On the thread entitled “Species Kinds”, commenter phoodoo asks:
What’s the definition of a species?
A simple question but hard to answer. Talking of populations of interbreeding individuals immediately creates problems when looking at asexual organisms, especially the prokaryotes: bacteria and archaea. How to delineate a species temporally is also problematic. Allan Miller links to an excellent basic resource on defining a species and the Wikipedia entry does not shy away from the difficulties.
In case phoodoo thought his question was being ignored, I thought I’d open this thread to allow discussion without derailing the thread on “kinds”.
The question is what criteria should we use when making the determination? Using the “Darwinistic” idea of genetic isolation is now shown to be a dead end.
What else you got?
peace
I’m sure I never claimed to be brilliant and I’m certainly not a critic of science.
I am a critic of silly out dated theology masquerading as science and excluding other perspectives when they don’t correspond to the party line.
Especially when it causes harm to the environment and conservation
I’m also a critic of grammar and spelling police 😉
peace
I would agree that species exist in Minds however I would not limit it to just human minds.
I think “conventional” implies not real so I would not use that terminology either.
If species are not real then Darwin was wasting his time trying to explain their origin.
By the same token since species exist in minds it’s just silly to explain the “origin of species” by appealing to things totally outside the mental realm.
in case you are still wondering that is a good part of the point 😉
peace
LOL
peace
Fifth,
By Fifth Logic ™, New York City is not real.
Time to trade in your logic, Fifth.
I don’t know why people say that. Lots of science is conventional, starting with the measuring conventions that we use to define data. If conventional implies not real, then science is not real.
People sometimes point out that Darwin never really explained the origin of species. He did explain the origin of biological diversity.
Yep it was revealed by James Mallet from Harvard University that those who argued that genetic isolation is what defines species had a blinkered attitude.
Who am I to question such a revelation when it comes directly from someone who would know?
peace
biological diversity makes no sense unless you have way of differentiating. That is what biological species are suppose to be.
If species exist in minds then explaining biological diversity by appealing to the non mental is like explaining the difference between a square and a circle by appealing to physics
peace
I don’t think New York City is just a “human convention”
Do you?
peace
No, he didn’t. And he even admitted that he didn’t.
I would agree that “a meter” or “a fathom” is a human convention but length certainly is not.
peace
LoL! Nice one. 🙂
fifthmonarchyman,
So, one thing is clear: FMM isn’t particularly interested in having anyone know what his point is. And he has no acquaintance with the extensive discussion of species and species concepts in the scientific literature. OK, two things.
So, one thing is clear: FMM isn’t particularly interested in having anyone know what his point is.
me just an hour or so ago
LOL
peace
fifthmonarchyman,
What is “a good part of the point”? Do you mean “since species exist in minds it’s just silly to explain the ‘origin of species’ by appealing to things totally outside the mental realm”? The problems with that are 1) “a good part of the point” isn’t the same as the point and 2) I have no idea what you meant by that; perhaps nobody does.
Like most things the “point” is multifaceted. The core is I suppose the idea that the old dictionary definition of species is obviously incorrect. The peripheral has to do with all the implications of that realization.
Well i can lead you water but I can’t make you drink the ontological water. Perhaps you could make an effort to understand the difference between physical and mental when it comes to concepts .
If you are so bound by your philosophical presuppositions that you are unable to understand the difference between physical objects and mental ideas perhaps you could ask your co-travelers here or you could ask clarifying questions and I would be happy to answer them
Here is a hint of what that might look like
Why is it a bad idea to try and explain a mental idea by appealing to a physical process?
Why are species mental ideas and not physical objects?
Why is it important to under stand the difference between mental and physical?
Why did it take so long for Darwinists to understand that species are not physical things?
etc etc etc
I have no idea why you don’t understand.
As it is I just don’t have the time to waste on trying to explain something so simple as this to someone who is completely unwilling to even put in even a small amount of effort understanding the very broadest philosophical categories but instead assumes that because he does not understand then understanding is impossible.
Talk about being blinkered
Perhaps the moon is made of blue cheese and pigs can fly and no one here understands the difference between mental and physical.
But I doubt it.
😉
Oh well. I suppose you can just go back to your job of saving the world from the evil creationist straw-men if you like.
life is too short and I need to get back to work anyway
peace
Don’t make John think, that bird brain can’t handle it.
I’m quite sure he is not birdbrained.
I am not so sure he is not blinkered 😉
fifthmonarchyman,
My confusion may result from my suspicion that there’s something you haven’t quite said hiding behind the surface of your point, and that the something might be Jesus. Am I wrong?
Now, I would agree that what we call species are abstractions, but what that abstraction attempts to deal with is real: the non-uniform clustering of the morphologies, genetics, and genealogical histories of individual organisms. Most of the time, species delimitation is an adequate way to describe this clustering. So my position is that species are neither quite real nor simply mental constructs, but are an abstraction from patterns that actually exist in nature. As such, biological criteria are certainly relevant. They aren’t something we just make up.
The bit you quoted from Barrowclough & Cracraft is a disagreement about fine points of species concepts, labeled “phylogenetic species” and “biological species”. Generally the difference is only whether one counts allopatric populations as one species or two. Introgression is another matter, but as long as it’s rare, which it is between described species, there’s no reason to suppose it’s much of a problem for the biological species concept. Finally, hybrid speciation, which may be up to 5% of speciations in plants, isn’t that much of a problem either.
If you want to discuss any of this, I would be happy to.
Watching nature channel. Scientists received a revelation about tuna. I guess it’s not just fmm and religious types. Go figure.
John Harshman,
I had lengthy discussions about the difficulties inherent in fmm’s essentialist conceptions of species when applied to a gradual succession. Take two clear species separated in time by some genetic distance and try to identify the generational point at which the one becomes the other. The answer was along the lines that ‘God would know’. A massive help to conservationists.
Yahweh is the center of everything in my life so I would hope that Jesus was present in all my discussions sometimes more obviously so than others, bye the way your “center” is also present in every thing you say whether you are willing to admit it or not.
I suspect that is why you are having a hard time understanding the point
exactly,
There is a real pattern in nature that corresponds to the real pattern in our minds despite there being no reason for this to be the case.
That profound mystery is the real problem of species. You can’t explain it by appealing to the physical realm.
You attempt to solve the problem by splitting the difference between the mental and the physical. That won’t work. Mental and physical are incompatible categories there can be no hybridization between them. 😉
Again just because species exist in minds does not mean they are “something we make up” They are very real even if your philosophy has no way to handle that sort of thing,
peace
why wouldn’t it be?
Please be specific
peace
fifthmonarchyman,
‘bot response.
Why would it be? Please be specific.
Literally none of the responses you gave John make any sense. At all.
There are things which, if God exists, He knows, yet we do not know. So unless God tells us those things, they can’t be a help to us. So merely because God knows them doesn’t mean they are a help to us.
God doesn’t seem to intervene to solve murder cases, even though God is purported to know who the murderer is. So in that case God having possession of certain knowledge is not a help to us unless God deems it appropriate to pass on that knowledge.
God might know what a proper species is, but since He hasn’t told anyone, it’s not much of a help.
So sad to hear that you have such an empty life.
Received from whom,the tuna?
So when we discover a new species of beetle God reveals what we should name it?
Says your revelation.
What is my “center”? And now that we know your point concerns Jesus, would you explain what your actual point is? The reason I’m having a hard time understanding the point is that you won’t actually say what it is. You just dance around it. Why not try making yourself clear for once?
But there is a reason for it to be the case, as I have explained: the pattern in our minds is abstracted from observation of the pattern in nature. So of course there’s a correspondence. Why, we even have a good explanation for the partial non-reality of species: speciation happens gradually, and so we see populations in all possible intermediate states between one species and two.
It isn’t a mystery at all. I’ve already explained it.
I’m not splitting the difference. I’m merely pointing out that anything in our minds is an imperfect representation of the reality of nature.
This is the sort of statement that convinces me you have no interest in communication. You’re fond of cryptic little snippets, which you never explain, because you know nobody else is equipped to understand. You aren’t arguing, you’re testifyin’. I suppose that’s because Jesus wants you to. But if that’s all you have to offer, you might be better off testifyin’ somewhere else.
Who cares? The show clearly stated it was a revelation to scientists. I feel sorry for people like John who try to do science without revelation.
Snore.
You made the analogy that it was similar to fifth’s revelation where the whom is divine
And from the context of the show you think they meant ” something that is revealed by God” rather than “an enlightening or astonishing disclosure” ?
How do you do science with divine revelation?
Sounds to me John had a revelation ,you should be happy
Keeping in mind that I don’t see anything Mung says, what are you talking about?
You haven’t been paying attention.
What?? To center your life only conceivable thing in existence that can give life meaning beyond oneself is the opposite of empty.
On the other hand if I was to center my life on things that are fleeting and that I knew had no lasting intrinsic value now that would be empty.
quote;
“Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there–on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”
end quote:
Carl Sagan
I think there is a verse that said it better with less waisted bandwidth
quote;
Ecclesiastes 1:14(ESV)
I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.
end quote:
now that is empty 😉
Peace
There are things that Rumraket knows that I can ascertain with out him telling me. some of them are very helpful to me.
For instance I know that you understand English and are not a fan of intelligent Design even though you never told me those things.
You reveal lots of stuff with out actually saying it why should God be any different?
Perhaps that is because you are blinkered like the fellow from Harvard was. It’s hard to see when you have blinders on. 😉
peace
Help! I have blinders on my blinders!
Where do you think the data comes from that detectives use to solve murder cases? Do you think it just magically appears out of nothing?
peace
I think there is a verse for that one as well
quote:
Genesis 2:19 Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.
end quote:
These discussions would go quicker if you would just keep up on the required reading 😉
peace
If you don’t know don’t you think it would be a good idea to find out? I’d hate to go through life not knowing what I thought was most important.
Just ask yourself “what do I value most of all in life?”
Every possible point concerns Jesus who is after all the “Truth”. Why should this one be any different?
Once again my point here at it’s core is simply that the definition of species that most folks (including most scientists) use is obviously and wildly inaccurate and that sort of muddled thinking has detrimental real world consequences and needs to be corrected.
Sorry that just won’t fly. What we see in nature is a fuzzy hodgepodge of individuals each having similarities and differences from all the others.
What our minds understand instinctively is that all of this pulsing amorphous mass was meant to and can be discretely categorized and fitted together in an organized beautiful and meaningful pattern.
On the other hand when we look closely at the mass we find that the pattern evaporates in a wisp of smoke.
That is the real problem of species.
We don’t abstract species from nature we see in nature reflections of the patterns that preexist in minds
peace
Nope you have it exactly backwards what we see in nature is an imperfect representation of what exists in minds.
You can’t explain the mental by appealing to the physical or by appealing to something supposedly halfway between the mental and the physical it just won’t work.
Species like ideal geometric shapes exist in minds.
Nature contains no ideal circles it never did.
peace
I’m not arguing or testifyin I’m simply sharing an interesting article and watching you bend over backwards to try and minimize it’s implications.
peace
Can’t we just change the subject?
yeah that is the ticket,
Lets talk about God not speaking out loud or the fact I am Christian.
that is a lot more relevant than the fact that the 5 species of Panthera are essentially hybrids.
peace
Is it a Christian value to be pompous and snarky at all times? All I wanted was to know what you were talking about.
Meaningless fluff, like putting “In the name of the Prophet, peace be upon him” at the start of every sentence.
So, nothing about Jesus there. My point is that your claim is wrong. The biological species concept works quite well for most species of obligate outcrossers, especially if you limit your sampling in time and space. Highlighting a few exceptions is not an argument. Quoting people whose point you do not understand is not an argument.
This suggests to me that you have never looked. You seem to be describing a uniform distribution in character space, with individuals spread all over. Instead we see mostly distinct clumps. I can easily tell a red-breasted merganser from a common merganser from a hooded merganser. Perhaps you can’t, but that’s your problem.
That makes no sense. Pulsing amorphous masses can’t be discretely characterized. And there is no “meant to be”, there’s just “is”. When you say “our”, you mean yourself and, presumably, your intestinal flora.
Again, that suggests to me that you have never looked.
To be clear: just what minds are you referring to here? Yours? Mine? Jesus’s? And could you state that in less flowery, metaphorical language?
See? You don’t understand what you read. They aren’t hybrids. They have just each experienced some introgression. Only a small part of the genome is affected, and the rest shows nice, consistent, treelike relationships.
Sure if you squint real hard and install arbitrary limits then almost any concept will do.
The point is that all that squinting and ignoring conflicting data tends to make you blinkard according to that fellow from Harvard.
Nope not a uniform distribution more like an over processed bowl of soup any clumps you see could just as easily explained as lumps in the gravy.
I can do better than that.
Give me time to study them and I can tell one hooded merganser from another.
Why is the difference between a two ndividual merganser considered to be more fundamental that the difference between an arbitrary group called hooded and arbitrary group called common?
sure they can and they are it’s the real problem of species
Now perhaps we are getting to the real issue. You can’t abide any hint of meant to be can you
It’s this sort of blinkard philosophical position that is so detrimental to real world conservation.
Species exist in my Mind I assume yours as well.
In fact I would go so far as to say that the presence of Platonic forms “like species” is a big part of what makes a mind a mind
peace
How much needs to be affected before we can call them hybrids?
21%? 34%? How do you make this determination?
Peace