Evidence Of Evolution

C

chikis

Registered Senior Member
This is a question I met in the course of preparing for my future exam:
The evidence for evolution can be obtained from the following except A. fossil B. anatomy C. history D. embryology E. taxonomy.
From the option A-E, I know that fossil record, comparative anatomy and embryology are good evidence of evolution.
Am stuck between taxonomy and history. Taxonomy has to do with the scientific process of classifying things especially plant and animal (arranging them into groups). I don't know how that (taxonomy) can be handy in this.
History is worth considering becuase it has to do with the record of past events. If you think about the history of man right from the homohablis stage through homoerectus down to the present homosapiens stage and including the stone age (dark ages) you may see how handy history is to this question.
With the above reasons, I take it that taxonomy has no help to this question. Therefore option E. should be the most suitable answer since the question requires from the multiple choices one that is not an evidence of evolution.
Now to you viewing this thread, I want you to look at this question critically and tell me your mind. What do you think? Is E truely the correct answer to the question as I thought or absolutely wrong? You can make citations if necessary and give useful link or links as well.
 
Taxonomy is the classification of species, so it's how we try to break down what we find into groups. It's not evidence OF evolution, but more how we deal with that evidence.
 
Rhaedas said:
Taxonomy is the classification of species, so it's how we try to break down what we find into groups. It's not evidence OF evolution, but more how we deal with that evidence.
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If taxonomy is not an evidence of evolution, do we now consider history as one ?
 
It's embryology. It used to be thought that ontology recapitulates phylogeny, but that has proven untrue.

It's also taxonomy, as explained above.

It's also history. This represents recorded events from a human perspective, and I doubt there is much evidence there for evolution.
 
spidergoat said:
It's embryology. It used to be thought that ontology recapitulates phylogeny, but that has proven untrue.

It's also taxonomy, as explained above.

It's also history. This represents recorded events from a human perspective, and I doubt there is much evidence there for evolution.
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Does "recording history" count as evidence? Not to mention the ways we can now record history... Freedom of speech is still missing pieces. Obviously you can say things that are personal and distasteful enough to threaten the pride of a person or be outrageous enough to ban someone from any "forum". Including your mom's house :D and sure enough we can find the oldest looking monkey fill his head with beads and say "look it's smaller than my head!" ...

"Yeah well his arms are bigger, which probably gave him an advantage with the ladies."

"that's not evidence of evolution! That's evidence that our behaviors are similar."

"Back then or now?"

"both... Gods Image used to be a monkey. He lived another life and came came back in human form and decided to make that image as well"

"..... That makes sense... How much other shit has he made since then?"

"Uh... Just us"

"Right..."
 
Because all of recorded history is only about 5,000 years. And evolution works more slowly. Usually. With humans. I'm not aware of any history documenting the domestication of animals, for instance.
 
You could document increases in minor or major genetic disabilities (maybe), since humans are essentially immune to their old indices of selection these days. Or major actors in human selection, if you like.

Then again, cavemen didn't make glasses anyway. Surely there must be a way to do it. That's a couple hundred generations, an enormous pedigree length over which selection could operate. The problem, inevitably, is record-keeping.
 
Part of the issue is semantic, since my interpretation of the word history only means recorded human history. If by history you mean all of past time, then that would also include fossils and the lives of each individual living thing.
 
It must be doable within recorded history also though. There has to be something.
 
spidergoat said:
If by history you mean all of past time, then that would also include fossils and the lives of each individual living thing.
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But even then, history, as it pertains to evolution, is put together only with reference to other disciplines (paleontology, geology, molecular biology etc).
 
History does not have evidence of evolution. That is the answer to the question - end of story. You are over thinking a simple mulitple choice question - this is a sure way to fail a MC test.
 
origin said:
History does not have evidence of evolution. That is the answer to the question - end of story. You are over thinking a simple mulitple choice question - this is a sure way to fail a MC test.
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The following species have evolved into new, separate species while we watched:

Evening Primrose (Oenothera gigas)
Kew Primrose (Primula kewensis)
Tragopogon
Raphanobrassica
Hemp Nettle (Galeopsis tetrahit)
Madia citrigracilis
Brassica
Maidenhair Fern (Adiantum pedatum)
Woodsia Fern (Woodsia abbeae)
Stephanomeira malheurensis
Maize (Zea mays)
Drosophila paulistorum
 
How do you define the difference in plant breeds as opposed to species.
But maybe selection done in a plant breeding program is evolution speed up in a direction that maybe not necessarily for the betterment of the plants but man.
 
Antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria too.

Also, the mutation of viruses in response to modern environmental factors.
 
spidergoat said:
There is adult lactose tolerance, but I doubt anyone thought that was noteworthy until recent times.
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If you picked the right population - where it's rare and thereby worthy of note - it might have been recorded.
 
I think the only sure answer, the one that can't be evidence for evolution, is taxonomy. Taxonomy is notorious for being wrong about the evolutionary relationships between species.
 
I think a better system can be developed using only words, but based on genetic relationships.
 
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