I might help if you gave me some idea of what you’re talking about.
Oddly enough, that paper doesn’t discuss “gene variation”.
Projection, much?
Bill ‘the shifty shifter’ Cole being by far the biggest burden-shifter on this forum.
A case in point:
Bill Cole made this absurd claim. So the “burden” is on Bill, and only Bill, to demonstrate it. This would require demonstrating that all models are incapable of explaining the observed genetic changes. This would require math. Bill, notoriously, never brings any math. Therefore Bill fails HIS burden (again). QED. 
It does not help that (i) Bill seems to be unaware of any model beyond Behe and Snoke’s inexpert one (such that he applies it, if-your-only-tool-is-a-hammer-everything-is-a-nail-style, to all genetic changes), and (ii) he is so confused that he thinks Lynch’s rebuttal of that model is validation of it.
When Bill meets his burden, by demonstrating, with math, that there is any problem with this “model”. Until then, it is Demand Math from Bill Time.
Perhaps all of Bill’s comments should be automatically moved to a containment thread?
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My claim is there is no model or even the concept of a model. The proper counter argument is to cite a model. Crispr posted a tree as a model. The problem is you could put dozens of other species in the tree he cited and they would fit in the middle of that model where plants could be more closely related to white tail deer than to muntjac deer.
How are new genes and different chromosomes counts generated by the reproductive process? The answer is that we don’t know yet the current model infers they are generated by the reproductive process along with mutational variation.
What is the problem with exploring an alternative model that does not involve reproduction and mutational variation as the mechanism?
If the point and purpose of your modeling – or displaying relations in a graph like that, anyway – was something other than reflecting the genetics, then yes, you could. However, most of us would think such an exercise beneath their intellect and a waste of their time, and leave it to children to draw random lines on blank paper for their amusement. Us adults, when we generate graphs like that, are trying to display patterns present in real data. And putting any species in any randomly picked arrangement on a tree like that would in most cases grossly fail to meet that goal. We can draw anything we please, that much I grant you. What we cannot do is draw something completely different and have it be an accurate reflection of the data.
There isn’t one. That’s both. There isn’t one problem with exploring such alternative models, and there is also not one such alternative model. By all means, present an alternative that is consistent with all of the data so far collected, and simultaneously yields predictions that are specific enough to be compared against data yet to be collected – either in the field or in experiment – and anyone here present and qualified will be happy to discuss its merits.
The tree you cited. I linked to your post.
This is a demonstration you don’t understand the tree. Or the model that produced the tree. Which isn’t surprising, as so far you’ve never demonstrated an understanding of any model.
Mutation. We know how, we see it happen all the time!
You have never presented an alternative model. Models have mathematics. Where is yours?
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The model I am inferring from the data is separate trees based on different gene types and chromosome counts.
Show your math…
There is no math required here as we are not claiming a reproductive connection.
If there’s no math it’s not a model. Swing and a miss.
We could summarise Bill’s various types of posts in a list, e.g.:
- There is a problem with X, which I refuse to describe in detail.
- I do not know how Y happens, therefore no-one else does either.
- Here is a diagram I don’t understand.
- You say Z, but what about this squirrel?
- By asking me to support my claim you are shifting the burden of proof.
- Etc…
Then, Bill can just post the appropriate number(s) instead of replying, which will save him time, and us the effort of deciphering.
As well as reducing thread lengths and scroll-bar wear, this could provide opportunities for bingo or similar pursuits, and we’d never again need to ask Bill to provide numbers.
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What kind of connection do the separate trees reflect, then? Do you just like drawing pictures of trees?
The population genetics math exists for the individual trees and how changes get fixed in the populations. Since we are not claiming a reproductive connection we do not need to account for the differences between species.
The separate trees represent the same genetic make up allows the ability to reproduce.
Grammar aside, I do not understand at all what you mean. In what way does the tree represent a genetic makeup, or the ability to reproduce? What about the tree-like structure is it, that is necessary to represent these things? This is sounding more and more like you just like drawing trees, and had we asked the next toddler in your group, they would have drawn separate trucks to “represent the same genetic make up allows the ability to reproduce”.
Again I ask, considering two deer calves spawned from the same doe are less than genetically identical, by what genetic indication do you get to conclude their reproductive relatedness, and how does that analysis not yield any relatedness between them and, say, cattle? What is your analysis? What is your “model”, how does it make predictions anybody can actually test against the data?
No, but don’t you need to account for the differences between individuals? Without any math, I should think that’d be just as impossible also, but by all means, prove me wrong.
You need to account for the data, with math. If you can’t, you don’t have a model. Present your model. With math.
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Population genetics models will work here for the individual populations. Are asking for the wheel to be re invented?
Uh, population genetics shows common ancestry. So…
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Population genetics can be used for any population as the Behe and Lynch papers are using for adaptions in bacteria.