidently not by random
>processes, for with a chance 1/4 of choosing each of the correct base pairs
>at random, the probability of discovering a segment of 200 specific base
>pairs is 4^200, which is equal to 10^-120. Even if one were given a random
>choice for every atom in every galaxy in the whole visible universe the
>probability of discovering histone-4 would still only be a minuscule
>~10^40." (Hoyle F., "Mathematics of Evolution", [1987], Acorn
>Enterprises: Memphis TN, 1999, pp102-103).
While we're at it, what is Hoyle talking about? A chain of base pairs has
to have some arrangement, if it is to exist at all. One might as well talk
of the arrangement of rocks on the surface of the moon. The odds of
the prevailing arrangement being the case are so, well, astronomical,
in relation to the possibilities, that reasonable people must conclude
that there are no rocks on the moon.
--Cliff Lundberg ~ San Francisco ~ cliff@noe.com
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Feb 16 2000 - 04:36:44 EST