8 -- Human Evolution Made Easy

The evidence for human evolution. Part of the "Made Easy" series which traces our origins from the Big Bang to the human migration out of Africa. This video can be copied and distributed fro educational purposes, but not for commercial use. It may not be built upon or transformed. You must attribute this work to "YouTube's Potholer54".

(Music: Astor Piazzolla's "Libertango" performed by Bond.)

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Potholer54
• evolution
• creation
• human
• atheism
• god
• christianity

[HessenDragoon]

Go to a zoo and I'll bet you'll never see an ape give birth to man! Proof God exists!

[Ilicium]

I hate the term "missing link". Evolution is not an all or nothing change, it is gradual.

[Oohsnappydude]

@5:12 Actually some christian fundamentalist organizations in my country suggest not only that idea, but the idea that things simply cannot be fossilized. The idea that museums spend money on making plastic figures to enlarge the group of disbelievers.

I normally watch pointless creationist videos and crockoduck nominees as if it was comedy. But sometimes it frightens to know, that there is a fairly large group of people with similar outrageous beliefs that are willing fight for their religion.

[MrGralgrathor]

@StrikaAmaru

"little more complex"

Well, the mutations in themselves can be quite simple. But indeed, their effects can be quite complex, depending on the complexity of the mechanism by which they are expressed. Gene expression in nature is extremely complex, as opposed to intelligently designed mechanisms to express coded blueprints (eg. programs etc).

[MrGralgrathor]

@StrikaAmaru

"a good definition of "improvement""

It's called a 'fitness landscape'. In engineering, the fitness landscape is determined by the properties of the desired solution. In nature, the fitness landscape is determined by just one thing: reproduction.

"this isn't evolution"

The algorithm works the same in nature as it does in computer models: reproductive variation and differential reproductive success.

[StrikaAmaru]

@XGralgrathor Oh, yes, random mutations with non-random selection can be used to improve all sorts of computer models, as long as you can implement a good definition of "improvement". But this isn't evolution, it's a branch of computer science named genetic algorithms, and I'd rather not conflate those mutations with DNA mutations, which are a little more complex than moving a few bits around.

[XGralgrathor]

@StrikaAmaru

"can't have random mutations for things which aren't alive"

Well, not entirely. Surely evolutionary theory does not model non-life, but equally certainly some of the laws of evolutionary theory can be applied to non-living replicators, including any hypothetical prebiotic replicator.

[MrGralgrathor]

@moocowpunk

"another state"

Evolution isn't about states, or about reaching a "higher level". Evolution is just change. It doesn't necessarily lead to improvement, just to something different.