Our fruit trees know something is wrong, they can't figure out what time of year it is. Half of one of our pear trees is thick with blossoms, and the other half with brown falling leaves. And another little apple tree with most of it's leaves off and from which we picked the last of it's apples not more than a week and a half ago is covered with blossoms just as we move into a cold snap with temps in the 20s. They are totally confused.

Like any change from one extreme to the other, change is marked by chaos and wild oscillations. What is looked at is Average Global Mean Temperature which is steadily increasing. This requires lots of calculations based on data collected from thousands of sources which will vary wildly. And Wagga makes a good point. Scientists can get frustrated that some particularly bitter winters give people the illusion that all is well or in fact moving the other direction. That may be some of the reason for the fudged data (though my Conspiracy Theory may have a modicum of Truth too . I thought it might get a bit more response, it wasn't entirely in jest).

GB

Gandalfs Beard;
I would give you a hug, but I could not take the chance of the other marsh-wiggles seeing. So this will have to do
Your little conspiracy theory was pretty good. But here's a suggestion.
Substitute Chancellore Palpatin with the Devil.
I know, old fashoned, but hear me out. Check out his qualifications.
-By all accounts the best liar ever.
-Can even appear as an angel.
-Many people don't even believe he exists, those with heads in sand make great targets.
-Has the desire to controle everything.
-Is willing to stab even his most loyal followers in the back.
-Has the ability to manipulate matter, including weather.

What do you think?

Yes, well, metaphorically speaking I can go along with that Puddleglum . Palpatine represented an Imbalance in the Force, which is more or less the "Oriental" notion of Evil. But he also represented The Dark Side, which is a very Western and Christian notion of Evil.

If the "Ruling Elites" also can be said to represent an Imbalance in The Force and The Dark Side, then that correlates with the Metaphor. So with very little stretching that can work for me .

GB

Yes, well, metaphorically speaking I can go along with that Puddleglum . Palpatine represented an Imbalance in the Force, which is more or less the "Oriental" notion of Evil. But he also represented The Dark Side, which is a very Western and Christian notion of Evil.

If the "Ruling Elites" also can be said to represent an Imbalance in The Force and The Dark Side, then that correlates with the Metaphor. So with very little stretching that can work for me .

GB

OK. I hope I'm getting this quoting thing right this time.
While you can make the connection, metaphorically, I would add the one other qualification that I forgot.
He, satan, has the ability to blind people. Not physically, at least not that I have heard. I unfortunatly cannot remember the exact verse, but it speaks of his blinding people to the truth.
I know the parable of the sower, when seed was scattered, and some fell on the hard ground of the path, (Signifying a heart hardened by sin) it was easy for the devil to come and pluck God"s word away, so it would not take root.

On another note. Iwas hoping for a response to the post on vistigel organs.
Good Night.

One of the reasons I mentioned the Evil Overlord Theory is that it's very difficult to discuss possible weather-energy connections without discussing politics, which isn't done on NW , but we can discuss hyptheticals.

I presume this includes discussing other times. So for your entertainment, I refer all to the famed French scientist Buffon, whose name I remember because he made a bit of a buffoon of himself. Having never visited the New World, he declared that the Americas had just emerged from Noah's Flood -- unlike, say, all the other continents? -- and therefore was only just drying out. Thus he insisted that the new continents were swampy, the air putrid, and the weather foul. Healthy European livestock and people sickened there, and Buffon's claims about the environment's long-term effect on the First Nations men were both insulting and very personal. Enraged (though not on the Amerinds' behalf), Thomas Jefferson instructed Lewis & Clark to bring back some of the mighty creatures of North America. Lewis & Clark failed to find the mammoths that Jefferson had expected. So Jefferson sent a dead moose (with elk antlers; they'd shot a female moose or youngling, apparently) to prove that American creatures were mightier than European equivalents. They also sent mastadon teeth. But Buffon merely insisted that this was proof that even if great beasts wandered into the Americas, they promptly died in the "denegerate" climate and location. The story is told in detail in Bill Bryson's A short history of nearly everything, a breezy (if large) pop-science book. A lot of Christians won't read it because of its acceptance of Old Earth, evolution, and the like. But it also has a lot of chapters on modern science -- the discovery of the element phosphorous is priceless.

He, satan, has the ability to blind people. Not physically, at least not that I have heard. I unfortunatly cannot remember the exact verse, but it speaks of his blinding people to the truth.

Or, in other words, 'There is none so blind as those who will not see". I'd agree that Satan would make a good example of 'Evil Overlord', except for political reasons. You see, "The Great Satan" is USA's still current nickname among a powerful world political lobby, however offensive and undeserved it might be, and however sanctimonious it sounds coming from the sorts of governments which ascribe to such views. And as TOM says, we really shouldn't be discussing politics, however it impinges on the present, the everyday and how it affects us all at this very moment. Even when we are not citizens of the world's third most populous nation.

So I'm going to suggest another 'evil overlord'. The Mammon suggested by Jesus himself. AKA the love of money. Which also affects the sorts I mentioned in my last paragraph. Think about it!

So for your entertainment, I refer all to the famed French scientist Buffon, whose name I remember because he made a bit of a buffoon of himself. Having never visited the New World, he declared that the Americas had just emerged from Noah's Flood -- unlike, say, all the other continents? -- and therefore was only just drying out. Thus he insisted that the new continents were swampy, the air putrid, and the weather foul.

Ouch! Did Thomas Jefferson live at the same time as Captain James Cook's visit to Botany Bay (29 April 1770)? Did that mad scientist Buffon even learn about the theories of what might be 'Down South'?

On another note. Iwas hoping for a response to the post on vistigel organs.

If you want a discussion about vestigial organs, go no farther than your own appendix. A vestigial organ which is barely noticed until it gets infected in some way, and then starts mattering a good deal to you and your well-being. There are other vestigial organs, such as those that differentiate male from female within a species, and which only matter if the right hormones are applied at the right time in the lifestory of a particular creature, especially before it is born or before it is hatched. It is scary to learn that crocodile eggs and the sex of the hatched offspring are affected by earth and atmospheric temperatures. What would global warming do to them?

But it also has a lot of chapters on modern science -- the discovery of the element phosphorous is priceless.

Sounds enchanting! Pray do tell.

Sounds enchanting! Pray do tell.

I shall do my best.

Bryson wrote his book in part because the schoolbooks he read as a boy were too dull. He was surprised that so many discoveries and inventions traced back to people whom one would gently describe as having a touch of Weird.

Like Buffon -- who really was quite intelligent except for this glaring storytelling compulsion -- the discoverer of phosphorous was a fine scientist with an unscientific hobby. In his case, it was alchemy (trying to turn ordinary substances into gold). He decided to try to turn (spoiler-spoiler!)

into gold. (Notes Bryson dryly, "the similarity in color seems to have been a factor in his calculations.") He never did get gold, but after some months of experimenting and processing, he was able to make his materials glow. He called his discovery "phosphorous" which means light-bearing. For a time it did sell at more money per ounce than gold. A few years later, a Swedish scientists found an industrial way to manufacture phosphorous in bulk without using the Secret Ingredient. It is for this reason that Sweden became a leading producer of matches.

(As Rose George put it, "To be uninterested in the public necessity is to be uninterested in life.")

I don't know Buffon's opinion of Down Under. (You probably already know that Bryson also wrote an Aussie book called In a sunburned country, but it doesn't mention Buffon.) But Jefferson would have been alive and writing freedom papers in 1770; he wrote the Declaration of Independence in 1776.

EDIT: the scientist of the Secret Ingredient was Hennig Brand. He discovered phosphorous in 1675; the Swedish scientist Schele industrialized the process for manufacturing a few years later.

Wagga;
I think you might be confusing the temptation with the temptore.
Though money can certanly be the "lure" it is the Devil who is fishing.

As for the "vistigel" examples given, you have missed the point.
GB's example called for a change, not just physical, but genetic.
Your examples showed changes in creatures that they were already genetically pre-disposed to do.

The appendix is always the first given example of a vistigal organ. It has always been my understanding of vistigal organs to be ones that are not only not noticed until they are infected, but also useless to the body. Yes, we can survive without an appendix, but it has uses. My memory is a little rusted on this but it either is for the digestive or immune system.

Now if you want more examples of organs we don't notice, you can try your kidneys, your liver, your gall bladder, your adnoids, your tonsils, shall I go on? We notice them when they are injured, but normally we don't. Just because we can live without them, that doesn't mean the no longer have a purpose. You can live without an arm and a leg as well. The appendix is not a vistigal organ. Plus, if evolution has been taking place as it should, wouldn't we be seeing some humans born without appendices? Or at the least, appendices in progress of being dispensed. But every human still has a fully functional appendix (with few exceptions for birth defects). Science is showing these suppossedly vistigal organs are really production to the body and are no longer considered vistigal.

Interesting you should say that Puddleglum, because our DNA contains a whole lotta so-called "Junk DNA", what scientists say is basically "vestigial" DNA from our entire genetic history which we no longer use.

GB

Interesting you should say that Puddleglum, because our DNA contains a whole lotta so-called "Junk DNA", what scientists say is basically "vestigial" DNA from our entire genetic history which we no longer use.

GB

Given that genetics is still a growing disciplin there are a couple of possibilities.

Mutations are one. I would admit that we as a race, (human that is), do suffer from this, and it is possible that such changes may not be immediatly harmful.

Then you have recessive, and dominant genes which can, and do "hide" latent traits often for generations.

Or there are genes whose purpose has not yet been discovered.

But this still does not exlpain how your fish could change an air bladder into lungs, with the accompying changes, in the one generation needed for survival.

Thank you, TOM. I did remember Bill Bryson as someone who wrote about Australia, but was unaware of his Short history of nearly everything. Since it is readily available here, I'll make an effort to get hold of it to read or maybe even re-read.

Wagga;I think you might be confusing the temptation with the temptor. Though money can certanly be the "lure" it is the Devil who is fishing.

.

Oh I'm not denying that the Devil is behind all the trouble. You might even say 'the Devil is in the Detail'. But the Devil has many names, and Jesus' name for the Devil, 'Mammon' that is to say, the love of money, fits best in this case. Besides, isn't Greed a Deadly sin?

As for the "vistigel" examples given, you have missed the point. GB's example called for a change, not just physical, but genetic.
Your examples showed changes in creatures that they were already genetically pre-disposed to do.

I took what you meant by "vistigel" as vestigial, that is to say, the adjective formed from the word, "vestige", that is to say a remaining trace. As Fencer for Jesus noted, the appendix is a left over from the days before humans started to eat meat. Most carnivores have shorter and less complex digestive systems than do herbivores, who sometimes need more than one stomach to digest the cellulose in plants. Cows, for example. That also explains the dietary restrictions imposed on the Ancient Hebrews, since who wants to be a serial carnivore?

Now about changes in genetics: There is one book I really want to get hold of. It explains how genetic diseases such as cystic fibrosis, sickle-cell disease and others come about in one's offspring because on at least one side of the family, or more like both sides, there has been at least one remote ancestor who has been exposed to malaria or some other deadly disease and survived. The subsequently transmitted genes then mutate to show a resistance to that disease, but the mutated gene can be deadly in other ways.

I also read about a Dutch study in which the children and grandchildren of those people in the Netherlands who survived the horrendous wartime conditions there at the end of WW2, also showed distinctive genetic markers to do with surviving a famine. Such markers can predispose the affected person to various other conditions such as diabetes.

The drivers for genetic change are generally those to do with diet, survival and reproduction. Australia was the last continent to split off from Gondwanaland, I suppose, when it broke away from Antarctica, and it is the still -highly active Indo- Australian tectonic plate sliding alongside others which have caused some major disasters in the area, like earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanic eruptions. But Australia is unique in its marsupial fauna, unlike the mammalian fauna generally found elsewhere.

The only native mammals, apart from Man, himself, are the dogs that accompanied the original people who came here as long ago as 40,000 years, maybe indicated by Mungo Man. Now dogs show an incredible variety of breeds, from Chihuahuas to Poodles to Maltese Terriers, to Welsh corgis. Only big dogs like German shepherds show a resemblance to the likely common ancestor of both wolves and modern dogs, who can still technically interbreed. Just as the dingo can also interbreed with other dogs. But at one stage there must have been a wolf who found that cosying up to humans, living off scraps and driving off other wolves was a smart thing to do to survive, and taught it to its puppies, who then taught it to their own offspring. And something similar must have happened to explain the somewhat less differentiated domestic cat.

Given the way these two creatures have been influenced by man in their environment, in particular by dog and cat breeders and their horrible fancies, do you doubt for one second that environmental factors and how to deal with them do influence genetics?

And isn't it more than likely that the desire to eat in abundance insects and foliage at the water's edge taught lungfish to take a gulp of air to grab an insect, then another, and another, to do so, meanwhile inflating airbags, and that like-minded lungfish, who took the same path, and also sporting inflated airbags, interbreeded to eventually develop lungs?

And come to think about it, wasn't Eve partaking of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil also taking an evolutionary step? We are, after all, what we eat.

Waggawerewolf;
Still learning this gadget, and I can only get the response page without seeing your post. So If I miss something I apologize in advance.
Thank you for the example of breeding. Darwin tried to use pidgeon's as an example, but forgot that any manipulation by man could only proove manipulation of the existing genetic traits.
Yes the enviroment can effect geneics. We have the fruit fly experiments to proove that. Those poor critters were interbred, and bombarded with radiation so that they produced all kinds of mutations. Unfortunatly non were benifitial, and some were outright fatal. While I will admit that they created one with a second set of wings, they were useless.

Thank you for mentioning the syckle cell-malaria mutation. But I must ask, If it is on example of a mutation resulting from survival from malaria why is the trait only carried by males? Also why do we not see it in other races where malaria is previlent in the region?

As for the lungfish explanation. I must ask where are the lungfish with the partially developed lungs? And if the lungs are only partially developed, how could it survive long enough to get at the food that it was looking for?

Like I said before I cannot see what you said directly, so I hope I covered most of it.

Puddleglum:
As for the lungfish explanation. I must ask where are the lungfish with the partially developed lungs? And if the lungs are only partially developed, how could it survive long enough to get at the food that it was looking for?

See! This is what I mean about misunderstanding how Natural Selection works. It wasn't like one day there were fish with gills, then the next day there were fish with "partially developed" lungs. If a genetic "mutation" is advantageous, the creature survives and passes these genes on to it's descendents.

Some fish had developed "gas bladders" that could extract oxygen from air, when their ponds dried up they were the ones to survive and pass on their genes and the others died out. And as I pointed out, there are any number of fish species that developed similar advantageous adaptations including Catfish and Mudskippers.

I knew about Lungfish, Catfish, and Mudskippers, but frankly, I was surprised myself to find that they were just a few of the fish species that could survive out of water, some of them even developing the ability to "walk" across land. So it's no stretch of the imagination to see how some aquatic species would eventually develop into land animals, generation by generation each new genetic advantage building on those that came before.

Check out this video:

http://www.metacafe.com/fplayer/40644/walking_fish.swf

Personally, I think Evolution is a more miraculous and substantial evidence for God (or some sort of Universal Sentience) than an ancient manuscript or Creation Myth. No matter how many Spiritual Truths such texts may contain, "Creation" itself is ultimately the best evidence .

GB

Agreed, GB! With bells on.

Still learning this gadget, and I can only get the response page without seeing your post. So If I miss something I apologize in advance.

No problem. Try having two browsers up at once. One to reply with and the second one to refer to.

But I must ask, If it is on example of a mutation resulting from survival from malaria why is the trait only carried by males? Also why do we not see it in other races where malaria is previlent in the region?

Some genetic traits seem most evident in males, since gender determination is either XY in the case of males or XX in the case of females. In other words, a girl generally gets two copies of the X gene, one each from her mother and her father, whilst a boy only gets his X gene from his mother. The Y gene a boy gets from his dad is what confers masculinity.

That means that for a girl to suffer a genetic disorder, she has to inherit from both sides of her parents' families. But a boy, who doesn't have a masking second X gene, only has to have one gene for a disorder, for it to show itself. I hope that explains a lot. As for regions, the same disorder might simply have different names in various locations. Like Tay-Sachs disease in Palestine, or Thalassaemia, a Greek term, in other parts of the Mediterranean.

About the lungfish and others, the only reason that they are known at all, is because examples were found in some fisherman or other's catch. The intervening generations long ago bit the dust, ended up in some shark's digestive system or else dissolved into nothingness. Not unlike whatever happened to those Israelite tribes who left Egypt with Moses. A host of refugees would surely leave traces. Now although Assyrian sources back up the Judah chronicles, before Solomon the Bible doesn't even name which Pharaoh was which. Exactly what do you think happened to the Ark of the Covenant?